Being transgender is hard

[Toke]

....
Long story short: I don't know an adequate answer to your question

Well, it is a complicated one.
A few years ago I read of a "Gender-bender" rally in Copenhagen.
It apparently included just about any combination of male-female identity imaginable. I conclude that as there is a sliding scale for sexuality there is one for gender identity as well.

Administratively it is likely best to settle for male(M), female(F), and other(X).

 

[Dessi]

Didn't see this coming:

Fox News' Megyn Kelly stands up in support of transgender rights, defends Chaz Bono:

On "America Live," Kelly said that the argument seemed very, very dubious to her. "Do you really believe that children are going to turn transgender from watching Chaz Bono?" she asked Ablow.

Ablow said that "we kindle behavior in one another," and that it was dangerous for transgender people to be "mainstreamed and celebrated...and lifted to heroic proportions," because it could lead children down a "very torturous road."

Kelly noted that the American Psychiatric Association had given a damning verdict to his views, saying there is "no evidence" to back them up. "Aren't you being irresponsible?" she asked.

"No, what I'm doing is I'm protecting their children," he said. "There's also no evidence that watching will not cause some problems for your kids in terms of their sexual identities."

"It is a recognized disorder!" Kelly said, citing another psychiatrist who vehemently criticized Ablow. Ablow criticized the APA in response.

"I think [viewers] get that our children are no more likely to turn transgendered from watching Chaz Bono than they are to turn gay from watching 'Will and Grace.' You either are or you're not." As Ablow protested, Kelly cut him off. "There's so much hate for gays and lesbians and transgendered people," she said. "...You seem to be adding to the hate."

Watch video here.

 

[Toke]

"Kindle behaviour in each other"
Sure lets get them back in the closet, the world will be a much simpler place if we avoid such complicated issues. Just too bad for the people affected.

If gender identity were that fragile then why are we bothering with it in the first place?

 

[Alt+F4]

Or you can be a cisgendered man in a heterosexual relationship with a transwoman.
Or a cisgendered woman in a heterosexual relationship with a transman.
Or a cisgendered woman in a homosexual relationship with a transwoman.
Or a cisgendered man in a homosexual relationship with a transman.
Or a transwoman in a heterosexual relationship with a transman.
Vice versa for all cases.

Dessi, how dare you mention homosexuality in this thread! You are wrong, you are ignorant, you need to be educated about these issues! I can't believe how little you know!

On a more serious note, I was curious as to why in the FtM study you linked to a few pages back that the researchers made mention that all the trans participants were right handed? Does anyone have insight on this?

 

[Professor Yaffle]

On a more serious note, I was curious as to why in the FtM study you linked to a few pages back that the researchers made mention that all the trans participants were right handed? Does anyone have insight on this?

Handedness is partially determined by conditions in the womb and some studies have found a higher rate of left handedness in both homosexual and transsexual people. Presumably they wanted to make sure any differences they found were not just due to handedness differences.

http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&so...-wcBoAc_8-5uqh3qQ&sig2=T1axMvhfY_Q5ol_QRgK4Dw

http://www.narth.com/docs/lefthand.html

 

[Aepervius]

Kind of an odd thing to say when, earlier in the thread, Earthborn posted:


It seems like your suggestion, that trans people should just accept their body is not the only theoretical treatment.

Transitioning is not maladaptive -- unlike, say, prescribing diet pills to anorexics. Its also easier, improves the lives of trans people, substantially reduces symptoms of gender dysphoria. Its no surprise that every major psychological and psychiatric organization recommend trans people to take steps (supervised by endocrinologist and gender counselor) to integrate into their target gender as an appropriate and preferred treatment for Gender Identity Disorder.

I don't want to throw oil on the fire, but in some medical mental illness the patient reject part of his body as being his own. Goes up to self mutilation. Are you telling us that whether we should help the patient with a surgery to remove the offending limb, rather than psychologically treating the illness is OK and should be left up to the patient ?

because that is essentially what you are saying with transgenderism.

 

[Aepervius]

What claims make you skeptical, and what sort of research are you looking for?

