#are explaining that sex is different from gender (yes!) and that biological sex is real (no!)

[fandomoddblog]

IDK why but my brain is replay that one very intersexist bit from the "Why JK Rowling's essay is transphobic" Jammi Dodger video and I hate it.

[1010ninetynine]

honestly i don't agree with terf ideology but to call it colonialist is interesting imo.

it’s always so fucking funny to me when terfs are like “how can you say trans women and women are the same thing! being born as a man makes you different!” because like. yes. trans women and cis women are different. so are black women and white women. and straight women and queer woman. and women from different countries and different socioeconomic statuses. there’s diversity in the experience of womanhood? what a wild concept

[catgirlforeskin]

I am the Essentialism anon.

Sorry, I am kind of afraid of making statements with anon off because I don't want to deal with controversy.

Firstly, yes, it was inspired by a post like "You say that I am a transphobe for saying that femboys and trans women are basically the same, but you are wrong! Transphobes say that your biological sex is what matters, not their gender identity. I say that neither sex nor gender are real, none of it matters, so being femboy or trans woman is not different! I am not a TERF, I am very progressive!"

Now to stupid philosophical talk.

Part of my inspiration came from the addition, but yeah, it was like this.

It's an absolutely cruel idea, at least from my perspective and experience. Aside from its inability to describe emergence of gender dysphoria, it basically excludes closeted trans people from "really" being their gender on the basis of not being socially treated as one. They do say that it doesn't matter because none of it is real, but like, there are other people who are recognized as being their gender. You can't solipsism away from it, and this framework offers nothing else. If you live as your CASAB then you participate in society as your CASAB, by their ideas. I hope that they are not stupid enough to openly say it, but if the only way to make your conception of "gender is what societal dynamics you are placed in" is to not apply it to trans people then your conception is just transphobic.

Moving on to gender essentialism. In its practical usage gender essentialism means attributing certain qualities to certain gender. Qualities that are attributed are usually based on existing conceptions of femininity and masculinity, that are based on current iteration of patriarchal system. You can pick different set of qualities, obviously, but it will not make more sense. In this regard, I think that its correct to say that gender as defined as set of qualities is socially constructed, and usually with obvious purposes.

Now, that's the reason that I am on anon, but in any other way it doesn't add up with my experience.

I don't attribute any innate qualities to gender, but I do consider gender an innate quality itself, with no additional conditions or qualities. An eidos, if you will.

A good comparison is electric charge. Its polarity and ammount influence the movement of the charged object, but it doesn't define it. The movement is defined by interaction between the particle, the electric field, and other particles. Particles with same charge can still behave absolutely differently.

The innate gender of person influences their actions through lifetime, but it doesn't define them - the set of material conditions, culture, and gendered social dynamics do. Still, it says nothing about their personality, and people with same gender can otherwise have nothing in common, and their life stories may be absolutely opposite.

Continuing the electric analogy (I literally invented it for this ask so it's raw and has a lot of unfortunate implications, but that's the only comprehensible comparison I have), the constructed gender roles and gendered societal dynamics are like magnets that move people into their socially constructed roles, and patriarchy is the set of those magnets and wires, created to power whatever machine it is currently manifested as.

While laws and material conditions are definitely what patriarchy is based on today, I think that it's daemonic effectiveness and persistence and some other qualities can't be described without analysing the ways culture and society can influence human behaviour far beyound what should be called rationality.

It is probably becoming too complicated, unfortunately.

It probably sounds weird and nonsensical, but I think that it's the only way I can properly explain my experience. My desire to be a woman was born out of pure being, it certainly wasn't born out of being treated as one in my childhood, or out of desire to be treated as one by society. Nobody realistically would think that being treated as a woman by society is desirable, especially considering that I am a lesbian and low-key gnc (which dispels the other explanation of transness). And yet it certainly is desirable for me. Not because I like it better, but because manifesting myself and actualising my gender is that important, I don't think that anybody here needs to hear it.

Unfortunately, due to the fact that the only not inherently essentialist (wow what a combination of words) conception of what makes someone belong to any gender that I was presented with was the thing about "that's how you fit in society and your experience of it". And it sucked hard and overall messed me up a lot. I said that realistically nobody would like to be treated the way women are treated, and yet that's exactly what I wanted. The experience of the most cruelest kinds of misogyny is oftentimes presented as "what makes women women", which is a no nuance radfem take, you are right, but it was more or less accepted as being the "treated" in question by my surroundings, so obviously the fact that I was (almost) never catcalled or told to do traditionally feminine labour at school or whatever in fact gave me a lot of dysphoria (and low-key guilt, to be honest), because if this experience is what defines being a woman, then what am I? And it all started long before I cracked, so it did involve things beyound just societal conditioning or whatever.

You may say that I took it to extremes, and you are right, healthy psyche is not something I possess, but the same goes to seemingly less traumatic parts of what socially constructed female gender entails. Trying to make yourself into acceptable image of a woman is certainly the experience any girl has, and even more so if she is trans. But treating this image as what does it mean to socially function as a woman definitely did a damage to me. It's one thing to get into popular media that you hate but consume to fit in or being docile the way "proper" women are and the whole other one is developing the fucking comphet.

At least now I do have the cis woman ammount of gendered trauma, you stupid girl.

I don't, like, accuse anyone who says that gender is just socially constructed of my suffering, it's just that after dealing with this bulshit and patriarchy I feel everything bad about everything even remotely like this.

(I am better now but what happened over years can't be forgotten)

None of it matters because I am what I am and so is everyone else. I am not "a man becoming a woman", I am just innately a woman placed in circumstances that are antithetical to my being, and even the proper societal definition of a woman is unfitting and traumatic, it is and it always was the experience of a woman, however weird and rare.

Just a charged particle that has to go against the current, and even then she doesn't have the designated place, even though the magnets forced her to go there.

None of it would make sense otherwise.

Sorry for incomprehensibly venting about my stupid life and strange ideas in your inbox. Feel free to call me a mysticist and a charlatan and anything you like.

A lot of that makes sense to me, yeah

To your initial point about the people who say trans women are just femboys because gender/sex aren’t real, I think most of these people do still believe in and enforce a sex binary, whether they realize it or not. The posts usually boil down to grouping trans women with femboys/traps/whatever and against cis women/tme lesbians, and the only reason to do this is if you believe in sex essentialism.

It reminds me a lot of the people who say “sexuality isn’t real, we’re all just bi to some degree heehee XP” but for gender. It’s never meaningful abolitionism, it’s just trying to deconstruct someone else’s identity and say “umm actually mine is the only real, natural one”

A lot of people also just outright don’t understand what something being a social construct means, which is why we get these stupid takes about gender. How gender is constructed in our society is political, it’s the main means of enforcing patriarchy, but like, taking that to say that gender isn’t real at all is a bit silly. It would define trans people out of existence

Also saying gender isn’t a thing to enforce a sex binary is the basis for a certain hate group everyone here loves to talk about, I’m sure that isn’t a coincidence

[aikoiya]

Writing Sins - The Importance of Establishing the Rules of Your Fanfic

Pardon me, ya'll, while I vent.

Because oh my gosh...

I just read a story a while ago... An admittedly well-written story for the most part... but the Fem!Reader in it was after another woman. Now, if that was the end of it, then whatever. She's gay, now let's move on. (Well, technically, she was bi. The whole point of the story was that she'd eventually get together with this one mafia bossman, but I digress.)

But it wasn't. The narrative was that she expected to have "plenty of cute little babies" with this woman &...

Already this was delusional, but to top it all off, the setting was in a place inspired by Victorian England & she was not only a rich girl, but the heiress & only child of her family.

This... entire situation... was patently impossible!

I asked how this was supposed to be possible & the reply I got was something along the lines of "anything's possible for lesbians 😃" & I was like "No, it's not! In fact, this specifically, is not possible for lesbians! The entire reason they are considered lesbians is because neither have the necessary equipment to make it possible! If they did, then they wouldn't be lesbians! Because lesbianism is a sexuality, which the entire point of sexuality is that they are based on a person's preference for a certain, specific biological sex!!"

I just... the thing is... if this were an A/B/O situation then at least then there'd be a logical & biological explanation because 1 of the women wouldn't actually be female (which, remember, is a sex, not a gender, meaning it's immutable & not subject to change), she'd be a hermaphrodite (which is a sex based on the myth of Salmacis & Hermaphroditus in which a male & female become fused into a single entity that possesses the reproductive organs of both sexes & doesn't occur naturally in humans; distinctly different from being intersex as intersexuality is a sexual mutation & even in such situations they are either sterile or only one of their reproductive organs actually work, thus making them not true hermaphrodites), which would've been a good enough explanation for me as to how this would work, but the impression I got was that these girls would just... wishful think these theoretical children into existence because, as it stood, both were biologically female, as neither were indicated to be transwomen or hermaphrodites, & thus neither had the literal gonads to do it... And there was no mention of getting a donor...

