Are Transgender Women Real Women?

Was Caitlyn Jenner correct when she wrote these words in her bestselling autobiography?

“Transgender women are not real women!” This is what a lot of people say.

But is it an entirely accurate statement? That depends on how we define “real woman.”

“A real woman is obviously someone who’s born female,” some will say. “A real woman is a genetic, biological female, with female chromosomes.”

Before taking that as the definitive and final word on the matter, consider the following, from the post Transgender: Ideology, Delusion, or Scientific Fact? –

Important new scientific research published in March 2018 indicates that transgender people literally have different brain structures than cisgender (i.e. not transgender) people, that their brain structure and function resembles that of the gender which they inwardly feel themselves to be, and that this different brain structure exists not only in people who have taken hormone treatment but even in those transgender people who have not even yet started any such treatment. This can be read about at https://psychcentral.com/news/2018/03/16/structural-brain-differences-for-transgender-people/133802.html.

Another team of scientists found the same thing at around the same time and this was reported in the news in May 2018. This can be read about at https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180524112351.htm.

These reports need to become widely known, as they would do away with almost all prejudice, discrimination, and hatred towards transgender people. . . .

Anti-transgender people often say things such as “If a person is born with male chromosomes and male genitals, they’re a male, end of story. That’s a fact of science.”

Actually, science has moved on since the days when such statements were accepted as being the last word on gender matters. The people who make such arguments are behind the times and perhaps don’t even realise it.

Medical science now accepts the possibility that a foetus developing in the womb could form the basis of a female brain but that an unintended surge of testosterone within the mother’s body could cause the foetus to develop male genitals, thus resulting in the mismatch and dysphoria felt and experienced by transgender women from early childhood onwards.

This clearly corresponds to the brain structure discovery mentioned above.

The same principle is of course true, in reverse, for transgender men.

Hence why experts who have spent their lives studying and researching the transgender phenomenon unanimously affirm that counselling and psychological therapy will not properly treat a person’s gender dysphoria, nor will trying to ignore it, which is something that never works in a lasting way. The only real “cure” is gender transition through changing one’s hormones and appearance to match the gender one feels oneself to be.

“Sex” and “gender” used to be seen as synonymous terms. Medical science now acknowledges that they are different.

Medical professionals now say that gender is one’s inner sense of personal identity, and if an individual has a persistent, long term, fixed inner sense of definitely inwardly being a woman, then it is said that their gender is female, even though their bodily sex may be male.

The concept of sex and gender being the same thing is primitive, crude, and ignorant. If medical science and medical professionals are catching up, why can’t everyone else?

That seems clear enough but then there are some people who say that “transgender women are biological women.” That is a very specific statement and one which is generating a lot of controversy on both sides of the argument.

The idea that transwomen are biologically female sounds obviously erroneous to most intelligent people, who understandably think “to be biologically female means to be born female, hence not a transgender female.”

To a large extent that’s true but there is a subtlety that needs to be taken into consideration:

If a transgender woman is on HRT (hormone replacement therapy) and the HRT is at the right dosage, she is hormonally female.

Her body has ceased to be powered, influenced, and energised, by the male sex hormone of testosterone and is now powered, influenced, and energised, by the female sex hormone of estrogen.

Her body may still have male characteristics and even male genitals but those features and genitals are no longer governed by the testosterone which contributed to their development; they are now governed by estrogen. This is probably the reasoning behind some pre-operative and non-operative transwomen saying that their penis is a female penis.

A transgender woman on HRT does not have male hormone levels anymore. She has female hormone levels and very often her testosterone levels are even lower than those of many natural born (or cisgender) women and her estrogen levels can also be higher.

In this sense, and this sense only, transgender women could be said to be biological women, due to the fact that their body’s biochemistry has been dramatically changed.

But that change is dependent solely on the hormone medication. If for whatever reason that is stopped, the transgender woman’s hormone levels will in time revert back to those of a male. When or if that happens, her physical appearance and body will also start to re-masculinise and revert back to its previous form. So a transgender woman is not a biological woman in the ordinary sense of the term.

As for the even more definitive and specific claim made by some that “transgender women are genetic women,” that is obviously and undeniably false, incorrect, and misleading.

No amount of hormone treatment nor surgery will ever change a transgender woman’s DNA and chromosomes from male to female. We may be psychologically as well as visually female but we will always be genetically male. That’s just a scientific fact of life and there’s no reason to feel bad about it or try to deny it, like some people do. Someone born male has XY chromosomes and someone born female has XX chromosomes. This literally cannot be altered.

But the point I was trying to make above is that although transgender women are genetically male we are still female hormonally and psychologically and to that extent – which is a very very big extent – we are women. Men do not have female hormone levels . . . men are not psychologically female . . . that should be clear.

But do we have the right to say that we are “real women”?

Here’s what Caitlyn Jenner, the most famous transgender woman in today’s world, has to say on p. 100 of her 2017 autobiography “The Secrets of My Life”:

“I am firmly on the side of womanhood now. But I am not a woman. Nor will I ever be.

“I am a trans woman. There is a difference.

“I never menstruated or had menopause. I obviously cannot give birth. I was never screwed out of a job because of the sexism that is still pervasive.

“Is my gender female? Yes. Has it always been female? Yes. I use the women’s restroom because I am a woman. I changed the gender on my birth certificate to female because I am a woman. But it’s a different kind of womanhood for me. And that will never change. I’m fine with that. It doesn’t diminish Caitlyn.”

