Do you think????????

[deebra]

Do you think the way women are portrayed had a significant effect on you becoming a crossdresser and being attracted to feminity? I do. When I was growing up beautiful women with their beautiful, curvy, busty bodies were glamorized in Playboy magazine and yes this was the time when hormonies (in this case politically correct for being horney) were cranking. And perceptions and standards were being ingrained in our brains that would dictate our path for our entire lifetime. In the last couple of decades women have been glamorized to the max. where men have not. Through mags., movies, standards of dressing being lowered to be more sexy and female clothing being more pretty, sexy,and revealing women have rocketied to the top where men's clothing and acceptance for change has hardly progressed. Now why wouldn't men be more attracted to the prettier gender and want a little piece of that rather than settling for DRAB. Just this morning when reading Kohl's mag. in the newspaper I was amazed at how skimpy, colorful and flattering womens bikinni panties were and the mens were from the waist to mid-thigh, heavy cotton and dark colors. How have we allowed this to happen???????

[Karren H]

I don't think I knew how women were portrayed when I was 7....

[Kate Simmons]

Basically we are against the "tsunami" of society with regard to gender perception. We, however, are capable of enjoying the best of both "worlds" it seems. Go with it.:)

[Laura912]

Nope. I am older than Playboy. Women have always, at least in recent human evolution, looked the way they did pre and post Playboy.

[Michala]

For me I don't think it was how women were portrayed as much as I wondered what it would be like to wear women's clothing. Once I tried my mom's clothes on I was hooked. Loved the feel and the look. Especially loved the feel of wearing nylons (with a garter back then, no such thing as pantyhose) and a bra. Never felt the desire to become a woman other than looking like one sometimes. Was very masculine and macho when not dressed. 50+ years later I still have no desire to become a woman but do like to portray one at times.

[Beverley Sims]

I know how women were portrayed, but in these changing times how do they want to be portrayed now?

[Jenniferathome]

No, not even remotely. At 7 or 8 I didn't care about "women." I didn't see a Playboy until I was 12 or so. It was something far more innate.

[Tina B.]

No at 6 to 7 I also was not following the media, on how women where being portrayed. But I will admit the little girl next door had really cute clothes, and so did my big sister.
What ever was in me that came out when I put my sisters slip on, felt right, and I've been doing it every since, without any idea why, I gave up trying to make sense of it years ago.

[deebra]

Karen, Jenn and Tina, I never said anything about looking at Playboy when you were 6 0r 7, Playboy was being published 5or 6 years ago and maybe it still is today; it's what ever age you looked at it, all I was saying is looking at beautiful women in silk stockings, garter belts, and bras "could" help draw you to being a CD. It has all the ingredients, pretty, soft, sexy and being worn by gorgeous sexy women, why wouldn't this encourage a male that had the urge/curosity to CD to try it. Looking at Playboy at whatever young age didn't make me a CD, I discovered this at age 4 when my playmate (girl) and I switched shoes. It was electrifying and I was hooked, the desire Never went away, but looking at Playboy, mens mags, Sears catalogues, laungerie ads in the newspaper all helped speed up my hunger to CD. And I still am drawn to and enjoy looking at womens clothing and women dressed or undressed.

[Alice B]

I'll respond differently in that I do think how women were presented did effect me. I started dressing late in life, was influenced by advertising and grew up around lots of beautiful woman. I had no noticeable desires or tendencies as a kid.

[Valerie1973]

But why are most ordinary women dressed like slobs most of the time. Been out to the stores lately and most women are in pants, tee-shirts. Only the Jehovah's Witnesses women at Wal-Mart on Sundays are dressed in dresses and skirts.

[makin' it real]

Hi Deebra. It took me a minute to understand the 5 or 6 or 7 year old comments were referring to when they started dressing, which then implies that the dressing wasn't influenced by media presentations since they weren't media consumers at that age.

As for me, I started dressing at 5, and still was influenced 10 years later by the hypersexual cultural norms of the 70s.

