Sometimes it certainly is.  No question about that.  But sometimes people...starting at a very, very young age...realize they aren't the same as everyone else.  Some of their wiring is wrong.  And they feel the internal anguish and turmoil throughout their lives.  We can't relate to it, and they don't understand it either.  That's the way I see it...and if those people feel their sense of relief and peace will come from correcting what they feel needs to be corrected...and that, in their minds, will lead them to a path of happiness and peace...then I wish them the best.

Dorothy, hey it's a free country.

But to insist that I must go against my senses and call them a "she" when they are clearly a "he" is a little ridiculous. 

If all transgender is not a form of crazy, I struggle to see where it is not a delusion of some kind on the same level as anorexia. I'm sure anorexic people struggle all their lives thinking they are overweight. But it's not mean for me to refuse to call an anorexic person fat, in spite of their deeply held beliefs about themselves.

But I try to be as objective as possible. And so I go to the least common denominator. If a person were dead and not able to tell us what pronoun they felt like, could we still tell what sex they were? Yes we could. And because we can determine that without anybody's feelings coming into play, it seems to me that this is closer to the objective truth of the matter. And it is upon that that I base my pronoun use.

It is offensive to me that someone thinks they should have the power to override the basic truth that my own two eyes are telling me.

Even aside from all of that, there are other questions at play. So, a transgender person doesn't feel like they are the gender of their sex. Fine. My question is, without being a member of the other sex, how in the world can one possibly know what it "feels like" to be the other sex? I'm a man. I have absolutely no idea what it is like to be a woman. None.

I know some will say, if the person is male, that they are more effeminate. But that doesn't equate to "thinking like a woman." In fact, it furthers gender stereotyping. Must all men be macho men? Must all women be girly-girls? I don't think so. I think there is a wide range of expression within the two sexes. It is entirely possible to be an effeminate man without "really being a woman."

And I'll just add this anecdotal bit which people can take or leave... I'm married. I have a daughter. I am viscerally aware that there is a difference in the way men and women think. I have met effeminate men. I have met masculine women. They did not seem to really think like the opposite sex. The effeminate men still seemed like men to me. The masculine women still seemed like women.

But I'm into rambling mode here, so I'll stop.

And I might be the crazy one. Who knows? But to me, if I see a person who has the characteristics of a man, even if they are dressed up like a woman, that person is still a "he." There are some things that are just not escapable. But that's life.