Some people protest at that and say “But a trans woman is a real woman, there’s no difference!”

There obviously is a difference though. Caitlyn Jenner makes the point that she has always been inwardly a woman but that she has never been experientially a woman . . . or at least not until she made her transition and even then it is only a partial experience. She makes the point that she is not a genetic woman and that she can never and will never be a genetic woman.

But as we see, she doesn’t constantly attach the prefix of “trans” and that seems the most sensible way to do it, for the truth is that we are women even though we are transgender women, and we do not need to always identify ourselves as transgender in every single situation and circumstance.

On Facebook, some select “Transgender Woman” or “Transgender Female” as the gender to appear on their profile information. Doing this can indeed sometimes help the cause, by showing the world that we are not afraid or ashamed to be visible as what we are. But we also shouldn’t feel obligated to always reveal our transness. I personally just say “Female” on my Facebook profile but when it’s relevant and appropriate I have no issue with saying that I’m a transgender woman.

So, is a transgender woman a real woman?

It’s not straightforward enough to be able to answer either “yes” or “no.”

The true answer lies somewhere in the middle. You may not like that but such subtleties and unexpected depths are what add a touch of beauty to the experience of human life.

How Not To Pass: Passing Tips for Transgender Women

“Passing” is a term used by transgender people to describe being successfully viewed and addressed as the gender to which they have transitioned.

You too can have Greta Garbo style eyebrows . . . and it can help you to “pass” as such highly arched, plucked eyebrows are associated in the human mind with women and not with men.

For example, a transgender woman, i.e. a male-to-female transsexual, “passes” when people who don’t know her look at her and see a woman and then call her “madam” or “miss” or “she” or “her” and so forth.

When this doesn’t happen and she gets called “sir” or “mate” or “he” or “him” etc. it is said that she is being misgendered and therefore not “passing.” In other words, since she isn’t “passing,” she is “failing,” although understandably that term isn’t commonly used as it could make people feel too bad about themselves too much of the time.

But in this blog I take a common sense and straightforward approach to the various facets and aspects of being a transgender woman, so let’s be honest and upfront about this subject: if you’re a transwoman you didn’t transition in order to get constantly or frequently misgendered, did you? No-one does.

Some people say, “You transition for you, not for anybody else, so it doesn’t matter if you don’t pass, as long as you’re living as the woman you know yourself to be. That’s the most important thing.”

I agree, that is the most important thing, but the fact of the matter is that no-one transitions solely for themselves; one of the main reasons we transition is for other people, so that the world will see us and treat us the way we’ve always wished to be seen and treated, namely as a woman.

In reality very few transgender women pass perfectly, 100% of the time, 24/7.

But most people – not all but most, here in the UK at least – are polite and decent enough that if they see someone doing everything in their power to come across as a woman, yet obviously having been born male, they will still address and treat that person as female. In those cases, you often won’t know whether you’re truly “passing” in that person’s mind or not but even if they’ve “clocked” you (to use another transgender slang term) they’re at least treating you the way you obviously wish to be treated and that’s what counts.

And that’s where the main issue lies when it comes to passing or not passing: if it isn’t fully and unmistakably obvious as to what gender you’re endeavouring to present yourself as to the world, you cannot expect to pass nor can you blame people for misgendering you.

If you’re coming across predominantly male, a person who calls you “sir” or treats you as a man is usually not being transphobic or a “hater” but is making an honest and genuine mistake. I say “usually” because there are of course hateful and bigoted people who delight in offending and upsetting others but many misgenderings are accidents rather than deliberate.

Rather than allowing misgendering to hurt and damage you emotionally and psychologically, you can look on it as a helpful lesson: “There’s obviously something more I need to do or something I need to change and do differently in order for the world to see me or at least treat me as what I am.”

For most transgender women, it is possible to pass most of the time, even without any surgery, and I’ll give you some tips as to how.

Let’s do it with an example of how not to pass. Last year a young transgender woman here in England was the subject of an article in her local newspaper in which she complained of the depressing effects of being constantly misgendered, which she attributed to people’s transphobia and prejudice. I won’t say her name as that wouldn’t be appropriate. But let’s just say that the video interview with her on that newspaper’s website showed these details of her appearance:

1. She was wearing a very obvious wig and it was obviously cheap, poor quality, and in poor condition.

2. She had very noticeable facial hair stubble all over her face.

3. She even had tufts of chest hair poking out from under the top of her t-shirt.

4. She had a completely flat chest, with no indication of even very small breasts.

5. She spoke in an entirely male voice, with typical male depth and male speaking style.

6. Her face had no definition to it and her lips were very small and extremely thin; these things can be the case for women occasionally but most of the time they are far more true of men.

7. She did not appear to be wearing any makeup or cosmetics.

8. Her clothes looked somewhat female but were incredibly tacky looking and not typical of anything that most women usually wear. The clothing was also too tight . . . it’s true that many women wear tight clothing but transgender women have to be aware that if they have a big or bulky “male” frame, as this lady did, too tight clothes will only emphasise that and draw attention to signs of “maleness” such as making the shoulders and upper back seem even bigger and wider. For some transgender women, looser and more flowing clothes are the only way to go if one wants to pass.

