TW who supports the SC ruling - AMA

[VanishingVision]

Hello! I was thinking of doing this post for a little while now as the previous posts doing this by the rather wonderful trans men here were really interesting but I didnt want to take up too much space here or take any attention away from much more important things here than what I have to say.

But I figured to just go for it before I have a big old break from the Internet for a while.

So like the title says, I'm a transwoman who accepts the SC ruling: ask me anything if you'd like to and I'll do my best to answer.

That's a community should be, but when people refer to the 'trans community' they mean all of us as a whole. I don't think different ideas are allowed in groups, but most trans people i speak to one on one agree with me to some extent.

I absolutely agree with that, i think you have the loud nasty minority who set the tone and the rest of the community kind of gather around it because they feel they cant survive without it and then you have people like myself and the others posting here who are outliers and just live their own life outside of it, which is why we can see both sides and often feel caught in the middle but have ended up coming to agreeing with the GC side lately.

I'm not aware of any, I think they often get more involved with GC groups instead if they feel inclined to join such a similiar organisation. I also think it's because trans people who think more this way are more inclined to live a quiet life away from everything surrounding this, if they can.

Hi, also a trans woman and I want to understand whether your support for the ruling comes from you being ENBY - certainly the way you describe yourself comes across this way?

My passport currently says F and actually yes, this is one thing I do have a concern about. I'm not going to freak out if it has to change back to M, not everything is about me, but I would be concerned how that may affect travelling as I do travel somewhat frequently.

I could separate it more like this: 1. Transsexuals - people who's dysphoria requires them to change sex characteristics 2. People who feel they experience dysphoria because of the social expectations of their sex 3. People with autism (this is more often the types claiming non binary i think) 4. Autogynephiles and 5. Yes the predatory and vile men.

Of course the 5th category deserve no sympathy at all or accommodation and every step should be done to keep them well away from everyone, not just women and children! AGP is actually alot more complicated than i used to think, I used to think AGP was all transvestites fetishism but it seems to be more of a sexual orientation than a fetish so I think they likely need some kind of therapy to deal with this.
The first 3 categories often get mixed together, so I think more psychiatrictic help needs to be available firstly to separate those so that they get the appropriate solutions before considering that transition could be that solution but that would only be for the first group. Group 2 and 3 needs help to understand themselves better.

I think we do but perhaps not consciously? I don't know if i consciously assess people's sex and age consistently, perhaps as risk assessment for sure but y'know im certainly aware of whos in the room with me! It depends on your definion of anti-social and the particular person, do I think it's anti-social? No, not really because I'm personally not trying to hide my sex in my view I've changed my sex characteristics and there's no ulterior motive in doing so. I'm honest about it but of course that's coming from a point of self-bias, I will admit. I can understand why somebody could think that though!

I'm not really the kind of person to try and convince anyone of anything, your opinion and view is your own much like mine is my own. All I'd say is that I don't think allowing that small number of people to transition (after sufficient help first) hurts society as a whole, I think the narrative surrounding transition should change and that trans people need to understand that the world shouldn't change everything to fit around you and that you can't have everything. This is the mindset I've had from the start and is likely why I'm quite happy.

I don't know alot about that so I can't speak on behalf of those with BIID but I think the difference in my opinion is that a person wishing for transition is to be a happier and more functional person in the longterm whereas somebody with BIID wanting to amputate a leg is wishing to be a less physically functional person (I'm sorry if this sounds ableist it wasn't intentional I just had to word it as clearly as I could). So that's where I make a distinction between the conditions and why I don't think it's a reasonable comparsion.

I do understand how you correlate dysmorphia and dysphoria, but I think it's a big trade off if this is the correct thing that you feel you need to do. So, i do feel healthier in many ways genuinely because I have to be more aware of my body than I was before, before I used to reject my body but now I consider it my home and I need to look after myself mind, body and soul but I'm very accepting of the unknown longterm effects that could happen. So i went through two different private clinics for hormones, the first one didn't tell me much about the health risks but I already knew them and the 2nd clinic did very clearly despite me having been on hormones for two years.
No I never wanted to preserve that or have children. I warmed up to having kids briefly once but generally I never wanted them, it's not a desire of mine.

No my immediate family generally wasn't, my step father was homophobic and often called me gay as a child because I quite clearly in love with my male best friend. I didn't join any groups, I never felt like I needed to. My problem in myself didn't lie in my attraction to men, though I did try to hide that for some time, my problem in myself was my sex.

