I am Cait: Woman of the Year?
The second season of Caitlyn Jenner’s I Am Cait premiered episode 2, “Woman of the Year?” on E! Sunday night. This season follows Cait and her pals Candis Cayne, Jenny Boylan, Chandi Moore, Zackary Drucker, Kate Bornstein and newcomer Ella Giselle as they get on a bus and travel across the country to raise transgender awareness.
***Spoiler Alert***
The girls were back on the bus this week as they headed to Santa Fe, New Mexico. As expected it was the word “tranny” that became the first topic of debate. Kate Bornstein talked about how she wears the word as a badge of honor and that it is the term she uses to define herself with pride. Jenny Boylan would tell a story about a time when she was attacked and the perpetrator used the very term. “Somebody grabbed me by the neck, used that word and other words, dragged me around by my neck for about a half hour and finally dropped me” said Boylan. Here we have two ladies of two different era’s who see this issue differently. Though they admire and respect each other, they are miles apart in their views of the word.
Next it was right back into the politics. Kate Bornstein fueled the fire by bringing up Donald Trump. One by one the girls moved away to the back of the bus as Cait became overbearing while arguing her views. Eventually everyone would be disgusted. The only ones that were able to hang in there were Chandi Moore and Zackary Drucker. Meanwhile Cait bashed the Democrats and Hillary Clinton.
Kate Bornstein would also talk about coming out to her mom after her father had passed. She felt her father would disown her and even her mother did so for a while. Her story has a happy ending as her mother would eventually come around and start to refer to Kate as her daughter. Kate Bornstein would become the focus of this episode as she described how she views herself as non-binary transgender. It also highlighted how even though they were both strong minded, Kate and Jenny had different views on what it means to be transgender.
Ella Giselle would break the tension by starting a game called “Fluffy Bunny” where she and Caitlyn each tried to say “Fluffy Bunny” with the most amount of doughnuts in their mouth. Forever the Olympic competitor, Caitlyn would take the prize. The girls would next go horseback riding and Chandi Moore would provide the comic relief as she had never been horseback riding.
“Sometimes I get very passionate about it, and the old Bruce comes in” Cait would end up saying
Kate and Jenny would end up working out their differences by agreeing there was a lot they could do together even though they had different points of view. The girls would confront Caitlyn on how she scared them all when she got angry about politics.”Sometimes I get very passionate about it, and the old Bruce comes in,” Caitlyn would end up saying. Kate Bornstein would apologize for fueling the fire by bringing up Trump. The girls would all make up as they toasted Caitlyn’s pending Glamour Woman of the Year award.
The gang would finally make it to Santa Fe to meet with the Mayor to celebrate the changing of single occupancy bathrooms from being gender assigned to gender neutral. Caitlyn graciously let Kate Borstein hang the first gender neutral sign on the door. For 30 years Kate waited for someone to recognize who she was as she thanked the Mayor for finally providing her with a place where someone like her could use the restroom.
I am Cait Airs Sunday nights at 9:00 PM on E!.
Mila Madison – | Twitter | Email
I have been on record saying I am not a big fan of the term “tranny”. I realize Kate Bornstein is from a different era and the term means something much different to her. The point is that even in our own community we are diverse. There are transgender people who are Republican. Some are trans but are more gender fluid or non-binary. The lesson is that if we cannot come together as a community and we cannot accept each other for our differences, how can we expect the rest of the world to accept us? My heart goes out to Jenny Boylan and Kate Bornstein as they really shared their personal experiences in this episode. It was good to see Kate have her moment. My problem with the Santa Fe bathroom issue is that though it gives us the right to be other, it still does not make us equal.
