Why do trans people try to pretend they are the opposite sex

[DragonRunor]

instead of accepting that they have a sex? They also have a gender identity. Both could be recorded on id documents, and they could tell everyone clearly and honestly who they are. Trying to pretend they’re something they are not just makes it seem like they’re ashamed

Subject to bullying and violence for being trans? Then that needs to be addressed by society challenging the perpetrators, not by victims hiding.

TWANW, they are TW and could be accepted and respected for that

To answer sadmillenials question, this really - do they feel there is something lesser about being trans? Or, to overthink a bit more, is this necessary for Stonewall/WPATH to further the victim narrative?

Thankyou for this, it’s really interesting.

My questions would be around what made you feel ‘male’ ie how did you decide that the way you felt was male rather than just a different version of being female? I don’t recognise feeling female, but I am female. I also don’t feel male - I don’t really understand what either of those feeling is. This is the sort of discussion that was banned by #nodebate, and it really hasn’t helped - people need to discuss things to understand each other!

Thankyou for engaging

I wouldn't say I "feel male", so like you (and a previous poster who responded, sorry I haven't read everything yet), I don't really believe in "essences" or "souls" or anything like that.

I don't know what male feels like. I don't think all women feel the same. Yet... Something around the "I", my identity, always took the form of a male in my imagination, if that makes sense. So, my body felt wrong, and I desired to look male, and imagined myself as male consistently.

I would have dreams and the "me" in them would be a guy, when I would read stories I would see "me" as the guy, I would play pretend as a guy, I would daydream and the "I" in those daydreams was a guy. I desperately wanted a male body. I wanted clothes to fit my body like a male body.

I don't particularly want to be "treated like a man" in the social way, I don't much behave like one anyway I suppose having been socialised as a girl, but I wanted to look like one.

A deeper voice, a more masculine facial structure, a male fat distribution, male looking legs and hips, no breasts, etc etc. I loved it when I would get sick and my voice would get lower... I even found myself (and I know this isn't right) wishing to get/be at risk of breast cancer so that I could "have a valid reason to remove them".

I tried just to live with my body until my mid/late 20s. Tried therapy and medications to help with how I felt and to just get on with it. It didn't go away.

So, I suppose in the end I'm not even saying I have a gender identity or that I'm a guy or have an essence. It's just that the only thing that relieved how I felt in the end was looking more male. I feel better using a male name etc. Could I walk around like this and just keep calling myself a woman? Yes, I suppose so - but that is also confusing for people, isn't it at times? If you really were to ask, I would agree I'm not a man, I'm a trans man, a woman who strongly desires to live in a masculine body?

Personally I try to use unisex facilities wherever possible.

Lots of trans people are open about being trans but I do think some hide it "go stealth" due to the transphobia - fear of being harassed and ridiculed and attacked. A desire to blend in and not be bothered I suppose. And many do go about like that, but they also aren't the loud ones you see in the media, and I'd argue they are the ones more likely to pass fairly well anyway... Of course that's not women's problem, I'm not saying it it, it is a problem though. I think the simple acknowledgment of their own sex is distressing for some of them, which I can empathise with, but also that's simply the reality of our lives.

Although, I myself would likely be labelled as transphobic by a large proportion of the community these days, as I don't think we literally are men/women, and I do think dysphoria is needed. It's a rare medical/mental problem, for which transition may be the best course of action for some (imo).

It is interesting to consider the transsexual/transgender split as well. I feel "transsexual" had such negative connotations that there was a desire to move away from that association...

As a GNC lesbian I had a lot of shame regarding who I was that I had to work through. Society is not often kind to people who are very GNC. I don't think trans-identification is the way to go, but I empathise with their feelings of shame.

Thanks again for being so open with your thoughts and feelings, Zandax.

I can relate to the daydreams about being male - I knew what I would look like, what kind of clothes I would wear, even what kind of shoes - brogues, before they became fashionable I knew what my name would be.
Becoming that man was never an option, and I was lucky in that respect.