Along with the above, two other common but silly mistakes that some transgender women make are:

9. Having bald patches or a receding hairline on display and expecting people to somehow either not notice it or to overlook it, even though women by definition do not experience male pattern baldness, for that is caused primarily by testosterone. That’s why hormonal issues – decreased estrogen, increased testosterone – can sometimes cause women to start to lose their hair. Besides that, the male forehead tends to be quite a bit longer than the female forehead, so it’s often necessary to have a fringe to disguise that and to soften the facial appearance, unless you’ve had hairline lowering surgery, which is something most of us cannot afford.

10. Walking, moving, sitting, and standing, in a typically male way, such as taking big strides, sitting with legs apart instead of legs together or legs crossed, standing with feet quite a distance apart, and just not doing the things that virtually every woman does.

There we have a list of ten important things not to do. But how could someone make so many of those mistakes and still expect to pass?

Speaking from personal experience, it seems that a lot of us experience some strange delusions about our appearance when we first start presenting ourselves as female. We fail to consider that even though our appearance may now be more feminine than it was prior to HRT we may still look more male than female to the rest of the world.

We also fail to understand the necessity of patience and waiting and imagine that just because we’ve had a few months of HRT and a bit of laser hair removal or electrolysis we can now expect to pass most of the time. But it doesn’t usually work like that; for myself it took a year to a year and a quarter on HRT before I started passing most of the time. Only after a year and a quarter did I ever dare to go out anywhere – even to the local shops – without makeup, for until then makeup was essential for me to avoid getting misgendered. Thankfully that’s usually no longer the case (two years and four months into HRT, at the time of writing) but there are a number of other factors at work which help transgender women to pass, some of which I’ll list here:

1. Unless you’ve already eradicated every single last trace of facial hair through laser hair removal and/or electrolysis, it’s essential to shave as closely as possible before going out or before meeting people who may misgender you and then apply a good quality and suitably coloured concealer to every part of your face that’s still prone to facial hair growth. Not too much but not too little either . . . and it has to blend in well with the rest of your face, for which purpose you can, if necessary, apply a touch of the palest blush over the concealer so as to reduce any stark contrast. The longer you’ve been on HRT, the slower any facial hair will grow back, but if there’s a lot and it grows back quickly you may need to apply a thick layer of concealer and just hope that the hair doesn’t start poking through it while you’re still out in public. Facial hair is the bane of most transgender women’s existence until a sufficient amount of hair removal sessions have been had . . . so this is one good reason to not even try to “pass” until you’ve had at least a few hair removal treatments on your whole face and neck. To begin with, I naively imagined that just because there was “only a little” facial hair visible no-one would notice it but believe me, they do notice it, and a bit of artfully applied concealer can sometimes make all the difference between being called “sir” or “madam.”

2. If you don’t have enough breast growth for them to be noticeable under your clothing, you can wear silicone breast forms in a special bra . . . but don’t decide to go for a D-cup or bigger if the rest of your body still looks quite male; that can make you stand out even more and our real aim is to blend in with everyone around us, not to stand out as an abnormal object to be stared at.

3. Very few women have thick, straight, bushy eyebrows; that is usually a male trait. The eyebrows frame the face and there are certain eyebrow styles which men never have, such as very thin, arched eyebrows, plucked as highly as possible. It’s easy to learn how to do it, although the first few times will most likely be a bit painful and awkward, but you can quickly get used to it and come to enjoy it. Almost every time a transgender woman posts a photo online complaining that she can’t pass, her eyebrows are a large part of the issue, because usually she hasn’t bothered to do anything with them. The very first time a stranger called me “madam” was just after I’d plucked my eyebrows into as high an arch as possible; also be aware that aesthetics studies commonly say that the more “skin space” there is between the eyebrow and the eye, the more visually attractive the face appears and this is often even the case for men too.

4. You have to become comfortable and confident about using makeup . . . but don’t just guess what to do with it; it isn’t as simple or as obvious as you might suppose. Study and research online about all the different aspects and components of makeup and start to practice on yourself in private, then take some photos and form an honest judgment. It also helps if you have some good female friends whose opinion you can seek on the photos. The eyes and lips are key – being at the top and bottom of your face respectively, they help to synthesise it into an attractive whole. Well applied eyeshadow, eyeliner, and mascara, work wonders, when coupled with a good quality lipstick in a suitable shade. I personally always add a bit of lip gloss on top of the lipstick to create a shinier, moister effect.

5. Having plump and prominent cheeks and lips can make a huge difference. If you can afford dermal filler injections they are very helpful in providing volume, definition, and a feminising shape to your face and your mouth. Don’t overdo it but don’t underdo it either. In London I highly recommend Clapham Aesthetics; it’s the least expensive but best quality in the whole of London. I found the hard way that the more expensive and well known places can be the worst quality in every way, as well as charging ludicrously extortionate amounts.

6. To achieve a passably female voice can be the most difficult thing, especially if your male voice wasn’t a high one. HRT will make no difference to your voice but you can learn how to speak in a more feminine way, even if you have trouble reaching a female pitch. I also believe that anyone, with enough effort – and it will take effort – can arrive at at least a somewhat androgynous voice and that’s better than sounding 100% male and manly all the time. Study how women speak and sound and start practising voice feminisation exercises every day; for me the only thing that had much of an effect were the techniques taught by Christella Antoni; you can find some videos of her online.

7. The older you are when you transition, the more decades of “male programming” you have to undo in your usually automatic and natural movements, gestures, postures, walking, sitting, and so forth. If someone looks a lot like a woman but moves like a man, most people will notice and will stare, simply due to the fact that it’s so unusual. You can re-train yourself and there’s plenty of advice about this online, as well as an almost unlimited amount of YouTube videos with women in, who you can carefully watch and take note of how they move and then try to do the same, first by practising in private and then by implementing it in public.