~Rachel

[Karren H]

Hi Deebra. It took me a minute to understand the 5 or 6 or 7 year old comments were referring to when they started dressing, which then implies that the dressing wasn't influenced by media presentations since they weren't media consumers at that age.

~Rachel

lol... guess we should have spelled it out? All I knew was that women were prettier than men.... no media needed to reinforce that....

[Lorileah]

is looking at beautiful women in silk stockings, garter belts, and bras "could" help draw you to being a CD. It has all the ingredients, pretty, soft, sexy and being worn by gorgeous sexy women, why wouldn't this encourage a male that had the urge/curosity to CD to try it. Maybe that is your reasoning but it is really false logic. If...then. Did you look at a football player and decide to dress like a football player even though you would never play a down? Cowboy? President? Even though you may have done this at a young age (playing dress up) you don't continue into adulthood. So as an exploratory thing, maybe some did. Most here don't (or didn't). Imagine how this type of question would play on the "furry" websites?

[sandra-leigh]

Playboy was first published in 1953, so there are people on this forum who began crossdressing before Playboy was first published (but there probably aren't many left who began crossdressing before the Sears-Robuk catalogs were published.)

Playboy did exist for about a generation before I first started looking at it, but I really don't think it had that much influence on my dressing. Oh, who knows what was "really" going on in my mind, but the rationalization my mind presented for me for trying dressing had little to nothing to do with sexuality, and instead had a lot to do with fairness and equality, wondering how it felt to be a woman, to be socially oppressed, looked down on just for being female, required to wear uncomfortable clothes. I couldn't experience the oppression myself, but at least I could try the clothes and see for myself how uncomfortable they were, how they constrained movement, and so on. Of course the joke turned out to be on me, as I did not find them to be uncomfortable (except when the bra was the wrong size and badly adjusted)...


Only the Jehovah's Witnesses women at Wal-Mart on Sundays are dressed in dresses and skirts.

Things are different around here; enough women around here wear skirts or dresses "around" that although the majority might perhaps not, neither is it considered "uncommon" or a "statement" for women to wear skirts or dresses.

[Stephanie47]

I was attracted to my mother's nylon slips that she hung to dry in the sole bathroom in the apartment. When I first donned one of her slips it was for the feel of the nylon. Girls? There was only one girl I associated with and she played center field on our Charlie Brownlike baseball team. She, "Charlie." wore tee shirts and jeans. She was decades ahead of society. Me? I played shortstop and pitched. Girls did not come until junior high school.

[Wildaboutheels]

Females at ANY age are FARRRRR more likely to receive compliments, especially on their "looks", presentation, clothing choices, call it what you want. Even a 3 year old boy will "recognize" that his sisters [of any age] are far more likely to receive praise than he will.
Is it FAIR? How did it come to this?

WE [Humans] just did not arbitrarily decide to do things this way. We are merely operating in this fashion because of Evolution and nothing else. [Except the almighty dollar of course] Women basically are not nearly as VISUAL as men. Women don't need to see MEN'S BODIES [or faces] using every trick imaginable, [shapewear, makeup, wigs etc.] to look as ATTRACTIVE as possible. ALL those choices women have, [many not very practical and/or comfortable] serve just ONE purpose. The more ATTRACTIVE a woman is and/or the better her body, the more choice she will have in mates. [Translated, a" better" mate for her means a better father for her potential offspring and a "greater" chance HER offspring will survive to carry on her line of DNA.]

This PRAISE for Females starts at a very young age!!!!!!!

Watch ANY fancy awards show on TV, Oscars, Emmys, CMAs etc., and what will you see? Almost ALL the men will be dressed similarly... but certainly NOT the women. They [the men] could all easily afford to spend wild sums of money on their wardrobes but they don't/won't because it DOES NOT MATTER to MOST WOMEN what men wear or what they do to their faces.

Don't you think men of ANY age would wear ANY kind of clothing if it gave them ANY kind of advantage in attracting or catching females? Don't you think the clothing manufacturers would be all over it?

They aren't. NO MONEY to be made.

