Raiders of the Lost Etiology
Braaaaaaaaaaaaaiiiins
One of the rather fun things about being trans is that you live in a world where doctors poke and prod you hoping to find deep answers about why you exist- deep, award-winning, and powerful answers that will at last enable them to explain what the hell is up with us; because it’s not like we’re authorities on our own lives or anything.
To set the snark aside, I’m of course talking about the endless quest to find an etiology- or medical explanation of origin- for trans existence, a recent example of which can be found here. It is a particularly transfixing matter that seems to occupy the place of El Dorado or the Fountain of Youth in the eyes of our medical masters. A Lost Ark of the Covenant with which to at last claim final dominion over us. The ultimate Holy Grail being a “trans test” whereby folks in white coats will be able to objectively prove that someone is trans.
Yet like all the foregoing it is a myth, a legend. There is not likely to be any one coherent, purely biological/neurological explanation for our existence. The drive to research the matter is not inherently evil, mind, but the resources being dedicated to it come into question when studies of this sort appear to be to the exclusion of more directly beneficial research, like longitudinal studies on the long-term effects of hormone treatment on trans people.
Recent studies have been justified by asserting that they will benefit young trans people with early identification of trans-ness. But let us be as honest and realistic as possible for a moment, shall we? What would make things easier on young trans kids is not an MRI scan or some kind of trans test. It would be a world where having a trans child would not be a terrible thing, where bullying of children who defied gender norms would be frowned upon and actively discouraged, where parents raised their children to accept a multitude of gendered possibilities. A “trans test” would not even be a stopgap measure to help young trans people.
When I first came out to my father I naively waved studies in his face that spoke of this thing called “Gender Identity Disorder.” But his first reaction to me was not to say that my gender was valid. It was to say that since it was a ‘disorder’ there must be a ‘cure’- you know, one to make me into a boy again, like he wanted.
Transgender does not need a medical etiology in order to be accepted morally. The entire issue is a massive red herring that deflects a necessary moral and philosophical argument into whether or not we objectively exist by the standards of a game we are rigged to lose. We are already on the backfoot because we live in a world where our voices do not count, we merely concede more ground when we suggest that narrow, incomplete studies that reveal- at best- a small piece of the puzzle should speak for us.
The critical moral argument that we must never lose sight of is whether it is okay to discriminate against someone because there isn’t a biological explanation for their existence. For most any situation, the answer is a resounding “no” among decent people. We do not say that people of faith bring discrimination upon themselves because they ‘chose’ to be a part of a given religion, and when people do say this, they are rightly derided for being assholes. We do not get sidetracked into asinine arguments about how some people are born Jewish and have Jew brains and, y’know, they just can’t help it and that’s why we should be ‘tolerant.’
No, actually. You should avoid bigotry because it’s simply the right thing to do.
On top of everything else, this vexatious quest betrays another deeply rooted assumption about gender in our society that plainly reveals our position as The Other. Where are the studies that inquire why cis people are cis? Or why heterosexual people are het? Because this is the presumed, normal default of society it goes unmarked and unquestioned (although scientific forays into “male” and “female” brains are nothing new and I will revisit this shortly). Whatever the intentions of these scientists, some of whom I will even be generous enough to admit may want to do the right thing by trans folk, they are participating in a discourse that holds that we are invalid until proven to have a Cause that can be established scientifically and thus set in stone.
The reason that this is dangerous and more than simply a fool’s errand is nicely illustrated by one of the trans community’s leading scientific antagonists, Northwestern University psychologist J. Michael Bailey. The attendant quest to trans etiology is, of course, the crusade to find a ‘gay gene.’ Bailey has argued that if such knowledge is used to find and abort ‘gay foetuses’ it would be morally acceptable and a matter of “parental rights.” What would my father have done with me had a doctor told him I was trans while I was still in the womb? That grim scenario aside, however, it is also absurd simply because we have no way of pinning down a single neurological, genetic, or other physiological ‘sign’ of queerness and/or trans-ness. The number of false positives would be astonishing, I expect.
At the heart of this issue, however, is that simple question: do we choose to be trans or not? My answer is: the question is bollocks and so is your face. It is an overly simplistic binary question that does not account for the following realities:
- Social construction of gender shaping how we all- cis and trans- learn about what is feminine, masculine, etc.
- The fact that biological inclinations will differ from person to person and perhaps take wildly different forms in two trans people.
- The agency of a trans person who shapes various aspects of their gender consciously, even if the “decision” to be trans, full stop, was not fully theirs. Some of us have seemingly natural preferences for things, some of us have red lines we will not cross, and some of us change things about ourselves all the time. Is there an etiology that can account for the wild number of variables in that equation? Unlikely.
- The fact that there are several million different ways to be a man or a woman. Some trans women are very feminine, others are less so, others are outright butches. I myself am somewhat femme but lean heavily towards the Hillary Clinton end of the spectrum. Is there an etiology for that level of specificity about these things that comprise my gender and the genders of countless trans folk?
What it comes down to is that ‘research’ on trans origins is basically asking you to see only two types of people in the world: Men and Women. You are very subtly and tacitly asked to see these groups as wildly different from one another, but also to see men as being all exactly the same and women as being all exactly the same, and that “gender” only means your body. When you take a long step back from that to behold the riotous cacophony of beautiful gendered diversity in our world, the findings of these small scale studies on trans etiology begin to seem a lot less far reaching than they otherwise might.
What’s more, we are not going to be loved by people who presently hate us if, suddenly, a study came out tomorrow with The Ultimate Biological Explanation for Transness. The murders would not stop, the discrimination would not stop, the hate would not stop, the cultural exclusion and medical colonisation would not stop. We would be filed in a few cis scientists’ “Hmm, that’s interesting” cabinet and locked away while the beat goes murderously on. Proving ourselves biologically is not salvation, it’s a titanic straw man.
I know this: my growth into womanhood was necessitated by a powerful understanding that if I did not come out, death- literal or waking- awaited me. I was being compelled powerfully to live a lie not of my choosing. Accepting myself as a woman, as a person of trans experience, has had profoundly positive effects on my life. It would be a colossal misreading of my difficult and painful experience to say that I “woke up one day and decided to be trans” as some transphobes might have it. But that is not the only alternative to saying that I was ineluctably and unproblematically “born this way” with some purely biological cause that was not in some way socially and personally mediated.
I say this because this is true of absolutely everybody. Not just trans people. That is one of the critical distinctions to understand here that separates what I’m saying from the rest of the pack. Everyone’s gender is constructed, no one is born a man or a woman. The subtle implication of a lot of trans research is that there aremale brains and female brains when reality proves to be far, far more confounding on that score than not. When we think we’ve found the key to gendered brain difference, we get tripped up. “Women have a bigger corpus callosum than men! Wait, no do they don’t. Wait, yes they do! Sometimes! Behold my small data set!” That particular merry-go-round was critiqued with true scientific precision by biologist Anne Fausto-Sterling in her 2000 book Sexing the Body, which also provides a good deal of data to buttress my points here more generally.
I do not have a female brain so much as I have a Quinnae brain, a lovely grey mattered lump of brainy loveliness shaped by my unique experiences, learning, and an ongoing dynamic life that alters those meandering curves with each passing day. There may be something biological that made my coming out all but inevitable, but a good deal of the shape my womanhood took had nothing to do with the brain I had when my mum bore me.
I should not need a certificate, or a study to tell people that I am who I say I am in terms of my gender. Transphobic people will not stop once an etiology is discovered. Let me make something abundantly clear:
The search for biological explanations is perfectly fine in and of itself. It is not fine for that to act as a substitute for real moral and political discussion. This research is an academic curiosity. It must never be the fulcrum upon which our rights and dignity as human beings rest.