With any of these things, practice makes perfect. Mistakes are unavoidable but that’s how we learn. The main thing is: it costs a lot of time, a lot of effort, and at least some money, but it’s worth it in the end.

You are reprogramming and repackaging yourself outwardly to faithfully reflect and represent the woman you’ve always been inwardly.

Whoever you are, wherever you may be in your transition from male to female, I sincerely wish you all the best and hope that this blog post will be a practical help in your journey!

Transgender: Ideology, Delusion, or Scientific Fact?

“Being transgender is a harmful ideology,” some people say. “It’s the transgender agenda!”

“Being transgender is just a delusion,” say others. “People who say they’re transgender need to be cured from that delusion.”

On the contrary, “transgenderism” is neither an ideology nor a delusion but a scientific fact.

Important new scientific research published in March 2018 indicates that transgender people literally have different brain structures than cisgender (i.e. not transgender) people, that their brain structure and function resembles that of the gender which they inwardly feel themselves to be, and that this different brain structure exists not only in people who have taken hormone treatment but even in those transgender people who have not even yet started any such treatment. This can be read about at https://psychcentral.com/news/2018/03/16/structural-brain-differences-for-transgender-people/133802.html.

Another team of scientists found the same thing at around the same time and this was reported in the news in May 2018. This can be read about at https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180524112351.htm.

These reports need to become widely known, as they would do away with almost all prejudice, discrimination, and hatred towards transgender people.

Real bigots will naturally choose to ignore such reports or to spread misinformation about them, claiming that the reports are falsified and designed “to further the transgender agenda.” But thankfully most people are not incurable bigots but are prepared to change their mind about things when presented with hard facts.

Anti-transgender people often say things such as “If a person is born with male chromosomes and male genitals, they’re a male, end of story. That’s a fact of science.”

Actually, science has moved on since the days when such statements were accepted as being the last word on gender matters. The people who make such arguments are behind the times and perhaps don’t even realise it.

Medical science now accepts the possibility that a foetus developing in the womb could form the basis of a female brain but that an unintended surge of testosterone within the mother’s body could cause the foetus to develop male genitals, thus resulting in the mismatch and dysphoria felt and experienced by transgender women from early childhood onwards.

This clearly corresponds to the brain structure discovery mentioned above.

The same principle is of course true, in reverse, for transgender men.

Hence why experts who have spent their lives studying and researching the transgender phenomenon unanimously affirm that counselling and psychological therapy will not properly treat a person’s gender dysphoria, nor will trying to ignore it, which is something that never works in a lasting way. The only real “cure” is gender transition through changing one’s hormones and appearance to match the gender one feels oneself to be.

“Sex” and “gender” used to be seen as synonymous terms. Medical science now acknowledges that they are different.

Medical professionals now say that gender is one’s inner sense of personal identity, and if an individual has a persistent, long term, fixed inner sense of definitely inwardly being a woman, then it is said that their gender is female, even though their bodily sex may be male.

The concept of sex and gender being the same thing is primitive, crude, and ignorant. If medical science and medical professionals are catching up, why can’t everyone else?

Transgender Women Singers

Since the late 1970s, transgender women have been fixtures of the pop music world . . . and even though our female vocal range is usually very limited due to obvious physiological reasons (female hormone treatment does not make the voice any higher or more female, despite popular misconceptions) we’ve shown that we can still make reasonable music.

True, some of it’s very camp, kitsch, and over the top, and the primary fan base of transgender women singers tends to be comprised of transgender women and gay men, but nonetheless they’re worth knowing about.

Here are a few clips from my five favourites, starting with the most famous and most successful, Amanda Lear, who – quite surprisingly, it must be said – has sold over 25 million singles and 15 million albums worldwide. All of these women are quite well known and celebrated in their own countries, even if they’re not widely known elsewhere. And Amanda Lear and Romy Haag both had relationships with the famous David Bowie!

Amanda Lear

(France – born 1939)

 

Bibi Andersen (now known as Bibiana Fernandez)

(Spain – born 1954)

 

Romy Haag

(Germany – born 1948)

 

Gloria Gray

(Germany – born 1965 – please be aware that the presence of a flag with a swastika on it is merely due to some of these performances taking place at an event that was focused on life in wartime Germany)

 

Eva Koumarianou

(Greece – born 1954)

Both Bibi Andersen and Romy Haag released songs that were specifically about gender transition. Romy’s, titled “Superparadise,” was somewhat aggressive and crazy in style, and had as its lyrics:

Once upon a time there was a world,

A super paradise, the seventh wonder of the world,

Come let me take you there!

Super paradise, come on through,

Boy or girl, it’s all up to you,

Left or right,

In super paradise they do the sex change too!

Come on baby, birth control me,

Cut me down and you will see how happy it will be,

When you do the sex change with me!

Bibiana’s “Girls Will Be Boys” was more gentle in style and says in part:

Glossy gleam on his lips, he’s shaking his hips, he winks his eyes

Thinks in sensitive ways, he’s out of the race, he’s in the sky

That’s now where he is in, like it always begins, like it starts . . .

Girls, girls will be boys, boys will be girls, oh what a world

They change identity, not only visually

Boys, boys will be girls, girls will be boys, ’cause they enjoy to show the way they feel

Take them for real.

Why Are Men Attracted To Transgender Women?