In any case, transgender people have been studied for decades, there are 1000s of studies which are easily accessible in a quick google search. At present, I don't think there's a known "cause" of gender variance (and there could be several different causes that affect people in different stages in life), but its helpful to know that the latest transgender brain studies indicate that tg people have brain structures which closely resemble their target gender.

The study says whereas it is true for f-to-m (and I darkly recall might also be for lesbian through I would have to search http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06/17/amygdala_research/) the article precisely says that in anotehr article for m-to-f the brain are half way

In a separate study, the team used the same technique to compare white matter in 18 male-to-female transsexual people with that in 19 males and 19 females. Surprisingly, in each transsexual person's brain the structure of the white matter in the four regions was halfway between that of the males and females

quote taken from the article you linked. In the article they reference this :

Journal of Psychiatric Research, DOI: 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2010.11.007

So it ain't as clear cut as you say.

 

[Aepervius]

True, I know how hard it was for me to come out on this issue, since then it is easier since people here know, but it's still not easy considering that anyone with half an ounce of detective skill could figure out who I am behind my Avatar, and I'm not transitioning. For someone that is, it is way harder.

The thing that gets me the most is that some people here feel they have a perfect right to judge me and what is going on in my head and to tell me to harden up, accept the body I got born with, and besides it's all a mental disease anyway, and refuse to listen to or accept anything I say. It's the sort of attitude that if it was in RL would make me want to punch them, and then they look surprised and act innocent when told that their statments insult people.

Sure it might sound insulting, but you also have to understand that transgender, as far as my knowledge goes, is one of the rare case where instead of treating the brain (chemically, physiologically, surgically or even with therapy) the body get adapted to the brain.

And while there are *some* correlation offered thru fMRI between the desired gender brain and the disphoria brain, it isn't as clear cut as pretended here.

That said, I am for allowing adult to do whatever they want with their own body, controversially that include widespread stuff like transgender, self multilation, S/M , cannabis smoking, Euthanasia. It is neither mine to forbid or to applaud, it is the people own choice.

 

[Aepervius]

Except that humans don't "self-mutilate out of disdain and discomfort" either. I have yet to hear of any TG woman cutting off her own genitila with a knife or trying to rip it off, it doesn't happen. So if it doesn't happen with humans, why should you expect that sort of thing in animals?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16121084

Most genital self-mutilations in nonpsychotic patients are found in transsexuals, and premeditation of sex-conversion surgery is the main objective. In this paper, we will describe the case of a male-to-female transsexual who took out his testes as a way to facilitate the surgery and to circumvent the Brazilian laws.

 

[Aepervius]

This says otherwise.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16121084

Ha. I see this was already posted. Curse my linear reading of a thread by chronological order.

 

[Dessi]

Transitioning is not maladaptive -- unlike, say, prescribing diet pills to anorexics. Its also easier, improves the lives of trans people, substantially reduces symptoms of gender dysphoria. Its no surprise that every major psychological and psychiatric organization recommend trans people to take steps (supervised by endocrinologist and gender counselor) to integrate into their target gender as an appropriate and preferred treatment for Gender Identity Disorder.

I don't want to throw oil on the fire, but in some medical mental illness the patient reject part of his body as being his own. Goes up to self mutilation. Are you telling us that whether we should help the patient with a surgery to remove the offending limb, rather than psychologically treating the illness is OK and should be left up to the patient ?

because that is essentially what you are saying with transgenderism.

Bold part is important. Unlike people with an irrational amputee fixation, surgical procedures which help them transition are not maladaptive.

A person's gender identity is immutable and unlearned. No matter how hard you try, you can't counsel a person into accepting a new gender -- there are numerous examples where, doing just that, drives a person to suicide (David Reimer, Kurk Murphy). Reparative therapy is dangerous, its quack medicine, and it kills people.

On the other hand, nearly everyone who successfully transitions have a tremendous increase in personal happiness. Transitioning is the treatment for transgenderism and gender dysphoria, which is pretty much the position of every major psychological and psychiatric organization in the world.

