Ms. Donna
06-07-2006, 06:47 PM
Hi All,
There seems to be a lot of interest lately regarding where people fit in the whole CD / TG / TS framework and I thought that this might be of interest.
The below is an excerpt from an article written by a Canadian Transgender rights activist friend of mine. Please be aware that this is entirely her work and I make absolutely no claims to authorship of any kind whatsoever.
I'm presenting this primarily for the Stages Of Life section, but the rest of the excerpt helps to put it in context. Anyone interested in reading the entire piece can PM me and I'll provide you with a link.
Please, please, please be aware that these are not necessarily my views. Although I do find much resonance here, I can not say I agree completely. Treat this exactily for what it is: one person's take on things based on her experiences. As always, your milage may vary.
Love & Stuff,
Donna
·´¯`·.¸¸¸.·´¯`·.¸¸¸.·´¯`·.¸¸¸ .·´¯`·.¸¸¸.·´¯`·
The Transgender Process
We may only now be arguing the merits of prenatally tampering with a person's life, but there is a wide consensus that interference in a transgendered child's life is not only permissible but desirable. Discouragement of non-sextypical behaviours in children has been a feature in Aryan, and Aryan influenced cultures for at least the last three centuries.
The Clarke Institute's gender clinic sees reason to intervene in the lives of children showing signs of transgender identity. Kenneth Zucker PH.D., writing in "Clinical Management Of Gender Identity Disorders In Children And Adults", summarized the clinic's views like this:
"There are, in summary, various rationales for intervening in the gender identity development of highly feminine boys or masculine girls. Some of these rationales rest on firmer empirical or medical-ethical grounds than others. At least two goals -- elimination of peer ostracism in childhood and prevention of transsexualism in adulthood-- are so obviously clinically valid and consistent with the medical ethics of our time that either by itself would constitute sufficient justification for therapeutic intervention. The primary goal of avoiding adult homosexuality is considerably more problematic; especially if this is attempted for religious rather than clinical reasons." (page 30)
On what grounds is this so "obviously clinically valid"? Firstly; in "The BrainSex Theory" we learned that children's gender identities are set months before birth. Secondly; nobody has ever proven, beyond assertion of their own moral standards, there is anything inherently wrong about being a transsexual. Finally; these are healthy children who usually are of average intellect, have no unusual health problems, and are not out of control. With all this in mind, I find myself gravely concerned with the morality that fuels Zucker's logic. He seems, without much concern for the potentially destructive impact upon the child, to assume that it is ok to tamper with a young person's life in order to enforce moral conformity in adulthood.
In the end, it matters not the justification used to interfere in a harmless person's life, it still remains interference.
Children gain enormous social experience, and knowledge shortly after birth, but the way they absorb and utilize this new information is pre-programmed by the patterning of their brains. A girl will learn in the girl's way and a boy will learn in the boy's way; it matters not which sex the person is, this is a function of brain coding. If they are woman-coded they will be a woman in adulthood or if they are man-coded they will be a man. This is now known to be an immutable and instinctual feature of the human animal.
To attempt to force a transgendered child to conform to genitally determined expectations of their behaviour is no less than an extinguishing of their true and instinctive selves. Asking a transgendered male child (i.e. a little girl) to live and act as a boy, would be no different than taking a normally gendered female child and forcing her to live as a boy. The impact is the same, in either case. The child's spirit is eventually broken, and their self-esteem is affected. It is the resulting shame that frames the closet of denials we will later have to work our way out of, one nail at a time.
Over the centuries this interference, justifiable or not, has evolved into a cycle of oppression, suppression, and expression that has become known as the "Transgender Process".
Stages Of Life
The reporting factor for the following stages of life was virtually 100% amongst my peer contacts:
Childhood Awareness
All but one of my peer contacts report they were aware of some sort of cross-gendered identity at very young ages. Mostly these early emanations display themselves as opposite-sex play preferences. Some proclaim this difference, and others quietly carry the knowledge they are different in some way. This can often occur as early as three years of age. Adults most often report this as "having always known I was different", or as "one of my earliest memories".
As we have already established, transgender identity is our natural state of life. As children we don't know what is genderally right or wrong, and have few qualms about being ourselves quite openly. It is our parents and associates who think there is something wrong with us, and force us into the denials we call "the closet".