A lot of people assume that the men who find transgender women attractive are very few in number and that such men are

 

either homosexual or bisexual.

Both assumptions are incorrect.

A surprisingly large amount of men around the world, including here in the UK, are attracted to and interested in transgender women. When I started exploring the dating scene after a year to a year and a quarter on HRT, I discovered that far more men are interested in transgender women than I had initially suspected.

Men of all age groups, all nationalities, all social backgrounds, and all ages, want to date transgender women, and such men are everywhere.

And the vast majority of these men are insistent that they are neither gay nor bisexual. Almost all of them insist emphatically that they are “100% straight,” i.e. heterosexual. If it was only post-operative transgender women with whom they would like to be in a relationship, their claim of being “100% straight” would be uncontestable. But almost all of these men have no issues about being involved with pre-operative or non-operative transgender women.

Still, in most cases these men say that they find the thought of themselves being intimate with another man repulsive and that male appearance, male behaviour, and male body, do not appeal to them in the slightest. They say they are attracted only to women, whether cisgender (i.e. natural born women) or transgender, but that it doesn’t bother them if a woman has some “male parts.”

Incidentally, there are two types of men interested in pre-operative and non-operative transgender women:

(1) Men who are interested in them because they still have male genitals.

(2) Men who are interested in them despite them still having male genitals.

The first category of men are known in LGBT slang as “chasers” and are best avoided; they tend to view transgender women as little more than sexual objects and almost all of them want the woman to take the “male role” with them sexually, which is something hardly any real transgender women would be interested or comfortable about doing. Unfortunately, every specifically transgender dating website is full of these types of men.

The second category are generally decent and respectful men and in my experience none of them have the same intentions or attitudes as the “chasers.” On the contrary, they want a typical male-female heterosexual partnership and are attracted more by the person than by their genitals.

But what is it that actually attracts them to transgender women? Some are more interested in finding a transgender woman as their partner or wife than in finding a cisgender woman. But why?

Each of the men I’ve dated gave the same answer, which was essentially this:

“What attracts me is femininity. Transwomen tend to take more care of their appearance and their makeup and their clothing than natural born women; they tend to exude femininity more strongly. I like expressions of femininity in natural born women and so any woman who magnifies and multiplies those expressions of femininity – as many transgender women do – is naturally more appealing to me.”

That sounds reasonable enough . . . yet it also has to be borne in mind that although many of us do enjoy things like doing our makeup, painting our nails, wearing pink or other typically female colours of clothing, etc., all this is also done partly as a matter of necessity and from the sometimes very valid concern that if we don’t do such things some people may perceive us as men and misgender us and so forth, which are things we would naturally rather avoid happening.

There is also the “exotic” element behind some of the attraction of men for transgender women: a tall woman with the long legs of a model but with a few androgynous features and a uniquely deep or husky voice holds a certain appeal for some.

Take a look at these two short videos. The first is an Italian-French song by the famous French transgender woman Amanda Lear, who’s been successful for more than forty years as a singer, painter, actress, and model.

Various aspects of the performance are characterised by what some describe as an “ultra-femininity” or “hyper-femininity.” People sometimes say regarding Amanda Lear that “no natural born woman would be that feminine” or “no other female singer would make a video as “camp” as that.” That’s largely true and relates to what I said above about the main reason why some men like transgender women: they find us very often to be more feminine than many cisgender women.

The second video is a brief monologue from Eva Koumarianou, a performer, actress, and singer, who is probably the most famous transgender woman in Greece after Anna Kouroupou.

It will be noticed that she’s very expressive with her hands and voice and facial expressions and bodily movements . . . and if one stops to think about it, it’s difficult to think of any natural born women who act and behave like that. It tends to only be transgender women and some very feminine gay men who speak and act and move in such a way. Eva Koumarianou does it in a more pronounced way than most.

To conclude, we return to the question of whether the men who are strongly attracted to pre-operative and non-operative transgender women are heterosexual, bisexual, or homosexual.

The actual answer is “none of the above.”

Scientific studies have discovered that they are in reality an “orientation” all of their own, which is officially named gynandromorphophilic. But that term is unlikely to catch on, partly due to its length and partly because it sounds like a horrific disease.

Men who experience gynandromorphophilia were found to be attracted only to cisgender women and transgender women and not attracted to men or the typical male anatomy. Their attraction to transgender women was discovered to be slightly stronger than their attraction to cisgender women. If you’re interested to learn more, you can click here – https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27858199 – for the brief summary from the U.S. National Library of Medicine/National Institutes of Health.

It refers to such men as “GAMP men” or “men with GAMP” . . . which also doesn’t sound particularly pleasant. The more normal sounding “trans-oriented men” has just started to enter the mainstream.

Whilst such things are interesting from a sociological and psychological point of view, each one of us as a human being ultimately transcends any categorisation or classification or compartmentalisation; there is much more to us than any of that.

The Sexual Orientation of Transgender Women

Left to right: Gigi Gorgeous (one of the world’s most famous transgender women) with her cisgender female partner Nats Getty. Photo courtesy of http://gomag.com/article/gigi-gorgeous-nats-getty-engaged-couple/.

It’s often assumed that transgender women are in almost every case attracted only to men and that transgender men are in almost every case attracted only to women.

In other words, the popular idea is that transgender women were more or less effeminate gay males prior to transitioning and that transgender men were more or less butch lesbian women.

Whilst that is of course true for some, it isn’t the case for all.

