Gender Essentialism, Genderqueer theory and Transgender stuff

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Probably because the system seems very unlikely to change any time soon, so instead people seek to expand the labels/classes in order to have a place at the table?

Instead of just having "opportunities for people," everything is still couched in terms of female and male, "expanding/changing female roles," etc. And many are attached to their gender in their personal lives; people still think in terms of gender, sometimes fiercely. I honestly don't see it going away, I don't know if people could let it go.

Give it another two hundred years and see where we are.

@Entropic: Thanks for that last post. You managed to articulate a lot of what I think, I just couldn't seem to put it into words like that right now; you explained it well.

It seems to be very hard for a lot of people to not stick things in boxes and attach more important to these boxes than is actually useful. The idea of discarding or diminishing the importance of classifications entirely seems terrifying to most people, as though it would make the world lose all meaning.

As usual, rather than attempting to look at things objectively, and see the way things actually are, and attempting to overcome our biases, people find it easier to operate within the confines of some kind of ideological system. A relic of the influence of Plato on western society, perhaps? (That might be going off topic, though.)

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I apologize if I'm stepping on anyone's toes here, but I wonder if cultural upbringing has something to do with whether or not someone transitions into another sex. I worry I might be stomping all over a delicate issue, but it's something I've noticed. I've been thinking lately that cultural upbringing is a current that is incredibly difficult to swim against, and can't imagine what it would be like if someone's cultural upbringing was so diametrically opposed to their own nature.

Take a look at this for instance. Apparently Iran has an issue with homosexuality, but not sex reassignment surgery. I'm curious to know what people make of that.

Again, sorry if my curiosity is getting the best of me here...

 

[Totenkindly]

I apologize if I'm stepping on anyone's toes here, but I wonder if cultural upbringing has something to do with whether or not someone transitions into another sex. I worry I might be stomping all over a delicate issue, but it's something I've noticed. I've been thinking lately that cultural upbringing is a current that is incredibly difficult to swim against, and can't imagine what it would be like if someone's cultural upbringing was so diametrically opposed to their own nature.

Take a look at this for instance. Apparently Iran has an issue with homosexuality, but not sex reassignment surgery. I'm curious to know what people make of that.

Again, sorry if my curiosity is getting the best of me here...

Iran is basically creating gender dysphoric people by forcing gay people to have sex changes; instead of them identifying as a woman, now you've got a gay man without a penis. It might be great for true transsexuals but not for homosexuals, who get to choose between punishment/death and what amounts to genital mutilation.

If you read anything else in the thread, you would see people describing experiences that go against what you've said, so I'm not sure how you missed all that. (For example, entropic's post just a few posts above?) However, I do think the rigid United States obsession with binaries and conservative underpinnings can strongly exacerbate the situation and put a lot of pressure on people and potentially also muddy the waters so you've not only got true gender dysphoria occurring but also a lot of unhappiness with gender roles that create so much pressure on non-conformist individuals that they might seek alleviation in some less-preferred way.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

If you read anything else in the thread, you would see people describing experiences that go against what you've said, so I'm not sure how you missed all that. (For example, entropic's post just a few posts above?) However, I do think the rigid United States obsession with binaries and conservative underpinnings can strongly exacerbate the situation and put a lot of pressure on people and potentially also muddy the waters so you've not only got true gender dysphoria occurring but also a lot of unhappiness with gender roles that create so much pressure on non-conformist individuals that they might seek alleviation in some less-preferred way.

I admit to having a hard time grasping grasping entropic's argument. That's probably my own failing, perhaps due to lack of sleep.

Is the crux that there is a distinction between gender dysphoria and non-conformist individuals, and that it it is a mistake to just assume that gender dysphoria is just another variation on simple non-conformism? I may not understand gender-dysphoria, but perhaps I can grasp that distinction.

But yes, I am very Butlerist in my conception of this... it's what makes the most sense in light of my own experiences.

I should get more sleep, at any rate.

 

[Entropic]

I apologize if I'm stepping on anyone's toes here, but I wonder if cultural upbringing has something to do with whether or not someone transitions into another sex. I worry I might be stomping all over a delicate issue, but it's something I've noticed. I've been thinking lately that cultural upbringing is a current that is incredibly difficult to swim against, and can't imagine what it would be like if someone's cultural upbringing was so diametrically opposed to their own nature.

Take a look at this for instance. Apparently Iran has an issue with homosexuality, but not sex reassignment surgery. I'm curious to know what people make of that.

Again, sorry if my curiosity is getting the best of me here...

Actually, there are a lot of cultural studies done that show that transgender, though not always understood or known as such, is a widespread phenomenon and not at all limited to a particular time and space. You will find this all over the world so it is most definitely not related to social upbringing or the like, outside the fact that social oppression may hinder people from coming out out of fear of losing social, financial and other forms of support and being ostracized from their community. Some societies have even created very specific socio-cultural roles that are unique to cater to these identities such as the hijra or travestí, though the latter is less clearly transsexual because they in many ways do not at all adhere to the heteronormative matrix often mixing between what is deemed as masculine and feminine like preferring female names but using masculine pronouns. Otherwise the typical is that a transsexual though not necessarily someone who is transgender, tends to identify with the heteronormative matrix and will thus post-transition, have a congruent gender performance, if speaking from a Butlerist perspective. A much more interesting question is whether people who experience themselves to be transgender have a tendency to choose to conform to the created social roles that already exist i.e. if a society such as India allows sex-bodied individuals to identify as men/women/other and live their lives as a third gender category in their society known as hijra and gain specific social statuses and perks based on that, would sex-bodied transgender individuals in general be more likely to ultimately choose to identify as hijra as opposed to say, just male/female, genderqueer, agender and other variants thereof? I mean, speaking from my own perspective, it would definitely be easier to pick a social role that still kind of fits what you want and be recognized as such, because it is much more complicated and requires much more effort to create an role from scratch. On the same token, is transsexualism and how it's expressed then, also the most common form of transgender because Western society does not allow for additional gender categories and roles?

Anyway, Iran and most of the Muslim world, has a big issue with anything that is deemed transgressive. It is not just deviating sexualities, but also identities and that the support for transsexual people (the article emphasizes transwomen, but we do not know if this is true for say, transmen) seems to largely hinge on a previous revolution that occurred which has influenced the politics in the country. Then there's the part that Jennifer noted and that if you read the article more carefully, you will see that the article itself is not very reflective on its sources and that there is some criticism brought up against what is actually being stated in the article and that the view may be overly positive. The article itself is not very well written imo, so I wouldn't take everything written there that seriously. The fact that the title of the article is "transsexuality" which is an incorrect term, the proper term is "transsexualism", is suggestive of this.

I admit to having a hard time grasping grasping entropic's argument. That's probably my own failing, perhaps due to lack of sleep.

Is the crux that there is a distinction between gender dysphoria and non-conformist individuals, and that it it is a mistake to just assume that gender dysphoria is just another variation on simple non-conformism? I may not understand gender-dysphoria, but perhaps I can grasp that distinction.

But yes, I am very Butlerist in my conception of this... it's what makes the most sense in light of my own experiences.

I should get more sleep, at any rate.