Going In
This is the slow acquiescence to the pressures of society. It is the entrance into a state of severe denial. During the Going In time we will slowly be learning to act out the behaviours sociotypically ascribed to our genital sex. We learn to present as a little boy because we have a penis or a little girl because we have a vagina and we do it mostly to avoid reprisals from those around us. We are usually quite well closeted by the time we start school and can often completely hide our true genders for many years.
Passing
The time we spend in denial of our gender identities. This is a time when our behaviours match those socially consistent with our physical sex. It is a state of dishonesty. We actually try our best to be "just like everybody else", but we are not. For us this becomes a self-enforced denial, a means of avoiding the self- loathing we have been taught, and it represents a highly abnormal state that is often the source of enormous inner turmoil and many social problems. We often persist with this well into middle age.
One of the ways many of us deal with the mounting pressure from the denial is that of giving it a release. For most of us this is accomplished via secretly cross-dressing, which often does more to confuse and frustrate than to relieve frustration.
Coming Out
Our re-emergence from the denials as honest people and our rediscovery of our real gender identity. Coming out is the first step in regaining our emotional health. When fully completed, this is the recognition of our normal state, a state of transgender identity. Depending on closeting pressures we can begin this phase anytime in life.
Presenting
Presenting is the search for counseling and advice. This is the most unstable part of our process. We have just Come Out and usually have not reached self-understanding or inner peace yet. Many of us experience profound identity confusion, and body revulsions during this time. For us the primary issues are those of self-acceptance, social acceptance and self-esteem. We will be learning to live in society, and with ourselves, all over again. Most suicides by transgenderists or transsexuals happen during this time and they most often happen in reaction to the inability to locate appropriate support services.
Transition
This is the adjustmental phase. During this time we are working on self-esteem, and dignity while changing our presentation to sociotypically conform to our gender. Males will begin life as women, females will begin life as men. This can often take years and can be marked by repeated failures. Most of our human rights problems will come up during this time. We are routinely fired from careers, evicted from our homes and refused all sorts of services we had access to before beginning Transition. Often we suffer an overall loss of access to society during this time.
Cross-Living
For most of us this is the end of the fight, we now have our new lifestyles sorted out and are seeking to live a quiet life. We will be cross-living in some structured way, often after making many compromises. To varying degrees, males will be socially integrated as women, females will be living as men. Some go on to have sex-changes, some don't.
Although we have, by this time, rejoined mainstream society, it must be understood that cross-living is fraught with risk. We must live in constant fear of discovery, bad reactions from people, being "outed" and other such hideous things. Ours is a difficult life, but cross-living is far less uncomfortable for us than trying to keep up the facades of Passing.
Many people have a perspective problem with this "Transgender Process". Our natural, healthy, states are those most people (including psychiatrists) consider part of a mental illness. Once again the BrainSex theory shows us that our transgender identity is natural, and inborn. We are not mentally ill, we are simply not quite like most other people.
Notes About Coming Out
For me, the coming out was a slow process of peeling away the layers of denial I had used for many years while in the Passing phase of my life. For others it has taken many different forms but we each come to the same conclusion -- transgender identity.
I found myself in a condition where I was becoming less and less comfortable about being masculine. At the same time, I was re-discovering my predisposition to womanhood. However; upon allowing my womanhood, I found that I had not fully dealt with the problem. As I continued my introspections I discovered that the first acceptance had actually been accompanied by a new kind of denial. I had rejected my maleness. There was now one more self-acceptance I had to complete.
Interestingly, this second coming out was a cinch compared to the first. All I had to do was look in a mirror and see my penis. I had positive proof of maleness. From the first part of the Coming Out I understood my womanhood. All I did was let these equally undeniable facts sink in.
Transsexuals, when the coming out begins, reach about the same conclusions as we transgenderists do. They come to grips with their womanhood, or manhood, but somehow never complete the second stage, pursuing sex-change surgery instead of self-acceptance.
There are many reasons for this difference between the two groups. Neither route is better than the other, it is simply a personal choice. Some transsexuals are so repelled by their genitals that if not granted surgery, they would either self-amputate, or mutilate themselves trying. Others for various reasons, such as poor counseling or failure to consider options, aren't even aware of the second stage of the coming out.
There is also a lot of cross-over between the two groups, with transsexuals rejecting gender clinics, and transgenderists deciding to have their surgery after all. Some people co-exist in both groups as a means of keeping as many options available to them as possible.