It's happened a few times, I was sexually assaulted by an older man I was friends with multiple times before I transitioned (it actually scared me away from transitioning too), since transitioning I have been harassed by men here and there after the first year or so also and plus the man you mentioned but I tend to keep myself to myself. I did have another experience with a man I was sleeping with that you could consider an assault quite honestly because I withdrew consent.

No, since I've transitioned a woman hasn't tried to hurt me (though a very drunk woman did aggressively hit on me at a gig once, I was clearly so uncomfortable that a man actually ushered me away). I did have an abusive relationship with a woman though, when I was trying to convince myself I was a straight man for a time and she did sexually assault me.

In which case, I do have a question but I appreciate it's probably a bit of a derail because it's not necessarily a question for the OP (because I don't know if the OP feels this way too) and I've appreciated how respectful you have been to the OP in not taking over this thread.

I'll ask my question anyway and will put it to the OP in the first instance, given it's the OP's AMA...

"If you are a TW who doesn't believe that 'we all have a gender identity', how do you make sense of your decision to transition i.e. if you don't feel like you've got the gendered soul of a woman, why do you think it resolves feelings of discomfort about yourself to have changed your body to resemble a woman's body (within the limits of surgical/hormonal possibility)?"

OP, please ignore my question if this doesn't apply to you. Troubled, I would be genuinely interested in your thoughts if the OP is happy that it's not a derail on this thread.

To expand upon my "I find it bizarre" statement and pick up on your point about a pragmatic approach to resolving dysphoria....

I'm not sure I understand why it's pragmatic. I'm not against medical transition for people who a) are over 25 (after the shift in amygdala versus frontal lobe thinking) b) have been through a very rigorous, neutral support pathway, which rules out and seeks to address every possible reason for the dysphoria (I'm not convinced this pathway exists currently, particularly in relation to autism) and c) fully understand the significant risks and known impact of their decision about their body.

However, I've got no decent answer for the very valid counter argument that it makes as much sense to support this as it does to medically support an anorexic person to stay thin or to amputate the leg of someone who feels dysphoria relating to it.

All I've got on that is that belief is very powerful: 2 billion Christians believe that it's possible for a virgin to give birth and that conception of a child can happen without sperm. I don't. But my lack of belief has no impact on their belief that there is an exception to what we know about biology and reproduction.

I wouldn't support anorexics or amputee-wannabes being medically supported in a way that enable their belief to be enacted on their body. Nor do I support situations where parents refuse life-saving medical care for their children because of their religious beliefs. But belief remains very powerful and it's a reality that it has to be accommodated in some medical treatment decisions.

But if a TW doesn't actually believe "I'm a woman because I've got a woman's soul", why is transition a pragmatic solution to dysphoria?

(I will say at this juncture that I'm reading this thread in good faith... I'm cautiously optimistic that it won't go the same way as another one I was on a while ago now where it gradually edged its way towards increasingly less ambiguous comments before turning into a full-blown fantasy about nurses in female prisons 🤮 To cap it all off, I got told by one particularly cross poster that I was to blame for the behaviour of the TW in question because I had been interacting politely - I pointed out that I didn't own MN or the internet, but to no avail. FFS 😂)

Honestly I'm not that bothered how people refer to me, I'm quite secure in myself so it doesn't really bother me. It does feel weird to me being called a man, there is just something that doesn't compute in my brain haha. But it doesn't bother me nor do I find it insulting.

Honestly I'm not sure what I think about the GRA, whether there is any point to keeping it or repealing it. I don't have a GRC because I never saw the point in it though my DRs really want me to get one, I don't want to get married and I don't care if people call me a man when I'm dead I'm too busy living my little life to worry about that! Plus I've never had any desire to do any job specifically for women so the 'legality' of being recognised as a woman in the law has never concerned me though my passport does say 'F' on it but I guess I saw that as more of a practically? If strangers generally assume me to be a woman or at least a trans woman (I'm not actually certain of how I may 'pass').

I don't have a real definite answer for you, sorry. I think i need to give this one some more thought.

My biggest issue is not genuine trans women (usually gay effeminate men) who just want to blend in and live authentically

The problem is that it progressed to self id and that womanhood was a feeling with no debate which TRA's campaigned meant no one could say no to autogenophiles deciding they were suddenly lesbians and entitled to get their cocks out in the women's changing room and predatory men putting on a dress and putting mobile phones under cubicle doors in women's toilets.

Self id and TRA's and horrible men have made genuine trans womens live immeasurably harder - blame them for the situation now not women who have just said 'no more'

I've watched some of her stuff and I
very much agree with her on that!

Thank you for sharing that- really interesting.

