Does gender dysphoria have a biological basis?

If you ask most experts in the field what causes someone to become transgender (as in experiencing gender dysphoria or being gender incongruent), they will tell you that this most likely caused by a combination of biological, cultural, social and personal factors. Most of them will agree that there is a significant biological component.

This is important, because it means that it is hard to dismiss gender incongruence as something imaginary caused by political and cultural pressure from sinister people promoting some kind of "gender ideology". All serious scientists in the field acknowledge that the identities of trans people are real and tangible and the great majority believe there are biological factors influencing the development of gender incongruence.

That does not mean that our concepts of gender are not influenced by culture. They most certainly are, as seen in the anti-trans insistence on gender being reduced to "biological sex", another concept that is as vague and ambiguous as the term "gender".

"Biological sex", as it is used by anti-trans activist, is a political and cultural construct that goes against everything we know about gender variance and intersex conditions, both in humans and in other animals. 

In intersex people chromosomes, gonads, genitalia and hormones do not match in wide variety of combinations, and in trans people a persistent and intense experience of a gendered self does not mach the gender assigned at birth. Dismissing this as "illusions" or "irrelevant variations" does not cut it.

What science says about the biological component

Research indicates significant biological factors influencing gender identity and dysphoria, particularly in brain structure and function. ​

All you need to know about transgender regret rates

We have collected a large number of articles and papers on to what extent trans people regret transitioning over at Transgender Report. There is only one possible conclusion to draw from all of this: The regret rates are extremely low.

Defining what "transgender regret" is, is not an easy task, as there are various ways of transitioning (legal, social, medical etc.) But if we look at what most people consider "transitioning", namely undergoing hormone replacement therapy and gender-affirming surgery as part of coming out as trans publicly, we end with regret rates around 1 percent.

A meta-study from 2021 ended up with the following conclusion:

“A total of 27 studies, pooling 7928 transgender patients who underwent any type of GAS [gender-affirmation surgeries], were included. The pooled prevalence of regret after GAS was 1% (95% CI <1%–2%). Overall, 33% underwent transmasculine procedures and 67% transfemenine [sic] procedures. The prevalence of regret among patients undergoing transmasculine and transfemenine surgeries was <1% (IC <1%–<1%) and 1% (CI <1%–2%), respectively.” 

In comparison, studies indicate that approximately 20% of cisgender plastic surgery patients report some degree of dissatisfaction post-surgery. Specific procedures have higher regret rates, with breast augmentation leading at 31%, followed by rhinoplasty at 27%, liposuction at 24%, and eyelid surgery at 16%. 

This does not mean that all gender-affirming surgery is perfect. What we see here is most likely that transgender patients are so relieved to be able to live as their true selves, that they are willing to live with some imperfections. They starting point is most often a jarring mismatch between body and gender, and not a cis person's desire to live up to some kind of esthetic perfection.

Go to Transgender Report for a large number of articles, news stories and papers looking at transgender regret and regret rates.

Photo: Gettys

Gender variation, normalcy, "autogynephilia" and the culture war

I was talking to the transgender blogger Joanna Santos on WhatsApp the other day and we made some observations regarding generational shifts regarding the role of transphobic theories like "autogymephilia" in the lives of trans and gender variant people.

If we allow ourselves to generalize a bit we may say that the older generations (boomers and those 50+) have had to face several challenges:

1. The oppression and shaming that is associated with such theories, when used in politics and public spaces.
2. The way these theories can be used by family and friends.
3. The way these narratives easily become internalized, leading to shame, suppression of transgender dreams, fear, anger and depression.

The younger generation, and especially Gen Z and the Millenials, more often face only one of these three:

1. The oppression and shaming that is associated with such theories, when used in politics and public spaces.

The right wing and TERF backlash against transgender rights makes this remaining bullet-point painfully visible right now, but as Joanna pointed out to me, young people today get their gender affirmed by those who matter: Friends and family. 

A new culture for the young

Younger cis people may not fully understand what being trans means, but are more likely to have grown up in a cultural setting where you respect and accept the identities of others, and where marginalized groups are to be included and not ostracized.