There wasn't even a suggestion that in this world there was some way to fertilize an egg using stem cells like they're trying to do IRL. Which, in & of itself deserves an entire rant all on its own, but that's not what we're talking about here, this is about writing! So, ONWARDS!!

So... No... Just no... If you're going to make this sort of assertion at least give a biologically sound explanation as to how.

Admittedly, this universe had magic, but at the same time, you can't just say "its magic" or "a wizard did it" without explaining how the wizard did it. Magic isn't a fix-it button that makes anything & everything possible with the wave of your hands! It's a narrative device that needs to have rules! Otherwise, there's no real conflict because the characters can just ✨️magic✨️ their problems away!

Yes, Star VS the Forces of Evil's magic was like that in a lot of ways, but that's because that was just how their magic system worked & the show establishes it as such, which means that you know going in what to expect: chaos. If you wanna go that way, then sure. Go ahead, but at least bring attention to the situation & give a bullshit excuse for the why & how.

That isn't even taking into account the fact that, realistically, a rich family in a world where the media isn't at the forefront of everyone's consciousness manipulating everyone. SPECIFICALLY, in a world that is inspired by VICTORIAN ENGLAND!! Would NEVER allow this without being ostracized & labled social pariahs & the daughter a degenerate or sexual deviant & the whole family lynched. (That might be a bit of an exaggeration, but I digress.)

Part of the entire themeing of Victorian England is that they were repressed & puritan & all about facades & false perfection, to the point where sex was more of a business transaction! That's part of why it's such a compelling thematic location. Because then you get to juxtapose it with a character or characters that break the mold & challenge societal norms. Otherwise, it isn't a very good inspiration!

Not only that, but this girl was the only fucking child of this wealthy family which would, realistically, put even more pressure on her to find a man to marry & have the children of!

The very idea that this family would actively support such a union in this veerrry specific situation, is just ludicrous. Which, in the story, they just... did... & in a way that made it seem as if the situation was perfectly normal & would not cause consequences. Namely, them having to eventually forfeit their fortune to some other part of the family, if not an entirely different family that they were unrelated to, when neither their daughter nor her wife produced an heir... (Which, if the parents had been painted as loving & accepting & supportive, then I would've been willing to believe as them being willing to accept those consequences for the sake of their daughter's happiness. But they weren't. They were your typical, rich, snobbish, emotionally constipated, socialite parents that stifle & control their spoiled, & equally emotionally constipated children for their own benefits.)

Hell, the author could've kept the whole "female lead living in oppressive society is bi & wants this other girl" thing if they'd have focused on the societal pressure to be straight & produce heirs & how difficult it was to be bisexual/lesbian in a place & time where such things were subject to cruelty. But they didn't. It was just normal & there were no consequences whatsoever to being like that. Which was, by far, the most unbelievable part of the situation.

These impossibilities weren't even mentioned, let alone addressed, as if with the expectation that those reading would just be like, "I see no logical discrepancy here! This is a plausible situation that can absolutely happen in this specific setting!"

Listen, ya'll, I am willing to stretch my suspension of disbelief pretty far so long as you give even a half-hearted attempt at making the plot at least SEEM plausible. Hell, even a bullshit explanation that at least sounds like it could possibly work (but really couldn't if you think hard enough) would've gotten a pass.

And if the story just had one of these many logical fallacies, I might have been more willing to swallow the bullshit, but it wasn't.

It was all of them on top of each other & I just couldn't.

Look, write whatever you want, but if you're posting this stuff, expect to get criticism. That's just how the world works! And if you do post writing with plot points that are factually impossible based on common sense, without *clearly stated* alterations to the basic rules of life, then don't expect all of those reading to be on board!

Let me make this clear. This isn't a complaint based on discrimination. Well, okay, maybe discrimination... specifically against bad writing... I physically cannot read something that is badly written.

Like, don't get me wrong, I'm not expecting anyone to write anything worthy of a Pulitzer or whatever. I'm just asking for a reasonable explanation!

Good day!

Aikoiya's Writing Tips Masterlist

[burningtheroots]

Sex dysphoria (and "Gender" dysphoria) is an ego-syntonic mental health condition, and we need to improve how we view and treat it [here‘s why]

Yes, it‘s quite long.

First of all, there‘s a difference between »sex« (the biological reality one is born with) and »gender« (a social construct which associates one‘s sex with stereotypical traits and behaviors). So, of course, sex dysphoria and "gender" dysphoria aren‘t the same thing, but are usually intertwined.

Let‘s sum up what »ego-syntonic« and »ego-dystonic« mean in the context of psychological disorders:

»Ego-syntonic« means that ideas and our perception match up with our needs, self-image and personality.

»Ego-dystonic« means that ideas and our perception don‘t match up with our feelings, values and personality.

Ego-syntonic disorders, like Body Dysmorphic Disorder, Eating Disorders and Personality Disorders of all kinds make the person who suffers from these mental illnesses perceive them as a part of themselves; a part of their identity. The symptoms are experienced as congruent with their "reality" (e.g. starvation is experienced as a rational solution for the falsely believed flaws one wants to eradicate).

Ego-dystonic disorders, like Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) make the person suffer, but they’re still able to acknowledge that the symptoms they experience are inconsistent with their own perception (e.g. "I‘m going to hurt xy" —> intrusive thought, doesn’t align with the person‘s values) of reality. They have it easier to identify it as a problem which needs to be treated as such, and don‘t identify with their symptoms as a part of their self.

Here‘s a little comparison between OCD and OCPD (obsessive compulsive personality disorder) to make it clearer:

Sex/"gender" dysphoria are ego-syntonic disorders, as they make the person experience the symptoms and identify with them like eating disorders and personality disorders do (also, they often go hand in hand!).

An important doubt I‘ve come across is that sex dysphoric people struggle with what their body parts really are whereas anorexic people (for example) struggle with how they perceive their body parts.

This is a fair argument, however, it‘s not entirely true so we need to take a closer look at it:

People with anorexia and body dysmorphia see what their body actually looks like but perceive it as "wrong" which then translates it to beliefs like "I‘m too fat", or more generally "xy is wrong with me; I‘m xy because of […]". They struggle with the perception of reality and identify with their symptoms, thus believe that these thoughts and feelings represent the truth about their bodies. After all, they struggle with a mental illness, not with their eyesight!

The same applies to sex dysphoria. People who suffer from it see their actual body parts and think they‘re "wrong" which then translates to "I am trapped in the wrong body" and "I need to change xy". They view the thoughts and feelings caused by their dysphoria as a fact, as a representation of reality.

This also explains why "gender affirming care" has rather low rates of regret, as the constant reassurance and affirmation don‘t challenge the symptoms but rather reinforce them.

Anorexia patients are likely to die due to starvation and malnutrition, whereas the negative side effects of hormonal treatment and cosmetic surgeries are not as obvious (but still very real, although often denied).

When you have a person with an eating disorder, they‘re likely to defend their behaviors and perception and feel attacked when you don‘t go along with their symptoms — but you still need to solve it with them. Imagine if we listened more to those stuck in their eating disorder than to those who break the cycle.

When you have a person with OCD, for example, they want their struggles to be recognized as such — as a problem — and receive help. When you go along with their symptoms, they usually feel misunderstood and hopeless (whereas people with ego-syntonic disorders experience these feelings at first when you don‘t go along with their version of reality).

Mental health care providers aren‘t supposed to go along with and reinforce the dysphoria of their patients but rather to actually do research and find ways to treat them. Instead, they tend to follow the rules of gender ideology and don‘t bother to solve the issue — they rather justify its existence. And those who speak against it are silenced immediately.

My criticism therefore clearly lies with the (mental) health system and the gender ideology propaganda. "Gender" is a set of stereotypes which has nothing to do with actually being a man or a woman, and no one is "born in the wrong body". It‘s a mental health condition which isn’t properly recognized and treated as such, which eventually hurts both dysphoric people and women as a sex class.

We need more research, better communication, better understanding and actual treatment options that don‘t rely on or hide behind patriarchal ideas of "identity".

We need more people to acknowledge that dysphoric children are very likely to overcome their dysphoria when they aren‘t constantly affirmed that they "need" to change and conform to anything, and we need to raise more awareness to the underlying mental health issue.

Of course, people who have sex dysphoria and other illnesses mentioned above will and can say that "it‘s not the same", which is true — no disorder is 1:1 like another. That‘s not the point. The point is that sex dysphoria is viewed and treated in an extremely counterproductive way and "professionals" delude their patients further.

