@kdfrawg being gay was so stigmatised when I came out. It was before Queer as Folk or the L word came out. All the gay characters on TV were a stereotype. Some of my friends shunned me, some people refused to believe me. Hitting on someone was terrifying in case they might get nasty (which happened to me more than once), and you couldn't really tell who might be interested and even if they were interested, you couldn't tell if they could get over the stigma of being with someone of the same sex. And having kids was impossible unless done on the sly.
However it was decriminalised, there was a pride march, there were some gay icons and there was a lgb culture. So it wasn't all bad.
In those ways being trans now is very similar to what being gay was like 17 years ago.
In other ways quite different - you don't need to see a doctor to have self actualisation as an LGB person. You don't need to worry about physical changes and shifts in gender role (ok you might if your gender expression shifts to be more reflective of your true nature I suppose) and you don't need to worry that your partner will stop being attracted to you because you've decided to be yourself…
(sorry, I don't mean to be argumentative, but more to explain what exactly I meant earlier which i didn't make very clear and was pretty confusing - i'm sure we actually agree)
// @indigo