LeaP
04-25-2012, 06:46 AM
(note - pronouns used are from a MtF perspective)
Coming to terms with transsexuality has been called an existential struggle. And so it is in many dimensions, among them psychological, social, philosophical, moral, ethical, religious, legal, even political. People struggle for meaning in all these contexts and always have. But why does gender in the transsexual, uniquely among them, so often superimpose considerations of life and death?
I've been thinking of this for a while because existential struggle has been called out to me several times recently, in this forum and elsewhere, and also, frankly, because life and death has been on my mind more frequently than I care to admit.
It's not that, say, religious or ethics situations can't invoke choices about living and dying. They can - but the decision is made based on a religious or ethical position which is already known at that point. Religious and ethical exploration themselves, as profound as they can be, don't typically drive one to question whether or not they should continue to live, or which parts of their psyche should live. Gender does, and not just in a physical sense, either, as a transsexual will often describe aspects of transition in life and death terms on both sides of the gender divide and decision.
Fundamentally, I think gender for the transsexual invokes life and death because the gender binary introduces either/or choices that cannot be finessed. Though this may start with notions of gender that are learned, it is those notions that are intrinsic to our personal belief system that drive us to desperation. One doesn't experience anguish (except perhaps temporarily) over that which can be dissected and dismissed, a transsexual anguishes over things she IS, in which she believes deeply, and cannot express - and which, in her individual belief system, are incompatible with her assigned gender and self-imposed role.
This is unlike the shades of grey that one finds in much self-examination not involving gender (or, for that matter, gender issues in non-transsexuals) One can debate multiple points of view, actually empathize with them, with many questions, e.g. theology. By contrast, one experiences gender, and a transsexual typically has personal needs of role and (in particular) expression that go along with it and which fall along binary lines.
Because of expression and role conflict, it is literally impossible for the pre-transition transsexual to actualize authentic behavior. This insures alienation, both from others and from self. Whatever the transsexual thinks of himself, of her identity, in suppressing expression, she ultimately allows herself to be defined by others, and substitutes social norms (which have no identity) for her own identity because she accepts those norms as her own, practically speaking. And because those are empty, being disembodied social constructs, so is she. This is lived identity by self-negation. And it's a kind of death.
Moral judgement is involved because we take the morality of our actions from our motives. If we act in accordance to our inner self, beliefs, and drivers, we act authentically. When we act to conform to an outside standard, we are acting inauthentically and betray ourselves. Once again, the conflicts in a transsexual are over either/or, male/female situations. The transsexual, in her projected male persona, conforming to expectations (self imposed and not) acts immorally by her own standards. The same applies to ethical and philosophical conflicts. From an external standpoint, of course, there is no way to discern whether someone is acting with integrity (to their real values). It is completely true, however, that there is no way to BE completely authentic without ACTING authentically. To not do so is, again, a self negation. The response in an ethical person is a reaction like depression. A pathological example is suppression.
Transcendence (nice word in this context) takes on an interesting aspect in the pre-transition transsexual. That she is something beyond her appearance - what may be observed - is definitional. Her suppression and repression tend to strongly drive her toward negative conceptions of self, e.g., ugliness, misfit as to body, pain, fear, depression. Negative self-conception becomes predominant in the transsexual's consciousness and daily life. It can be said in the transsexual that her transcendent qualities - the very meaning of personhood - assumes a negative aspect. And when her anguish starts overshadowing every other aspect of life, her thoughts turn to obliterating the pain. Transcendence - personal meaning- can drive psychological pain in anyone, but the life and death aspect is so characteristic of transsexuality that it invokes the question of existence itself far beyond cases of simpler, self-exploratory angst. Woody Allen can parody the latter. It's harder to make fun of a body on a slab.
Transsexuals perceive self-destructive choices no matter what path they take. To remain as-is is to accept the self-negation described above. To transition is to take a leap of faith into the unknown for something authentic - but at the risk of a kind of death of the old, familiar self and with the prospect of loss of things in their current lives from which they draw comfort and meaning. Faced with a choice between two different kinds of self-death, is it surprising that so many simply choose to die? That the realities may work out in better or unexpected ways doesn't change the nature of the existential dilemma at the time of discovery and choice.
The irony is that the death-vs-death choice concerns the pre-transition life that the transsexual so detests! The attachment is to the familiar, conflicted self. The fear of loss is of those things, circumstances, and people attached to the current life and false persona more than fear of transition itself or life post-transition life.
The questions raised in existential thought include how one knows (in one's self) what is authentic, by what standards meaning is judged, the source of motive and emotion, how conflict reveals elements of self, the role of action in self-actualization, whether facts and relationships or transcendence are determinate, and how anguish and freedom play in the consciousness.
The existentialist concept of freedom may be the most interesting of all to the transsexual. Freedom is thought of as an aspect of consciousness that exists outside of the things on which it acts. The mismatch between body and mind in the transsexual illuminates the point by providing a delineation between opposing states (male/female) that makes it clear that the transsexual acts despite physical state, i.e., the separation between desire and object couldn't be clearer. And because freedom in existentialist thought is conceived as proceeding from the transcendent self - that we make choices foremost because of who we are and not what we think - action taken because of the body/mind mismatch clarifies and reveals the transsexual's true nature.
The transsexual struggle for meaning is not only existential, but may be one of the best illustrations of existentialist ideas extant. It's unfortunate that the clarity of the example is due, in large part, to the stark choices and personal costs involved.
