Can we please talk about "Gender" - I seem to find myself in a muddle thinking about it

[LovelyFriend]

I'm still not perfectly clear on the differing feminist ideas/theories/positions on gender. I've read many threads on here about it and they are enlightening and I have learnt a lot but my mind but still struggles to understand some concepts.

My own feelings veer towards gender being a spectrum - society wants each sex to conform/identify in particular gendered ways. I see that being a woman/man as a very broad spectrum that includes all the ways a biological born woman or man may live and be. I guess by extension then I would view a Transwoman as a biological man and part of the spectrum of "maleness" and a Transman part of the spectrum of "femaleness". (I totally accept any trans persons right to be called by the name/pro noun of their choosing).

Perhaps it is biological physicality I view as a spectrum, rather than gender?

Apologies for my clumsy descriptions!

So I was looking at a RadFem website about an upcoming event that seemed quite interesting.

The event website states:
It is a central part of radical feminist analysis that gender is a tool of women's oppression, not women's liberation. None of the organisers consider ourselves to have an innate gender - neither masculine, feminine, trans, cis, gender queer, or any other gender. We are gender abolitionists who have been raised and socialized as girls and women because of our female bodies* in the context of patriarchy.
Women who view gender differently, as a benign spectrum of self expression rather than a human created power hierarchy, will find other events where they can organise with like minded people. RadFems Resist is designed by and for women interested in radical feminism and those who want to genuinely engage with second wave theory and women's liberationist ideas.

I'd like to understand this statement better - what are gender abolitionists? How does that manifest in daily life? What is "second wave theory"?

Am I one of the "Women who view gender differently, as a benign spectrum of self expression rather than a human created power hierarchy" who they don't want to attend the event? I can't figure it out.

Can anyone provide any insight or recommend any reading on this? It is something I'd really like to be confident discussing (outside of this forum).

Yeahwell, I'm so sorry you and DD are going through this

Wish I could post more but on shitty connection. to yeahwell.

Have PM-ed you, YeahWell (story is not mine to tell, so didn't want to put it on an open thread).

flora yonic bertie buffy lucio
Feel better for the first time in a year. I knew I couldn't be the only one who thinks the way I do but just didn't know where to look. I will support her no matter what but this thread has certainly helped clarify my thoughts.
Thanks for starting it lovely friend

It might be worth talking to your dds doctors about the actual evidence behind gender reassignment. They probably do think it is in her best interests.

In the past there was a view that (with the right hormones and socialisation). An infant born as a male/female could be reassigned successfully. Gender was not fixed it was something you learned.

A lot of this come from the now discredited work of John Money. The David Reimer case is famous (penis burnt off in botched circumcision at 8 months old, parents advised by Money to raise him as a girl (I think he was a toddler) - anyway it was a massive failure David never adjusted to being a girl and when he found out the truth he wanted to be male).

This and other cases has lead to a view that feeling female or feeling male is not just about your body. It is also about how your brain is set in the womb.

I personally think that there will be some individuals who would do better or be happier after surgery.
That said teenagers are famously agst ridden and are often unhappy with their bodies.

So how a Dr can tell if a teenager would genuinely benefit from transitioning or if it would be a mistake is a seriously difficult judgement call.

David reimer was also forced to simulate sex acts with his twin brother as part of his "gender reassignment surgery" and was never given proper female genetalia, he reportedly urinated through a hole in his abdomen. It is hardly surprising that he wanted to go back to being male and I do wish that gender theory proponents would stop wheeling the poor man out as an example of somebody being forced into the "wrong" gender roles when it is quite clear that he had significant other issues and experiences to contend with. It's not even hard to find this information, I looked him up on Wikipedia.

I'm no doctor but...could gender dysphoria be linked to hormones - ie low testosterone in males and low oestrogen in females? And if so could hormonal treatment be possibly indicated but not cross-sex hormones? Just thinking of the woman who felt trans until she went on the pill and started to feel more ok with being female.
I wonder whether any research has been done into levels of sex hormones in people who identify as trans?

bertie I did say it was a famous case, obviously it's on Wiki. It's an exceptionally well known case. Sorry for not putting everything about it down.
What John Money did to David and his twin brother (raised as a boy) was twisted and despicable. I think the twin raised as a boy went on to develop schizophrenia, no idea how much Money contributed to his mental health but I'm sure it didn't help.

The reason it gets "trotted out" is that Money developed the theory that gender was purely down to socialisation. He knew his experiment with David did not support his theory but he falsified data and passed it off as successful, this had an impact on medical practice.

