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Since I have seen various ‘’Brains sex masterposts’’ floating around on Tumblr in favour of the so-called ‘’brain sex theory’’, I’d like to do the same from a gender critical perspective in response to transmedicalists, more colloquially known as ‘’truscum’’. Anyone is welcome to respond to this post to get some discussion started, but please be civil.

So in short, in this post I will explain why I cannot accept the ‘’brain sex theory’’ as a scientific fact, pointing out some holes in the theory. I will also link sources to back this up. So, I will summarise my criticisms in a couple of points…

1. Most children who were diagnosed with Gender Dysphoria (GD) (or Gender Identity Disorder (GID), as it used to be called but sometimes is still referred to as such), do not end up identifying as transgender into adulthood.

If one’s ‘’brain sex’’ (also: ‘’neurological sex’’) is innate and unchangeable and if a disparity between one’s brain sex and one’s natal sex is characterised by gender dysphoria, then one would be transgender for life. As in ‘’born this way’’, not as in ‘’You can grow out of it, though’’.

‘’Most children with gender dysphoria will not remain gender dysphoric after puberty.’’ (Madeleine S.C. Wallien, Ph.D. and Peggy T. Cohen-Kettenis, Ph.D, 2008)

‘’Of the 139 participants, 17 (12.2%) were classified as persisters and the remaining
122 (87.8%) were classified as desisters at follow-up.’’ (Devita Singh, 2012)

‘’Interestingly, the prospective literature on gender dysphoric children
shows that gender dysphoria in childhood does not irrevocably result in gender dysphoria or
GID in adolescence and adulthood. Feelings of gender dysphoria persisted into adolescence in only
39 out of 246 of the children (15.8%) who were investigated in a number of prospective follow-up
studies (Bakwin, 1968; Davenport, 1986; Drummond, Bradley, Peterson-Badali & Zucker, 2008;
Green, 1987; Kosky, 1987; Lebovitz, 1972; Money & Ruso, 1979; Wallien & Cohen-Kettenis,
2008; Zucker & Bradley, 1995; Zuger, 1984). Although the persistence rates differed between the
various studies (2% to 27%), the results unequivocally showed that the gender dysphoria remitted
after puberty in the vast majority of children.’‘

(Desisting and persisting gender dysphoria after childhood: A qualitative follow-up study, Thomas D. Steensma et al., 2011. Download this full study here.)

2. If transgender identity can be 100% accounted for by one’s brain sex, which is innate and exclusively the result of genetics and/or womb environment, then there would be a nearly 100% concordance in identical twins for transgender identity. However, this is simply not the case.

‘’Combining data from the present survey with those from past-published reports, 20% of all male and female monozygotic twin pairs were found concordant for transsexual identity. This was more frequently the case for males (33%) than for females (23%).’’ (Milton Diamond, 2013)

‘’The model that best described the data included a significant additive genetic component accounting for 62% of the variance and a nonshared environmental* component accounting for the remaining 38% of the variance.’’ (Coolidge FL, Thede LL, Young SE, 2002)

*Environmental here meaning: social environment, not womb environment.

3. The ‘’brain sex studies’’ have a flawed design.

So basically, what is always done, is the following: the participants are firstly divided into a transgender group and into a control group based on their natal sex and self-proclaimed gender identity. Then, their brains are scanned and results are compared.

However, it should be done the other way around if one wanted to prove that one’s brain sex accurately predicts one’s gender identity regardless of natal sex. So, firstly the brain scans would have to be made, and THEN those would be divided into a male group and into a female group. If it is true that transgender people’s brains are (very) similar to those of their respective opposite sex’s, they would naturally be classified as such. A transgender woman’s brain would not be understood to be the brain of a man, for example.

The way the studies are currently conducted, does not demonstrate that brain scans would accurately predict people’s experienced gender identity. Also, in the results of various studies I have seen, there is always at least one transgender woman whose brain is ‘’more male’’ than the brain of a non-transgender man, thus further proving that brain scans cannot accurately predict transgender identity.

Watch Ben Shapiro explain this better than me.

4. The studies’ results are flawed, because we know that sex hormones such as estrogen and testosteron affect brain chemistry (and brain structure?). That means that IF studies on the correlation between brain sex and transgender identity were to be conducted, all transgender participants should not have (yet) been on HRT, as this messes up the results, which would be ‘’cheating’’. If it is true that brain sex is innate (and present from birth?), then we should be able to find evidence for the theory that transgender people naturally have brains that are similar to those of the opposite sex in the brains of transgender individuals who have never been on HRT.

