Gender Expression

I'm not exactly sure... but wouldn't it be obvious he wasn't REALLY a female? Or is plastic surgery/whatever that good? I mean, I'd be pretty uncomfortable if I realized, by the time I reached a certain age, that my female parts were fake. Not sure though if he realized this, or if he just never felt right?

The household and the way someone is raised by their family is not the only influence... There's friends, mass media, etc. There's so many factors, other than that even - experiences in life that we don't even realize affect us.

Does this mean that, say, a mtf transsexual person is a male born with a female brain?

 

That seems to be the current understanding. Perhaps not a female brain, so much as one that is hardwired in a more female manner than a 'typical' male brain. There's no real scale for this kind of thing - the wide range of personalities attests to the fact that brains can be constructed in a myriad of ways. In all likelihood there is probably a huge scale of possible 'pre-wiring' its just that at a certain point there's a threshold at which one stops being a 'feminine-thought-process-guy' and actually identifies as a female trapped in a male body.

 

hmmm interesting. I'm just curious is transsexuals are biologically different or if it is some sort of mental thing. Kind of like the debate between homosexuality I guess... Is it nature or is it nurture?

I've always had so much confusion regarding transsexualism (or w/e), because, I don't see how anyone can be a "feminine-thought-process-guy"? Is there really such thing as feminine attributes? Or are these a result of socialization? It doesn't seem like feminine characteristics would really be biologically derived. Unless there are differences in the brains or hormones... I don't think you can just have a girl's way of thinking. Some male people are more feminine than others.

 

Ok...

Please keep in mind I am not an expert - nor have I consulted one - I have read around this issue quite a lot - seeing as I appear to be dab slap bang in the middle of it. But this is where my understanding stands so far:

- Yes. From the research that has been conducted - there appears to be a physical distinction, particualrly in relation to nueron arrangements, between "normal" subjects, homosexual, and transsexual ones. The debate of 'nature/nuture' has been raging for a long time, and will probably continue as long as human society exists. But there is definite sceintific evidence that there are minor cerebral differences between the different camps.

- However - a concept of "masculine" or "feminine" traits and behaivours is a purely social construct. A gay/trans person is unlikely to realise they are such if they are living solitarily on a desert isle. The same goes for a male or female. There are definite physical distinctions between the sexes, but a lot of the mental ones - and some of the more minor physicals ones have to do with how we raise young boys and girls.

- As for how someone can be a "feminine-thought-process-guy" - it's more like...you naturally have an inclination to think in a certain manner - and society labels that manner as feminine. The "female" way of thinking I'm referring to is that caused by differences in brain structure. Not social indoctrination. For the most part, the way your brain is assembled has more to do with how you think than the way your taught to behave. Hence why it's possible for people to come to the realisation that they are trans/gay after years of living under a straight guise. If social teaching could fundamentally re-write your thought patterns - you'd have migrated to being a "normal", socially-acceptable 'straight' person ages ago.

- Both homosexuality and transsexuality are a combination of biological difference and social constructs. Thankfully not soley one or the other. It's less a question of nature or nuture and more one of - "how much nature...how little nurture?"

 

Has anyone looked into gender roles within the evangelical christian home schooling movement? It's a good extreme example where everything's clearly shown. The divide between gender roles is pretty extreme, and you can see how things turn out differently if you raise your daughter to obey and submit to a man, rather than adopting a more neutral approach and encouraging independent thinking. It also might be the reason queer people don't fit in to their world view. A same sex couple just doesn't make sense in a world where women go from father to husband and never have an identity other than in relation to a man. I don't know if I can post the things I was reading here (the name of the site is potentially nsfw), but I'll see if I can find something similar to post. It's an interesting case study.

 

These conclusions from these studies aren't agreed upon in the scientific community as far as I know. The huge challenge with studying brain structure is that the variations are hard to spot and are not very consistent. The spectre of variation is so huge for any given group you'd want to look at that it is hard to get any statistically conclusive results.

Whatever it is that morph a brain towards female or male (gender is a dimorphism, not a binary by the way), there is not a strong correlation between that and physical sex. It is even suggested that "maleness" and "femaleness" aren't even on the same axis but are orthogonal properties. Meaning you can have plenty of both without that being a contradiction in itself. I find that interpretation interesting, and it also explains the large variation in how people express and experience gender.

