Bradley manning.

The name may well be recognised by you, but from the start of this i'll just explain something. Recent media has shown that Bradley Manning is now starting treatment to change sex. Out of respect, i'll be reffering to Bradley Manning, the name, however, where i would normally use "he"i shall be using "she". This is until i know for sure what Bradley would like to be known as (different media outlets give different names). While i'm still to establish if this is true that Bradley does want to change his sex, this already is causing a stir to the public, and it is this what we address.

Bradley as some of you may well know, has been sentenced to 35 years in prison, for leaking documents to the website "Wikileaks". It is since this verdict and Bradley's imprisonment that the news of his sex change has come about on the scene.

I myself, have not had the feelings of wanting to change my sex. I'm not against people doing such a thing at all, provided it will make them feel more comfortable in their own skin, once all the proceedures are carried out.

A friend of mine, whom i won't name, is currently going through this period of time, going from female to male. I could here, write about his personality and explain to you how kind he is and how well we get along, but personality is down to the person and i think very little is actually influenced by his sex, although maybe how happy he is, may well have changed with this.

My friend has only breifly explained to me about the proceedures, i've seen some of the scars and i know from having looked into this topic, that it is a long and drawn out process.

If Bradley is just at the start of the journey, then i can only wish her luck (be it, that she'll never read this). I DO know how it feels wanting the world to know something, you're literally bursting to tell people, but you don't know how their reaction to the news will be. This is probably how Bradley will have felt for some time now and now that the case is all delt with, it's time to be honest to himself.

But how will the world cope?

Years ago, Corronation street, a british soap handled the story of someone who had been through the trans gender process and was now female. It sparked the debate. I was only young at the time, so i don't know exactly what the public reaction was, but i know that to this day, the charicter is still in the soap and has literally won a place in people's hearts, be it now though, that the charicter is being killed off as the actress who plays her would like to move into other area's of acting.

When i first saw the news about Bradley manning, i was shocked. I didn't believe it at first. It took a little while for the news to kind of sink in. Other people moved onto things like wentworth miller coming out and Bradley's case seems to have been put to "old news" now.

Some people question the whole proceedure, not understanding how that person is mentally feeling about their own sex and how it could be effecting them from day to day. If this sounds like you, then i can only say to do some research on the matter. Simply sitting, wondering, will get you nowhere. It's a perfect time for you to look into the topic and see what these people have to go through in order to be accepted for the sex change proceedure. This really isn't one of those things where you'd wake up and think "i want to be the oposite sex today".Often people will have spent alot of time thinking about this, years in many cases, wanting to be sure themselves.

I've seen it already, that people just come out of the woodwork to critique those who are going through the proceedures, or are considering it themselves. They do it with very little understanding of what people may well be thinking and in many cases, it just causes offense.

Admittedly, I am a part of the LGBT community, that's Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender. While i might know more about the first three, i know little when it comes to transgender and transexual people. Sure, i might know more than somebody who hasn't looked into it at all, but i still feel there's more i could learn. While some people world over may well speak about their experiances and show their scars, everybody has a different story to tell and i only wish that more people would tell their story. It's how people learn. The gay community didn't make progress by being silent.