In any moral, just world, the question of our humanity would be settled by the mere reality of our humanity, our existence as human beings. Whatever we “choose” or “don’t choose” is irrelevant to the moral and political questions about our rights. Such debates are really slam dunk arguments that get mired in false concern about scientific relevance that really has no bearing on how most people live their lives. For me, I have found who I am. Nothing will dissuade me from that. I do not, personally, care about the nature versus nurture question apropos which made me trans. If there is an answer it is “both/and with a lot of beautifully messy complications.”
But I am who I am, and I thankfully never needed a peer-reviewed study to tell me so.
fantastic post.
some years back the post would’ve really upset me, I think. before I truly came to appreciate that the authenticity game will always be fixed.
I see the quest for etiology as a subset of a more general barrier to dignity & justice. in my U.S.ian experience, a lot of folks seem to have “choice” right at the center of their moral universe. it goes like this: whatever you are, if you chose to be that way, justice/equality isn’t meant for you. I mean, how do “we” know you’re not faking it? but if you can’t help it- then we can talk, then maybe you’re telling the truth and your issues deserve my time.
“You should avoid bigotry because it’s simply the right thing to do.”
clearly I agree… don’t know what hope there is of having this sink in on a mass scale. along the lines of what I wrote above, a lot of people don’t see bigotry as bigotry if it targets anyone who “chose to be that way”.
MHS
27 Jan 11 at 1:38 am
::applauds::
Jennifer
27 Jan 11 at 3:58 am
Very well said! I was tempted to try to quote some of the most significant passages for linking this but I realized that pretty much encompassed the entire piece.
“You should avoid bigotry because it’s simply the right thing to do.” is brilliant. My view is that if they need a justification to avoid it then they are looking for any excuse to allow it and that, as you said, is a game we can never win.
Two years ago, when leaving my first appointment with my endocrinologist, the thought that occurred to me was “welcome to being pathologized.”
What you said about informing your father really struck me. I told my family this past Saturday. My approach was different, thanks to what I’ve learned from so many others in places such as this, and the outright rejection of the overly clinical language in the template letter my therapist gave me.
D W
27 Jan 11 at 6:33 am
Beautiful!
I have one thought I’d like to add: If there was some day a magic trans test, does that mean someone would expect any of us who “failed” it to respond with “oh nevermind, I was wrong”?
I am a firm believer that if someone wakes up one day and says to themself “I think I’ll be trans” they have every bit as much right to live as they choose as someone who “can’t help it” does to live that way.
Marlene
27 Jan 11 at 7:04 am
Great post!
On the surface, it really doesn’t surprise me that if there are some small dimorphic parts of the brain –that all males or all females would share these slight differences. I hate that studies like these are conducted from an unannounced bias of “proving” something we already know–people who call themselves males or females have certain similarities. But it can’t possibly be so when some of those people are trans! Let’s do a study. I mean, they could have saved their money and just asked some trans people.
I absolutely hate that instead of emphasizing how small the areas and differences they are looking at are, they are using the cultural and ideological “male brains” and “female brains” implying huge essential differences between cis assigned sexes…to the point that trans men are assumed to have “female brains” only to have some of that questioned.
History has shown us that human culture tends towards the eugenicist. We should all be worried about etiology research conducted by cis people and under cis terms.
My family has a half-baked idea of an etiology for my transness regarding two generations of fertility drug usage. It has not helped them accept me or be kind to me in the least.
jayinchicago
27 Jan 11 at 7:58 am
Social justice-wise, I totally agree with you, but the scientist in me will always want to understand. However, I would like scientific research to be less binary and more inclusive of the myriad ways that one can be trans. Also, neurology isn’t the only way to prove that we didn’t choose this path. Evolutionary biology could be used to understand how different genders affect the survival of our species (same for gay people). I want proof that we exist because we are important, not that we exist because of some mutation or misstep in development.
Kian
27 Jan 11 at 11:48 am
Thank you so much for this. These ‘quests’ and ‘studies’ are exactly how and why people so often try to disprove that I’m ‘legitimately’ trans. I did the same thing as you when I came out to my family, and over the past couple of years I’m starting to realize why that route was such a poor one to take.
Static Nonsense
27 Jan 11 at 12:00 pm
How can evolution have missteps or importance? It has no guiding purpose. It can’t. That’s the entire point.
And isn’t everything a mutation? I mean, traits persist because they either directly contribute to a species’ survival or because the transmission of these traits is not immediately lethal in all cases, enabling them to survive over time, right?
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 12:17 pm
I meant missteps in development, as in an individual’s development from conception to adulthood. And yes, mutations are the origins of genetic diversity and are not inherently meaningful. But do you think that each trans person is an independent mutation or a type of person necessary for human survival?
Would humans still be here if there was no gender and sexual diversity? If we only had hterosexual cissexual cisgender men and women, would our species be worse off? These are question that are just beginning to be asked and could perhaps lead others to not just think of as mistakes, but as past mutations that led to adaptations that are extremely important for our species’ survival. This is what I mean by important.
Kian
27 Jan 11 at 1:21 pm
I do believe biodiversity is important for the survival of a species, and that traits that may appear maladaptive often also have linked traits that enhance survival. What I mean is there’s no genetic blueprint where someone planned out “This trait is necessary for human survival, and thus people with this trait serve this purpose.” It’s all a series of accidents.
I’m not sure what “missteps in development” mean. I’m neuroatypical, and I don’t view those as missteps either. How could they be missteps in any objective sense, as opposed to human definitions of what makes a life worthwhile vs. a “misstep?”
Edited to use the wording I should have used.
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 3:22 pm
Thanks, Quinnae. I too made the mistake with my parents of trying to make medical justifications; naturally, discussion devolved to how abnormal I supposedly am, and I’ve totally given up on my father ever acknowledging my gender (even when I simplify it to “woman”, which isn’t accurate, but his circuits will blow if I talk about being a transgenderqueer woman).
Kian: Actually, what’s important is that we be treated as fully human. Right now, not when we find some debatable evolutionary advantage to being trans. History has shown time and time again that people who discriminate against us care not a whit about our place in evolution; indeed, most of them dismiss evolution out of hand.
I don’t care whether its brain studies or evo bio. I’m tired of endlessly begging cis people, hat or scientific study in hand, to respect us. Our *humanity* should be enough to justify our existence.
It’s fine to be interested in the question, but when we use it to justify our rights, we get into a problem: Will cis people use studies like this as another filter to whittle away the “undeserving” trans folk from supposedly “deserving” trans folk? Will we be forced to submit to genetic testing or MRI scans to prove that we’re trans enough?
GallingGalla
27 Jan 11 at 3:23 pm
“I don’t care whether its brain studies or evo bio. I’m tired of endlessly begging cis people, hat or scientific study in hand, to respect us. Our *humanity* should be enough to justify our existence.”
hear, hear!
MHS
27 Jan 11 at 3:36 pm
I agree that we shouldn’t have to justify our existence in order to have equal footing. Sorry for derailing, I just wanted to point out that regardless of how I feel about it, the inquisitive part of me will never stop wondering why I exist.
Lisa: I used the “misstep” because that is how people frame the brain science question: when did things go wrong? I actually don’t think anything went wrong – I think it went perfectly right. I too am neuro-atypical -autistic – and think similar thoughts regarding that part of my existence. I belong here because people like me are necessary for the survival of the species. Biodiversity isn’t just important, it’s critical. And I’m not sure why this means I believe that it was planned out – I feel like you’re reading typical assumptions about the nature of natural selection into my writing that just aren’t there.