We have not "allowed" this to happen. What has happened is that "we" [most people along with the clothing manufacturers] have come to a better understanding of what drives Humans and makes them tick and use it to sell lots of "stuff" that enables "more" females of all shapes and sizes to be "more attractive".

None/all of this ^^^ is going to change anytime soon, so wear what you want.

Like the AT&T commercial says, it's not complicated.

[CherylFlint]

No. I knew I should’ve been born a female when I was 4 or 5.
It all has to do with the combination of the X and Y chromosomes, as we learned in biology.
Females of most species crave attention: the more suitors she has the better choice she can make as to the best provider for a family.
In some species, mostly birds, it is the male who goes all out to convince the female that he, and he alone, will be the best provider/head of household to raise a family.
Human girls compete with one another so as to attract the most male suitors.
No matter how each of us dresses, whether in drab or drag, we express ourselves in some way.
So I disagree with your thesis, that outside influences determines whether one is a cross dresser or not.
I think we’re born that way.

[ReineD]

... all I was saying is looking at beautiful women in silk stockings, garter belts, and bras "could" help draw you to being a CD. It has all the ingredients, pretty, soft, sexy and being worn by gorgeous sexy women, why wouldn't this encourage a male that had the urge/curosity to CD to try it. Looking at Playboy at whatever young age didn't make me a CD, I discovered this at age 4 when my playmate (girl) and I switched shoes. It was electrifying and I was hooked, the desire Never went away, but looking at Playboy, mens mags, Sears catalogues, laungerie ads in the newspaper all helped speed up my hunger to CD. And I still am drawn to and enjoy looking at womens clothing and women dressed or undressed.

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? I think both at the same time. :p (disclaimer: my words below do not obviously apply to people born transsexual).

I actually agree with your quote above. You needed to have a seed a desire within you in order to start (although it may have disappeared as you got older and settled into your male sexual role), but in my opinion the desire was magnified at puberty because of your libido (a very natural lust for women experienced by most adolescent boys). So again in my opinion, the lust for beautiful women turned inward within you, in your attempts to emulate not the average woman, but the ultra stylized version found in ads. This created an onslaught of dopamine which eventually rewired your brain for a lifetime (I've just seen a series of videos that explained this), to desire looking like a beautiful woman and not the average woman you see on the street. In fact, many of the CDers here bemoan the average woman's looks and they're constantly comparing them to the women they see in ads, even ads from the 1950s.

I gather that the CDing is universally sexual for the vast majority of teenage CDers - as opposed to dressing for identity reasons without any thought of sexual gratification?



I know how women were portrayed, but in these changing times how do they want to be portrayed now?
We want to be portrayed the way we are, and not some fake, stylized, sexualized, large busted, ultra skinny, younger and more beautiful version of who we are. We want to be portrayed like this, and like the real women in the video below:

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/money/4511021/Marks-Spencer-replacing-stars-with-ordinary-models.html

So when we see the barrage of fake versions of ourselves constantly hurled at us through catalogs, media ads, etc, (beginning at age 5 with our first Barbie doll), we begin to believe that our own looks simply do not measure up. This is very sad:

XpaOjMXyJGk

[Jaylyn]

I am a masculine male, I also love the feel of women's clothing and have since I was a very young male. I looked at the Sears , Montgomery Ward, and other catalogue s when I was young. I slipped my moms nylons and girdles and smooth silky things on when ever I had a chance. I don't really believe the pictures or catalogue s caused this. I was born I believe with the urge to be feminine. I do male things and love that also, I also love the feminine side. What difference does it make at my present age of 63 wether I was born with the chromosomes for a female or male. I enjoy both being a male and sometimes acting as a female. I do not want to be one or the other 100% of the time. I mix the two in small ways usually in my thoughts and actions all the time. The scales sometimes tip one way in favor of one or the other from time to time. When I am in the female mode I can dress full up and stay that way for a day or so. Then just out of the blue I have to get back to the masculine male side. It a funny mixed up life but I just laugh and enjoy it. Go with the flow. Learn to read your body and cater to it and you'll find happiness either way. I can say I do feel pretty when dressed. I feel manly in the wranglers and work boots. So who knows genetics, physical, or a learned process... It is all good when done for the enjoyment of your body.

