Gender Roles

[Tammy Hope]

Sure...

Chiming in here without having finished this exchange because I can't resist, lol.

I think it's true that a given act, whatever it is, has no gender. and you will scarely find an act that is not biologically based (inserting a tampon, shaving a beard) that is not practiced "cross gender" even by those who are secure in their cis-gender.

BUT

I don't think I would be so fast to rule out the concept of "gender roles" - there CLEARLY is SOME thing going on in our heads beyond the particulars of the action in question.

i recall there was once a study designed to support feminist theory to the effect that you could give little girls - pre-schoolers - boy toys and vice versa and they would play just the same as their opposite gender peers.

But they didn't. In large measure the girls rejected the trucks and the boys rejected the dolls.

Further,when we see signs of gender dysphoria in pre-school children it manifests itself precisely in "gender role" type behavior - the "boy" who MUST have a skirt, the "girl" who abhors her long hair.

All these things point to SOME component of our selves that inherently absorbs the cultural concept of gender roles on a VERY early level and fels a tendency to conform to them.

it CAN'T be that these are inherited (in the sense that what is a cultural norm for a female in one culture is not in another) but the mental tendency to identify what is "boyish" and "girly" is clearly something that goes well beyond an artificial cultural construct.  Even when "girly" in one culture is not the same as in another.

SO

In light of that reality, it CAN, I think, be said that some activities have "gender roles" in the sense that in each culture, the very young child will identify and usually gravitate towards those actions which are identified with their own perceived gender in that culture.

And the shorthand for that very complex observation is that, in short, there are roles that, if not "inherently" gendered are at least predominantly gendered.

Thus the concept "gender roles"

[Tammy Hope]

I have notice what Violet point it out, and ponder perhaps as an "overcorrection" mechanis. Personally, I a m what I am, most of the time playing conciously or uncociously a female role, and sometimes uncociosly playing a male role.

I think Sarah points well very well taken.

Love to all,

Perlita

perhaps if I had transitioned younger I might have "overcorrected" in some way i can't now but I find that, for me at least, my "girly-ness" is very much a manifestation of qualities I always had and either had to combat, channel into a maleish outlet, or simply be seen as "less male" on.

For instance, the things I hated about my appearance had no "manly" way to correct so I pretty much just wallowed in my "ugliness" and never took much care of myself, developing some horrendously bad habits I still pay for today.
Alternately, I have always been far too "helpless" for a normal man. The number of times i called on some male relative or in-law to fix something on my car that the average man (around here at least) can do in his sleep is staggering.

I get the point about "compensating" and there are a few ways in which I find myself wanting to (and utterly failing if I try) to compensate (primarily in speech patterns) but I'd say 98% or more of the presentation you'd see if you saw me on the street is very authentically my natural self, not an affected "role playing" character.

[Tammy Hope]

And there, I think perhaps we should leave it, and let Violet have her thread back.

Sorry for the slight derail of which I myself was a part. Even if we didn't end up agreeing it was interesting to see the various arguments.

Right now good people lets try to get back on the original track which I think was about whether people in the early stages of transition tend to try and become the stereotypical member of their target gender, and indeed whether this is simply adopted behavior with intent of making their passage through the "therapy and assessment" stage easier. 

OOPS!!

Sorry! If i read the whole thread first i forget what i was going to reply to!

[Tammy Hope]

Sorry Perlita, those are nothing but unverified theories. The etiology of transsexualism remains an unknown, else there would be peer-reviewed papers being upheld as the definitive reason behind transgender behaviours - and massive media coverage of these breakthroughs.
And I've yet to see either of these things happen.

Slightly off topic. I recently saw a rather compelling discussion, from a scientist with no obvious agenda (political or cultural) which was a scating review of the whole concept of "peer reviewed"

the upshot being that the internal politics and prejudices within the scientific community made the concept of "peer review" lending validity to a study a joke.

Not being a scientist, I'm not in a position to defend the claim but being, as it were, a student of human behavior, i find the likelihood of his being correct very high.

[Tammy Hope]

Hi, Ladies and Gents,

I am and have been a scientist most of my adult life. Like all scientists I work using the scientific method: observe, make an hypothesis, test the hypothesis, conclude, share result with the scientific community (e.g. publish result in a peer-review journal); eventually somebody independently verifies my FACTS and when a series of proven fact accumulates a THEORY on the given phenomena is given. As more facts accumulates the theory is polished and refined, and that is the way modern science work and has come to explain many natural phenomena, including complex human behavior.

