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  • ashinadash [she/her]
    ·
    2 months ago

    Since I am unable to eep late at night despite being eepy, I shall share a study as a little treat:

    click for study and blogging

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3076785/

    This is Views From Both Sides of the Bridge? and it fuckin slaps. I discovered it by punching "trans sexuality" (critical spacebar press) into Searx or something ages ago. I have also done this with "autism and sexuality" because Idk I'm weird this way. The title might sound less than promising, but the abstract is downright insightful;

    The aim of this paper is to examine whether transgender people’s experiences of relationships are influenced by heteronormativity, the related concept of sexual legitimacy, and gender as a binary construct. Data from an Internet-based study of transgender people in the USA was used. Findings seem to indicate that participants were strongly influenced by heteronormative discourses. However, less rigid gender beliefs are associated with lower levels of internalised transphobia, which, in turn, are associated with higher levels of self-esteem. Transgender people can therefore find themselves in a double-bind where, on one hand, conforming to gender and sexual norms leads to validation by mainstream US. society, but could possibly entail diminished psychological well-being.

    It's pretty silly and boring that it only polls Terminally Online Mostly White Binary Trans People From Burger Empire, but that's okay, it's got cool and funny observations: 'More transfem people cohabitate!' This Just In: truly, the u-haul is essential to the experience of being a dyke, since lesbians were like 30% more common than straight trans women or some shit.

    It has a lot of stats I never thought I would see statistified though: Trans women are less likely to want to discuss dysphoria in a relationship, and naturally trans men are more game to talk about their junk with a partner. Funnily, 85% of both categories surveyed are chill with being touched 'down there'. One third of people surveyed are non-monogamous in some form. These statistics are amazing, even if it's just a small study group. I'd die to have more info like this freely available. Idk it's like an anthropology thing, look at the facts about my people. Qualitative and quantitative study and surveys coupled with ACTUAL FIRST PERSON TESTIMONY about trans people and their sexual/romantic lives? I'd pay for this, easily. How many stupid fucking cisnormative studies are there that are basically trash? This is gold to me.

    Views also provides super concrete utterly unassailable objective proof that dogmatic, stringent, binary gender ideals are unhealthy for you:

    A Pearson correlation of the selected scales, using SPSS 17.0, revealed two statistically significant correlations, as detailed below. The gender ideology scale significantly negatively correlates (r = −.347) with the internalised transphobia scale (p < .001). This means that the higher participants scored on the first, indicating more strongly held gender stereotypical construing, the lower they scored on the latter scales, implying a higher level of internalised transphobia. The internalised transphobia scale significantly positively correlates (r = .326) with the Rosenberg's self-esteem scale (p < .001). This means that the higher participants scored on the latter, indicating higher levels of self-esteem, the higher they also scored on the former, indicating a more positive transgender identity and lower levels of internalised transphobia.

    That's my personal favourite stat. I cannot genuinely express how pleased I am that Views exists. It also cites Kate Bornstein (!!!!) and Julia Serano (!!!!!!!) so it truly was made for me. Its Discussion section is super good, excerpt:

    Interestingly though, a closer look at the three psychological instruments used in the survey, indicates that participants experiencing lower levels of internalised transphobia not only have higher levels of self-esteem but also hold less rigidly stereotypical gender beliefs. This could be said to leave many transgender individuals in a double-bind: on one hand performing masculinity or femininity is often key to their sense of selves; yet less rigid construing of such gender binary is related to higher self-esteem and a positive transgender identity. Whereas, in fact, a non-transgender person could challenge stereotypical masculine or feminine behaviour without their gender identity being put into question, although their sexual orientation might be, a transgender person might feel far less free or safe to do so if they want to avoid harassment or even violence.

    [...]

    If all of us, including transgender people, are to be able to express our authentic selves, as well as to increase our capacity for intimacy and sexual autonomy, a new sexual revolution is necessary. This revolution would entail the collapse of limited, hierarchical models, and a move away from reductionist binary constructs of gender and towards the creation of pleasure-based models of sexuality encompassing the wealth and breadth of human desire and experiences.

    It is an alltime banger. One of the only studies I have taken true joy in reading and I recommend you do it too.