there are a sect of (mostly, in my experience) older, white trans people who still seem to be locked into the rigid structure of gender roles and believe that you can only be considered your gender after numerous (very expensive!) surgeries and presenting in a certain way.
That's why rich assholes make the worst relatives at social gatherings, too. They're the ones that must be the toppers all the time: "oh, you went on vacation to (affordable) place? I went to (expensive) place with authentic (foreign thing that is prestigious to insufferable rich assholes)" as a regular conversation topic.
To a large degree it's a function of what medical gatekeeping for transition looked like until 2011 in the US. You get through that either by learning to lie to doctors (often with community support) or internalizing it heavily.
You still see that with younger transmeds/people who self identify as HSTS. But I think you're right that it's mostly older white trans people.
oh yeah it is absolutely the medical structure that made so many of them internalize it. i've observed that so many of them seem to treat transness as a disease or an unfortunate affliction they must overcome through treatment and that's 100% a result of navigating the medical system. its an inherent flaw with tying transition to the medical system i think, but i digress.
but its also just them being older too. they just grew up with heavier enforcement of the patriarchal standard (women look this way, men look this way, you need these parts to be female and these parts to be male). its super generational, i think younger transmeds are a very loud yet tiny minority.
if you mean the concept of transness as a disease, it's just from the pathologization of deviance from cisnormativity, one that's perpetuated by the medical system. if we know gender to be a social construct (there is no biological basis for gender, and a very shaky biological basis for sex), and is enforced for the benefit of capitalism (it is in the interest of the bourgeoisie to enforce rigid gender roles and by extension the traditional nuclear family unit, it's productive to generate more workers. the men go out and work, the women stay home with the family, and under the view of reactionary biological determinism, you aren't allowed to change what you were assigned. i recommend the first few chapters of "sexuality and socialism" if you're curious about this), then there's nothing really inherently wrong with deviating from it and identifying as something outside the gender binary or identifying as something different than what you were assigned. but obviously the capitalist system, and by extension the medical system, enforces this social construct by pathologizing that deviance. but don't let that convince you that transness is a disease or affliction. the truth is that it isn't, its just a simple condition of being that comes about because the complexity of human expression does not always fit neatly into the constructed rigid binary. it's just a descriptor for how we interface with the social structure of gender, not something we did wrong or is wrong with us. at least, this is my view on it.
if you would be willing to expand on this part as I'm very curious to know more about how sex is of shaky biological basis, since I would've assumed that's largely pretty straight forwards in humans aside from unusual cases
there is no biological basis for gender, and a very shaky biological basis for sex
Using medical procedures to get your body where you want it is cool and good. Like, I take hormones and I desperately want bottom surgery, that's not the issue.
The issue is that a lot of cis people view transness as predominantly a medical "issue" and have set up gatekeeping around that, which causes a lot of trans people to internalize that way of thinking. As in, you are not Normal and we're going to graciously allow you medical procedures to allow you to get as close to Normal as possible (and in many cases and especially before 2011, not even that in the vast majority of cases). Gender Dysphoria is in the DSM, it's categorized as a mental disorder- the fact that transition is currently accepted as the most effective "treatment" doesn't change the fundamental issues of that framing.
The old gatekeeping makes this abundantly clear. Like, a trans woman could lose her hormones back then if she ever wore pants to a doctor's appointment or if the doctor found out she wasn't straight or if she didn't want to do what we now call going stealth. Because the goal was taking somebody "deviant" and making them as not deviant as possible. And this is also where we get hierarchies like AGP and HSTS- which is to say, hierarchies of good assimilationist trans people who can be tentatively allowed to transition in a single prescribed way and bad deviant trans people who are probably faking their transness and must be denied the ability to transition- which were and are formalized and treated seriously by psychologists (albeit less now than they used to be).
May even be some boomeresque sunk cost fallacy: "UNLESS YOU SPENT X DOLLARS ON SURGERY LIKE I DID, YOU DON'T COUNT!"
there are a sect of (mostly, in my experience) older, white trans people who still seem to be locked into the rigid structure of gender roles and believe that you can only be considered your gender after numerous (very expensive!) surgeries and presenting in a certain way.