No, but the crux is that Butler denies the existence of a gender identity that is felt as intrinsic to the self in promotion of a view that emphasizes our chosen gender presentation or performance. One can choose to identify with an idea or a role and thus also attempt to perform this role (in many ways her idea of gender is perhaps ironically neo-Platonist, which makes it no less essentialist than the essentialism of gender that she is attempting to oppose). Dysphoria, in Butler's world, doesn't even make sense as an experience, because dysphoria is an experience of the body not matching an inner felt idea of who you are which she would deem essential. She would claim that this inner felt experience would be false and is something that we are being taught to experience since we are after all according to her, not born as men and women but we are made into ones. Her view moves dangerously close to the constructivist view that permeated the treatment of intersex individuals during the 50s, 60s and onward until quite recently. One of its main and primary proponents was the sexologist John Money, who, in many ways, actually endorsed an idea of gender that is heavily promoted in this very thread, which is that gender as an idea is just that, an idea. We are not born as men and women but are taught to become so. He thought of human beings being born more akin to tabula rasa and that we could be raised to become literally anything. He also set out to prove that this was the case with intersex people whose genitals was not able to be clearly classified as either male or female. They used specific measurements to ensure that people fit the bill which in ways, is reminiscent of the story that Jennifer mentioned earlier in this thread. One such child was David Reimer who was born with genitals deemed as too small to be seen as a penis. They therefore forcibly gender reassigned David as an infant and David's parents were told to raise him as a girl. Money argued that because David had no previous known experiences of being either a boy or a girl, he would accept his life as a girl and thus also come to identify as one. David's parents also kept it a secret that he was born intersex, so there was no way David could have known of this. However, the experiment failed, and David felt deeply dissatisfied living as a girl. He eventually found out that he was not born a girl and quickly assumed a male identity and life thereafter, having his penis reconstructed.

Butler's idea of gender goes against cases such as David Reimer, because Butler would argue that since David was raise as a girl and did not know that he was a girl and had no previous experience of being otherwise, how could he choose to identify as a man and feel that he is not a girl but a man? Gender is not essential or intrinsic to us, but something we construct and create and from there, choose to perform. Our creation is entirely based on society's expectations of gender so we can only exist in relation to these static ideas. Thus someone can be deemed congruent or they can be deemed as transgressive or deviating. No matter what you do, you will be either for or against this essential idea of what a man or a woman is. This is also one of the biggest issues with most modern feminism being unable to accept trans women as a part of their movement since trans women are male-bodied and while they may therefore choose to identify as women and thus also perform a role of one, they, according to these feminists, do not inherently understand or cannot relate to the actual female struggle since they were not raised as women. Instead, a lot of feminists view trans women scornfully, seeing them as men trying to express their additionally gained entitlement that men intrinsically are given in society, that is, that they have a power to consciously choose to transgress gender boundaries because they can due to simply being additionally entitled because they have that power while women do not (in ways it is more difficult for women to gain power because a lot of the feminist struggle precisely lies in that women are trying to acquire the same power men pretty much always have possessed), in order to "pretend" to be women and be a part of and share the female experience. From this perspective, the existence of trans women is seen as a form of mockery, a mimicry.

The problem has less to do with how trans people and cis people experience their identities and is more an issue of philosophy and how identity and expressions of identity are understood.

Last but not least, [MENTION=7]Jennifer[/MENTION], no problem. It helps having studied this at university level lol.

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

Actually, there are a lot of cultural studies done that show that transgender, though not always understood or known as such, is a widespread phenomenon and not at all limited to a particular time and space. You will find this all over the world so it is most definitely not related to social upbringing or the like, outside the fact that social oppression may hinder people from coming out out of fear of losing social, financial and other forms of support and being ostracized from their community.

You are correct. I had forgotten this fact. I suppose I was way off here.

A much more interesting question is whether people who experience themselves to be transgender have a tendency to choose to conform to the created social roles that already exist i.e. if a society such as India allows sex-bodied individuals to identify as men/women/other and live their lives as a third gender category in their society known as hijra and gain specific social statuses and perks based on that, would sex-bodied transgender individuals in general be more likely to ultimately choose to identify as hijra as opposed to say, just male/female, genderqueer, agender and other variants thereof?

Good question. I'm still not really sure what role the hijra actually played, or what their history is in Indian society.

I mean, speaking from my own perspective, it would definitely be easier to pick a social role that still kind of fits what you want and be recognized as such, because it is much more complicated and requires much more effort to create an role from scratch. On the same token, is transsexualism and how it's expressed then, also the most common form of transgender because Western society does not allow for additional gender categories and roles?

How are you distinguishing transexual and transgender? I admit that I'm not clear on the difference.

As for the question itself, I think it's hard to answer without more knowledge of other societies that might have different conceptions.

A related question is the issue of marriage. Various Tibetan groups practiced polyandry. How did/does that play out socially? I'd like to know more.

No, but the crux is that Butler denies the existence of a gender identity that is felt as intrinsic to the self in promotion of a view that emphasizes our chosen gender presentation or performance. One can choose to identify with an idea or a role and thus also attempt to perform this role (in many ways her idea of gender is perhaps ironically neo-Platonist, which makes it no less essentialist than the essentialism of gender that she is attempting to oppose). Dysphoria, in Butler's world, doesn't even make sense as an experience, because dysphoria is an experience of the body not matching an inner felt idea of who you are which she would deem essential. She would claim that this inner felt experience would be false and is something that we are being taught to experience since we are after all according to her, not born as men and women but we are made into ones.

Performance has a very deliberate sound to it, which creates connotations that seem inaccurate. I don't make a deliberate choice, to buy clothes that are labeled as being made for men. I do it without even thinking about it.

My inner felt idea of who I am is undoubtedly male, even if other people around me may have questioned this at times. This was because of a combination of being somewhat short as a kid (as an adult I'm just below average height), not liking activities thought of as male, and being interested in activities that are considered odd for people of any gender. This may have caused self-doubt in my more insecure days, but ultimately I think of myself as male. I'm not really sure what it would be like for someone for whom this was more complicated. Are there any good biographies or novels about this subject? That might be the best way to get a better idea of the inner experience, if such a thing is possible (it may not be).

 

[Coriolis]

And I've already told you why that analogy is bunk because no one feels as if there is something inherently wrong with their hair unless you were born without hair, perhaps, as much as there's more of an envy or a desire to have a different kind of hair. I offered a much better example in the very post you quoted but it seems as if you conveniently overlooked it.

As an example, I'm born quite short in comparison to other people in my country, largely because I'm Asian. I've always wanted to be tall like my cousin (we are not blood-related). My dissatisfaction with my height is not the same kind of dissatisfaction I experience in relation to my gender identity and presentation and how I'm read and understood by society at large, though I now realize another aspect why I wanted to be taller is probably related to gender. There are also obvious impractical issues that come with being shorter than average height; issues that are in fact outright discriminatory though they aren't big enough to really impede in my daily life more than as frustration moments (like being able to find clothes that fit my body size).

My experience surrounding certain physiological aspects not being in agreement with how I perceive myself to be is different. It is one thing to be born short and desiring to be taller because it is more convenient or it seems better because it's seen as more desirable to be, and another to feel a strong sense of dissatisfaction with your body because it does not fit or should not be. In the former case, the desire is other-oriented, the desire is derived from outside the self; but in the latter the desire is intrinsically derived and not associated with external expectations or needs. As such I can come to terms with being short. It's not ideal or desirable but I can't do anything about it so that's it, and similarly, while I wish my voice would be even deeper I can't do anything about that either but at least it is deep enough, within a male range, to feel as if it's finally making sense.