Dysphoria goes hand in hand with high rates of anxiety, depression, dissociation and many patients suffer from comorbidities, including eating disorders, autism, personality disorders and BDD. This isn’t a coincidence, and the current approach only makes it worse, although the sufferers are often convinced of the opposite.

By the way, this isn’t about self-expression — everyone is free to present themselves however they like; this is about mental health. No one needs to disrupt or try to debunk reality in order to be themself, but when you‘re constantly told to do so, you end up in an endless cycle. And begin to feel anger towards anyone who and anything that challenges your perception.

Gender ideology isn’t going to help anyone, it‘s only going to keep harming everyone and is taking advantage of actually dysphoric people who are dragged into it and used as a "justification".

I‘m not here to hate. I‘m here to help. Thanks for reading.

[crazyintheeast]

This goes double for people in foreign countries with far less visible LGBTQ community . Like I am on the internet , I have been part of queer fandoms before but I had no idea what being trans meant before watching Orphan Black . Yes that was a mere ten years ago and I had no idea . I heard of the word trans but I thought it was another word for intersex people . I was utterly baffled to discover that trans people existed and frankly the entire concept of gender . In my country we don’t have a word for gender just biological sex so it’s not really something I have ever thought about . And again this is coming from a person who is actively on the internet and has been active in queer communities . People in the real world are far less informed than you believe and most of their information comes from evil bigots like Rowling . So spend more time in the real world and non queer spaces and explain things in calm manner and with a friendly vibe . The difference you can make is enormous

Today I was helping run the booth for the local queer non-profit at the farmer's market and a woman told me that she would like a flag, pointing to our little bucket of flags. So I picked up the bucket and I brought it over and asked her which one she'd like.

"Well, tell me about them!"

"Oh! Okay! This one is the inclusion flag- its for everyone, including allies."

"What's this one?"

"That's the bisexual flag: it represents people who are attracted to two or more genders."

"Hmm... what about this one?"

"That's the nonbinary flag: it represents people whose gender isn't strictly 'male or female.'"

"Hmm... what's this purple one?"

"That's the asexual flag: it represents people who may not feel sexual attraction the way that others do."

She put her hand to her chest and got this really curious look on her face. "Tell me more about that!"

"Oh, happy to! So like if you're out with your bestie and someone real fine walks by and she's like 'omg look at him' and you're like 'girl get a grip?' Or like you just don't get what the 'big deal' is about sex or why everyone is so weird about it? But there's also room for like- you don't fall in love with the way someone looks, you're attracted to the person- their sense of humor and their kindness, or there's something about their personality that just makes it click for you? That's asexuality, too!"

And she got real quiet and seemed to think about it for a minute. So I grabbed our little informational sheet about different queer identities and handed her a copy. "If you want to do some research, this is probably a great place to start."

She thanked me and took an ace flag, stuck it in her hair.

Sometimes when you're online all the time, its easy to think that 'everyone knows about (topic), there's no reason to keep talking about it so much.' But while the people on the internet are real people, the internet ISN'T real life. And there are lots of people who do need to know that they do have community!

One of the jokes is that I'm a lot of people's 'patient zero' for discovering that they're queer. This is why.

[rosiewitchescottage]

I've heard this mentioned around the place.

Because at 7:30 Mr Rogers explains his song lyrics

Boys are boys from the beginning. If you're born a boy then you stay a boy.

Girls are girls from the start. If you're born a girl then you stay a girl.

Of course there are people going ballistic.

There are those saying that this is just used as fuel for transphobia.

And I'm sure that there are people who are doing so. I don't excuse them.

But It Doesn't Mean That What Mr Rogers Said Isn't Right or Good.

Because there's a wide difference between countering gender theory with biological facts, and being transphobic.

Either being trans is rooted in biological facts, or it isn't real, because gender theory is just that, an idea to explore.

If Gender Dysphoria makes maleness therefore manhood or femaleness therefore womanhood unbearable.

Then I can absolutely understand the male living as a woman to distance herself from maleness, or the female living as a man to distance himself from femaleness.

That is rooted in biological reality. The male is a trans woman, not a woman, the female is a trans man not a man.

And this is perfectly OK.

There's no lesser than or greater than. There's just the acknowledgement of biological reality, and how it works.

Mr Rogers is making it clear that whilst a boy will always be a boy, because he's male and his sex won't change.

Whilst a girl will always be a girl because she's female and her sex won't change.

That doesn't mean that the child can't become whatever he/she has the ability and passion to become.

Because he/she most certainly can.

Mr Rogers is just making it clear that we shouldn't be telling children things about their bodies that isn't true.

A feminine or androgynous boy is still a boy

A masculine or androgynous girl is still a girl.

In 1980 we were playing around with these ideas. But they were still a long way from being mainstream.

All this is merely biological fact versus gender theory.

And unless one aims to deny all trans people their rights, then this isn't transphobic.

As the beginning of gender theory came from a monster named Dr John Money, who both lied that his excuse for a failed experiment was a roaring success, and sexually abused both his subjects, who later committed suicide.

I'm not sure whether Mr Rogers would have any truck with it.

Yes. John Money had a terrible childhood, and no doubt Mr Rogers would mourn that.

But the man still decided to behave in this diabolical manner, causing suffering in others on the way.

There have been proper transgender studies. But they were a whole other game of marbles, meticulous care taken off the subjects, the strictest insistence that there be no mental health issues, history of abuse etc, that might otherwise be affecting the young person's self perception.

Plus, those who carried out the study are livid that their work is being used in such a cavalier manner.

They know that the hormones they used are not to be handed out lightly.

And certainly not without making sure that they and not something else entirely, aren't want the patient truly requires.

[transmeds]

I saw your blog and felt like explaining my own view on gender and see your own! I’m not trying to debate so pls don’t get upset, I just want to learn more about tucute/transmed discourse since I’ve been out of the loop for a long time!

I personally believe that gender and biological sex are unrelated and although gender was based on sex, it has grown far beyond that. One’s own experience with gender is different from everyone else’s. Yes, people may have similar views, but one’s one gender experience is unique and only they can determine how they identify.

nobody can tell others how to identify or what’s a “valid” identity. Trying to make rules and specific meanings for something that was constructed by people and has such a loose meaning is impossible and there’s no all-inclusive definition.

pronouns ≠ gender, pronouns are a form of self expression/presentation

neopronouns and xenogenders are just highly specific and unusual ways of identifying one’s self. It’s a form of being non binary. They just describe gender experiences. That’s it. People don’t genuinely think they’re a dog or a galaxy or whatever.

being nonbinary isn’t a third gender, it’s not being entirely male or entirely female. You can be male aligned nonbinary and female aligned non binary because you don’t identify with the binary 100%

sorry if that was a lot, I just had a lot to say! Lol.

see when you describe gender as some vague concept that is a rainbow n different from everyone thats immediately bullshit because... what does that even mean?? you didn't give me an explanation you gave me w definition you would give to a kid because theyre not old enough to understand what you actually meant. unless you truly just dont have a further understanding of what you meant past that.

sure i cant tell anyone how to identify or whatever but i can point out that 99% of the time, all of these stupid genders and things are Just Personalities and making it harder for people who just want to be who they are to exist. there's a reason a shit ton of trans people have started to gravitate back towards transsexual over transgender. because there is a fundamental difference between OUR gender and YOUR gender.

pronouns are NOT A FORM OF SELF EXPRESSION THEYRE A TOOL IN SPEECH TO HELP US SPEAK SMOOTHER AND IDENTIFY THE GENDER OF THE SUBJECT WE ARE TALKING ABOUT. "red isnt a word to describe a color its to describe ur self expression and connection to any color!" no, its to describe the color red.

honestly the whole gender experiences shit is so fucking crazy useless. what the hell is a gender experience? to me gender experiences sounds like how you would get treated because of your gender or at the very least something like do you follow gender roles or not? but to some people apparently its a uniquely personal thing thats unable to be described (often because it isnt real/they know if they did describe they would be told that's.. normal and doesn't make them a different gender) anyways. no theyre not a form of describing unusual ways of identifying or whatever. they're just there for people who dont understand the difference between gender and a personality.

if someone is "not entirely male" they're either not male or not nonbinary you cant be in-between.nonbinary is not binary, so it cant be partially binary. asexual is Not asexual, so it can't be Demisexual. any man who is partially a man but doesn't Relate to other men is still just a man. i was gonna bother saying more n shit but honestly ur message is too long and i don't care anymore.

[lavenderfeminist]

Hello. I have a question and I don’t know if you’ve talked about this before because I’m fairly new to your blog. I also haven’t heard other people talk about it either, but until pretty recently I wouldn’t really use social media so it’s possible people have talked about it and I just don’t know. I’m also curious as to what you have to say. Anyway I don’t know why I’m giving such a long introduction lmao it’s a simple question.

