I'm trying to find some real research about anything that supports transgenders.

I have this online friend who doesn't believe that people can be trandgendered (or gay).  He thinks it's all just a psychological problem stemmed from something like child abuse.   It's completely wrong.  but he's convinced of it and he bombarded me with all these links to articles to support what he was saying (none of them actually did).  Now I want to do the same thing back to him
We just argue all the time, as logically as we can.  that's how our friendship works.  And he tries to be very logical, but he's also biased because he's religious.  so anyways, I plan to refute everything he gave me, as well as bombard him with any research that supports that transgenders, basically... exist.

I've already got a list going, but I thought I'd ask here as well if anyone knows anything good to add.

You could argue that a person's unwillingness to believe in anything outside of social norms and the mindless following of social norms is nothing more than conditioning and so their beliefs are not based in genuine scientific fact, but rather in emotion relating to the need to be accepted and follow the crowd?

I am also very interested in this topic, particularly about the cause behind gender dysphoria.

Here is a leaflet released by the UK National Health Service.
http://www.gires.org.uk/assets/DOH-Assets/pdf/doh-transgender-experiences.pdf

See the section on Gender Dysphoria - it specifically says that this condition is NOT a mental illness. And that "this condition is increasingly understood to have its origins before birth." It talks about recent research on the development of the brain.

Personally I have felt like a boy since as early as I can recall. So I honestly believe it is something which happened before the child is born.

For the record, I have never been a victim of child abuse or any abuse of any kind.

Any additional info on this topic would be welcome. There needs to be more research into this area.

"It is believed that during the intrauterine period the fetal brain develops in the male direction through a direct action of testosterone on the developing nerve cells, or in the female direction through the absence of this hormone surge. According to this concept, our gender identity (the conviction of belonging to the male or female gender) and sexual orientation should be programmed into our brain structures when we are still in the womb. However, since sexual differentiation of the genitals takes place in the first two months of pregnancy and sexual differentiation of the brain starts in the second half of pregnancy, these two processes can be influenced independently, which may result in transsexuality. This also means that in the event of ambiguous sex at birth, the degree of masculinization of the genitals may not reflect the degree of masculinization of the brain.

There is no proof that social environment after birth has an effect on gender identity or sexual orientation. Data on genetic and hormone independent influence on gender identity are presently divergent and do not provide convincing information about the underlying etiology. To what extent fetal programming may determine sexual orientation is also a matter of discussion. A number of studies show patterns of sex atypical cerebral dimorphism in homosexual subjects. Although the crucial question, namely how such complex functions as sexual orientation and identity are processed in the brain remains unanswered, emerging data point at a key role of specific neuronal circuits involving the hypothalamus"


The abstract for "Sexual differentiation of the human brain in relation to gender identity and sexual orientation" from the journal Progress in Brain Research

All of the scientific research I've seen says basically the same thing or is inconclusive.  I haven't yet found one supporting the view that it's not biological.

There is ample evidence for a biological cause. But what does it matter? What if it was a mental condition? Still the only known cure for GID is transition. No other treatment for GID has had anywhere near the amount of success as transition has.

Regardless of the cause the cure is obvious.

Quote from: cynthialee on May 02, 2011, 02:38:22 PM
There is ample evidence for a biological cause. But what does it matter? What if it was a mental condition? Still the only known cure for GID is transition. No other treatment for GID has had anywhere near the amount of success as transition has.

Regardless of the cause the cure is obvious.

You don't got to tell me that.  I know that.  But I need to find a way to prove that to my friend.

Quote from: cynthialee on May 02, 2011, 02:38:22 PM
There is ample evidence for a biological cause. But what does it matter? What if it was a mental condition? Still the only known cure for GID is transition. No other treatment for GID has had anywhere near the amount of success as transition has.

Regardless of the cause the cure is obvious.

I am afraid I have to disagree on this. Regardless of the fact that there is a successful cure, it is still of paramount importance for us to understand the cause of this condition that has affected the lives of so many. If not for anything else, it is of intrinsic scientific interest to find out the truth or at least try to get as close to the truth as we can.

In addition, if we can gain deeper understanding of the cause of GID, it could also help us study and understand other related conditions affecting human behaviour and develop their cures.

Just because something has a good solution does not mean that the cause of the problem no longer matters.

I am just saying that it is rather silly to try other cures when we have a cure that works and works well.

I never said anything about not looking for causes. I feel as if words have been placed in my mouth.....

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20032-transsexual-differences-caught-on-brain-scan.html

Quote from: Ryan on May 02, 2011, 06:09:47 PM
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20032-transsexual-differences-caught-on-brain-scan.html

Really nice article. The comments at the bottom were also really interesting, especially the ones questioning the notion of "A Cure".

If the definition of "a cure" refers to the complete elimination of a condition, then at the moment there really isn't "a cure" per se for GID, at least not a perfect one. For instance, FTMs can't get a fully functioning penis and cannot produce sperms etc.

However if "a cure" means relieving the symptoms of the condition, then at present we have a good basic working model in some countries, where we allow individuals who show strong desire to transition the medical means (hormones/therapy/surgery/support) and legal/civil rights.