The Wikipedia page on “Transgender Sexuality” at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_sexuality explains: “Like other people, transgender people exhibit the full range of possible sexual orientations and interests, including the potential for a lack of sexual attraction.”

The Wikipedia article also reports and references the following interesting facts:

* 60% or more of transgender women are attracted to women and are thus essentially either bisexual or lesbian. The percentage of transgender women who are bisexual or lesbian is thus significantly higher than the rest of the population. In the UK, for example, apparently only 2% of women describe themselves as either bisexual or lesbian, although this does seem unusually low seeing as even in my own limited number of acquaintances I know numerous women who openly acknowledge their bisexuality.

* The vast majority of transgender men are attracted primarily or exclusively to women and are therefore predominantly heterosexual.

* 6% of transgender women say they are asexual, meaning they do not experience any feelings of sexual attraction for anyone of any sex or gender. This is also higher than the rest of the population, where only 1% of people identify themselves as being asexual.

* Overall, only 19% of transgender women – i.e. less than a fifth – identify themselves as heterosexual, i.e. as being attracted only to men. This is probably far less than most people would have imagined.

Some probable reasons for why 60% or more of transgender women are bisexual or lesbian are these:

1. Transgender women spend a lot of time studying natural born women in order to try to accurately copy or emulate them and this may result in feelings of attraction.

2. Women are generally more accepting, friendly, and supportive to transgender women than men are, so transgender women may start to develop romantic feelings for natural born women.

3. Many of the men who are attracted to transgender women are insensitive or rude or sexually obsessed, so transgender women may realise that it would be better for them to date women instead.

4. The fact of being transgender, including being open about one’s gender identity and also having explored one’s inner nature and psyche at quite some depth, may result naturally in more “openness” towards things in general than many cisgender people have, so they may feel more comfortable and confident about being bisexual or lesbian.

5. No-one can better understand and relate to the struggles and experiences of being a transgender woman than a transgender woman and so it is not too uncommon to find transgender women dating one another and forming “transgender-lesbian” relationships. Perhaps the most prominent example currently is that of Caitlyn Jenner and Sophia Hutchins.

In studying all this, it’s also necessary to keep in mind that one’s sexual orientation can change or intensify after a few months of starting hormone treatment, and one’s confidence and sense of freedom and overall liberation can – and ideally should – also increase.

Some transgender women were only ever attracted to women, during the time they were living as men and solely under the influence of testosterone . . . but after reducing or blocking their testosterone production and coming under the influence of estrogen they find that they are now only attracted to men, which makes a lot of sense from a biochemical perspective.

And to be asexual doesn’t necessarily mean to be averse to romance.

There are more romantic but non-sexual relationships and partnerships amongst even cisgender people than one might suppose. There can be heteroromantic, homoromantic, and biromantic, asexuals. This is real but it is rare. And because it’s so rare, asexuals – whether transgender or cisgender – require a great degree of self-acceptance to be able to accept that they are not too likely to ever find their “other half.” A strong sense of self is therefore needed, in order to be able to live life alone with true happiness, contentment, and peace of mind.

SOURCES: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_sexuality, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/10/04/bisexual-women-rise-celebrities-go-public-sexuality/, https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/culturalidentity/sexuality/bulletins/sexualidentityuk/2016, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asexuality, https://health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/articles/2015/05/04/asexuality-the-invisible-orientation

Should Transgender Women Ever Self-Medicate?

If one is to believe what some transgender women say online, to self-medicate and self-prescribe HRT (hormone replacement therapy) is extremely dangerous and carries a very serious risk of causing death or at least lasting damage to one’s health.

As someone who self-medicated for around the first fifteen months of my transition, I can say that such statements are usually fear-mongering and highly misleading. Self-medicating – i.e. buying estrogen and anti-androgens (testosterone blockers) online or through some other unprescribed channel – carries next to no risk at all IF the person is sensible.

Being sensible is key. If you are not prepared to do the following then it would indeed be very risky to self-medicate:

1. Research as much as you possibly can online about the medication you will be using and become closely familiar with all the details of how it works and what the side effects can be, so that you will always be on guard to notice and deal with any negative side effects that might (but usually will not) arise. “Deal with” in this case means seek professional medical attention promptly.

2. If you smoke and/or have any liver issues and/or have any propensity for blood clots or similar issues, do not self-medicate or at least not without discussing your self-medication intentions thoroughly with your GP. If, due to those or other existing health issues, they urge you not to do it, you should follow their advice.

3. Have regular blood tests to monitor your estradiol (estrogen) and testosterone levels as well as your liver function and ideally other things too such as prolactin levels and SHBG (sex hormone-binding globulin) levels. Ideally have such a test just before starting self-medication and then repeat it one month after beginning. Do it again at the second month and thereafter repeat it every three months if everything is going alright. Here in the UK, many GPs will provide such blood tests for you free of charge, if you go to them and openly and honestly explain what you’re doing and why you need such tests. If for whatever reason you cannot get the blood tests done on the NHS (National Health Service) you ought to do them privately, as otherwise you have no idea what’s really going on in your body.

4. As indicated in the above point, tell your GP that you’re self-medicating and inform them what medications you’re taking and what dosages. Ideally show them the boxes and tablets that you’ve purchased, so that they can confirm that it’s real, genuine, legitimate medication. They will want to refer you (if in the UK) to the Gender Identity Clinic so that you can receive specialist treatment and services and eventually an NHS prescription; unless you have enough money to transition privately (which is very expensive and unaffordable for most people) it would be silly not to agree to the referral. Any GP who has any understanding about transgender issues will not be angry with you but will understand why you’re doing what you’re doing and will be willing to give their consent and approval to your HRT self-medication, even though they know it’s not an ideal scenario. There are good GPs like this in London.