David Reimer made his case public to try and expose Money's work and prevent any similar reassingment in the future. He case is in the public eye because he wanted it to be there.

David Reiner was male. He had male hormones and a male body. Raising him as a girl didn't erase those facts. The Reiner experiment doesn't prove that gender is innate, it proves that physical sex and hormonal makeup is relevant to how we experience the world and develop our identifies. That's not a groundbreaking discovery.

David Reiner was male. He had male hormones and a male body. Raising him as a girl didn't erase those facts

Exactly, David was a boy. He had his testes removed when he was a toddler and was raised as a girl. But obviously he was a boy and still very much identified as a male.

Money very much expected David's case to prove his theory that gender is purely down to socialisation. It failed hideously. It doesn't prove gender is 100% innate but is does seem to suggest that gender is down to more that just socialisation.

It doesn't prove anything at all, and the other facts are HUGELY relevant. Not shouting but cant use other emphasis on this tablet.

It's usually 0resented that he was raisedfemale, not knowing that he was male, as an adult he felt wrong and changed back to male, and later killed himself.

If there was only this too it, then okay, it's a relevant conclusion to say he was unhappy being female because something innate inside him was male. But this is NOT only the case. He was aware of his original transition to a great extent, having many unethical experiments performed by Money, his brother was also mentally ill which may also have been caused by the experiments, we don't know. But it's not as clear cut to say he was unhappy because he was raised as female and he was innately male. Because he always knew he was originally male, he was not fully transitioned, and in no way did he have the normal childhood of a typical female child.

If Reimer is truly the only example that gender activists have then the whole argument of proof is utterly ludicrous. Even if it was a clear cut example, which it clearly isn't, you can't generalise from a sample size of one.

bertie this will be my last post on David Reimer, you are right he is a sample size of one.
I maintain it is an important case as it was dressed up by Money to "prove" that

• you could raise a child born male as a female through surgery and socialisation.

Money told the world his case study was a success but (and this did affect medical practice) clearly it was a disaster.

I do agree with you that if this was the only example it wouldn't show much but it isn't.
also what on earth is a gender activist?

There is a study by William Reiner (Prof of Psychiatry and Urology) into boys born with cloacal exstrophy. So they have normal testes but no penis or an exceptionally small penis.
It was regular medical practice to reassign the infants (neonates) as female and raise them female.

This study follows 16 of these patients.
bradyurology.blogspot.fr/2014/03/classic-manuscripts-in-urology-reiner.html?m=1

He followed 16 male children born with cloacal exstrophy. 14 underwent reassignment (as neonates).
At the last follow up 8 (of the 14 assigned female) identified as male, 3 were unclear on their sex and 5 were female.

These boys had normal testes and were subjected to normal levels of androgens in the womb.
They lost there testes when they were reassigned as neonates and were raised as girls.

I think there is evidence to suggest that gender identity (at least in males) is in part down to hormones in the womb.
Humans are complicated, very little is 100% innate with us but there's good evidence hormones influence how the brain develops as well as how the body develops.

Sorry the numbers weren't clear on the 8 male, 3 ambiguous & 5 female.

There were 16 infants who were entered into the trial. 14 were reassigned but 2 parents chose not to reassign their babies but were still included in the trial.

I'm very sure that part of our gender identity is down to our hormonal balances. I suspect that trans women possibly have lower testosterone in general and trans men lower oestrogen but as I posted before I have no idea whether that is something that I have completely made up or whether it has been researched.
Hormones play a large part in who we are and how we relate to the world. I don't think that david Reiner proves anything about gender, I just think he was a male person who had testosterone and a male body and was aware that he wasn't biologically female, whether that was a conscious or unconscious knowledge.

obsidian the hormone thing may be a reason for some people who want to GRS but it isn't generally the case, or it would be super easy to treat people who are struggling with dysphoria. My dd had all the blood tests done and is absolutely bang normal as far as hormones are concerned.
If you saw her you would see a tiny dainty little creature with big eyes soft perfect skin and delicate face and hands. She has breasts and menstruates. There is not one male thing about her although now she is trying to speak at a lower register. The psychiatrists did try to tell me she may have been exposed to male hormones in the womb ??? Which have left her brain marked as male ??? Which is why she feels male. Here's my prob with this:

1. What is he on about exposed to male hormones while in my womb? Don't we all have a mix of hormones? Isn't your sex determined chromosomally? Don't the chromosomes dictate which hormones will be synthesised. What's he on about? Some extra male hormones that went thru my blood stream while I was pregnant? From something I ate? What?