Kian
27 Jan 11 at 5:19 pm
I’m probably one of the few detractors here, but… that article made me happy. As does any research that suggests a biological basis for transgenderism. Because it takes so much of the blame off myself. I’ve spent more than a decade of my life – and still often do – thinking that I was either psychologically disturbed, as the masses claimed, or that my aversion to my body and assigned gender was the result of internalised misogyny, or that I had somehow got myself into a cycle of faulty thinking, and if everyone else with female bodies and assigned genders could be happy with who they were, why not me? Surely it had to be my fault, then, I reasoned.
Whereas if it turns out that there’s a neurological or biological or whatever cause, it comes along with huge relief. There’s no more need for me to try and desperately search out what combined factors in my childhood might have led to me thinking I’m trans; there’s no worry that I might transition, only to later solve my issues and then regret what I did to myself.
If my brain is physically, indubitably different, then it says that this is who I am. It says that I am not confused, I am not deluded, I am not imagining things, and this is real.
It says to my parents – when I eventually come out to them – that this is natural, it was not a choice, it was not something I did to rebel, I am not possessed, it was not a fault of their upbringing. More importantly, it says that it cannot be cured by psychological means; it cannot be cured by sending me to an exorcist; it cannot be cured, even if such a thing became possible, by fixing my brain, because if that were to happen I would no longer be myself. It would tell them that I need to transition.
And that security – that confirmation – is vastly important to me. I understand the politics in this post and how in an ideal world, this would not and should not matter and people would just be nice to each other. But we don’t live in that world. Not yet. And until then, in a world still convinced of an essentialist, cissexist binary, every single thing that shows them otherwise helps. It greatly helps.
aaskew
27 Jan 11 at 5:46 pm
About an hour after reading this someone shared this link on facebook:
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20032-transsexual-differences-caught-on-brain-scan.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news
Here’s a quote:
“A 2010 study of 121 transgender people found that 38 per cent realised they had gender variance by age 5. White matter differences could provide independent confirmation that such children might benefit from treatment to delay puberty.”
Or they could take their foot off our necks and honour our experience. We will “be forced to submit to genetic testing or MRI scans to prove that we are trans enough.”
Cindy Bourgeois
27 Jan 11 at 6:00 pm
Kian, when you said:
“I want proof that we exist because we are important, not that we exist because of some mutation or misstep in development.”
I wasn’t trying to read anything into that, but it resembled to me past arguments in which I have seen people argue evolution does have a purpose – it’s easy to for me get caught up in the perceived form of an argument and forget to ask for clarification. Especially given that most of my discussions on topics like this have been with people who are not explicit about what they mean.
Thank you for clarifying, and apologies for misunderstanding.
And I agree with this:
I do not feel this research is entirely negative in outcome, simply because it does not best serve our needs. It has evidence for things that I personally have wondered about for a long time and the actual studies serve as a direct contradiction to poorly researched explanations such as those introduced by Bailey, Blanchard, Lawrence, and Zucker. There is simply no scientific evidence for their claims, and scientific evidence that directly refutes it.
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 6:04 pm
Cindy,
The article is overreaching itself. MRIs are too expensive to be used as diagnostic tools like that.
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 6:06 pm
My fundamental problem with searching for a biological reason for trans is that there’s more likely a cluster of biological reasons than one particular gene switch or knobbly part of the brain – and once one particular switch is discovered, then anybody who doesn’t display that exact form of biological evidence will, to put it bluntly, get fucked over even harder than they already are.
It is sure interesting to think about, but given that scientists don’t know for sure what causes ADHD, dyslexia, or a host of other far more common traits which are arguably just as difficult for the individual to cope with, it seems a little too much like it’s just a trendy thesis topic for PHDs – Tabloid science as it were.
I do believe however that there is a blindingly obvious form of absolute biological proof of trans people though – and that is the existence of trans people, all over the world, and in all different cultures, with all different tones of skin colour, socioeconomic brackets, religions and speaking all sorts of different languages (these things have all been proposed by people opposed to biological proof of gay, ADHD, Dyslexia, trans, etc.)
Mainly I fail to see just how any evidence whatsoever is likely to influence bigotry or ‘X’~phobic reactions – After all, these things are not logical in and of themselves, so what’s the point in throwing logic at them.
As it is we know 100% for certain that trans exists (if not 100% why), and we know a pretty good cure for dysphoria. The problem isn’t what causes trans, it’s what causes bigotry, and I don’t see bigotry abating due to any biological proof.
Em
27 Jan 11 at 8:28 pm
Yeah, scientific research is not going to prevent bigotry. There’s already been research pointing to neurological causes going back over a decade, and it all just gets dismissed.
I think there’s a tendency to mark research as all bad, though, which I disagree with. It’s not helpful and I would rather the money be spent on finding practical ways to help trans people.
What I would like to see is whether research like this can be used to shift policy like health care coverage and legislation. I don’t think there’s much at all that can shift bigotry, after all.
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 9:17 pm
And I think I should point out that research wrt ADHD and other conditions has resulted in better education and treatment. ADHD, for example shifted from being considered a superficial childhood-only disorder to being seen as a lifelong condition for the majority who have it, and more and more doctors and psychiatrists becoming educated about it and knowing to diagnose and prescribe to adults. it is still far from ideal, but the outcome has generally been positive, on the treatment front.
Similarly, it was research that resulted in Asperger’s Syndrome being added to the DSM-IV, which meant a lot of people who were falling through the cracks prior to its addition started getting the support they needed. It’s still far from perfect and the state of autism research is generally terrible, but in general it seems that an increased understanding of existing conditions has resulted in improved protocols and education for medical professionals.
I also know that research that has explored how these things function has not resulted in more expensive, more technological testing procedures. Rather, research like this has typically been used to demonstrate that the people who are diagnosed from the DSM-IV or whatever have a particular thing going on in their brains that affects them in particular or pervasive ways. So it is actually more likely that this research would mean that trans people who seek transition would be seen as likely to have neurological differences as described in this article, and not expected to undergo expensive research-level MRIs to prove they are trans.
I don’t think it’s possible for any piece of research to be a magic bullet that will solve all of our problems, and some research is almost certainly more problematic than others, but I find it difficult, having been up to my eyeballs in medical research for the past several months, to believe that the only possible outcomes for research like this are negative, or at least not positive.
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 9:24 pm
Also:
I’m not saying nothing bad can come of this. It’s pretty clear that – for one example – Autism Speaks is looking at earlier and earlier identification to make it feasible to identify and abort potentially autistic fetuses in the womb (although I don’t know how likely this outcome is) and a so-called medical ethicist argued here on QT that it would be better to abort potentially trans fetuses than subject them to lives of discrimination and misery (under the assumption that trans lives are automatically unlivable).
So I realize this is a possibility, and I don’t want to dismiss that, I just want to point out that research has good as well as bad outcomes.
Lisa Harney
27 Jan 11 at 9:50 pm
Oh, I’m not anti research at all, a great deal of good does come from different researches, and as I said above, it’s sure interesting. In truth I spend a fair bit of time reading research papers (mainly non-trans related stuff), and find them pretty interesting.
I do question the intent of certain types of research – for instance finding a way of identifying trans babies in utero is a concept that makes me shudder, I just know that it would be abused rather than used to normalise us. – Likewise there’s a risk of abuse in trying to find definitive tests in adults to decide whether they should be allowed to transition or not.