I find it fascinating - and it seems to be almost an internet meme - that no matter how well one sources their scientific views, or how qualified the poster, if the assertion contradicts the other posters' views, the slur is "they don't know what science is" or "how science works"

I do not know from personal experience the qualifications of any poster in this thread to speak authoritatively on the subject (except that i myself am massively unqualified) but as an outside observer, hearing one poster slur the other posters' understanding of "what science is" is tantamount to me hearing that person concede the argument because I stop taking them seriously on the point in question.

To use that particular retort against a published scientist would be embarrassing to me.

I don't mean to slag on any poster in this thread - I purposely didn't take note of any names  - i just mean to say that the open statement, which amounts to "clearly you are not as informed as me" seems beneath a discussion on this level.

[Tammy Hope]

One the other hand, my intuitive, experiential side expresses the unhappiness I have always felt, the lack of fit. I experience "fit" when I wear women's clothes, and wear my (long) hair down. I feel comfort when I shave my legs (a totally cultural artifact). I love being called mam, and regret the frequent embarrassed follow-up of "oh, sorry; sir".

Yes Yes YES!

that is EXACTLY my experience. it makes NO logical sense that "artificial" gender constructs like shaved legs or painted nails give me peace but they DO!

[Tammy Hope]

     On the concept of unlearning...that I understand.  Sometimes you get so good at acting that it becomes hard to stop.


   

Agreed.

here are some things i still do that i HATE - hated when i was acting the role which required them - but they are so ingrained in habit that they are the devil to be rid of.

[Tammy Hope]

I first want to address (Vexing? Your name is a dot so I'm not sure.)

I noticed that too. i find it...vexing.

[VeryGnawty]

VeryKnawty: I don't think you and I are very much alike

Apparently not.  I take no pleasure in lying.  Even if I can pull the wool over men's eyes and take advantage of the way my body looks, I don't feel like it empowers me in any way to do that.  It gives me a huge advantage, but in a very sinister and devious way.  It is not in my natural personality to do that.  I had to learn to do that for survival.

I hate every single thing about pretending to be male.  It is not a "treat" being a white male.  It is a curse.  It is not candy.  There is nothing pleasurable about hiding what I truly want just because some people would make my life more difficult if they knew about it.

Japple, I'm glad you can at least find some sort of value in infiltrating the world of men.  I, however, cannot.  The only value I ever got out of being a man is what I learned from it.  Everything else is torture.  I am not a spy.  This is not James Bond.  I am not an actor.

[japple]

Apparently not.  I take no pleasure in lying.

I'm not going to take offense in what I am doing being called lying or sinister.   I'm not lying. I am male-bodied.  While I am male-bodied I am able via good coping mechanism to compartmentalize my despair over being the wrong gender and function in society.  When I become female-bodied I don't imagine myself changing personality-wise at all.   People's perceptions of me will change and that is what sexism and racism is.  If I have good ideas and verbalize them with people perceiving me as a a white male I will get further than if said the exact same things with the same delivery as a non-white male or younger male or female. (in corporate America today.)   Even with transition I will never be a white woman, I will be a white trans-woman.

When it comes to the gender roles and advantages to me it's less about masculine, feminine, passive, aggressive, and more about perception. 

I don't wallow over being trans.  I have an autoimmune disorder that until twice-weekly injections left me pooping on the floor and crawling from my car to house.  I don't wallow.   These things make me sad and are difficult but I am still going to get up and live life the best that I can.

You can call it acting but I call it strength.  No one gets to pick their body.  No one gets to pick their life.  I'm not going to take anything for granted and have been at this for a long time.  Frankly this has put me in a position where i don't have to struggle through transition. I'm not going to lose my spouse because I told her on our first date. I can't lose my job, I own the company. I can afford the choices I make financially.

I'm proud of myself for how I've dealt with this issue.  There is nothing sinister going on here.