Capitalist mindset means everything is more legitimate if it's also more expensive.
Oh, nice apartment, but it's not a real house, unlike my McMansion.
Cute boat, but my yacht is better.
Oh you have a functional car? Yeah I drive a hummer.
Darling, you took an uber here? My chauffeur drove me in a limousine.
Etc etc.
That's why rich assholes make the worst relatives at social gatherings, too. They're the ones that must be the toppers all the time: "oh, you went on vacation to (affordable) place? I went to (expensive) place with authentic (foreign thing that is prestigious to insufferable rich assholes)" as a regular conversation topic.
To a large degree it's a function of what medical gatekeeping for transition looked like until 2011 in the US. You get through that either by learning to lie to doctors (often with community support) or internalizing it heavily.
You still see that with younger transmeds/people who self identify as HSTS. But I think you're right that it's mostly older white trans people.
oh yeah it is absolutely the medical structure that made so many of them internalize it. i've observed that so many of them seem to treat transness as a disease or an unfortunate affliction they must overcome through treatment and that's 100% a result of navigating the medical system. its an inherent flaw with tying transition to the medical system i think, but i digress.
but its also just them being older too. they just grew up with heavier enforcement of the patriarchal standard (women look this way, men look this way, you need these parts to be female and these parts to be male). its super generational, i think younger transmeds are a very loud yet tiny minority.
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if you mean the concept of transness as a disease, it's just from the pathologization of deviance from cisnormativity, one that's perpetuated by the medical system. if we know gender to be a social construct (there is no biological basis for gender, and a very shaky biological basis for sex), and is enforced for the benefit of capitalism (it is in the interest of the bourgeoisie to enforce rigid gender roles and by extension the traditional nuclear family unit, it's productive to generate more workers. the men go out and work, the women stay home with the family, and under the view of reactionary biological determinism, you aren't allowed to change what you were assigned. i recommend the first few chapters of "sexuality and socialism" if you're curious about this), then there's nothing really inherently wrong with deviating from it and identifying as something outside the gender binary or identifying as something different than what you were assigned. but obviously the capitalist system, and by extension the medical system, enforces this social construct by pathologizing that deviance. but don't let that convince you that transness is a disease or affliction. the truth is that it isn't, its just a simple condition of being that comes about because the complexity of human expression does not always fit neatly into the constructed rigid binary. it's just a descriptor for how we interface with the social structure of gender, not something we did wrong or is wrong with us. at least, this is my view on it.
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if you would be willing to expand on this part as I'm very curious to know more about how sex is of shaky biological basis, since I would've assumed that's largely pretty straight forwards in humans aside from unusual cases
Which matter? Transness being seen as a disease?
deleted by creator
Using medical procedures to get your body where you want it is cool and good. Like, I take hormones and I desperately want bottom surgery, that's not the issue.
The issue is that a lot of cis people view transness as predominantly a medical "issue" and have set up gatekeeping around that, which causes a lot of trans people to internalize that way of thinking. As in, you are not Normal and we're going to graciously allow you medical procedures to allow you to get as close to Normal as possible (and in many cases and especially before 2011, not even that in the vast majority of cases). Gender Dysphoria is in the DSM, it's categorized as a mental disorder- the fact that transition is currently accepted as the most effective "treatment" doesn't change the fundamental issues of that framing.
The old gatekeeping makes this abundantly clear. Like, a trans woman could lose her hormones back then if she ever wore pants to a doctor's appointment or if the doctor found out she wasn't straight or if she didn't want to do what we now call going stealth. Because the goal was taking somebody "deviant" and making them as not deviant as possible. And this is also where we get hierarchies like AGP and HSTS- which is to say, hierarchies of good assimilationist trans people who can be tentatively allowed to transition in a single prescribed way and bad deviant trans people who are probably faking their transness and must be denied the ability to transition- which were and are formalized and treated seriously by psychologists (albeit less now than they used to be).
Does this make sense/answer your question?
Transmedicalists are unfortunately a real thing, and as you could imagine, they do tend to be very white and privileged.