On our post on people's interest in transgender erotic content

Earlier this month we posted an article on the increasing interest in transgender "erotic entertainment".

This triggered Blogspot (on which platform this blog is published) to add a warning screen regarding problematic content. 

We suspect Google, who owns Blogger,  is not able to distinguish between pornographic content and articles about such content.

We take no chances regarding out search engine rankings and have therefore moved the article to another platform. 

You can read the article here.

While you are here, we will use this opportunity to remind you of our social transgender news curation channels. Get a daily dose of up to date transgender news via one of these accounts: Follow: Twitter | Telegram | Flipboard | Mastodon

Site map for Transgender World..Image by Midjourney

New study gives insight into the spectrum of gender as regards brains, psychology and mental health

A new study argues that 50% of people are some shade of androgynous and that this gives them an advantage as far as psychological health goes.

Male brains and female brains.

Is there such a thing as a “male” or a “female” brain?  Scientists have desperately scanned, dissected and mapped brains in order to see if there are any solid differences. Researchers have found some parts of the brain that seem to be different between men and women, but there are two important caveats:  

These differences are only found on an aggregate level, so there are a lot of men with “female” structures and vice versa. 

Moreover, scientists have never been able to fully document a causality between these brain differences and – let’s say – gendered behavior as reflected in interests, abilities, expressions and identities.

Men are not from Mars

One problem is that we have very messy and blurry notion of what it means to male or female, so the research becomes equally messy. Much of this research is based on culturally defined gender stereotypes, which are not fixed in biology in humans. Since culture and our ideas of the normative female and male behavior changes,  the scientists are basically trying to hit a moving target.

One of the scientists who constantly talk about “female” and “male” brains is Simon Baron-Cohen. His own research shows that only half of women have “a female brain”, as he defines it. Yeah, right...

Contemporary science is gradually giving up on the idea that men are not from Mars and women are not from Venus. We are all from Earth.

The adrogynous brain

To give you a recent example: Barbara Jacquelyn Sahakian, Professor of Clinical Neuropsychology at the University of Cambridge, and her colleagues Christelle Langley, Qiang Luo, Yi Zhang and more,  decided to use the connectivity between different brain areas as a measure of gender (as this kind of connectivity has been known to vary between men and women on an aggregate level).

Kourtney Kardashian on "Autogynephilia" in Non-transgender Women

Kourtney Kardashian implicitly debunks the transphobic "autogynephilia" theory in a new article on her Poosh site. She explains why  women may get aroused by their own bodies and sensuality, a kind of sexuality that is used to invalidate the identity of transgender women.

Kourtney Kardashian on Instagram

As you might remember the "autogynephilia" theory of Ray Blanchard argues that gynephilic (woman loving) transgender women suffer from an "erotic target location error" whereby they are sexually attracted to the image of themselves as women. 

"Auto-gyne-phile" means "Self-Woman-Love". 

Their crime is that they may get aroused by the idea of being a sexy, attractive woman.

These trans women are therefore suffering from a "paraphilia", Blanchard argues – basically a sexual perversion driven by a straight, masculine, sexuality.

But what about autosexuality in cis women?

As many have pointed out, this theory presupposes that cis women do not get aroused by their own bodies or by "feeling sexy". Because if they did, that would make this a female sexual trait, and even a human one.

Indeed, if it is found among cis women, you might  argue that finding such arousal in trans women is a clear indication of their female gender identity.

The autogynephilia supporters have dismissed this argument by pointing out that cis women do not have such feelings. They have, for instance,  done everything they can to undermine Dr. Charles Moser's study of "autogynephilia in cis women". In accordance to Patriarchal orthodoxy cis women only get aroused by male bodies "out there", or – if they are slightly more liberal – by female bodies as well. Cis women do not suffer from such "autoerotic" tendencies, as they are, I suppose, innocent and pure.

I would guess that a lot of women have played along with these beliefs, well aware of the fragility of the male ego. If women can get aroused by their own sensuality, who needs a man? 

