In recent months, much has been made of the Olympic athlete formerly known as Bruce Jenner, now called Caitlyn, and her perceived use of the media to further both transgender visibility and an agenda of self-interest. There’s been a sense of bad faith surrounding Jenner’s rollout of the information about her gender transition, both because of her connection to the media-savvy Kardashian family and because of the timing of an announcement of Jenner’s own forthcoming documentary series.
Today’s revelation of the July cover of Vanity Fair, on which Jenner appears for the first time as herself, probably won’t silence those rumblings. But for those willing to presume the best of Jenner, it’s more than a brave act—it’s a revolutionary one.
Jenner is by a mile the most famous person to ever transition in public, and she’s shown the public her female self in the brashest way possible. She wears a revealing white corset, her hair glamorously tousled; the image will appear on every newsstand in America. Is this using the media to achieve Jenner’s own ends? Of course! No one appears on a magazine cover to get more privacy, strictly speaking. But the media has been the ocean in which Jenner has swum for the majority of her life since becoming the perceived face of American masculinity in her late 20s. Is it so tremendously shocking that she’d want to correct the public record in as memorable a manner as possible, even if it’s just to decisively dismiss the “Bruce Jenner” image?
At the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Bruce Jenner won the gold medal in the decathlon, setting the world record at 8,616 points.Getty ImagesJenner became a national hero following his Olympic win and was later inducted into the Olympic Hall of Fame in 1986.Tony Duffy—Getty ImagesJenner became an NBC Sportscaster in the late 1970s following his Olympic performance in Montreal.NBC/Getty ImagesJenner married actress Linda Thompson, above, on Jan. 5, 1981, following his divorce with Chrystie Crownover.Getty ImagesJenner was diagnosed with dyslexia as a child. In October of 1985, he received the Outstanding Learning Disabled Achiever Award from then-First Lady Nancy Reagan alongside stars such as Cher and Tom Cruise.Getty ImagesJenner was a successful race car driver in the 1980s, though in a 2013 interview he said, "I was a lot more badass runner than I was a driver.”Ann Clifford—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty ImagesIn 1991, Jenner married Kris Jenner, previously Kris Kardashian, just one month after she finalized her divorce from Robert Kardashian. The two had dated for only five months.Maureen Donaldson—Getty ImagesTheir marriage merged two already large families, evident here in this 1991 portrait.Donaldson Collection/Getty ImagesAfter his sports career, Jenner, seen here at a celebrity golf event in 1993, had a number of small acting jobs and television appearances.Stephen Dunn—Getty ImagesThe family poses at an event in 1995, the year Jenner and Kris welcomed the first of their two children together, Kendall Jenner.Ron Galella—WireImageKylie Jenner was born two years later in 1997. The girls can be seen here on the red carpet in 2000, long before they covered magazines and appeared on TIME's Most Influential Teens list.Scott Nelson—AFP/Getty ImagesJenner, seen here in 2005, would re-enter the spotlight thanks to Keeping Up With the Kardashians, which first premiered in 2007.Steve Granitz—WireImageJenner spoofed his reality-star fame with a commercial for Tropicana Juicy Rewards in 2010.APJenner and Kris, here at The Tonight Show with Jay Leno in 2011, announced their separation in 2013. She filed for divorce the following year.Kevin Winter—Getty ImagesJenner poses with a box of Wheaties in 2012. He appeared on the front of the box first in 1977 after his Olympic gold-medal win, then in 2012 when Wheaties rolled out a retro series.Noel Vasquez—Getty ImagesJenner appears with two of his sons, TV personality Brody Jenner and musician Brandon Jenner, who records with his wife as Brandon & Leah, at an April 2013 release party.Chelsea Lauren—WireImageJenner walks with step-daughter Kim Kardashian in October of 2014 — about five months after rapper Kanye West became his son-in-law.Bauer-Griffin—GC ImagesCaitlyn Jenner, formerly Bruce Jenner, appeared as a woman for the first time on the cover of Vanity Fair's June 2015 issue, photographed by Annie Leibovitz.Annie Leibovitz—Vanity FairCaitlyn Jenner accepts the Arthur Ashe Courage Award onstage during The 2015 ESPYS at Microsoft Theater on July 15, 2015 in Los Angeles.Kevin Winter—Getty Images
The cover itself is artfully done. The fact is that Jenner is now that rare 65-year-old woman to have appeared in lingerie on a major magazine cover; Vanity Fair is forcing the reader not just to embrace her achievement in the abstract, but to confront the reality that Jenner is a real person who has undergone a real physical change. Those who supported Jenner as she admitted her hopes and dreams to Diane Sawyer who are made uncomfortable by this cover photo must ask themselves why.
There’s something moving going on, too, in Jenner’s self-presentation. The name she’s chosen, emblazoned across the cover in a headline, isn’t just a name beginning with a “K-” sound but not exactly a “K.” (Sorry, Kim, Kourtney, and Khloé.) It’s also a name that reached its peak popularity in the 1990s, one that was not in use when Jenner was born. Jenner, boldly willing to wear undergarments and a smile on the cover of Vanity Fair, is as much a young person as anyone else named Caitlyn; she’s only just now discovering who she is in the public eye.
Jenner’s willingness to take the public along with her isn’t just a necessary corrective to years of misinformation about “Bruce Jenner.” It’s welcome, and it’s enlightening.