Unless you know something different from these organizations or even transgender people themselves, I don't think there's any point comparing gender dysphoria to anorexia or amputee fixators.

 

[L.Y.S.]

I'm still skeptical we haven't analyzed other dysphorias enough to know the nature of this one dysphoria. Science should disprove all alternative physical explanations and go onto prove the proper explanation.

 

[Mark6]

Reading his thread makes me feel really amazed about how some societies we may consider conformist can be laid back on gender issues.

I am thinking about my cousin's classmate in medical school in Russia. According to my cousin, this person was born with both sets of genitals. That being Russia, his/her parents had no resources to operate. He/she grew up androgynous and was fully comfortable with it. To the point of letting med school professors use him/her as an exhibit during relevant lectures.

Try to imagine that in US.

[Edited] Apparently was um... functional, and as far as my cousin knew, liked women.

 

[davefoc]

Please don't feel a need to read through any of the links I listed below. They all more or less express the same question about all this that I have: What is it that makes somebody think they are a different sex than what they seem to be physically?

I have discussed this issue before on this forum and with my family. Essentially, it seems like there are a lot of people that seemed to be mostly women that thought that there really was something intrinsic in our brains that made us know what sex we were and that changing our physical body to match the perception that our brain had about what sex we were might be beneficial in some cases. I don't know of anything that can disprove this idea and it looks like a study was put forth in this thread that supported the idea that there really is something different in the brains of people who view themselves as transgender.

Given my sexual stereotyping about who held what view on this issue I was surprised to see that Alt+F4 (A self professed woman) expressed what was my (I profess to be a man) question so perfectly. Apparently she doesn't understand exactly what the nature of this intrinsic knowledge of what sex we are either. But it seems like she's open to the possibility it exists. But even if it exists it still isn't clear to me why somebody could become so caught up in the idea that their mind and their body were opposite sexes that they would want to mess with hormonal therapies or surgery when in fact neither can accomplish the goal they seek. I think from Alt+F4's view and definitely my view is that if one is physically a woman, but their brain is leading them to lust after other woman they are a homosexual, but what is it in our brain that could drive us to want to look or act like somebody of the opposite sex with such intensity? Most of us have desires to be or do lots of things that we can't be. Generally, the mentally healthy approach is to give up on what is obviously impossible and try something else. I just struggle to see why this doesn't apply to the issue of desiring to be the opposite sex also. And for what it is worth, I don't express this view very strongly with my daughters and wife (a woman) who all think I'm some sort of neanderthal MCP on this issue.

And as an aside: epepke is still around, happy days, I haven't seen any posts by him in a few years.

I, on the contrary, imagine that gender change leads to a decrease in personal happiness in the long term, compared to just getting their head right and living as who they biologically are*.

(* biologically obscure gender cases are not included in the statement)

I've always been curious as to the concept of what being a man or a woman means. If a man gets his penis shot off in a war, is he no longer a man? Of course not. If a trans woman gets her penis turned inside out and turned into something that's not a vagina, is she a woman? I don't think so.

Or, is the concept of being a man or a woman not involved with what genitals we have but rather something totally psychological? That doesn't make sense for me either. I could never understand when a trans woman would say, "I was born in the wrong body, I'm a woman". What do they think that "being a woman" means? A vagina, boobs, high heels, dresses? Or is being a woman or a man nothing other than a societal construct?

To an anorexic we would say (or not actually say, but we would try to get the message somehow through): your body is OK as it is, stop imagining that there is something wrong with your body. A psychological problem, a psychological solution.

I find it subjective and emotionally loaded when the same people who would search a psychological, rather than surgical, help to anorexia refuse to acknowledge the possibility, or ethicality, of the same approach for this other case where a person has a perfectly OK body, but he or she has a negative view about the body. In a world where gender change operations cause irrepairable damage which is impossible to undo if the person later changes his or her mind (which sometimes happens), psychological rather than surgical approaches should self-evidently be the primary way to attempt first. Gender change surgery should be illegal without at least one year proven track record of trying to solve the problem with psychological treatment.

This is a valid concern.

