The Internet. Everyone is talking about it. Even those people who haven't touched a computer have heard about it on the news. But what is it and how can it help those with Gender Dysphoria? Firstly there is email. This enables you to send messages to other people with access to email anywhere in the world for the cost of a few pennies.No stamp. No paper, No envelope. Messages are usually received within the day and cannot get lost in the post as today's sophisticated mailer programs automatically return mail that cannot be received. You can mail umpteen people the same message with ease.You can even send and receive digitised pictures and even sound if you have the know-how. Messages on email tend to be shorter, more regular and more spontaneous that conventional mail. I have many email TS pen pals. Some of whom have become extremely close friends. Email is a good way to hide your physical identity to show people the woman you are. You can interact and talk to women without the embarrassing barrier of your male body. For those who are worried about security there is an easy mechanisms to send anonymous mail. The two most popular are penet and wizwax. I use penet, as do the samaritans. To find out about penet send a blank email message to help@anon.penet.fi For those who are absolutely paranoid there is a share-ware program called PGP that enables you to encode files to military standard encryption I met my first boyfriend by email. A second bloke has shown a strong interest in me after responding to his advertisement on the internet.My current boyfriend also has email access. Cyberspace can be a good place to meet young intelligent guys. BUT watch out for perverts they infiltrate the internet and you can become easy prey. Do not reveal your personal details to strangers. I even came out on the internet by sending a carefully worded message to everyone in my department.This meant that everyone knew the facts at the same time avoiding the usual gossiping or a terrifying announcement in a group meeting.The internet has helped me so much with my transition. There is also a language for the internet that new users may find strange. :-) means smile. :-( means unhappy. ;-) means that the last sentence was not serious. IMHO means 'In my humble opinion' TG's have our own abbreviations. Char X means Charing Cross Hospital. TS means transsexual, TV mean transvestite, TG means transgendered that joins TG's and TV's. M->F means male to female F->M means female to male. SO means significant Other/Partner Secondly there are the mailing lists. You can subscribe to mailing lists where messages that are sent to the list are forwarded to everyone on the list. I am on the UKTG mailing list. This is an excellent list run by Krystine of the Roses organisation. You subscribe to the mailing list by sending a request to Krystine@UKTG.FTech.Co.UK TRANSGEN is the American/worldwide equivalent to join them send a message with the command SUBSCRIBE TRANSGEN (Your Name) in the body of the message to listserv@brownvm.brown.edu. Once you have agreed to the terms of Transgen you then send a note to transgen-request@brownvm.brow.edu saying that you've read the list header and agree with the terms. You then have to fill in a questionnaire about your interests.They also run a separate mailing list for SO's. CROSS-TALK is an American/worldwide mailing list for cross-dressing, TV, TS and other gender issues.All mail is anoymous.To join you have to send am email explaining why you want to join to cd-request@therev.losalamos.nm.us. You have to send a biography about yourself within a month of joining. TRANSACTIVE-L mailing list focuses on the political aspects of TG issues. To join send an email to listserv@netcom.com with the message subscribe transactive-l in the body of the message. AEGIS have recently launched a mailing list for their society for TG's giving announcement You cannot send your own announcements on this list.To subscribe send an email to majordomo@lists.mindspring.com with the message subscribe aegis-list (your email address) in the body of the message.e.g. subscribe aegis-list (your email address) CD-FORUM is a non-profit, private electronic publication for the support of cross-dressing, transsexuality, and other gender issues. Send an email to cd-request@TheRev.LosAlamos.NM.US asking to join the list. You are then asked to send a biography about yourself. Mailing lists are available to anyone who has email access. Thirdly there are the newsgroups These are worldwide areas for public discussion.The two newsgroups that are relevant to us are alt.transgendered and soc.support.transgendered.The two groups are very similar and usually carry the same messages.alt.transgendered tends to be less censored and so is not carried by all sites.It tends to have more dating ads, fetish and pornographic things on it than soc.support.transgendered.Ask your service provider whether is censors