1. If the above mystery transfer of male hormones to her brain happened bullshit then that will have left her brain with a male marker of some description presumably? Where is this marker? What are the diagnostic criteria for discovering it? If her brain was placed beside the brain of a non gender dysphoria girl would he be able to see the difference? is it a chemical difference? What should be checked for when taking blood tests? All hormone levels are normal. Anyway he said there is no test but he still believes a test will be possible someday. I asked why and he said 'it's just a feeling I have' supposedly the top psychologist for adolescents in the country with special expertise in transgender teens learned while working with Tavistock clinic £500 for less than 1hr appt donkey a feeling? Not very scientific is it. No I don't think I'll leave my kid in your care for you to drug and give a mastectomy and sew on some other poor deluded persons donated penis on to her little body. No that doesn't seem like a good idea on the basis of your feelings.

1. What does it mean to say I feel like I am a boy? How does she know what a boy feels like? how does a boy feel different than a girl? Is it something that will be clarified by plastic surgery and solipsism ie I demand that everyone else live my version of my metaphysical reality even tho it is the opposite of any objective reality. If you don't bend to my thinking against your better judgement you are a hater and bigot and cruel and I will label you an ignorant transphobe.

It's like being in Alice in Wonderland ..but not in a good way.
Why aren't the medical community applying standard treatment to these kids ie hippocratic oath - first do no harm.
Dr Paul Mc Hugh maintains that there will be lawsuits aplenty in 30 yrs time with all these poor kids left high and dry on the sands of a retreating tidal fad. He is massively despised by trans community but he says he had the same crap when he queried repressed memory syndrome 30 yrs ago which involved similar solipsistic thinking eg in my mind it happened so even tho there is zero external corroborating evidence and actually there is often counter evidence my truth MUST be believed. It was a craze that thoroughly undermined genuine survivors of abuse.

I just can't let my child be washed along on this wave of wrong thinking negligent doctors and transgender adults with a political agenda.

Oh my god what a rant
Apologies
Going to sleep now. Good night all.

YeahWellMaybe you sound like an amazing mum and I agree with everything you say

It can't just be about hormones in the womb - all those things you read about finger length, maths and spacial awareness etc. I come out well on the masculine side, but I've never had a wish to be a man.

I certainly spent most of my teenage years hating my body (I'm short and fat, and have come to terms with that now!), but it never occurred to me that switching to be a boy could be a thing.

Having said that, I did go for investigations (entirely pushed by me) when I was 12 because of my height, and it was suggested that I could have growth hormones. I looked into it all and decided that it just wasn't worth the risk for a couple more inches - my parents were entirely hands off about it, and left it up to me, I don't know what they would have done if I had decided to take the hormones and risk it.

YeahWell - you really are dealing so well with trying to protect your child from making any damaging decisions too early. Please don't lose heart (I know you won't - your child is at risk!)

Thank you chunky (branston??!)
and obsidian. I have lost heart, i do lose heart, I can hardly bear it. My ds is freaking out too. It's fucking awful. But many thanks for the kind words. Have felt better today than in ages

yep - at risk of being being a stereo typical woman, I walked into the kitchen, opened the cupboard (rebel - I know lots of people keep it in the fridge) and picked the first thing I saw. Didn't even like it at the time (I have been turned.. cheese and pickle sandwiches are now delicious to me - as is a Worcester sauce and cheese toastie)

Who wouldn't freak out. It's totally understandable. I can mentally imagine you feeling like things are barrelling towards some outcome and just standing there, arms splayed, saying hangon, wait a minute, lets think this through before we do anything permanent. It has to be the right decision to take your time and really consider your options.

YeahWell Maybe, my heart goes out to you. I can feel your pain on the page.

I cannot understand what is going on with young people and gender right now. I mean I understand the young people's POV but I don't understand how they are being treated as if they are speaking with such absolute unquestionable truth, when we don't do this with young people in any other context; nor do medics normally do this with patients who emotionally self-diagnose and prescribe their own treatment. I just don't get it. Again, my heart goes out to you.

I am so glad I didn't mutilate my body in ways I would have done if I had been allowed to when I was 15. I would be as changed as Michael Jackson if someone with infinite sympathy and the power to make it happen had sat down with me and said "so, what would you like to be different then?"

Now I am 43 and I am still short, chunky, freckly and ginger and I have two beautiful children and a strong healthy body that takes me everywhere I need to go and walks miles fast without complaining. I wish a strong healthy happy future to your dd, and children if she wants them, and I am praying for you both that she can find a way to express herself in the way she needs to do without hurting herself. Good luck to you both xxx