#neurosex

[dhddmods]

Some new varsex terms!

(Please read and reblog our intersex guide, by the way! Its important to educate yourself and spread awareness!)

Neurosex

Neurosex: A term describing a varsex person whose neurodivergence is linked to their sex in some way. This could be an altersex person who feels as though their sex identity is directly correlated to neurodivergence, or an intersex person whose variation caused neurodivergence.

A few examples include the following:

-An intersex person with a chromosomal variation, and the chromosomes caused a developmental condition as well as their sex-traits.

-An intersex person with hypergonadism/hypogonadism or otherwise atypical-levels of hormones, who experiences a mood disorder or sexual disorder as a result.

-An altersex person who experiences sex-repulsion as a result of their neurodivergence, and identifies on the sexless spectrum because of that (such as desiring for their genitals or reproductive organs to be removed, so that sexual urges will dissipate.)

-An altersex person who feels as though they are xenosex due to one of their hyperfixations/special-interests, and desire to have sex traits relating to that interest.

-A system that is nonhuman-heavy, and desires for their shared body to be mythicsex as a result.

This term was requested by a user that wishes to remain anonymous.

The colors of the flag are taken from the neurodivergent flag. It takes the format of the varsex flag. The neurodivergent infinity symbol is also present.

___________

Invisiex, Invisigenital, Invisifluid, & Invisixenive

Invisiex: An altersex term, describing someone that desires one or more of their sex traits to be invisible, either solely to other people or to themself as well. When referring specifically to genitals, the term Invisigenital is used instead.

Invisifluid is used to describe someone that desires the ability to turn one or more of their sex traits invisible at will.

Invisixenive: An altersex term, describing someone that desires for their gonads or reproductive organs to be invisible, or to turn invisible at will. This generally refers to people with descended testes/ovotestes, however it could also apply to non-humans within systems, whose innerworld body is see-through in some way, or otherwise visible by outsiders, and they wish they could hide it.

Invisiex, invisifluid, and invisixenive is not the same as desiring retractable genitals, as the terms morphisex and morphixenive would be used instead.

The invisiex & invisigenital flag uses shades of bluish-grey to symbolize different levels of visibility.

The invisifluid flag follows a similar format to the invisiex flag, except bottom half of the flag inverts the top half, representing fluidity. There are also arrows within the altersex symbol to represent fluidity as well.

The invisixenive flag follows the theme of the other transreproductive flags.

___________

Objectex, Objenital, & Objectoxenive/Obxenive

Objectex: An altersex term, describing someone that desires one or more of their sex traits to be objects or object-like. For example, a person that desires a sex-toy in place of their genitals, or somebody that desires an inflatable chest. When referring specifically to genitals, the term Objenital is used instead. Cyberex and machinex might be considered subsets of this.

Objectoxenive: An altersex term, describing someone that desires for their gonads or reproductive organs to be objects or object-like. For example, a person that desires a toy uterus. Technoxenive might be considered a subset of this.

The objectex & objenital flag uses yellow to represent childhood-themed objects, brownish-yellow to represent adult-themed objects, dark green to represent objects formed through nature, brown is for culturally-themed objects, black is for non-tangible objects, and the white sparkle is for fictional objects.

The objectoxenive/obxenive flag follows the same theme as the other transreproductive flags. The teddybear represents childhood-themed objects/toys. The sparkler represents holiday-themed objects. The pot represents decorative objects. The couch represents furniture. The moon, star, sun, and planet represent space-themed objects. The buildings represent construction and location-based or cultural-based objects. The screw, nut, gear, telephone, and screen represent technology. The rocks and plant represents nature-based objects. The paper, paintbrush, and pencil represent art. The arrow represents weaponry. It also uses similar symbols to the luduace flag, to represent adult-themed objects.

___________

Xenochest: An altersex term, describing someone that desires a chest/breasts and/or nipples that are "unusual." (For example, desiring a chest made of clouds.)

