B. Scott -- Suing BET Has Me Feeling Like Oprah Winfrey!

B. Scott and Oprah Winfrey have something in common -- all their life, they had to fight! -- at least that's what Scott says as part of his lawsuit against BET ... claiming he feels like O's character in "The Color Purple."

As TMZ first reported, B. Scott -- an openly gay transgender person -- is suing BET, claiming the network humiliated him during last year's BET Awards by yanking him off the show because he was wearing women's clothes.

Scott says in the deposition -- obtained by TMZ -- before the blow-up he hadn't thought of himself as a transgender person, but during his battle with BET he came to realize that's exactly who he is.

He explains, "I feel like Sofia in 'The Color Purple.' 'All my life I had to fight!' Because of my experience with BET, it led me to the realization that I am transgender because of my gender identity and expression, it was specifically because of my gender and not my sexuality that made me a target."