So long as nobody expects to find ‘a magic bullet’ then the research is potentially a good thing in that it normalises and legitimises peoples experience – I’m just a little bit leery of the people (not you :D ) who tout research as a means of ‘proving that we exist, and that we should exist’ ~ when our existence is already a given and our right to exist is basic human rights.
I do also think that pop-science and the reportage of the same often do an appallingly bad job of explaining the things they’re researching and the ramifications of their research.
Em
27 Jan 11 at 10:25 pm
Yeah, research won’t prove we exist. That’s axiomatic.
Mostly I was going off on my own take – I didn’t mean to direct that at you, just a general reaction to a lot of the negativity in reaction to the research. In part, I have difficulty understanding not wanting to have factual information… Like, I don’t understand not wanting to know how things work.
I totally understand concerns about unethical use of this information.
Lisa Harney
28 Jan 11 at 1:31 am
Yeah, I do like to know how things work, it’s just a pity that many (I won’t say most) people prefer the simplest (to them) explanation, even when it flies in the face of all evidence.
Em
28 Jan 11 at 1:55 am
Great post. The crucial thing is that – once there is a supposedly test for transexuality, those who fail it can be classed as ‘not-transexual’ no matter how they identify. And, if the objective scientific truth (I apologize for using the term) turns out to be that there were several ways of being transexual, those people will have been made to suffer completely unfairly.
Any such attempt is bad science because it gets caught up in completely circular reasoning – “Our method picks up transexual brain waves which we define as those brain waves which our method picks up.”
I favour the statistical explanation – why are you trans? Someone had to be to make the numbers up – or the existential one – why are you trans? It was Thursday, it was raining.
Hands off our bodies, hands off our minds.
Roz Kaveney
30 Jan 11 at 4:28 pm
(these comments are as interesting as the post)
science IS interesting,
but never seems to end up helping in any way.
i guess i wouldn’t necessarily be against it if it did….not sure, as it isn’t there.
but “history is written by the victors”,
so to speak…..
as Winston Churchill (a Tory)said…..
so i guess maybe we shouldn’t hold our collective breaths.
javier
31 Jan 11 at 2:13 pm
I agree with most of the sentiment, but I disagree that these kinds of studies can’t help reduce prejudice. Most of the applicable social psychological evidence suggests that attributions of responsibility feed prejudicial reactions to stigmatized groups. For example, exposing people to evidence that weight is partially heritable actually reduces overall expressions of weight-based prejudice. See, for example:
Crandall, C.S. (1994). Prejudice against fat people: Ideology and self-interest. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 66, 882-894.
Lewis, R.J., Cash, T.F., Jacobi, L., & Bubb-Lewis, C. (1997). Prejudice toward fat people: The development and validation of the Anti-fat Attitudes Test. Obesity Research, 5, 297-307.
Granted, none of this research is about transphobia (give me a few years and I’ll get on it – haha), but it seems reasonable to predict that there might be some benefit to evidence of an underlying biological explanation, even though such evidence cannot possibly be a complete etiology, for the reasons listed in the OP.
(Incidentally, I’m also sorta irked by the tendency of the OP to conflate gender-stereotypic behaviors with gender identity. Those of us in the trans community who argue that we are men, women, or anything else because of an ineluctable sense of self rarely mean that we like pink or monster trucks or whatever for the same reason.)
Sara
31 Jan 11 at 7:18 pm
@Sara:
Point taken with regards to most of your comment although I was also arguing against that mentality, that decency and dignity should not be contingent on the fact that “we can’t help it.”
Secondly, as to your last paragraph… that is absolutely -not- what I was saying.
I’m sorry if you got any indication of that from what I wrote but I was actually arguing the opposite. Many cis scientists judge trans people’s transness by how stereotypical we are, and my point was that any etiology would have to account for the complexity inherent to the fact that we all express our genders very, very differently.
This includes the fact that I, say, do not like pink. But for most run of the mill psychologists and so on, the stereotype still is that trans women such as myself grew up wanting to wear pretty pink dresses and play with dolls- which is absolutely untrue.
I was arguing *against* conflating gender-stereotypic behaviours with gender.
Quinnae Moongazer
31 Jan 11 at 7:24 pm
[...] From QT: [...]
More controversy(around on the web):
31 Jan 11 at 9:25 pm
Yeah, I shouldn’t have implied that you were arguing that. I just meant that, while many cis psychologists in the *clinical* field judge our transness based on stereotypes, the goals of the *neurology* studies sometimes differ, and may point at something closer to gender-as-sense-of-self rather than gender-as-set-of-behaviors. That doesn’t mean such findings wouldn’t be used to try to justify stereotypes, of course, but it’s a given that stereotypes bias interpretations of most new information anyway.
Sara
1 Feb 11 at 10:42 am
This is a brilliant post and I hope you don’t mind if I link it. I’ve always hated the viewpoint that being outside the heteronormative box was only acceptable if science could only prove that certain people can’t help being trans/queer/poly, etc. You’re right, even if science could prove that, it won’t stop the hate, discrimination, and violence against trans people. People will still see it as wrong, a wrong that some people can’t help being, but still wrong and that’s enough justification for them to be assholes.
I really like what you said about how the reality of one’s humanity should be enough to settle the question of one’s humanity. That’s the way it should be.
Lika
2 Feb 11 at 9:28 am
Thank you so much for this post.
Julissa
2 Feb 11 at 6:16 pm
It’s not your job to be educating the privileged, but I wanted to let you know that this post was extremely helpful and I thank you so much for writing this.
I don’t want to presume knowledge of how anyone experiences their gender, but I agree: the focus on a “biological source!!!1″ made me skeptical if only because I had always been taught to approach gender as a social construct. Now, I don’t mean to water down your beautifully thoughtful essay into “it’s just culture, moving on” but it was genuinely something of a surprise to me to see gender-as-construct is approached that way (not to say by all) in the trans community, because elsewhere it’s aaaaaalways about defining gender in absolute scientific FACTS. This, of course, is Derailing101, and now I think I can see it that much more clearly.
If I’m wrong in any part, in any way, I welcome the correction.
Heyella
3 Feb 11 at 12:12 am
I, er, think there’s significantly more diversity in trans people’s positions on gender and what gender is.
I think both biological determinism and social construction are heavily oversimplified approaches to explain what’s going on. I think a lot of cis people focus excessively on the idea that transitioning is strictly about gender roles and don’t really acknowledge that many (not all) trans people transition because of the need to have a physically appropriate body. That need for transition says nothing about what men and women are supposed to be like, however, and it’s frustrating when some constantly try to make it out to be such.
Lisa Harney
3 Feb 11 at 8:44 pm
[...] Raiders of the Lost Etiology: … this vexatious quest betrays another deeply rooted assumption about gender in our society that plainly reveals our position as The Other. Where are the studies that inquire why cis people are cis? Or why heterosexual people are het? [...]
Linkspam outside alone after dark (5th February, 2010) | Geek Feminism Blog
4 Feb 11 at 12:20 pm
[...] than the brain scans that Quinnae critiqued last week, this research has an immediate, practical, obvious purpose. Hopefully this data will translate [...]
Injustice at Every Turn at Questioning Transphobia
5 Feb 11 at 4:30 am
History seems to bare out that any advancement in knowledge can be used to either harm or help, and that anything possible is eventually put into practice. So does this mean we should cry out for a discontinuation of scientific inquiery, in the name of preventing possible and likely inevitable abuses of the knowledge gained?
