My own little theory on gender dysphoria

[Anthrogal]

I posted this is the transgender thread on another forum, and thought I'd post it here to.

Gender is a continuum. As an anthropologist, I've studied many cultures where it is accepted that there are more than two genders. Androgyny is just accepted. There are also cultures where sex roles are switched: men gabber and preen, women are aggressive hunters. However, I also know that in general, behavior is a combination of nature and nurture. There is scientific evidence that there is a certain "wiring" to the brain of either gender, and transsexuals tend to have the wiring of the opposite of their genetic sex.

This wiring, it is my theory, is a kind of evolutionary adaptation that might not be shared across the board of all human cultures. Culture creates the criteria for what is "masculine" and what is "feminine". Those who fit the criteria of what is "masculine," and are male are eventually selected for and vice versa with women. That does not mean that a genetic male cannot have the same wiring as a woman, it's just much less likely. This, I think, is the genesis of trannsexuality.

This "wiring" is within a certain range and is as diverse as any other genetic trait. The society determines what range of feminine traits makes a woman and what range of male traits makes a male, if the society even sharply divides between male and female. Like, I said before, it is all on a continuum

So what do you think?

[Shang]

I like it.  I can see where you're coming from, too.

[Lori]

 My theory is, transsexuals are born like this, it's biological and there is nothing you can do about it. Bitch, whine, moan, and cry, but in the end it takes you down.

I see the definition of Continuum is, (theory), anything that goes through a gradual transition from one condition, to a different condition, without any abrupt changes. Is Gender really that or is transsexuality that?

Most people don't question or change their gender so I don't think gender is a "continuum" but GID would be described by "continuum".

And GID or transsexuality would be a birth condition and the end result could be described as a continuum.

[Anthrogal]

I'm not saying that it is not something we are born with. I am saying that nature and nurture, in evolution, reciprocate each other. Society defines gender, biology makes those who's "wiring" matches their biological gender selected for, the wiring becomes established for men and women. This establishment of wiring and gender does not cause men to have female wiring and vice versa to die out. They still occur, but are much rarer. So the wiring we have is determined at birth, but whether that wiring leads to what society defines as "male" or "female" behavior depends on social constructions.

As far as it being a continuum, we know it is a continuum because there are societies with a range of genders going from most feminine to most masculine. Also, as I said before, there are societies where gender roles are switched. Of course, to prove my theory in the first paragraph of this post empirically, it would be necessary to do scans of the brains of those in such societies to see how the wiring of their brains differ.

[Vanessa_yhvh]

I find it a sufficiently interesting hypothesis that if you scored some decent funding (would require a fat chunk of change) I'd be interested in following the course of the study.

[Anthrogal]

Thank you! Yes, to do the research in one fell swoop would take quite a few sizable research grants. That's usually why research in any field is usually done one small study after another. Also, it would need more than just anthropologists, but neuroscientists and biologists as well. I'll need a PhD before I can even begin to have the kind of influence necessary to do get the ball rolling though 

[Muffin]

I've found the word gender to be rather confusing recently. For so long I thought I knew what it meant but now with all these sub-meanings and theories. I just don't know any more. :S
I remember seeing (on a non-TG forum) someone swearing black and blue that gender and sex are linked in the sense of what is referred to biological gender, which there have been studies done but it kinda throws my original idea that sex was all that is physical and gender is of the mind referring mostly to the gender-identity side of gender. I can see how gender roles and all of that side could be a continuum but the side that is "hardwired" doesn't seem to be to me, I mean the word "hardwired" suggests that it is "fixed".
The word gender seems confusing, can gender be defined in one sentence? Without splitting it into sub-meanings? *confused*.

[Anthrogal]

The thing to keep in mind when reading science or philosophy papers is that in general, the meaning for the purposes of the article are different than the general meanings used in everyday language. Here, when I say gender, I mean an identity that falls between culturaly defined ranges of masculinity and feminity, or among various genders in the case of societies with more than two.

I argue that yes gender is hardwired, however it was first a cultural construct that eventually led to hardwiring of the brain through evolution of the human species and is probably not found across the board of human cultures (namely those I have identified previously).

[Muffin]

Yeah ok. So it's questioning the origin of the concept of gender-identity.
Is gender learnt and if so from what. From nurture and behavioural differences that are learnt and passed on?
Or... was it from something more physiological in response to how humans evolved to reproduce.. so in a sense the way our body produced hormones and how we reacted to those? 
I mean the current understanding of transsexualism/GID is that it was a hormonal or genetic disorder during development in the womb? And nothing related to nurture? But you're suggesting it could of come about from nurture during our past/original evolution?
Now I'm more confused :S
But interested...

[justmeinoz]

Are you referring to epigenetics Anthrogal?  How the genetic makeup can be influenced in descendant generations due to something happening to an ancestor. 