There are a lot of questions about this, and I find it unfortunate that they are not discussed. I'm tight with some trans-advocacy groups, and I've seen a lot of them simply react to these questions with accusations of bigotry.

Whether a child at 10 can make such a decision, however, is less important than another consideration. Most places I know of, at 10, a child does not have the right to refuse medical treatment. If the parents decide that the kid gets a needle stuck in them, then a needle gets stuck in them, period.

So it's really the choice of the parents, and I wonder if at times the parents make bad decisions. Parents make bad decisions for their children all the time. Usually it can be corrected. Usually, this only requires decades of intensive therapy to correct.

It does not, however, cause lifetime sterility, except in extreme cases. That's pretty serious. When various groups of people were sterilized at the hands of the government, people get very offended, and I think rightly so. I think that one has to have an extremely good reason indeed to sterilize children, and I don't think that sufficient reasons have been presented.

I've also seen teevee programs featuring parents of transgender children, and they always say things like "Crissy always wanted to play with dolls instead of trucks." This does not strike me as relevant in any way. I played with a lot of dolls as a kid, and I dressed up in dresses, and sometimes I fervently wished I had been born female. I grew up to be about as male as it is possible to get without magical influence, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Of course, parents of transgendered kids get very agitated and abusive when this is pointed out and insist that they are certain, but there is a curious lack of explanation.

The very first of what was then called a sex-change operation was performed in my lifetime. We still know hardly anything about mental disorders, even seemingly simple ones like depression. There are disorders that psychiatrists aren't even supposed to diagnose at age 18, because there is a perception that people develop throughout adolescence.

Yet, at the same time, we are not only asked to believe that gender dysphoria is so well understood that it is not only acceptable to administer drugs to pre-pubescents that will prevent them from developing a functioning reproductive system, but that our understanding is so incredibly perfect that withholding agreement that it should be done on a regular basis can only be a sign of transphobic bigotry.

Color me skeptical.

Of course, I support everyone's right to do whatever they please with their own bodies.

However, I can't really get myself to consider surgical or hormonal 'sex change' treatments sensible or advisable.

I can very well understand if someone does not want to follow the 'expected' dress code of his or her gender. Or if someone does not want to follow 'expected' gender behaviour. This is something I support politically and also instinctively. I'm not saying all gender 'roles' are absolute social evils, but it's good for everyone if this stuff becomes more optional.

However, when it comes to changing a perfectly functional body, this appears to me to fall in the same category as an anorectic woman removing some ribs to become unnaturally thin, or a man operating himself to get a gigantic penis because he somehow believes this is necessary for his self-esteem. The way I see it, it is not the body that is the problem.

I know there are studies suggesting that sex-change operations improve the well-being of patients. I'm a bit doubtful of these studies, because they all seem to have a very low response rate. If the people responding claim to have had their lives improved, that does not tell us that much, because there may be a very strong correlation between responding to the survey, and having had a positive change. Also, because it's a 'sunk cost' situation, self-evaluation after the fact is not a good measure. Rather, I would like to see a study where patients' well-being is first evaluated before treatment, and then re-evaluated with identical questions after the treatment, with serious efforts made to get a response from all patients.

The way I see it, we may be happy or unhappy with our bodies, but we are what we are. If we do not like our bodies, the solution must be to get ourselves to reconcile ourselves with them anyway, not to make attempts at surgically altering the bodies to somewhat better suit our wishes. If we want to engage in fantasies that we belong to the opposite sex, that is fine. If we want to involve others in that fantasy, that is also fine. I have no problem with that and I do not consider it wrong or pathological or anything. I respect that, absolutely. But I really doubt surgery or hormonal treatment is a solution.

Of course, this does not in any way excuse or mitigate the very widespread and serious persecution against transgender people. Such hatred seems to stem from people being themselves extremely unsure of their own sexuality, having a morbid fear of being 'fooled' by a person's gender appearance. Clearly, if one finds a person attractive, it could not reasonably matter one bit if that person has undergone a sex change operation, or has an appearance not typical of his or her genetic sex, or is dressing contrary to social norms. I consider myself heterosexual, but if one day I found myself romantically involved with someone who turned out to be equipped with a penis, or who was born with one, I'd simply draw the conclusion that I'm actually bisexual. The idea that the shape of someone's genitals should somehow be relevant in a situation where sexual attraction is already a fact, is beyond me.