So, you know how gender isn’t real (in an innate biological way) and I’ve recently become quite critical of what it means to be trans if gender is not this innate thing. But something that I can’t wrap my head around is how when people transition, they discover that their sexuality is different. Like there will be lesbians who were like 100% certain of their homosexuality and then they transition and find that they are attracted to men. Sometimes they’ll even quit being attracted to women entirely. And they’ll say stuff like “testosterone makes you gay”. Before, I wouldn’t think too much of it, I would think about that episode in The L Word where Max is transitioning and realizing he likes men when he was a butch lesbian before and he says something along the lines of “it’s not about wether you’re attracted to men or women specifically, it’s about same-sex attraction” sort of stating that since he’s a man now he likes men because he’s same-sex attracted. But now that I’m thinking about how the concept of having a gender identity doesn’t make sense, there’s just male and female, and being same-sex attracted is liking one or the other forever, I’m confused. Does this mean that people like Max were bisexual after all? Does this mean that how you identify with your gender has some sort of impact on your attractions? What does that mean for people who wish for the abolition of gender? How does that explain former lesbians who now aren’t even attracted to women? I doubt they were straight all along. I have never been attracted to men (nor have I ever had the desire to transition), but if I went on T, would I magically start liking men? This is so confusing!!!

Anyway I said it was a simple question and then followed with a whole bunch lmao but thanks for reading anyway✨. No pressure to answer by the way, just curious on what you think.

I wrote my entire response to this and then tumblr deleted it 😭 Here we go again.

The first thing I want to point out is that male homosexuality and female homosexuality are two separate entities. Yes, I relate to and connect with gay men on a social level over our shared experience of homosexuality, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we’re homosexual through the same biological mechanisms. For example, there’s no female counterpart to the fraternal birth order effect. A man’s statistical likelihood of being homosexual increases with his number of older brothers, but there’s currently no recognized phenomenon where a woman’s likelihood of being homosexual is linked in any way to her number of older siblings or their sex. That’s because the hormone they believe is responsible for the fraternal birth order effect influences the development of attraction to males; in a woman, that’s not going to make her a lesbian. I personally believe there are unrecognized phenomena related to the development of lesbianism specifically, which obviously would not have the same effect in males. Of course, there are also some mechanisms that affect both sexes, such as the genes that might be responsible for high instances of both female and male homosexuals in certain families. I don’t think I’m homosexual only as a matter of genes, and that’s not concerning to me. There are no other instances of homosexuality in my family that I know of, so it makes sense to me that I developed this way through mechanisms beyond the genetic material I received from my parents. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t born this way.

Why am I saying all this? Well, because I think Max from The L Word is full of shit. First of all, Max is a character: a representation of a human being, not a human being who actually exists in the world. What that means is that Max was created by living breathing human beings, who have their own beliefs and biases towards homosexuality that are inevitably reflected in her character (hint hint). Second of all, cross-sex hormones…don’t change your sex. A female on testosterone is still female. So even if we believe there are some mechanisms which result in same-sex attraction (rather than male attraction or female attraction), they’re not going to change their presentation in one person, because humans can’t change sex. Max is materially bisexual; she was seemingly attracted to just women for a long time, and now seemingly just men. We’ve all heard of the “bi-cycle” before, where a bisexual person can experience attraction to just one sex for a stretch of time, and then just the other for a stretch of time. This is not uncommon among bisexuals, and that’s in cases where they’re not taking a cross-sex hormone that has the known effect of *drum roll* increasing your sex drive.

Once, when going for a walk with my (to my knowledge at that time, lesbian) ex girlfriend, she lightheartedly confessed to me that she “only fantasize[d] about men when [she was] really, really horny.” If you imagine that I was taken aback, you’d be correct. That is the farthest thing from my experience. Being turned on doesn’t make me more receptive to thoughts of men, it makes me more disgusted by any thought of them. I’m never more hot and bothered for women (and repulsed by men) than when I’m ovulating (which happens to be when women’s testosterone levels increase). It’s not a far-fetched idea to me that if you’re a bisexual woman with a much more significant attraction to women, testosterone is going make you pay more attention to your less-apparent attraction to men. And without getting controversial, if you’re the kind of person to dismiss your attraction to men and call yourself a lesbian, it’s utterly unsurprising to me that once you’re paying more attention to men you’re going to jump right over to calling yourself a gay man. That’s far more believable to me than that testosterone can literally turn a lesbian straight.

Conclusion? No, gender identity doesn’t influence sexuality. No, the abolition of gender does not mean the abolition of homosexuality. Yes, I consider people like Max bisexual. No, testosterone doesn’t turn lesbians straight; bisexuals exist, and they’re very comfortable claiming labels that don’t fit them even before adding in a regressive belief in gender identity.

[intersexcat-tboy]

Respectfully, do not reblog me erasing intersex violence, shut the fuck up. You believe the "beef" to be "experiencing additional transphobia" which... Wow lmao. I don't even know how you got that.

The point being made is it will not protect THEM from bigotry.

Why do you think those with innate differences in their bodies are safe from harm? Do you not realize how absolutely absurd that sounds? This is like those w mental disabilities claiming if it were physical they'd have more support, or people would treat them better, taken seriously.

Just because you may not face bigotry does not mean the rest of us don't. It is well known intersex are of some of the most vulnerable in the entire queer community. 1 in 4 intersex youth from the US have faced physical harm in the past year (via Trevor Project). But yeah sure intersex violence doesn't occur 🙄 22% of intersex respondents in the EU have faced (physical/sexual) violence in the past 5 years, and 42% faced harassment (17% and 48% for trans) in the past year.

"it's very much treated differently than transness" then why is it one of the most common misconceptions we face? Why do multiple / advocacy / groups / have a page discussing the differences or mentioning how they're confused?

Intersexism and transphobia are two different concepts with a lot of overlap. "Less likely to physically attack" ... refer back to previous paragraphs.

Yes, in some places violence against intersex individuals can be argued to be a hate crime based on sex, but not always. Plenty of places have a ban on gender identity related discrimination. Very few explicitly mention intersex. It took the US nearly a decade after gender identity was added to protected classes to confirm intersex traits fell under sex discrimination.

"this issue is more complex than you may be led to believe" is so grossly undermining of my ability to comprehend and witness. You even acknowledge exogenous causes are also still super stigmatizated

Do you genuinely think bigots are going to care about the law? Assault is assault. Trans panic isn't a named law or anything, it's a strategy, and could very well be used against intersex individuals.

"'Panic strategies' are those strategies that try to explain a defendant’s actions […] based upon the knowledge or discovery of [actual or presumed protected class] or associates with a person/group with one or more of these characteristics."

"Essential to the claim of trans panic is the argument that the average heterosexual man would've been provoked into a heat of passion if he'd discovered that the person with whom he'd been sexually intimate wasn't a 'real' female, but a person with male genitalia pretending to be a woman."

"[…] the defendant's violence may be motivated by the defendant's extreme discomfort with gender nonconformity. His act of killing reflects a desire to enforce prevailing gender norms that align sex with gender". These are from Trans Panic Defense Revisited.

"a disgruntled sexual partner could point to 'ambiguous or noncongruent sex features' and claim they had been deceived regarding the 'true' biological sex of their intersex partner." From (Trans)forming the Provocation Defense

Besides... Defendants in the US are charged with homicide ~83% of the time between 1970 and 2020 when using a panic defense, from the Williams Institute.

#also anyone who pits the trans and intersex communities against each other instead of focusing on the source of intersexist and transphobic #violence... (aka perisex cishet people) cannot be trusted as intersex advocates. #least destructive south park fan award for op good job turning your directionless rage into misdirected rage.

No one is pitting communities against each other, and perceiving a request for thoughtful consideration of how ones actions can affect others, and respect for our experiences, says more about you than it does about the OP

You are literally spreading misinformation. YOU cannot be trusted as an advocate

PLEASE STOP TELLING PEOPLE YOU HAVE A TESTOSTERONE/ESTROGEN DEFICIENCY IF YOURE A PERISEX TRANS PERSON. not only is it becoming a mainstream “excuse” for a lack of passing, meaning it’s not very effective, but it also contributes to stigma against intersex people and our… everything, really. you’re basically saying that intersex people are medical anomalies and that our struggles are comparable to the trans experience (some are, many aren’t).

sincerely, an intersex trans man who grew up with people mocking my intersex characteristics, only for some ppl to use them to their advantage transition-wise.