There seems to be a lot of interest lately regarding where people fit in the whole CD / TG / TS framework and I thought that this might be of interest.
The below is an excerpt from an article written by a Canadian Transgender rights activist friend of mine. Please be aware that this is entirely her work and I make absolutely no claims to authorship of any kind whatsoever.
I'm presenting this primarily for the Stages Of Life section, but the rest of the excerpt helps to put it in context. Anyone interested in reading the entire piece can PM me and I'll provide you with a link.
Please, please, please be aware that these are not necessarily my views. Although I do find much resonance here, I can not say I agree completely. Treat this exactily for what it is: one person's take on things based on her experiences. As always, your milage may vary.
Love & Stuff,
Donna
·´¯`·.¸¸¸.·´¯`·.¸¸¸.·´¯`·.¸¸¸ .·´¯`·.¸¸¸.·´¯`·
The Transgender Process
We may only now be arguing the merits of prenatally tampering with a person's life, but there is a wide consensus that interference in a transgendered child's life is not only permissible but desirable. Discouragement of non-sextypical behaviours in children has been a feature in Aryan, and Aryan influenced cultures for at least the last three centuries.
The Clarke Institute's gender clinic sees reason to intervene in the lives of children showing signs of transgender identity. Kenneth Zucker PH.D., writing in "Clinical Management Of Gender Identity Disorders In Children And Adults", summarized the clinic's views like this:
"There are, in summary, various rationales for intervening in the gender identity development of highly feminine boys or masculine girls. Some of these rationales rest on firmer empirical or medical-ethical grounds than others. At least two goals -- elimination of peer ostracism in childhood and prevention of transsexualism in adulthood-- are so obviously clinically valid and consistent with the medical ethics of our time that either by itself would constitute sufficient justification for therapeutic intervention. The primary goal of avoiding adult homosexuality is considerably more problematic; especially if this is attempted for religious rather than clinical reasons." (page 30)
On what grounds is this so "obviously clinically valid"? Firstly; in "The BrainSex Theory" we learned that children's gender identities are set months before birth. Secondly; nobody has ever proven, beyond assertion of their own moral standards, there is anything inherently wrong about being a transsexual. Finally; these are healthy children who usually are of average intellect, have no unusual health problems, and are not out of control. With all this in mind, I find myself gravely concerned with the morality that fuels Zucker's logic. He seems, without much concern for the potentially destructive impact upon the child, to assume that it is ok to tamper with a young person's life in order to enforce moral conformity in adulthood.
In the end, it matters not the justification used to interfere in a harmless person's life, it still remains interference.
Children gain enormous social experience, and knowledge shortly after birth, but the way they absorb and utilize this new information is pre-programmed by the patterning of their brains. A girl will learn in the girl's way and a boy will learn in the boy's way; it matters not which sex the person is, this is a function of brain coding. If they are woman-coded they will be a woman in adulthood or if they are man-coded they will be a man. This is now known to be an immutable and instinctual feature of the human animal.
To attempt to force a transgendered child to conform to genitally determined expectations of their behaviour is no less than an extinguishing of their true and instinctive selves. Asking a transgendered male child (i.e. a little girl) to live and act as a boy, would be no different than taking a normally gendered female child and forcing her to live as a boy. The impact is the same, in either case. The child's spirit is eventually broken, and their self-esteem is affected. It is the resulting shame that frames the closet of denials we will later have to work our way out of, one nail at a time.
Over the centuries this interference, justifiable or not, has evolved into a cycle of oppression, suppression, and expression that has become known as the "Transgender Process".
Stages Of Life
The reporting factor for the following stages of life was virtually 100% amongst my peer contacts:
Childhood Awareness
All but one of my peer contacts report they were aware of some sort of cross-gendered identity at very young ages. Mostly these early emanations display themselves as opposite-sex play preferences. Some proclaim this difference, and others quietly carry the knowledge they are different in some way. This can often occur as early as three years of age. Adults most often report this as "having always known I was different", or as "one of my earliest memories".
As we have already established, transgender identity is our natural state of life. As children we don't know what is genderally right or wrong, and have few qualms about being ourselves quite openly. It is our parents and associates who think there is something wrong with us, and force us into the denials we call "the closet".