The flag goes along with the xenophallus & xenoyoni flags and the xenoclitoris & xenovulva flags. A symbol meant to represent a chest is atop the altersex symbol.

[ryanyflags]

combo neurogender × neurosex by @dhddmods

neurogender neurosex pt: neurogender neurosex

Neruogender and neurosex combo flag :D

↓ References: ∞ alt neurogender flag (by kasatate1) ∞ neurosex coining and flag (by @dhddmods)

The neurogender and neurosex horizontal stripe colours are pretty similar, so I just combined their colours together. I added a horitonal white stripe in the center, to make it look more like the neurogender flag / visually set it apart from just looking like a edited neurosex flag.

For the symbol, I just used the same neurodivergent symbol that neurogender used (neurosex also uses a rainbow infinity symbol, but in a different design (different colours + shape), I only have a svg of the neurodivergent symbol I used, so i just defaulted to that).

[shrimpmandan]

genuinely people on this website need to realize “brain sex isn’t real!” is blatant TERF rhetoric and antithetical to actual decades of various neurological and psychological research pertaining to basic functioning, evolutionary biology, mental disorders, etc.

and no, some jackass thinking that it means male brains are “superior” or that the existence of neurosex somehow validates the existence of arbitrary stereotyping and gender roles doesn’t mean it doesn’t fucking exist!!! for the love of god!!!

[probablyasocialecologist]

When it comes to gender theory, scientists of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries who were informed by eugenics “made strong statements about the social and political role of women, claiming all the while to speak for the scientific truth.” They typically referred to women’s reproductive capacity as a natural indication of their divinely ordained social role. Social, political, and religious ideologies informed the scientific beliefs of this time period, which is not dissimilar to the widely held beliefs of current gender/sex psychologists. It can be argued that the father of modern psychology himself, Sigmund Freud, in his quest to validate psychoanalysis as a legitimate science, reproduced the social opinions of his time in his psychological theories. His theories about femininity, in particular, have been criticized by feminist thinkers for the ways in which his frameworks position femininity as fundamentally incompatible with subjectivity, thus cementing women’s passivity and subordination as a psychological disposition that explains and justifies their social position under patriarchy. Although psychology has developed considerably since Freud, his work remains foundational to the field, and informs the ongoing structural violence of psychiatric pathologization experienced by marginalized subjects. Psychoanalytic concepts have become embedded in clinical, academic, institutional, and colloquial language, influencing the epistemologies of neurosexists and feminists alike. We continue to see bioessentialist reasoning about sexual difference employed in the name of feminism. Notably, bioessentialism informs contemporary discourse about trans rights. For example, Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminism (TERF) refers to a radical ideology that equates womanhood with biological sex, and maintains a bioessentialist stance to discriminate and incite violence against trans women, and to exclude trans women from women’s spaces.  Proponents of trans exclusionary radical feminist ideology espouse the conviction that women are a group with a singular shared experience of womanhood based on the patriarchal violence experienced by people with vaginas. It arose out of the work of anti-porn feminist writing like that of Andrea Dworkin and Catherine MacKinnon in the 1970s, which centered the ways in which cisgender women’s bodies are uniquely subjected to sexualized violence. The objectification and sexualization of the cisgender female body was the main concern in this discourse, and as such, postmodern perspectives that disrupt bioessentialist ideas about gender and the body have been received as an existential threat to the objectives of this radical ideology. Third wave feminist discourse and theories, like intersectional feminist theory, have disputed the idea that bodily or physical similarities are experienced in the same ways socially and culturally (e.g., at intersections of race, class, ability, nation, gender identity, and sexuality). When it comes to trans discourse, it is important to recognize the ways in which non-normatively gendered bodies with any perceived association to femininity or womanhood are subjected to patriarchal and sexualized violence. Heteronormativity and rape culture affect more than just cisgender women. To weaponize a binary understanding of gender against women with diverse experiences of womanhood is to collude with the oppressive forces of the colonial, white supremacist hetero capitalist patriarchy.