[a-room-of-my-own]

A while before the latest hoo-ha about Judith Butler, I had just been reading her again. Though she claims her critics have not read her, this simply isn’t the case. I read Gender Trouble when it first came out and it was important at the time . That time was long,long ago. She was just one of the many ‘post-structuralist’ thinkers I was into. I would trip off to see  Luce Irigaray or Derrida whenever they appeared.

I got an interview  with Baudrillard and tried to sell it to The Guardian but they  didn’t know who he was so its fair to say I was fairly immersed in that world of theory.  For a while, I had a part time lecturing job so I had to keep on top of it. Though Butler’s idea of gender as performance was not new , it was interesting.  RuPaul said it so much more clearly in a  quote nicked from  someone else “Honey ,we are born naked, the rest is drag”

What I was looking for again , I guess is not any clarity – her writing is famously and deliberately difficult-  but whether there was ever any sense of the material body. She wrote herself in 2004 “I confess however I am not a very good materialist. Every time I try to write about the body, the writing ends up being about language” . 

Butler from on high ,cannot really think about the body at all which is why they (Butler’s chosen pronoun) are now the high priestess of a particular kind of trans ideology.  The men who worship Butler are not versed in high theory. The fox botherer had a “brain swoon” at some very ordinary things Butler said. Mr Right Side of history nodded along in an interview. Clearly neither of these men are versed in any of this philosophy and would be better off sticking to tax law and the decline of the Labour Party. Butler is simply a totem for them.

Butler said in the Guardian interview for instance  “Gender is an assignment that does not just happen once: it is ongoing. We are assigned a sex at birth and then a slew of expectations follow which continue to “assign” gender to us.”

So yeah? That’s a fairly basic view of the social construction of gender though I take issue with the assigned at birth thing ,which I will come back to and why I started reading her again in the first place.

This phrase “Assigned sex at birth” is now common parlance but simply does not make sense  to me. I am living with someone who is pregnant. I have given birth three times and been a birthing  partner. I know where babies come from. There is a deep disconnect here between language and reality which no amount of academic jargon can obliterate. 

Babies  come from bodies. Not any bodies but bodies that have a uterus. They grew inside a woman’s body until they  get pushed out or dragged out into the world. 

The facts of life that we are now to be liberated from in the form of denial. Only one sex can have babies but we must now somehow not say that. The pregnant “people” of Texas will now be forced into giving birth to children they don’t want because they are simply “host bodies”. The language of patriarchal supremacy and that of some of the trans ideologues is remarkably close, as is their biological ignorance.

There is no foetal heatbeat at six weeks for instance. When a baby is born , doctors and midwives do not randomly assign a sex, they observe it and they do it though genitalia. 

There is a question over a tiny percentage of babies ,less that one percent with DSDs but even then they are sexed with doctors having  difficult conversations with parents about what may happen later.

Somehow, though when I read the way in which this is now all discussed it is clear to me that the people talking have never been pregnant, never had a foetal scan, never been near a birth , never miscarried, do not understand that even with a still birth babies are still sexed and often named. 

If you want to know the sex of your baby you can pay privately and know at 7 weeks ((*49-56 days from the first day of the mother’s last menstrual cycle). A 12 week scan will show it. That is why so many female foetuses are aborted . I have reported on this. 

Talking to paediatricians about this is interesting because they do indeed have to think through these things that we are being told are not real eg. that sex is just a by-product of colonialism for instance.  Sometimes pre-conception , geneticists will be looking at chromosomes because certain diseases are more likely in men or women. Males have a higher risk of haemophilia for instance.  

One doctor told me “When babies are premature, the survival advantage of females over males is well known throughout neonatology. This is sometimes something we talk about with parents when there is threatened premature labour around 23 weeks' gestation and options to discuss about resuscitation and medical interventions. In fertility treatment (or counselling around fertility in the context of medical treatments) it is pretty inherent to know whether we need to plan around sperm, or ova + pregnancy.”

She also said that if she involved in a birth that “assigning” isn’t the word she world use. “Observed genitals a highly reliable observation, just like measuring weight or head circumference which is also done at this time. “ Another doctor said that anyone involved with a trans man giving birth  would be doing the best for the patient in front  of them. 

Sex then is biological fact. A female baby will have all the eggs she will ever have when she is first born which is kind of amazing. It is not bio-essentialist to say that our sexed bodies are different nor is it transphobic to recognise it.

Except of course in my old newspaper ,The Guardian who are now so hamstrung by their  own ideology they have got their knickers in such a twist they can barely walk.  They completely misreported the WiSpa incident , basically ignored the Sonia  Appleby  judgement at the Tavistock. Appleby was a whistle blower ,a respected professional concerned with safe guarding. She won her case. The cherry on the cake this week was an interview with Butler, themselves (?) in which they went on about Terfs being fascists and needing to extend the category of women.

Does anyone EVER stop to think that most gender critical women are of the left, supporters of gay rights, often lesbian and that this is not America? We are not in bed with the far right. This is bollocks. Just another way to dismiss us.  

As we watch Afghanistan and Texas ,to say Butler’s words were tone deaf is to say the least. But they didn’t even have the guts to keep the most offensive stuff in the piece and overnight edited it out without really explaining why : the bits where Butler described gender critical people as fascist. Perhaps because the person their “reporters” had  defended against  transphobia at WiSpa turned out to be a known sex offender,  perhaps because someone pointed out that Butler was throwing around the word fascist rather like Rik Mayall used to do in the Young Ones. 

All of this is rather desperate and readers deserve better. When I left that newspaper I said that I thought and expected editors to stand up for their writers in public. Instead they go into some catatonic paralysis. I may have not liked this interview but it should never have been cut. Stand by what you publish or your credibility is shot.

But this is about more than Judith Butler and their refusal to support women . Butler is not really any kind of feminist at all. What this is about is the large edifice of trans ideology  crumbling when any real analysis is applied. Yes, I have read Shon Faye’s book and there are some interesting points in it and I totally agree that the lives of trans people should be easier and health care better . I have never said anything but that.

What Faye does in the book is say that there can be no trans liberation under capitalism so there will be a bit of a wait I suspect. 

Yet surely it is the other way round and what we are seeing is that trans ideology (not trans people – I am making a distinction here ) represent the apex of capitalism .

For it means that the individual decides their own gendered essence and then spends a fortune on surgery and a lifetime on medication to achieve the appearance of it. Of course lots of people spend a lifetime  on medication but not out of choice.  Marx understood very well that the abolition of our system of production would free up women.

Now it is all about freeing up men. Who say they are women. Quelle surprise.  

 Nussbaum’s famous take down of Butler is premised exactly on the sense of individual versus collective struggle “ The great tragedy in the new feminist theory in America is the loss of a sense of public commitment. In this sense, Butler’s self-involved feminism is extremely American, and it is not surprising that it has caught on here, where successful middle-class people prefer to focus on cultivating the self rather than thinking in a way that helps the material condition of others. “

Such thinking now dominates academia. There is simply an unquestioning  rehearsal of something most of know not to be true thus Amia Srinivasan writes in The Right to Sex  “At birth, bodies are sorted as ‘male’ or ‘female’, though many bodies must be mutilated to fit one category or the other, and many bodies will later protest against the decision that was made. This originary division determines what social purpose a body will be assigned.”

What does ‘sorted’ mean here? A tiny number of intersex babies are born. A tiny number of people are trans and decide to change their bodies. The feminist demand to challenge gender norms without mutilating any one’s body no longer matters. What matters now is this retrograde return  to some gendered soul. This is not something any decent Marxist would have any truck with . Of course one may change over a lifetime and of course gender is never ‘settled.’ We are complex people who inhabit bodies that often don’t work or appear as we want them to.

But not only is there a denial of basic Marxism going on here , what becomes ever more apparent is  that there is a denial of motherhood. Butler said “Yet gender is also what is made along the way – we can take over the power of assignment, make it into self-assignment, which can include sex reassignment at a legal and medical level.”

Self-assignment is key . One may birth oneself. No longer of woman born but self -made. This is a theoretical leap but it also one that has profound implications for women as a sex class. We are really then, just the  host bodies to a new breed of people who self-assign.

Maybe that is the future although look around the word and there isn’t a lot of self-assignment going on. There are simply women shot and beaten in the street, choked to death or having  their rights taken  away. There is no identifying out of this , there is no fluidity here . This is not discourse. It is brutality and do we not have some responsibility to other women to confront male violence ?

Instead the hatred is aided and abetted by so called philosophers describing  other women as Terfs. It is utterly depressing.

The sexed body. The pregnant body. The dying body. The body is in trouble when we can’t talk about it . I thought of Margaret Mary O’Hara’s  beautiful and  strange lyrics and what they might mean. I await my child’s return from the hospital as hers is a difficult pregnancy and thank god they are on the case. The sex of the child she carries does not matter to me at all .

