Transgender Marriage

Recently read this story on CNN.com about a couple who were recently married in Virginia, but may face charges for misleading officials, presumably because "Justin" pronounced her name with an accent on the second syllable, i.e. "Justine". Justine, who was born male, was dressed very convincingly as a woman, and may be transgendered or transsexual.

I was sort of surprised to note that all but three states change the sex on a patient's birth certificate after a sex-change operation, which allows two people born of the same sex to be granted a marriage license. Now, must we demand that Justine undergo expensive, painful surgery to be recognized as the opposite gender and get a legal marriage, if it's all under her clothes anyway? Public nudity is illegal. Seems cruel to demand someone to go that far, especially if that person could live as the opposite sex without surgery. After all, there are some seriously androgynous straight people out there that aren't required to get plastic surgery to look more traditionally (fe)male before being granted a marriage license.

This brings me to several issues.
1. The definition of "straight". Is it attraction to people who were born the opposite sex, or who look and act like society's expectation of the opposite sex? Your biological sex (or sex at birth) doesn't really determine who's going to be attracted to you - it has a lot more to do with self-presentation, health, and (gasp) personality. Biological women can look and act more like stereotypical men than most MTFs or cross-dressing men, yet the males attracted to those women are considered typically straight, and men who are into drag queens are supposedly "gay". If a woman (say a "femme", for argument's sake) is attracted to a person who looks and acts male but is biologically female, she's gay or at least "queer". Why does it matter what's under the clothes, in the eyes of the law? I somehow doubt Americans would appreciate it if they had to get naked to obtain a marriage license.

2. Transsexual marriage rights vs. gay marriage rights. If transsexual people can get married as long as they've had surgery, what's the big deal about gay people? The whole religious argument about procreation loses its footing. I'm just puzzled as to why America is so entrenched in the idea that gender is defined in the way you dress and how your bits are shaped. What if an MTF and an FTM wanted to get married but didn't have surgery? Would the MTF have to be the legal "groom"? Why should it matter to the state whether a married couple have the same genitalia, if they're condoning marriage between people who artificially (and painfully) create different genitalia? If marriage were only allowed between people born opposite sexes, at least they'd be being consistent - but then what do you do about the xxy's of the world?

The point is, gender is very difficult to define, which makes restricting marriage along gender lines a losing battle - particularly in a country where (in the eyes of the law, anyhow) female-male equality is mandated.

It all stinks of ignorance to me. It's a touchy issue, since I obviously support the right of trans people to get married - but using it in comparison to the gay marriage battle just makes me feel like things are so completely unfair.