Anne Lawrence, who is not only a researcher on this topic, but also a transgender woman, has written about this and explains that cross-sex hormones at least partially account for the results found in the Zhou et al. study from 1995. It is likely that this is the case for most studies (unless they specified all transgender participants had never taken any cross-sex hormones).

Further reading:

What Many Transgender Activists Don’t Want You to Know: and why you should know it anyway by J. Michael Bailey, Kiira Triea

Partial versus complete Autogynephilia and gender dysphoria by Ray Blanchard

Blanchard’s typology on male transsexualism explained on the Wikipedia page

hi! im currently undecided on the whole brain sex thing (but i feel it doesnt matter regardless from a social and biological perspective because the body is sexed regardless? its relevant for medical purposes tho, but dysphoria exists without the brain sex theory too. idk its relevance is, overstated imo.)

my concern is, i think you made some great points with the post itself but im not sure if blanchards theory contributes well to the rest of it, considering it has many considerable holes? it makes everything else u said seem more unreliable as a result. could you explain a bit about like, how you feel those holes are accounted for or why you support blanchards theory etc?

some example issues w the theory are the lack of analysis and comparison to ftm transsexuals and it strictly devides into hetero and homosexual categories, that completely erases the possible implications and complications bisexuality would have on the theory

@bone-jar

I don’t think the exact cause(s) of gender dysphoria matter in social context either. If people think you’re a freak for being transgender, or a ‘’degenerate’’, or whatever, they will believe so regardless of what causes transgenderism. Same goes for homosexuality and disabilities. You can’t argue with bigots.

From a biological viewpoint, it’s a bit different, in my opinion. GD/GID is understood to be a mental disorder, meaning its root is psychological and not neurological. This could potentially mean a lot for how it’s treated. I mean, mental disorders are things like depression, anxiety and anorexia, whereas an example of a neurological disorder would be ADHD. Completely different things. Currently, we ‘’treat’’ gender dysphoria with cross-sex hormones and cosmetic surgeries, though we don’t do anything equivalent to that for body dysmorphic disorder or anorexia… Anorexics are forced to eat, we don’t give them liposuction so that they can ‘’look more like themselves’’ or ‘’look how they feel’’.

I mostly added Blanchard’s typology because it tends to spark interest in gender critical circles and I think it offers a different viewpoint from the one we always get shoved down our throat. I don’t necessarily support or reject the theory since I’m incapable of forming a professional, medical opinion on it, given that I don’t study or work in this field. I’m not super familiar with it anyways besides the basics, really. I don’t even think Blanchard has theorised about the causes for autogynephilia much; I think his theory doesn’t exceed much further than the typology and the semantics, really. But again, I’m not sure.

Okay, yes, Blanchard and his co-workers focused on male transsexualism rather than female transsexualism, but one thing isn’t proven to be untrue simply because another thing has not (yet) been as extensively researched. Blanchard stated on his Twitter account he doesn’t believe in the existence of autoandrophilia, but he included it in the DSM-V in spite of this because he didn’t want to be accused of sexism. Other experts in this field have said they don’t believe in the existence of autoandrophilia either or they believe it’s ‘’exceedingly rare’’. This makes sense, statistically speaking at least, as males in general are statistically much more likely to develop a sexual disorder / paraphilia than females are. So, I don’t see this as a hole in the theory, actually.

Blanchard has also stated on his Twitter that he believes there are ‘’pseudo-bisexual’’ autogynephiles / transsexuals or something like that. To sum up, he indeed doesn’t believe that bisexuality plays a role here. Theoretically speaking, bisexuals could fall into either of the two categories that Blanchard describes, since they are (theoretically speaking) capable of being attracted to other males as well as targeting their attraction for females against themselves (target location error). I’m not sure what some other experts’ opinions on this are. I do know that in some of the studies Blanchard has worked on, the testing group was divided into homosexual, non-homosexual and asexual. So perhaps the defining characteristic for autogynephiles is being attracted to females, rather than being exclusively attracted to females. That’s what this division implies, anyway.