Of course, as an often villified minority within our larger human community, we should be concerned and watchful, perhaps even vigilent concerning the abuse of such research as yet another means or supposed justification to marginalize us, as a community or any supposed sub-set within the trans-community. I’m curious, however, about all the speculation cited about possible infringments upon our rights through the expedient abuse of such research, and the lack of actual examples of scientists, politicians, etc., (excluding, of course, the rabid agendas of religious extremists) calling for such research to be utilized for the kind of social engeneering the OP warns about.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not claiming I believe there are no such agendas being promoted. I’m merely a bit surprised such examples weren’t as readily submitted for our consideration. My reasoning being that to attack scientific inquiery rather than agendas to exploit such research to further and more thoroughly attempt to justify discrimination against our trans-communtiy misses the point of the real danger.
Perhaps I’m being naive here, or not paranoid enough as the case may be. Essentially I do agree with a lot of the comments made in response to this post made by my trans- brothers and sisters, that there is reason for concern here. I just believe the focus of this concern is slightly misplaced. Science is a tool, and like any tool its use for good or evil is not self-determined. So, I’m more interested in who is really conducting agenda-directed research and who has the motive and means to abuse legitimate research for their nefarious political agendas. I see this, in other words, as less a matter of scientific ethics than a question of political agendas.
If soneone strikes and injures you with a hammer, should we, as a consciencious society, prosecute the hammer? Of course I do agree with the cited dangers of pop (especially agenda-driven) science as a tool designed for only corrupt purposes. Yet, here again, do we focus on the tool or the tool’s designers?
I do not intend my comments to be taken in opposition to anyone else’s comments given here – just another perspective to consider, right along with what the more qualified responders have offered as food for thought.
In closing, I’d just like to state how much I admire the passion and intelligence of the very thoughtful posters responding in this thread. We have a diverse and beautiul and very human community deserving all the dignity we afford ourselves, in lieu of the cis community’s willingness to universally recognize our legitimate civil and human rights. Let’s try to not sabotage ourselves by either over- or under-reacting to any preceived challenge. There’s as much danger in us appearing paranoid as in seeming too submissive or compliant when it comes to responding to social and political rhetoric coming from the often ignorant and prejudiced cis community at large. Let’s be wary of not doing bigots’ anti-trans propoganda for them; let’s not don the victims’ mantle via our oratory’s too-often fatalistic perspective.
Christina Shannon
29 Mar 11 at 8:10 pm
You do have a point in that all science isn’t bad, but that how it is used can be problematic.
The hammer bit though is a poor analogy – the person who struck someone with a hammer would be charged with hitting someone ‘with a hammer’, it’s not like that’s the same as hitting someone with a fist. Yet if someone uses science to harm a group of people they probably won’t be charged with anything at all, let alone charged with ‘doing harm with science’ – this despite the fact that it can be a very effective social weapon.
If anything they’ll probably get paid a lot of money and cited as a specialist on the topic.
Em
29 Mar 11 at 10:36 pm
Point taken, Em. I just believe that approaching this potential problem with the idea in mind that such research should be banned or even challenged, rather than addressing the violation of our human and civil rights by an undereducated and so unsympathetic majority of the society we must live in puts us in a similar camp with fundementalist who demand certain books be banned from public and school libraries (at least in regard to methodology) despite our obviously different agendas.
I don’t think it serves us to come off as defensive and extreme. Spending our energy and efforts on the dissemination of accurate information about ourselves and taking a stand for our civil and human rights on the basis of being human, however, is neither defensive nor extreme. It is proactive, non-invasive, and in reality is non-threatening, despite how the fringe minority of extremists will continue to see us.
The loudest clamour to deny our rights, to be sure, come from a minority of cis people. The majority, if educated about the realities of being trans, would quite likely refrain from prejudicial attitudes and actions. After all, many people claimed that a black president was a radical and impossible pipe-dream of a self-deluded minority. They were wrong! Enough of a majority of voters proved them wrong in 2008, despite all the efforts of the religious right and of even more extreme racist and hate groups in the US.
Have a little faith in the capacity of the average cis person’s capacity for compassion and empathy for the so-called “other” in society. It’s only the loud and obnoxious minority who are and will likely remain intollerant despite anything we do to challenge their heart-felt biases based on the ignorance they cling to for dear life.
Christina Shannon
30 Mar 11 at 8:40 am
Christina, you appear to have misread my article if you think I’m calling for this kind of research to be “banned” (and it’s incredibly dubious from any perspective to suggest that *challenging* science is bad).
Here is what I said at the end, in a summary that effectively acts as a thesis statement for the article:
“The search for biological explanations is perfectly fine in and of itself. It is not fine for that to act as a substitute for real moral and political discussion. This research is an academic curiosity. It must never be the fulcrum upon which our rights and dignity as human beings rest.”
Where in that statement, an idea expanded upon throughout the article, am I coming across as a fundamentalist who wants to ban things she doesn’t like? Your comparisons suggest that you either did not fully read the article or that you skimmed over certain parts.
Quinnae Moongazer
30 Mar 11 at 8:51 am
Please accept my apology, Quinnae. I wasn’t actually referring to your article in general or to any of the many valid points you made therein, when I employed the “fundementalist” comparrison. I was referring to some of the more paranoid-tinged comments in postings that responded to your article, as well as reactions I’ve come across elsewhere for actually banning any scientific inquiery along these lines – from both sides of the divide, by the way.
As far as questioning science goes, I didn’t mean we should not question motives, methods, or (especially dubious) results like I admit it sounded in my mini-diatribe. I meant we should not jump on the band wagon of those who deem science (as a whole) an evil force in society to be erradicated. And believe me when I state I’ve heard a call for this far too often, and again, from both sides of the artificial philosophical divide between cis and trans people.
Reactionaries and extremists, like cis people and trans people, come in all shapes, sizes, and brands of fear-based bias and resulting political practice. To ignore this kind of diversity is naive at best and potentially self-defeating. Please Don’t take this, my observation, as having anything to do with you (I don’t know you, other than through your articale) or your well-considered article, itself, Quinnae; I just mean to say that as a diverse community, trans people are not universally immune to being reactionary, even in the name of supporting tolerance.
Christina Shannon
30 Mar 11 at 1:02 pm
Reactionaries and extremists are a minority of any demographic, generally when their numbers start to swell it’s a sure sign that something is badly wrong – to talk about extremist anti-science trans people as though they were the majority isn’t exactly any more helpful than what the extremists are doing. Making out that the extremists are a majority rather than a vocal minority allows our detractors to cheerfully dismiss as extremist even the moderate and rational arguments which would carry our demographic towards equal rights.
I’m only willing to speak for my own opinion as word and thought (especially on the interwebz) can be terribly dimorphic with regards to intent and received meaning.
When I wrote in the comments above that I’m extremely leery of people pursuing trans as a trendy PHD topic (some do) and that science can be misused this was partially because history has proven this, and partially because science itself doesn’t help us (generic human us) as people.
I live in a country which has basic human rights for trans people, gay people, and other demographics which are either unsupported, or actively reviled in other countries – it’s not perfect here, and awful shit still happens, but we do have a basic foundation of human rights to work from – and this hasn’t happened as a result of presenting scientific studies to regular people on the street.
Scientific research is essentially “by scientists, for scientists” – It does, as findings are confirmed spread beyond that rarefied circle, but it’s still not intended for Joe Bloggs on the street, and frankly most people couldn’t give a rats ass whether the latest scientific research is at odds with their deeply held, lifelong, socially acquired (pseudo)moralistic beliefs.
What we’ve had here instead has been laws which were passed to affirm and quantify our status as human beings (thus worthy of the human rights of our acquired/transitioned status/role). Some of this has been predicated by research, but ultimately it has generally come down to a “moral vote” where people in parliament simply vote for what they believe is morally right – As I said, it’a not perfect here, and we do still have a long way to go before people transitioning, genderqueer people, and people percieved that way can expect a fair go, but we do have a basis to work from.