I guess this is also partly why autosexual feelings often are classified as a kind of pathological "narcisssism", instead of a natural and enriching part of normal sexuality. It ruins the simplistic and banal narrative of the other sex being a kind of "magnet" that is attracting a person due to his or her sexual "magnetism" alone. 

Research documents a lot of autoerotic fantasies in cis women

Studies of women's sexual fantasies documents that cis women may perfectly well get aroused by the idea of being a sexy, attractive, woman. I doubt very much that the multibillion dollar fashion industry is driven by the need to attract men alone. In fact, many cis men show no appreciation of female fashion at all. I suspect may women dress up because looking good feels good.

You may perfectly well argue against this "submission to a sexist fashion industry" on a political level, but the fact that some women enjoy dressing up does not make them mentally ill.

And it is at this juncture that Kourtney Kardashian presents an important argument. Over at her site Posh she has published an article called "Are You Low Key Autosexual?".

The Autogynephilia Theory Debunked by New German Study

The autogynephilia theory of Ray Blanchard has been part of the transgender discussion since the late 1980s. It is currently being aused by anti-transgender activists in order to undermine the legitimacy of transgender identities. A new German study proves – again –  that the theory has no foundation in reality.

If autogynephilia theory is a completely new concept for you, you might want to read the following  short summary of what it is all about. If you already know the theory, you can skip the next part.

A very short introduction to Ray Blanchard's theory about the two types of transgender women

Blanchard's two type theory on transgender women and MTF crossdreamers has its root in the late 19th century idea that gay men and lesbian women are "inverts".  According to this way of thinking a gay man has a female sexuality and a lesbian woman has a male sexuality. This is why, the story goes, all gay men are effeminate and all lesbian women are butch.

This isn't true, obviously, but it was a neat and simple to understand model. Transgender women were extremely effeminate gay men and transgender men were extremely masculine lesbian women.

This is the basis of Blanchard's category of "homosexual transsexuals" (HSTS). Trans women who love men are gay men who try to seduce straight men by presenting as women.

The people who came up with this model  faced one serious challenge, though. There were transgender women who loved women.

They attempted to solve this problem by focusing on the crossdressing of these "men". So the "transvestites" where straight men who got turned on by dressing up in female clothing – a  parallel to a fascination for rubber and leather, if you like. They were therefore put in the same category as other sexual perversions ("paraphilias" in the current lingo).

Blanchard still  thinks that both gay and trans people are mentally ill, but trans women who love women (including those he calls "pseudo-bisexual") are doubly so. Unlike the androphilic (man-loving) trans women, they are basically in love with the image of their inner female self, as Blanchard sees it. They are suffering from an "erotic target location error". They are "auto-gyne-philiacs" (broken Greek for "self-woman-love").

This means that Blanchard is expanding  upon the traditional "transvestic fetishism" model: It is not the clothing that is the trigger anymore, but the idea of being or becoming a woman.

As you can see, the model rests on one very important premise: What causes the transgender identities in the two categories (HSTS vs autogynephiles) has to be completely different. These women will have to have nothing in common beyond the desire to live as women.

If there is overlap between the two, the model's explanatory power is lost. The gender identity of man-loving (androphilic) trans women can no longer be reduced to an effect of their sexual orientation. The gender identity of woman-loving (gynephilic) trans cannot be caused by a "erotic target location error". Instead you will have to identify another factor or factors that explain their gender variance.

The German study of "autogynephiliacs" and "HSTS"

The German researchers – Jelena S. Laube, Matthias K Auer, Sarah Biedermann, Johanna Schröder, Timo O. Nieder, Peer Briken, Johannes Fuss and Thomas Hildebrandt – have been taking Blanchard's theory very seriously.

In their paper "Sexual Behavior, Desire, and Psychosexual Experience in Gynephilic and Androphilic Trans Women: A Cross-Sectional Multicenter Study" (Journal of Sexual Medicine) they make use of new data provided by 189 gender dysphoric transgender women recruited at four transgender health care centers in Germany.

Crossdresser, Transgender, Bigender: In Search of an Explanation

A gender variant person explores their gender identity, their sexuality and what has made them who they are, with a special emphasis on being bigender.