However, I certainly understand that spouses of people undergoing a sex change operation are often not accepting. I do not believe I would be. Perhaps in the end I might tolerate it, perhaps not. I'm sure I would not be 'estranged' from a spouse for this reason, but I would expect it to probably lead to separation.

I know Alt+F4 work with me here. There have been other racial self-image studies done, the most famous of which were about black children and their self-image issues. Clearly it could be argued the same way for people desiring to be another race. Can we have another racial category on our exams, are you transracial? But the case and point is that several blacks do wish to be white.

Do we as a society allow these individuals to pursue their goals in order to get themselves into racial alignment? You know, to make themselves look more like the race they feel they ought to be. When I heard the man speak on Tyra, I did hear a lot of the privilege issues you mentioned, but I also heard the anatomical dysmorphia he mentioned, not dissimilar to the transgendered argument. He argued he was ugly, he hated how he looks, he hated how being black felt, etc. How can we be certain that similar things don’t cause gender image issues?

If I were magically transformed into a pengiun I would know inside that I was a human because I had experienced what being a human is. What I don't understand (and I'm not trying to be snarky or facetious) is how a MtF trans person can know they are a woman when they have never been one? What does being a woman even mean? I'm a woman and I don't know.

I don't want to throw oil on the fire, but in some medical mental illness the patient reject part of his body as being his own. Goes up to self mutilation. Are you telling us that whether we should help the patient with a surgery to remove the offending limb, rather than psychologically treating the illness is OK and should be left up to the patient ?

because that is essentially what you are saying with transgenderism.

hhh

 

[Earthborn]

But even if it exists it still isn't clear to me why somebody could become so caught up in the idea that their mind and their body were opposite sexes that they would want to mess with hormonal therapies or surgery when in fact neither can accomplish the goal they seek.

Transsexuals don't necessarily seek the goal of becoming the opposite sex. They may just want a body they can be reasonably comfortable with.

I think from Alt+F4's view and definitely my view is that if one is physically a woman, but their brain is leading them to lust after other woman they are a homosexual, but what is it in our brain that could drive us to want to look or act like somebody of the opposite sex with such intensity?

If you can empathise with homosexuals, I don't think it should be so hard to empathise with transgenders. People have sexual preferences because that obviously has an evolutionary advantage. Reproduction has been helped tremendously by the fact that most people have a sexual preference for the opposite sex. Evolution doesn't produce perfection so in some people the mechanism that causes a sexual preference for one opposite sex doesn't work in a reproductively optimal way.

Something similar is likely the case when it comes to "gender identity". I think it is highly likely that there is an evolutionary advantage to feeling comfortable with one's body and with one's sexual characteristics. So what do you think happens when that mechanism malfunctions?

Most of us have desires to be or do lots of things that we can't be. Generally, the mentally healthy approach is to give up on what is obviously impossible and try something else. I just struggle to see why this doesn't apply to the issue of desiring to be the opposite sex also.

Perhaps because living in another gender role and/or having some bodily characteristics altered is not "obviously impossible" ?

And for what it is worth, I don't express this view very strongly with my daughters and wife (a woman) who all think I'm some sort of neanderthal MCP on this issue.

There is nothing wrong with that. Neanderthals are wonderful people. Tell them to stop their anti-Neanderthal bigotry.

Should I order this T-shirt for you?

 

[Alt+F4]

Transsexuals don't necessarily seek the goal of becoming the opposite sex. They may just want a body they can be reasonably comfortable with.

It's my understanding that transgendered folks don't seek the goal of becoming the opposite sex, it's that they are the opposite sex, it's just that their physical body doesn't match that.

