Transgender activist-writer says Europe forces trans women to “pretend to be cis women” while India offers community support and workplace acceptance.
A transgender activist and memoirist, Thanuja Singam speaks to Frontline about navigating identity across three countries, the weaponisation of beauty standards, and why she used sex as “the key to being a woman” in a patriarchal world that offers trans people both hatred and worship. Edited excerpts:
What does gender mean to you?
Gender doesn’t mean anything to me because we can’t specify anything by birth. A person has all the gender identities within themselves. I have seen many straight, cisgender men who have a feminine touch. And then, there are many cis women who have a masculine touch. We all are kind of fluid.
Does that mean you do not believe in the man-woman binary at all? How does this work for transgender people?
I don’t believe in that gender ideology. Society gives me the norm to be a transgender woman. The two-norm society decides how a transgender woman and a transgender man should look. People come up to me saying, “you look so good, you look like a cis woman.” But that’s not my intention. I wanted to feel the way… I wanted to look the way I felt. But society wanted me to look like a model. So there again, we have this problem. Let the person be the way they want to be.
How much should doctors and psychologists be involved when someone transitions? Do you think treating gender issues as medical conditions is necessary?
Well, it is necessary to have all this guidance. We are going to take medicines which are going to affect us, and give us side effects. So that’s why it’s very important for a young teenager or whoever is going through this path to know what they are doing.
Psychotherapy is very important because you don’t know if it is gender identity disorder or if you are feeling different than the others. So in our community, sadly, there are many gay men who became transgender women without even knowing what the problem they have. Later on, you get to know about homosexuality. That’s why it’s very important that we show the difference between all the sexual minority groups and educate the youngsters who want to go through the path.
You do talk about that confusion between being a transgender woman and gay. Can you explain it further?
A transgender woman is a person who is trapped in a different body. They want to look the way they feel. And that’s what we call gender identity disorder. If it comes to homosexuality, a homosexual person is happy in their body. They don’t have this gender identity disorder. They have a different sexuality preference. They are not attracted to the opposite sex, they are attracted to the same sex, but therefore they don’t need to do anything to their body.
You have lived in India, Sri Lanka and Germany. Is being transgender different in these places?
Yes, there are many pros and cons. Time has changed a lot. People have changed. My sisters in India have evolved. They fought for their rights, and society started accepting them. So once I came back in 2016, that was my first time I came to India as a transgender woman. So I saw the privilege of being a transgender woman.
Here in Europe, we are forced to act like a woman, which is nice. You won’t be labelled as a transgender woman. At the same time, you have to go through a thousand procedures to pass through. We call it passing through as a woman. You have to do a lot so that you can match into society, and that can be a burden. So every day you live with the fear that someone is going to tell your colleagues or your friends that you’re a transgender woman and you don’t know how they’re going to react. So you don’t have this transgender woman privilege here. You’re forced to be a cis woman. Even if it comes to the workplace, if you come up saying, I’m a transgender woman, it’s very hard to get a job. You will be having medical leaves because you’re going to do surgery. So that’s why you won’t get the job. So you have to pretend that you are a cis woman.
Back in India, you can be proud saying you’re a transgender woman and the employer will be knowing your path. He will know that you have gone through this hard journey to be where you are today. And he will know that you are capable of doing the work. So you have this difference here. So you have pros and cons. And again, in India, you have a strong community. If you get discriminated against, there will be 50 girls next day fighting for you. Here you fight for yourself.
What does beauty mean to you? What does it mean to transgender people?
It’s peer pressure for us. It’s something which we have to do to match into society. I wanted to just look like a woman. But society forced me to look like a model. And nowadays, I’m fed up with showcasing transgender women as a beauty icon, as a model, and as beauty pageant contestants. The youngsters will just see the beauty side of being a transgender woman and that’s not what we are. There are more sides to us.
Thanuja Singam says that writing the memoir was very important for her because she wanted to share what a transgender woman faces in her life to the world.
Thanuja Singam says that writing the memoir was very important for her because she wanted to share what a transgender woman faces in her life to the world. | Photo Credit: By Special Arrangement
You mention that transgender people are excluded from feminist movements. What do you think about feminism today? Has it changed?
It has become worse than before because back in April 2025, the UK government came up saying transgender women are not allowed in women’s spaces because Europe was very forward when it comes to LGBTQIA+ movements. Even what we see in America is very bad. Transgender people are being taken out from the U.S. army, and they are not considered female.
Some transgender women even got their female identity taken back. So it is not moving into a brighter future. So it’s time for us to fight back.
In your memoir, sex seems to be more than just physical. Can you explain the role of sex in your life?
