IN a trailer for her new reality television show, I Am Cait, Caitlyn Jenner describes herself as "the new normal".

"How many people," she asks, "waste an entire life because they never deal with themselves to be who they are?"

Wow. There's a lesson in how to reach out to others. A week ago the public knew Cait as Bruce Jenner, the former Olympic decathlete and Kardashian dad, though anyone who had been paying attention to Kardashians universe would have know that Bruce had been transitioning, since he had discussed it with Diane Sawyer on ABC News. Then, on Monday, came the announcement: and there Caitlyn was on the cover of Vanity Fair, photographed by Annie Liebovitz, dressed in a cream corsetry, and accompanied by the coverline: "Call me Caitlyn."

The internet was set afire: Caitlyn's Twitter account went live and she broke records to become the fastest person to reach over a million follows on the social networking site. Among the most retweeted messages of the day was one from former stepdaughter Kim Kardashian: "How beautiful! Be happy, be proud, live life YOUR way!" Even President Barack Obama, said: "It takes courage to share your story."

Was this a big step forward for transgender acceptance? On one level I think it was. Acceptance of others for whatever they are, is a contemporary ideal of sorts, even if we're not always good at it. Of course, it's one thing accepting and wishing the best to a showbiz personality who already conforms to many of society's expectations of what makes a beautiful glossy magazine image. Accepting the many and varied expressions of gender that exist out there is something else. Nevertheless, it's a significant step - and, frankly, it would be surprising if the first ever Vanity Fair transgender cover had been of anyone who wasn't rich, famous, white and beautiful.

That's not to say it's an easy acceptance, or that there hasn't been an undercurrent of transphobia and bigotry in the murkier realms of the internet. Nor that there wasn't also a rash of negative quips like Snoop Dogg's description of Jenner as a "science project", as well as a slew of commentators who refused to describe Jenner as anything other than a man called Bruce. Transphobia lurks out there, though I often think that's not quite the right word for it. Rather, I think it's part of a wider fear of anything that steps outside the box of what we see as traditionally male or female - or, more particularly, that diverges from mainstream masculinity. We can see it in the bullying of boys who seem feminine, or in the fact that, as one trans woman told me, she was far less employable now as a woman than she had been as a man.

For most transgender people, the world is still hugely unaccepting. US transgender workers are twice as likely to be unemployed as the rest of the population. According to the Trans Murder Monitoring Project, more than 1700 transgender people in 62 countries have been murdered in the last seven years, and in the UK one-third of trans people experience transphobic abuse every day. Not only that, but the press - which on this occasion has been mostly supportive of a famous personality who appears to be courting attention - is not always so kind or considerate. We only have to think back two years ago to the case of Lucy Meadows, a trans woman and teacher who committed suicide after her gender reassignment became national news, who, according to the coroner at the inquest into her death, had been the victim of a "character assassination" and "sensational and salacious coverage".

I don't believe that Vanity Fair covers are truly progressive. They don't lead the way; rather, they tell us a little about where we've already got to, and in what direction we might be travelling. This one tells us that society is willing to embrace one version of the transgender story. But we should remember that Jenner's is just one trans narrative. After the Diane Sawyer interview, the playwright and trans woman Jo Clifford wrote this about the media obsession with coming out stories: "There are many crucial aspects of trans lives that get overlooked in this process. For starters, not every transgender individual's life journey fits the canonical 'born one gender, transition to the other gender' mould. Many transgender people never transition, or do not identify within the gender binary (ie as either women or men), yet we rarely hear their stories."

Caitlyn isn't, in other words, the new "normal", since there is no such thing. But she is a sign that transgender people are becoming a little more visible. We have even learned that Caitlyn will "earn five times more than Bruce" as a motivational speaker, with estimated earnings of "$100,000 an appearance" following gender transition.

Lucky her. We shouldn't forget, though, that we are still some way off the average trans woman being able even to earn the same as her former male self.