[ReineD]

I am a masculine male, I also love the feel of women's clothing and have since I was a very young male. I looked at the Sears , Montgomery Ward, and other catalogue s when I was young. I slipped my moms nylons and girdles and smooth silky things on when ever I had a chance. I don't really believe the pictures or catalogue s caused this. I was born I believe with the urge to be feminine.

You don't think it was your male libido that made you appreciate the silks, nylons, and restrictive things like girdles? Recent studies confirm that our sexuality is there from the beginning of life (http://www.netdoctor.co.uk/sex_relationships/facts/sexualitythroughoutlife.htm), and does not begin with the onset of puberty as previously believed.

I also don't mean to sound contrary, but we women don't have the same pull towards the girdles and slips, etc, as CDers. To us, these things are functional. Of course the silks do feel nicer than coarse fabrics like burlap ( ... but men don't have to wear burlap either :p) but to the vast majority of us on a daily basis, wearing these things is utilitarian. It didn't and doesn't lead us to sexual gratification like it does for CDers, even if at times when we do feel sexual and want to make love to a man, we put on these things in the hopes that he will find us more attractive. But most of the time we don't think twice when we put on our female clothes, even our sexy clothes.

It's a fallacy that women feel like CDers do when we put on lingerie.

[carhill2mn]

I, too, started wearing feminine clothes before I really noticed the ads for women's clothes, etc. However, I do believe that the ads for products such as "My Maidenform Bra" certainly helped fuel my desires!

[NicoleScott]

It wasn't beautiful, curvy, busty bodies that got my attention, but rather how those faces and bodies were adorned and embellished that affected my definition of pretty, beautiful, and sexy. My focus was always on clothing, shoes, hair, and makeup, and the influences came largely from looking at stacks of Life and Look magazines my dad kept back then.
I like women's legs, and short miniskirts. Sexy. How could I think a skirt two inches longer could be sexier? If there is glimpse of lace-top stockings peeking out, that's how. How that's relevant, I don't know. I guess to say that more skin isn't always better. I'm a CDer - it's about the clothes.

[Kelly DeWinter]

No not really, I grew up without TV,newpapers or magazines. There seems to be a generation group within this forum who were not influenced by media at a young age and still have become TG/CD just by their very nature. If you are of a younger generation who grew up with tv/newspaper, there is an inclination to wonder if you might be influenced. If you are a recent young generation who grew up with 'social' media where people are exposed to either hard porn, soft porn or ad porn, there is an even greater inclination to blame that for becoming CD/TG .

[Kelly DeWinter]

..... It's a fallacy that women feel like CDers do when we put on lingerie.

So true, I think that's another reason I identify more with being TG , then CD. To me clothes are an end to look my best, not as some fetishists who use clothes more for the gratification. I hate pantyhose, wire bras, and hooker heels as much as most women and find any heels over 2inches impractical for daily wear. Do I wear lingerie, to be found more attractive , you betcha, but only within what I've learned my SO finds attractive. ...... OK and for photography LOL

[kimdl93]

No, not in any way whatsoever. If the determining factor, as you surmise, was exposure to the way women were portrayed then, one would assume that more males, equally attracted...or horny if you will...might have come to the same place we are at.

[Annaliese2010]

It's because women are prettier, sexier, smarter and overall Superior to men. Read George Bernard Shaw's play entitled "Man and Superman". Though a supposed allegory or clever metaphor, it actually puts forth the notion (and correctly so, IMHO) the idea that Woman is intrinsically (and of necessity) grounded in the Real world (they are earthy, practical, sensible, logical, STRONG).

And how Man is essentially ethereal, apt to explore, float, drift and if thus untethered by a woman's good-grace & naturally basic & necessary grounding influence, he becomes WEAK. Ultimately self-destructs (i.e. when left to his own intrinsic nature).

