I'm asking from a place of genuine curiousity, as a bi trans woman I ask myself this question regularly and never quite settle on an answer. I suppose the key question I ask myself is was I born trans and spent 25 years figuring it out, or was it something that developed and grew as I matured?
My inspiration for this question is this video: https://www.ted.com/talks/dr_lisa_diamond_why_the_born_this_way_argument_does_not_advance_lgbt_equality
Obviously I don't think it matters, lgbtq rights and legitmacy shouldn't be tied to the idea that "they can't help it, they were born that way", it's just the right thing to support. And even if it isn't something you are born with that doesn't automatically make it a "choice" that one could consciously change (or be tortured, a la conversion therapy, out of), there are many parts of my identity that I wasn't born with but are now core parts of me.
Idk, I'm interested to hear others' thoughts. I feel as if my self-discovery was somewhat delayed because I had the idea that if I were trans, I would absolutely know because it'd be some core part of me that I was born with, and how could you be ignorant of that? I feel like, if someone told me at 18 "You know you can choose to be a girl if you want" and showed me a picture of post-transition me, I'd probably would've started questioning then instead of years later. In some ways I feel as if I chose to be trans, but is it really a choice if I would pick the same answer every time? Was I predetermined to choose to transition? Could there be a person born gay/trans, but never realize it? Would they still be gay/trans if neither they nor anyone else knew it?
And what about the future? Lately I've been thinking that an identity like non-binary or agender might fit me better. Does that mean I've been wrongly interpreting my true self? Ultimately whether there's some true, fixed identity buried deep in my psyche and I'm just trying to interpret it, or if that doesn't exist and my identity is just this fluid thing I consciously construct and am constantly revisiting, I think the outcome is the same. Personally, I prefer the idea that my gender identity and sexuality are fluid, ever-changing things that evolve as I grow and experience the world. I'd like to have it where I didn't feel shame or guilt when I continue to question my gender or sexuality after already coming out. I'd like to be able to enjoy my pre-transition memories as a legitimate part of me and my journey, rather than a false me that should be buried away and seldom talked about.
I realize this is a very subjective experience, and other people will relate differently to the things I wrote about. I'm not trying to prescribe a certain way to approach this topic, I'm just interested to hear other people's thoughts on the matter. Solidarity forever comrades.
:hexbear-pride: :flag-bi-pride: :flag-gay-pride: :flag-gay-pride-mlm: :flag-pan-pride: :flag-demi-pride: :flag-trans-pride: :hexbear-gay-pride: :flag-agender-pride: :flag-asexual-pride: :flag-lesbian-pride: :flag-aromantic-pride: :flag-non-binary-pride: :flag-genderfluid-pride: :flag-intersex-pride: :flag-genderfluid-pride: :flag-genderqueer-pride:
What actually caused me to break down and realize I was trans was when a close friend of mine came out as a trans woman. I remember thinking "wow that's so cool, good for them, it'll be tough but in a few years time they'll probably be living completely as a woman, I wish I could do that" and then being like "wait why did I think that last part, why do I feel jealous."
I kept my head above water for a long time without ever really considering gender as part of the problem. It’s hard to put myself back in that mindset now and retroactively gender myself but I guess I tend to view it as having been a man who was really bad at it and really unhappy, rather than as being a woman all along
That's how I was too, during my teen years I basically avoided dating, thinking about gender and all that stuff, I just read books and played video games. I sunk into a sort of depression in my early twenties, which now I connect to probably worsening dysphoria but even then I just felt like "failed" man rather than a closeted trans woman.
I was dazzled by estrogen within about 2-4 weeks of being on it. The world had become gray to me on T, to the point that I thought my eyes were going bad.
Oh my god I really need to get started with HRT asap. Your whole comment was really inspiring. How did you get started? There is so much information to try and take in.
experience ptsd dreams and crack my teeth in my sleep
:jesus-christ:
I think in some aspects, I was "born this way", but it also took years of learning about the world and these socially constructed roles that are built for people combined with actually getting a chance to learn from other trans people about their experiences for me to put all the pieces together. I definitely saw myself as more feminine growing up as I look back on it, but a confusing world and societal cisnormativity and heteronormativity clouded that perception. However, the second I learned what being trans actually meant beyond the stereotypes and general transphobia displayed in popular media, all of those clouds dissipated and I got a glimpse of my true self. The clouds put up a fight for a while (and still do sometimes), but my true self has become much more clear as I've been able to explore my gender identity on my terms instead of just taking what was handed to me for all those years
I relate to that, the pieces only really started connecting for me when I saw other trans people living normal and fulfilling lives, and realizing that transition was option that was available to me, if I wanted to do so. I think it took me a while to get over the mental block of "real trans people have/feel something I don't." I definitely am mentally way better post-transition, but I still often wonder if I'm just guessing at shadows on the cave wall and what it all means. Either way, I'm happier now and that's good enough for me.
