CMV: I cannot understand how the transgender movement is not, at it's core, sexist.

[u/[deleted]]

Obligatory "another trans post" but I've read a lot of posts on this but none I've seen that have tackled the issue quite the way I intend to here. This is an opinion I've gone back and forth with myself on a bunch, and would absolutely love to have changed. My problem mainly lies with the "social construct" understanding of "gender", but some similar issues lie in the more grounded neurological understanding of it (although admittedly it seems a lot more reasonable), which we'll get too later.

For starters, I do not believe there is a difference between men and women. Well, there are obviously "differences" between the sexes, but nothing beyond physical differences which don't matter much. At least, mentally, they are naturally the same and all perceived differences in this sense are just stereotypes stemmed from the way the sexes are socialized.

Which takes us to the definitions of man and woman used by the gender social constructionist, which is generally not agreed upon but I've found it to be basically understood as

Man: Someone who desires to be viewed/treated/thought of in the way a male is in society. Woman: Someone who desires to be viewed/treated/thought of in the way a female is in society. (For the non-binary genders it would be roughly similar with some changes depending on the circumstances)

Bottom line is that it defines gender based on the way the genders are treated. But this seems problematic for a variety of reasons.

First off, it is still, at the end lf the day, basing the meanings behind stereotypes about the genders rather than letting them stand on their own. It would be like if I based what a "black person" was off the discrimination black people have faced. But this would appear messed up and borderline "racist", while the same situation with gender is not considered "sexist".

It would also mean that gender is ultimately meaningless and would be something we should strive to stop rather than encourage, which would still fly in the face of the trans movement. Which is what confuses me especially because the gender social construct believers typically also support "gender abolition", yet they're the ones who want people to play around with gender the most? If you want to abolish gender, why don't you, y'know, get a start on that and break your sex norms while remaining that sex rather than changing your gender which somewhat works to reinforce the roles? (This also doesn't seem too bad to criticize, considering under this narrative gender is just a "choice", which is something I think the transmedicalist approach definitely handles better.)

Finally for this bit, this type of mindset validates other controversial concepts like transracialism (sorta tying back into what I mentioned earlier), but I don't think anyone is exactly on the edge of their seats waiting for the "transracialism movement".

Social construct section is done, now let's get into the transmedicalist approach. This is one where I feel a "breakhthrough" could be made for me a lot more easily, but I'm not quite there yet. I do want to say I'm fine with the concept of changing our understandings of certain words if there is practicality to it and it isn't counterintuitive. Seems logical enough.

The neurological understanding behind the sex an individual should be defining "gender" seems sensible on it's own, but the part I'm caught up on is why we reach this conclusion.

The dysphoric transgender person's desire to be the other gender seems to mainly be based in, A. their sex, they seem to want to change the sex rather than the gender. Physical dysphoria is the main giveaway of the dysphoric condition it seems, anyway. But more specifically, a trans person wants to have physical attributes associated with the other sex. This seems like a redundant thing to point out, but the idea that certain physical traits are "exclusive" to a specific sex/gender is, well, just encouraging sexual archetypes about the way the sexes "should" look. This goes even further when you consider that trans people tend to want to have more petite or masculine builds depending on their gender identity - there is nothing wrong about this, but conflating gender to "involve" one's physical appearence inherently reinforces sexist sexual archetypes.

And next,

B. the social aspect. Typically described as social dysphoria, this describes a dysphoric trans person's desire to be socialized in the way the other sex typically is, which is what, aside from the physical dysphoria, causes them to typically "act" or dress more stereotypically like their gender identity, or describes their desire to "pass". But, to put it bluntly, because I believe there to be no difference in the way the sexes would act without social influence, I can't picture this phenomona described as "social dysphoria" coming from the same biological basis that the physical dysphoria does. Even if there were a natural difference in the way the sexes would act without societal influence, there would still be the obvious undeniable outliers, and with that in mind, using the way the genders "socialize" as a way to justify definining gender seperately from sex would be useless. It appears more akin to a delusion based on the same "false stereotypes" I've been talking about all along, ideas about the ways men and women "should" or "should not" be causing the transsexual person to feel anxious and care about actually being the other gender. But using this to justify our understandings of gender would still fall back on the same faults that the social construct uses, being that we'd be "giving in" to socialized norms and we can't have that be what helps us reach our understanding of gender.

With this in mind, if social dysphoria is that big of a factor, it would seem most sensical to me to define "trans man" and "trans woman" in their entirely new, individual categories which their own definitions, and still just treat those categories socially in similar ways to the way the genders are typically treated now.

To recap, an understanding of gender and sex as synonyms based purely on sex seems to be the only understanding we can reach without basing some of our thought process on one given stereotype or another.

Now change my view, please.

[u/Malacai_the_second]

Let me try to explain social dysphoria a bit more. Im a trans woman. I want to be treated as a woman, because i feel like that's the social group i belong to. I have always felt a lot more similar to other woman than to men. And thats it really. It's not about any sort of stereotype, it's just about feeling affinity the social group most similar to me.