Okay! Here's my take on gender identity then for you!

Gender identity makes NO sense really, unless you are talking about a trans person. I think gender identity is a thing but I see it as a tool to decide what to do with your dysphoria as opposed to like a gendered soul.

If you experience dysphoria and it's figured out it's because of your sex characteristics and NOT because of social expectations of your sex and you wish to transition then I think the concept of 'gender identity' is really a tool to say 'hey I'm a male/female and I wish to transition to female/male'. Does that make sense?

I think the reason I think this is because I don't 'identify as a woman' or 'feel like a woman', i couldn't know what it's like to be a woman y'know I was born a boy right? I have dysphoria towards my male characteristics and for some reason I genuinely can't explain it just seems 'correct' for my body to be female instead, though I can't ever actually be an actual adult female person/a woman so I accept that I am a male to female transsexual, a trans woman. I hope that makes sense! Maybe that does still kind of sound like 'gender identity'? But I don't think it makes me a woman.

It's funny because I'm very interested in esoteric stuff, spirituality, the occult, religions etc etc and don't have trouble in getting my head around abstract concepts but when it comes to trans related stuff I try to be DEATHLY clinical 🤣 as opposed to the magickal language trans people usually like to use.

Whatever happened on that last thread you mentioned sounds awful 😢

Oh God I don't know! I really don't think it will sadly.

Just a question, do they typically spend alot of time in the trans community and stuff?

I'm so sorry to hear that though that he's turned on you especially as youve helped them out so much. I couldn't imagine cutting my sister and mother out ever.

Hmm, no I don't really. I of course, at one point, had male privilege (not that I was aware of it). I do think most trans people go through a sensitive period early on,I did but I didnt shout at people or anything like that I just internalised it. I had a short period of time where I tried to pretend to be a very masculine straight man (which i later found out my mother was laughing at me about) so that's the only way I could relate to that at all.

How DARE you do the trans thing and come onto MY thread and make this all about yourself... haven't you had enough fame and glory on your own??

Of course I'm joking please do chip in wherever you want! 😊

Hello @VanishingVision

Your posts (and the contributions from other TW) have been very interesting and illuminating. It has explained a lot to me that I had not really understood before. Three pages of courteous discussion is quite a feat too!

Do you feel that your transition has resolved the discomfort you felt from your body dysmorphia? And if so was it a full resolution or did it reveal that there were other underlying causes that remained?

There have been a handful of cases where people have transitioned back then transitioned again, which would indicate a certain amount of unresolved issues.

I think interest in transsexual people rose in the 1960s and 70s. There were several well-known people who made an appearance at that time, and although there was the inevitable sensationalist coverage, I think most people felt that this was clearly a serious issue for the people involved.

I remember watching the documentary about Julia Grant, who underwent transition in real time back in the 1970s. I watched it with my mum and we both felt a lot of sympathy and good will towards her. It has to be said that her later life was a bit rackety, so I'm not sure transitioning solved all her problems, but it's likely it did improve things for her in the main.

Transgender is considered to be the 'umbrella' which is a relatively new thing, which all the trans 'identitities' exist and TS is under it though generally the trans community hate that term and anyone who uses it.

I don't really relate to anything outside of being a transsexual as far as being trans goes so I don't like the term transgender and it seems to mean everything all at once and also doesn't mean anything at all. I think transsexual is very direct.

What would I have to scold you on? You are simply doing what you believe to be right and I support you in that. I don't have to agree with you on every point much like you absolutely won't always agree with myself and that's how we get to a good place in life by existing and treating each othe like human beings!

I don't think it's a popular idea for a number of reasons.

1. The reality is it likely won't happen on a wide scale, which is why my attitude is that I just deal with doing my wees in the men's even if it looks and feels weird at this point but ultimately I don't really have a problem with it (and I agree that TW shouldn't be using the female spaces anymore, the 'social contract' decided by male doctors clearly was used to overreach).

1. Most TW won't accept that they aren't actually women, whether it's because they genuinely believe they are the same as a 'cis' woman (their language not mine) or because they can't accept society not treating them as such. So that's either a genuine case of feeling like they are being segregated unfairly or they need the validation. TM are normally less bothered which space they use, they don't wanna make women uncomfortable if they pass but I know TM who use the women's anyway because they don't pass.

I wouldn't consider myself to be an 'Enby' or non-binary as that seems to be more about the social expectations of sex and gender. I still see myself in a binary way as sex goes: male to female transsexual. I don't see myself a man, I see myself as a trans woman and it's down to others to decide how they view me.

My support for the ruling is primarily a result of how I feel about trans activists and the 'debate'.

