NOTE: If you are joining our blogs today, be advised you are doing so in the middle of a thread of blogs which began back on April 3, 2022, titled TRANSPHOBIA. In order to understand the underlying foundation we established for what you will read today, it is important that you go back and read all of those blogs in sequence before reading the one below.
As we now begin to conclude our blog series on TRANSPHOBIA, we want to delve into areas rarely explored, let alone discussed. Most people who are not trans simply think those caught within the web of the trans world have made this decision only by choice, influenced by pressures inflicted upon them. In our wrap-up series beginning today, we are going to demonstrate that those who are trans have been heavily influence biologically and behaviorally by factors beyond their control. We seek only The Truth in this series and challenge all readers to explore the areas we have highlighted. The hope is that many who have been repulsed by the trans world, will see more clearly the dilemma these trans folks are in, and maybe engender a greater understanding and even sympathy for their daily struggle. We do not believe that all, who may think they are transgendered, queer, or of some other newly invented variant of the trans world, are legitimate. Only through scientific analysis, extensive counselling, and a full exploration of all contributing and influential factors, can and should hormonal and biological changing processes be considered.
In these concluding chapters of our TRANSPHOBIA blog series, we will be referencing a book titled, “The Riddle Of Gender”, by Deborah Rudacille, published in 2006. There are 35 pages of additional notes at the conclusion of the book giving source and reference material. In addition, the bibliography has 78 references given. There is an extensive Index at the back of the book covering 19 pages by itself. Obviously, this book is well documented for the those who may be skeptical of books on such topics. In the author’s Acknowledgment section, it is important to share her own words concerning her development of this book: “Many individuals and organizations have contributed to my education on topics discussed in this book. My informal conversations with people at various conferences attended during the course of my research, as well as my participation (and lurking) on various online discussion lists has helped me to understand that members of the trans community (or more properly speaking, communities) are quite diverse in their backgrounds, beliefs, and goals. I regret that I have been unable to cover many of the topics that various individuals encouraged me to explore: for example, the challenges faced by trans elders and veterans; the impact of race and socioeconomics on access to health care and other services; the problems encountered by homeless, disabled, and incarcerated trans people; and the role of faith and family in the lives of trans people. Each of these subjects is important and worthy of discussion but, unfortunately, falls outside the scope of this book. My apologies to those who generously contributed their time and expertise on these matters, only to find that I have not covered their issues. My deepest thanks go to those individuals who shared with me sometimes very painful and private information, and permitted me to use their names and stories – and also to those whose personal or professional responsibilities required that they assume the cloak of anonymity. I am profoundly grateful to all my sources, both named and anonymous, whose candor helped me to understand their lives and struggles.” Following are some excerpts from this book that will reveal many things you did not know, and will hopefully encourage more compassion towards the trans communities, while at the same time diminish TRANSPHOBIA in our world today. First, the book lays out facts concerning the development of the fetus in the womb, so a brief human biology review is in order. Our search for The Truth continues below.
“I grew up in a time when increasing numbers of people believed that the differences between males and females were socially constructed, and that if children were raised to understand that there were no essential differences between being born in a male body and being born in a female body, we would all be ‘free to be’ – free of all gender-based boundaries and limitations, free of social stereotypes based on genital distinctions. Boys could cry, and girls could compete; boys could be nurses, homemakers, and teachers (the nurturing professions), and girls could be fighter pilots, police officers, and firefighters (the warrior professions). I am happy to live in a society that has struggled to eradicate limiting beliefs and practices that have kept both men and women from realizing their full potential as human beings. But I have largely abandoned the belief that all the differences we note between men and women are purely a matter of social custom. Some differences run much deeper than custom, the primary one being the deeply felt and ineradicable sense that one is male or female – or neither.” “But gender differences cannot be rooted in culture alone, because my body (what’s below my neck) and my brain (what’s above my neck) are not divided by some kind of biological Berlin Wall. The body and the brain are an open city, built on the constant exchange of information. Just after my mother’s egg and my father’s sperm united, each contributing and X chromosome to my female genotype, skeins of DNA began to uncoil and replicate. Messages traveled between the rapidly multiplying cells that had not yet differentiated into specific organs and tissues, switching genes on and off under instructions from the master template, guiding my development. In the sixth week of pregnancy, the process of sexual differentiation began. The androgynous embryo, which possesses both mullerian and wolffian ducts and thus has the potential to develop either a male or female reproductive anatomy, accepted its genetic fate, and an exquisitely choreographed dance began, performed by a company of steroid hormones.” “Evidence suggests that my brain was prenatally ‘sexed’ as well, through the mechanism by which this process is carried out is less clearly understood.” “In an XY fetus, a different set of chemical messages begins circulating in the second month of pregnancy, based on instructions encoded in the Y chromosome. ‘Male!’ the Y chromosome shouts, and a gene called SRY directs the primitive gonad to form testicles, rather than ovaries. The testicles soon begin to produce androgens, which will masculinize both genitalia and brain. One of the chemical messengers produced by the testicles, mullerian-inhibiting substance (MIS), begins circulating throughout the rapidly dividing cells, barking out orders to arrest the development of a female reproductive anatomy. Testosterone and MIS ensure that [the male sex organs are developed]. In males, the hormone-driven sexing of the brain is known to continue into the weeks immediately following birth, when the testicles pump out a flood of testosterone at levels that will not be matched until puberty. By that time, the male child will have learned what behaviors and attitudes his family and culture expect him to display; these are based on the presence of male genitals. The process of prenatal sexual differentiation is complex and multifaceted. An embryo needs more than a Y chromosome to become male; it also needs and androgen receptor gene on the X chromosome to enable it to respond to the androgens its testes are producing. If the androgen receptor gene isn’t functioning, the XY fetus will develop female genitalia. Moreover, testosterone (the so-called male hormone) is transformed into estrogen in the brain by an enzyme called aromatase. As researcher Lindsey Berkson has pointed out, ‘one cheeky irony of life is that how masculine a man is as an adult may be partly the result of his having had optimal amounts of estrogen in his brain at a certain time during his stay in the womb. Amazingly minute differences – parts per trillion or parts per billion of a few sex hormones – literally affect the making of men or women.’ More often than most people suspect, the ‘script’ of sexual differentiation is altered during pregnancy, producing variation.”