Sex for me as a transgender woman was the key to being a woman. So when I, before transition, used sex as a key to get closer to cis men. So that gave me the confirmation that I’m a woman. So if he likes me, if he has this intimacy with me, I’m woman enough. That’s what I felt. So I use it as a key. Later on, I used it to get into society, get recognised in society. Because we live in a world where a woman has to have a man beside her. Without him, she is not woman enough. Not only in Indian culture, even in Western culture. So, I used sex as a key to get all this recognition, to feel happy, to feel this fake happiness within myself. If you ask me whether I get pleasure out of this, no, most of us don’t get pleasure out of it. Just the men, it’s a man’s world, the patriarchal world, men get pleasure out of it. We just serve to get the recognition. So therefore, it’s a symbol of patriarchy.
Is it harder for transgender people within the LGBTQIA+ community?
Yes we do because we are visible. First of all people can recognise us as an LGBTQIA+ person. So that’s why it is hard for us at the beginning. So the transition period will be very hard later on once a transgender woman is completely transitioned it’s quite easier because again we live in a world where we get hated on one side; at the same time we get worshipped on the other side; we have this worshipping privilege as well.
How important was your memoir? Did you have to relive difficult experiences?
It was very important for me because I wanted to share what a transgender woman faces in her life to the world. The media is ready to show the beautiful side of hers. But the saddest side and taboo sides, they don’t want to talk about. I really wanted to come up with that because even my community, the transgender women, we, among us, we are openly talking about that. But we are not ready to open up. We are not ready to talk about our abuses. We are not ready to talk about our side effects from the surgeries. We are not ready to talk about the side effects which you have from the hormonal replacement therapy. So we are not ready to talk. So that’s why I thought it’s better to talk about that, because we live on the edge of criminality and we still manage to survive. And that’s something which we really have to open up and talk about. And society has to wake up and take these girls from the edge of criminality and bring them into normal life.
But for me myself, there was so much pain in my heart. So I wanted to share it with the world because from the day I was born until the day I transitioned, no one was ready to accept me or listen to my stories. So, there was always this question: what am I doing? Is it right what I’m doing? So is it okay what I have done? Is it okay what I have faced? Maybe that gives me the happiness and satisfaction. Even writing the book was a hard journey because that’s when I realised all these traumas can affect my mental health. I just didn’t even take it seriously and moved because I needed to rush. I need to run. I was just running from the age of six, where I got abused for the first time, sexually abused, until the day I got the transition, until the day I started writing the book. I dumped all these feelings underneath my subconscious memory, and I was just running. So once I sat and started writing, I realised what I have gone through. I needed justice at the same time. So writing gave me this justice and at the same time, writing gave me this strength to open up and to ask for my rights. So that really helped me to overcome all this.
Your memoir shows a lot of resilience. How important is resilience for LGBTQIA+ people? What kind of support do transgender people need for their mental health?
People start commenting bad things about being queer. They don’t really understand what being queer is. Therefore, all these comments, all this hate gives anxiety for the upcoming community, upcoming generation. So they might be scared to be a visibly queer person. That’s why it’s very important that we stand against it. That we stand against all this humiliation, all these different thoughts people have about us.
Family support is very important because they know they have a shelter where they can go back and relax and relate to. We all need good friends. Today, I’m really happy because I have good friends.
How important is Koovagam festival for your sense of belonging?
It’s a mass gathering. That’s the day where we feel welcomed. Even when we go to our family events, we don’t feel welcomed. There is always a hesitation. They invite us, but with the hesitation. So we don’t feel like we belong to this. But if I go to Koovagam, I just feel like I belong there. I’m one among them. They are my family members. So therefore, for our mental health, it’s an amazing festival. But I don’t think the village is happy about us. Since you go through a lot of transition in your life, because it’s too much for them.
How much should LGBTQIA+ topics be included in school curriculum?
That’s the problem. That’s where the problem starts. So we have one side of people who are against LGBTQIA+ people and they don’t want their kids to learn about that. But at the same time, we have queer people saying, we didn’t have that in schools. I didn’t learn about transgender women at school. I never saw a transgender woman in the media in India when I was living in India. But I have chosen to live like this. So I didn’t get manipulated or influenced by any influencer. I was choosing for the answer which I was looking for in my mind for such a long time. Once I found the answer, I became who I am. So when we start educating kids at the school about LGBTQIA+ people, I don’t think every kid will start becoming a queer person. Those who want to be, those who feel within themselves, those who were born that way, they will be the one who will be saying, aha, that’s the problem I’m facing. That I think will be the result of educating.
How can someone be an ally?
The person needs to learn about LGBT people. Once they are ready to understand and accept, that’s the time when their allyship starts. So you should be willing to accept and understand. But not everyone should understand and accept LGBTQIA+ person. That’s not what we want. There are some things which I don’t accept as well. I don’t understand as well. We don’t want everyone to be ally. You can hate us, but let us live. That’s it.
Courtesy : Frontline Megazine
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