Push and pull factors in transitioning

[GCScot]

People's motivations in making a change can be categorised into 'push' and 'pull' factors. 'Push' factors are your dissatisfaction with your current state. 'Pull' factors are the perceived advantages of another state.

I started thinking about the possible push and pull factors for people transitioning their gender. It made me realise that there are two distinct groups:

Group 1 = mainly motivated by push factors. i.e. they are unhappy with their sexed body. They include:

• Women/girls with internalised misogyny

• Gay people with internalised homophobia

• Non-genderconforming autistic people who have internalised sexist stereotypes as fact

• Survivors of abuse/trauma who are trying to protect themselves from future abuse/trauma

Group 2 = mainly motivated by pull factors. i.e. they are attracted to being/being perceived to be the opposite sex. They include:

• People who are sexually aroused by the idea of themselves being the opposite sex (AGP/AAP)

• People who think they can gain a personal advantage (sporting/competitive/sexual access) by claiming to be the opposite sex

Group 1 are mainly children and young adults, especially girls. They have gender dysphoria. Because they are trying to permanently and convincingly escape their sexed bodies, they are more likely to undergo medical modifications (surgery, artificial hormones). They have a diverse range of vulnerabilities as a result of their own personal life experiences and the prejudices of society

Group 2 are mainly adult men. We might say they have gender euphoria. Because they aren't trying to escape their sexed bodies they are unlikely to undergo medical modification, preferring temporary and superficial modifications such as clothes, make up, prosthetics, names and pronouns. The majority of the aggressive vocal TRAs come from this group

TRAs deliberately merge the two groups

They know they can utilise the sincerity, vulnerability and innocence of Group 1:
Trans appears in childhood - it must be innate!
Trans appears in childhood - it can't be sexually motivated!
Trans people have gender dysphoria - they're vulnerable!
Look at the lengths they'll go to (surgery, hormones) - they must be genuine!

But when it comes to the motivations of trans people, the TRAs suddenly switch track. They emphasise the pull factor acting on Group 2 ("wanting to be a wo/man") rather than the push factor acting on Group 1 (trying to escape your sexed body). Because any detailed discussion of just why someone might want to escape their body would raise awkward questions about whether wanting to transition is really a cause for celebration and affirmation.

I think it's very important we distinguish between the two groups when discussing objections to gender ideology. They are very different groups with different motivations and consequences. I think part of the reason so many trans allies are resistant to changing their opinions or even discussing the issue is because most of the trans people they know are Group 1s. They recognise these people's sincerity and vulnerability and have been duped by Group 2 TRAs into not examining the underlying push and pull factors of transition

Masturbation on a hospital ward is a criminal offence regardless of who does it. The solution is the police, who are exactly who handles anyone committing indecent exposure. Trying to use a single gross criminal act to justify pathologizing an entire group of normal, law-abiding people is the oldest bigoted trick in the book.

refuse to discuss or acknowledge these types even exist

Criminality exists therefore trans people don't? Brilliant Sherlock!

Look who's refusing to discuss.

Your argument is that Paula should have been masturbating on a female ward.

Yes, I thought that too reading your posts.

You always write utter rubbish based on hurty feelings rather than actual provable science.

The TIM trans people I know are definitely suffering delusions (and paranoia) and would benefit hugely from appropriate mental health support, not pointless affirmation.

All I said is that it was a crime that belongs in the hands of the police. That person has a history of sexual offences so no I don’t think he should’ve been on a female ward.

You won't discuss it because you can't admit that being a transwoman is an entirely unfalsifiable belief

So are mental illnesses so by GC logic trans people can't be kRaZy.

Don’t think Dr Science is running in the opposite direction.
Try asking some psychiatrists for their take on this phenomenon. It’s pretty much aligned with the OP.

Why do you call the women who was masturbating he?

Don't you believe Paula when she says she's a woman?

I don’t think it’s discordant for me to believe trans people exist and deserve protection while also thinking sexual predators shouldn’t expect their identify to be respected

Why just sex predators’ “identities”, though? It isn’t really relevant to whether their identities are meaningful, is it?

😂 at Dr Science, the reds-under-the-beds and the never-having-met-any-trans

I work in a university, have a professional science background, and am a leftie. I have trans and non-binary colleagues who are lovely people. Not sure about the pineapples though 🤔

Are you able to discuss the substance of the debate rather than resorting to ad-hominem attacks? Do you think that none of the motivations I've suggested ever apply to any trans people?