Science is great, and frankly most of the people who choose to write a doctoral or post doctoral thesis defending their (often reductive) beliefs about what makes people trans will probably be dismissed eventually as over-simplistic and/or flawed as evidence of variety gradually develops, but the path to human rights lies with the law, supported by (a rather small amount of reasonably proven) science rather that rhetoric supported by the latest studies, or even, god forbid, science based on rhetoric.
So no, I’m not really anti science, I just think that science as a focus for gaining rights is a little misguided as rights are a legal issue and that science is something of a side issue until those basic preliminary rights (and protections) are granted and a dialogue can be started on a more even footing.
Em
30 Mar 11 at 2:07 pm
Hi Em,
Seems to be some miscommunication between us here. I never claimed extremists are a mojority – whether among cis or trans people. Part of my point was that they are a very vocal minority, and that we should avoid the appearance of being part of that ilk for the very reasons you state in your latest response.
I’m also in agreement with you on your point about this issnue being a political and moral human rights issue, not one that should be decided by scientific research and results. My point is that to vehemently react against scientific research (and I’m not saying you are) in the name of trying to protect ourselves from bigotted cis people comes across as extreme and paranoid in a way we can’t afford, again for reasons you also stated. We aren’t going to get anywhere with reasonable cis people and legislators if they see us as a reactionary militant threat.
This is precisely why I suggested that we expend our time and energy and resourcs on educating cis people about transgenderism rather than continue to give them excuses to believe we’re a bunch of (in this case anit-science) kooks.
Besides this, I do disagree with one contention put forward by some responders about how scientific evidence concerning genetic predisposition will not sway anyone’s opinion. Yes, I know there are those who have had negative experiences in arguing the point with family members, etc., who obviously were not going to be swayed by any kind of argument or evidence. This is anecdotal evidence, however, and does not speak to the simple fact that (not counting rabid biggots, who are in the minority) reasonable people do respond to reasonable evidence. It’s also a simple, though sad fact, that many people tend to have a bias against choice when perceived as a factor in a condition or a state of being that they don’t understand and are suspicious about.
We are not going to get anywhere without allies who will go the distance for us, and if we alienate our allies and potential allies by acting as if all cis people are prejudice, at best, and out to oppress us, we might as well go back into the closet and [redacted]
Christina Shannon
31 Mar 11 at 8:13 am
That is coming across to me at least as intensely reductive.
You have stated that respondents here are anti science, that they are fundamentalist, and “anti-science kooks” – yet I’m not seeing that at all – the responses are far more nuanced than that, even from the people who are opposed to using science as a basis for claiming equal treatment.
I personally do not believe that any minority should be expected or required to educate people – Having my safety contingent on the eloquence or lack thereof of a person that I do not know is not something that I’d ever agree with.
When you say that reasonable people will respond to reasonable evidence you do not allow for the fact that WE STILL DO NOT KNOW WHAT CAUSES TRANS in all cases, and we only have suspicions (some strong admittedly) for what causes particular flavours of trans.
If the aforementioned ‘reasonably’ person listens to half a dozen people at different points ardently explain that trans is caused by Genetic predispositions – intersex conditions – physical variance in autonomous control system structures in the brain – personal choice – hormonal wash in utero – natural neurological variance – or social conditioning – or even harry benjamin condition (oops, that’s 8) then they’re going to wonder if we’re making this all up and what we are, as a group, hiding. Yet there is varying amounts of evidence for each of these propositions (ranging from spurious to compelling).
Dismissing as ‘anecdotal’, comments which you are not willing to allow for, is also problematic – try reading Bailey et al on how trans women are really confused gay men – their entire hypothesis is wholly anecdotal – yet it gets trotted out repeatedly to argue against far better science – moreover, to tell someone that something that they have personally experienced is anecdotal is falicious – direct phenomenological evidence is anything but anecdotal in the first telling – a sentence that starts “I have heard…” is anecdote – “I have experienced…” is not.
Minorities do not achieve equal rights through citing science, nor through individually educating people who discriminate against them – they achieve equal rights through legal re-mediation and through normalisation.
We have plenty of allies already, every person who believes that we are just regular people and that we shouldn’t be discriminated against is an ally. They don’t need to know that we’re scientifically special little snowflakes to accept us as human, and frankly insisting that people research us and take on board every little difference point by point – science by rote, isn’t exactly going to help us be normalised within society.
Also – the binaristic choice of ‘Accept science and take on the role of an educator or go back in the closet and hang yourself’ – That shit’s offensive aye? – It’s exactly the same as “If you’re not out and ‘honest’ then you’re ashamed and *-phobic”.
In summary;
I do not feel that I have an obligation to educate people.
I do not feel that my human rights should be contingent on scientific proof, when this same onus is not placed on the rights of cis people.
Not devoting my life to educating people about trans does not make me either anti science, nor does it make me ashamed of who I am.
The science is not there as a quantitative empirical block to educate people anyhow – there is still much speculation.
Finally, much of the science (but not all) around trans is based on rhetoric rather than statistics, and as a personal opinion, I suspect that much bad behaviour is based on rhetoric, and it is the law which curtails bad behaviour – thus I’d still focus on gaining equal legal rights rather than trying to educate people on how we as a demographic are ‘different’ to them – normalisation rather than othering would be my goal.
Em
31 Mar 11 at 3:04 pm
I can haz typological errorz?
Em
31 Mar 11 at 3:08 pm
Wow, Em, why so hostile?
Okay, I’ve taken a deep breath, and I’ve reminded myself to not take your response personally. So, here’s my (now that I’ve chilled out a bit) response, for what it’s worth.
How do you suppose legislators who recognize our humanity and respect the diversity of the human as well as trans condition are going to be elected in order to make laws protecting our human rights if the populace (voters) remains ignorant about and thereby hostile to us as a minority in the larger human (and voting) community?
You argue eloquently for legislative solutions. I agree. You point out that there is not only not a universal trans condition or nature but a myriad of ways of bieng trans. I agree. In fact, most of what you have stated strikes me as relevant and true, yet you seem to take offense at the suggestion that we might do well to do what we can to challenge the ignorance of those who might otherwise become allies – or, in other words, those who might actually vote for progressive legislators.
You also seem to take the attitude that because science has yet to discover the possible and various mechanisms that cause a person to be either trans or cis that it is virtually worthless and would merely confuse the issue. The fact that being trans is not merely a delusional and frivolous life-style choice (in the way that most ignorant cis people believe) could be a valuable and effective argument to sway those whose prejucice is based only on ignorance and not on a pathological phobia.
Of course, you have no obligation to educate cis people who are ignorant, nor should any of us have to be placed in that position, but the fact remains that as long as cis people remain ignorantly attached to stereo-typical mythology that promotes our “otherness” rather than our humanity, we will remain as “other” in their eyes. So go ahead and defiantly assert your right to not educate those around you in the name of your dignity as a human being who should not have to prove her humanity. More power to you, sister, if that’s what you feel will be most effective. I’m just suggesting another alternative (in addition to, not in lieu of) what you feel is the proper and most effective stance to take. So, please don’t keep assuming I’m hostile to your perspective. I respect your right, and everyone else’s, to decide the position and/or action to take, if any, in trying to assert our human rights.