Going In
This is the slow acquiescence to the pressures of society. It is the entrance into a state of severe denial. During the Going In time we will slowly be learning to act out the behaviours sociotypically ascribed to our genital sex. We learn to present as a little boy because we have a penis or a little girl because we have a vagina and we do it mostly to avoid reprisals from those around us. We are usually quite well closeted by the time we start school and can often completely hide our true genders for many years.
Passing
The time we spend in denial of our gender identities. This is a time when our behaviours match those socially consistent with our physical sex. It is a state of dishonesty. We actually try our best to be "just like everybody else", but we are not. For us this becomes a self-enforced denial, a means of avoiding the self- loathing we have been taught, and it represents a highly abnormal state that is often the source of enormous inner turmoil and many social problems. We often persist with this well into middle age.
One of the ways many of us deal with the mounting pressure from the denial is that of giving it a release. For most of us this is accomplished via secretly cross-dressing, which often does more to confuse and frustrate than to relieve frustration.
Coming Out
Our re-emergence from the denials as honest people and our rediscovery of our real gender identity. Coming out is the first step in regaining our emotional health. When fully completed, this is the recognition of our normal state, a state of transgender identity. Depending on closeting pressures we can begin this phase anytime in life.
Presenting
Presenting is the search for counseling and advice. This is the most unstable part of our process. We have just Come Out and usually have not reached self-understanding or inner peace yet. Many of us experience profound identity confusion, and body revulsions during this time. For us the primary issues are those of self-acceptance, social acceptance and self-esteem. We will be learning to live in society, and with ourselves, all over again. Most suicides by transgenderists or transsexuals happen during this time and they most often happen in reaction to the inability to locate appropriate support services.
Transition
This is the adjustmental phase. During this time we are working on self-esteem, and dignity while changing our presentation to sociotypically conform to our gender. Males will begin life as women, females will begin life as men. This can often take years and can be marked by repeated failures. Most of our human rights problems will come up during this time. We are routinely fired from careers, evicted from our homes and refused all sorts of services we had access to before beginning Transition. Often we suffer an overall loss of access to society during this time.
Cross-Living
For most of us this is the end of the fight, we now have our new lifestyles sorted out and are seeking to live a quiet life. We will be cross-living in some structured way, often after making many compromises. To varying degrees, males will be socially integrated as women, females will be living as men. Some go on to have sex-changes, some don't.
Although we have, by this time, rejoined mainstream society, it must be understood that cross-living is fraught with risk. We must live in constant fear of discovery, bad reactions from people, being "outed" and other such hideous things. Ours is a difficult life, but cross-living is far less uncomfortable for us than trying to keep up the facades of Passing.
Many people have a perspective problem with this "Transgender Process". Our natural, healthy, states are those most people (including psychiatrists) consider part of a mental illness. Once again the BrainSex theory shows us that our transgender identity is natural, and inborn. We are not mentally ill, we are simply not quite like most other people.
Notes About Coming Out
For me, the coming out was a slow process of peeling away the layers of denial I had used for many years while in the Passing phase of my life. For others it has taken many different forms but we each come to the same conclusion -- transgender identity.
I found myself in a condition where I was becoming less and less comfortable about being masculine. At the same time, I was re-discovering my predisposition to womanhood. However; upon allowing my womanhood, I found that I had not fully dealt with the problem. As I continued my introspections I discovered that the first acceptance had actually been accompanied by a new kind of denial. I had rejected my maleness. There was now one more self-acceptance I had to complete.
Interestingly, this second coming out was a cinch compared to the first. All I had to do was look in a mirror and see my penis. I had positive proof of maleness. From the first part of the Coming Out I understood my womanhood. All I did was let these equally undeniable facts sink in.
Transsexuals, when the coming out begins, reach about the same conclusions as we transgenderists do. They come to grips with their womanhood, or manhood, but somehow never complete the second stage, pursuing sex-change surgery instead of self-acceptance.
There are many reasons for this difference between the two groups. Neither route is better than the other, it is simply a personal choice. Some transsexuals are so repelled by their genitals that if not granted surgery, they would either self-amputate, or mutilate themselves trying. Others for various reasons, such as poor counseling or failure to consider options, aren't even aware of the second stage of the coming out.
There is also a lot of cross-over between the two groups, with transsexuals rejecting gender clinics, and transgenderists deciding to have their surgery after all. Some people co-exist in both groups as a means of keeping as many options available to them as possible.