or plans to censor some groups. The alt group is sometimes banned as a whole.There is also another excellent TG newsgroup available for users of CIX. Remember those that it is for public access so any nutter can and does mail to it and to you.If you do mail then I would advise the use of the anonymous server, after all your message has the potential audience of 23.5 million people worldwide. This is a larger circulation than 'The Sun'. Remember that the name of your university/employer is embedded within your email address so be careful. Also some people's definition of pornography is different to others. The laws on blasphemy and pornography are still not clear cut on the internet. There are messages from all types of TG's and TV's at all different stages from all different parts of the world in all different positions in society. Most of the messages are intelligently written, thought provoking and sometimes heart breaking.You will realise that we are a powerful and numerous force and that you have no need to be lonely or vulnerable. I would recommend reading the mail for a long time before sending your own. There is such a thing as netiquette and you will get 'Flamed' for sending anything objectionable. You need to have a newsfeed for this and a viewer. e.g tin or vnews or a WWW browser. I use tin. Fourthly there is the World Wide Web (WWW) This will blow your socks off. You have to see it to appreciate it.Imagine an encyclopedia for the whole world with everyone making a contribution, with choice of indexes that allow you to get at any piece of information on any subject with just a few clicks of you mouse button. A good starting point for Transsexualism is http://scratchy.csd.abdn.ac.uk/~mosaic/gender.html This is run by Mharia to whom I give my thanks.Her site has links to nearly every other TS site around the world. You will find a fantastically ample and varied amount of information there.Press for Change can be found from her page too. I have written some WWW pages myself and hope to get them on the net soon. You need to have access to the WWW and a WWW browser e.g netscape or Mosaic. I use netscape. Fifthly BT is working on even fancier things. Watch this space. What do you need? Well you DO NOT need to be a computer guru. With the WWW you don't even need to be able to type.You do need access say via your work-place or university. If that is not possible you can always visit one of the new cybercafes that are springing up like mushrooms.I cannot say how TG friendly these places are but generally the frequenters of such places tend to be odd balls anyhow. You can get a TS friendly computer guru to down-load the information for you or even print it out.If none of these options are available then you will need a modern phone socket, a computer and access to a service provider.Computers vary incredibly in price. I would recommend that you get one with colour and that you ask a computer guru friend to help you buy one. You also need modem to connect it to the phone line.Some modern computers have this built in. You can have the equipment for a few 100 pounds.You also need to find yourself a service provider:- BT/IBM/MS do not as yet provide a residential service yet. I will let you know more when this is available.BBC Networking club, CIX, Demon, Cityscape Compuserve all provide services at about 10 pounds per month.Other smaller service providers are available that undercut these main operators.The cost is dependant upon where you live. I have a list of local providers for every town in Britain.It is available on http://ww.limitless.co.uk/inetuk/table.html and is published regularly on uk.telecom.Being a local provided means that you only have to make a local call to access the internet. Conclusion I predict that everyone who is anyone will be on the internet soon, maybe GEMS will be online one day sooner than that.I would not recommend buying the equipment just to keep abreast of TG issues. Marie List of Cyber Cafes:- Cyberia 39 Whitfield St., London, W1. behind Goodge St. Tude Station and the Tottenham Court Rd. CBA 32 Mill Road, Cambridge, CB1 2AD Bytes, Falls Rd., Belfast. Cyberia, 48 High St., Kingston upon Thames Peak Art, 30 Market St., New Mills, Stockport, SK12 4AE Cyberia 88 Hanover St. near Princess St., Edinburgh WEB13, 13 Bread St. near Lothian Rd., Edinburgh. The Six Bells, Covent garden, Cambridge. Wet, 28 Oldham St., off Piccadilly part of the Hacienda, Manchester Zap Cybercafe, Brighton opposite the Old Ship Hotel, Sussex, UK CyberPub, Victoria Shopping Centre, Nottingham. The Hub, The Bell, Walcot St., Bath The Custard Factory, Gibb St., Digbeth, Birmingham Sputnik, Temple St., Birmingham, B2 5BN Cafe Internet, 28 North John St. near Paradise St. Bus Terminus, Liverpool L2 9QN Cyber, 2 Ram Yard off High St., Bedford Global Net Cafe, 72/77 South St., Romford, Essex, RM1 2NX
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