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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Former Trans Child of Gender Critical Parents (very long). *Trigger warning - descriptions of self harm and suicide* - Title edited by MNHQ

541 replies

pop91 · 26/03/2022 22:33

Hi,

To start I wanna say I'm writing this post in good faith to provide the viewpoint of a Trans person with Gender Critical parents but I know this is the internet and this will probably just be trolled to death but here goes.

I had a pretty regular 'happy' family setup, and apparently first told my parents of my identity at just 5yrs old but the first I remember is at 8yrs old when I refused to go by my 'very gendered' birth name but my parents insisted on using it especially publicly.

My parents were never particularly strict on gender roles in the home - my sister would wear my dad's glasses and jacket and stomp around with his briefcase in hand and my brother had an emo phase with heels and mascara to match and apart from some grumbling from my father it was never the biggest issue in our house.

Sexuality was different though even though my father would class himself as a pragmatic centrist, barring a socialist university phase, and my mother a card-carrying progressive New Labour type whose Best Friend was the most flamboyant gay man and an Aunt who lived with her 'friend' until she passed. There was an uncomfortableness with sexuality where both my parents would call it a lifestyle choice and opposed gay marriage - cut to three years ago when my older brother came out as bisexual and last month the youngest sister as a lesbian Grin but rest assured the other 3 siblings remain firmly 'normal.'

Back to me and by 12 I had started puberty and was experiencing debilitating gender dysphoria - I would look into the mirror and see nothing that matched my brain. I would continue to feel this way until the bullying and dysphoria got so bad that one night I climbed into my bathtub with a kitchen knife hoping I could change my body to fit my brain somehow I managed not to perform self-surgery in my bathtub.

A couple of months later I came clean to my parents, I wasn't expecting a big hug but I wasn't expecting what came next. They ignored it as if I had told them what I wanted for dinner, they decided they didn't hear what I had said at all.

Over the next year, the internet became my friend as I found ways to affirm my gender by doing hidden things at first and then slowly more outward things. I came out to my siblings and although they found it confusing my oldest brother and sister were a godsend who I wouldn't have survived without, They helped me pick out a new haircut and new clothes and we came up with a new name.

I came out in school and sure there was bullying but I was feeling so Euphoric that it almost didn't matter. When the teachers found out they informed my parents and that's when everything changed! My parents sat me down and said I was just confused. They threw out my new clothes, anything that I used to affirm my gender, even my shoes and magazines then they took my bedroom door off and took away my laptop and phone and forced my older siblings to refer to me by my birth name, my older brother and sister stopped supporting me and I lost my only family support and anything that was helping me.

Eventually, when they realised everything they had done hadn't worked and I still felt the same way, they decided to try both religious and non-religious conversion therapy which left permanent scarring to my mental health and I frequently have nightmares about it.

At 15 I had my first suicide attempt and my parents forced me to lie and say it was due just to bullying at school but that wasn't true it was the dysphoria and conversion therapy that was killing me.

From 15 to 17 I had multiple suicide attempts and after the third one, my parents finally allowed me to stop the conversion therapy but still forcibly live as my 'biological' sex.

Eventually, I managed to get to a great University and at 18 I socially transitioned and by 20 I had started hormones. I now have a job that provides me financial stability and have an amazing partner, with 2 children from a prior relationship that I now consider like my own. We are also now having a baby very soon.

My mother now describes herself as Gender Critical and frequently posts online about how she will be unable to see her grandchildren because of her views, which is true as I will not allow my parents to see either my child or stepchildren.

My parents continue to refuse to acknowledge my identity and pronouns. The last time we talked, she said she believes I am just gay, which neither makes sense considering my partner's gender nor the fact she also has a terrible relationship with my lesbian sister and bisexual brother who also rarely allows his child to visit my mum, due to her comments about their sexualities.

I finally have the support back of all my siblings and we do frequently gather without my parents. I hope one day my parents change their minds but honestly I don't hold much hope and I don't know if I could forgive what they did to me.

A lot of online trans activists wish trans children for Gender Criticals but I don't, it wasn't very nice at all. If you're going to ask if I think kids should transition, the answer is I don't know as I didn't transition as a child and a social transition helped plenty for me.

Well that's it I think, just the perspective and experience of a trans person with Gender Critical parents, feel free to ask any reasonable questions or respectful questions. Smile

OP posts:
pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:24

@LosingTheWill2022

They forced me to go by my birth name and pronouns and insisted I wear the 'right' clothes

Gender critical means that there is no "right" or "wrong" clothes for either sex. Nor right/wrong jobs, make-up, domestic roles etc. etc.

