How did the trans trend come about and gain such momentum?

[PerverseConverse]

Still new to this subject and trying to get my head round it. I am genuinely interested in how being trans became such a thing for want of a better expression.
At uni 20 years ago, I knew of one man who wanted to be a woman. I don't think gender dysphoria was ever mentioned in our discussions as friends. He started off dressing more "androgynously" and calling himself by a female name. He was a nice guy, mature student, ex-forces, gentle, caring, lots of parent issues, possibly divorced but to be honest I can't remember. I started to feel a bit freaked out around him for some reason. My gut was waving red flags at me but I couldn't say why. Just something off. So I distanced myself. Out of the whole (small) university he was the only openly trans person AFAIK and I had a far few friends in the LGB group. My point being that back then it was very rare. Now if the media are to be believed there are so many trans people that we need to completely change society to accommodate and accept them. Gender dysphoria is a rare condition yet trans is being pushed and pushed. Where has all this come from and why? Why does not fitting in now equal being trans? How did teenagers navigate those difficult years before they were brainwashed without deciding they were actually in the wrong body? I really don't get what's going on and it scares me that our children are having this aggressively pushed at them and are having to accept unisex toilets or communal sleeping places at Guides where boys can obtain access to female spaces and nobody has a right to object because he says he's a girl. The world seems to have lost all perspective and gone mad. Quite frankly I want the world to stop so I can get off and then come back once sanity is restored. Assuming it ever will be.

Another big yes here to social contagion, there just can't be another explanation for the explosion in teen girls being referred to the Tavistock. The high rates of girls with ASD and mental health problems also identifying as trans is another real concern. Correlation is not necessarily causation, in either direction, but this needs to be looked into.
Does anyone know what academic research is going on into this?

Yes, it's the getting medically locked in and living with the consequences that's problematic.

It's generally accepted that teenage pregnancy by choice is inadvisable and to be discouraged. Because the consequences are life changing, irreversible and lifelong. I put teenage transition in the same bracket.

Does anyone know what academic research is going on into this?

A few years ago I slogged through a fair few studies that confirmed what we already know. Social pressure (AKA peer pressure) is one of the most effective ways to fast track altered behaviour in individuals and groups.

So if children are bombarded with messages from adults, which are then strictly enforced and reinforced by their peers, and they get social credits (love bombing, raised social status, higher profile etc.) by reflecting those messages back via their behaviour.... more and more of them will take a potentially, wholly synthetic spark, and aided and abetted by adults, turn it into a personal forest fire.

I suspect that is how the contagion works, particular in the young. The question is was that the intent when specific strategies in terms of social sanctions/credits were first established ?

IMO it was no "happy accident".

Does anyone know what academic research is going on into this

None because it isn't funded, universities refuse to allow it and/or journals won't publish it. Not to mention that it earns the BIGOT stamp on one's CV and guarantees unemployment.

doedoe just as a point of information, Bacha Posh and Sworn Virgins are both biologically female. (Afghanistan also has Bacha Bazi, the male equivalent, and arguably it is far better to be a Bacha Posh, i.e. girl brought up as a boy until adulthood, when they face the trauma of being shoved back into their very restrictive box, than it is to be a Bacha Bazi which is basically a boy kept as a slave and subjected to repeated rape and sexual abuse by adult men).

However you are right in that the group who benefits from the existence of third genders in all societies which have them, whether those third genders are male or female, is people with penises, because these third genders always have the effect of reinforcing restrictive sexual stereotypes (where restrictive is the understatement of the year - we're talking about social structures which normalise and legitimate physical and sexual abuse here, not just social structures which allow firms to sack women workers for not wearing heels).

"doedoe just as a point of information, Bacha Posh and Sworn Virgins are both biologically female."

Sworn virgins are virtually non-existent; not sure how common Bacha Posh are, but it is very wrong and misleading to imply that 'third genders' might just be male or female - the overwhelming majority of people that would be classed as third gender are biological males, and acting out a sort of sub/wife role in a relationship with men. Often linked to prostitution.

Plenty of cultures have so-called 'third gender' biologically male transgender and then homosexual women are simply 'lesbian'.

It's important to recognise the homophobia in 'third gender', rather than to hold it up as some sort of model.

I think we're on the same side doedoe.