By Guest Author Jemimah/Jeremy

Recently I bought my first reasonably lifelike wig. This, together with some good concealer I bought a little earlier, are my first steps towards creating an ‘en femme’ persona which is not laughable. Good – but is it taking me into a different world.

Two or three years ago, when I first realised that I was at least attracted by the idea of crossdressing, I wrote a rather wild note entitled ‘why me, why now’.

I now feel the need to do something more rational and try to work over the ideas which relate to where I am – which I think for the moment is bigender. Lots of wandering the web and reading books has provided lots of theories and opinions and probably most of it is covered somewhere on the Crossdreamers web site but I wanted to work it out myself.

Brain types

Also I wanted my understanding to be based on academic, or at least unemotional, sources.

Interesting video sums up research on male and female brains

Below I have embedded a great video from SciShow Psych on the differences between female and male brain. I recommend it because Hank Green and colleagues have clearly read most of the relevant literature in the field.

The conclusion they come to is that although you may measure differences between the two biological sexes brain wise, it is unclear whether these differences have anything to say with men and women’s abilities, interests, or behavior.

It is also clear that if there are any clear differences, they are normally very small and only make sense on an aggregate level. That is: The individual male and female brains always display a mix of “femaleish” and “maleish” traits.

Hank Green does not discuss research into the brains of transgender people in this video. What his presentation tells us, however, is that it makes little sense to say that a trans woman is a woman because she has a “perfect female brain”. Given that there is so much variation between men and between women in this respect (a woman may have a brain that looks similar to the average “male brain” and still identify as a woman), being close to the female average neither confirms or invalidates her gender identity.

Does the WHO ICD-11 Manual Erase Transgender and Non-binary Identities?

In the new WHO ICD-11 manual the only condition described is gender incongruence. Does this mean that transgender people who are not suffering from this kind of misalignment between experienced and assigned gender will be denied the help they need?

The new edition of the health manual of the World Health Organization no longer considers being transgender a mental illness. Stigmatizing diagnoses like "transvestic fetishism" have been removed.

After my positive review of the treatment of gender incongruence in the new edition of the international WHO health manual, I got an email from one concerned non-binary reader who pointed out that since gender incongruence  – i.e. the experience of a deep mismatch between the experienced gender and assigned gender – is the only symptom of being transgender included in the manual, the medical profession may ignore the suffering experienced by other transgender and non-binary people.

They  argued that the medical gatekeepers may even use the manual to erase other parts of the transgender spectrum, leaving us with what was once called "the classic transsexual" (i.e. those that are able to live up to the "trapped in the wrong body" narrative) as the only "real" transgender people.

They also argued that given the gender stereotypes listed under the gender incongruence in childhood definition, this may even lead to continuation of a system that forces transgender people to live up to the stereotypes.

The threat of a binary backlash

You are not paranoid when they are out to get you, so do understand what this reader is getting at.

Transgender separatists ("HBS", "truscum" or "transmedicalists") may try to use this new edition to argue that they are the only real transgender, that there is no spectrum and that other transgender people should stop calling themselves transgender.

The WHO ICD-11 health manual removes transvestic fetishism. Being trans is no longer a mental illness.

Yesterday the World Health Organization released the new version of its International Classification of Diseases, the ICD-11. The new edition brings some very good news to transgender people.

Being transgender is no longer considered a mental illness by the international medical community (Photo: Wavebreakmedia)

"Transvestic fetishism" is no longer included

First of all, the diagnoses of "transvestic fetishism" and "dual-role transvestism" are no longer included.

Several countries, including the Nordic ones, have already removed the transvestic fetishims of the list of "paraphilias" from their national versions of the ICD-10 , arguing that crossdressing is just an unharmful expression of gender variance, and that including it in the manual causes needless stigmatization and suffering.

According to the WHO crossdressing and crossdreaming are no longer considered  mental illnesses.

Being transsexual is no longer a mental illness

Furthermore, being transsexual (in the sense of suffering from a mismatch between your biological sex and/or expected gender role and your experienced identity) is no longer classified as a mental illness, either.