5. Research as much as you can online about dosages for the particular medication you’re buying and make sure you start at a low dose and very slowly and gradually (i.e. over the course of months) work your way up to a higher (but still reasonable) dosage.

6. Research thoroughly about which websites are the best and most reliable sources of genuine HRT medication and search online for other people’s reviews of them before buying.

7. When your purchase arrives, examine it carefully to see if it looks genuine. Take a look online via Google Images at what that particular medication should look like and then compare. Some sellers reduce postage costs by not sending the outer box but it should at least still come with the standard information leaflet and have some official identifying marks. In almost every case it will, seeing as there is no-one out there – as far as I know – who specialises in manufacturing fake counterfeit HRT tablets. 99% of the time you are sure to get the real deal but do check and be attentive just in case. Obviously, if it looks questionable or suspicious in any way, don’t take it.

Following these seven steps, you should be able to self-medicate successfully and without any problems but bear in mind that it should only ever be a preparatory or preliminary step and not a long term thing. Also remember there is more to transitioning than just taking hormones: permanent hair removal is needed plus changing one’s clothes and the way one speaks, moves, and acts, and more besides. It’s a serious, extensive, time consuming process that in almost every case takes years. Do not go into it unless you are absolutely sure about it.

Please note that all of the above applies to transgender women, i.e. male-to-female transsexuals, and should not be taken as applicable to transgender men, i.e. female-to-male. I am a transgender woman and know next to nothing about the female-to-male process other than that self-medicating with testosterone is said to be much more difficult and to carry far greater health risks. From what I understand, it is also illegal to purchase self-prescribed testosterone whereas it is not illegal to purchase estrogen and anti-androgens.

For transgender women, self-medication is not stupid unless YOU are stupid . . . so don’t be!

Is Being Transgender A Mental Illness?

Many people, particularly those who for whatever reason are prejudiced against transgender persons, readily say that “being transgender is a mental illness” and that “transgender people are mentally ill” or “psychologically disturbed.”

It was in fact only as recently as June 2018 that WHO (the World Health Organization) declassified “transgenderism” from being a mental illness.

It was previously listed in the category of “mental, behavioural and neurodevelopmental disorders” but has now been allocated a place in the “conditions related to sexual health” category.

However, this change of classification will need to be approved by United Nations member states at the World Health Assembly in Geneva in May 2019 and then, if successful, the change will take effect from 1st January 2022.

Although that change is still almost three years away, the majority of medical professionals, in the United Kingdom at least, where I happen to live, have already ceased referring to it as a mental illness. That would now be widely considered a very offensive and damaging way to speak of it.

But although quite rightly everyone should do their best to avoid hurting another’s feelings or making people feel bad about themselves, those of us who are transgender also need to be realistic, sensible, and dispassionate, about what our “transgenderism” really is.

Some people say that the World Health Organization’s declassification is probably largely an attempt to decrease stigma, encourage general acceptance, and lessen transphobia. Effects such as those can only be a good thing but let us take a dose of reality and consider the following points:

1. “Mental illness” may not be strictly the right term for it but being transgender is undeniably a “mental condition.” It is also undeniably not a normal mental condition, i.e. the vast majority of human beings are not transgender.

2. Lest that should sound offensive and make any transgender person feel bad about themselves, please calmly reflect on the following facts: being transgender is something which all revolves in the person’s mind . . . and the amount of distress it causes until medical treatment is received is certainly like a chronic mental illness. The WebMD website says, on its page about Gender Dysphoria: “Feeling that your body does not reflect your true gender can cause severe distress, anxiety, and depression. “Dysphoria” is a feeling of dissatisfaction, anxiety, and restlessness. With gender dysphoria, the discomfort with your male or female body can be so intense that it can interfere with your normal life, for instance at school or work or during social activities.”

3. Even though medical professionals here in the UK do not nowadays call Gender Dysphoria a “mental illness” or a “psychiatric condition” it is nonetheless still something which is only officially diagnosed by a psychiatrist. It is quite patently not a “sexual health condition” as the World Health Organization would now like to claim. It almost never has anything to do with one’s sexual health but everything to do with one’s mental health.

4. Being transgender is something medically diagnosable and medically treatable and it’s usually only illnesses which are medically diagnosable and treatable.

5. Just as some mental illnesses can only be remedied by taking antidepressants or antipsychotics, so the effects of being transgender can usually only be remedied by taking medication, i.e. hormone treatment, and changing one’s bodily appearance. It may not be quite right to say that transgender people are “mentally ill” but there can be nothing wrong with saying that transgender people have a psychological condition, as that is a fact which it would be difficult for anyone to successfully argue against.

Part of the issue here is the shocking and disgraceful amount of social stigma that sadly still exists against mental illness in general. A lot of people are still in some ways fearful and prejudiced against those who they are told are mentally ill and although there is almost never any valid or legitimate reason for such an attitude, transgender people understandably don’t want to be subjected to the same type of ignorant behaviour.

Perhaps the most important and sensible thing would therefore not be to declassify “transgenderism” (or transsexualism, as British medical professionals still officially call it) as a mental illness, re-defining it absurdly as a sexual health condition, but rather to increase all efforts to decrease and remove stigma and prejudice about mental illness and people who experience mental illness.