It simply exists. Not in language but within a body. 

Why is that so difficult to acknowledge? 

[gingerswagfreckles]

Queer is my fave word, thanks for posting about that book, I'm gonna try to get a copy! It's just awesome to have an umbrella term for not feeling cis-hetero but not entirely certain where you fit under the umbrella yet.

Ahh yes!! You mean Gay New York by George Chauncey? That book is THE book on queer history in the US (it's really not just about NYC, but it is focused there). Not only is it the most meticulously well researched book I have EVER read, it is just. So brilliant in how it analyses the construction of and intersection of gender, sexuality, biological sex, class, race, and society. Like I read it for a class in freshman year of college and trust me I was already EXTREMELY liberal and well versed in queer discourse. Yet it completely I mean COMPLETELY changed my understanding of not only sex and gender but just like. What identity is, how much of what we see as static and natural are actually very contextual social constructs. And it really showed in a very concrete and reality based way how every identity exists and is defined through the context of its environment, and that while our experiences are very inherently real, the lines we draw around these experiences to define them are not. Like. The existence of a queer identity the way we generally think of it now did NOT exist in the same way throughout history. The intersection of so many facets of life have been interpreted so completely differently throughout history and in different places and social contexts. The queer community has never been some static and well defined club that one is or is not a member of. It is and always has been a nebulous and highly changeable social network of people with common experiences and interests who have defined their own communities in wildly different ways depending on where you look. Trying to strictly define who does or does not belong in or who has or hasn't existed in the queer community throughout history is completely pointless, because in reality we are talking about an absolutely enormous group of people who have been variously connected to and socially isolated from others, who have seen their own identities and their own communities in completely different ways.

It really highlighted for me how pointless 99% of the discourse on this website is, and how much almost all of it boils down to a fundamental misunderstanding of what identity is. NONE of the identities we think of as inherently real are inherently real, and arguing about who should be included in a community or who's identities are "valid" just shows that you think the framework through which you understand sex and gender is universal rather than cultural, contextual, and highly individual. Like, identities overlap! Identities step on each others toes!!! Words and labels change, and people do not universally agree on what they mean at any point in time!!! You would not believe how many people who you would think of as being part of the queer community didn't think of themselves as part of the queer community, and you would not believe how many people who you do NOT think of as part of the queer community DID see themselves as part of it, and were accepted!!

Like, for example, the interpretation of what it even meant to be "homosexual" was SO different depending on what period on time you look at, what location, what social and financial class these people were part of, what racial identity they saw themselves as (and that's a whole 'nother can of worms!) Sexuality was often seen as MUCH more connected to gender performance and sexual roles one took than it is today, and a lot, I mean a LOT of men who always topped did not see themselves as homosexual/gay/part of the queer community at all, especially in working class communities. And!! Guess what!! This is the part that will really blow your mind!!!

T H E Y W E R E N ' T W R O N G!!!!!!!!!!!

They were not WRONG about how they defined their identities or how they saw themselves in relation to a certain social community!! Because they were using their OWN social and sexual framework to interpret their identities and their actions!!! And saying they were WRONG in their interpretation fundamentally misunderstands that the criteria YOU use to measure whether someone is part of an identity or social group is not any more correct or real than the criteria THEY used! Saying these people were "wrong" is to impose one's own modern and highly contextual social framework on people from the past-- and TBH it's fine to see people from the past through modern lenses, and to recognize that they would be seen as gay/a certain identity by modern standards. That's fine! But the way they saw themselves then wasn't wrong, it was just different, and your criteria for what you see as gay or straight or part of a community is just as arbitrary and based on the context of your environment as theirs was.

People like to argue with this all the time, saying things like that these individuals were just suffering from internalized homophobia, gender bias, ignorance of what this or that identity "really" means, and these people are really really really misunderstanding the point. These are usually the same people who say things like "words mean things!!" when points like the one I'm making are brought up, because they continue to misunderstand how much these words yes, mean things, but mean things within historical and cultural contexts that are NOT shared by the entire world. Like, ok, you may say our example man from the 1910s is gay whether he recognized that or not, because he engaged in homosexual acts. But what does it mean to have homosexual sex? To have sex with someone of the same biological sex? Well what is biological sex, and how do we define what makes ones biological sex the "same" or "different" from your own? Is it someone with the same type of genitals as you? That's not a universally shared opinion, and the way you define the "types" of genitals are not universally shared either. What if I told you that there have been cultures throughout history who have categorized biological sex through the length of the penis, with people with shorter penises being seen as a separate sex than those who have longer penises? So two people with penises could have sex with each other and not be understood as having sex with someone of the same sex, in that culture!

Oh, that's not what you meant? That's wrong? Why? Why? Because your personal understanding and your culture's general perception of what biological sex is is more valid and real than that culture's? Why? WHY? Could you really explain why, or is it just that the difference is making you uncomfortable, because it threatens your perception of a LOT of the ideas you see as inherently real?

And we could do the same thing with the ACT of sex! I mean, what is sex? What physical acts are sexual, and what aren't? Is it just someone putting a body part inside of another person's body in some way? Well what about handjobs and other kinds of outercourse? Is sex then some physical thing we do in pursuit of an orgasm? What if you don't orgasm? Is it not sex then? Is sex the use of our bodies to derive general physical pleasure? Well what about a massage? Is a massage sex? In some times and places, many people would have said yes!

These aren't just theoretical questions- Chauncey outlines how these differing definitions of what sex is and what makes it queer not only allowed for a lot of people we would unquestioningly think of as part of the queer community to exclude themselves, but also resulted in the inclusion of people we would never consider to be queer now. Like, most female prostitutes who served only male cliental absolutely hands down refused to give blow jobs in the early 1900s, because blowjobs were seen as an extremely deviant expression of sexuality and were understood to be part of "homosexual" activity, regardless of the sex or genders of the people involved, because it was sexual activity that explicitly was not seeking to create a baby. This was a widely understood concept at the time, and persisted despite the fact that many of these women were using contraception and therefore obviously not seeking to get pregnant. Blowjobs were still seen as perverse and "homosexual," and thus not something most regular female prostitutes were willing to engage in.

Therefore! Female prostitutes who only ever had sex with male cliental but DID provide oral sex (and many other not-penis-in-vagina-activities) were often lumped in with lesbians!!! And treated as such in arrest records and propaganda! And guess what?? As a result, guess who these women usually hung around with, and where they usually could be found? Within the queer community and queer spaces!! These women were seen by the broader society as well as by much of the queer community as QUEER, and many of them likely understood themselves this way as well!

And for the record, these questions of what sex is and what gender is and what makes it gay or straight or whatever are not questions that belong strictly to the past. Survey the general population about what act they consider to have been the one where they "lost their virginity," and you will get wildly different answers. Survey self identified gay or straight people on what kind of sex acts they engage with and with who, and you will similarly find an enormous variation in reports.

And these questions MATTER! These questions matter, not in that we have to find some way to answer them, but in order to understand that we can't, definitively, and that thinking our own perceptions of any of these things are more valid than others' perceptions is incredibly harmful and dismissive to the lived experiences of other people. You can't define other people's identities out of existence just because they threaten or overlap or contradict with your own understanding of some concept, because your definitions of literally any of the criteria you are using to try to build your boxes are ALSO up for interpretation!

Like, I'm sorry I know I am rambling soooo much but you opened the same floodgates that this book opened back when I read it. If the people on this stupid website had any understanding of the history they claim to know so much about, they would see how their attitudes of "this identity is more valid than that identity" and "you can't sit with us because you're not actually part of this or that identity because my definition is better than your definition" is nothing new or woke or progressive, but is the exact same shit that has always been done and has been used to marginalize people who's existence or behaviors threaten the status quo. Like yelling at asexual or pansexual or nonbinary or aromantic people or whatever other group that they don't belong, or that their identity isn't real because it threatens the perceived integrity of another identity...it's all so stupid!! Your identity is also just a way for you to define yourself within your cultural context! Like I've literally seen people be like "asexality isn't a real identity bc if we didn't live in a society that was so sex obsessed then you wouldn't feel the need to define yourself this way." And it's like....what?? Yeah, ok??? But we do live in this society???????? And you can say that about LITERALLY ANY identity??! Not even ones related to sex and gender! Like "you aren't really deaf and deafness isn't real, because if we lived in a world without sound then you wouldn't notice you couldn't hear." Like yeah?? But we do live in a world with sound?? So...people find this term useful to articulate their experiences? And they might even dare to form an identity around it, and maybe a community, and might even become proud of it, even though it is a social construct, just like pretty much everything else??