What Transphobic Norwegian Doctors can Teach Us about the Diversity of Transgender People

The major Norwegian clinic for transgender people is run by  doctors who are invalidating large sections of the transgender community. This  tells us a lot about how old stereotypes and prejudices among  gate keepers can ruin the lives of young trans people.

You'd better live up to the stereotypes if you want to get help from the transgender university clinic in Oslo. Photo: olgakr.

A progressive country...

As a Norwegian I am happy to say that we have some of the most liberal gender identity laws in the world. A trans person who wants to get legally recognized as their true gender, fills in an online form,  and that is all there is to it. There are no gate keepers in the legal sphere.

Morevoer, "transvestism" has been removed from the Norwegian version of the international medical manual, the ICD-10, and is no longer considered a mental illness. The same applies to being transgender in general.

...with a reactionary trans clinic

But getting your true gender legally recognized does not necessarily get you the medical assistance you need.  The National Treatment Unit for Transsexualism (Nasjonal behandlingstjeneste for transseksualisme, NBTS) at The University Hospital of Oslo has controls people's access to  surgery and does so in a very restrictive way.

I know of many trans people who have been denied any kind of help if they have admitted to erotic crossdreaming fantasies, for instance, or if they have not lived up to gender stereotypes as regards dress code, interests and mannerisms.

In the end it got so bad that Amnesty International got involved, arguing that the whole policy was in violation of trans peoples' human rights. (I have written more about this here.) 

A white paper has proposed a whole new regime, basically arguing that more clinics should provide services of this kind, in that way removing some of the power The National Treatment Unit for Transsexualism  has today.

Doctors show their true face

That has turned out to be a very wise recommendation, indeed. In a recent article in the major Oslo newspaper Aftenposten, leaders of the NBTS express opinions that are undeniably transphobic.

Among traditionalists Jazz Jennings is the perfect
transgender girl. God bless Jazz Jennings, but
the fact is that a large number of trans kids
are forced to hide who they are. 

The arguments they use to invalidate trans people are the  ones readers of this blog will know far too well:

Trans people who come out during puberty or later, and who do not visibly express their true gender through gender stereotypes throughout childhood, are not considered the right kind of transgender.

Anne Wæhre og Kim Alexander Tønseth from NBTS address the minister of health, Bent Høie, in their article, arguing that his liberal policy for transgender people has backfired.

The recent upsurge in young people approaching the clinic is, as they see it, the result of a "misguided and misplaced kindness mixed with minority activism and professional conflicts."

What Japanese monkeys can teach you about sex and perversions

We are at the end of the year, and Japanese macaques monkeys have come crossdreamers to the rescue, effectively undermining some 150 years of hard sexological work aimed at separating  good people from the sexual perverts.

Japanese macaque monkey. (Photo: vichie81)

A basic tenet of sexology, especially of the so-called "evolutionary psychology" type, is that sex is for procreation, men are sexual predators who would sleep with anyone anytime to spread their seed, and women are timid and asexual beings, protecting their eggs while waiting for the evolutionary fit Mr. Perfect -- the so-called Alpha Male.

Since these are traits based in biology and nature, the same researchers have also been projecting this ideal on other animals, finding "proof" in studies of chimpanzees, penguins and what not.

This logic has obviously also been used to invalidate gender variant and transgender people, effectively reducing their crossdreaming (i.e. the dream of becoming their target sex) to a misdirected sexual impulse: a fetish and/or a sexual perversion ("paraphilia").

Monkey do

The Japanes macaques have not read the paraphilia memo, because members of one tribe has been found to be using  nearby deers for sexual pleasure. It seems the relationship is consensual. The researchers are not sure what the deer get out of this, but deer who do not like this kind of attention can easily shake the monkeys off. In fact, they have been known to do so.

The researchers explain that the observations were conducted on the two free-ranging groups of Japanese macaques living in the Meiji Memorial Forest of Minoo Quasi-National Park, an unfenced
forested area located on the outskirts of Minoo City, Osaka Prefecture, in central Japan.