Your mother was not gender critical.

wanna tell her that?
OP posts:
AlexaShutUp · 27/03/2022 02:24

no, I believe gender is real bc I 'feel' it inside me.

I don't 'feel' a race inside me.

OK, but I don't "feel" a gender inside of me, so your experience clearly isn't universal. Who are you to say that someone else might not "feel" a race inside of them? Presumably you don't think that their feelings are less valid than yours?

Isn't that essentially the problem with defining reality in terms of people's feelings? Nobody can know exactly what someone feels inside, so it isn't very helpful to base definitions on feelings alone or on how someone "identifies".

I am not arguing for people to be able to identify as another race fwiw. I just don't see how it's different from people identifying with a gender that is different from your sex. In either case, it seems to be based on a feeling that has no basis in reality.

sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:24

Many people 'feel' many things, but it doesnt make them true. They could be delusions. A white person may very well 'feel' black, but it doesn't mean they are. That white person has no actual lived experience of being black-skinned. They only have their interpretation of what that might be like.

A black person will ALWAYS know what it os like to be black skinned.

A white person will never know what it is like to be black skinned (they can only manage a guess - could be a very well informed guess, but it wi aways be a guess).

Equally on feelings.... People can feel like they are other people, and try to impersonate them. People can apparantly feel like they are
Korean. People can also feel like they are not good enough, that no one likes them. People can feel that they are godlike. People can feel like everyone is whispering about them, that everyone is plotting to kill them. These are all delusions - very real to the person but bears no actual reality.

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:26

@AgathaMystery

Conversion therapy SHOULD be banned. Almost all GC women agree on this matter. It’s homophobic and vile.
should that include trans conversion therapy?
OP posts:
pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:28

@AlexaShutUp

no, I believe gender is real bc I 'feel' it inside me.

I don't 'feel' a race inside me.

OK, but I don't "feel" a gender inside of me, so your experience clearly isn't universal. Who are you to say that someone else might not "feel" a race inside of them? Presumably you don't think that their feelings are less valid than yours?

Isn't that essentially the problem with defining reality in terms of people's feelings? Nobody can know exactly what someone feels inside, so it isn't very helpful to base definitions on feelings alone or on how someone "identifies".

I am not arguing for people to be able to identify as another race fwiw. I just don't see how it's different from people identifying with a gender that is different from your sex. In either case, it seems to be based on a feeling that has no basis in reality.

Assuming you're female - do you believe if you had the same brain but had male biology and a penis, eat.. that you wouldn't feel like there was a disconnect or something was off?
OP posts:
AlexaShutUp · 27/03/2022 02:28

That white person has no actual lived experience of being black-skinned. They only have their interpretation of what that might be like.

Yes, exactly this.

sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:31

The problem with these delusions is when the deluded person asks thst everyone join in with their delusion. Or when their delusions and demands undermind the rights of other people. When these delusions/demands put women in uncomfortable positions, break down safeguarding that is there to protect women and children, deny women the right to words to accurately describe themselves, and silences anyone who does not pander to said delusion.

If johnny down the road thinks everyone is out to kill him, then i feel awful sorry for him and i hope he can find a way out of that mental quagmire. It crosses a line when he encroaches on my life with his delusion.

RoastedFerret · 27/03/2022 02:31

no, I believe gender is real bc I 'feel' it inside me.I don't 'feel' a race inside me

OK great, so you can understand how people that don't 'feel gender inside of them' might your situation perplexing?

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:31

@sacredfeminina

Many people 'feel' many things, but it doesnt make them true. They could be delusions. A white person may very well 'feel' black, but it doesn't mean they are. That white person has no actual lived experience of being black-skinned. They only have their interpretation of what that might be like.

A black person will ALWAYS know what it os like to be black skinned.

A white person will never know what it is like to be black skinned (they can only manage a guess - could be a very well informed guess, but it wi aways be a guess).

Equally on feelings.... People can feel like they are other people, and try to impersonate them. People can apparantly feel like they are
Korean. People can also feel like they are not good enough, that no one likes them. People can feel that they are godlike. People can feel like everyone is whispering about them, that everyone is plotting to kill them. These are all delusions - very real to the person but bears no actual reality.

but trans people are not claiming to know what it's like to be biologically the other sex.

Just to know the experience of being Trans.