Other studies have reported that transsexuals might ‘’change’’ their sexuality after or during transitioning. By ‘’change’’ I do not mean consciously and willingly changing, but feeling different about their sexual orientation. So they might believe themselves to be gay at first but then later they claim to believe they’re straight or something like that.

oh, i agree on the treatment stuff. as i understand it, transition is like the gold standard currently. (like how lexapro is the gold standard for gad w mpd) however i feel, like other medical help, it should be accompanied with therapy. regardless of whether its neurological or psychological it would have lasting impact to have sex dysphoria. i do disagree on the relation to anorexia; but im not sure how to articulate it. ive found people tend to have varying levels of ‘obsession’ in their dysphoria— not how much they focus on it, but how they do. for example, some may get really focused on their chest being flat. not male, Flat. that almost transcends sex dysphoria into body dysmorphia (i do think that the first can easily lead to the second.) experiencing dysphoria, it feels more reminiscent of my anxiety disorder because of how it drifts from high to low level and can have stressors, and is chronic (but of course this is my specific case!!!)

i think if transition, the gold standard, (i mean any transition now such as gaining access to a binder which is completely reversible) doesnt result in some allieviation, an immediate 180 should be done to see the degree to which its possibly more ‘obsession’ based than not. of course, some dysphoric people are able to minimize dysphoria through therapy and mild life adjustments without fully transitioning, and this same line of thinking is why people transition to different points (some go for srs, some just socially transition, etc) i think equating transition for a sex dysphoric person and liposuction for an anorexic person isnt quite accurate because for the anorexic the disorder would continue while for many dysphoric ppl, transitioning eases dysphoria quite a lot. again, there are that group that leans more towards ‘obsessive.’

sorry if thats convoluted btw im a bit tired ^^“

the differences between mtf and ftm transsexualism under this same theoretical lens would be really interesting i think !!! my issue with it isnt necessarily lacking the research proves it untrue but that it does leave it open to missing a bigger picture. it adds another comparative group to assess the degree to which certain transsexuals would be considered paraphilic. i dont think its necessarily good to study mtf or ftm transsexualism in a vacuum because doing so would avoid seeing any vast differences or similarities which would be potentially vital.

and thats super interesting with the bisexuality part!

and the sexuality part. i swear ive seen something relevant to that but i cant remember it.

sorry for being discombobulated, i really appreciate your response!

Transitioning isn’t exactly the ‘’gold standard’’. Even some trans activists will admit that transitioning isn’t for everyone. The problem is the lack of proper follow-up studies here. We don’t really know whether most people, both adults and children, are happy with having transitioned 10, 20, 50 years down the road. When someone is starting their transition, their doctor will also tell them that they can definitely request to stop if it doesn’t feel right. Some people have said that transitioning actually worsened their dysphoria, and there are also a couple of de-transition stories on websites like Reddit and YouTube.

If you look at some pro-ana blogs here on Tumblr, I’d say the same applies to anorexia. A lot of people in that community talk about how much they hate their thighs and stomach area specifically.

It is true that can happen with gender dysphoria as well. There are definitely FTM’s out there who feel very distressed about their breasts but feel just fine with their genitalia. They will most likely call themselves ‘’non-binary’’, though. This is actually a thing. I’ve read about it before, I thought it was called ‘’Partial gender dysphoria’’ or something like that, but I can’t seem to find any sources right just now. But I just don’t see how this would make gender dysphoria incomparable to anorexia nervosa.

I do want to point out that trans activists falsely claim that most things are reversable when… they aren’t. Even wearing a binder can bruise your rib cage and overtime, it can even reduce your lung capacity. It might also mess up the breast tissue, which will actually make it more difficult to get your breasts surgically removed. There is no such thing as ‘’safe binding’’, despite what people here might claim. Sure, you can do things to reduce the damage (like not wearing it for very long, extended period of times), but that doesn’t exactly make it safe.

I get your point when you say that anorexia has no endpoint. An anorexic will want to lose weight regardless of their current weight. Even when dangerously underweight, they will continue to lose weight because in their minds, they are still fat. But I would argue the same applies to gender dysphoria in a sense that it can never go completely away, given that it’s physically impossible to become the opposite sex. You can reduce gender dysphoria to some extent but there will always be things that you’d rather see differently? (e.g. shoulder width, height, voice, perhaps even things like hands and feet. Genital surgery doesn’t given very aesthetically pleasing results either, and it doesn’t give you the functions of the organs you’re trying to mimic). So yeah, anorexia doesn’t get reduced in a similar fashion, but both illnesses have no endpoint.

I also found a study that discusses the role of bisexuality in Blanchard’s typology:

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/BF01542107

Basically, there is a homosexual group and a non-homosexual group (including heterosexuals, bisexuals and asexuals).