It just drives me nuts. We go around and around in circles without ever understanding that so much of the bigotry we face is the same thing we are perpetuating with each other, because we don't understand that it is natural and normal for people's definitions of certain identities to conflict, and for their interpretations of the world to run up against each other sometimes. And that there is no strictly defined queer community, and who does or doesn't "belong" is not a decision that any one person or even any one culture gets to make, ever.

To try to finally actually wrap back around to what your actual comment was to begin with, I think queer is a wonderful word, and that GENERALLY SPEAKING in our current cultural context, it is used to encapsulate so much of the messiness and overlap that makes people so uncomfortable, but is what makes the queer community so great!!!!! That being said, it of course has had different definitions in different time periods and cultural contexts just like everything else, and some people may still have negative connotations associated with it and therefore not feel comfortable using it to self-identify. And that's fine too, as long as you don't try to force other people to stop using the term to describe their own identities on the basis that your definition is more real than theirs, which is the opposite of what queer history is all about.

If anyone is interested in the book I am talking about, you can buy it as an ebook, audiobook, or paper copy here: https://www.basicbooks.com/titles/george-chauncey/gay-new-york/9780786723355/

It goes into way way way more depth about everything I'm rambling about here, and backs it up with the most research and evidence I've ever seen in one single book. The physical copy is about as thick as two bricks stacked on top of each other, so if you can't get an exclusionist to read it, you can always just whack them over the head.

[girlswillbeboys11]

In case anyone felt berated by her saying she did extensive “research,” please know she completely misunderstood dysphoria and then proceeded to misquote a feminist out of context.

Edit: I have already responded with a further explanation of my analysis of The Second Sex. While people have responded ignoring that calling me a man, a misogynist, and a homophob, who doesn't read books, I would like to point out two things.

First, I am a gay feminist woman who not only is an English major but a multi- published writer with experience in the publishing industry. So, yes, I do in fact read. I’ve probably read more books last year during my work with a lit agency than most of you have read in five.

Second, while transphobic individuals love to use The Second Sex to further their point, there have been a number of academics who say the author probably would have supported Trans rights, as her entire point was society forces roles onto women and men alike. While she notes the biological differences, she also recognizes when it comes to gender, it’s a complete social invention. This idea does not negate Trans identity. To me, it only furthers it.

So far, I have only had one person come to have a real conversation with me. Everyone else is reposting with hate speech, nonsensical comparisons, and jumps to conclusions about myself that miss the mark so bad it’s comical. You can have a different opinion than me, but please don’t insult your own intelligence by using blatant logical fallacies as “arguments.”

Second edit:  Essay Published by NMU explaining why Simone de Beauvoir would probably support Trans rights based on her work

 Article From Yale Exploring De Beauvoir’s The Second Sex & while it was written for women, explaining how it was an argument for freedom of authenticity regardless of gender and opened the door to accept new gender interpretation 

Essay using De Beauvoir & other famous feminists to explain the history of Transgender theory, stating that De Beauvoir jump started the idea of dismantling gender and redefining sex 

Quotes from Simone De Beauvoir that transphobic people ignore: 

 "The situation does not depend on the body; the reverse is true. It is how we conceive of the body that matters, not the body itself," (page 697).  

"Man is defined as a being who is not fixed, who makes himself what he is. Man is not a natural species: he is a historical idea," (page 716)  

"The body is not a thing, it is a situation: it is our grasp on the world and our sketch of our project," (page 34).

 & the quote everyone is up in arms about me "misunderstanding" in full. 

 "One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman. No biological, psychological, or economic fate determines the figure that the human female presents in society; it is civilization as a whole that produces this creature, intermediate between male and eunuch, which is described as feminine," (page 267).  

Lastly, I would like you to reread the sentence, "no biological, psychological, or economical fate determines the figure that the human female presents in society."  Simone de Beauvoir stood for dismantling gender and meaning behind sex. She understood that sex had no meaning other than that which society concocts for it. I know she is loved by terfs who take her discussion on sexual oppression and morph it into a weapon of hate, but I feel you are the ones that need to better understand her. All the arguments I've heard are cherry picked and surface. I, in all honesty, am not the biggest fan of Simone de Beauvoir, as she was very anti family, but to use De Beauvoir's work on destroying the idea of "women" to hate on Transgender people is a vastly tepid take.

[lorynna]

I have some thoughts/questions I ask myself, that I'd like to share with the radfem community. I have not been able to answer these for myself yet.

I am still so undecided about this topic of when I see a TIM that puts a huge effort into their appearance and there are some cases (most in which they started hormone blockers and estrogen early in puberty) where you could meet them in person and would not be able to tell that they are male.

Of course I get the hypocrisy of this video where a male is trying to explain to another male that he is not "woman" enough. But isn't it also hypocrisy switching from calling a TIM a she (because they passed so well you couldn't tell) to a he, the moment you find out? - general question, not in reference to this because I think you can still pretty much tell here.

I find that I sympathize way more with TIMs that actually put an effort into their appearance to seem like a woman, even when it's heavy make-up, long nails, extensions, fake lashes, hyper feminine clothing and god knows what more, than their counterparts like the man with the beard in the first part of the video who is not trying at all and expecting to be addressed as a woman. That's what they see being presented in the media of how women are and how they present themselves. It makes sense to me that they would not dress in unisex clothing, not do make-up or everything they deem as feminine because their view of womanhood is warped the same way as many women's when it comes to beauty etc. and in their mind it is the first time they feel like they can finally try all of it. Same with Blaire White, I do not see him as a "female" or a woman in that matter and yes, he has also had mysogynistic takes, but overall his takes on transgenderism show me that there are some people more or less capable of logic, that do condemn gender ideology but just have such an intense case of gender disphoria that they chose to go down this path. Another example would be Buck Angel.

Especially in cases of TIFs even when they start their journey after puberty they almost always pass as males, because of testosterone. Be honest, would you be able to tell Buck Angel is a female? Because I am saying I couldn't. And that's the twist, how does it make sense to refer to them as their sexed pronouns when they look so differently? I catch myself calling Blaire a she often or Buck a he. Still, a real sex transition isn't possible and you will always be male or female regardless of surgeries or appearance, you will always have been socialized either male or female and I recognize this even after their transition. TIMs are overall from I have witnessed still so arrogant, self-indulgent and have a lot of audacity, whereas TIFs are rather compromising, do not want a lot of attention and would not threaten people misgendering them with violence or rape. Rape is a male crime and the amount if TIMs I have seen on this page, a lot of them under the specific hashtag "terfbreaking" etc....

Of course I criticize the trans movement, it seems overall nonsensical to me, and it's linked closely to gender ideology which I strongly condemn. Just sometimes I ask myself what does the radfem community think is the right treatment for someone with strong gender disphoria, which is medically recognized? For all I know therapy was tried but apparently it does not work as well as a "transition" until their (in this case) specific biological markers / indicators of their sex like a beard, Adam's apple, deep voice, penis etc. are gone and replaced with markers that look the closest to what a female biologically would have, like breasts, a vagina, smooth face, female features overall.

The only thing is, disphoria seems to be of different intensity from person to person. Someone might go through all of their surgeries, someone might only do it partly. (Not talking about the cases in which a male might transition because it arouses him, also not talking about children being fed hormone blockers or cross sex hormones.. another topic)

And yes,regardless of how many surgeries a male can never be a female and a female could never be a male and patients awaiting a "transition" should never be given the illusion that they could be and compared to body dismorphia where a patient does not recognize their leg being part of their body and wants it removed, it is weird that we deny the request there but affirm it in the case of gender disphoria. Also adding that those surgeries come with a great risk of infection or life long issues, not even talking about the hormones yet.

Are their any good, reliable studies on the effects of therapy in regards to gender disphoria compared to a "transition" or studies on gender disphoria itself? If you have any please send them to me.

Yeah, I guess this was most of me just rambling, I hope that maybe some of you want to reply or show me your side of thoughts and if you at some point had the same questions and how you answered it for yourself. Would help a great deal because I'm not making progress on these.

I suggest everyone takes a look at her tik tok

I love the way she does not bullshit or cut corners when it comes to talking about issues in the trans community

What do y’all think?

[bookfreaky]

Identity in Reality

It seems inconceivable to cis people that trans people are not always sure about how to approach their own gender identity, that’s because for the cisgenders their concept of what gender is has been introduced to them in numerous forms of behaviour and image since they were little babies. Society imprints patterned images for what is “masculine” and what is “feminine” and anything that deviates from these two standards are outcasted or labelled as usual or degenerate. There are lots of ways to identify in sex and in gender that are left out just because they do not attend to the gender norm.