 

[Alt+F4]

Given my sexual stereotyping about who held what view on this issue I was surprised to see that Alt+F4 (A self professed woman) expressed what was my (I profess to be a man) question so perfectly. Apparently she doesn't understand exactly what the nature of this intrinsic knowledge of what sex we are either. But it seems like she's open to the possibility it exists.

Indeed, I don't know what it means to "be female" and I have been female for 47 years. I'm just me. As mentioned in previous posts I was very much the tomboy as a child. I loved "boy toys", had short hair and again, I was just me.

Does having a vagina and breasts make someone female? Is it about getting your period, giving birth, going through menopause? Or is it a societial construct?

I'm not trying to be insulting, snarky or facetious but I don't really understand how someone can say they know they were born in the wrong body. Where does that knowledge come from?

 

[tyr_13]

Indeed, I don't know what it means to "be female" and I have been female for 47 years. I'm just me. As mentioned in previous posts I was very much the tomboy as a child. I loved "boy toys", had short hair and again, I was just me.

Does having a vagina and breasts make someone female? Is it about getting your period, giving birth, going through menopause? Or is it a societial construct?

I'm not trying to be insulting, snarky or facetious but I don't really understand how someone can say they know they were born in the wrong body. Where does that knowledge come from?

This is what I meant by keeping in mind that some people answer the questions differently. To some, being a woman is about have breasts and a vagina (or reasonable facsimile). Just having those things will let them feel a lot more like a woman. To others, being a woman is being treated by society as a woman and the plumbing isn't as important. For them, even the full surgery might not be enough as a large part of society will treat them as 'other'. Or no change other than clothing is needed as most people will treat them as they present themselves. Some define womanhood via motherhood, and some define motherhood as biological motherhood.

What is 'good enough' for one person might not work to get the right 'feeling' in another. I've heard the sentiment, "It's horrible that I'll never be a real woman."

In the end it is really what they need to define themselves as a man or a woman that they seek, and not what you or I might consider a man or woman, whether that be the bits or social approval. Many transsexuals just can't get around to understanding that others might already classify them as men or women.

 

[Earthborn]

It's my understanding that transgendered folks don't seek the goal of becoming the opposite sex, it's that they are the opposite sex, it's just that their physical body doesn't match that.

Some express their experience like that, many don't.

Indeed, I don't know what it means to "be female" and I have been female for 47 years. I'm just me.

Cisgenderism tends to do that to people. It works like that for most mechanisms in the human body: unless they break down you likely do not notice them. If they work they seem "obvious".

Does having a vagina and breasts make someone female? Is it about getting your period, giving birth, going through menopause? Or is it a societial construct?

Yes. All those things contribute to making someone female, but as transgendered and intersex individuals show there is not one single thing that makes one female; it is always a combination of contributing factors and some individuals may have some of those while not having others.

I'm not trying to be insulting, snarky or facetious but I don't really understand how someone can say they know they were born in the wrong body. Where does that knowledge come from?

They don't know they are "born in the wrong body", they just know that their experience can make them feel that way. "Born in the wrong body" is not a claim you should take literally. It is more an expression to describe an experience that is at least as confusing for them as it is for you.

 

[Gazpacho]

There are black people who despise not being in the category that their society glorifies (white people)

Do we as a society allow these individuals to pursue their goals in order to get themselves into racial alignment? You know, to make themselves look more like the race they feel they ought to be. When I heard the man speak on Tyra, I did hear a lot of the privilege issues you mentioned, but I also heard the anatomical dysmorphia he mentioned, not dissimilar to the transgendered argument. He argued he was ugly, he hated how he looks, he hated how being black felt, etc. How can we be certain that similar things don’t cause gender image issues?

I would not be certain. TGs' drive for medical treatment in the west comes from their experience living in a western/Christian culture that is ruthlessly heteronormative. In this interview, the guest's physical self-hatred is rather blatantly bound up with people not seeing him in the social class that he wants to be a part of. It's a problem of having "markers" that cause people to perceive him a way he doesn't want to be perceived. If he's really miserable every single day, I'm not going to be the one to tell him that studying sociology for the next few years is the solution and wearing some makeup is not.