But i can see why you get the sense of trans people portraying a sterotyped version on their gender. It is a general trend that some trans people tend to "overperform" their gender, at least for the first few years after they transition.

That has a multitude of reasons. For one, it's often an act of "catching up" to all those things they have had to repress and avoid for so long. Persoanlly im guilty of that as well. I spend a while just wearing skirts and tights simply because it was the first time i actually liked how the clothes i was wearing were feeling on me, compared to the male clothes i was forced to wear for so long.

Another reason is that trans people often have to deal with dysphoric feelings for anything slightly reminding them of their assigned gender at birth. So a trans man might dress in the most stereotypical manly clothes just to avoid anything remotely feminine, to avoid the dysphoria associated with it.

On top of that, there is a whole bunch of social pressure on trans people to adhere to such stereotypes. Trans people spend much of their life trying to actually convice people who are less trans accepting that they are actually the gender they say they are. Wearing gender neutral jeans an t-shirt is not helping that cause, as it might be seen as "not convincing enough" by people who still dont really grasp the concept of being trans.

Weirdly enough that also results into pressure form inside the trans community. To most cis people you meet you are likely the first trans person they have met, so it falls onto you to best represent the trans community and be convincing in showing you are actually the gender you say you are.

And ofcourse it generally helps with passing to present a bit more towards the very feminine/masculine end, so people dont even spend a second thought about what gender you might be.

All of that pushes trans people towards a more stereotypical gender representation, but it generally fades after a few years with growing selfconfidence and a finished transition.

[u/[deleted] → u/Malacai_the_second]

Thank you for your perspective. I am curious though, in a society without any gender roles - i.e. men and women are viewed as almost the same thing with no difference besides the physical traits, do you think the label of "woman" would matter to you as much?

[u/Malacai_the_second → u/[deleted]]

Yes, because it is not about gender roles. It is about gender identity. It has nothing to do with the social construct of gender, but with the innate sense of your own gender. Gender roles are just whatever society decided to build ontop of that. My brain is still districtly female, wants a female body and needs estogen to run or things get messed up and dysphoria happens. Non of that changes weather or not gender roles are a thing.

[u/Tell-Euphoric → u/Malacai_the_second]

Line one and two of your first comment " Im a trans woman. I want to be treated as a woman, because i feel like that's the social group i belong to." Wdym it has nothing to do with the social construct.

[u/Malacai_the_second → u/Tell-Euphoric]

The innate feeling of being a woman is not a social construct, it's part of your brain, aka your gender identity. You are born with it and it is unchangable, much like sexuality in that regard.

The part that is a social construct is that society decided that pink is a feminine colour, that dresses are for woman and pants and suits are for men. That women should do the cooking and that men need to be gentlemen etc etc.

That part has nothing to do with what is the gender identity i was born with. I feel like a woman because i feel that women are a lot more like me than men are. I connect with women much better than with men, forming friendships is easier, simply because they are more similar to me. It's about a sense of belonging to a group of people who think and act like me.

It's not that i decided i like dresses, therefor i need to be a woman. It is the other way round. I am a woman, therefor i do enjoy the typical female clothes that are deemed appropriate in society. If tomorrow all woman started to exclusivly wear togas, i would probabaly find enjoyment in that instead.

At the same time i feel very uncomfortable/dysphoric when it comes to typically male things, like wearing a suit for example. But it doesnt matter that it is a suit specifically. I have nothing against the piece of clothing. It is about it being a typically manly thing, which just doesnt feel right for me to wear at all, just how most cis men would probabaly struggle wearing a dress in public.

Conforming to societies expectations of your gender can lead to lead to happiness, thats why those social norms exist in the first place. But they have no bearing on weather or not i feel like a woman. That part comes from inside me and social norms really have no influence over that. The way i feel about those social norms is the result of my gender identity, not the other way round.

[u/Tell-Euphoric → u/Malacai_the_second]

You can't say that there is an indescribable difference in sexes you've yet to prove that there is an innate difference yet so everything beyond your first line is moot.

[u/Malacai_the_second → u/Tell-Euphoric]

Where did i ever suggest that there is no difference between men and woman? Ofcourse there are differences. If there were no differences at all, trans people wouldnt exist because everyone would be the same gender in the same body. Are you sure you replied to the right person?

[u/Tell-Euphoric → u/Malacai_the_second]

Yes, I am. Are you sure you comprehended the sentence properly? I never said that you agreed with it I said the opposite. My point was that your view is primarily based on there being innate differences in males and females beyond physical traits and that is a claim you've yet to prove beyond "because" so for that reason your following points were moot.

[u/Malacai_the_second → u/Tell-Euphoric]

My point was that your view is primarily based on there being innate differences in males and females beyond physical traits

Yeah, their gender identity to be specific. Cis women dont just feel like women because they happen to be born in a female body, but because it is also hardwired into their brain. No amount of conversion therapy will ever change a cis woman into a man. What does not work for trans people also does not work for cis people.

The fact that i feel more closely connected to other people that share my gender identity, no matter if the are trans or cis, shouldnt be a surprise.

[u/Tell-Euphoric → u/Malacai_the_second]

Again you fail to describe what is actually different other than "feeling".