[amfetuum9mobile3]

yeah definitely not going 2 sleep soon

[dykeulous]

by the way, even though i am not fond of the doomerism and the blackpillers in this community, and my activism is more tied to dismantling neurosexism, biological essentialism, misogynistic spirituality and the like; i believe women should still have a space to vent their anger and even wrath. i believe women should be allowed to be nihilistic, angry, sad, mad, furious, wrathful– i believe women should be allowed to feel all the negative emotions in the world without risking being labeled hysterical and irrational. it’s easy to ramble on tumblr dot com about how useless & damaging pessimism and nihilism are– but how else are women supposed to feel when our society actively prays on our dismay and oppression. let women feel. let women speak. let women shout. let women destroy. let women cry. let women break. let women ruin. let women exist as human beings with the capacity to feel every single emotion on the broadest of spectrums.

stop holding every individual woman at the highest standards possible while letting men scot free. women are human. and as radfems, we should acknowledge this the most. as radfems, we should acknowledge that we also have internalized misogyny to battle and strangle. we have to work on unlearning that shit. we have to work on recognizing our own selves, and our sisters, as imperfect human beings. being angry at the state of the international woman proletariat is good. anger can be revolutionary. negative emotions can produce positive outcomes. and even if they don’t– it’s okay. you do not have a moral failing for having emotions. it’s okay.

[shrimpmandan]

Hi! I had a question -

You said in one post that you were interested in neurology, so I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind clarifying what this review is trying to say. I think you need an account to see it, but maybe you have one? If you don’t, I apologize. I also wasn’t able to read it, just the abstract, but I was able to read the conclusion.

I think it’s trying to say that there isn’t a single determined cause of being transgender, but I’ve also seen numerous people, including science educators, discuss how neurology plays a role in trans identity. Or maybe the review is not saying that neurology isn’t playing a role, just that trans identity is more complicated? I dunno, it’s confusing me - that’s why I wanted to ask. Of course, if you don’t want to answer, you don’t have to, but I was just curious. Thank you!

My first thought was to pop it into Sci-Hub but that just draws a blank page for me, unfortunately. Same with 12ft ladder.

You basically got the whole idea though, yeah. We don't know what exactly causes being transgender (there's a multitude of theories out there and honestly, any one of them or even multiple of them could be true-- the one I personally believe the most is hormonal imbalance in the womb), but you ARE correct that neurology plays a role (or at least evidences the existence of the gender incongruence), though the topic of if neurosex is even A Thing has been a contentious one for a long, long, LONG time.

If anyone has a way of access the link, do lemme know! Links to other sources about trans stuff would also be appreciated bc I'm honestly too lazy to grab shit rn

[self-loving-vampire]

Maybe I'm misreading but I feel kind of weird about the "forcemasc exists, here are examples from conversion therapy!" thing because as a transmasc it's like, okay, are you also going to acknowledge that forcefem can be part of conversion therapy, or...? Like your tags about "isn't foremasc what they do to GNC AMABs generally?" Are completely correct, but I feel like I would get destroyed for saying the same thing about forcefem. If we can acknowledge that forcefem has a whole culture around it with an origin that isn't conversion therapy surely we can see that forcemasc is similar?

Yeah I think I reblogged a post about that a couple of weeks ago that mentioned it in the context of like, being forced to dress up for family photos and the like. I don't think that's actually controversial to say that's a thing that people are forced to go through as well?

I'm pretty sure that was a common feminist talking point when I was growing up, even. It made conservatives really mad when anyone at all did not conform to the norms of their gender assigned at birth, even if they were completely cis.

This is evident enough from looking at christian parenting guides. For example, in "Bringing up Girls" known christofascist and child-beating apologist James Dobson comes out explicitly in favor of gender essentialism and argues (with use of some old-timey neurosexism) that not raising children in accordance to this view is doomed and harmful, and that deviations from it are aberrant and artificial. "Proper" boys like guns and violence and "proper" girls like flowers and babies.