Thus the title of that 4 act drama. Where MAN (as man, or male) is below, inferior to, vulnerable towards (and rightly so) and so it holds, is in NEED of direction, restraint and the correction rendered by the natural presence of a normal, unassuming simple yet pure-of-heart, pretty in her own way (for ALL woman have their own individual, indefinable, precious charm & undeniable 'lightness-of-being") SUPERMAN. (i.e. WOMAN).

'Tis a play which I actually attended at Ann Arbor's (U of M) Power Center for the Performing Arts (in the round) Theatre. And thus it was, and carried on for yeeears thereafter, as I hereby admit how it 'marked' me! And became an ongoing back-of-the-mind puzzle that took shape. I, for some reason unapprehended, needing to solve it, but couldn't! Not until a decade later when finally (subconsciously) the dots connected, and all the pieces fellinto place. When my essential female-self did grace, supersede and take her place. Above and beyond the male disgrace, by whom all my problems (past & present; arrogant & insensitive) my life doth trace...a legacy of hurt, injustice, murderous deceit (Jason Bourne, was ME).

And in so doing, M2F transitioning, I immediately understood the essential thesis. Whereupon all the pieces fell into place. And resonate. Man and Superman, yeah....I get that! How we reach...leaning towards an asymptote, forever unachievable, close but unattainable. Like ZERO Kelvin. Molecular motion & therefore TIME itself STOPS! Hovering somewhere, I and thee are somehow, somewhere in-between. Superhero! Heaven & Hell, we ARE the Lost, the unrecognized, underappreciated, misunderstood and misperceived. The scourge of the Many. The cure of the Few i.e. those who seek the high road, search for meaning & truth.

We are Mary Wollstonecraft Shelly. The Brides of Frankenstein. God's forgotten. Too ugly to behold. Irresistible to those who do. We're a hybrid specie. Somewhere in the middle. In the in-between of beautiful vs mediocrity. We REDEFINE. Standardize. By our mere existence (in spite of GG resistance) we carry the Future with us! Part male part female. The very Best of both worlds. We lubricate the common (boring-ass) World. Ho-hum. Lah-de-dah...we prance & primp. Dance & dress. Unattached to what we're Told (even scolded) SHOULD BE the norm. We can't help it: push the envelope (just by being who we are or that whom we're becoming).

With vampire eyes upon first awakening, we behold a New World! SEE things we were previously ignorant to. We understand with grace & pity. Piety (and whatever tha fc...lol...srry...). But no! STILL...we are the New Persecuted. (so excuse me if I break-away, take liberty, levity, laugh at myself - JUST to maintain i.e. stay sane in an ohhhh so Not so world! Geeze....)

Navigating thus, in & about & amongst...throughout this time, this space, you cannot argue how we ARE as if....IMMORTALS.

We get bored fast! If it isn't moving!!! Advancing. Getting prettier by the moment. 'Cause we're SO adverse to DRAB = the same-old/same-old, going on-and-on, We'll die like petals, on an un-watered flower. A Rose is a Rose, so the saying goes. WHY can't the fcing MALES in this world, understand that?! Just.....let us BE who we BE! (superior to them fcn dweebs, actually).

:battingeyelashes:

WE are the 4th dimension. The few. The proud. The ohhh-sooo pretty!

[Georgina]

The pictures mostly made me angry that women could dress like they did and I couldn't. Catalogue photos and illustrations did show me the clothes I craved.

[RenneB]

I'm with Karen on this one too. Started back when I was 4. Wasn't in school yet (pre-school hadn't been invented yet) so I had no precognition of what girls were like. Then there was my neighbor and that fateful day of going over to her (she was 5) house and seeing that dance dress by the piano... My parents will even tell the story of when I was three and they found me with lipstick..... Nature or nurture? For me I think it was nature.

Renne......

[Frédérique]

How have we allowed this to happen???????