So you are ruling out the possibility that someone who feels they should have a different body type (e.g. tall and slender instead of short and stocky) is driven by the same kind of intrinsic sense that leads many people to feel they have the wrong anatomical parts. I don't think you would want your perspective invalidated in this way. I can see either problem being externally driven or internally driven, depending on the specific person and circumstances. It seems to have more to do with internal vs. external locus of control: do you judge what is right for you based on inner values, or external judgments and utility?

It has nothing to do with how easy or not easy it is to deal with, but has to do with how permeating it is in Western society. You again make it into a non-issue because it is not an issue for you, and entirely missing the point of what was being conveyed. It has nothing to do with whether it is an issue for the sole individual, but has to do with how deeply pervasive the segregation is actually ingrained. What I brought up were simple examples of how our daily lives are separated in this particular way, even down to such silly things as hygiene articles.

It was never about you as an individual, but it's about society.

It's always about me, or you, or whomever as an individual, because ultimately we can control only our own behavior. We have to live with whatever the world dishes out to us, one way or another. Yes, I appreciate the pervasiveness of gender bias, particularly gender bias against women since I am one, but can see its effect on men, transfolks, and people outside the gender binary. It is why I generally advocate simply removing gender from the equation altogether. It is thus not a non-issue for me, but rather an issue I have found a way to deal with.

. . . because if gender is something we create and perform, it suggests no person truly has an actual gender identity that they identify with as much as it is something that is an ideal that people are taught to conform to. All other gender expressions would be created in relation to this ideal. While one can argue that this ideal in itself is essential in an ideological sense, gender as a concept is not essential to people. We are not born as men and women though society tends to teach us that this is how it is, but we are made into ones and even contrary to other social theories, Butler implies that we even do this ourselves. We (un)consciously choose to conform because we identify the values of conformity as being more advantageous (consider for instance how mistreated men become would they suddenly be read as effeminate/feminine). It raises an issue for trans people and their identities being questioned since Butlerism posits that they are actually not transgender because their innate sense of who they are doesn't exist since Butler doesn't believe that gender as an essential concept to humans as in, I'm born a man or a woman, doesn't exist. If we are not born into men or women, then how can I know that I'm born in the wrong body?

Do you believe gender is an essential concept that is inborn, whether it matches our physiology or not? If so, what is the physiological basis for this? I some ways, this is the root of my question, since I have always considered it a social construct. In other words, if we had no gender roles or expectations at all, most of the problem would go away except for the part where one's physical body feels wrong.

The problem is that this understanding of gender is very simplified and actually removes how complex it truly is. Gender isn't a one-dimensional line on a piece of paper, but it is multi-dimensional. A person can therefore for example possess several traits that in general are considered very feminine and in other situations posssess traits that are considered very masculine. This doesn't make the person in question androgynous, assuming the distribution of traits would be roughly equal across time and space, furthermore, how do we even measure it to begin with? Is an effeminate man really more androgynous or feminine just because he's deemed effeminate? Is it not just simply so that he is as masculine as any other man since he still identifies as one? And therein lies the problem with a one-dimensional understanding, because it posits that all other forms would be variations or relate to this one concept where presentation and body is congruent in comparison to what is deemed as the ideal that I mentioned in the above. While society does indeed organize according to this view, it is erroneous to assume that gender itself operates in accordance to it. A multi-dimensional understanding for example allows to label the effeminate man as masculine, but a one-dimensional view does not. It is about the realization that one can't quantify subjective experiences by weighing them against each other (more or less masculine for example), yet we attempt to do so.

So what, then, makes an effeminate man masculine? In what lies his masculinity? To me this is a nonsensical matter of semantics. Why bother even to group human traits into masculine and feminine? Who decides which traits go in which column? What about cultural differences? This distinction is so subjective and varying as to be pointless as anything except an ideal, divorced from human reality.

Instead of just having "opportunities for people," everything is still couched in terms of female and male, "expanding/changing female roles," etc. And many are attached to their gender in their personal lives; people still think in terms of gender, sometimes fiercely. I honestly don't see it going away, I don't know if people could let it go.

It's a bit like race. Some people see the ideal as a "color-blind world", where no one takes any notice of race. Others instead want to highlight, preserve, and appreciate the diversity. I see no problem with individual expressions of gender identity, any more than with individual expressions of racial identity, culture, religion, or anything else. That doesn't mean we need to codify these distinctions in law and public policy, or judge people whose self-expression is different from ours or we cannot understand.

I've always wondered if having the ability to swap genders regularly would help refocus people's views of others through a more "people-centered" lens rather than gendered, although some people would still likely identify as a particular gender regardless and favor one form over the other.

Sounds like just another way to walk in someone else's moccasins. An invaluable experience, when you can arrange it. Most of us don't have the opportunity to experience gender from the opposite side, though I suspect many of us deviate from the traditional expectations for our gender to some degree. I suspect what I would notice most is any difference in how others treated me.

It really should not be necessary for any sort of gender expections to exist at all, or even the concept of gender to exist, and while there really are no absolutes, in todays day and age stereotypes still hold strong. As with what is undoubtadly going to happen with race, acceptance and tolerance are hopfully going to allow imagined borders to intermingle until the whole idea of distinction is laughable, emphasis on individuality and individual merit grows, and categorization falls to the wayside

I could see what Jennifer and Jarlaxle are talking about happen, and while it might end up helping the cause, there seems, as mentioned before, the need for caution as to those who would misuse it. Rewards could end up worth the risk, or risks could just derail rewards.

I agree with this. As with many issues, there is a significant gap between the ideal and the present reality. While waiting for sweeping change on a societal level, we must still navigate our individual day to day lives. The way we do so, however, will bit by bit contribute to that eventual broad change we seek.

 

[Entropic]

Good question. I'm still not really sure what role the hijra actually played, or what their history is in Indian society.

Not overly familiar with the subject, but I am aware of how it works in South America and with the travestí who denounce crossdressers and the like as not being as authentic.

How are you distinguishing transexual and transgender? I admit that I'm not clear on the difference.

I am using the medicinal definition where transsexual is someone who transitions to the sex opposite of what they were assigned at birth and adopt to fit into the heteronormative matrix whereas a transgender person is someone who does not feel that their gender assigned at birth matches their identity but may not choose to conform to the heteronormative matrix post-transition, if they ever make an official transition. Some people don't.

As for the question itself, I think it's hard to answer without more knowledge of other societies that might have different conceptions.

Well, it's less to do with understanding those specific societies and more to do with having to perform deep interviews with people who do identify with and fit into those social categories and those people who choose not to, while still experiencing themselves to be trans in some way.

A related question is the issue of marriage. Various Tibetan groups practiced polyandry. How did/does that play out socially? I'd like to know more.

What do you mean?

Performance has a very deliberate sound to it, which creates connotations that seem inaccurate. I don't make a deliberate choice, to buy clothes that are labeled as being made for men. I do it without even thinking about it.

My inner felt idea of who I am is undoubtedly male, even if other people around me may have questioned this at times. This was because of a combination of being somewhat short as a kid (as an adult I'm just below average height), not liking activities thought of as male, and being interested in activities that are considered odd for people of any gender. This may have caused self-doubt in my more insecure days, but ultimately I think of myself as male. I'm not really sure what it would be like for someone for whom this was more complicated. Are there any good biographies or novels about this subject? That might be the best way to get a better idea of the inner experience, if such a thing is possible (it may not be).