I also grew up knowing I was attracted to women, which could have fed that fantasy - trying to pass as a man to court women. But - again I thank my lucky stars - it occurred to me that the women I wanted to be with were women who were attracted to women, so it would be counterproductive to try to be a man.

The 'fantasy me' lives on a bit in my haircuts and my love of sharp tailoring

I confess that, although I've read your posts with openness and interest, I find it hard to understand taking a feeling, a daydream, so far that you would take such drastic and potentially dangerous steps to change what is after all just one aspect of yourself. You admit that you remain the same person, you know you remain a woman, and the only thing that has really changed is literally the most superficial thing about you as a person: your outward appearance,

So no matter how much good-will I feel, and no matter how open my mind is, I can't understand how the resemblance of maleness, a simulacrum of a man, which you acknowledge is only skin deep, can have such weight and significance for you. But it obviously does; I guess that might be a good definition of gender dysphoria.
And if it is, dangerous surgery with far-reaching consequences seems like a very unsubtle physical way to deal with what is a psychological issue.

I don't understand, but I wish you well, and thank you for sharing your experiences and thoughts.

I'm trans, and it baffles me that apparently some trans people deny they are their sex. That's not healthy at all. Just from a medical perspective: how can you properly take care of your body, if you deny its sex? I'm a biological woman, and I need to get pap smears, not prostate exams. Denying that wouldn't get me anywhere good.

"They also have a gender identity. Both could be recorded on id documents, and they could tell everyone clearly and honestly who they are."

I'd love that!

"Trying to pretend they’re something they are not just makes it seem like they’re ashamed"

I don't think it comes from shame. I think it comes from unhappiness at being the sex they are. And when people around them encourage them to turn that unhappiness into a full-blown delusion, well... I suppose it's hard to resist :(

Magical thinking is very powerful. Just look at the extreme lengths many religious people go to in an attempt to align objective reality with their deep seated beliefs and their powerful, but subjective and entirely imagined, spiritual experiences.

I think the place to start is with an understanding that humans are not complete and fully-formed entities. In fact, we never can be, and it's a religious conceit to think it's possible. Instead, we have developed over a billion years from tiny little replicating strings of chemicals to highly complex animals through random evolution in a series of many, many steps each one making us a little (or sometimes a lot) better at reproducing in an ever-changing natural environment.

And that was before we developed complex societies. Those societies have also evolved, as have the beliefs within them. But society evolves without any agency or intended direction, other than the pull of our increased scientific understanding and technological manipulation of the universe in which we live.

The hard reality is that humans are made of many parts (biology and ideas) and none of them are designed by an all-knowing power. And so it is that sometimes (or perhaps "often", or maybe even "usually") the parts don't fit together properly, and, humans being compulsive problem-solvers, we try to find a way to make them fit. And because we love simple patterns we try to fit the broken pieces into whatever feels like the closest simple pattern.

Trans people have pieces that don't fit together (and I suspect it's not always the same pieces that don't fit). The easy way of making the pieces fit is to adapt the familiar, well-understood pattern of sexual dimorphism. If gender and biological sex are treated as the same thing, and if gender is given priority (which is easy in a libertarian culture that gives the "inner self" the moral right to define reality) fitting a trans person into the pattern of sexual dimorphism by swapping them from male category to female (or the other way) is a fix so simple that for some people it feels intuitive.

What we're seeing now is the collapse of that simple fix. The judges have ruled that reality is messy, and pretending otherwise isn't acceptable when the simple fix breaks the law. And the reason why so many people find the ruling hard isn't just that the lives of many trans people are now going to be worse. It's because it threatens a core existential belief, namely the belief that following the path dictated by the true "inner self" is the most important part of being a human, and that it's the way we can all fit our pieces together.

This ruling, along with the Cass report, is a little bit like telling millions of religious people living in a theocracy that their God doesn't exist and that the law is now going to be secular instead of theological.

Normally if I ever get into online discussions with the genderist end of the trans community I have to give up first because it just makes my brain ache!