This is how the study is presented in scieneese:

This is the first quantitative study of heterospecific sexual behavior between a non-human primate and a non-primate species. We observed multiple occurrences of free-ranging adolescent female Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata) performing mounts and sexual solicitations toward sika deer (Cervus nippon) at Minoo, central Japan. Our comparative description of monkey-deer versus monkey-monkey interactions supported the “heterospecific sexual behavior” hypothesis: the mounts and demonstrative solicitations performed by adolescent female Japanese macaques toward sika deer were sexual in nature.

The Transgender Clash of Narratives

Much of the conflicts and misunderstandings in the transgender debate seems to be caused by what we can call the clash of transgender narratives. As I see it, they do not have to be in conflict.

Photo: Jupiter Images

The trapped in body narrative

We hear the phrase over and over again: "I feel like a woman trapped in a man's body." "I feel like a woman trapped in a man's body".

For many (but not all) transgender people, the phrase does capture something essential about how they feel about themselves, especially if they are suffering from gender dysphoria, a deep sense of discomfort caused by a mismatch between their assigned gender and the way they feel gender wise.

The narrative is popular among sex and gender researchers steeped in the neurophysiological tradition.

The main explanation given is that during the pre-natal brain development of a fetus it is exposed to an unusual flow of hormones that feminizes the brain of male to female transgender persons and masculinizes the ones of those assigned female.

This model  does leave room for nonbinary persons and those who do not fully identify with one or the other gender, as the exposure to this unusual hormonal mix may vary. However, these people are often ignored in the debate.

The main problem with this narrative is that many of its supporters have a tendency of turning the concept of female or male into a well defined "thing", and that the definition of a woman or a man is reduced to a well defined list of abilities, interests, personality traits and expressions.

On Quantum Desire and why we need a new sexology of gender variance

Felix Conrad pondering the sexuality of
gender variance.
(Photo: elwynn1130)

Felix Conrad, spiritual leader of the Transcend Movement and crossdreamer philosopher per excellence, has written a new book on sexuality and gender variance called Quantum Desire. 

Antonia has asked him a few questions.

ANTONIA: Is it really necessary you write another book on crossdreaming? What’s this...the hundredth?

FELIX: I’ll ignore that! Anyway..it’s the ninety eighth.. Yes...absolutely necessary. Most of my work has been about the seismic tremors of a transgender awakening: trying to understand why I feel that I’m a woman...how valid is that feeling... and how I can live with it? So, basically, they’re about transgender psychology. This book deals with gender variance as a sexological phenomenon.

ANTONIA: And why the change?

FELIX: It’s a question of survival really. The transgender crisis screwed with my mental health and I had to sort it out...and I sort my head out out by writing. Now that I’ve turned a corner with my gender issues I can write something that’s been on my ‘to do’ list for quite some time: a sexological analysis of crossdreaming.

Also, I think that one of the fascinating things I’ve discovered recently is that when I got on top of my gender issues I started to see my desire to change gender as more of a sexual thing. Now, I don’t want to overstate that...because I’ve been irrevocably changed by my transgender awakening - but something’s shifted. It’s this quality of gender variant sexuality that gave me the book’s title: Quantum Desire; as fucking crazy as this may sound...it seems that the way you observe our sexuality can change it.

ANTONIA: But come on Felix, don’t be shy...that’s not the only reason you wrote it...hasn’t there been a certain Spanish beauty who started off this quest?

Looking for students and scientists who want to study transgender issues

Dr. Jaimie Veale is looking for students and researchers who would be interested in studying transgender  issues.

Jaimie Veale

Dr. Jaimie Veale has done some extremely important research in transgender people, documenting, for instance, a diversity and a complexity that goes far beyond the traditional dichotomies between two types of male to female transgender people.

In this context she has delivered compelling evidence that undermines the so-called "autogynephilia" theory of Dr. Ray Blanchard of Toronto, a theory that effectively reduces transgender identities to paraphilias.

I have presented some of her research here  and here, and you can find more material over at her own web site.