You and I seem to understand performance differently. Yes, performance suggests some kind of deliberation to it, but it obviously needs not be conscious. The act itself is conscious in that I still ultimately choose to conform to use specific hygienic articles over others, but my choosing to conform may not be a consciously made decision as much as it is something that is learned and seen as more desirable due to the fear of repercussion that comes with transgressing outside of the matrix.

So you are ruling out the possibility that someone who feels they should have a different body type (e.g. tall and slender instead of short and stocky) is driven by the same kind of intrinsic sense that leads many people to feel they have the wrong anatomical parts. I don't think you would want your perspective invalidated in this way. I can see either problem being externally driven or internally driven, depending on the specific person and circumstances. It seems to have more to do with internal vs. external locus of control: do you judge what is right for you based on inner values, or external judgments and utility?

Why would it be about values or utility? WTF? What kind of demarcation is that? Again, my comparison was quite clear. There is a difference in feeling there's an intrinsically felt experience of something with your body not quite matching in how it functions and desiring to have a different hair color. Your body still functions as it should, curly or straight hair. The latter is deemed as body dysphoria in the DSM, which is a very different kind of classification from gender dysphoria in the same manual. There's also some science pointing out that our gender identity may be partially biological, so there's that. Also what do you mean "my perspective invalidated in this way"?

It's always about me, or you, or whomever as an individual, because ultimately we can control only our own behavior. We have to live with whatever the world dishes out to us, one way or another. Yes, I appreciate the pervasiveness of gender bias, particularly gender bias against women since I am one, but can see its effect on men, transfolks, and people outside the gender binary. It is why I generally advocate simply removing gender from the equation altogether. It is thus not a non-issue for me, but rather an issue I have found a way to deal with.

My point is that you used your personal experience and applied it across the board without stopping to consider that I was not once speaking about your personal experience on the matter or what you truly think about it. Your inherent assumption about how you go on and do things and that this is how things should be and thus speaking for other people and their experiences was very offensive. Your experiences cannot be used to speak for anyone else but you.

Do you believe gender is an essential concept that is inborn, whether it matches our physiology or not? If so, what is the physiological basis for this? I some ways, this is the root of my question, since I have always considered it a social construct. In other words, if we had no gender roles or expectations at all, most of the problem would go away except for the part where one's physical body feels wrong.

What is gender here, according to you? Because you are defining it in terms of performance/roles, which is not the same as identity in itself.

So what, then, makes an effeminate man masculine? In what lies his masculinity? To me this is a nonsensical matter of semantics. Why bother even to group human traits into masculine and feminine? Who decides which traits go in which column? What about cultural differences? This distinction is so subjective and varying as to be pointless as anything except an ideal, divorced from human reality.

I don't understand why you don't understand this, lol. It's not a nonsensical matter of semantics but it is that people themselves have the right to define who they are. So if he thinks he's masculine he is masculine and this is regardless of where he happened to be situated and in the context he is situated in. It is not the environment that defines him, but he defines himself. No one has the right to take away that experience from him so it's funny you are talking about how it's "divorced from human reality" when to me, it seems as if you don't quite understand how to deal with lived human reality and our actual experiences.

 

[Coriolis]

Why would it be about values or utility? WTF? What kind of demarcation is that? Again, my comparison was quite clear. There is a difference in feeling there's an intrinsically felt experience of something with your body not quite matching in how it functions and desiring to have a different hair color. Your body still functions as it should, curly or straight hair. The latter is deemed as body dysphoria in the DSM, which is a very different kind of classification from gender dysphoria in the same manual. There's also some science pointing out that our gender identity may be partially biological, so there's that. Also what do you mean "my perspective invalidated in this way"?

I am using values broadly, more in the Fi sense, to indicate a very personal and internal sense of rightness. in this example, one feels one's body isn't right. If you consider that this can apply only to aspects of physiology that affect functioning, it would seem you are arguing for the importance of utility also. But the aspects of physiology usually used to label humans male or female are not the only ones that affect our functioning. Hair color might indeed be irrelevant, but body build and stature are not. Why could someone not feel body dysphoria on these grounds? If you deny that such a sensation is possible, you invalidate the experience of anyone who might feel this way.

My point is that you used your personal experience and applied it across the board without stopping to consider that I was not once speaking about your personal experience on the matter or what you truly think about it. Your inherent assumption about how you go on and do things and that this is how things should be and thus speaking for other people and their experiences was very offensive. Your experiences cannot be used to speak for anyone else but you.

Nor can yours. You seem quite hostile, however, to the idea that your experiences might have anything at all in common with those of others, or that people who have different ways and degrees of not fitting within the standard gender binary have anything to learn from each other. I am not judging your experience, simply asking questions to understand it better. Some of these take the form of: "is it anything like my experience of X, or this other group/person's experience of Y?"

What is gender here, according to you? Because you are defining it in terms of performance/roles, which is not the same as identity in itself.

See - even this question you refuse to answer, and try to throw it back on me. I don't mind providing my own answer, but if I do, I know you will simply try to invalidate it by claiming it to be simplistic, narrow, self-focused, etc. Perhaps it would be. Perhaps that is why I am asking, because I think you might have a more complete and comprehensive answer and I would like to learn. Until you stop assuming the worst about my motivations, however, there is nothing I can learn from you because you prefer to scold than to educate.

I don't understand why you don't understand this, lol. It's not a nonsensical matter of semantics but it is that people themselves have the right to define who they are. So if he thinks he's masculine he is masculine and this is regardless of where he happened to be situated and in the context he is situated in. It is not the environment that defines him, but he defines himself. No one has the right to take away that experience from him so it's funny you are talking about how it's "divorced from human reality" when to me, it seems as if you don't quite understand how to deal with lived human reality and our actual experiences.

People certainly can define who they are, but if they use a word that is commonly used to mean one thing (or one of a subset of things, like definitions of masculinity currently are), they risk being seriously misunderstood. I also agree that these definitions of masculine and feminine are too narrow, and that everyone should be free to come up with their own. Once we all do this, however, the words themselves lose meaning because it will mean something different to each person. I cannot then tell someone "I am masculine" or "I am feminine", without specifying what I mean by that. So, why not cut out the middle-word, and simply state "I am this way [whatever qualities you feel describe you]". Just another example of how the gender binary creates more harm than good. And I would almost consider the highlighted insulting, except I realize that you don't know me from Adam/Eve and so have no basis for judging.

 

[Entropic]

[MENTION=9811]Coriolis[/MENTION] I am hostile because I honestly find your tone and how you approach this subject as if it is a matter of dissecting an insect in the bio lab extremely offensive; you have not once attempted to change your tone and actually approach it from a matter of understanding it as an issue of human experience. Your attitude throughout, extending from the previous thread on the subject, is extremely divorced from connecting to actual lived human experience on the matter. Instead, you approach it as if it is a clinical procedure. Approaching it this way severely reduces the importance that this is ultimately about lived experiences.

I am using values broadly, more in the Fi sense, to indicate a very personal and internal sense of rightness. in this example, one feels one's body isn't right. If you consider that this can apply only to aspects of physiology that affect functioning, it would seem you are arguing for the importance of utility also. But the aspects of physiology usually used to label humans male or female are not the only ones that affect our functioning. Hair color might indeed be irrelevant, but body build and stature are not. Why could someone not feel body dysphoria on these grounds? If you deny that such a sensation is possible, you invalidate the experience of anyone who might feel this way.