And as a result, he concludes that there is a moral imperative to raise everyone AFAB to be feminine "ladies" (who are also sexually "pure", of course) and to counter any assertiveness they might have picked up from the fallen and overly feminist modern world.

Unsurprisingly, conservatives want people to conform to what was assigned at birth, regardless of what the assignment was and deviation gets punished.

We all know about transphobia, for instance, but even among cis people, those who deviate to their role experience more bullying, abuse, and sexual violence. Sex pests may also preferentially target women who violate gender norms.

(As an aside, this is why the argument that it is "femininity" itself and not GNC behavior that gets punished makes me feel like I'm losing my mind. Ditto for arguments that "pickmes" and "tomboys" are somehow privileged misogynists.)

[duckprintspress]

National Non-Fiction Day: 31 Titles to Get Your Queer Learn On!

In the past year, we’ve posted a lot about our favorite queer fiction titles. We wanted to take Non-Fiction day to talk about the non-fiction titles that have impacted us! Whether self-help, memoirs, psychology, history, sociology, or a different non-fiction genre, these are books that have helped us learn, helped us teach, helped us improve, helped us see and be seen, and helped us be more informed. So join us as we introduce our thirty-one recommendations for National Non-Fiction Day!

Fine: A Comic About Gender by Rhea Ewing

Gender Born, Gender Made: Raising Healthy Gender-Nonconforming Children by Diane Ehrensaft

Dear Senthuran: A Black Spirit Memoir by Akwaeke Emezi

Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic by Alison Bechdel

Ace: What Asexuality Reveals about Desire, Society, and the Meaning of Sex by Angela Chen

Here For It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America by R. Eric Thomas

Transforming: The Bible and the Lives of Transgender Christians by Austen Hartke

Bitch: On the Female of the Species by Lucy Cooke

Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity by Devon Price

My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness by Nagata Kabi

transister: Raising Twins in a Gender-Bending World by Kate Brookes

!Hola Papi!: How to Come Out in a Walmart Parking Lot and Other Life Lessons by John Paul Brammer

Strangers: Homosexual Love in the Nineteenth Century by Graham Robb

London and the Culture of Homosexuality, 1885 – 1914 by Matt Cook

Queering Your Craft: Witchcraft from the Margins by Cassandra Snow

Female Husbands: A Trans History by Jen Manion

The Ethical Slut: A Guide to Infinite Sexual Possibilities by Janet W. W. Hardy and Dossie Easton

The New Queer Conscience by Adam Eli

Before We Were Trans: A New History of Gender by Kit Heyam

Testosterone Rex: Myths of Sex, Science, and Society by Cordelia Fine

Peculiar Places: A Queer Crip History of White Rural Nonconformity by Ryan Lee Cartwright

Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference by Cordelia Fine

Queer Budapest, 1873 – 1961 by Anita Kurimay

LGBTQ-Inclusive Hospice and Palliative Care by Kimberly D. Acquaviva

Queering Colonial Natal: Indigeneity and the Violence of Belonging in Southern Africa by T. J. Tallie

Handbook of LGBT Elders: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Principles, Practices, and Policies edited by Debra A. Harley and Pamela B. Teaster

LGBT Transnational Identity and the Media by Christopher Pullen

Gender Diversity: Crosscultural Variations by Serena Nanda

LGBTQ Cultures: What Healthcare Professionals Need to Know about Sexual and Gender Diversity by M. J. Eliason and P. L. Chinn

The Terrible We: Thinking with Trans Maladjustment by Cameron Awkward-Rich

Trans Bodies, Trans Selves: A Resource for the Transgender Community edited by Laura Erickson-Schroth

You can view this list as a shelf on Goodreads!

It can be so difficult to find good non-fiction resources on queer topics. Which titles to DO you recommend?

[baejax-the-great]

Top five books this year? :3

I'm going to group series/authors together or else the list would be like 4 books by the same person.

Ancillary Justice series by Ann Leckie + Translation Slate. These books were really such a fun and satisfying read. I've read a few series recently that didn't/couldn't stick the landing, but I thought this one wrapped up really nicely.