So in terms of scientific research in this area, both the progress of identifying the causation and cures are still fairly crude.

If the search for "a cure" really does bring about the possibility of modifying the brain to be compatible with the physical body, I wonder what society would think? I know most trans people would probably object to this, I'm not endorsing this view at all, but do you think mainstream society would want to adjust say an infant's brain in order to administer an early "cure"? 

Let us turn this one around a bit and make it personal....

If your doctor told you that your soon to be born child will develop severe GID once the child becomes aware of gender/sex around age 3-7 and they could make it so the child would be born cisgender if you allow them to do whatever they need too do to fix things; Would you have them preform the medical procedure to have the baby born cisgender or would you not allow nature to be tampered with?

Personaly I see this as no diferant than repairing a cleft palate or a congenital heart issue. I would not want my child to go through this hell known as transsexuality. Now mentaly repairing adults is a totaly diferant situation. That I could not get behind.

Quote from: cynthialee on May 04, 2011, 10:12:30 AM
Let us turn this one around a bit and make it personal....

If your doctor told you that your soon to be born child will develop severe GID once the child becomes aware of gender/sex around age 3-7 and they could make it so the child would be born cisgender if you allow them to do whatever they need too do to fix things; Would you have them preform the medical procedure to have the baby born cisgender or would you not allow nature to be tampered with?

Personaly I see this as no diferant than repairing a cleft palate or a congenital heart issue. I would not want my child to go through this hell known as transsexuality. Now mentaly repairing adults is a totaly diferant situation. That I could not get behind.

I don't understand what you said.  If your soon to be born child was biologically male, but would develop severe GID in his life, and you could make it to that the child wound be born a cisgender male, that you would?

Personally, knowing what I know now, I would never forgive my parents for doing that.  Now if they made my body correct instead of changing my ming to make me cisgendered, then that I could appreciate.

Quote from: Caleb_ on May 05, 2011, 01:42:22 AMso here's what I propose: take the money that would be spent on fixing GID in the womb and put it towards better health access and better medical techniques for our community. Educate those in society who hate us and seek to destroy us. I think trans people learn a lot from living on both sides of the fence, and have a lot of unique insight that one just would not have as a cis person. Something like a physical defect, like a heart problem, only causes pain and has little to no attachment to identity.

This.  Very much this. lol

Thanks for posting

I can't under any circumstances support meddling with people's normal healthy brains pre-birth (or in childhood, for that matter). Fixing problems with the body is one thing, but the brain is the center of identity - it's what determines who the baby will be. Trans people's brains are normal and healthy - there's nothing wrong with them at all, they'd be perfectly fine if they were found in a body that matched them.

I also can't under any circumstances support the idea that the genitals should take precedence over the brain in determining what a baby's sex/gender is 'supposed' to be. Again, it's the brain, not the genitals, that determines who a person is.

I think that you guys are just giving lofty answers that will reflect good on you.

Remember the pain of gender angst? You would allow a baby to be born with this curse?
Screw that!
I would do just about anything to be sure my child was not born this way.

Cynthia the genders don't even exist outside of us as individuals.  So you'll always have individuals with an incongruence between born gender and true gender.  The brain develops it is not a static item, people could screen out some transsexuals but as I said gender is an individual phenomenon and that means an unbounded variable.  Try and screen an unbounded variable.

Lexia,
Huh? That made no sense when compared to what I have said in this thred.

Quote from: cynthialee on May 02, 2011, 02:38:22 PM
There is ample evidence for a biological cause. But what does it matter? What if it was a mental condition?

I don't believe there's one cause to be screened out.  Or more specifically we'd screen people born clearly manifested.  But there's many many causes for transsexualism.  Some are indeed born this way, some come to be transssexual from being transgendered, then there's some who become transsexual through psychological trauma.

Just to make an important distinction some transsexuals come to be transgendered.  But commonly people are both to some degree, they are linked but to be one you do not necessarily have to be the other.

So it's unbounded and we'd be screening only the early manifestors of one kind.  The brain develops over time.

Quote from: cynthialee on May 02, 2011, 02:38:22 PM
Still the only known cure for GID is transition. No other treatment for GID has had anywhere near the amount of success as transition has.

Regardless of the cause the cure is obvious.

In my case I call it detransition to the state of being me.  This is not just a semantic point.  I've been missing out on near everything just because I was born wrong sexed and wrong gendered.  Some will see it as transition because they have lived successful lives as males, I have peace of mind and strenght of character, health and honour because I have had to live as an insider-outsider.  Would not trade that for anything, not all the tea in china.

I'd like to see what crap he comes up with to explain queer animals in nature. Personally, I even owned an FTM chicken years ago when I was raising chickens on my parents farm. She never laid eggs, crowed the best she could, and even tried getting on top of the other hens! In the end, my father gave her to my uncle when he asked for a bunch of chickens to start his own brood ;-)

Another simple thing is to think of all the dogs that do it their style with other male dogs. Homosexuality is a natural occurence! And there are numerous animals such as certain fish that change sex as they get older. I think one of them is the grouper, that starts life as male and can become female after several years.

Do a search on "the sex lives of fish" and read the pdf file that comes 2nd in the list. It's natural to change sex if the environment is suitable!