By making it about a matter of classification? No, it's not. I already brought up body build and stature and I used myself as an example of it. You again conveniently ignored it. I never once denied or decried that people who feel body dysphoria have lesser experiences; I have myself have had a fair share of body dysphoria. However, body dysphoria is decidedly different from gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria is not a matter of "I wish I could be taller" for whatever reasons, but it's a feeling of that something is more inherently wrong with your body and its functioning. And to say that our genitals is an irrelevant or only a small part of our functioning is really a reductionist and offensive statement. It affects a lot of little things such as how we have sex or how we pee. It is not about utility. It is about an intrinsically felt experience of something being wrong with your body in relation to its physiological sex which has nothing to do with values. It is more of a gut kind of feeling. I suspect you will never understand because I don't think there is a way to ever truly explain this in a way that is satisfactory to you, since you can't seem to distinguish between regularly felt body dysphoria and gender dysphoria to begin with and you think that I am trying to make that separation is somehow offensive to people who do experience body dysphoria.

Nor can yours. You seem quite hostile, however, to the idea that your experiences might have anything at all in common with those of others, or that people who have different ways and degrees of not fitting within the standard gender binary have anything to learn from each other. I am not judging your experience, simply asking questions to understand it better. Some of these take the form of: "is it anything like my experience of X, or this other group/person's experience of Y?"

No, I am only hostile because of your tone, solely. That you think this is about comparing certain experiences to others just shows that you don't inherently understand the gravity of the difference between the two. I gave you numerous examples and you still don't understand. Perhaps it would be in your best interest to let it go and realize that you can't understand everything and that not all things should approached from the perspective of clinical procedure.

See - even this question you refuse to answer, and try to throw it back on me. I don't mind providing my own answer, but if I do, I know you will simply try to invalidate it by claiming it to be simplistic, narrow, self-focused, etc. Perhaps it would be. Perhaps that is why I am asking, because I think you might have a more complete and comprehensive answer and I would like to learn. Until you stop assuming the worst about my motivations, however, there is nothing I can learn from you because you prefer to scold than to educate.

I assume the worst of your intentions because frankly, I have seen very little to you that fundamentally showcases a basic level of respect towards the subject matter (that is, not approaching this as if it is a clinically sterile operational procedure). Furthermore, you also are inherently biased in your approach but at the same time try to veil it as if you are pro LGBT but then completely fail to understand the lived experiences and showcasing a basic level of respect of the LGBT struggles. When you begin to express that this is about actual humans and actual human experiences, perhaps I'll too change my tone and perception of you.

People certainly can define who they are, but if they use a word that is commonly used to mean one thing (or one of a subset of things, like definitions of masculinity currently are), they risk being seriously misunderstood. I also agree that these definitions of masculine and feminine are too narrow, and that everyone should be free to come up with their own. Once we all do this, however, the words themselves lose meaning because it will mean something different to each person. I cannot then tell someone "I am masculine" or "I am feminine", without specifying what I mean by that. So, why not cut out the middle-word, and simply state "I am this way [whatever qualities you feel describe you]". Just another example of how the gender binary creates more harm than good. And I would almost consider the highlighted insulting, except I realize that you don't know me from Adam/Eve and so have no basis for judging.

But some people do enjoy the terminology and their meanings. In some cases a reductionist approach is the better but I doubt you will convince the rest of the world to take on such an apathetic approach that you have on the matter in question. So let people come up with their own definitions. There are already cultural differences found across the world to begin with, so it clearly shows there is no real uniform definition of masculine or feminine to begin with. So really, I don't see the problem. If someone wants to go to the length of using their own understanding that is ultimately their pejorative. It's really quite simple.

 

[Mane]

I think what's going on here is basically this:

From what I've been able to understand, it is something you don't experience as a sense in itself, but experience the pain and discomfort when it isn't matched with everything else. You can live your entire life not been aware of any sense of an internal organ until unless something happens to it, this could very well be the psychological version of that, and unlike that internal organ, we don't have a common knowledge textbook explaining it.

Curiosity isn't disrespectful, I kind of think the reverse is true, the prevailing "Let's never question each other's beliefs" is treating each other like toddlers. But one of curiosity's potential traps is expecting that any experience can be communicated, and sadly it can't, a blind man from birth can know everything there is to know about the physics of light particles, and it will tell him very little about the experience of sight and colors. Nothing you'll ever say is going to help him make sense of why some people stand in awe of a beautiful sight of nature. we all have some level of experiences we'd be incapable of conveying to someone who hasn't experienced them, sometimes if we are lucky a great piece of art can serve that function, but those are rare gems. Sometimes you just need to acknowledge that something might not be part of your qualia, and yet is still there.

Ok I can't really deal with that indefinitely either. Can the scientists working on artificial telepathy hurry up?!

 

[Totenkindly]

Yeah, the comparison is if you take a man or a woman who is very secure and happy in their gender [and it forms their sense of self] and then toss them unexpectedly and permanently in the opposite body so that everything feels off physically, socially, emotionally, etc. Wham.

There might be some people who can adjust to that, I don't know; but others can't regardless of what coping mechanisms are attempted. You're aware of the dichotomy. You might not be able to say what a particular gender "feels like," but you're aware of what you're not if and when a mismatch occurs. I think transsexuals have said they 'feel like a man/woman [opposite gender] inside' simply because there is not an easy way to put it into words. If you try to deconstruct it, that statement might literally make no sense since we can't define what a gender "feels like" but it's simply the best some people can do in trying to convey their experience.

For a more literal revelation of experience, it's that everything (even the good stuff) feels wrong and long-term unenjoyable and unfulfilling, to the point of continual depression and suicidal urges regardless of therapy or whatever other coping mechanisms are attempted, but then afterwards all that "noise" is gone and even the bad experiences tend to be better long-term than even the good experiences previously. It's amazing how much you can accept and work through when you at least feel like "yourself" physically and socially, even if you're just average in appearance and have the same problems as every other person.

 

[Doktorin Zylinder]

Being trans is almost an ineffable experience. Like Jennifer said, we can't really say what it feels like, per se, just that something is terribly wrong (gender dysphoria), like someone said previously, we have a software/hardware mismatch. Things may feel better for us if we do certain things to alleviate the dysphoria like dressing how we want instead of how society expects us to dress, engaging in certain activities that we think are typically cross-gender, changing how we look physically, augmenting our voices in one direction or another, or eventually seeking medical intervention.

I will throw in a caveat about "cross-gender activities," though: I don't think an activity is inherently masculine or feminine, but sometimes we perceive them to be due to cultural conditioning. For instance, if this were the fifties, women stayed home and did the cooking, cleaning, child rearing, et cetera, whilst men went out and worked bringing home the money at jobs that included tough manual labor or, for some, things of a more white-collared nature. I like doing almost all of the typically feminine things like cooking, cleaning, sewing, and what have you from a very young age to the extent that I still think I'd make a really good housewife, but I'm also an engineer and I love to take things apart and put them back together whilst devising even better or entirely new designs along with building systems and solving problems. Nowadays, women can pretty much do what they want in any fashion activity wise, but men are unfortunately still looked down upon for engaging in what is thought of as traditional feminine activities. I remember when I was a child that I really wanted a Barbie but when I asked my mother, I was reamed out about how boys don't pay with Barbies and to never mention anything of the sort to my father. I was lucky enough to have a many female childhood friends who let me play with theirs. Instead of Barbies and dolls, I got Batman and cars, but I did manage to get lots of stuffed animals, which, to this day, I still collect.