So would you then say that your gender identity is transgender woman?

I am also unclear on what you mean by your support being based on the "debate".

Hello!

So yeah, it's interesting because I do feel like transition itself not only helped to alleviate dysphoria itself but it provided a bedrock for me to also tackle other problems in my life that I never could before and it's also changed the way I go about my problems, I'm not avoidant I deal with them and if it's something I can't control i don't waste my energy on it. I definitely discovered much more about my self I didn't know too, so I wouldn't say I discovered other underlying things causing the dysphoria but that was certainly a roadblock in dealing with anything else.

I had a lot of unresolved trauma and it wasn't until after transition I was able to unpack it and deal with it. I also had off and on again problems with alcohol and substance abuse and I only accepted my addiction after transition and am now totally clean and sober for two years at this point which I never thought would happen 😊 The other areas of my life improved too, like my relationship with my mother who is my bestie, work, being able to just enjoy little things too. Dating is another story however but I'm not too bothered about that 🤣

I acryslly hate the weaponisation of Suicide ideation by TRAs but I genuinely don't think I would be alive now if I hadn't finally made the step to transition. It's not perfect, because life isn't anyway. It's 'rackety' as you say about Julia Grant (I hadn't heard of her before so ill look her up thankyou! I love reading about TS from back in that time period) and I guess there is always a little voice there which is my 'dysphoria' but I don't tend to listen to it unless I'm just having a bad day, what I have now is much better than I had before. Transition isn't perfect and you have to be realistic that there will be difficulties alongside the positives.

No, I consider being a trans woman more like a medical fact not an identity. I'm a biological male who wished to transition to female, but I'm not the same as a woman. It makes me a trans woman.

I mean, you only need to spend 5 mins in the media, looking back at the actions of TRAs towards women and also the way trans people have been both demonised and weaponised for political gain to see what I mean by that.

One question, which might be too personal, but what age group do you fall into?

I’m an older feminist who grew up with the term transsexual. That term was accepted as describing the material reality ie some men wanted a female (presenting) body but knew they were male. They either cross dressed or had surgery. Some body dysphoric and some AGP. Many or most were gay men.

That understanding (and some acceptance of that position reaching back centuries) has been utterly upended in the last two decades and I see, like you, that the demand for making everyone accept gender over sex has… hurt trans people along the way and I would add, harmed the LGB community as well as those identifying as trans.

This second question might beyond your scope as it’s less personal and more observational, but do you have any thoughts on why the trans or gendered phenomenon has swept through young people? I see so many young people (pretty much all ASD) coming to believe they’re trans or NB or one of the many genders. It’s this aspect that worries me the most.

Thank you, and the other Transwoman so far on this thread for your time and thoughts.

We still think of my trans sibling with love. We don't need to understand the motivation or detail behind their internal life. It's not a journey that we can be alongside. He does spend a lot of time on line and will have made this a deep dive special interest, although clearly not from how myself or my daughters might feel.

We're aware it's early days but good to hear it's almost a necessary part of the evolving to a more stable contentment.

My mum, privately, is exasperated, worried, angry, and occasionally probably does laugh ironically but she says she is amazed at how strong the bond of love is despite a lot of challenges over many decades of previous challenges.

I hope you feel loved unconditionally by family.

Right but then in what sense did you transition? This seems like a weirdly semantic difference and also suggests a high degree of transmed logic - for example, how are you a transsexual if you have not had GRS? Were you not one until you had it?

Well, no - the ruling is very clearly about whether a GRC means that you are legally recognised as the gender you identify as. It's not at all clear to me how the fact that people are upset about a ruling that says "it is not" rationalises that ruling.

That's okay, without being too personal or exact I'm in my mid 30s!

Ive always had that mentality about it honestly as far as what transsexual is. And I agree, the upending it's hurt everyone in my opinion. Women, children, trans and LGB people.

Honestly i think it's very much because the way 'trans' is viewed as now, this kind of fluid thing that's all about presentation, identity and pronouns (that can lead to medicalisation) that you can invent or define however you wish... I mean, I see how that can appeal to young children, especially those with ASD struggling to understand themselves.

Think of the way it's all presented, bright and magickal and affirming that part of it is very much like a subculture. I can see why that'd be alluring to people figuring themselves out and in reality, if it wasn't about 'gender' it'd be totally fine. People can and should explore their identity if they wish, wear whatever they want and call themselves whatever. I think it's the fact that can lead to medicalisation and it's essentially trying to change how everyone sees sex/gender and the consequences we're seeing is now where i find an issue.