There’s no doubt about it, the portrayal of women in movies, or in magazines, has had a strong influence on why I began to crossdress, but, in and of itself, it did not precipitate my CD’ing. The sexual aspect of images caused an awakening of sorts, like it would for any heterosexual boy going through puberty, but I was also very moved by beautiful images that had no sexual content at all. Up until a certain point in time, I was never interested in females, but one fine day all that changed! From that day forward, perhaps the desire to “get closer” to females resulted in my MtF crossdressing, but I wouldn’t blame the depiction of females in the media for it…

How did we allow this to happen? We didn’t have anything to do with it. Sex (and glamour) sells, so it is shoveled in our general direction 24/7. In societal terms, women are obliged to show themselves, and men play the part of observer, same as it ever was. I need to say that there are plenty of depictions of MALE beauty out there, if you are predisposed to look for them, or be attracted to them, and the proliferation of ideal feminine beauty may hint at the overriding desire to keep the genders apart, and keep procreation first and foremost in everyone’s mind…
:straightface:

[Tina B.]

Karen, Jenn and Tina, I never said anything about looking at Playboy when you were 6 0r 7, Playboy was being published 5or 6 years ago and maybe it still is today; it's what ever age you looked at it, all I was saying is looking at beautiful women in silk stockings, garter belts, and bras "could" help draw you to being a CD. It has all the ingredients, pretty, soft, sexy and being worn by gorgeous sexy women, why wouldn't this encourage a male that had the urge/curosity to CD to try it. Looking at Playboy at whatever young age didn't make me a CD, I discovered this at age 4 when my playmate (girl) and I switched shoes. It was electrifying and I was hooked, the desire Never went away, but looking at Playboy, mens mags, Sears catalogues, laungerie ads in the newspaper all helped speed up my hunger to CD. And I still am drawn to and enjoy looking at womens clothing and women dressed or undressed.

Dee, after thinking about it, your right, I loved the Sears catalog. It was as close a look at what women had on under that dress as a kid was going to find back in the fifties. But I think I was dressing even before I started studying that catalog.

[Sabrina133]

It wasn't beautiful, curvy, busty bodies that got my attention, but rather how those faces and bodies were adorned and embellished that affected my definition of pretty, beautiful, and sexy. My focus was always on clothing, shoes, hair, and makeup, and the influences came largely from looking at stacks of Life and Look magazines my dad kept back then.
I like women's legs, and short miniskirts. Sexy. How could I think a skirt two inches longer could be sexier? If there is glimpse of lace-top stockings peeking out, that's how. How that's relevant, I don't know. I guess to say that more skin isn't always better. I'm a CDer - it's about the clothes.

I very much agree with Nicole. I didn't start dressing until i was in middle school but i certainly remember looking at pictures of women at a much earlier age fascinated by the clothing they were wearing. I was also intrigued by how make up altered my sister's and my mom's look. When i was looking at playboy, i wasn't reading the articles - i was looking at the girls absolutely enthralled by the sexy clothes and gorgeous shoes they were almost wearing :heehee:

[Norah_joy]

A slightly different spin: I was in grade school in the late 1940s to early 1950s and what I recall was not so much how women were protrayed in pictures, but how they were protrayed in words. Teachers (in my case, nuns), would tell us that boys will grow up and earn a living and support a family. The girls will grow up to have children and take care of her family. As a young boy, I always thought the girls were getting the better deal. Oh!, and another thing: the girl's uniforms were cuter. Norah

[Sabrina133]

A slightly different spin... As a young boy, I always thought the girls were getting the better deal. Oh!, and another thing: the girl's uniforms were cuter. Norah

I certainly cant disagree with that :)

[docrobbysherry]

I expect Playboy imprinted those hot images of sexy, young women in my young brain.:daydreaming:

Did I notice what they were wearing? Not back then. I could have cared less! My thots were probably of how their delicious, sexy bodies would feel if I was with them. And, my highschool GF and I experimented accordingly!:o

I don't remember ever looking at the Sears catalogue or Nat. Geographic to get excited.

When I began dressing at age 50, the images of women I found attractive over the years continally run thru my brain. And, using Sherry, I attempt to mimic as many of them as possible!:battingeyelashes:

But, Playboy causing men to want to dress? Sorry, Deebra. I think you're way off the mark on that one! Men don't want to wear the clothes hot women r wearing. They only want the women out of them!:D