It's kind of like trying to run out of date firmware or drivers and the system keeps crashing. At some point, it is nearly impossible to cope and the system shuts down resulting in depression, anxiety, phobias, other mental health issues, suicidal ideation, attempts, or complete follow-through. If I remember my statistics correctly, nearly one in two (somewhere around forty-four percent) transgender people attempt suicide in their lifetime with a remarkably high recurrence rate. On occasion, some people, myself included, will jump into a really gendered activity like bulking up at the gym or in the case of Bruce Jenner (I saw the interview, but I have yet to read the thread in its entirety) did and became an athletic powerhouse, all in the name of or subconscious effort to run from our problems. It gives us something to focus instead of the feelings of incongruency. This usually ends up backfiring from what I've heard and I consider my attempts at escape to be something that hurt me somewhat in the long run.

The general theory is that transgenderism is partially caused by both genetics and prenatal hormone levels. It also has links to other mental health issues (and I hate how being trans is classified as a mental health issue), which I have a few of my own theories on. In utero, cis people have all of their genetics and hormones matching up at the right time in the right quantities. With trans people and, if I recall based on the last research papers I read, homosexuals don't have everything matching up at the right time in the right quantities to make us cisgendered and straight. The general amounts of testosterone and estrogen to which one was subjected to in the womb can be roughly determined by the index and ring finger digit ratios. Mine, being on the female range as well as many gay men also fitting into that range. The reverse is true of female to male trans people as well as many lesbians. Androgynes aren't really represented in any of the research that I've been able to scrounge up, unfortunately. That being said, our brains aren't cisgendered brains. My brain resembles a female brain in many ways, but not all. Hormone therapy also influences gendered brain differences. For example, estrogen will affect a male brain making it more female over time. I was lucky enough to have a brain scan before I started HRT for other reasons unrelated to being trans and parts of it were definitely in the female range. So, we end up being subject to bodies and hormones (during puberty) that are unlike those we were exposed to at certain times in utero that, essentially, start to make us crash resulting is thoughts and behavior unbecoming to how we feel we should actually be because the preloaded software is barely compatible with the hardware. It runs, but it runs poorly. In many if not most cases, cross-gender hormones alleviate gender dysphoria.

The Computer Analogy:

Nota bene: Know that this is an imperfect analogy, but I'm trying to make it easily understood even though I know it could be better and I'm trying to keep it as simple as possible. If you know about overclocking and whatnot, please just bare with me because I know it's more complicated that I've set it out to be with timings and other things. I'm going for ease of use, not specific technicalities.

The brain is the processor (CPU).
The way the person feels is the RAM.
The motherboard is the primary body as in the skeleton and all essential organs such as the heart, lungs, liver, et cetera.
The sex hormones are the power supply (PSU).
The secondary sex characteristics and reproductive organs are the video cards.

In utero, that is in the factory where the computer is made, the computer is assembled using the parts above except for the video cards. The fetus only has on-board graphics at the moment, meaning it's prepubescent. The assembly drawing with the parts list is incorrect and the wrong processor (the brain is affected by prenatal hormone levels) is inserted to the motherboard. It still works, but it's like getting an i3 instead of the i7 that you wanted. You also get some really crappy RAM sticks that have just enough memory to function. The power supply is inserted but set at the wrong voltage resulting in some early childhood issues of not feeling all that right in regards your body versus your gender, but you don't need all that much wattage, so it's tolerable and it's hard to explain to people.

When you hit puberty, it's as if the manufacturer sends you a package of self-installing Radeon graphics cards. The fact is, you really wanted nVidia cards instead. The problem now is that you require more voltage and wattage to run all these components, so the power supply ramps up (increase in sex hormones opposite from the ones you want) both of them but your voltages are higher than they should be affecting how the RAM and CPU work leading to system crashes (gender dysphoria). In order to deal with all of these issues, you decide to overclock the ram and the processor because you can't actually change the voltage yourself. This would be akin to trying to run from the dysphoria. If nothing is done about these issues, it results in the computer burning out and depression sets in or suicide is committed.

In order to combat these, cross sex hormones are used. You get a new fancy power supply set at the correct voltage. This reduces the stress on CPU and the RAM, but you're still stuck with some Radeon cards, but you feel better compared to before. Now that one of the issues has been solved as best it can, you can upgrade to a new processor, maybe an i5 or i7 depending on how the new hormones affect you. It also allows you to get some new RAM so you can deal with life again without as many system crashes. Now, let's say you're running Crossfire with your Radeon cards and want to swap them out for nVidia because you think you'll feel better with them instead (sex change or SRS). So, if you're FtM, you'll get a mastectomy and a phalloplasty and be pretty good to go with some GTX 860s, but it's not like you're getting water-cooled Titan Xs (akin to being born the sex you wanted instead). If you're MtF, you end up growing in a nice pretty pair GTX 860s, or if you have large breasted women in your family, GTX 970s and getting vaginoplasty. It's not as good at the water-cooled GTX Titan Xs, but it does the job and you're happy with it. This "upgrade" is called "transitioning." Bye, bye gender dysphoria.

Mind you, this doesn't really take into account the social aspects of transitioning or being trans like losing your job, having regrets, being disowned, et cetera. I hope it suffices for the time being, though.

 

[Coriolis]

Yeah, the comparison is if you take a man or a woman who is very secure and happy in their gender [and it forms their sense of self] and then toss them unexpectedly and permanently in the opposite body so that everything feels off physically, socially, emotionally, etc. Wham.

I think part of what I am trying to understand is: how much of gender dysphoria is based in physical reality (e.g. how one's body is) as opposed to social and psychological factors like traditional gender expectations, discrimination, and social exclusion? As I asked entropic, if all forms of discrimination and bias were removed, what aspects of the dysphoria would remain? I realize all of this is interconnected, and also will likely be different for each person. This is why I mentioned the example of height and build. I suppose someone would feel worse if gender does form a significant part of their sense of self. This is not the case for me, but again, we are all different. I wonder, then, about someone who is, say, Asian and were to unexpectedly land in the body of a black African. Again, much would depend on how strongly they identify with their own culture and ethnicity.

Being trans is almost an ineffable experience. Like Jennifer said, we can't really say what it feels like, per se, just that something is terribly wrong (gender dysphoria), like someone said previously, we have a software/hardware mismatch. Things may feel better for us if we do certain things to alleviate the dysphoria like dressing how we want instead of how society expects us to dress, engaging in certain activities that we think are typically cross-gender, changing how we look physically, augmenting our voices in one direction or another, or eventually seeking medical intervention.

Do you think then that there is no hope for people who aren't trans to understand it, and therefore it is pointles for us to try? Is it enough for others to support transpeople in the things they do to make life better, and accept them as they are (as with everyone), even lacking any real understanding? I have no patience with artificial limitations on anyone or bias against anyone, but when there is something I truly don't understand, I do tend to try to learn about it. To do otherwise seems almost trivializing.