Classic examples are the effect on the height of people in northern Sweden following a famine around 1900. The area was extremely isolated, so relief wasn't available, and the descendants of people born at that time are still shorter than average. 
Those who survived infancy during this famine tended to be small, and so needed less food. People born before the famine however, had normal height descendants, as they didn't have children until normal times had returned.

A similar effect has been reported in the Netherlands, following the winter of 1944, when the Wermacht starved the population of that country.

[Alyssa M.]

That's pretty much exactly how I see it. The details are complicated and I don't think anyone can claim to understand them, but I think the basic structure you describe is exactly the correct way to look at it.

The only thing I'd add is this: It's not just gender. Everything that is observable in nature or in human culture is a continuum. Literally everything. I study the most discrete things in the universe -- and they exist on a continuum. So you had better believe that squirrelly high-level concepts like gender exist on a continuum as well. Of course, some phenomena tend to cluster at particular regions of the spectrum, while others tend to spread out. But nothing is totally discrete.

[Lori]

The thing to keep in mind when reading science or philosophy papers is that in general, the meaning for the purposes of the article are different than the general meanings used in everyday language. Here, when I say gender, I mean an identity that falls between culturaly defined ranges of masculinity and feminity, or among various genders in the case of societies with more than two.

I argue that yes gender is hardwired, however it was first a cultural construct that eventually led to hardwiring of the brain through evolution of the human species and is probably not found across the board of human cultures (namely those I have identified previously).

Are you saying the hardwiring in the brain does not work correctly until there is contact with society? Or perhaps you can laborate a bit more for those that ar not anthropologists such as myslef.
Post Merge: July 24, 2010, 06:37:30 AM

I'm not saying that it is not something we are born with. I am saying that nature and nurture, in evolution, reciprocate each other. Society defines gender, biology makes those who's "wiring" matches their biological gender selected for, the wiring becomes established for men and women. This establishment of wiring and gender does not cause men to have female wiring and vice versa to die out. They still occur, but are much rarer. So the wiring we have is determined at birth, but whether that wiring leads to what society defines as "male" or "female" behavior depends on social constructions.

As far as it being a continuum, we know it is a continuum because there are societies with a range of genders going from most feminine to most masculine. Also, as I said before, there are societies where gender roles are switched. Of course, to prove my theory in the first paragraph of this post empirically, it would be necessary to do scans of the brains of those in such societies to see how the wiring of their brains differ.

http://www.amazon.com/Evolutions-Rainbow-Diversity-Gender-Sexuality/dp/0520240731


Ever read Evolutions Rainbow?

[Anthrogal]

Let me make it a bit more concrete for those who still have questions. I'll use a generally accepted theory regarding the evolution of gender roles along with my own theory. Back in hunter gatherer days, there was a need to clearly define gender roles. Women who were pregnant, even if they had hunting prowess, were not able to hunt efficiently and safely. If they did hunt, they would be slowed down considerably and also would put their unborn child at risk of miscarriage. As such, culture put "men's work" as hunting and "women's work" as gathering and domestic tasks.

There was nothing natural about gender roles when they first came into existence. It was just that men who had prowess at hunting and aggresiveness became selected for and women who were domestic were selected for. Over times, these behaviors became hardwired in the brain, and we get the present state of gender roles correlating with the wiring of the brain.

I hope this clears things up! And Lori, I've never read it , but I'm very interested in doing so!

[Lori]

Let me make it a bit more concrete for those who still have questions. I'll use a generally accepted theory regarding the evolution of gender roles along with my own theory. Back in hunter gatherer days, there was a need to clearly define gender roles. Women who were pregnant, even if they had hunting prowess, were not able to hunt efficiently and safely. If they did hunt, they would be slowed down considerably and also would put their unborn child at risk of miscarriage. As such, culture put "men's work" as hunting and "women's work" as gathering and domestic tasks.

There was nothing natural about gender roles when they first came into existence. It was just that men who had prowess at hunting and aggresiveness became selected for and women who were domestic were selected for. Over times, these behaviors became hardwired in the brain, and we get the present state of gender roles correlating with the wiring of the brain.

I hope this clears things up! And Lori, I've never read it , but I'm very interested in doing so!

I don't see how you can make such general statements. Nature wires itself how it wants regardless of conditions. You have to make too many assumptions that first all the women could and would get pregnant. Then assume they want to.

I'd say hormones and genetics do way more than socialization. Typically men don't care about shoes, but not all women do. Ya know?

Some women hunt. Not all men do. Some men gather, not all women do.

[Anthrogal]

This is a general theory as to why the majority of socities are patriarchal. What we're talking about is general trends, and this theory is widely accepted in the anthropology community. In order for the human species to survive, women had to be pregnant much of the time. That's simple mathamatics. As a result women who were good at hunting but not caretaking were generally not selected for. That doesn't mean that they no longer exist, just that in that time they were not selected for. Evolution is not an exact process. It's not a process towards perfection, as many believe, but rather merely adapting to a constanty changing environment. If it were a process towards perfection, we would all be becoming bacteria, which are the most ancient and succesfull species of animal in existence.