I still often wonder if I’m just guessing at shadows on the cave wall and what it all means
I think everyone who thinks critically about themselves, regardless of it's about gender or sexuality, wonders this. Wouldn't it be nice if we could just read our own minds?
The truth is that we can never know because the concept of "nature vs nurture" is inherently flawed, it has always been both. So yeah the argument "born this way" is harmful because it is based on a faulty premise. It also is not a positive argument for rights, it is a pleading to not be hurt, which I for one think I bullshit. If I fucking choose to be trans my right to be a trans woman is just as fucking good as anyone else's rights to be however they want and they had better fucking well respect me for it. A lot of this is also cultural, like humans aren't just behaviors that randomly bump into each other, yes be have intrinsic behaviors but they are also deeply wrapped in meaning and language that is not of our own making. So I would argue that a person could have the inclination to be trans but without the cultural collective understanding of that identity they would have no basis for understanding that form of self. In this way the internet has actually been very liberatory in that it has allowed otherwise isolated and rare individuals to come together and communal build culture and identity to reify and externalize their internal inclinations and desires. Like if I had been born as an "upper middle class white man" in the 30's the material and cultural conditions would probably have led me to being a "upper middle class white man" because not only would there been no communally built understood way to articulate my internalized desires, there was the material ease to "be normal" that would have been some degree of salve to the dissociation and distress of being trans. I give this example because I was always fairly certain my grandfather, who lived this "upper middle class white man" life, was some form of queer, but never articulated it as such. Having read my grandfathers journals after he passed I can get the sense that this was true, though he never comes out and states it plainly as such.
Which actually brings up the concept of dysphoria, this as a condition only exists in our communal understanding of it as such. What is the concept of happy? Mentally well? Mentally unwell? Many of these concepts are not some externalized force of natural but a communally decided upon condition. You can correlate certain brain states to certain phenomenology, but that doesn't constitute an unhealthy or unhappy mental condition. A woman who is working 3 jobs and living in a shithold apartment to take care of her kid probably has a brain state indicative of depression and distress, but no sane person would say she has a "mental health problem" her mental health is 100% appropriate to the shitty conditions she is forced to live under. It is in fact unhealthy to be happy in states of distress, the man laughing and screaming that he is having a wonderful time while getting shelled in a fox hole is not a healthy man.
As to your connection to your past self? I guess that is a project we need to work on together. I feel the same conflict that it seems most trans people do toward their past selves. On the one hand I like to say "I killed [deadname]" at the same time I am proud of many of the things that person achieved, even if I didn't particularly like being them at the time. Reconciling that is hard for me largely because there is anger at other people and society about how I was failed. All those therapists that no once asked me about my gender or identity when I was a small scared child, all the schools that let me be abused and bullied for what I perceived a just being myself.
Sorry for the long post but it just kind of poured out.
:trans-heart: Believe me if I wrote everything I wanted to originally my post would've been five times longer lol. You said a lot of what I was thinking, especially that last paragraph. Hopefully future generations won't have to struggle to live as themselves.
Fixed identity is a spook. Allowing one's self-concept to become fixed is the sort of stagnation that ends revolutions. Queerness is a rejection of the normative conception of human experience, a revolt against the comfortable hegemony of "the straights". The "born this way" argument is an attempt to quantize, medicalize, sterilize the chaotic truth of humanity. Be gay, do crime. No one else will ever understand the way your body and mind shift and grind against the shackles put on you by a society that wants to reduce you to a featureless cog in their machine.
You have some interesting ideas concerning gender. Seems to me you're rejecting the very idea of a static identity, along with a rejection of gender and sexual orientation as concepts. Quite an individualistic world-view. Do tell if I've made any mistakes in my interpretation.
As fixed, immutable concepts, sure, I reject them. As temporary labels for a set of behaviors and preferences, I think people can use whatever they like. But it's important to recognize that those labels are invented to describe an incomplete picture, and the interpretation of those symbols is not universal. "Man" and "woman" (and indeed every other label one uses to identify oneself) are symbols that in a particular time and particular social and political context have a particular set of interpretations among a particular set of people. They are not laws of the universe. Personal truth is necessarily individualized. I can recognize when someone expresses, say, sadness or pain, but I cannot know what the experience of that is for them. I can only truthfully know my own experience. I can recognize when someone expresses their identity (and respect and cherish and defend that identity), but I can only know who I am. Even then, who truly knows themselves? Does universalizing labels, making their interpretation perfectly precise and shared among all make the experience better? If it meant only one thing to be queer, trans, man, woman, would that reduce harm? Or would it necessarily stifle the unique expression of one's presence in and of the world?
Not really, I definitely had a period of my life were I didn't experience anything that I would consider romantic or sexual attraction towards women, and now I do. I don't think there's a second me in the back of my subconscious that secretly liked girls the whole time, I think "me" is a constantly changing thing, and the "real me" is whatever version of myself exists now.
