Author: A possible individual

I am actual, therefore possible

Q: How do you have sex?

A: Under most circumstances, it’s inappropriate and intrusive to ask somebody such personal questions about their sex life. Please don’t bring this one up with your trans co-workers or acquaintances.

But when I hear this question, part of me wants to reply: How do you have sex? Is your approach to sexuality really so limited that none of your skills or capacities would be useful in a relationship with a trans person?

Good sex isn’t just about reproduction, nor is it narrowly focused on genitals: it’s about pleasure, creativity, and communication. And once you stop being pruriently focused on the mechanics, those central guiding principles are the same whether you’re cis or trans.

Further reading

Q: Are trans activists just trying to shut down discussion?

A: It would be wonderful if we could all have a mutually respectful discussion about the philosophical meaning of gender, or about the many social issues that affect trans people. Unfortunately, many cis people make this discussion more difficult by derailing conversations with ignorant and irrelevant questions, or by talking about trans people in ways that indicate disgust and contempt.

On the one hand, there is no shame in ignorance. Everybody starts out knowing very little, and it’s impossible to attain knowledge of everything. If you don’t know much about trans people’s lives and experiences, but you want to learn, that’s wonderful and laudable. If you know a bit and want to know more, that’s wonderful too.

On the other hand, there is a kind of loud, confident ignorance that deserves to be shut down. If you find yourself acting like an expert on trans issues, and you are not yourself trans, this is a sign that something may be amiss. Perhaps you should hesitate before expressing your opinions. You’re still welcome to participate in the conversation, but remember that conversation has two parts: a talking part, and a listening part. Don’t forget the listening part.

Further reading

Q: Are trans women destroying women’s sports?

A: Trans women have been competing in women’s sports for decades, and so far, women’s sports have not been destroyed, so evidence points to “no.”

But doesn’t being trans confer an unfair advantage in women’s sports? In fact, it’s not clear whether, or how much, being trans confers an advantage at all. Testosterone enhances performance, but typically, trans women pursue medical interventions that suppress their testosterone levels. (Some regulatory bodies require them to do so, in order to compete as women.) Probably in some sports, being trans confers advantages through mechanisms like greater height, or greater muscle mass that lasts even after testosterone is suppressed. But the evidence doesn’t always point in that direction (see this discussion of distance running by Johanna Harper), and in general, we don’t see trans women dominating women’s sports.

Even granting that being trans confers an advantage to some athletes, it’s not clear that the advantage is unfair, or even what the standards for fairness should be. As runner Aimee Mullins points out, human bodies come with a such a variety of features that it’s futile to demand “a level playing field.” Mullins has been accused of having an unfair advantage because she runs on prosthetic legs (“How Abled Should We Be?” she asks in the title of her essay); access to fancy training facilities and equipment is unequally distributed; athletes differ widely in attributes like height and body shape; and procedures like golfer Tiger Woods’ LASIK surgery could be considered either a performance enhancement or the repair of an unfair disadvantage. Demanding that trans women’s bodies be exactly like cis women’s bodies is similarly misguided; cis women’s bodies aren’t exactly like each other.

Scrutinizing trans women athletes puts them in a double bind: either they lose, or if they win, they are assumed to have won unfairly. This backlash affects not just trans athletes, but also cis athletes whose bodies are deemed gender-nonconforming.

There are tricky philosophical questions about what counts as fairness in sport. But none of this justifies the level of vitriol that is often aimed at trans women athletes. Trans inclusion has not killed women’s sports, and is unlikely to do so in the future.

Further reading

Q: What if you regret transition?

A: Transition is a big life choice. And of course, any big life choice (including getting married, having children, changing jobs, pursuing a graduate eduction, or transition) might end in regret. But all of these life choices can nonetheless be reasonable and worthwhile. You certainly shouldn’t try to interfere with others’ choices on the grounds that they might regret their decisions.

The majority of trans people are happy with their choice to transition. “Transitioning,” of course, is not just one thing; it’s a process with many steps. But regardless of how you ask the question; regret is rare. Here is a little information about satisfaction and regret for different parts of the transition process.