The only times I've "won" are when I've asked if female people could just rename themselves something else - femans, perhaps - and leave the word "woman" to be an identity. Because if you don't need to he female to be a woman then you shouldn't need females to be women.

That's always brought an abrupt end to the discussion.

@Zandax your posts have been the most interesting I’ve read so far- and the closest explanation to something rational! Extra points for not referencing any of the dubious stats that shut down any questions as insensitive!

Reading your last post about your inner self reminded me of ‘man’ as the default human. I wonder whether you had a strong sense of self, a strong ego, perhaps, and because main characters, strong characters, are male, that’s how the inner you seemed?

With the best will in the world, ‘default’ is male. We’ve come a long way- lits of gendered language is redundant now, and strong women’s roles are becoming more visible, but still… we talk about football and ‘women’s football’.

If you see yourself as ‘at least equal’ then you might see yourself as male.

I want to be a better paid person who isnt viewed as about to fuck off out of my employment because babies.

A transwoman is that personified. A woman without any of the inconvenience of women things, like babies.

Why would you employ a woman? When a transwoman can be a man but also a woman enough for your stats

Some links to autism are suspects. Perhaps feeling that being same sex attracted would be more acceptable if one were to live as the opposite sex.

Many males are AGP, i.e. they are aroused by themselves as women. Over time this fetish becomes all encompassing to them and they will often transition later in life. They find things like getting invited to cervical screenings arousing. I was reading some posts on the uk trans subreddit and their will be posts form these men stating that women just accept them as one of the girls, that they pass and all they want is to be able to live as the gender they identify with and use those spaces and be left alone. So I click on their profile and 100% of the time its some massive, balding, ugly, obese, built like a brick shit house man in his 50's posing in fishnets and short skirts in creepy posts titled things like "I think I see Her" while nursing their euphoria boners.

They transition because they have a brain eating fetish, and to gain access to women's spaces and the women in them to get their kicks.

I agree that Zandax's posts are interesting, and in my opinion refreshingly free of ideological claptrap. I'm not at all sure that I understand, though. One of the things that I don't understand is how a person with a trans identity copes with the aging process. My self image changes as my body's (and face's) appearance and capabilities change. From being a fairly "pretty" boy (though I say it myself) I've changed into an old man. My self image would make no sense at all if it was still that of a pretty boy. I see some women, and rather fewer men, who don't appear to have accepted the changes that come with age. [Actually, the men who don't accept male pattern baldness are just as unaccepting.]

We're not 21 again each birthday. We're not as physically strong as we used to be. Our remaining time is dwindling. For most of us, our ambitions have changed. We may have to face up to the indignities of old age, and to let go eventually of our independence. All through this aging process, it is healthiest to accept our changing physical reality. We can look after our health to the best of our ability; I could eat better and exercise more frequently. But a happy old age is based in acceptance, rather than raging at the dying of the light.

My view is that this also applies to disabilities, and to sex. We are what we are, and acceptance is the foundation of a healthy relationship with our bodies. That sounds a bit dualistic; I mean acceptance of the bodies that we are. Is cosmetic surgery, or extreme bodybuilding, or tattooing, or even an obsession with beauty products, as healthy in the long run as a much more outward focus?

I think everyone is afraid of the peen. Girls going through puberty don't want to become women because they'd have to encounter one, boys don't want theirs and hide it (weirdly few of them actually opt for removal) but are scared of other peen's in loos. It all revolves around the peen from an outsider's perspective (after some wine anyway)

@RapidOnsetGenderCritic

I'm not Zandax, but I'm trans too, so I hope it's okay if I share my personal experience.

"One of the things that I don't understand is how a person with a trans identity copes with the aging process. "

Personally, that's not a problem at all. My body ages and I'm fine with that. Being trans is entirely unrelated to aging, to me.

"My view is that this also applies to disabilities, and to sex. We are what we are, and acceptance is the foundation of a healthy relationship with our bodies. "

In theory, I agree with that. But in practice, I feel like a horrible liar and dissimulator, to myself and to others, if I present as a woman. I have no idea why. I just know that nothing - not therapy, not medicine, not anything at all - stops that feeling, except for presenting as a man. It's weird, but it's very real.