I do think that if autoandrophilia exists, it would be different from autogynephilia in some ways, yes. As I’ve stated before, males are statistically much more likely to develop a paraphilia to begin with, so it is expected that autoandrophilia would be less common amongst women than autogynephilia is amongst men. In social context, what makes a male body attractive is also different from what makes a female body attractive – beauty standards just aren’t each other’s equivalent in that way. Also, autogynephiles seem to have a thing for cross-dressing, perhaps because women’s clothing is made to be sexual, whereas men’s clothing is very simple, comfortable and practical. Putting on a pair of stiletto’s and lingerie just isn’t the same as wearing sneakers and boxer shorts. I find it hard to imagine any woman would be turned on by having big muscles and a huge dick the same way a man might get turned on at the thought of having long hair, smooth skin and big breasts, but theoretically speaking, both can exist, but I feel that autogynephilia is fueled by the hypersexualisation of women in society. In some countries, breasts aren’t even seen as sexual body parts.

oh for sure. i run a gc for dysphoric radfems and many have detransitioned/seek ways outside of transition to help dysphoria. i think whatever data we have on how helpful transition is is inherently somewhat skewed by suicide; as we currently outright lack other options for dealing w sex dysphoria, when transition isnt accessed it can result in people who could have benefitted from different methods, esp less extreme ones, killing themselves. (im not trying to use the ‘let me transition or ill kill myself’ argument btw im just curious how suicide would impact it too) i agree, we definitely need long term studies. what i meant with gold standard is that its currently the ‘best known solution’ and is perscribed often; not that its the only solution nor the actual best, btw. most actually trans ppl i know would kill to get rid of dysphoria and just live as our actual sex. i dearly hope we find something.

i do know that transitioning can worsen dysphoria, it tends to be on how ‘successful’ it is at making it look, to us, that we have the actual sex characteristics. i know for ftms packers and binders can cause dysphoria because they remind them of the fact that they need to use those to relieve dysphoria and cant just have them naturally. that kind of thing definitely needs therapy. trans people who transition well tend to have less dysphoria, at least as far as ive seen, because they dont think about it. sorry, these are just kind of speculations. i think we should honestly have a specialized type of therapy for determining whether dysphoria can be managed without transition or not.

we need actual ‘gender’ therapists, not the ones we have now

concerning varied dysphoria, its most definitely a thing and another aspect i think should be researched !! personally im not actually dysphoric about my vulva but i used to be about my period and im distressed by pretty much all of my other female sex characteristics. however ive been on hrt for a pretty long while now and for 99% of stuff if a thought pops in my head i dont even acknowledge it. being near free of dysphoria is really, really nice.

i do admit part of why i think transition isnt completely flawed as a treatment is that it has worked for me to the degree mentioned above, and likely has for many others; but then again, id still give anything to not be trans, and there are many cases where it doesnt. if i was able to choose to undergo genuinely helpful therapy first and get rid of it w/o transitioning that wouldve been better.

thats a fair point with the no endpoint stuff, but that is the same for any chronic mental illness. im not trying to say its not an accurate connection between the two tho. i do think the reduction aspect is key in treating it. for body dysmorphic disorder its like anorexia except it moves to another part if the ‘offending’ one is removed, as far as i know, which is somewhat similar to how a dysphoric person would notice something else to be dysphoric about, but again dysphoria overall can be reduced very significantly which isnt much of a thing as far as i know with bdd? forgive me, im a bit uninformed on that one.

i agree btw, most things arent reversible. clarification on my part was bad but i kinda meant really short term binding to see if seeing a flat chest would relieve the feeling ? yeah, theres Way too little honesty about the dangers of binding.

thats super interesting with the autogynphilia rate!!!! it seems like its at best a general guideline though, since it spoke of likelyhood rather than ‘everyone’ then again it would be really hard to truly get an accurate answer from everyone, and i suppose a general idea is better than none!

yeah, i totally agree on hypersexualization of women driving autogynphilia. n its interesting to consider what would cause autoandrophilia. tbh, maybe itd be something of the opposite regard? because of how women’s sexuality is punished, it could lead to only letting ones self be aroused on a mans terms eventually associating the two.. im just talking haha. i think there would have to be a very big difference in what causes them.

i hope im not bothering you by continuing the conversation, btw!

Current data on transition falls, in my experience, in either of these two categories:

1. It states a percentage of gender dysphoric children who either stayed at a certain clinic for transitioning or decided to drop out. However, very little is known about why they drop out and we don’t know if they decided to go to another clinic.

2. It is a survery that asks about how pleased transgender patients are with the results of their surgeries/procedures and if it improved the quality of their lives. However, these surveys were typically taken only about one year after they got the surgery and everything is subjective. The quality of one’s life can’t really be measured (though you could look at employment rates, relationship status, etc.). But considering the limited time frame, it doesn’t tell us quite a lot about what things will be like in the long run.