You might expect that transgender people are to be confused navigating their own gender identifies, trans women have doubts and feel uncomfortable with the patterned idea of femininity, trans men often feel suffocated by the toxic high standards of normalized masculinity. It does NOT mean that these people are pretending to be something they aren’t, or that gender isn’t real, neither that their experiences with their own gender identities aren’t genuine.

The common standard of masculine and feminine can be not comfortable for many cis women and men, so one can only imagine how confusing, stressful and calcifying it must feel to trans people, who have not been educated into which their gender since birth, or rather, such education was indeed given but has otherwise not other useful purpose but to name, to label, but not to explain.  

The argument on transgender issues is a metaphysical one. Differently from the argument on homosexuality, which for decades brought out to public debate whether or not two people of the same sex being together sexually and romantically were natural or morally correct, the transgender issue debates whether or not trans people are real. Transsexuals, transgender men and women and travesties have to constantly fight to have their existence recognized as real, as valid and as something that matters. A society that denies trans people this recognition is a society that chooses to exclude, and therefore to kill, them.

It’s very on vogue in anti-trans groups nowadays the argument that society cannot accept as “proof” of their identity the simple declaration that they are who they are. As if people documents and public relations had some kind of biological examination attached to them. Discussing with this type of thinking is always a trap. Because if you argue that to be transgender there has to be certain characteristics that will formulate your identity, like any other identity really, easily you can fall into the discourse that transgenderism can be defined by “symptoms” and can pathologized, as it had been once in the past. And if you say that people’s self-perception only is all you need to recognize them, they will argue that the entire concept of identity is subjective, therefore, inclined to the unrealistic.

Trans identities are not a collective hallucination, we are not fantastical, not delirious, neither are we assuming that we will be XX or XY chromosome beings, but yes we are bringing the manifesto that says that identity is beyond what is written on the medical books. The way we live, the way to relate to others, the way we behave, we create art, we love and seek for love, all those things are what define us. We are different, but real.  

[comrade-meow]

A recent survey found trans people do not always understand how sexual health advice applies to them when clinicians talk about gender rather than anatomy, report Melanie Newman and Julie Bindel.

Since 2019 the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV (BASHH) has recommended sexual health clinics ask service users for the gender of their sexual partners, rather than if they are male or female.

But a report of a survey by Waverley Care and Scottish Trans of trans people’s access to sexual health services in Scotland found references to gender were causing confusion.

“Participants told us that they lacked access to tailored information to enable them to understand how sexual health advice applied to their circumstances,” the report said. “This was especially the case if risk factors or prevention options were communicated with reference to gender, rather than anatomy.”

The report added that participants cited access to HIV preventative drug PrEP, as an example of this confusion. “Many non-binary participants were unable to understand whether they would be eligible for PrEP, despite reporting potentially high-risk sexual behaviour,” it said.

BASHH also advises clinicians to use patients’ preferred terms to describe their anatomy and discuss their bodies using models or diagrams rather than “anatomically correct terminology”.

Dr John McSorley, President of BASHH, said it is important language in sexual health consultations is inclusive of all genders while also obtaining all the relevant clinical information.

He explained: “It is generally good practice for all medical history taking to start with more open questions and we feel that asking about the partner’s gender accomplishes that (rather than asking a closed question that only gives the option of male or female). Of course, the clinician will follow that up with more detailed questions.”

“Healthcare workers, should treat everyone politely and sensitively, but viruses do not recognise pronouns.”

But critics say ignoring biological sex in healthcare settings and health data risks obscuring medical realities for patients and policy makers.

Maya Forstater, of the campaign group Sex Matters, said when it came to healthcare not recording birth sex was “reckless”. “Healthcare workers, should treat everyone politely and sensitively, but viruses do not recognise pronouns,” she said.

A decision to drop a question about biological sex from official surveys about HIV and STIs has also proved contentious.

Public Health England told sexual health and HIV clinics to stop collecting data on the sex of service users after advice from the LGBT Foundation that it may be unlawful to do so.

Clinics now ask patients for their gender identity and give them the option of preferring not to say if this is different from their “gender assigned at birth”.

The changes were aimed at capturing data on the transgender population. But one data expert said the decision to omit the sex question risked obscuring what was really happening with HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Professor Alice Sullivan, head of research at the Social Research Institute at University College, London, said conflating sex with gender could make it difficult to identify and understand differences between males and females.

“Sex is an essential piece of information, both for the effective treatment of individual patients, and for health research. There is no reason why we cannot record a patient’s sex and gender identity as separate variables rather than confusing the two.”

The idea that it may be illegal to ask for a respondent’s sex in a confidential survey has “no foundation,” added the professor, who has herself been the director of large cohort surveys.

The suggestion of illegality was refuted by the recent Judicial Review judgment on the sex question in the England and Wales census.

The US’ HIV surveillance system has a 2-step question which asks for participants’ sex and then for their gender identity. The US system will not allow data to be passed from the clinic to the central survey administrator if the section on sex is not answered.

The background

Public Health England administers the HIV and AIDS Reporting System (HARS), which collects data on all people accessing HIV Services, and the Genitourinary Medicine Clinic Activity Dataset (GUMCAD) collects data on STI tests, diagnoses and services from all sexual health clinics in England.

The HARS questionnaire used to start with a question on sex, with a binary choice of responses (“male” or “female”) and no opt-out. In 2015 Public Health England removed the question from the form, stating: “Work with the LGBT Foundation and the transgender community has informed that it is not good practice or possibly even legal to ask for gender at birth therefore we propose to remove this field from the dataset.”

The questionnaire now asks: “How do you identify your gender?” The options for response are “woman (including trans woman)”, “man (including trans man)”, “non-binary” or “in another way,” and an opt-out is offered in the form of a “prefer not to say” box.

The survey then asks: “Is this the same gender you were assigned at birth?” The options for response are “yes/no” and “prefer not to say”.

In 2018 the GUMCAID questionnaire was changed to include the same questions. Guidance to the questionnaire advises that both gender identity and assigned gender at birth may change.

The latest GUMCAID dataset released contains STI diagnoses and rates broken down by “gender” (male/female). Public Health England’s notes to the statistics advise: “Male gender includes transgender (trans) men and female gender includes transgender (trans) women”. The published data does not allow analysis of differences in rates of diagnosis between males and females, because the categories collected are now both mixed-sex.

We invited Public Health England to comment but it declined. One clinician supporter of the data system, who asked not to be named, said the questions allowed respondents of each biological sex to be identified by working backwards from the “gender assigned at birth” question.

Very few people opted out of answering this question, the clinician added. “We have to give people choices about revealing their gender or gender assigned at birth, just as we give choice about answering questions on sexuality. Over 99.9% of people answer these questions so whilst opt out is possible it is not common practice.”

Our source accepted that the sex of non-binary participants could not currently be determined but said the “gender assigned at birth” question would be changed in future to capture whether individuals were “assigned male or female at birth”. Meanwhile, numbers of people currently identifying as non-binary or a “different gender than at birth” were too small for their inclusion to significantly affect male and female datasets.

“The question has been well accepted by community groups including those focused on women’s issues,” our source added. “The dataset will continue to be revised to ensure it is relevant and meets the needs of most affected communities.”

“This has the potential to substantially skew research results for both gay and lesbian and trans people.”

Professor Sullivan said the absence of a question on sex may also compromise the categories for same-sex attracted and opposite-sex attracted people.

For example, GUMCAID asks if respondents have opposite-sex partners (which the questionnaire defines as men and women who have sex), or same-sex partners (defined as men who have sex with men). Similarly, a question on the HARs form asks if respondents were exposed to HIV through sex between men.

It is unclear how non-binary and trans people and those with trans partners would answer these questions, given that both the terms “men” and “women” are explicitly defined as referring to either sex.

“This has the potential to substantially skew research results for both gay and lesbian and trans people,” Professor Sullivan said.

Our source said they were confident data could be accurately segregated by sexuality as well as by gender and “gender assigned at birth”.

Numbers of trans respondents are small, but critics fear the impact of their inclusion in an opposite-sex group may be significant when the data is analysed and presented at a granular level.

PHE published results from the national HIV self-sampling service in 2019. Its report counted trans men who have sex with women (ie females with exclusively same-sex partners) in the results for heterosexual men and presented transwomen in a dataset with women.

The report shows that 10, or 5.8% of trans respondents had condomless sex with more than 12 partners in the previous year – a higher percentage than that for gay and bisexual men. The figure for women (including trans women) was 62 (1.3%). If all 10 trans respondents in the category were transwomen, their inclusion will have increased the total figure for women by a fifth (from 52 to 62) and the percentage from 1.1% to 1.3%.

Melanie Newman is a freelance journalist covering health, legal and other areas.

Julie Bindel is a journalist, author and feminist campaigner. Her new book Feminism for Women: The real route to liberation is out now and published by Hachette.