Another interesting sharing of thoughts, thank you Seethlaw.

Both you and Zandax keep coming back to 'that's just how I feel'.
You feel like a liar if you present as a woman. Which is an interesting choice of words, because of course it is presenting yourself as a man which is the un-truth.
What you feel you should be is not what you objectively are.
Why you feel you are something that you objectively are not is a mystery to me, and apparently to you too. It's hard not to apply the concept of 'essence' as I did in a previous post, but Zandax didn't accept the term.

Individuals like yourselves saying 'that's just how I feel' is one thing, and thank you for sharing those feelings with us here, but a huge juggernaut of a TRA campaign based on a small number of individuals' feelings as the basis for widespread social change is another thing altogether...

Thank you @Seethlaw . In return, I hope you won't mind me sharing my personal experience. My son, out of the blue as far as I'm concerned, announced a trans identity. At first, he was tolerant of my confusion. As time has gone on, he has become more and more intolerant of my different worldview, to the extent of refusing to talk to me and his mother. I suspect that the announcement of his trans identity has actually caused dysphoria, and it has become painful for him to be reminded of physical reality. If I do not do as I'm told and accept his ethics, I have become, without changing my views at all, a hateful bigot.

I cannot handle the cognitive dissonance of referring to my son as "she". Using his preferred (and more and more that has morphed into "demanded") name is just about conceivable, though painful especially as I seem to be supposed to use it even when talking about when he was a child. I can at least try to see it as a nickname. But calling my son "she" leaves me feeling "like a horrible liar". To choose to do so would remove my integrity. If I lied deliberately and repeatedly to and about him, I would be rejecting my son, which is unthinkable for me, and it is no comfort to be told that I would be accepting "my daughter".

"What you feel you should be is not what you objectively are.
Why you feel you are something that you objectively are not is a mystery to me, and apparently to you too."

Yep, total mystery. I have hypotheses, but they are untestable, so they'll never be more than that.

Now, I suppose it doesn't particularly bother me because I'm used to feeling things that are not aligned with reality and yet are very real to me. I've been suffering from depression since I was a teen, and I had absolutely unrealistic beliefs about myself. Medicine and therapy have helped a lot, and I've been able to correct most of those beliefs, but they were absolutely real and devastating to me when I had them, to the point that I wanted to kill myself over them. So what I mean is: depression is real, even if it makes no sense.

So having another feeling that doesn't coincide with physical reality? Heh, nothing unusual for me. What's unusual is that so far nobody's found the beginning of a trace of a physiological reason behind it.

"It's hard not to apply the concept of 'essence' as I did in a previous post, but Zandax didn't accept the term."

While I would accept it. I once described myself to a religious friend as a male soul in a female body - even though I'd be utterly incapable of explaining what on Earth a male soul is supposed to be.

"a huge juggernaut of a TRA campaign based on a small number of individuals' feelings as the basis for widespread social change is another thing altogether..."

I totally agree, especially when those feelings are not even consistent across the group, or when the group can't even agree on what it wants anyway.

Their sex is whatever they say it is and is on a spectrum

People's sex is what they were born as. Male or female.

Sex is binary and is not on a spectrum.

@RapidOnsetGenderCritic

I'm so sorry :( I think I understand what you mean, and I hate that I can't think of any way to help alleviate your distress, even just a little. I understand both your need to stay true to yourself, and your child's need to be recognised as they feel they are. I really don't know what to say, other than thank you for sharing your experience, and helping me understand a bit better how it's like on "the other side".

Thankyou to everyone who’s contributed here. i’ve found it really interesting xx

I was just watching a 12 yr old guitarist on BGT. Well, I was in the same room while it was on. Long hair, unisex name, I assumed female. At the end, both arms raised on a triumph gesture and I immediately realised it was a boy.

Sex is about fine, minute differences as well as the gross, more obvious ones. It’s in the shoulder joints, the elbow, the pelvis… it just is. Sex can’t be changed. It runs through us.