I think you’re making a valid point. I don’t believe not transitioning will inevitably result in suicide, but I do believe transgender people should be able to access therapy (actual therapy, not seeing a ‘’gender therapist’’). Most, or at least several, studies do conclude that if transitioning is the chosen way, it should be accompanied by therapy, though I’m not sure to what degree that actually happens. As I’ve stated before, it’s a mental illness, which (typically) are not treated by changing something about one’s physical appearence, so perhaps we should not be looking for an actual treatment there, also not because we don’t really know an awful lot about the (potential) side effects down the road. You were correct when you stated that body dysmorphic disorder doesn’t go away by ‘’fixing’’ one flaw : it will just be moved to another part of the body. That’s how body dysmorphic patients get addicted to plastic surgery. Even transgender patients who have the money for it get surgery after surgery, so to me it’s hard to believe they have no dysphoria left whatsoever. I believe they believe getting all these surgeries will reduce their dysphoria, and to some extent it might, but it just shouldn’t be viewed as a magical fix-all type of thing. You fix one thing, then you’re happy until you notice another thing… They really are obsessed with the idea of ‘’passing’’ as the opposite sex, but realistically speaking, this isn’t going to happen for the majority, so you need to find a compromise between your ideal world and the reality. Convincing yourself you’re actually the opposite sex isn’t going to help with that.

Some studies do state that transitioning works for the majority of patients (though the sample sizes are small and these aren’t long-term follow-up studies), but little is known about why it works for one person but not for another person. According to ‘’truscum’’, it’s because the latter group don’t REALLY have dysphoria and thus aren’t REALLY transgender, which is just a childish way of dismissing the fact that transitioning doesn’t help all gender dysphoric patients. They just want to ignore that fact because it doesn’t fit in their world view.

Truth be told, I do find it remarking that a lot of FTM’s claim to be fine with their genitalia but not with their secondary sex characteristics. A lot of them don’t really want to be male, but rather gender-less, I believe. If you’re really interested in this, I’d suggest looking into ‘’Rapid onset gender dysphoria’’. About 80% of those patients are female (and a lot of them are lesbians as well).

I do think transitioning helps in some individual cases, but it should be a last resort, in my opinion. I absolutely oppose transitioning children for various reasons, but I think an adult should be free to make decisions about their own body. However, the complication here is that transitioning is, in the transgender community, ‘’advertised’’ as a solution to all your problems. Many transgender people believe that they will get their life back on track with some hormones, but this sounds naive. It reminds me a little bit of anorexic girls in the pro-ana community stating that once they will lose weight, they will be popular, get a boyfriend, get good grades, etc. Like, is there really a causation between losing weight and these things? Can you not do that without losing the weight?

i feel a lot about transition comes down to it just really, really needs more unbiased studies.

i think ‘successful transition’ inherently has to be accompanied by therapy or some sort of realization (often unattainable without therapy) to learn to manage one’s own dysphoria and stop from letting it just keep progressing. i definitely feel there are some people like that, and thats where i feel it definitely overlaps with dysmorphia/anorexia. i think the distinction is that some people can reconcile with just therapy, and some require therapy and degrees of transition. (personally i dont know many who get surgery after surgery, but yzah they probably exist.) as i said, it really just depends on, proven through studies, how good transition really is for trans people. personally, i feel it does work for a majority of genuinely dysphoric people, but again, to varying degrees (often dependent on outside circumstances such as mental and physical health and home and therapy.) currently its primarily the only option dysphoric people are offered because (as far as we know) it works but the lack of further research is extremely unsettling. i wish we had more options.

im really really annoyed at how sex/gender dysphoria had been broadened and undefined. it doesnt help anyone. i think it leads to a lot of confusion, personally my definition is for someone to have sex dysphoria (dysphoria that can cause transsexualism) they must experience high impacting distress over wanting the opposite sex’s sex characteristics. i consider rejection of ones sex characteristics without the want for the opposite sex’s to be a different thing; i do think its a thing, but i think it would be like, a sister diagnosis? but that would affect treatment. having sex dysphoria so broad doesnt help anyone. i dont think those feelings arent legitimate, if you feel me, just that its a separate but similar phenomenon.

an example is someone w the first type of dysphoria mentioned who isnt dysphoric over their vulva but is over their chest because its not male; its not pecs, the nipples are “shaped wrong,” etc

but someone w the second, same situation would want more just Flat and lacking and nothing

not to say that they cant overlap and mix symptoms but i think the distinction between the two is honestly significant in a way thats not addressed because since people invent nonbinary stuff people view the second as something you can ‘transition’ for (even though theres no nonbinary specific transition stuff)

i dont think thats how most transmeds feel bec they tend to say te second is bdd but i feel the two things are both sex dysphoria but they should be divided and studied and treated differently, if that makes sense.

i completely oppose transitioning prepubescent children. i think with teenagers its more complicated because letting a severe mental illness run rampant then could have severe life long impact, and having experienced puberty they could be considered for sex dysphoria; but i think again it comes down to we need more options because children should have another way to escape getting monumentally slowed in life compared to their peers (like actually successful therapy and other possible options)

i agree its touted as a life fixer; its an unhealthy mentality, for sure. but at least from my experience, its really a socially pushed thing, not necessarily the product of the individual. this in turn i think is why we need actual therapy as an option; i definitely think less people would transition on that basis alone.