Having spent some time in British Columbia, Jaimie is now back in New Zealand, in a faculty position at the School of Psychology at the University of Waikato.

In time Jaimie hopes to be able to build up a team of researchers interested in everything transgender (crossdreaming included). If you are interested in this kind of research, and would even like to contribute yourself, do not hesitate to contact her. She may even supervise students from a distance.

New Brain Study Indicates Great Gender Diversity

I would like to draw your attention to a recent article in the Guardian, which covers the research of a Israeli research team who have found that there is a huge overlap between male and female brains.

A complex mix of the "feminine" and the "masculine"

The volumes (green = large, yellow = small) of brain regions in 42 adults, showing
the overlap between the forms that brains of females and brains of males can take.
Image by Zohar Berman and Daphna Joel

The main point for me is not whether these researcher are "right" or not. Neuroscience is in constant flux, and there will probably never be a final theory that explains everything about this extremely complex organ.

What is interesting for me is how similar research data can lead to very different conclusions all depending on the point of view of the researchers.

The Guardian writes:

'Scientists analysed brain scans of more than 1400 men and women and found that while some features are more common in one sex than the other, each person’s brain has a unique “mosaic” of these features, as well as others seen commonly in both.

“What we show is that there are multiple ways to be male and female, there is not one way, and most of these ways are completely overlapping,” said Daphna Joel, a psychology professor who led the study at Tel-Aviv University.'

Scientists inclined towards gender stereotypes will focus on the macro level

This is nothing new. Even the neuroscientists who believes strongly in the dichotomy between "male" and "female" brains know that there is a lot of variation between individual brains, both male and female, but they interpret patterns they see on an aggregated level as proof of there being unique "male" and "female" brains. 

These aggregated findings are then used to confirm the gender stereotypes of the -- let's say -- sexually driven aggressive man and the passive and nurturing woman.

Overlap is the norm, stereotypical brains the exception

What is interesting with this study is that the researchers focused on the areas where there is least overlap between men and women on an aggregated level.

The Guardian again:

'Across the four different sources of brain scans they studied, the scientists found the percentage of “internally consistent brains”, in which all regions were at the male end or all at the female end, varied from zero to 8%, while those with both male-end and female-end features ranged from 23% to 53%.'

So even if you look at those regions who are supposed to prove that men and women are different, you find that most men have "female" traits and most women have "male" traits. At this point, of course, you have to ask yourself whether it makes any sense at all to call these traits "male" and "female."

Nope, transitioning does not actually lead to suicide

This is story about "The Science Proves What I Believe Complex", and how a Swedish study of post-op trans people  is misrepresented in order to "prove" that gender reassignment surgery is harmful.

I have now been blogging on trans and crossdreamer issues for seven years, and there is one game that never cease to amaze me. I call it the "Science Proves What I believe" complex. And it does not matter what people believe; they always seem to find a report or a paper somewhere that seem to support their position.

Anti-trans activists often lie about research to
"prove" that transitioning is harmful.
Photo by SIphotography.

If they cannot find such a paper, they often start misrepresenting reports, probably hoping that no one will bother to check.

The Internet is vast, though, and with a lot of clever people. There are always some people out there who take the time to check and double-check dubious statements. Cristan Williams over at Transadvocate is one of them.

Like me, she will go directly to the researcher and ask, if needed.

"The Swedish Study"

Recently we have seen a lot of anti-transgender activity where people are trying to prove that trans people who undergo gender reassignment surgery are not helped by such therapy.

Indeed, the argument now is that transitioning in this way is harmful for the ones involved, and that the alleged failure of the treatment  proves that they were delusional in the first place.

People fighting against transgender rights (TERFs, Fox News and religious fundamentalists included) make a lot out of a Swedish study on transgender people, claiming that it proves that gender reassignment leads to suicide.

US Report Calls for Ban on Conversion Therapies for Gay, Lesbian and Transgender Youth

A short little update here on LGBT policies in the US, as it may help many of us gain some perspective on where the general consensus is right now as regards sexual diversity and gender variance.

