Born William Bruce, Jenner came out as a Caitlyn Marie, transgender woman in April 2015.
There isn’t much Caitlyn Jenner can do without making headlines, but now that her tell-all memoir, ‘The Secrets of my Life’ due out 25 April, 2015, offers intimate details about her transition, it has the online gossip magazines going crazy.
Notably of the juiciest bits, includes Jenner reportedly revealing that Robert Kardashian Snr told her he knew O.J. was guilty of murdering his estranged wife Nicole Brown Simpson.
In her own words, she implies that life long friend Robert Kardashian Snr shamelessly defended OJ Simpson in the notorious trial of the century, because of a jealous love triangle!
Along with revealing she has undergone gender reassignment surgery, Caitlyn also accuses Kris of knowing about her identity issues before they were married and pushing her deeper into the closet.
Jenner also explains in the book that the decision to undergo surgery was “complex” but ultimately she wanted to “have all the right parts” and she feels “not only wonderful but liberated.”
However not all are welcoming the new publication. Kris Jenner says she’s never been “more angry and disappointed in somebody in her whole life” after reading Caitlyn Jenner’s forthcoming memoir.
The famous momager is speaking out about her ex-husband’s memoir “The Secrets of my Life” – and accusing Caitlyn of rewriting their personal history. In an upcoming episode of “Keeping up with the Kardashians”, (aired in the US this week) Kris tells daughters Kim and Khloe she’s deeply unhappy with how she’s portrayed in the book.
Kris Jenner: “I read it and basically the only nice thing she had to say was that I was great socially at a party one time.
Without disclosing specific chapters in Caitlyn’s memoir, Kris says the book is the final straw.
Kris Jenner: “I’ve done nothing but open up my home and my heart to a person who doesn’t give a shit. I’m done, I’ve never been so angry and disappointed in somebody my whole life. I’m done, Done, Dunzo.”
In the two years since the first “20/20” exclusive interview with Diane Sawyer, Jenner has become a bona-fide icon for the trans community with her own E! reality series, “I Am Cait” a series about her own transition, which aired between July 2015 and April 2016. She also made a few TV appearances including Amazon’s “Transparent” and “The Celebrity Apprentice”.
Even though Barbara Walters announced Caitlyn Jenner as the most fascinating person of 2015, the transgender former Olympian turned down the broadcasting legend, because she was already negotiating a new interview with Sawyer a longtime colleague and friendly rival.
Despite this, Walters praised the former Olympian for creating a ‘seismic shift’ in the gender universe by transitioning so openly and so publicly into Caitlyn.
Since going public Caitlyn now takes between 30 to 40 pictures with fans a day. Caitlyn says that most people ask for the photos because of her celebrity, but then there are still those who ask that are confounded, quite weary.
Caitlyn recalls a young man coming up to her and asking “Hey Bruce, can I have a selfie with you”. Well first of all Caitlyn hasn’t been called Bruce in over two years, but rather than correct him, she simply said “sure” because she wanted him to walk away thinking “Hey, transgender people are nice, and quite approachable”.
When asked about her “Vanity Fair” cover, Caitlyn says, her family felt it was a bit ‘too much’. But to Caitlyn she rather looked at it as getting past 65 years of suffering. To have a beautiful shot of her “authentic self” was extremely important, and she wanted “shock value”. She wanted to end the old Bruce, her old life, and it was that picture that did it.
After Vanity Affair, four month later in fact, Caitlyn shocked the world again when Caitlyn showed up at the ESPYS where she catwalked onto the stage to accept the “Arthur Ashe Award” for courage. It was in this room, most of the athletes remember Bruce Jenner, the 1976 king of the decathlon. A man of unmatched speed and strength mastering the ten olympic event that are the highest test of physical endurance. And now that very same person was to walk down the isle in a long flowing white gown. There in the audience was his Kardashian family and his 6 biological children who still all call him “Dad”.