Photos: 25 Transgender People Who Influenced American Culture
Laverne Cox has used her growing celebrity as a star of the critically acclaimed Netflix series, Orange is the New Black, to become an outspoken leader of the trans rights movement, addressing crowds of thousands at schools and other forums around the country.Jason Merritt—Getty ImagesWith her brother, Andy, Lana Wachowski has co-written, produced and directed Hollywood blockbusters like the Matrix triology, V for Vendetta and Cloud Atlas.Michael Sohn—DPA/APKye Allums became the first openly transgender athlete in NCAA Division 1, the top level of college athletics, when he played on the women's team at George Washington University in 2010.
John Lamparski—Getty ImagesCaitlyn Jenner, made famous as an Olympic gold medalist in 1976 and later as a reality TV dad, appears as a woman for the first time on the cover of Vanity Fair's June 2015 issue, photographed by Annie Leibovitz. Vanity FairChelsea Manning is an Army soldier who was sentenced to 35 years in prison for violating the Espionage Act, after she leaked hundreds of classified documents to Wikileaks. U.S. Army/APBrandon Teena was an American trans man who was raped and murdered in Nebraska in 1993. His murder was a catalyst for a lobbying effort for hate crimes legislation and his life and death were the subject of the film Boys Don't Cry.APThe electronic musician Wendy Carlos released Switched-On Bach in 1968, which won three Grammy awards and became one of the first classical albums to sell 500,000 copies. She went on to compose notable scores for films like A Clockwork Orange, The Shining, and Tron.
Ebet Roberts—Getty ImagesSince coming out publicly in a 2012 Rolling Stone article, the musician Laura Jane Grace has been a vocal advocate for trans acceptance. In 2014, her band Against Me! released the album Transgender Dysphoria Blues.
Gary Miller—Getty ImagesModel and actress Carmen Carrera vaulted to reality TV fame after appearing on RuPaul's Drag Race. Nearly 50,000 people have signed an online petition asking Victoria's Secret to make her the company's first transgender "Angel."Danny Aarons—Newspix/Getty ImagesChristine Jorgensen, a former soldier, became a nationwide media sensation after having sex reassignment surgery in Denmark in 1952.Fred Morgan—New York Daily News Archive/Getty ImagesThe American jazz musician Billy Tipton became famous after his 1989 death when it was discovered that he had been assigned the female sex at birth.APThe American public grew up knowing Bono as the daughter of entertainers Sonny and Cher, before he came out as a transgender man in 2009. Bono, who first came out as a lesbian in ’90s, has been an active LGBT rights advocate for decades, writing and making films about his experiences and using platforms like reality show Dancing With the Stars to talk about LGBT issues.Axelle/Bauer-Griffin/Getty ImagesCandis Cayne was the first transgender actress to play a recurring transgender character on a prime time series, as love interest Carmelita on ABC's Dirty Sexy Money. In past decades, the majority of transgender characters have been played by non-transgender actors and often been portrayed in negative roles, like psychopathic killers or dead prostitutes.Charles Sykes—Invision/APThe pioneering computer scientist and engineer Lynn Conway influenced a generation of computer chip designers and has worked at Xerox PARC, IBM, and DARPA. Caroline Cossey is a British actress best known for her role as a Bond girl in the movie For Your Eyes Only.Time & Life Pictures/Getty ImagesBefore she came out in 2014, the Serbian-born model was already blurring lines in the fashion world as the androgynous male model and muse for big names like Marc Jacobs. In 2015, Pejic became the first transgender model to appear in American Vogue.Nicholas Hunt—Getty ImagesThe LPGA removed a requirement that golfers be "female at birth" after trans woman Lana Lawless sued for the right to compete in 2010.Ben Margot—APFallon Fox became the first openly transgender fighter in mixed martial arts history when she came out in 2013.Sally Ryan—Zuma Press/CorbisBeatie went public in 2008 as America’s first “pregnant father,” undergoing artificial insemination after his former wife proved infertile. The transgender man captured the nation’s attention after appearances on shows such as Oprah, setting off cultural conversations about the social and legal status of transgender people in America. He has since had three children.Chris Jackson—Getty ImagesJanet Mock, a transgender advocate and writer, published a best-selling memoir about her transition, Redefining Realness, in 2014 and hosts a MSNBC web talk show about pop culture.Fernando Leon—Getty ImagesVeteran LA Times sportswriter Mike Penner announced he was a "transsexual sportswriter" in a 2007 essay and wrote under a new byline, Christine Daniels, for nearly a year. After struggling with the challenges of living as a trans woman, Penner abandoned the name in 2008 and returned to living as a man, before committing suicide in 2009.Los Angeles Times/APThe pro tennis player Renee Richards won a landmark decision for transgender rights in 1977 when the New York Supreme Court ruled that she could compete in tournaments as a woman.Larry Busacca—Getty ImagesSylvia Rivera was present at the Stonewall uprising and remained a tireless advocate for trans people of color, as well as gays and lesbians, who were marginalized as the LGBT movement became more mainstream.Valerie Shaff—Sylvia Rivera Law ProjectGeena Rocero was already a successful model before she gave a viral 2014 TED talk in which she came out publicly as transgender. “All of us are put in boxes by our family, by our religion, by our society, our moment in history, even our own bodies,” she said. “Some people have the courage to break free.” Her advocacy organization, Gender Proud, works to empower transgender communities around the world.Santiago Felipe—Getty ImagesJenna Talackova fought a legal battle to become the first openly transgender candidate to compete in Miss Universe Canada in 2012, after initially being rejected because of her gender status.Aaron Vincent Elkaim—AP