Idk tho, I don't read philosophy 😎
If I'm being honest, no. I was in my late twenties before I realized, or possibly developed, any attraction to men.
It's possible I guess that I'm just more attracted to women and so it was easier to just think I was straight, but when I was a teen I had several "If I'm gay, I should figure that out" moments where I seriously considered the possibility and decided that I was not attracted to other boys.
I feel like the world and humanity is complicated enough that there may be people who's preferences shift over time without any deliberate choice and people who's preferences are very concrete and unchanging and maybe even people who don't have strong preferences who do literally make a choice and acquire a preference the way one goes from disliking beer or coffee to loving them, but idk.
can I ask how you felt when you started being attracted to men?
I didn't really attach a value, positive or negative, to the attraction itself, it was just another group of people that I may or may not be attracted to but wouldn't pursue since I'm happily married.
I was mostly worried about my wife's reaction. Not that I'd ever known her to be a homophobe or anything, but I read a shocking statistic about bi men getting dumped/divorced after coming out to their partners and anecdotally a lot of people said that even progressive women had left them for being bi, even partners who themselves were bi. I was 99% sure that wouldn't happen but the possibility was pretty difficult to think about, and yet I couldn't hide if forever.
Got drunk with her one night after putting the kiddo to bed and "casually" mentioned it and she came out to me in turn lol.
Thanks, Im having intense anxiety about this thing in particular, probably attached to stress and previous bullying trauma and I just like hearing peoples stories.
About the possibility of coming out leading to your relationship ending? If so I'm sorry, I know it's hard and I hope things go well if and when you do talk to them about it.
I dont even think I have anything to out? Im having a ton of anxiety, I made a post on menby about it
I hadn't seen it previously, sorry, wasn't trying to connect the two or anything. Even though it's a different issue, it sounds stressful and I hope that you are able to get it sorted out.
Its okay, its okay you have nothing to apologize for. Im just trying to learn about other peoples experiences.
Personally I identify as non-binary and agender and it feels like cheating. I'm kind of androgynous so people will sometimes refer to me as a woman, until I talk or they get a closer look. It feels like cheating because I didn't have to do anything or come out or come to terms with it. Most people I've told don't seem to care or know what I'm talking about. I've never been bullied or denied housing or anything. Most people don't even know unless I tell them.
So I've always felt non-binary. I don't know if that means I was born with it. I don't remember a single moment where I felt comfortable with my name or pronouns or anything. As a kid I would ask people to not call me by name, in fact, just don't call me anything. I always hated getting grouped together with guys, hated the idea of marriage and adopting a masculine role as a parent. I never wanted to be part of what's called normal gender roles. Not to dissuade anyone else though, it's just not for me.
I'm also some level of autistic and a lot smaller than most guys in my family, so that probably had something to do with it.
I wouldn't worry so much though about figuring out if you have a true self from birth you're hiding. People are dynamic. You're also the ultimate authority of what your gender is. People change and it's fine to be different now than how you were before. Hope that's encouraging.
I mean, one of my very first fantasies involved being turned into a woman but I didn't even try to figure out I was bi until I was out of highschool.
:vivian-shrug: Repression's a bitch.
Right, in a sense the idea that "queer people are just born this way" just doesn't quite sit right with me. It turns gender and sexuality into essentialist categories that naturally exist and justifies the status quo.
But at the same time, does it actually matter that much? It's much easier to explain these things this way, i.e. trans people being born in the opposite sex's body, when there are so many people who literally deny that queer people exist. The fact is that humans (naturally) assigns "nature" to things they deem "valid" or "immutable". Sure we philosophy nerds can say umm akctually that isnt the case, but I feel it really is an irrelevant point outside of rigorous philosophical investigations, because everyday life is pure ideology where philosophy loses its meaning without the context. Under these situations Im more inclined to go with it, but theoretically I very much challenge the idea and I think it is interesting to think about its implications.
Final thing, sometimes I think that the ultimate goal must be to destroy the gender binary completely, not simply settling for "acceptance" of queer people. Queer people are the product of the gender binary in the way that the proleteriat is the product of capitalism. It is a contradiction that is impossible to resolve, despite this kind of "coexistence" becoming mainstream today. Of course this is extremely far off and considering humans reproduce sexually, the sheer social significance of reproduction makes gender almost inescapable in all human societies historically. But as history advances, just as how communism is inevitable, the disappearance of gender is too inevitable. Whether we live to see it is a different story, but the fact is that this is the direction that the world moves in.
now I’m just whatever I feel like on any given day.
Yeah I feel like that's where I've kinda ended up too. Although for me it feels hard to lean into that vibe because now most people expect me to present to a certain level of femininity as a binary trans woman. I just wanna wear eyeliner and vibe is that so much to ask.