As for my admittedly over-the-top closet/suicide comment – that’s called humor. It was meant to be ironic, to prove my point that overreaction and extremism sends the wrong message. Sorry you took it literally, but that wasn’t my intent, and I certainly don’t take the position that being in or out of the closet should ever be construed as evidence of being worthy or not worthy, truly trans or facetiously and frivoulously pretending to be trans, etc. That’s absurd! which is why I presumed others would get my use of black, ironic humor. Oh, well, another lesson learned, I suppose.
As far as your apparent assumption that I’m saying that scientific research is the answer to our dilemma goes, I’m again sorry I wasn’t clearer about this. I’m merely stating that extreme and reactionary stances against scientific inquiery comes across as if we are like flat-earthers and other anti-tech phobics. To ignore the fact that most reasonable people respond better to emperical evidence, even if it’s not conclusive and/or complete than an individual or group of individuals claiming something should be accepted as true because they say it is, is perhaps a bit naive. Even if not technically anecdotal, because of making the claim that this is what I experienced, rather than this is what I heard, it still comes across as anecdotal in the sense that people precieve it as an opinion as opposed to a fact. So let’s not use semantics to cloud the real issue here, which is that people place more value onto what they perceive as facts than on what they perceive as opinions – even those based upon another’s personal experience, even those based upon a goup of people’s personal experiences.
As I imply in an earlier response, I am far from the most qualified contributor to this conversation, but to dismiss my perspective as worthless, on the grounds that it does not exactly coincide with your “educated” opinions, and in such a reactive and hostile manner doesn’t really allow for a very helpful dialogue, IMHO. After all, we’re both very passionate about wanting to see our human rights acknowledged and honored. I’m not the enemy here; I just wanted to point out that taking a position that anyone who doesn’t seem to completely agree with us, on every single point, is our enemy is self-defeating in our goal to have a majority of cis people respect our human rights – what you call “normalization” in your response. Yes, our rights should be honored as a matter of what is right, and not on the basis of whatever the majority deems as morally correct. But the fact remains that until a majority of voters (mostly cis people, after all) see us as human rather than other, this will never happen, legislatively, no matter how much we insist it should.
Perhaps I’m dead wrong. Perhaps, my perspective is skewed and naive. Perhaps your stance will be proven to be exactly what is called for. In the meantime, I passionately respect and will defend your right and mine to put forward our opinons in the name of having a dialogue that might lead to some realistic and effective solutions (plural, as you might notice), rather than decry opinons that differ in some way than mine as unworthy of consideration. Yes, we all have a right to disagree, and yes, some opinons may prove more valid than others, ultimately. But let’s not become hostile toward one another because we imagine we have “thee” answer and that others are misinformed, ignorant, or stupid because they don’t agree with our particular perspective on how to best secure our inalienable rights as members of the human family. Let us not stoop to divisive rhetoric in the name of championing our preciously held opinon that we have possession of some imangined one and only valid perspective. This happened in the women’s movement back in the 70s and severly hindered the movement’s effectiveness. Feminsist became labled, by the reactionary and chauvanistic right, as radical kooks who couldn’t even agree with one another on what a feminist is, much less what their goals were. This label marginalized them and their efforts, because the average voter didn’t take them seriously anymore, at least in so much that the Equal Rights Amendment in the US fell short of ratification.
In closing, I invite you to continue to express your opinions as you see fit, and I’ll do the same. I just hope you begin to see that our goal is the same, even if we don’t completely agree upon the best way to go about attaining that goal. I assert that such dialogue calling for equal rights is necessary even if seemingly contentious. I just don’t think we need to let our differnces alienate and isolate us into feuding factions that those with another agenda, one in opposition to us, can exploit. So, peace sister, and keep on voicing your perspective. Just please be aware that passion can sometimes cause an unintended and regrettable rift; where openmindedness, tolerance and acceptance can heal such unfortunate wounds. Let us stand united in our diversity, rather than let it tear us apart to our detractors’ delight.
With respect and love,
christy
Christina Shannon
1 Apr 11 at 9:30 am
Please go back and re-read what I’ve written – you ascribe to me a bunch of traits and statements which are misreadings at best.
Using immature science rather than rhetoric to forward the rights for a demographic isn’t necessarily a good use of energy, there are many people in our community who are very skilled in rhetoric, so perhaps give them the floor.
Far from being anti science, and frankly I can’t be bothered explaining this again, I am stating that there isn’t any really definitive empirical and statistical scientific support for any of the current theories as to what causes trans – so maybe acting like there is isn’t exactly a good use of energy either.
If scientific evidence is proven to be in support of whatever cause of trans then by all means we should embrace it wholeheartedly, but untill such time I simply think that it’s a good idea to let people skilled in rhetoric have the floor rather than attempt to invoke ‘special little snowflake’ status which will ultimately other rather than normalise us in peoples eyes.
And yeah, if you read hostility into my comment then maybe you should meditate on why it’s perhaps not funny to make “Jokes?” about suicide to someone, or to a group of people, who’ve seen more than a few people step off the ride. Saying that something was ‘only a joke and to get a sense of humour’ doesn’t excuse you from offensive behaviour in the slightest.
I’m done talking. Someone can take this up if they care to.
Em
1 Apr 11 at 1:35 pm
Apologies for not seeing this sooner:
This is completely unnecessary and unacceptable. I actually find it a fairly harmful thing to say.
Also, I would appreciate it if people could spend more time not assigning motivations and emotions that are not in evidence. I didn’t see any hostility – or indeed, many of the things – in Em’s posts that Christina saw, and I wonder how they were perceived in the first place.
Lisa Harney
1 Apr 11 at 2:25 pm
Have it your way, Em. If you’d bothered to acutally consider what I’ve written in each of my responses instead of being so dismissive out of hand, you might have realized our positions are far closer than your hostility has allowed you to recognize. You have consistently misread or misinterpreted what I’ve written, ever since your second response. And I have re-read your postings several times. I’m sorry that you felt that I was contentiously singling you and your comments out. I wasn’t making any of this personal; that was your interpretation and subsequent reaction “in kind” toward what you misread into my comments. I won’t claim this is the first time that anyone has infered meanings simply not in my comments, nor the most blatant, but come on, even when I clarify what I mean, you still read what you want into it in order to claim I’m making rediculous and reductive assumptions. That’s just a fancy way of calling me stupid. Or perhaps you only meant to imply I’m too incompitent to express ideas worth considering when you stated that, “I simply think that it’s a good idea to let people skilled in rhetoric have the floor rather than attempt to invoke ‘special little snowflake’ status which will ultimately other rather than normalise us in peoples eyes.”
Where in blue blazes do you interpret that anything I stated means that I believe in “other”-ing us rather than “normalizing” us in the debate with cis people? I’ve called for the very same thing as you have here, if you’d ever bother to read, instead of read-into, what I actually stated. This is as dismissive as it gets, Em, to claim I’m stating the opposite of what I actually wrote. I feel like I’m trapped in a George Orwell novel when redressing your accusations. And for the last time: I never once stated that science is “thee” answer, or that I believed you, personally, are anti-science! I said that some posted comments (which I never specified nor made an attribution to) come off as sounding anti-science. This is actually two entirely different things, unless one who made an inciteful sounding comment misreads it as a personal attack – for whatever reason. Yes, I know hormone therapy gives us thinner skin (literally) but come on, Em, I wasn’t attacking you or your ideas. I was only warning how passionate rhetoric can be seen as extreme and used against us. You have yet to address whether or not you see that as a valid point; you’ve apparently dismissed this (my most important, central point) out of hand, as though not worth your emminent consideration.