I'm pointing to the anthropological finding that "third genders" are more prevalent in highly patriarchal societies with rigid sex-stereotypes and gender roles (in the old fashioned social sciences sense of gender). That's just an observation about how human beings relate to one another within cultues, and how the overall patterns of those relationships vary from one culture to another.

One might then hypothesise, based on that observation, that this indicates that the existence of third genders, being so variable across cultures, is not evidence that "trans people have always been with us and being trans is innate", but rather, evidence that phenomena which might be interpreted as "being trans" are sufficiently culturally variable to suggest that culture and social construction play a massive part in their prevalence, rather than being "natural".

To this, I personally would add a value judgement, namely that third genders do, as you say, seem all about re-inforcing sex stereotypes and gender roles, with the primary goal of keeping women subservient and second class citizens, and that this is clearly a bad thing.

So yes, I think we're on the same side here - I just want to use anthropology to point out that the way the current western European/North American trans ideology co-opts and appropriates "third genders" to defend a simplistic view that "being trans is entirely a biological things which is always there" is not plausible - because prevalence of third genders is highly variable cross-culturally and historically, and there is a strong correlation between the existence of third genders within a culture and that culture being highly patriarchal and having high degrees of inequality between men and women.

It would be interesting to see if there is a correlation between the decline of gender fluidity/non conformity since the 70s and the prevelance to trans indetifying people over the same period.

"A poster on here (maybe AngryAttackKittens) made a really good point that a lot of the girls who want to be boys may be identifying themselves out of the scary pornified sexual relationships that have become 'normal' for young boys to expect. This gives them a legitimate escape that pressure, with added extra attention & specialness. "

gender stuff is the new eating disorders (serves similar purposes)

attention
control
concern
legitimacy and validation of distress, confusion, fear
rejection of humiliating sex role for girls

looming threat of actual self inflicted death. "then they'll be sorry"

The extension of the trans umbrella to include fetishists surely also plays a role?

20 years ago gender dysphoria was assumed to mean you didn't like your secondary sexual characteristics or the gender role associated with it by society, and the expectation was that you would embark on a journey to modify your body and your presentation in order to 'pass.'

Now you don't need to pass. You don't need to dislike your penis. You can be proud of your penis and enjoy putting it into vaginas.

And if you dress up as a woman for sexual kicks - the old-fashioned transvestite - the new trans ideology says you, too are welcome in female spaces. So the law will change to accomodate your sexual fetish.

What men want, they get.

Perfect storm.

First time in history that women have sustained rights of their own, and it's not just a passing fad.

First time in history that gay rights have seemed to be accepted and normalised.

First time that "politically correct" speak tries to stop racism, sexism and homophobia.

First time in history that men don't automatically dominate everything.

First time in history that men can all talk candidly online in communities (like Reddit's incel groups).

First time in history that porn is available 24/7 all the time and is increasingly violent and weird.

First time in history that children are exposed to all this too, all the time.

Bam - anger, frustration, sex politics. The perfect storm for a men's rights movement like this.

nopeni, it's just the history of technology creating social change.

the perfect storm is the contraceptive tech, medical tech, and internet tech. everything else follows.

The reality is that the 'third gender' is ONLY for biological males in these countries.

Albania's Sworn Virgins are female.

Should have read the whole thread first. Gah.

RE women allegedly watching violent porn: I cannot foresee any woman enjoying vomiting whilst having a penis forced down her throat. Teen girls, being raped and assaulted at school, will see that porn and think that this is how all men will treat them forever. In those circumstances, I'd have been reaching for the blockers. I was pretty pissed about how girls were treated when I was at primary (I have mentioned my own sexual assault at age eight many times on this forum) and would have done anything not to be a girl if someone had told me that was an option.

It's only with adulthood that I've realised that it was never "being a girl" that was the problem, but how girls and women are treated. These teen girls heading off to Tavistock are in grave danger of having their bodies changed before they have the chance to realise that the problem is actually not them. This is not a bug, it's a feature: it destroys feminism by preventing feminist awakening in the women and girls who need feminism the most because men and boys have hurt them the most.

I think this current strain of transgenderist ideology has been so enthusiastically embraced by every institution of patriarchy, because of its concept of "cis men" and "cis women".

It sucks up patriarchal arse like a Dyson. Saying men are born to rule and women innately service and obey... , the "T" tells men "You're so BIG and powerful...". and lo and behold, the men decide it's the Most Urgent Civil Right Ever, and throws it cash and favours.