[xxUltraModLadyxx]

i was thinking that very long ago when women were treated very badly, had no rights, and only lived to give birth, and be the homemaker for a man. they also had no say in anything, it was whatever the man said. plus, women could not talk in the presence of men. i wonder if the people who were biologically male, but had GID would have even wanted to become women. i wonder how they would've handled those feelings, because GID is not a new thing. it's been in people forever. today, it seems like women have much more power. i know alot of households today, what the woman says goes, and the dad is more like a friend to the kids.

and then think about other species of life, bees for example. the queen bee is the one that's in charge and get's served (female.) while all the rest of the bees in the hive are just worker bees.

[Tammy Hope]

While peer-review may not be perfect, and may in occasion be marred with fraud, t is the best we have. Science is not perfect but what is the alternative? Say in the case of GID? If it is not biological, then what causes GID? Social or psychological traumas? If that was true, then over 80 years of psychological and sociological studies would have discover the common cause? right? If not psychological, then what, evil spirits?

Please don't misunderstand - I am as firmly convinced as it is possible for a layman to be that the major factor, to such an extent as to be the only meaningful factor, is biological.

I was digging at the implication that producing a "peeer reviewed study" would settle it - that is that she was placing too much stock in that as an argument ender as so many tend to.

But no, in this particular instance, your peer-reviewed studies confirm for me that which I already understood intuitively - I have no dispute with their conclusions  (albeit I am not learned enough to have an opinion on WHICH biological factor makes the most sense)

[Tammy Hope]

i was thinking that very long ago when women were treated very badly, had no rights, and only lived to give birth, and be the homemaker for a man. they also had no say in anything, it was whatever the man said. plus, women could not talk in the presence of men. i wonder if the people who were biologically male, but had GID would have even wanted to become women. i wonder how they would've handled those feelings, because GID is not a new thing. it's been in people forever. today, it seems like women have much more power. i know alot of households today, what the woman says goes, and the dad is more like a friend to the kids.

and then think about other species of life, bees for example. the queen bee is the one that's in charge and get's served (female.) while all the rest of the bees in the hive are just worker bees.

sort of like having GID in Saudi Arabia in the 21st century you mean?

[xxUltraModLadyxx]

sort of like having GID in Saudi Arabia in the 21st century you mean?

probably, there's lots of other countries in the world where women don't have nearly as much rights as here in usa.

[pretty pauline]

Thank you Dr. Perlita for the explanation and citations. Very clear.
do some trans-people over-do the gender role markers while they are learning their new behavior? I think over-doing is a natural part of learning a new way of being in the world. Gender role stereotypes give a "pattern-map" for how to behave for someone who was raised to behave differently. It makes sense people would over-do at first just as teenagers sometimes do. Later, with more experience it is easier to have the confidence to do what ever you want

A most interest thread, but thank you Kendall for the last paragraph specially, I can really relate to that, in my situation I find myself embracing a role that most other GG females are rejecting, what most women may find imprisonment I find it liberating, I got married last August, then became a fulltime housewife, other women friends of mine trying to give me advice ''pauline are you mad, fulltime housewife'' but I found it very liberating, I love being a housewife to my Husband, I have now found my role as a woman and my Husband treats and excepts me as a woman and a lady.

Dr Perlita your contribution to this thread has been very interesting and fascinating, thank you. Pauline

[viv]

gender roles? a mold?

*tuts* some parts of society has become more relaxed, it's just that some people wish to keep their thinking the same-afraid of change.

Sure, there are gender roles in society, to be honest. It's a kind of a 'it's there, so it's there' type of mold. People who don't fit into the mold get teased, and perhaps persecuted by other people.

In my opinion, i feel that it's up to each person to decide if the 'gender roles' should be applicable to them.

In a more personal opinion, i feel that it does apply very little to me, in fact, i can break the hold internally to prevent society from having the invisible hold.

[dyslexi]

For 26 years I was in the  role of a 1950's housewife, nurse and mother to my severely handicapped wife. She did all the traditional male stuff like finances etc and i did all the traditional woman's stuff.
I had a hard time with my initial CAMH interview because I did not fit the tg mold they were looking for. I have lived the role for so long in thought and feelings that I am not driven to express it visually as much as  a lot of girls. I am very grounded which may have worked against me in the interview. I am not going to kill myself if they deny my transitioning. I didn't cry myself to sleep as a child wanting to be a girl. I just never compared myself to either gender so  gender roles and mold never entered my life. I am just a girl regardless of any role I could try to play.