First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers by Loung Ung. I'd been meaning to read this memoir for over ten years now (since I visited Cambodia), and I finally bought it for myself. The author was a young child when the events of this book happened, so it's a fairly easy read with the kind of descriptions you would expect from a child. It is a heart-wrenching story, and I spent a weekend just reading and crying.

Fitz and the Fool trilogy by Robin Hobb. I think everyone on tumblr has seen my reaction to these books 😭😭💕💕. This trilogy fucked me UP oh my god. Hobb is a freak, I'll never get over it, everyone should read these books, especially if you want to watch one character suffer constantly always for ever and ever and to think "I have no idea what the FUCK these two characters have going on but I'm obsessed with it."

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik. This was my first finished book of the year! It's not perfect, but I really enjoyed the fairytale of it all and the mix of characters introduced. Publishing has such a hardon for series these days, and I appreciate a self-contained stand alone story.

Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference by Cordelia Fine. Another book I've been meaning to read for ten years and finally got around to. For a science book, it's very accessible to laypeople, and it addressed a lot of things that irritated me with my own education in neuroscience (imaging studies are stupid, and that one study where they gave monkeys various toys and the female monkeys liked playing with pots and pans showing that kitchen supplies are inherently and naturally feminine...???? Monkeys don't cook.... they don't know what they were for... what the fuck WAS that study and how did a professor tell it to me with a straight face...). It is over ten years old now so somewhat outdated, and I saw criticisms that there are some very similar studies done with regards to race that she doesn't cover, but I kind of think there is value in a researcher staying in one lane. I don't know, I flip flop back and forth on this, but the take downs of the shoddy studies remains valid and it was a satisfying read.

[pokegyns]

Sex dysphoria as an incongruous body map is the most sensical, persuasive and not-misogynistic argument for the innateness of gender identity I've ever seen, much more than I've ever got from a TRA, but then you start talking about young future-transwomen showing culture-bound signifiers of femininity in very young childhood. Why would there be any correlation between sex incongruity and gender nonconformity? You specifically say that this is even before they are aware of their own incongruity. Why? Are you saying it's a form of extremely subconscious mimicry of the gender roles of the sex the brain believes its body is? Even before the child even understands the sex-gender connection?

I can tell you're not saying that gnc=trans, I'm not misreading you quite that badly. But what could a correlation between sex incongruity and childhood gender nonconformity imply except either terfism or bioessentualism?

I'm asking in pure good faith. I want to believe.

i do not believe there is an innate, inherent biological connection between sex incongruency & gender nonconformity. however, due to societal indoctrination & environmental circumstances, sex incongruous children most of the time do not feel connected with their peers of the same sex. gender is not just a bystander, it is a large system and a huge superstructure that is built in every aspect of our society. it is something that can have war-torn impacts on people, and i think we all can see the way that this system uniquely disadvantages & impairs sex incongruous & dysphoric people– which does have a very lasting effect on dysphoric children. as children are most of the time raised under a strict gender binary, under the [current] colonial gender system, which is hierarchical & totalitarian based on assimilation that outcasts any ambiguity & deviation– it is no surprise that sex incongruous children will be impaired in numerous social aspects, and that their socialization will be very much affected by this rigid gender categorization which leaves them feeling alienated.

under a system without gender, there would likely be less connections between sex incongruency & gender nonconformity; as there would be no such thing as gender to conform or not to conform to in the first place– and i do believe that the currently existing connections between the two are real, however not biologically ingrained, fixated, or determined in any way– but are rather socially shaped, similarly to how social dysphoria is. just because a phenomenon exists, does not necessarily mean that it is inherently biologically predisposed in any individual. there is evidence that dysphoric children are in fact alienated from their peers & that they have face bigger struggle conforming to their specific assigned gender role, however that is not because their brain somehow misaligns with their sex [which would be neurosexism], nor are they at fault for being socially impaired to a degree; it is the extremely strict, fixated & totalitarian system of gender that unfairly & unjustly punishes those who deviate in any way. we cannot say that the phenomenon itself isn’t real, much like how we cannot say that gender is not– both are real, but they have no scientific basis, nor are they biologically determined. gender is forced on us, and the connection between gender nonconformity & dysphoria is formed due to the existence of gender itself– which must be abolished.