I think that, if a gender dysphoric person doesn’t lower their expectations, they won’t ever be satisfied with the way their body looks. Transition can accomplish a lot yes, especially if you’re still young, but it’s not magic. Most of those ‘’passing’’ transgender people only pass in photoshopped images. Transition cannot change literally everything about your body, I would argue that SRS especially is very limited. I believe that, many transgender patients believe that transition allows them to live the life they’ve always wanted, but you need to consider that hormones and surgery will not cure your depression, improve your financial status or allow you to be a different person. You’re still the same person you were before, except now you go by a different name and look a bit differently, but you’re not swapping lives with an imaginary person. It’s still your life.

I read that Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) is overrepresentated in the transgender population and this makes sense to me, actually. It’s almost like some transgender people create an ‘’alter ego’’ or ‘’persona’’ in their mind, who is of the opposite sex, and that they feel they need to become that person. So many transgender people say stuff like ‘’I don’t have to pretend to be Roger anymore, now I can be Jessica!’’, so it’s very clear they don’t believe that ‘’Roger’’ is their actual self, even though ‘’Jessica’’ is the same person as Roger except Jessica wears different clothing.

I do get what you mean, but I believe gender dysphoria to be both distress about your current body AND desiring to have the body of the opposite sex. If you only have the former, perhaps it’s not gender dysphoria? Again, this is where these self-proclaimed ‘’non-binary’’ people sometimes come from. I find it hard to imagine someone would only suffer from the latter, to be honest that sounds like transvestic fetishism to me. I just want to point out that most ‘’non-binary’’ people are ‘’afab’’ aka female, and tis simply reflects the fact that this stuff comes from Tumblr, but I’d argue it’s also because young girls do not want to be ‘’womanly’’ (aka curvy,’’mature’’, you know), whereas young boys typically look forward to become more manly (aka growing taller, getting stronger, getting a deeper voice, etc.) The way boys and girls feel about their puberty is quite different.

Transmeds/’’Truscum’’ argue that gender dysphoria stems from your brain being ‘’wired’’ like the opposite sex’s, they don’t believe anyone’s brain is gender neutral in that regard. So they don’t believe anyone would feel most comfortable being completely sex-less, though some people, mostly females, do claim to feel that way. They will state that wanting to have a flat chest is not dysphoria if it’s not accompanied by the feeling of wanting to be a male. Their world view does not only have a male/female binary, but also a cis/trans binary. The gender critical worldview has also a male/female binary, but knows no gender.

Transitioning is definitely pushed despite trans activists claiming no one would want to have a transgender child. Perhaps that is true, but no one wants to have a gay or gender non-conforming child either. So they’d rather pretend Johnny is a girl rather than accepting that Johnny is a young boy who likes My Little Pony. There are stories of transgender children out there who are younger than 10 years old and who are already getting puberty blockers. Like, we know who’s making the decision here. It’s like claiming your cat is vegan.

yeah yea, i agree 100% w yr first paragraph, exactly. thats why therapy should be integral to any aspect of this.

concerning DID, ive never even seen a person w a legitimate diagnosis but that would definitely be a very interesting thing to study

oh yeah thats what i mean when i defined gender dysphoria like that, i considered it the natural consequence, the idea of ‘intense discomfort because one doesnt have the opposite sex’s sex characteristics’ would obv result in distress at ones own sex characterisitics

and the distress w ones own but wo the want for the other was that secondary type i described that i think results in a lot of the non binary stuff yeah, yeah definitely agree