“Male-bodied persons dressing and living as women and female-bodied persons dressing and living as men were known in ancient Greece and Rome, among Native American tribes [as we have pointed out in previous blogs on this subject] prior to the arrival of Europeans, on the Indian subcontinent, in Africa, in Siberia, in eastern Europe, and in nearly every other indigenous society studied by anthropologists. According to historian Vern Bullough, ‘gender crossing is so ubiquitous, that genitalia by itself has never been a universal nor essential insignia of a lifelong gender.'” “Because we live in a culture that expects science to settle questions based in the body, we look to science to tell us what it means to be male and female, how gender identity is formed, and why it is that the sex of the body sometimes seems to be at odds with the sex of the mind. But despite our sophisticated tests, science can still offer no definitive answer to this question, only tantalizing clues.” “Today our tools are vastly more powerful, yet they are no more accurate in predicting gender identity in certain cases than the eyeball test . . . “ “Most do not make a distinction between anatomical sex and gender identity. Nor do they realize that it is possible for a person to have XY chromosomes yet female-body morphology and genitals as a result of androgen insensitivity syndrome (AIS), or XX chromosomes yet male-body morphology and genitals as a result of congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH). Those are only two of a number of genetic and endocrine conditions that can create anatomically intersexual people. Once these persons were called hermaphrodites, after the intersexual offspring of the gods Hermes and Aphrodite. As that myth indicates, in some cultures, intersexual and transgendered persons have been viewed with reverence and respect.” “No one accuses intersexual persons of being mentally ill. Their gender variance is inscribed on their bodies, in their gonads, genitals, or chromosomes – and so seems ‘real’ because it is a material, measurable entity. The same is not true of transgendered and transsexual persons, who present a baffling enigma to their families, physicians, and themselves.”
“Gender variance is not a widely discussed subject, even in medical schools, and as a consequence many physicians, like the general public, know very little about the subject other than what they are able to glean from sensationalist media accounts of cross-dressing and trans-sexuality. Gender variance still seems to be considered a more suitable topic for late-night talk show jokes than for journals of public health and public policy . . .” “Public prejudices make it difficult for visibly transgendered or transsexual people to gain an education, employment, housing, or health care, and acute gender dysphoria leaves people at high risk for drug abuse, depression, and suicide.” “Legal scholar Jillian Weiss has pointed out that ‘gender identity disorders’ are probably far more common than previously suspected, on the basis of four general observations. First, unrecognized gender problems are occasionally diagnosed when patients are seen with anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and other psychiatric conditions, which often serve to mask the underlying gender issue. Second, many individuals who meet the diagnostic criteria for ‘gender identity disorder’ never present themselves for treatment (this category includes the great majority of cross-dressers, professional female impersonators, and gender-variant gay people). Third, the intensity of some people’s feelings of gender-related discomfort fluctuates throughout their lifetimes, and does not always achieve a sustained ‘clinical threshold’ requiring treatment. Finally, gender-variant behavior among female-bodied persons is ‘invisible’ in a way that gender-variant behavior in male-bodied persons is not. On the most basic level, this is exemplified by the relative ease with which women can don men’s clothing.” “Others believe that greater public tolerance and acceptance, combined with the increased ability to connect with others online and in person, is responsible for the increasing visibility and political activism of gender-variant people. ‘Twenty or forty or fifty years ago, you couldn’t have had a meeting like this one,’ Professor Milton Diamond told me at the 2003 annual meeting of the International Foundation for Gender Education. The majority of the meeting’s participants were cross-dressed men, a group that remains the most heavily closeted of sexual minorities and the most persecuted. ‘A meeting like this would have been broken up by the police,’ Diamond said. Then too he pointed out, ‘Many of these individuals think that they are the only ones in the world, and they don’t think that there is a solution, and when they find a solution or find a safe haven somewhere, they utilize it. Many of these activities are like support groups in their own way. They don’t call them that, but that’s what they are.'”
In our continuing blog on “TRANSPHOBIA – The Truth“, next week we will begin to get a bit more technical and look at potential biological and scientific causes for the trans issue in our society today, as we continue our exploration of the book, The Riddle of Gender. Until then, as always, we encourage all readers to keep an open mind and continue to evaluate the evidence we are presenting to be better able to make rational, knowledge-based, science-based judgements about all things trans. FREEDOM and LIBERTY also means to allow our consciousness to be FREE to evaluate facts, make appropriate decisions based upon those facts, and then to act accordingly. The FREEDOM to speak, in open forum, should challenge our positions upon which we stand, to ensure we stand on truth, based on facts and knowledge. We will never agree on all things. In our great Nation, LIBERTY must extend to all citizens, even if we sometimes disagree.