After all, approximately 450,000,000 (450-million) people around the world are at this very moment suffering from some form of mental illness. Depression and anxiety, when chronic and persistent, are considered mental illness. One in every four people will at some point in their lives experience a mental health condition. Nearly the leading cause of all ill health and disability worldwide is poor mental health.

Shouldn’t we – while doing all we can to treat it – start accepting it as an unfortunate but inevitable part of human experience and existence? Rather than being something to divide us, it’s part of what unites us together as the human family.

In closing, it is necessary for people to know this:

Unlike almost every other mental condition, being transgender is in nearly every single case a feeling which is present within the person from childhood, often from early childhood. Important new scientific research published in March 2018 indicates that transgender people literally have different brain structures than cisgender (i.e. not transgender) people, that their brain structure and function resembles that of the gender which they inwardly feel themselves to be, and that this different brain structure exists not only in people who have taken hormone treatment but even in those transgender people who have not even yet started any such treatment. Another team of scientists found the same thing at around the same time and this was reported in the news in May 2018.

This needs to become widely known, as it would do away with almost all prejudice, discrimination, and hatred towards transgender people.

SOURCES: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jun/20/who-takes-transgenderism-out-of-mental-illness-category, https://edition.cnn.com/2018/06/20/health/transgender-people-no-longer-considered-mentally-ill-trnd/index.html, https://www.webmd.com/sex/gender-dysphoria#1, https://www.who.int/whr/2001/media_centre/press_release/en/, https://psychcentral.com/news/2018/03/16/structural-brain-differences-for-transgender-people/133802.html, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180524112351.htm

Non-Binary Is Not Transgender

Here in the United Kingdom and apparently also in the USA and elsewhere, the terms and concepts of “transgender” and “non-binary” have in recent times become conflated and thus confused. This is largely because non-binary people tend to say that they are a type of transgender. This unfortunately leads to actual transgender people getting a bad image and tarnished reputation.

Why?

Because non-binary people, despite being extremely rare, tend to be extremely loud and vocal about being extremely offended when the world does not take into serious consideration the fact of their existence.

Thus, changes to the way people speak – whether just proposed or already implemented – such as London Underground audio announcements apparently having to stop saying “ladies and gentlemen,” or the gender neutral expression “pregnant person” having to be used instead of “pregnant woman” – are often attributed in the media to “transgender people” needing to have their offence and distress placated. The media reports that “transgender people” have made complaints about “ladies and gentlemen,” “pregnant woman,” etc.

But why would a real transgender person be offended? People do not medically transition from male to female or from female to male in order to be viewed and treated as “gender neutral.”

Just the opposite: the medical transition is made in order to clearly pass from one side of the gender binary to the other. A transgender woman likes nothing more than to hear herself included in the expression “ladies and gentlemen.” A transgender man likes nothing more than to hear himself included in that same “ladies and gentlemen” phrase.

And while a pre-operative or non-operative transgender man can technically still become pregnant and give birth, he would almost certainly rather be termed a “pregnant man” (even if it does sound unusual) than the gender-negating “pregnant person.”

I do believe it is possible to be non-binary – i.e. to feel that one is inwardly either no gender or both genders – and although it is certain that quite a few people calling themselves “non-binary” do it mainly for style and aesthetic purposes (the androgynous look is considered quite “cool” right now) and to get attention, one can also hear non-binary people describing their strong sense of being neither man nor woman with such seriousness, detail, and emotion, and unwaveringly enduring such abuse for their convictions, that it’s just not reasonable to dismiss the whole notion of non-binary as being a fad or a trend or a fashion.

It must be a real thing and if a person feels so uncomfortable and distressed at being called either “he” or “she” I would have no issue with referring to them as “they,” which is the pronoun of choice for many non-binary people.

BUT . . . non-binary is not transgender.

The whole etymology of the word “trans-gender” is about moving across, from one side of the gender binary to the other, i.e. from either male to female or female to male. And it is something which is medically diagnosed and medically treated. There is no “non-binary” medical diagnosis and no standard non-binary medical treatment (although some do try a small dosage of hormones in order to make their body more androgynous) and most non-binary people’s “transition” consists largely of acquiring androgynous clothing and dying their hair green or purple.

It’s time for transgender women and transgender men to state that we will respect non-binary people but that we cannot respect their lumping themselves in with the term “transgender” as if it were an umbrella term, which it is not, and also that we cannot respect their expecting and demanding the world to change its centuries old way of speaking and acting just to suit them.

Minorities of whatever kind ought to be accepted and respected but there is no logical reason why an extremely small minority should be treated as if it’s a huge majority.

Numerically speaking, there are far more Arabic speakers in London than there are non-binary people and so one could argue that it would be much more important and necessary that London Underground announcements should be recorded in Arabic as well as English, in order to not offend the city’s Arabic speakers.

I am not for one moment suggesting that ought to happen but am merely making the point that any group has to more or less accept where it stands. And when a group of people is numerically and influentially at or near the bottom of the list it cannot justifiably expect to be hoisted to the top just because its feelings are hurt about not being given paramount importance.

Although in the past fifteen or so years the term “transsexual” fell out of popular usage and transgender people started calling themselves “transgender” instead, some are now reclaiming the old word and identifying themselves as “transsexuals” in order to distinguish themselves from, and avoid being grouped together with, non-binary people who are currently misleading a lot of people about what it means to be transgender.