Saying Trans Men are Men doesn't make them male but it does make them a different type of man.

OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:33

Or does it make them a dofferent type of woman? Because they are not men.

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:35

@sacredfeminina

The problem with these delusions is when the deluded person asks thst everyone join in with their delusion. Or when their delusions and demands undermind the rights of other people. When these delusions/demands put women in uncomfortable positions, break down safeguarding that is there to protect women and children, deny women the right to words to accurately describe themselves, and silences anyone who does not pander to said delusion.

If johnny down the road thinks everyone is out to kill him, then i feel awful sorry for him and i hope he can find a way out of that mental quagmire. It crosses a line when he encroaches on my life with his delusion.

Maybe people are actually trying to kill Johnny and you refuse to acknowledge that's possible and now Johnny is dead because you refused to believe that it wasn't a delusion but a reality.
OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:35

Transmen are female. Every cell in their body is coded to being female - a human female, a woman. They are literally coded and designed as a female. They can make themselves look more male, but thats about it. They will never have the right genetics, the right sexual organs, their body will always want to revert back to being female, being a woman.

Do you believe that sex change is possible?

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:37

@RoastedFerret

no, I believe gender is real bc I 'feel' it inside me.I don't 'feel' a race inside me

OK great, so you can understand how people that don't 'feel gender inside of them' might your situation perplexing?

but I say 'feel' bc there's not a word out there to describe it.

Another is a disconnect between the brain and body.

Like if your brain views things a certain way but your eyes view it in another.

OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:38

Johnny thinks people are out to get him, but they are not. That is why it is a delusion and not a reality.

Johnny thinks he is female, but he is male. That is a delusion, not a reality.

No one is out to get johnny, fact. Johnny is male, fact. The ongoing feelings inside of johnny could fluctuate around these facts based on lots of variables: mental health support, smoking drugs, too much time on internet, other mental health issues, etc, etc..

AlexaShutUp · 27/03/2022 02:41

Assuming you're female - do you believe if you had the same brain but had male biology and a penis, eat.. that you wouldn't feel like there was a disconnect or something was off?

No, I really don't think there would be a disconnect. I believe that, if I had a male body, that would make me a man. I would almost certainly have been socialised differently as a boy, and my brain would probably have developed in a slightly different way as a result of that socialisation. However, there is no question in my mind that a male body would mean that I was a man.

I simply don't have any other concept by which to define what a man is, other than that biology. And I firmly believe that it is my biology, rather than my brain, that makes me a woman.

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:41

@sacredfeminina

Transmen are female. Every cell in their body is coded to being female - a human female, a woman. They are literally coded and designed as a female. They can make themselves look more male, but thats about it. They will never have the right genetics, the right sexual organs, their body will always want to revert back to being female, being a woman.

Do you believe that sex change is possible?

I'm not saying Transmen aren't female just that they aren't women.

I believe a partial sex change is possible - changing of hormones and reshaping of organs are possible but not a chromosome change.

But say there was a perfect sex change in the future where every single cell could be recoded to male, would you then accept transmen as men?

OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:43

Thats called body dysmorphia. I have it regularly.. sometimes i think christ i am so fucking ugly. Sometimes i look in the mirror and think i am so beautiful!

Sometimes i think i am so fat, other times not. My perception of self is fluctuating.

Ive taken enoigh strong psychadelic drugs to know how utterly powerful our minds are in relaying the world back to us for interpretation. I have felt like I am water before, because somewhere in my mind i am having that (psychadically enhanced) perception of self altered. I am not water, nor fat, not ugly, nor beautiful.

The power of the mind is huge. But material reality is shared reality and that is something we as society must hold onto.

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:45

@AlexaShutUp

Assuming you're female - do you believe if you had the same brain but had male biology and a penis, eat.. that you wouldn't feel like there was a disconnect or something was off?

No, I really don't think there would be a disconnect. I believe that, if I had a male body, that would make me a man. I would almost certainly have been socialised differently as a boy, and my brain would probably have developed in a slightly different way as a result of that socialisation. However, there is no question in my mind that a male body would mean that I was a man.

I simply don't have any other concept by which to define what a man is, other than that biology. And I firmly believe that it is my biology, rather than my brain, that makes me a woman.

That's interesting but of course, there's no way of knowing.

Wasn't there some evidence a while back that Trans Men before hormones had brains shaped similar to that of biological males and Trans Women before hormones similar to that of Females?