The US Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA) has published a report on so-called "conversion therapies",  based on a thorough review of current research.

The expert panel was set up by SAMHSA and the American Psychological Association (APA) earlier this year, and included prominent American figures in LGBT human rights, policy, research, treatment, and advocacy.

"This groundbreaking report dispels widespread misconceptions about sexual and gender development and definitively concludes that treatments designed to change a child's sexual orientation or gender identity do not work, are devastatingly harmful to 'victims' of this type of therapy, and should not be considered appropriate mental health services," Dr. Celia B. Fisher, who served on the expert consensus panel says.

Conversion therapy does not work

Indeed, the main conclusions in the report are clear:

• "Same-gender sexual orientation (including identity, behavior, and attraction) and variations in gender identity and gender expression are a part of the normal spectrum of human diversity and do not constitute a mental disorder.
• "There is limited research on conversion therapy efforts among children and adolescents; however, none of the existing research supports the premise that mental or behavioral health interventions can alter gender identity or sexual orientation.
• "Interventions aimed at a fixed outcome, such as gender conformity or heterosexual orientation, including those aimed at changing gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation are coercive, can be harmful, and should not be part of behavioral health treatment."

Gender variance is not pathological

The message from the American Psychological Association is also clear: Being a sexual or
gender minority, or identifying as LGBTQ, is not pathological.

What Dr. Zhana Vrangalova Taught Me About Transphobia in Science

This is the story about how science can be used to persecute transgender people, and on how some seemingly well-intended LGBT-allies can contribute to transphobia.

Zhana Vrangalova
Photo by Enid Alvarez, New York Daily News

In this post I will give you the story about Dr. Zhana Vrangalova's support for the transphobic autogynephilia theory.

The Vrangalova story is interesting because it is such a clear an example of how scientific theories can be used to recruit even  the most well-meaning helpers to the oppression of trans people.

And yes, in this post I will prove, beyond any reasonable doubt, that the autogynephilia theory is transphobic.

Context

Those of you who do not know the ins and outs of this stagnant backwater of transgender research, may make note of the following:

1. The auogynephilia/AGP theory, created by Dr. Ray Blanchard of Toronto, says that there is a separate category of trans women who are motivated by a sexual paraphilia (perversion) that drives them towards transitioning.  They are, according to Blanchard, sexually attracted to the idea of themselves as a woman. The word is also used to describe male to female crossdressers and crossdreamers who do not transition.

2. Dr J. Michael Bailey is a supporter of Dr. Blanchard, and the author of The Man Who Would be Queen, a book that popularizes Blanchard's theory, dividing the world of trans women into two: "autogynephile transsexuals" (non-homosexual perverted men, according to Blanchard & Bailey) and homosexual transsexuals (extremely effeminate gay men).

3. Zhana Vrangalova is a sexologist; she has PhD in Developmental Psychology from Cornell and is currently an adjunct professor at the NYU Psychology department.

---

SIDEBAR This is not a blog post about the scientific value of the autogynephilia theory. This is a post about how it is used to harm MTF crossdreamers and trans women. I have elsewhere documented that  the science is bad, and that it has been thoroughly falsified by other researchers. You will find links to papers and blog posts showing this here. I have also written several blog posts on the scientific defects of the autogynephilia theory.

---

LGBT-support and autogynephilia do not mix

On June 13 Vrangalova tweeted a link to an interview the religious site Patheos had made with Bailey, adding the statement "There are 2 types of trans women".

I have been following Vrangalova since she often tweets interesting links to all things sexology. She has become an active spokesperson for the polyamorous amongst us. I also knew her as a supporter of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) rights, so her promoting Bailey in this way surprised me.

After all, the autogynephilia model is considered to be one of the most invalidating and stigmatizing theories around right now. It is routinely used by right wing religious  fundamentalists and left wing trans-exclusionary "radical" feminists to harass and invalidate trans women. It has been dismissed by transgender activists as toxic and unfounded, and has very little support among front line health professionals in the field.

The Vrangalova Dialogue

I responded in accordance with this, hoping I had been mistaken about the dear Doctor's intentions: