Posts tagged gender

bism-ishazz:

being trans is a phase

in the same way being a painter is a phase

you start doodling in the margins of your writing and then you realize you need a bigger canvas

that doesn’t mean you aren’t a writer anymore

it does mean developing new expressive techniques and aesthetic sensibilities

and maybe you’ll find that painting is the only modality for you, and that you’ll be a painter for the rest of your life

but it’s more likely that you’ll primarily identify as a cubist/impressionist/whateverthefuck artist (one who happens to use paint)

or a sculptor whose style is very informed by the years they spent painting

or maybe youll go right back to writing and never think about painting again

who cares if it’s a phase?

letitoutjamie:

This theory attempts to address the dissonance and dysphoria felt in non-binary trans* people in particular. That’s where it’s coming from, but also from the idea that sex and gender aren’t the same, and that there are two types of dysphoria, sex dysphoria and gender dysphoria. Sex dysphoria would be dysphoria based on the sex you were assigned at birth, and gender dysphoria would be dysphoria based on the gender you identify with. For this theory I am going to use four primary terms, ‘assigned sex’, ‘identified sex’, ‘assigned gender’ and ‘identified gender’. They are all pretty self-explanatory. The assigned ones are ones that were given to the individual by people outside, and the identified ones are ones that people take from the inside.

This will also use language ‘transsexual’ and ‘cissexual’ to identify the presence or absence of sexual dysphoria, and ‘transgender’ and ‘cisgender’ to identify the presence or absence of gender dysphoria.

Typically, someone with sex dysphoria would wish to alter their sex or secondary sex characteristics, whether or not this alteration actually takes place, and someone with gender dysphoria would wish to alter their gendered presentation, perhaps change their name or change the gender they socially presented as. It is possible to have either or both forms of dysphoria present, and indeed in the standard transsexual person, they are.

It is worth noting here that gender identity is not synominous with masculinity or femininity, they are entirely separate from this, and also that dysphoria is a spectrum and one can have more or less of either type of dysphoria, it’s not all or nothing.

I’m going to use a number of examples to illustrate this better:

LW is a trans man. His assigned sex at birth was female, and his assigned gender at birth was also female. He felt sexual identity dysphoria – a dysphoria with the physical sex of his body, and gender identity dysphoria, a dysphoria with the gender he had been raised as. He transitioned socially and medically and now lives as male.

SDQ identifies as FTMTF. It’s assigned sex at birth was female, and its assigned gender at birth was also female. It felt sexual identity dysphoria – a dysphoria with the physicality of its body, but felt less gender identity dysphoria, it was comfortable with the gender it had been assigned at birth. It transitioned to male, but felt that as a dysphoric experience because it lessened the ability to pass ‘socially’ as female. It has concurrent dysphoria with both its body as having been female assigned at birth and with its social gender when it is perceived as male.

GZI identifies as MtF. His assigned sex at birth was male, and his assigned gender at birth was also male. He felt sexual identity dysphoria but without concurrent gender identity dysphoria. He wished to transition medically to having a physically female body but without concurrent social transition – he wanted to continue to live as male. His transition was successful and he is happy.

ACN identifies as FtWtF (Ftwhat-the-fuck). His assigned sex at birth was female, and his assigned gender at birth was also female. He feels gender identity dysphoria without concurrent sexual identity dysphoria. He has transitioned socially to male – using a male name, and pronouns, and cultiviating a male appearance, but without wishing to change his body.

I will also use the popularised example of David Reimer. His assigned sex at birth was male but his assigned gender was female. Doctors also attempted to alter his assigned sex. Over time he realised that his gender identity was male, and learned that his assigned sex had also been male, and returned to living as male.

It is important to note that none of these are a binary, they are all spectrums. Gender identity and sexual identity are far far more than male and female.

In this way we can see that neither transsexual nor transgendered can really be used as an umbrella term for people that struggle with gender or sexual identity dysphoria, because the two phenomenoms can be quite separate.

I’d really appreciate some input on this, and people tearing it to threads, and some ideas. I have been thinking about it so much that I no longer have any idea if it has any worth.

(Source: theonewhowhistles-archived)

annabunches:

iamwhoiamandidontgiveadamn:

What does it mean to “feel like” a woman?  Or a man? 

How does one “feel like” a gender? 

What does it feel like when one does “feel like” a gender?

I’m reblogging this because oh boy, is there ever not enough room in the little answer box for this one.

So, I suspect the answer is, unfortunately, that it is impossible to describe this. Gender identity is fundamentally esoteric, and I mean that in the sense of personal gnosis, as an antonym to exoteric. That is, it is the kind of knowledge that you can’t transfer accurately; you have to experience it to understand.

But I can speak about my own experience, and that might give you some insight. Obviously, this is my experience, and is not necessarily accurate for anyone else.

Let me start by further frustrating you: I have always felt like a girl. My entire life. I just didn’t realize it for the first 20-something years, because society was telling me that I was a boy, and I bought into that.

But what do I mean by “felt like a girl”? That, of course, is the crux of your question. And the only answer I really have is the tautology: I mean that I felt like a girl. I could throw a bunch of anecdotes (some of which reek of sexism) at you: I wanted to wear dresses and makeup. I related more strongly to female role models. I looked at cis girls and thought “Why can’t I look like that?” I was more emotional and sensitive than boys are expected to be. I experienced bodily dissonance (although I didn’t recognize that’s what it was until recently).

All of those anecdotes are true. But none of them actually begin to describe what I mean when I say “I felt like a girl.” So how do I know I was a girl? Well, that part is easy:

When I finally applied the label of ‘girl’ to myself, (most of) my identity dissonance vanished.

It took me a long time to come to terms with being trans, but once I tried applying the label ‘woman’ to myself, it was like a switch had been flipped. I finally made sense to myself. A deep feeling of awkward wrongness, that had always been present but that I had never really identified the cause of, disappeared.

I am a woman. When I write those words, or say those words, it makes sense. It feels deeply and innately correct in a way I am a man doesn’t (that phrase feels outright wrong. Ridiculous. An obvious lie)

Like I said at the beginning, I doubt I can convey this in a way that’s helpful. It’s something that I just feel. That, once I got past the self-doubt and the fear, was a clear, obvious personal truth.

(emphasis added)