OP posts:
pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:47

@sacredfeminina

Thats called body dysmorphia. I have it regularly.. sometimes i think christ i am so fucking ugly. Sometimes i look in the mirror and think i am so beautiful!

Sometimes i think i am so fat, other times not. My perception of self is fluctuating.

Ive taken enoigh strong psychadelic drugs to know how utterly powerful our minds are in relaying the world back to us for interpretation. I have felt like I am water before, because somewhere in my mind i am having that (psychadically enhanced) perception of self altered. I am not water, nor fat, not ugly, nor beautiful.

The power of the mind is huge. But material reality is shared reality and that is something we as society must hold onto.

You don't think body dysmorphia is different to gender dysphoria especially as gender dysphoria often presents so early on?
OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:48

In order for someone to quite literally change sex they would have to go back in time, change their genes in utero and then progress and develop as the new sex. It is impossible.

Genes are the blueprint for creating one of the two sexes. They code that devopment. The body then forms to match that reproductive function. The hormones then regulate that reproductive body to enable it to do its reproductive role.

Its ongoing from conception.

AlexaShutUp · 27/03/2022 02:48

Saying Trans Men are Men doesn't make them male but it does make them a different type of man.

Ultimately, it seems that it all just comes down to definitions, doesn't it? What is a man, and what is a woman?

It seems that you're not trying to deny the reality of biological sex, but for you, the definition of man and woman isn't based on that. Whereas for me, it is.

What I'm struggling to understand is what that definition is based on, given that it all seems to boil down to the circular definition that being a man = feeling like a man. But we still don't know what a man (or a woman) actually is.

I'm still interested in your rejection of the idea of trans race though. What if someone felt that same disconnect that you describe between how their brain views things and how their eyes see it, but with regard to their race rather than their gender? Would you not accept their perspective? If not, how do you think it's different from what you describe?

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:53

@sacredfeminina

In order for someone to quite literally change sex they would have to go back in time, change their genes in utero and then progress and develop as the new sex. It is impossible.

Genes are the blueprint for creating one of the two sexes. They code that devopment. The body then forms to match that reproductive function. The hormones then regulate that reproductive body to enable it to do its reproductive role.

Its ongoing from conception.

Say it's hypothetical then.

Say there was a perfect sex change in the future where every single cell could be recoded to male, would you then accept transmen as men? or would they need to be born even if their entire physicality and biology were changed?

OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:54

Both gender dysphoria and body dysnorphoa describe the reality of a body which does not match self perception. An aneorixic girl sees a fat body. . . Etc etc. Aneorexia can present quite early. It could be that GD is the earliest presenting dysmorphia. Who knows.

I think though, either way its really neither here nor there whether it dos or does not truly exist in someones head. It is the common shared material reality which is important for our society, and the meaning of words.

The meaning of woman is an adult female of the human species. That is what it has always meant.

A person born a woman will always be a woman, even though they may live as a trans man, because sex change is impossible.

pop91 · 27/03/2022 02:58

@AlexaShutUp

Saying Trans Men are Men doesn't make them male but it does make them a different type of man.

Ultimately, it seems that it all just comes down to definitions, doesn't it? What is a man, and what is a woman?

It seems that you're not trying to deny the reality of biological sex, but for you, the definition of man and woman isn't based on that. Whereas for me, it is.

What I'm struggling to understand is what that definition is based on, given that it all seems to boil down to the circular definition that being a man = feeling like a man. But we still don't know what a man (or a woman) actually is.

I'm still interested in your rejection of the idea of trans race though. What if someone felt that same disconnect that you describe between how their brain views things and how their eyes see it, but with regard to their race rather than their gender? Would you not accept their perspective? If not, how do you think it's different from what you describe?

I honestly don't see anyone saying Trans men are actually Male and Trans Women actually Female just social and/or medical transitions affords us a different identity.

My definition of Man, Woman and Non-Binary is based in identity that I do feel is innate.

Because race is cultural because if you put a white baby and a black baby on a desert island and come back 100 years later, race probably wound't exist for them whereas Sex and Gender would.

OP posts:
sacredfeminina · 27/03/2022 02:59

That transman would need to change every cell in their body, have their body naturally produce male hormones and have a full functioning male reproductive system. It is impossible so it is a pointless hypothetical question. In that scenario i would more likely accept a transman as a man. I would be wondering though if this highly expensive and energy draining technology was necessary, when some people cannot even meet their basic needs like clean drinking water or heating their homes.