EX TENEBRIS CRESCIT FLOS

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THE GENDER CONTINUUM

My Concept of Gender

March 8, 2003

Introduction

Most people look at gender as a binary phenomenon: a person is either male or female. Additionally, gender is seen to be identical to the physical sex, which is again either male or female. This idea probably fits most people reasonably well, but it is not universal. A small percentage of people have some kind of gender confusion. Indeed, sometimes physical sex is even confused. (A person with this condition is called intersexed - the old term is hermaphrodite. Due to some kind of genetic mutation, such a person possesses elements of both types of sex organs.) More commonly, there is some type of psychological gender confusion. For example, someone born in a male body may actually feel like a woman or might even feel like some of each or neither. It appears that there is actually a continuum of gender, where most people fit firmly on the side that matches the physical sex, but a few are either on the opposite, somewhere in between, or even outside of the continuum. I am such a person. I was born in a male body, but, psychologically, I am far closer to the female side than to the male side; although I am not quite certain precisely where I am. I decided to write this article to help me explain this to others. It is based on research, both in books and on the Internet; and also on my personal experience and the experience of others. It is certainly far from perfect, but it should be a good start. I hope it is useful in that it presents information in a concise and fairly comprehensive format so that those who have not previously encountered this phenomenon can begin to understand it. Be warned that much of this represents my personal opinions on this issue and thus cannot be considered scientifically accurate. Also, note that scientific research on this subject is not very advanced at this time and that many researchers disagree on the details, so no source of information can be considered to be without error.

Definitions

This subject has a number of associated words which need to be defined. Note that there is generally poor agreement on many of these words, so some may not agree with my particular definitions. I will try to be as general as possible.
Androgyne
A person who is comfortable in both gender roles or who may be considered to be neither.
Crossdresser
A general term describing someone who dresses in clothing appropriate to the opposite sex.
Drag Queen
A man who crossdresses primarily for performances. Most drag queens put a lot of work into their appearance, often taking many hours to get ready, but they typically only dress up for performances. Most, but not all, are gay. Drag King is the analogous term for women.
Gender
In this context, gender usually refers to the psychological state of being male, female, both, or neither. It is not necessarily the same as the physical sex.
Hormone Therapy
The process of using hormones, either prescription drugs or the less effective herbal treatments, to cause the body to undergo physical changes to match a person's gender.
Sex
In this context, sex is the physical state of being male, female, or intersexed. Gender may or may not be the same.
Sex Reassignment Surgery
This is the sex change surgery that physically changes a person's sex organs to match the psychological gender. It is far easier to go from male to female than from female to male. It is often the best treatment option for transsexuals.
Sexual Orientation
This is rather complicated for transgendered people. Simple terms such as heterosexual and homosexual are not adequate. I will treat this in depth later.
Tranny
This is a common slang term generally applied to transgendered people. Another common slang term, typically used on the Internet, is t-girl.
Transgendered
This is a very broad term referring to anyone whose gender does not fully match the physical sex.
Transsexual
A person whose gender is opposite or nearly opposite to the physical sex. Often, but not always, a transsexual actively wishes for and pursues sex reassignment surgery. Sometimes this condition is evident from very early in life, but at other times it fully manifests itself later, usually in middle age.
Transvestite
Generally synonymous with crossdresser, but is a somewhat more scientific term. Some people, both within this community and in the society at large, see this term as derogatory; however, others like the term.

The Concept of Gender

As stated in the introduction, most people have a strictly binary view of psychological gender, and it is seen as identical to the physical sex. (Throughout this article, I will use the term gender to refer to the psychological and the term sex to refer to the physical. This is a convention that is common in the literature.) Many who have studied this or experienced it first-hand believe that there is actually a wide diversity of gender, which can be expressed as a continuum. Here is my concept, expressed in the form of a list. I have arbitrarily chosen a numerical scale with a range of 0 to 10, where 0 is 100% male and 10 is 100% female. This list assumes a male physical sex, but with slight modification it could be made to apply to a physical female.