– mod zoroark

[bloomshroomz]

I was trying to tell someone that finding a "physical explanation" for trans people existing is bioessentalist, fruitless, and could easily lead to attempts at eugenics, and I also told them that "brain sex" is a theory that has been widely debunked.

The brain, while having some average differences between those who physically develop as male vs those whole physically develop as female, is unisex. These average differences are of degree, rather than type, and are influenced by things like skull size and hormones (the former of which tends to average differently by sex, and the latter of which can change over the course of one's life). These differences in averages don't determine sex or gender any more than something like height or weight would. The myth of brain sex even has its own name: neurosexism.

Then they said they scrolled through my posts and believe I'm a science denier?? I'm not sure what could make them think that?? Worst part is, I was trying to elaborate on the problems with trying to find a concrete physical "cause" for trans people existing but my comments are no longer showing up. Don't know why; I wasn't blocked. But here's a brief summary of what I wanted to tell them, since it seems that I can't comment anymore:

Gender identity and sexual orientation don't have one concrete cause. The scientific consensus is that these things are influenced by a combination of biological, genetic, and social factors. But we still don't really know why queer people exist. Some studies suggest that prenatal hormones might have an impact as well, but they are not the sole factor, and cannot be used to reliably predict these things.

Regardless, I genuinely do not think we gain anything from finding a "cause" for queer people of any sort existing. We exist, and there are mountains of evidence showing that we fare best when allowed to live authentically as LGBTQ+ people. We don't need an explanation for that, because we don't need a justification, nor do we need prevention. Those are the only two things an explanation could conceivably be used for.

Edit: My comments finally showed up. Not sure why it took like half an hour lol

[jellyfishfem]

periods change the brain? But I thought sexual dimorphism in brains was a NeUroSExIST MYTH!

dont think u understand how that whole thing works. and idk what point is being made here, so i cant really comment:/ is the argument here that there are, in fact, sex-specific differences so there is such a thing as a female and male brain? i mean okay if thats what ppl want to call the biological differences. but these differences are exclusively found in either female or male humans and a male’s brain will never experience such drastic changes as he is incapable of having a menstrual cycle. a male still cannot have a “female brain”. if ppl want to suddenly acknowledge sexual dimorphism, they have to acknowledge that these female/male differences do not occur in male/female human bodies.

ive never heard of the word neurosexism but i think its being misused here. saying that women’s brains’ morphology changes much more drastically than men’s due to our very changing hormone levels isnt sexism, i think saying things like this whole process makes women [insert stereotype like hysterical or unstable] is. or that liking certain things makes your brain that of the opposite sex. or that a similarity between you and the opposite sex must mean you actually are the opposite sex. idk i have hypoglycaemia again so maybe im wording this really badly and incoherently.

[genderstarbucks]

a thing that went without noticing is that in many countries ftm/mtf terminology doesn't make sense or is untranslatable. at least where I live, common trans activists usually criticize these terms as imported from anglophones. they enforce innate transness narratives all the time, usually linked to neurosexism.

i'm an amab ftm, but I wish there was a way to communicate this where I live without neologisms or sounding strange or wrong.

I've actually never heard of being amab ftm, I've heard of amab transmascs but never amab ftms

You are still so valid and swag

I don't understand why so many people think the terms ftm and mtf are bad, they're just terms to describe yourself

[anaozorismo]

Cordelia Fine. Delusions of Gender: How Our Minds, Society, and Neurosexism Create Difference. 2010

[femme-ressentiment]

neither the biosocial nor neurosex model can really adequately explain my case of transness. i was implanted into a boy as a larva and emerged chestburster style after eating him from the inside out