Lea
Coming to terms with transsexuality has been called an existential struggle. And so it is in many dimensions, among them psychological, social, philosophical, moral, ethical, religious, legal, even political. People struggle for meaning in all these contexts and always have. But why does gender in the transsexual, uniquely among them, so often superimpose considerations of life and death?
I've been thinking of this for a while because existential struggle has been called out to me several times recently, in this forum and elsewhere, and also, frankly, because life and death has been on my mind more frequently than I care to admit.
It's not that, say, religious or ethics situations can't invoke choices about living and dying. They can - but the decision is made based on a religious or ethical position which is already known at that point. Religious and ethical exploration themselves, as profound as they can be, don't typically drive one to question whether or not they should continue to live, or which parts of their psyche should live. Gender does, and not just in a physical sense, either, as a transsexual will often describe aspects of transition in life and death terms on both sides of the gender divide and decision.
Fundamentally, I think gender for the transsexual invokes life and death because the gender binary introduces either/or choices that cannot be finessed. Though this may start with notions of gender that are learned, it is those notions that are intrinsic to our personal belief system that drive us to desperation. One doesn't experience anguish (except perhaps temporarily) over that which can be dissected and dismissed, a transsexual anguishes over things she IS, in which she believes deeply, and cannot express - and which, in her individual belief system, are incompatible with her assigned gender and self-imposed role.
This is unlike the shades of grey that one finds in much self-examination not involving gender (or, for that matter, gender issues in non-transsexuals) One can debate multiple points of view, actually empathize with them, with many questions, e.g. theology. By contrast, one experiences gender, and a transsexual typically has personal needs of role and (in particular) expression that go along with it and which fall along binary lines.
Because of expression and role conflict, it is literally impossible for the pre-transition transsexual to actualize authentic behavior. This insures alienation, both from others and from self. Whatever the transsexual thinks of himself, of her identity, in suppressing expression, she ultimately allows herself to be defined by others, and substitutes social norms (which have no identity) for her own identity because she accepts those norms as her own, practically speaking. And because those are empty, being disembodied social constructs, so is she. This is lived identity by self-negation. And it's a kind of death.
Moral judgement is involved because we take the morality of our actions from our motives. If we act in accordance to our inner self, beliefs, and drivers, we act authentically. When we act to conform to an outside standard, we are acting inauthentically and betray ourselves. Once again, the conflicts in a transsexual are over either/or, male/female situations. The transsexual, in her projected male persona, conforming to expectations (self imposed and not) acts immorally by her own standards. The same applies to ethical and philosophical conflicts. From an external standpoint, of course, there is no way to discern whether someone is acting with integrity (to their real values). It is completely true, however, that there is no way to BE completely authentic without ACTING authentically. To not do so is, again, a self negation. The response in an ethical person is a reaction like depression. A pathological example is suppression.
Transcendence (nice word in this context) takes on an interesting aspect in the pre-transition transsexual. That she is something beyond her appearance - what may be observed - is definitional. Her suppression and repression tend to strongly drive her toward negative conceptions of self, e.g., ugliness, misfit as to body, pain, fear, depression. Negative self-conception becomes predominant in the transsexual's consciousness and daily life. It can be said in the transsexual that her transcendent qualities - the very meaning of personhood - assumes a negative aspect. And when her anguish starts overshadowing every other aspect of life, her thoughts turn to obliterating the pain. Transcendence - personal meaning- can drive psychological pain in anyone, but the life and death aspect is so characteristic of transsexuality that it invokes the question of existence itself far beyond cases of simpler, self-exploratory angst. Woody Allen can parody the latter. It's harder to make fun of a body on a slab.
Transsexuals perceive self-destructive choices no matter what path they take. To remain as-is is to accept the self-negation described above. To transition is to take a leap of faith into the unknown for something authentic - but at the risk of a kind of death of the old, familiar self and with the prospect of loss of things in their current lives from which they draw comfort and meaning. Faced with a choice between two different kinds of self-death, is it surprising that so many simply choose to die? That the realities may work out in better or unexpected ways doesn't change the nature of the existential dilemma at the time of discovery and choice.
The irony is that the death-vs-death choice concerns the pre-transition life that the transsexual so detests! The attachment is to the familiar, conflicted self. The fear of loss is of those things, circumstances, and people attached to the current life and false persona more than fear of transition itself or life post-transition life.
The questions raised in existential thought include how one knows (in one's self) what is authentic, by what standards meaning is judged, the source of motive and emotion, how conflict reveals elements of self, the role of action in self-actualization, whether facts and relationships or transcendence are determinate, and how anguish and freedom play in the consciousness.
The existentialist concept of freedom may be the most interesting of all to the transsexual. Freedom is thought of as an aspect of consciousness that exists outside of the things on which it acts. The mismatch between body and mind in the transsexual illuminates the point by providing a delineation between opposing states (male/female) that makes it clear that the transsexual acts despite physical state, i.e., the separation between desire and object couldn't be clearer. And because freedom in existentialist thought is conceived as proceeding from the transcendent self - that we make choices foremost because of who we are and not what we think - action taken because of the body/mind mismatch clarifies and reveals the transsexual's true nature.
The transsexual struggle for meaning is not only existential, but may be one of the best illustrations of existentialist ideas extant. It's unfortunate that the clarity of the example is due, in large part, to the stark choices and personal costs involved.
Lea