I will throw in a caveat about "cross-gender activities," though: I don't think an activity is inherently masculine or feminine, but sometimes we perceive them to be due to cultural conditioning. For instance, if this were the fifties, women stayed home and did the cooking, cleaning, child rearing, et cetera, whilst men went out and worked bringing home the money at jobs that included tough manual labor or, for some, things of a more white-collared nature. I like doing almost all of the typically feminine things like cooking, cleaning, sewing, and what have you from a very young age to the extent that I still think I'd make a really good housewife, but I'm also an engineer and I love to take things apart and put them back together whilst devising even better or entirely new designs along with building systems and solving problems. Nowadays, women can pretty much do what they want in any fashion activity wise, but men are unfortunately still looked down upon for engaging in what is thought of as traditional feminine activities. I remember when I was a child that I really wanted a Barbie but when I asked my mother, I was reamed out about how boys don't pay with Barbies and to never mention anything of the sort to my father. I was lucky enough to have a many female childhood friends who let me play with theirs. Instead of Barbies and dolls, I got Batman and cars, but I did manage to get lots of stuffed animals, which, to this day, I still collect.

I agree entirely. My interests and abilities have always been a mix of what society considers masculine and feminine. I was given Barbies as a child, but rarely played with them. I wanted to learn how to make real clothes for real people instead. I was given tinkertoys, and taught how to do woodworking by my dad. Given my age, I was luckier than most of my contemporaries.

The general theory is that transgenderism is partially caused by both genetics and prenatal hormone levels. It also has links to other mental health issues (and I hate how being trans is classified as a mental health issue), which I have a few of my own theories on. In utero, cis people have all of their genetics and hormones matching up at the right time in the right quantities. With trans people and, if I recall based on the last research papers I read, homosexuals don't have everything matching up at the right time in the right quantities to make us cisgendered and straight. The general amounts of testosterone and estrogen to which one was subjected to in the womb can be roughly determined by the index and ring finger digit ratios. Mine, being on the female range as well as many gay men also fitting into that range. The reverse is true of female to male trans people as well as many lesbians. Androgynes aren't really represented in any of the research that I've been able to scrounge up, unfortunately. That being said, our brains aren't cisgendered brains. My brain resembles a female brain in many ways, but not all. Hormone therapy also influences gendered brain differences. For example, estrogen will affect a male brain making it more female over time. I was lucky enough to have a brain scan before I started HRT for other reasons unrelated to being trans and parts of it were definitely in the female range. So, we end up being subject to bodies and hormones (during puberty) that are unlike those we were exposed to at certain times in utero that, essentially, start to make us crash resulting is thoughts and behavior unbecoming to how we feel we should actually be because the preloaded software is barely compatible with the hardware. It runs, but it runs poorly. In many if not most cases, cross-gender hormones alleviate gender dysphoria.

This is interesting information. It shows connections between what we usually think of as the physiology of gender (reproductive organs and secondary traits) and brain physiology which then ties in with aspects of psychology. I have read about certain parts of the brains of gay people being more like those of the opposite sex. It doesn't seem unreasonable that something similar is going on with transpeople.

Mind you, this doesn't really take into account the social aspects of transitioning or being trans like losing your job, having regrets, being disowned, et cetera. I hope it suffices for the time being, though.

Understanding or no, there is NO excuse for subjecting anyone to this sort of treatment. It sounds like getting rid of outdated gender expectations would provide at least some benefit for transpeople, others outside the gender binary, and people with nontraditional gender expression. That is already alot of people.

 

[Doktorin Zylinder]

Do you think then that there is no hope for people who aren't trans to understand it, and therefore it is pointles for us to try? Is it enough for others to support transpeople in the things they do to make life better, and accept them as they are (as with everyone), even lacking any real understanding? I have no patience with artificial limitations on anyone or bias against anyone, but when there is something I truly don't understand, I do tend to try to learn about it. To do otherwise seems almost trivializing.

I hate to use this analogy, but I will because it is one of the few I can think of. I know very little about you, so anything I say should not be taken offensively.

If you are straight, did you ever figure out you were straight or is it just the way you are? Think of it like tasting a new food. If you ask me what asparagus tastes like and you've never had it, I really can't give you that experience because to my mind the only thing that even tastes remotely like asparagus is okra. If you haven't had okra, you're out of luck because I can't give you that experience. Another one I can think of is that to some people, including me, have a genetic predisposition to cilantro tasting like soap. To some people cilantro tastes awesome and they can't get enough of it. The only thing I can give you is a mouthful of soap to emulate what I taste. I can't give you the feeling of being trans, but I explain it the best I can with the tools and knowledge I have.

I wouldn't say it is pointless for you to try to understand us. The broadest way of understanding it would just us being different; I think everyone can at least empathize with being different in some way. I wouldn't go so far as to say that it's like a tree trying to understand a rock, but an oak tree trying to understand a cactus, they're both plants, but there are many differences. Support and acceptance would be very nice, indeed, but without some sort of shared experience or a magical form of empathy, I don't think it's really possible for a cis person to understand a trans person. I could be wrong. As a trans person, I don't have the reference point of being cisgender. I can conceptualize it intellectually, but I can't feel it.

 

[Coriolis]

I hate to use this analogy, but I will because it is one of the few I can think of. I know very little about you, so anything I say should not be taken offensively.

If you are straight, did you ever figure out you were straight or is it just the way you are? Think of it like tasting a new food. If you ask me what asparagus tastes like and you've never had it, I really can't give you that experience because to my mind the only thing that even tastes remotely like asparagus is okra. If you haven't had okra, you're out of luck because I can't give you that experience. Another one I can think of is that to some people, including me, have a genetic predisposition to cilantro tasting like soap. To some people cilantro tastes awesome and they can't get enough of it. The only thing I can give you is a mouthful of soap to emulate what I taste. I can't give you the feeling of being trans, but I explain it the best I can with the tools and knowledge I have.

I wouldn't say it is pointless for you to try to understand us. The broadest way of understanding it would just us being different; I think everyone can at least empathize with being different in some way. I wouldn't go so far as to say that it's like a tree trying to understand a rock, but an oak tree trying to understand a cactus, they're both plants, but there are many differences. Support and acceptance would be very nice, indeed, but without some sort of shared experience or a magical form of empathy, I don't think it's really possible for a cis person to understand a trans person. I could be wrong. As a trans person, I don't have the reference point of being cisgender. I can conceptualize it intellectually, but I can't feel it.

I appreciate your honesty, and your courtesy. I was beginning to wonder if I was asking the equivalent of "does this taste like chicken". I have known people who are different from myself in many ways, and who have had experiences that I can only imagine. With those to whom I am close enough that it is appropriate to discuss these differences and experiences on a personal and specific level, I have been able to reach some level of understanding, as they have of my experiences. We know we will never understand completely what the other's experience was like, but we can each find something in it that we can relate to. Perhaps to achieve that regarding the trans experience, I will need to have similar discussions with someone close to me rather than conversing with strangers on an internet forum.

Yes, understanding that trans people are simply different (and not bad, wrong, etc.) is what motivates my actions toward them, just as toward people who are different in other ways. I have at times been the one who has been different, so I do know one way that can feel. I don't have to experience your specific way of being different to be accepting and helpful.

 

[á´…eparted]

The closest thing I can relate to in regards to transgender is experiences with forcing myself to be more masculine than I am (I'm a cis gay man).

It sucks.