  • Social transition: According to the 2015 US Transgender Survey, about 8% of respondents socially “de-transitioned,” meaning that they had “gone back to living as their [sex] assigned at birth, at least for a while.” Of that 8%, however, the majority (62%) had re-transitioned, and were once again living as a gender other than the one assigned to them at birth. The most common reasons for de-transition involved social pressure from parents and other family members, and difficulties associated with employment, harassment, and discrimination. Only 5% said they had de-transitioned because they realized that transition was not for them.
  • Genital surgery: It is very rare for trans people to regret genital surgery; most studies put the regret rate at 1-2%. (See Brynn Tannehill’s citations.)
  • Chest surgery: People whose breasts are disordant with their gender identity sometimes choose to have their breasts removed. Studies suggest that it is rare to regret this kind of surgery; a recent study by Frederick et al reports that 83% of patients surveyed were very satisfied with their surgery results and 100% would recommend the surgery to others, while van Grift et al report that 94-100% of patients are satisfied with their surgery 4-6 years out.

Of course, if someone regrets transitioning, they deserve support and respect (just like anyone else who has made a choice they regret). But here, as in other contexts, “what if you regret it?” can be used as a weapon of control, rather than an expression of genuine concern.

Further reading

Q: Is being a trans woman an autogynephilic sexual fetish?

A: Probably not, but this question is a little hard to answer. The concept of autogynephilia is so loaded with bad presuppositions that it’s not clear whether there are any facts about autogynephilic sexual fetishes at all.

The word “autogynephilia” was invented by heterosexual cis male psychologist Ray Blanchard in 1989. Here’s how he introduces the term:

Gender identity disturbance in males is always accompanied by one of two erotic anomalies. All gender dysphoric males who are not sexually oriented toward men are instead sexually oriented toward the thought or image of themselves as women. The latter erotic (or amatory) propensity is, of course, the phenomenon labeled by Hirschfeld as automonosexualism. Because of the inconsistent history of this term, however, and its nondescriptive derivation, the writer would prefer to replace it with the term autogynephilia (“love of oneself as a woman”).

Ray Blanchard, The Classification and Labeling of Nonhomosexual Gender Dysphorias

That’s a lot of flowery language, but here’s what’s going on:

  • Somewhat confusingly, Blanchard uses “male” for all people who were assigned male at birth (that is, people who got the “it’s a boy!” treatment as babies), regardless of what they are like now. So his classification lumps together trans women, male crossdressers, genderqueer people who were assigned male at birth, and a bunch of other categories.
  • If you were assigned male at birth, and you like to wear dresses or be called by she/her pronouns or consider yourself a woman, Blanchard classifies this as a “disturbance.” This language already suggests that there’s something wrong with being a trans woman.
  • Blanchard is saying that everybody he’s studying (trans women, male crossdressers, genderqueer people who were assigned male at birth, etc.) has one of two kinds of sexuality, without exception:
    • either they are attracted to men
    • or they are attracted to the image of themselves as women.
  • Blanchard considers both kinds of sexuality to be “erotic anomalies.” This language suggests that there is something wrong with trans women’s sexualities (or at least with the only kinds of sexualities that Blanchard can imagine trans women having).
  • For Blanchard, “autogynephilia” means “being attracted to the image of yourself as a woman.”

So to sum up, Blanchard thinks that if a trans woman is not attracted to men, then she must be attracted to the image of herself as a woman. His language throughout the article suggests that there’s something bad, abnormal, or perverted about a trans woman being attracted to the image of herself as a woman, and also that trans women are actually men.

All three of these assumptions are wrong. More recent research (along with common sense) shows that trans women’s sexualities are too varied to fit into Blanchard’s narrow two-type theory. And there’s nothing bad, abnormal, or perverted about being attracted to the image of oneself as a woman. It’s common among both trans women and cis women (that is, women who are not trans): psychologist Charles Moser surveyed a sample of cis women, and found that between 28% and 93% met Blanchard’s criteria for autogynephilia. And of course, trans women are not men.

Even if (contrary to observed fact) all trans women were attracted to the image of themselves as women, that wouldn’t make being a trans woman a fetish. Trans women are entire human beings who spend the bulk of their time doing non-sexual activities like working, sleeping, engaging in hobbies, doing chores, and spending time with loved ones. To reduce them to their sexuality is objectifying and demeaning.

Further reading

Q: A trans woman once said something angry and violent to me; does this prove that trans women perpetrate male violence?

A: Let’s break down the different things that are wrong with this argument.

You can’t blame the actions of one person on everybody in the group. Different trans women are different people. Treating them as interchangeable is transphobic and sexist.

Violence is not unique to men. Women also commit rape and sexual assault, intimate partner abuse, homicide, and workplace bullying. When a woman behaves violently, it’s not male violence. It’s just violence (which is still wrong, regardless of the gender of the perpetrator).