[Dryad]

Well; I can see your point, but I have to disagree.
You see, in most modern cultures, people are, again, selected for their qualities rather than their part in reproduction. Of course it makes sense that most men would, in ancient days, be hunters, while most women would be gatherers. This is not only because of child carriage, but more because of physical qualities.
I've noticed that most women are far more clumsy than most men, for example. That is just my experience, though. Most men are better at moving unnoticed, and most men are physically more durable, have an easier time neglecting physical damage, and are simply more muscular.
However, some men are perfectly incapable of hunting. Some women are perfectly able. It's not as black'n'white as you come across.
So I think gender roles are social constructs based on averages.
An example of this is another species: Lions. The females do most of the hunting, while the males do most of the care and protection. The reason: Female lions are faster. The males are bulky, and that makes them less adept at hunting fast game. However, males, due to their bulk, make excellent fighters, which is, in a lion's pride, a very important attribute for their cub's survival.
In other words: I think that societies adapt; not the brains. At this point in time, the hunt is, for human survival, near to meaningless. We have farms, after all. A lot of people make their living in an environment where gender is simply not important. Because of this, society adapts gender-roles to be far more fluid.

[Anthrogal]

Again, I never meant it to be black and white. It is only a general theory for how gender roles came about. I'm most certainly not saying the all women are not capable of hunting while all men are, onle that it is selected for.

[Fenrir]

Interesting! But how does this theory make a distinction between, for example, feminine males as opposed to MTFs? Because the two are very different, and your hypothesis seems in danger of labelling feminine males/masculine females as transgendered when they're not. 

[Izumi]

This is a general theory as to why the majority of socities are patriarchal. What we're talking about is general trends, and this theory is widely accepted in the anthropology community. In order for the human species to survive, women had to be pregnant much of the time. That's simple mathamatics. As a result women who were good at hunting but not caretaking were generally not selected for. That doesn't mean that they no longer exist, just that in that time they were not selected for. Evolution is not an exact process. It's not a process towards perfection, as many believe, but rather merely adapting to a constanty changing environment. If it were a process towards perfection, we would all be becoming bacteria, which are the most ancient and succesfull species of animal in existence.

If you take a look at what she is saying it make sense, in a society the general majority tends to pick TRAITS that suit survival, its not the case as much today, but over time the traits that gave a better chance at survival were taken as positives for breeding and thus past down from generations.  Say being tall is attractive to everyone, then short men wouldn't get dates, using punitz square dominant tall jeans would create taller off spring and they would continue to grow as generation after generation picked those traits. 

If you look at dog breeding it works the same way, where selective traits are chosen to bring breeds for a purpose, certain dogs have certain temperaments, some are docile by nature some are active breeds, having these traits bread for centuries.  Why no the same in humans? 

What is interesting is if that theory is sound, then it posses some interesting questions on the future of humanity, strength in partners being the norm to this point, now intelligence and wisdom being more popular for women for survival.  I wonder how this will effect us as species overtime as heterosexuality becomes more popular and mainstream. 

[Alyssa M.]

A general reply after skimming some comments here.

First, trying to think about gender roles from an evolutionary perspective is highly suspect in my opinion -- at least, if you are trying to say something like "men are like X because of Y factor in Z early human society." Some broad factors you can account for -- there is a selective advantage to women looking "fertile," (whatever that means), because of sexual selection. That's almost certainly true. Also, sure, there's probably a division of labor in some early societies that has to do with why men are generally more strong (in simple terms of the maximum force most major muscles can apply).

But evolution is not a remotely straightforward process, and there are lots of caveats. There are many avenues to evolutionary success, and they often act at cross purposes, especially within populations. This is true in all sorts of animals, but especially so in humans.

That's why traits that seem like evolutionary dead ends (transgender internal identification or homosexuality) might be extremely beneficial. A possible scenario is that having a few adults without children can increase the odds of survival for a family or community: they can adopt children whose parents die, or they can fill in when others are occupied; or being free from family obligations, they have more opportunities to use their creativity in any number of ways to help the community; or who knows what else? Also, it's possible that variation within normative gender categories can be beneficial for filling in different roles in societies, kind of like rounding out a sports team, and people whom we now think of as queer or LGBT or whatever are just the outliers of the distribution.

So, Izumi, Punnett squares simply aren't relevant, at least not in the traditional usage -- the success probabilities depend on the state of the population, resulting in large coupled differential equations whose solutions are probably chaotic (like a Lorentz attractor). (I mention you, because you pointed them out, and they're a useful tool for discussion.)

In short, it's all really complicated, and we err if we don't acknowledge that.