would you date a transgendered man?

[ecofreeek]

I am in my late 30's and single (divorced). Recently though work I met a man who seemed really nice. We flirted a bit and last weekend he asked me out for a drink. It went really well, nice snog! and we arranged to meet for dinner this week

At dinner he told me that basically he used to be a woman. He has had testosterone treatment for many years and both breasts removed and a hysterectomy. But not the surgery that makes a penis...

I really like him. But I'm a bit freaked out. I guess that's why he told me 'early' in our dating... I dont want any more children s thats not an issue... its the whole man thing - he looks like a man, acts like a man and I would never have guessed that biologically he is not a male...

the sex thing ....

would you date a transgendered man >?

But I expect we all do sometimes

How do you think I picked my user name.
(it's in Italian, just stick an -ious on the end, ignore resultant creative spelling of English version)

I can't "write" posts, I have to "think" them as I type, so concise is not exactly my middle name.

Ohhh, names to google. Cool!

I like your name (I did GCSE Italian which is very rusty!).

I have to think as I type too.

Hello! Sorry was watching something. You are right LRD I was being very simplistic. Not sure typing on an iPad lends itself to this kind of philosophical debate. I would not necessarily ascribe GD to past categories of people. Its much more complicated. As I understand it many cultures have understood that gender can be quite fluid, as to how they consider the person as a man or a woman, separate to genitals, and that people may be attracted to the same gender.

In some cultures I seem to distantly remember when two men are living together that one is then considered to take on the role of a woman etc. It understood that someone may consider themselves to be a woman. Ie what was considered important might not be the genitals of the person but the role they were playing eh carrying water or cooking etc if those were considered the female. Role in that culture. Im sorry I can't recall specific examples right now but will see if I can.

To some extent we still struggle to escape the idea that if someone is carrying out certain roles then there are of a certain gender. Eg many people are not quite comfortable with the idea of househusbands or fathers taking on more of the childcare which NB I think is great if works out better for the couple. Just said it to illustrate that we have relatively entrenched ideas if who does what and that is linked to what we consider a man or a woman to be...

There are also plenty of historical examples of women living as men. Maybe not always because they wanted to be one but possibly to allow them to do more adventurous things!

Probably nog making much sense by now...

Sorry! Yes, I take your point. I hope I didn't come across as rude.

That makes perfect sense.

Loquace try googling 'muxe'. From the Zapotec culture. V interesting wiki article which explores many of these issues!

LRD no not at all! You're just picking up v astutely exactly where I'm being simplistic

I think the reverse.

(God, aren't we all polite while we're .. erm ... rather hijacking the OP's thread! )

Also another wiki article on " two- spirit people" in native American peoples.

many people are not quite comfortable with the idea of househusbands or fathers taking on more of the childcare

Not in Italy they are not, my husband got a ton of crap when he took over as main carer when I went back to work. He loved it, but when my hours changed and we went back to 50/50 he said he was relieved that the faces were a thingnof the past. And he is a huge, hairy bear like creture, hate to think what would have been saidif he had been less obviously "butch".

Thinking of that...not sure how to connect this up with the idea of "stiff" gender roles. One of the things I struggled with when living in BKK was how DH 1.0's family were very very very demanding that I fell in line with the (to me) hyperfeminie mode of being a woman. I even had to speak in a voice that wasn't really mine. Gender lines were well strong. Yet there was this (not perfect utopia of) acceptance of transgendered people in the mainstream world of work (less sure it extended to close social circles). For men and women.

Still haven't worked put how such tight application of gender roles for most people occurred with such (realtive to here) acceptance of fluidity happening at the same time.

I think that's a good point about women choosing a male persona to get chances and choices denied to females, I remember "the cabin boy" (or such like) as a recurring theme in stories, where it was discovered that a girl had dressed as a boy to get adventure.

God, aren't we all polite while we're .. erm ... rather hijacking the OP's thread!

Better a polite meandering slightly around the terrain of the OP than a Very Rude Bunfight that is so on topic that basically the last 200 posts said the same damn thing.

Think of it as givng MNHQ a night off having to go at people.. We are doing for the sisterhood!

Loquace. Two other interesting things to google 'two Spirit' and charlotte Clarke from the late 18 th century. Sorry cant link!

Oops something funny happened there and I missed several posts!

Loquace exactly! But did the transgendered people in Italy then act like the role they'd taken on? Very feminine or masculine? Doing accepted feminine or masculine roles? Like that they are not subverting what society has decided men and women shd do. Whereas your husband was flouting the rules by being a big hairy man and doing women's stuff.

