[rant]
What I want to know, is how did we end up here? How did certain groups find a way to turn perceived offense into actionable transgression? I thought people wanted more awareness of transgender? Now simply using an image of transgender person in a fictional world is offensive? I can't keep up. In my world, I can be called every foul name known to man, spit on, kicked, punched, slapped, and generally degraded or insulted in every way possible. It won't be an actionable crime. In fact, chances are the initial thought will be that I did something to deserve that treatment.
Even worse, EVERY movement and EVERY social injustice uses those like me as the punchline and seeks to find fault in every possible thing I do. It's like there is someone always standing just around the corner waiting to jump out and say "HA! I caught you being insensitive!". It's like every conversation is littered with landmines. One single wrong word can literally cause a change in my career. Even the implication that I might have had a bad or intolerant thought is actionable and can change my life.
I suppose it doesn't matter how we got here. The point is that we are. I just hope that we are strong enough to stand our ground as humans and keep doing what is right and good. Because despite what some would say, when I open a door for someone, it is done out of kindness and not because I perceived that person as weak. When I respond with "Yes maam", it is said with respect and not out of some patriarchal need to force gender norms on people. When I got a raise at work it wasn't because I have a penis and conform to societies unreasonable expectations. It was because I worked harder, faster, and smarter than my co-workers.
The part that makes me a really bad person though, is that I have ZERO intention of changing. It's not going to happen. I will keep opening doors for people. I will keep being polite. I will keep being respectful of those around me and will not change that to make that 1/1000 person happy. I would much rather be a good person to 999/1000 than to change everything because that last person thinks they can find some way of squeezing something offensive out of my daily interactions. I'm not saying that person doesn't matter, or matters less. It's just that I'm not going to spend any portion of my life trying to keep from offending someone that is actively trying to find offenses in everything around them.
[/rant]