Thought this was interesting. Any respectful thoughts or comments? Also, if this is in the wrong section, I apologize. I assumed that since it was about the lead singer of a pretty popular band it would go under the other music section. Against Me!'s Tom Gabel Is Becoming a Woman Tom Gabel, the lead singer of punk rock band Against Me!, says he's becoming a woman. The 31-year-old tells Rolling Stone that as a kid he felt disconnected from his body and has a condition called gender dysphoria. He plans to take hormones and undergo electrolysis. He also is considering gender reassignment surgery. Says Gabel: "Growing up, my experience with transsexualism was nothing but shame." Gabel says his new name will be Laura Jane Grace. He says he's not attracted to men and will still be married to his wife. They have a 2-year-old daughter. Against Me! is best known for the song "Thrash Unreal." The group will hit the road for its tour with The Cult later this month. The June issue of Rolling Stone hits newsstands Friday. Source: http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/wireStory/mes-tom-gabel-woman-16307102#.T6pwqejO6fV
If you talk shit just know that he'll probably smash your head on a coffee shop counter. Seriously though, he deserves 100% respect for this.
Well, that really is interesting! I think I've never heard of such a case in the rock scene. I have their album White Crosses and thought it was great. Awesome that the lead singer can follow his dreams like that. Seriously, I have never heard of a rock band whose lead singer changed gender I wonder how their future albums will sound like. Certainly different. I'm kinda excited!
The most intriguing thing about this, to me anyway, is what this will mean for her career as a singer (and subsequently, what it will mean for the band). Obviously, undergoing hormone treatments is going to cause some pretty drastic differences in her voice, to the point that I wonder how feasible it will be to continue performing old Against Me! material.
Supposedly, he's keeping his coinpurse and the hormone treatment doesn't affect the voice. That said, I know nothing about said operation, just going by what people have said.
I guess the effects on the body may be different for a male-to-female transition. I'm acquainted with one person who's undergone hormone treatments as part of a female-to-male transition, and his voice changed a TON within a couple months of being put on a testosterone regimen. I'm really not well-versed in this subject at all though, so for all I know it might just be a situation where your voice can change a lot in one direction, but not so much the other.
Yeah, that's what I've been told as well. Now that her vocal chords have developed one way they can't be shrunk again, whereas if it were someone making the opposite transition you could still alter their voice to sound more masculine.
Because I find the idea of it ridiculous and appalling. Let's be honest, you're not really becoming a woman by going through this surgery. It's just something that will probably bring some solace to the heart of the person going through it and I can respect that. But in general the idea of it is still ridiculous to me.
You do realize that, if a person has a total-conversion surgery and goes through hormone replacement, they are, for all intents and purposes, a woman, right? And vice versa? Even their blood tests identify them as women at that point.
Oh, really? Even with the elevated estrogen, it wouldn't identify them as a woman? Huh. (edit) I mean, obviously I know DNA doesn't change; I just figured it'd still identify them as a woman/man (whichever they weren't before).