Fascinating Benjamin Boyce interview

[MeltsAway]

With a transwoman, Kayla/Kyle (they use both names), who is honest as heck about her condition. Very open & intelligent. And makes me feel a lot of sympathy for a male caught in the psychological coils of her condition (I'm using female pronouns to be kind, but also out of respect for someone who is so open & respectful of women).

Who says things like "I don't want to make women feel uncomfortable in their spaces. Is it worth it, just for a single moment for me?"

What I'd like to hear is his/her ideas about how the condition from which she suffers might be ameliorated or 'fixed' via therapy, as opposed to medical or surgical intervention. I'm being careful about mentioning Kayla's own frank acknowledgement of her condition, but she is very frank about it as a mental or psychological state. Not much truck with 'gender identity' vis a vis gender extremist ideology.

Really interesting.

I find Boyce also interesting in the way he just very relaxedly [is that even a word?] draws out his interviews, so it feels like an empathetic conversation of two friends.

There's an earlier thread on this:

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4186383-Autogynephilia-One-Mans-Account-with-Kayla

I watched this about a week ago and while I do have a lot of sympathy for Kayla, after I'd had time to digest it I became a little more distrustful of Kayla.

My biggest issue was how Kayla excuses the excesses of the trans rights activists, saying that it is political activists job to push things as far as they can. Like - violent threats, endless lies? No, that isn't remotely acceptable, or normal.

Also, I'm not 100% convinced that Kayla was being honest about the AGP. I have no problem with autogynophelic sexual orientations, but Kayla's version really seemed to be stripped of the sexual aspect altogether. He just mentions one childhood occassion in which he was in some kind of trance. Now while Blanchard said that the sexual aspect often wanes with time, I think he has generally said that there is usually something pretty explicitly sexual going on at some point. I do get that this is a very difficult thing to be completely frank about (although Debbie Hayton manages it) but Kayla's description didn't quite add up for me.

Kayla is certainly a great musician, and I do appreciate that he is making some effort to be respectful of women.

So mixed feelings overall. I don't think that Kayla is the kind of friend to women that I think that some transwomen are, like Debbie Hayton and Fionne Orlander.

PS Mumsnet - I used "he" because Kayla says that he doesn't mind which pronouns you use, and he is happy with "he".

Oh @nauticant so sorry - I thought there'd been a thread, but then couldn't find it ...

I hope you didn't think this was me telling you off. I was just thinking that if you didn't get many replies you'd know that there'd already been a thread and could look there.

FWIW, I agree with the comments by AnotherLass above and while I felt a great deal of sympathy for Kyle, I was struck that his experience of femininity was alien to just about all women's experience of their sex and rather was a coping mechanism for him having a difficult life. I was pleased to see far more self-awareness there than I'm used to seeing in videos by transwomen but even so I didn't think that meant that he ought to be treated by women in any way different to how they would treat anyone else of that sex.

Most of all though, it was a very interesting watch.

No, not telling me off at all - thanks for the link to the other thread!

Afraid to say I got a really creepy vibe from Kayla. Plus Boyce frequently indulges his own misogyny.