It just felt wrong. The reason I did (and sometimes still do for short periods) is because I thought it would be more appealing/attractive to the types of guys I am attracted to. All it resulted in is me feeling very restrained and locked up, and like I was starving/yearning to more properly express myself. It did draw in different types of people, but I found myself to be incompatible with them.

It's not much, but it gives me a tiny bit of insight to how it must feel to be transgender. In a world that tacitly requires you to adhere to roles that you might not want, that's got to be really, really shitty and difficult to manage.

 

[Frosty]

This might sound rude, but do you think it is fully possible to really find a way to completely understand your feelings towards your own gender?

Even if you were born CIS and straight, I would think that you would have to take in information and judge that against what you believe about yourself. As was said, and of which I agree, everyone is composed of different traits/feelings, which make up not only their gender, but everything about them. I suppose that you can assign a gender to someone, or TRY to understand someone elses conflicts, I don't think that you can really live them.

I guess that the idea of switching bodies would MAYBE help to develop some sort of attempt at understanding, but even then the understanding would not probably be whole. Although gender identity is huge, and if it doesn't come close to sharing any 'characteristics' with what is pushed it would be extremely painful, but isn't everything basically on a spectrum?

I know this was in arguments before, but isn't everything composed of everything? You cannot completely recreate an experience, but there are so many different experiences that sometimes they can overlap or take the place of another, although none can be exact. That being said, the gender community has a long long way to go to immediately come even close to being accepting of all individuals.

LAcceptance of differences, all ideally but gender specifically, would probably need to come before distillation of roles all together. People are attached to labels, they provide an easy way to quickly sum something up without having to really know much, so I would think that people would be hardset to let them go unfortunately.

It could happen but it would take lots of evaluation, that evaluation would need to spread like a virus, and it would need to withstand attempts to cure.

 

[Seymour]

The closest thing I can relate to in regards to transgender is experiences with forcing myself to be more masculine than I am (I'm a cis gay man).

It sucks.

It just felt wrong. The reason I did (and sometimes still do for short periods) is because I thought it would be more appealing/attractive to the types of guys I am attracted to. All it resulted in is me feeling very restrained and locked up, and like I was starving/yearning to more properly express myself. It did draw in different types of people, but I found myself to be incompatible with them.

It's not much, but it gives me a tiny bit of insight to how it must feel to be transgender. In a world that tacitly requires you to adhere to roles that you might not want, that's got to be really, really shitty and difficult to manage.

I still struggle with aspects of this, as well, even at my age (47). I still find myself trying to act more masculine and repress the less masculine aspects of myself. I grew up in a medium-sized conservative Texas town, so blending in was definitely a survival trait. At least I've learned to appreciate the guys who just are who they are, and leave it to those around them to cope or not. In a way, those that are less gender conforming tend to open up a wider space for the rest of us.

While being gay is tough, it's panful to imagine having most of the same issues plus needing additional resources to transition. Then having to deal with the reactions from others when one did so.

Meanwhile, it's interesting to try to tease apart being gay, being INFP, and the contribution of other character traits. It's interesting to have the subjective experience of being gay, but feeling fine with my gender. Sometimes I've felt irritated by societal expectations (Be more dominant! Don't express emotions! Care about sports!)... but I've never felt like I should be a woman.

Being gay also gives one an odd outsider perspective to various aspects of the gender wars, even as at times it seems like certain aspects of gay/lesbian stereotypes come from having one gender predominate without the counterbalancing influence of the other.

 

[Doktorin Zylinder]

This might sound rude, but do you think it is fully possible to really find a way to completely understand your feelings towards your own gender?

Even if you were born CIS and straight, I would think that you would have to take in information and judge that against what you believe about yourself. As was said, and of which I agree, everyone is composed of different traits/feelings, which make up not only their gender, but everything about them. I suppose that you can assign a gender to someone, or TRY to understand someone elses conflicts, I don't think that you can really live them.

I guess that the idea of switching bodies would MAYBE help to develop some sort of attempt at understanding, but even then the understanding would not probably be whole. Although gender identity is huge, and if it doesn't come close to sharing any 'characteristics' with what is pushed it would be extremely painful, but isn't everything basically on a spectrum?

I know this was in arguments before, but isn't everything composed of everything? You cannot completely recreate an experience, but there are so many different experiences that sometimes they can overlap or take the place of another, although none can be exact. That being said, the gender community has a long long way to go to immediately come even close to being accepting of all individuals.

LAcceptance of differences, all ideally but gender specifically, would probably need to come before distillation of roles all together. People are attached to labels, they provide an easy way to quickly sum something up without having to really know much, so I would think that people would be hardset to let them go unfortunately.

It could happen but it would take lots of evaluation, that evaluation would need to spread like a virus, and it would need to withstand attempts to cure.

I don't consider it rude at all. And, to be honest, I'm probably not the best person to be asking this question of due to the fact that I have Asperger's Syndrome, Alexithymia, almost no empathy, and underdeveloped feeling, but I'll give it a shot, nonetheless.

For me, personally, I will probably never truly understand my feelings towards by own gender, but do know that compared to years ago, the majority of my life has gotten better as a result of my decision to transition. I actually feel better and happier and emotionally lighter to a degree with not nearly as much anxiety. That is not to say that I haven't had some things get worse, mostly in the social and familial departments.

The way it transpired for me was that I managed to get anti-androgens the first time I saw my psychiatrist. The first day I took them, I felt physically crappy. I had a testosterone spike and I was pretty much unable to function that day. The weeks after slowly got better as my androgen levels dropped. Fast forward nine months and I got to see my endocrinologist who prescribed my estrogen. Within a week starting that medication, I was pretty much dysphoria-free. Within two months, my testosterone levels were in the female range.

Originally, I hadn't intended on transitioning socially when I went to see my psychiatrist. I wanted the psychological effects of the medication more than the physical effects. Later, I did decide to fully transition, which I'm in the process of, now. At this point, I know I feel better as a result of being on cross-gender hormones, I also feel a hell of a lot better being able to express myself without reservations, as well. I'm also not a typical female, either; I am extremely androgynous at the moment appearance wise, but my interests and activities span nearly equally those thought to be gender specific such as the ones I listed in an above post. Mind you, I will probably never be able to say I'm exactly ninety percent feminine and ten percent masculine, but I don't think that needs to be done because it seems to me that it is a spectrum and a fluid, forever moving one at that. Sometimes labels make things more difficult and this is coming from someone who loves to categorize things.

I'll agree with the "everything being composed of everything" but in order to have a significant overlap and reference point is required. Do to personal experiences and the inability to be someone else, reference points are never the same. Think of a person's focus (as in a single dimensional point) surrounded by a circle in two dimensions. A second person's focus and circle can become very close to one another, even overlapping, but they can never be superimposed upon one another.

I just thought of a better analogy. If you've ever stepped on a nail or had an infected splinter or hangnail or, hell, a cold or the flu, I think it can give you a pretty decent reference point. There is a foreign body in you, whether it's a virus, bacteria, or physical object. It hurts or it makes you feel terrible and your immune system is fighting it to remove it from your body because it knows it doesn't belong there. If it's a virus, you have to let it run its course. If it's bacteria, you can sometimes sterilize the area or go to a physician and get antibiotics. If it's a nail, you know you're going to have to pull it or get someone to do it for you. In any event your immune system is fighting the foreign body. Being trans is like having a foreign body or walking around with a really bad cold for years. You know you need to do something about it. It's as if your body and brain are at odds with one another and your mind is the battlefield.