In Cailtlyn’s speech, she starts with her greatest fear and that was “coming out”. She goes on to say, she never wanted to hurt her family or kids, but is so so grateful to have them all in her life. As her speech went on, and she canvassed the crowd with her eyes, she couldn’t help but wonder what her peers were thinking. “What a freak” came to mind. Some people will accept it, some won’t. Caitlyn says, she got through the moment buy thinking of how she was representing the thousands upon thousands of transgender people, people who are bullied, people who are tortured, the 40% of people who ultimately take their own lives because they are different and trying to live in a world of discrimination and ridicule.
Caitlyn says, for those out there who want to call her names, make jokes, or doubt her intentions, thats fine, go ahead, because the reality is, she can take it. But for the thousands of kids out there, coming to terms with being true to who they are, they shouldn’t have to take it. A promise to be there Champion.
It was only two years before, Caitlyn told Diane Sawyer, she was setting out to create an inclusive world.
Since Caitlyn came out, in America alone, the estimates for transgender people as risen from 700,000 to 1,400,000 as they no longer feel afraid to express who they really are.
Caitlyn said she knew their was something wrong back when she was 8 years old. She always felt more comfortable dressing up in her sister and mothers clothes. Move forward 50 years and Caitlyn as an executive, giving inspirational talks in a suit, felt she was a liar. On the outside, she was male, but underneath she wore panties and a bra. Bruce, fell into a deep depression and started to take female hormones, and was feeling so much better, but then lost his nerve and stopped. Rather he altered his will and left instructions in it, that he be dressed feminine, because this was how he wanted to go to heaven. As Caitlyn, not Bruce.
Caitlyn says, “Its by far harder at the age of 65 to get your bearings and become the woman you always were inside and kept secret. At the time she decided to come out, she hadn’t even met another transgender person. In the beginning she was euphoric, but so uniformed, she about to hit all the land mines before her.
On the Ellen show, she seemed hesitant when asked if she supports ‘marriage equality’. Though she now says, she is 100% on board.
And then came her reality show ‘I am Cait’ which tackled some very serious issues transgender people face. Internet trolls, attacked Caitlyn for being transgender, being quite brutal in their rants. People in the streets abused her yelling out obscenities and making threats against her. But then out of the blue, she may receive a post that simply says ‘I love you’ and that they thought about suicide but now won’t. Absolutely, without a doubt, Caitlyn has made a difference, she has saved lives.
People underestimate what transgender people go through to morph into a ‘new life’, to go from one person and become another, to let go of the past, and move forward into the future.
I seemed as if overnight, after Caitlyn went public, America was grappling with so many different ideas. Gender fluidity, Gender neutral pronouns. For some Americans, this was building into a backlash. The fear is that the world is in an unstable place and this was never more evident, than with the ‘Trump Presidential Campaign’.
Caitlyn voted for a Trump administration, and Trump himself was shocked to receive her support at his inauguration. He called Caitlyn and invited her to a game of golf. But then, just 34 days into his administration, Caitlyn was shocked when he revoted a Obama directive designed to strengthen federal protection of transgender kids on their bathroom choice.
Is it possible to find ‘Common Ground’ amongst this ‘National Divide’. Can people care more about whats in their hearts, than that of a persons anatomy.
Whatever is going on under Caitlyn Jenner’s designer threads is really no-ones business but her own. Caitlyn shouldn’t feel pressured to tell us what procedures she’s had done or why, however in her book she answers her critics conquering she had her “Final Surgery” in 2017. Our natural fascination with the bodies of trans gender people totally ignores and probably exacerbates the discrimination these people face on a day to day basis. I personally feel it is time we all play a role in changing that mentality.
MY FINAL THOUGHT
When you meet a transgender person for the first time, get to know them as people, as human beings first. They are just like you or I, trying to fit into a world with far greater issues that need our focus.
For the record, I personally do not have any issue with transgender people, gay people, coloured people, people of different religious backgrounds, the list goes on. I feel, if it doesn’t hurt me physically, and opens my thought process to other possibilities, it can only help me grow as a person. I don’t even have a problem with non-believers, they should voice their opinions. Banter is always good. Its how you use your opinion productively and with dignity.
Clearly the world is changing. I personally feel at a rapid rate, perhaps to fast for many to embrace and cope with. How this will all turn out, only time will tell. If we act now, hopefully our generations to come, will learn to take the blinkers off, love and embrace each other and live as one race, the “human race”.