i totally agree on that being a heavy impact on why most nb ppl are female, yep

ive been in the transmed community and theres actually a lot who believe non binary people could be a possibility, less that its a ‘sex-less’ brain and more that its got ‘almost equal male and female traits’ resulting in dysphoria on both sides but honestly i dont really think thats a thing, i think the situation is like ‘i dont desire the other sex’s sex characteristics but i have distress because of mine’ which falls in that funky category of not quite dysphoria (the kind that i talked about being a separate kind, not necessary illegitimate but requiring different treatment, that tends to result in ‘nonbinary ppl’) i dont think its like a cis/trans binary but more that theres ppl w sex dysphoria (with intense discomfort about lacking opposite sex characteristics) and (sex?) dysphoria (without that, resulting in the distress at ones body (of course for this to be medical it would have to be to life impacting amount just like anxiety n stuff, cuz honestly most women are at least somewhat uncomfortable unfortuantely) like, more that theres two illnesses that are similar nut treated differently

i hope that made sense i feel like it ended up convoluted but basically since aspects of both types are natural to an extent, it would require clinical severity for a diagnosis (like every other illness) and i think they should be different diagnoses because of the clear difference between the two (traditional sex dysphoria involving both distress at ones sex characteristics And not having the other sex’s, and ‘nonbinary’ sex dysphoria thats just extreme distress at ones sex characteristics)

^ok that went better haha

oh god, yeah. the ‘transgender children’ make me so fucking sad. their parents are condemning them to this. it disturbs me. kids shouldnt even have the opportunity to being getting evaluated for sex dysphoria until after puberty (and thats in an ideal world where evaluations would actually be non biased and not just slap the trans label on any young girl).

DID is considered controversial within the scientific community, but I have seen at least one study stating DID was overrepresentated in the transgender population, which kind of makes sense as mentall illnesses tend to ‘’go together’’. Many transgender persons also suffer from depression or anxiety, for example.

I do want to entertain the idea that some ‘’non-binary’’ people suffer from legitimate gender dysphoria. I think the idea of being transgender as in ‘’in the wrong body’’ is a socially constructed idea that is derived from it being a genuine symptom of gender dysphoria. I just don’t believe we should validate this idea. Some gender dysphoric patients do not have this symptom and thus do not genuinely believe themselves to be ‘’trapped inside the wrong body’’ or ‘’a man/woman on the inside’’. Given the current social climate, the ‘’in the wrong body’’ rethoric is being validated by especially transmedicalists, and theoretically speaking, they could expand that idea to include non-binary identities, yes – though it’s harder to believe that in their framework, given that there are only two sexes and transmedicalists believe your gender either fully matches your sex or it completely doesn’t. They even ignore the fact that their own studies support the idea of there being a ‘’gender spectrum’’ when it comes to ‘’brain sex’’ : these studies imply that ‘’brain sex’’ exists on a spectrum that has ‘’completely male’’ on one end and ‘’completely female’’ on the other end. That implies some people are ‘’more man’’ than other men if you define manhood based on brain sex. It’s ridiculous. That’s like saying ‘’Men with more testosterone are more men’’.

Amother major flaw with these studies is that they might only look into one (1) region of the brain, whereas the brain might just be a mosaic containing both male and female parts.

The link above is an article in The Guardian about a study on brain sex. Here is what the conclusion of the study says:

The lack of internal consistency in human brain and gender characteristics undermines the dimorphic view of human brain and behavior and calls for a shift in our conceptualization of the relations between sex and the brain. Specifically, we should shift from thinking of brains as falling into two classes, one typical of males and the other typical of females, to appreciating the variability of the human brain mosaic. Scientifically, this paradigm shift entails replacing the currently dominant practice of looking for and listing sex/gender differences with analysis methods that take into account the huge variability in the human brain (rather than treat it as noise), as well as individual differences in the specific composition of the brain mosaic. At the social level, adopting a view that acknowledges human variability and diversity has important implications for social debates on long-standing issues such as the desirability of single-sex education and the meaning of sex/gender as a social category.

This study is also based on 1,400 individuals, which is a much larger sample size than the studies being referenced by transmeds, typically.

If it were true that having equally male and female brain parts would result in gender dysphoria on ‘’both sides’’, then most people would have dysphoria lol. It doesn’t make any sense to me either, because you can’t experience distress over features you don’t have. You can’t feel distressed about both having a penis and a vagina because you only have one of those two. Gender dyshoria is a one way street in that regard. I don’t see how you can experience dysphoria from both sides because it’s physically impossible to be on both sides to begin with.