Your interpretation of the behavior as violent or threatening may be influenced by a double standard. People often classify a trans woman’s behavior as threatening or violent in cases where they would accept the same behavior from a cis woman. This double standard is not so different from the one that says that cis women are angry and violent when they behave in ways that would be considered acceptable coming from a cis man.

This Twitter thread documents examples of cis women deploying arguably violent tactics in pursuit of feminist goals: political uses of violent jokes; politicized images of weapons; violent tactics including assault and arson in the fight for women’s suffrage; violent rhetoric (or sometimes physical attacks) aimed by women at other women. Some of the tactics in the thread are morally acceptable, and some are not, but none of them show that cis women are disposed to commit male violence. (What would that even mean?) Similar behavior by trans women does not show that trans women are disposed to commit male violence. (Again, what would that even mean?)

So to sum up: Trans women are human beings, and therefore are capable of anger and violence (both justified and unjustified). But there’s no evidence that trans women are more prone to these behaviors than other people, nor is there any reason for labeling these behaviors “male” when a trans woman displays them.

Further reading

Q: Are so-called queer trans people just straight people who dyed their hair blue and want to feel special?

A: No. Gay trans men are men, and they are attracted to other men, which makes them not straight. Lesbian trans women are women, and they are attracted to other women, which also makes them not straight.

Many queer trans people are not straight because they aren’t exclusively attracted to one gender. Results from the 2015 US Transgender Survey suggest that this group comprises the majority of queer trans people. 32% of all the trans people in the survey classified themselves as either “bisexual” or “pansexual,” and an additional 21% simply labeled themselves as “queer.” By comparison, 16% labeled themselves as “gay, lesbian, or same-gender loving” and only 15% labeled themselves “straight or heterosexual.”

Finally, let’s pause a moment to unpack the stereotype of a person with blue hair who wants to feel special. When you picture that person, you’re probably picturing a college student, or a recent graduate in their early 20s. But there are many older queer trans people. As the stories of figures like Leslie Feinberg, Lou Sullivan, and Sandy Stone illustrate, there have been trans people who explicitly understood themselves as gay, lesbian, or bisexual for decades.

Anyway, what would be wrong with queer trans people wanting to feel special? Like all human beings, queer trans people are special. If you’re cis, the existence of queer trans people doesn’t make your existence any less meaningful or valuable.

Further reading

Q: Is being trans based on a misunderstanding of basic biology?

A: No. Plenty of us took biology in school; some of us have PhDs and work as biologists. But “biological sex,” when used to exclude trans people from social and legal protections, is a moving target.

Is it about chromosomes? Or gamete size? Or genitals? Or what’s listed on a person’s birth certificate? (Or their original birth certificate, to prevent a trans person from legally changing their biological sex?) Usually, it’s about whatever conveniently justifies the view that trans people are not who we say we are.

In fact, trans people are likely to be more knowledgeable than cis people to know about the aspects of biology that affect our lives. A lot of cis people don’t understand what spironolactone is, or the various delivery methods for testosterone and their different costs and benefits, or even that hormone therapy causes trans women to grow breasts.

We know our bodies as well as cis people know their own bodies (and better than cis people know our bodies). We know our biology facts as well as cis people know their biology facts (and for biology facts that are directly related to transition, we tend to know them better). And we are trans.

Further reading

Q: Are so-called trans men just sad girls who can’t accept their own lesbianism?

A: No, for several reasons.

First, trans men are not girls. In phrasing this question, I chose the word “girls” on purpose: a lot of concern about trans men is infantilizing, and incorrectly assumes that trans men are incapable of making their own medical decisions. You should trust trans men when they say they’re not women, and you should trust adult trans men to understand themselves and their needs.

Second, many trans men are missing another property that’s essential for lesbianism: a primary sexual and romantic interest in women. In the 2015 US Trans Survey, only 23% of the trans men surveyed listed themselves as straight or heterosexual (the option you would expect a trans man to choose if he was primarily sexually or romantically interested in women). 12% identified as gay, lesbian, or same-gender-loving, and a majority (53%) listed themselves as bisexual, pansexual, or queer. The remainder either listed themselves as asexual (7%) or did not answer the question (5%).

It is true that the boundaries between butch lesbians and trans men are sometimes fluid, and that lesbian spaces often provide support and community for trans men. But that doesn’t make lesbians and trans men the same. Luckily, there is plenty of room for lesbians and trans men to exist alongside each other, without anyone being diminished.

Further reading