So we should respect a transwomans identity as a female and let them in female single sex spaces until such time as that transwoman commits sexual assault or some other predatory behaviour and only then may we say that they are actually a man?

Yes, I think you're right. Their motivations would be Group 1 factors: trying to escape who they are or how society sees them

Thank you @TwoLoonsAndASprout , I will have a read!

Agree with some of your points but you don't have any data or research to support your conclusion.

Based on the people I've met I think 90%+ of trans people I've met fall into the abuse survivor bracket. They're effectively crying for help and instead of providing therapy they're being given drugs and being encouraged to lop off parts of their anatomy.

I haven't met anyone who would fall into your definitions of pull category. I understand from press articles they do exist but I struggle to believe they are a majority. If thinking being the opposite sex would bring advantages from being that sex was enough of a driver to transition, I'd assume we'd see a massive number of women transitioning to wanting to be men. White, straight men specifically.

Similarly, I know a woman who very badly wanted a daughter and had five sons in an attempt to have a girl. Incidentally, her fifth son was born at around the time transgender ideology went mainstream and, according to her, he identified as a girl before he could even talk! What are the chances 🤔

If trans people were born we’d see hand prints of cave men in pink lacy dresses masturbating in the women’s spaces of course….

We’d have years of evidence and it would be in all societies.

Except we don’t. We have examples of sexual abuse or coercion - such as eunuchs or young boys used in place of girls in society where access to girls is more limited in some respects.

Your child was not born ‘trans’ anything. Your belief they can ‘trans’ forms a large part of their behaviour.

You’re the one who made this about spaces. I just commented that it’s incredibly reductive to try fit everyone into two groups where one side is vulnerable and confused, and the other is predatory.

I have no problem treating someone with decency, but if they commit sexual violence I have no problem calling that person a man because they’ve shown themself to be one.

I see that TPA is still insisting that posters on this board don’t know or talk to Trans people whilst simultaneously ignoring Seethlaw on other threads,

Yes, it is odd that while there has been an explosion of middle aged men suddenly finding and being able to express their true selves as women, there is no corresponding cohort of middle aged women.

Why is it that a non-dominant part of society can't just identify and be accepted into the dominant group?

Trans boys and men are more at risk when they transition. They experience more sexual harassment and abuse than before.

As usual, I don't suppose you have studies and statistics to back that claim up? Because it doesn't align with neither my own experience, nor that of other transmen I've talked to.

Wasting your life explaining why a minority you don't belong to exists is not normal behaviour.

You don't belong to it either, so why do you spend so much time and energy defending it? Also, arguing that only the members of a community should investigate topics related to that community is blatantly idiotic. We don't argue that men can't study female matters, or women male matters, do we?

life is not a computer game

Indeed: there's no respawning. Once body parts are gone, you can't get them back...

There are less dodgy pull factors too.
Wanting to be part of a particular social grouping.
Wanting to be what you admire in a hero worship not sexual sense.

I think there is a third factor which is simply self-reinforcing meme, intrusive thought or whatever you call it. Once someone gets hold of an idea from whatever source, mental tracks that reinforce it are preferred and mental tracks that contradict it go unnoticed.

Combine that with a belief in gender identity and it takes very little to start you down a track, and once you're started it becomes a feedback loop.

So transwoman Paula ceases to be a transwomen and reverts to being a man when Paula does something bad?

Paula must be a man because Paula 'show[ed] shown themself to be one.'
Is that literally, as in displayed 'her' penis?
Or does it mean that only a non-trans-identifying man would ever commit sexual violence, and therefore TWAW doesn't apply to Paula?

It looks like an an example of the 'if a transwoman does something bad they must not be really trans', and under that logic, transwomen never do anything bad.

Regarding the OP: I can't find myself anywhere. But I think I can still categorise my reasons.

Push: since my brain "sees" my body as male, I am dissatisfied with my body's sex, and take measures to make it look more masculine.

Pull, maybe? : since I see myself as a man, I am happier when people interact with me as though I were a man, and I take measures to make myself look more masculine to them.

I'm not sure what I think of that categorisation. It's intriguing. I'll have to think more about it.

The self-reinforcement path comes up in research - in particular, in online communities, it’s been found that any expression of doubt is seen as evidence of a trans identity. So, a girl says “I am confused, I don’t know if I’m a boy or a girl”, or “I don’t know if transition is really the right thing for me,” and is told “that absolutely means you are trans, because cis people don’t ever question their identity.” This then becomes the questioning child’s own internal narrative, and they begin saying “I know this confusion is all just my own internal transphobia / I know my reluctance is a clear sign that I’m trans.”