I do understand your point about gender dysphoria being different in individuals, but perhaps it’s a bit radical to claim that differences prove that it’s not one and the same condition? I mean, many people with depression undereat, but many others overeat, so it’s not like that proves that there are two kinds of depressions out there. People simply experience different symptoms and according to the DSM 5, you don’t have to experience all symptoms of gender dysphoria to be diagnosed with it.

yeah i think research into possible comorbidities with gender dysphoria would be really interesting !!

concerning the brain thing, yeah, i think it falls in the category of being ‘too perfect’ an answer. when i believed it it seemed logical, to say brains being different results in an incorrect body map that results in dysphoria and thus people want to transition, and to a degree maybe the body map part may have some value but the brain stuff? not really.

i think if non binary people suffer from gender dysphoria its either the opposite sex focused kind, but has been misinterpreted, or the only distress at own sex characteristics one, but i think either way people who identify as non binary would be much more likely to respond well with just therapy rather than any sort of transitional treatment. mainly because non binary as a concept, as much as they try to deny, is honestly a pretty recent social invention and people who may have had similar experiences either transitioned or, more likely, lived normally. not to say the distress a non binary person possibly feels is lesser than a trans persons, but i think the drive behind the want to transition is more likely to be less.

as for why i think theyre distinct enough, i consider the ‘normal’ dysphoria, to have distress at ones own body as a Result of extreme discomfort at not having the other sex’s, while the ‘non binary’ dysphoria would just be distress at ones own sex characteristics. both have that distress but the first’s stems from the opposite sex thing which would, imo, change treatment methods enough that it should at the very least be a separated diagnosis (not to say it couldnt be under an umbrella description, but it would be like bipolar I vs bipolar II if that makes sense?)

im really enjoying this convo ngl normally at some point along the way ppl go ~noooo u cant say that~

Many people with multiple mentall illnesses claim that one illness worsens the other, and I think this can be the case for gender dysphoria as well. Imagine suffering from GD and from anorexia, for example. That must really mess you up and I wish there was more research on this so we’d be able to provide better care for these individuals.

The ‘’brain sex’’ theory is different from the ‘’brain map’’ theory, although some transmeds believe both to be true or to be related to one another in some way. The brain sex theory states brains are sexually dimorphic and that transgender people have the brain of a male yet the body of a female or vice versa. Oftentimes, transmeds claim this comes into existence because of (a lack of) exposure to testosterone in the womb. They claim that the brain is somewhat aware of not being ‘’matched’’ with the rest of the body, leading to distress. Besides the problems with this theory in my original post, it doesn’t account for neuroplasticity at all.

The brain map theory states transgender people ‘’feel’’ that their body should be different akin to how people feel after their leg or arm got amputated. The problem with this, is that a phantom limb can only exist after a limb got amputated : the individual had the experience of having that limb in the first place. This isn’t the case for transgender people, as they never were of the opposite sex to begin with. How can you experience the equivalent to a phantom limb if you never had a penis or breasts to begin with? Besides, phantom limbs are painful and people might say that they feel an itch. These feelings decline over time, though, which isn’t always the case for dysphoria.

Transgenderism in itself is a modern concept in some ways. Back in the 1800s, some doctors believed homosexual men to be ‘’female spirits’’ or ‘’female souls’’ that were trapped inside the body of a man. However, the T was added to LGBT in the 1990s and the T actually meant Transvestite or Transsexual, not Transgender. Transsexuals did not literally believe themselves to be of the opposite sex, though in current times, they oftentimes do, and they state that if you disagree with that sentiment, you are being discriminatory or even oppressive. The concept of a ‘’gender identity’’ is very new, but the concept of ‘’non-binary identities’’ is even newer and was literally invented by Tumblr lol. People claim that various ancient cultures had ‘’non-binary genders’’, but this simply isn’t true. These were gender roles pushed onto gay people, gender non-confirming people, intersex people or infertile people. It’s essentially saying ‘’you’re not a REAL man/woman if you do X’’, which is just plain sexism.

Not many people transition, actually, or not ‘’fully’’, statistically speaking. Very few people choose to undergo SRS, especially very few FTM’s, because it’s expensive, very invasive, irreversable and the results may not be satisfying both in terms of aesthetics and functioning. So yeah, it’s not like assuming that a trans woman has a penis is somehow an assumption without any logical basis. Besides, we don’t even know whether people will regret this or not on a long-term basis.

I do believe transmeds will say that the ‘’non-binary’’ kind of dysphoria you’re describing is not genuine dysphoria, but then again, the DSM V states you do not have to have every symptom to be diagnoseding with it. Many gender dysphoric people genuinely believes themselves to be of the opposite sex whereas many do not, for example, so again it does look differently in individuals. Perhaps it would make sense to differentiate between the two types you’re describing if it turns out these two groups respond differently to transitioning or so. Like, there needs to be a reason to distinguish these two types, otherwise the distinction may be real but not actually meaningful or significant.

Lol, I know right? I’ve had this so many times with both ‘’tucutes’’ and ‘’truscum’’.