0 A normal male who exhibits fully masculine tendencies and feels absolutely no confusion about gender identity.
1 A normal male who may occasionally exhibit female traits but has essentially no confusion and has not crossed over into ``gender-inappropriate'' behavior.
2 Someone who basically identifies as male but may occasionally wear women's clothing and usually gets a sexual charge out of it. It never quite becomes an obsession but is an occasional diversion. The tern fetishistic crossdresser is sometimes applied.
3 A man who still identifies predominantly as male but has a strong female side and often wears women's clothing to express it. At this point, it is an important part of life and should not be suppressed, and it can create problems in relationships. The term crossdresser or transvestite would be appropriate here.
4 A rather more severe version of 3 or an androgyne who leans male.
5 An androgyne. This is someone who is equally comfortable (or uncomfortable) in either gender role and can often go back and forth at will.
6 An androgyne who leans more to the female side.
7 A physical male who feels mostly female but may still have a rather weak male identity and does not necessarily want to give that up. Such a person, given the freedom, would probably behave as a woman most of the time. Sex reassignment surgery may or may not be a good option.
8 A transsexual who perhaps still retains a slight male identity but would much rather live as a woman. Many late-onset transsexuals probably fall into this category; often the realization does not quite hit until middle age.
9 Basically, a woman trapped in a man's body. There may be a hint of male identity.
10 Someone born a man who has not even a hint of male identity. The condition is painfully evident from a very early age. This is the classic transsexual. Sex reassignment surgery is the best treatment option.

This list is certainly not conclusive, but I believe it begins to express the actual diversity of gender. Some people may not fit well into any category. I believe that I most likely fit into 8 or possibly 9.

Sexual Orientation

In this context, sexual orientation gets rather confusing. Like gender, sexual orientations are actually quite diverse. To use terms like heterosexual or homosexual to apply to transgendered people is not very useful. For example, to describe a genetic male who identifies as female as heterosexual creates some confusion: is the term relative to the person's sex or to the person's gender? I prefer to completely dispense with these terms in this context. Instead, I would prefer to describe simply to which type of person the transgendered person is attracted. This results in a great diversity of sexual orientations. A person, transgendered or not, can potentially be attracted to one or more of the following: genetic males, genetic females, any type of transgendered person, even more unusual options, or none of the above. For example, I am attracted to genetic females or post-operative male-to-female transsexuals. To use the traditional terms, since I identify psychologically as a woman (predominantly), I am a lesbian. But it is easy to see why terms such as that are inadequate here. Trannies have a wide variety of sexual orientations, but the statistics are difficult to determine. They may be attracted to genetic men, genetic women, both, or often other trannies. Also, there are a few people out there who are not transgendered at all but for some reason are strongly attracted to trannies.

Scientific Hypotheses

At present, many scientific hypotheses (I prefer to call these hypotheses rather than theories at this time, because in my opinion they are little more than educated guesses and research is far from complete.) relating to transgenderism focus on what happened during fetal development. For example, a fetus with XY chromosomes (a genetic male) must receive doses of testosterone at appropriate times in order to develop into a normal male. The sex organs and the brain develop at different times, so if the testosterone is elevated normally at the time that the sex organs develop but is reduced as the brain develops, it is possible that the person will experience gender confusion later in life. This fluctuation of hormone levels is also used to explain sexual orientation. If various aspects of gender develop at different times, abnormal hormone levels could explain many gender identity issues. At present, there is no easy way to test this hypothesis, but it is a plausible option. It is certainly possible that events that take place after birth can also affect this, but it appears that in typical cases, a person is born this way.

Transgenderism and Society

All societies in the world traditionally have well-defined roles based on physical sex. In the old hunter-gatherer societies, men typically were the hunters and women were the gatherers. Due to physical differences, a division of labor was necessary. A person who did not fit into traditional roles could potentially be seen as a threat. The binary concept of gender is well-entrenched in people's minds. Upon encountering a transgendered person, a normal person is usually quite confused and often feels threatened. On a societal level, this often results in persecution against the transgendered. These attitudes get codified in religion and laws and become extremely difficult to change. In western European/North American society, there is no traditional place for trannies, so they are seen as outcasts. Some other societies (for example, India and some Native American groups) recognize this to at least some degree and provide a traditional role for transgendered people. Western society has begun to grudgingly accept homosexuality, and hopefully acceptance or at least tolerance of transgenderism is not far behind. At present, however, being transgendered in our society is potentially dangerous. The result of being discovered sometimes leads to loss of employment or housing, or sometimes physical violence. There are few legal protections. For this reason, it is necessary for trannies to be secretive. Hiding such an important part of oneself is detrimental to mental health; trannies are frequently afflicted by depression, and suicide rates are high. There is no legitimate reason for this. In a society which is supposedly free, a person should be free to be transgendered without having to fear loss of livelihood or life. It is very important for transgendered people to have support. If friends and family are unsupportive, a person can feel completely alone. Fortunately, in some locations, there are groups for transgendered people. At least we can count on support from within our own ranks and often within the gay community.

Conclusions

I hope this essay helps increase the understanding of transgenderism. It is just a start, and it primarily represents my opinions, with which others may well disagree. For someone truly interested in understanding this, it will be a lifetime of study.


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