NO and i have had relationships with men and women.

LRD I like to think we're having a relevant and fascinating hijack

Muxe

Interesting that again acceptance (relative to here) of fluidity, within a culture of similar gender hardlines to Thailand.

I sw the third sex refenece, but also saw refences on transgendered people's blogs saying these were examples of acceptance of transgendered people in other cultures.

Does that mean that the Muxe (of now) define themselves along the same lines as "here" Transgendered people, or is the third sex still the one considered right and appropriate by Muxe in Mexico ?

I will have to read more....

Ok signing off. Sadly time to sleep.

Loquace I understood about muxe that there were many accepted variations. Maybe a kind of empty category to shelter many different types of differences to the norm...

But did the transgendered people in Italy

Ah, it is a different world in Italy compared to Thailand. The only transgendered people that I have seen here (in 18 years) are mainly South American prosititutes (that is not a cristim or a slur, just stating fact, there is little control over street walking here and it can be a bit....graphic. Even in the daytime. I can't go to the supermarket with my son saying "why is lady showing her bosums ? "She is hot dear, here have a biscuit").

That's not to say transgendered people don't exisit here, they obviously do, but I don't think there is much crossover in the mainstream, certainly not to the extent there was in Thailand.

Oh, well, if it's for the sisterhood ...!

It's interesting what you're saying about strict gender roles and also acceptance of transpeople. But it's logical in a funny way, too, isn't it? Sort of, so long as you pick a side - fine.

I've heard similar things about gender roles and crossdressing in Brazil, but don't know much about it and I get the impression it's very complicated.

Ithink I am really interested in all the references, thanks very much. (I know you've gone to bed, but hope you'll see in the morning!)

I'm not sure. It depends on how much I liked him. If you can't see it happening I hope you let him down gently and remain friends. I hope he finds happiness with somebody. In a psychology lesson I was told that there is such a thing as a 'male' or 'female' brain. It's a small difference but that they had found that transgender people were indeed born into the wrong body. Imagine how absolutely miserable that is knowing that you are a male but you have a female body. Good for him that he's changed his outside to match his inside and that actually people do see him as a male

I have decided I deeply dislike Spanish for pretending to be quite like Italian...when it blimming well isn't.

I found somethingniteresting that sort of flopped up more questions of this concetp of a third sex.

" Las Intrepidas, a festival in ?celebration of ambiguity and mixed gender identitiey"

So is a 3rd sex a welcome, desired concept for a transgendered community in a soxial system of very rigid gender roles BECUASE the rigidity is swopping one set of restrictions for another, when what they want is access to fluidity/non binary system. (whereas here less rigid gender roles can encompass fludity within the binary system)

OR

Is it what they "settled" for cos the culture around them would outright reject entry into the binary system and given half the chance their desire in terms of gender classification would resemble what the transgendered community here are looking to achieve ?

And why do I end up with just more questions when I go looking for answers ? Pretty sure that is not how it is supposed to work.

In a psychology lesson I was told that there is such a thing as a 'male' or 'female' brain.

I have nothing against psycology, I think it is a very valid field with much to teach us, but isn't it quite a soft science? In the sense that it can be very hard to prove therories put forward ?

Was this female/male brain theory deemed proven ?

Psychology is not a soft science. If the class was any good, they will have looked at brain scan and as well as noting the differences, would have discussed whether these differences were innate or socially constructed. Psychology is related to neuroscience.

I don't know how long ago your psychology class was, or the quality of teaching but I am deeply suspicious about it. I have worked in neuropsychology and IMO, a lot of gendered behaviour is learned and a lot of 'brain strengths' are plastic. For example, it is fairly well know that men have more areas in the brain that activate during spatial awareness tasks. However we also know that more boys are given toy cars and lego as children - thus building their strength in visuospatial tasks. Women can do visuospatial training tasks to achieve the same levels as men. That is an example of the brain adapting according to how it is used. Not innate strengths.

You cannot generalise though, there is a hell of a lot that is unknown. We can only observe and generalise and make inferences which run the risk of being biased and flawed.

Bear in mind with this next comment I am definitely not a scientist (soft or otherwise), and certainly don't want to criticize a whole discipline. But ... I have come across work in psychology that simply does not pass muster. I'm talking people who don't understand basic statistics, people who mis-interpret their own data, people who don't understant the concept of a falsifiable hypothesis.

I am not saying this to have a go, or to pretend I know any better (I don't), but it does make me wary of what is out there, because the influence of psychology on the media is so huge at the moment.