I already acknowledged, twice, that I’m not the most qualified person (in a purely accademic sense) to put forward suggestions concerning effective ways to spur an eventual legislative resolution of our common dilemma as marginalized trans-people. However, your latest response is simply condescending and offensive on a level that frankly surprises me. I call for an end to contention between us, to stand united, depite our few differnces, and you ignore that to deride my suggestions, through misstating my comments in your rather dismissive summaries and implication that you and others have a right to post their opinions here but that I should leave this to you and the others you suggest are the only ones worthy, through their rhetorical expertise.
Then you close off the dialogue, altogether, refusing to continue on the basis that I’m apparently to thick to get how much more brilliant you are than a moron like me who should’ve deferentially bowed to your obviously superior intillect several postings ago.
So have it your way. What you’ve obviously choosen to believe about me and my ideas do not define me nor do your vitriolic opinions based on your misreading of my comments determine the actual value of my ideas any more than what any biggoted cis person says about my gender (or anyone elses) – and, no, I’m not calling or implying that you are like a biggoted cis person, I am saying you have reductively and quite expediently interpreted my comments to serve your agenda’s promotion rather than to engage in an honest and respectful discourse with me. I am not easily roused to anger, but you’ve succeeded in turning this dialogue personal and quite unnecessarily contentious.
And by the way, I never said that my closet/suicide comment was a joke; it was the use of ironic black humor to evoke an empathetic and visceral response to the dangers of extremism in our presentation of ourselves to the cis majority who hold our fate in their hands whether you like it or not, whether you accept it or not. My use of humor was deadly serious, not some flippant joke like you’ve wrongly accused me of insensitively employing. Do you really imagine I, or any of our sisters, are ignorant of how many of us have taken our own lives? How dare you! You don’t know me and haven’t even tried to listen to what I really have to say, that much is obviously and painfully clear. That’s your perogative, Em. But when you misrepresent my comments to villify them and me, you’ve gone too far. So take your “‘special little snowflake’” sarcasm with you and peddle it to whoever is willing to put up with your ego-centric elitist attitude. I’m done trying to reason with and make peace with you, since you so obviously have deemed me unworthy to speak in the same arena as you and whoever else you consider in your rarified and privilleged intellectual league to be your equal.
As for me, I’ll gladly listen to and accept your apology if it’s ever forthcoming, the same way I’ve apologized to you a number of times in the assumption that I was not making my points clear enough for you to not continue to misread my meaning. And yes, I am sorry that it has come down to this, and I do regret that I failed to find a way to prevent what started out as a productive dialogue from devolving into such a personal pissing contest between us. I have no qualms about owning up to my part. It remains to be seen if you are women enough to admit your part, too, or if you’ll continue to take the very male stance of not only insisting you are completely right, that I’m completely wrong, and that I bare all responsibility, alone, for this becoming personal.
I also apologize to others who have been following this devolving conversation. For my part, I regret letting my passion get the better of me, and I will do my best to refrain from personalizing anything on this site again like I did here. I have no excuse. I should’ve known better, and admitting this as well as promising to amend my conduct is the best I can do to make up for my inappropriate behavior. My apology and amends is intended especially for you, Em. I am sorry, and I never meant to get so out of control of myself. Looks like I’m pretty thin-skinned, too, at least more so than I’d normally like to admit – even to myself. So, sorry for that flippant comment, Em, and any others I slipped in there, too.
Sincerely and remorsefully,
Christy
Christina Shannon
1 Apr 11 at 4:02 pm
That’s an apology?
I’m going to let someone else field this.
Em
1 Apr 11 at 4:14 pm
This is your single warning: Misgendering anyone here is against the comment rules. Don’t ever do that again.
And I am not going to argue over whether you think you were misgendering Em or not. You suggested if she did not behave according to your expectations that she has taken a “very male stance.”
Drop it.
Lisa Harney
1 Apr 11 at 4:33 pm
Wow. Sounds friendly.
Look, I’m not anti-science; a few people have been silly enough to fund my research in neurosci on a variety of topics, enough so to cover my grad education. So here here for science. That said, neither the author nor Em are against science. Quinnae is correct in that a singular focus on science as salvation may be fraught with failure. Certainly, “some” will see a bio/neurological/evolutionary rationale for our existence as more reason to be accepting. It jumps the choice debate. That’s nice. Unfortunately, an understanding of skin pigmentation hasn’t solved racism. Nor has an understanding of gender differences solved sexism. Assuming it’ll be utterly different for us may be naive.
Beyond this, “some” will also use a cause as a reason to pursue a cure. It’s not idle fantasy; both ours and the Nazi government toyed with solving being a POC. Already conservative camps continue to advocate for reparative therapy for LGBT people in spite of recent suicides associated with their practices.
The long and the short of it is that a scientific rationale for why we exist — and it’s interesting we need to provide this yet cis folks don’t — will help us and hurt us. Increasing social acceptance through advocacy only helps. Advocacy is also a heck of a lot cheaper than scientific studies, and probably a heck of a lot faster; it sounds like a good way to go. Even as a scientist I’m with the Quinnae on this one.
FWIW, Christy, I’m not sure these responses are helping.
Jackie
1 Apr 11 at 5:47 pm
@Jackie: what a great comment.
What struck me: the “can’t help it” Ann Landers rationale for gayness aside, claims of biological determinism are generally not employed to the benefit of the oppressed.
Perhaps more to the point, and in agreement with the author of the essay…being trans is my window, my best and most perfect window, on what it is to be other. If that awareness does not lead me to fight for human dignity — a dignity based on intrinsic worth independent of whether the different can “help themselves” or not — then the gift is wasted. I am not inclined to think that finding some biological causative will improve anything for anyone.
A great deal of money and academic energy seems to go into why we exist. As opposed to, y’know, medical access and health issues.
jessl
2 Apr 11 at 11:22 am
I’d like to address Christina’s choice to deploy the use of the terms “anti-science,” “extremist,” and their variants as a means of trying to silence or dismiss views with which she disagrees.
as a basic principle and value, I think each individual deserves the freedom to determine their own path to meaning and truth. this means that nobody should be compelled (particularly violently compelled) to aver allegiance to a religious doctrine- it should be their free choice what to believe or not-believe. this freedom of belief extends out beyond what is termed religion, to also philosophy, epistemology, spirituality, metaphysics. regardless of whether a supreme being is involved, we all should have the freedom to determine our own beliefs on what is or is not out there.
and that brings me to science. I’d like to investigate why exactly it’d be considered an insult, or at least a discrediting factor, to call a person “anti-science.” there are some questions that science is well-equipped to answer, such as how a particular vaccine acts to prevent a particular infectious disease. and there are areas of human experience which, in my personal opinion, to not find all their explanations and answers in the realm of science.
I also keep close in mind and heart that humans have done much evil in the name of science, and have done much evil science. eugenics is the example that jumps most quickly to my mind; all manner of human experimentation also. for these reasons, I do not personally think it’s a bad thing if some stranger on the internet deems me “anti-science”- particularly if that mostly refers to my deep cynicism about the motivations and potential harm done by cissexual scientists attempting to determine etiology.
on a similar note. many of the people I consider role models and heros, including civil rights activists and revolutionaries, have been deemed “extremeists” by their contemporaries. if the status quo is violent, oppressive, and ignorant- why would I not want to stand at the opposite “extreme”? in my opinion there’s much support for the proposition that one doesn’t attain equality or justice by asking nicely.
so in conclusion… I see the charge of being “anti-science” and being “extreme” or “reactionary” as empty labeling and posturing. I think it is more productive to engage with and respond to specific statements and ideas than to march in and declare “all these anti-science extremists need to pipe down, else the cis people will stop listening!!!”
MHS
3 Apr 11 at 9:19 am