I agree with you here, just find it useful to point out that it doesn't mean male and female aren't different, and that there is a relation to physical appearance and what is the right and wrong bodily image. A bit like the rant Morpheus has in the Matrix about your outwards projection of your inner self.

I just feel this point is important because sometimes in the eagerness to equate male and female, one sometimes goes to far and portray them as the same by going in the opposite range of the binary view. Certainly, society force a large degree of this binary on us. Which for most people is a minor problem. It is not easy for those of us who fall in between. If I go towards the male stereotype, I am "faking it" because I am not really much male on the inside. I just like like one. At least now as an adult. I didn't as a kid. But when I can't just be female either, because I don't conform to what society expects a woman to be, this is about appearance in my case. So whatever I do, I don't really fit. Now I have two choices really. I can reject my inner identity and play man all my life, or I can make the necessary outwards corrections to align my inner self with my outer. Either way, it requires a step in one direction or the other that comes with a price. In a prefect society that step shouldn't be necessary. But as the social constructs are so ingrained, they are.

 

First off - let me say I am not an expert. Simply relying on my very limited knowledge that I've garnered from my ametur research. I apologise if I gave any misconstrusions / or just plain wrong facts. I'm still relativley new to this compared to most of you.

I do know that gender is dimorhpic, and not a bianry - and I thought I had expressed that, but obviously not :icon_redf.

Wow - so clearly I wasn't the only one that remembered "residual self-image" as soon as I started contemplating these kind of issues. Matrix FTW

The 'orthogonal' plot of gender characteristics sounds very intriguing - a neat way of explaining all the apparent contradictions in gender-confuddled persons. I must research that some more.

And yes - I've had the dicussion in regard to the split between observable distinctions between the genders, and the social constructs that have grown up around them. I agree completely with the perspective you presented in your last paragraph.

Perhaps someday we'll reach that ideal society - free of sterotypes / social constructs for race - gender - sexual disposition - political ideology - religious affiliation - preference for toast - etc etc. But I must say once we do - it shall be a sad day for humanity. What on earth will we debate about? How good our European, male-dominated, heterosexual, far-right, God-fearing, butter-side-up-loving, nation is?

Call me mad but I'd prefer to keep the HRT bills, and my preference for olives on my toast, please.

 

I was not saying you were wrong, just adding my own thoughts to yours

I think that bit stuck in a lot of our minds. We've been on the Matrix topic before

 

What about those of us who like being male but would rather be thin, feminine male? Is that innate?

 

Firstly:

Veronica: (*hug*)


Secondly:

Hmm....

Now I hate to kind of void the entire point of this thread, but I tend to find that it's easier to argue a point that you actually beleive in, so if you'll excuse my blatant disregard for a proper answer Zontar...

While you can argue until the cows come home, whether or not your preferences of sexual orientation, body-image, gender-identity etc etc - are as a result of basically - "nature or nuture"...

There ultimatley isn't any point.

What most of us here need to do, is simply accept the fact that this is the way we've turned out, and - like everyone else on the planet - live our lives to the best of our abilities. Why would it matter if someone wants to be a 'feminine male' as a result of a inherent nuance of thier fundemental brain-structure, or because they were forced to wear dresses by their mother. What are you going to do about it? Go back in time and "fix" whatever caused this "problem" ? Or perhaps your more egalitarian....maybe you want to prevent future generations from having these kind of "issues"? To my mind that's mucking about with nature just a tad too much. And sure, you might be very considerate in your application of this principle - and follow the line that "we'd only want to know how, so that we could change society to better accomodate these people" - but to my mind that reasoning has little to do with how a person develops - and more to do with how they can intergrate with society once they do develop.

I'm sorry if i seemed a bit critical there - but ultimatley I think that while debating this kind of thing is very interesting, it still boils down to the essential practicallity that none of us really need to know why we're the way we are. We just need to accept it and get on with life.

---------- Post added 13th Nov 2011 at 05:21 PM ----------

Also...as a more helpful response to your question Zontar...


Perhaps for those of us that do prefer to present as a thin, feminine male - it speaks more of our individual perception of beauty? Notions on what an "ideal" man/woman vary incredibly across cultures/individuals - and it isn't unreasonable to presume - so too do men's preferences for how they look.

Remember back in the 18th centuary, many men preffered to present clean-shaven, powdered, and with rediculous-by-today's-standards, wigs.