Outlining the essential differences between sex and gender, Audrey Mbugua discusses the damaging general incomprehension of transsexualism within Kenyan society. Drawing upon personal experience of prejudice in the field of work and life at large, Mbugua states that transsexual people deserve the same respect and treatment as any other member of society, and urges those uneducated about transsexuals to think before opening their mouths.

A transsexual person is someone who experiences deep and long-lasting discomfort with his or her anatomical (genital) sex and wishes to change their physical characteristics, including genitals (through hormone therapy and sex reassignment surgery), to the opposite of those usually associated with their anatomical sex in order to live in the gender role opposite to that normally associated with their anatomical sex. It is not a form of sexual orientation but a clinical condition whose basis is the existence of sex and gender conflicts. It is best managed by a psychiatrist, a urologist and a gynaecologist. Contrary to public misconception, sex and gender are two entirely different entities. Sex refers to the type of genitals one has. Gender refers to one's internal perception as male, female or something else (like androgynous).

The etiology of transsexualism lies with the neurological wiring of the brain and is common in the animal kingdom. In Kenya, there exist different groups of transsexual people: pre-operative, non-operative and post-operative. Transsexualism is not illegal, much in the same way that diabetes, cancer, kidney failure and heart failure are not illegal. It is extremely naïve to suggest that it is illegal to have a certain psychological disorder. It is common among Kenyans to claim that transsexuals are criminals, thoughtless and foolish utterances that beggar pity for the depths to which human folly has sunk in this information age.

Transsexual people face deep-seated hatred and intolerance within Kenyan society. That's not the end of their problems. The people expected to protect and serve all Kenyans (including transsexuals) are the worst human rights abusers in the world. It's obvious I am referring to the police, a group who are so good at arresting and beating up transsexual people held within cells while sexually assaulting them. I think they love transsexual people with a passion and they can't help but want to touch them, even if it means kicking them around. Much as they are justified in doing such horrendous acts owing to the fact that they are intellectually challenged, as well as being stressed back home, breeding as they do like rats (and with the price of maize flour skyrocketing, stress levels are reaching record heights), the police should know that transsexual people have feelings like everybody else. I feel pain when am slapped and it doesn't feel nice been slapped around for no 'fault' of your own.

Another minefield in transsexual people's lives is the issue of discrimination in Kenya's labour market. Though I have personally been denied job opportunities just because I am a transsexual, I still don't understand the logic. I hope I am just too daft to get the argument. Here is the argument, and maybe you could help me understand the quantum electrodynamics behind it: 'You were born a boy and you are now a woman. How could you do that to yourself? Do you actually think God made a mistake in creating you the way he did? In the first place, who do you sleep with? ...blah...blah...blah...lots of crap'.

Will somebody please help me understand, because I thought the employee-employer relationship was that of 'Give me your most productive 40 hours in the week and at the end of the month, I will deposit KSh blahblahblah in your account. Satisfied?' That's how I see things and furthermore if you are clean and tidy, does it matter that I look like a woman but I have a penis between my legs?

How is my penis supposed to make organisations lose profits? In fact, I am wondering why these morons are not blaming transsexuals with penises for the global financial crisis. A penis on a transsexual people is not a substitute for her brain. Look at the skills he or she possesses, not penises and vaginas. Why don't you go around the streets of Nairobi, stopping and squatting under women in skirts to see whether there is a shwing shwong up there? Go ahead and feel the crotch of every person you meet to determine whether their genitals and physical presentation are incongruent or not. You could go further and smell the genitals. Your god will add more days to your lives and you will live to blow 1,001 candles.

Don't annoy transsexual people further by asking them who they have sex with. That is none of your bee's wax. How would you feel if you accompanied your dad to a bank and the cashier asked him whether he enjoys taking it up his ass or whether he suffers from impotence? Would you nominate the cashier for an Oscar or a Jerk-of-the-year award? Another thing my dearest friends, I have the right to change my sex if am not comfortable with my sex or even for whatever reasons I have. It's my body and I don't see how it interferes with your lives. Or, had you expected me to first consult with your church elders before I had a scalpel plunged inside my scrotum? No, maybe you wanted me to accept myself as a man that god created me to be? Why don't you also tell diabetic people to stop taking insulin shots and accept themselves the way God created them, as diabetics? We hate such stupid and disrespectful questions and you hateful, ignorant and annoying religious nutcases need to reform.

Religious fundamentalism is another irritating obstacle in our lives. Let me put it in a nutshell: use your religious doctrines to guide your lives not mine. I also have my religion which I don't use to try to mess up your life. If we worship different gods, there is no point in you hitting my face with a shovel to prove that your god is better or to ridicule me behind my back, and you should know that your kids and I were in the same school and I know their memory and intelligence to be like those of earthworms. Give the shovel to your god and tell him to square it with me. After I am done with him, he will regret the day the homo habilis created him in their primitive cultures. Furthermore, public institutions and even private organisations such as banks should not assume the role of venerating their employees' gods and goddesses irrespective of whether you are the CEO or the senior human resource manager. It's a form of human stupidity. If you deem yourself a qualified human resource manager and you don't know how to deal with transsexualism at the work place, then there is a high possibility you got your degree between your lecturers' bed sheets or in the back seats of their cars, or else there is a serious problem with our education system.

Have some unconditional, positive regard for human beings irrespective of the differences that exist between us. Differences don't have to be justifications to deny other people jobs, medical care, respect and security. I don't think anyone worth less than dogs and wolves in the jungle would resist the temptation to deny a transsexual person a chance to put a roof over her/his head, or her/his right to put bread on the table or the right to access healthcare. Learn something about transsexualism before you open your trap to say something you think is a fact about transsexual people. Such foolish utterances make you dumber and there is a high risk very soon there won't be much difference between your IQ score and those of plants.

* Audrey Mbugua is a member of Transgender Education and Advocacy, a Kenyan organisation formed to address social injustices committed on the country's transgender community.

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