I actually encountered this line of reasoning in Mary Daly's "Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism." I thought it was very strange and quite opposed to the feminist beliefs that I have so far encountered. When I was reading, I wrote it off to the age of the book. I am now quite disturbed to see it being used as modern anti-feminist propaganda.

Well, the piece didn't make it up. There is, sadly, a significant and often violent history of anti-trans sentiment and action among feminists in general and radical feminists (using the term in its technical meaning, not as a catch-all) in particular, justified with this line of reasoning. I have a close friend, a transwoman who has been politically active in feminism since the 1960s, prior to her transition, who experienced this firsthand. It doesn't make it right, though, and it doesn't mean that such feminists speak for the rest of us.

Many feminists believe that the behaviours and feelings which are considered typically masculine or typically feminine are purely socially conditioned.

I don't want to sound pissy but a lot of them are. And we've had this discussion a while back when there was a post about transgendered kids and the whole playing dress up, etc.

Wearing make-up and dresses aren't inherenitly female, there was a time when both men and women did that. The current concept in America of what's "masculine" and "feminine" didn't come into being until fairly recently, what with the shaving of the legs and under arms, etc.

I'm not transgendered but I consider myself a very masculine woman and often times it has to do with gender performance (again, wearing make-up, etc.)I don't like that stuff but I have no idea if it's because of something inante or what.

What gets me is that, hypothetically, if we had a society like that you saw in THX 1138 where there is no specific gender difference then what constitutes transgendered?

I know I probably sound ignorant but that's because I am:) I actually know very little about transgender issues and internally/mentally what that feels like. I just question that if there we didn't have gender performance how would that articulate itself.

"Many (not all) radical feminists (and here, I'm not talking about feminists who are radical; I'm referring to those subscribe to a specific set of beliefs and assumptions that are the hallmarks of radical feminism) indeed reject trans women's self-identification as women, but it is not because they view biology as destiny; rather, they challenge the notion of "true" gender identity, or the innate and core sense of being male or female, as deterministic."

From Emi Koyama's blog:
http://eminism.org/archive/2007/07/04-23.html

Emi doesn't agree with the position, but does offer a brief description of how it works as promoted by the Colorado College director of feminist and gender studies. I just found it interesting how closely this ties into your post.

hi. not ready to jump into this debate, but i just wanted to point our that julie bindell's not trans (she's a lesbian feminist; it's the article that quotes trans folks who say they made a mistake getting surgery).

also, i'm reading a great book on trans issues right now by trans woman julia serano called 'whipping girl: a transsexual woman on sexism and the scapegoating of femininity'

i highly recommend.

oh, and Julie Bindell has her own take on this (sans random BBC commentary) in the Guardian: http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/julie_bindel/2007/08/my_trans_mission.html

I too grappled with how to integrate an understanding of transexuality into my feminism, UltraMagnus. What I found most enlightening was talking at great length to the friend I mentioned above--she said something that struck me as quite significant. She said that talking about feeling as though one was a woman in a man's body was not, in her opinion, the technical literal truth, but was the best available way to express the feeling of being trans--that it is as close as our language allows in our cultural context, not a bedrock stone-set truth. Understanding that--understanding language as an imperfect medium for conveying a highly complex gender experience.

Understanding that helped me to understand that transexuality is not a threat to a feminist understanding of gender roles as socially conditioned. The patriarchy devotes an awful amount of time, energy, and money to socializing males into a masculine gender identity and females into a feminine one--but it is not all-powerful or foolproof. Given that many if not most gendered behaviors are socially constructed, it doesn't seem to me to be that far-fetched to accept that in a given number of cases, the way that the socialization process interacts with a person's inborn character is going to produce a gender-identification that is counter to what was intended.

By the way, I hate the Breasts not Bombs ad, not because I find it offensive, but because it gives me a splitting headache. I wonder if it might trigger an attack in someone with epilepsy? A friend of mine mentioned that flashing icons on LJ carried that risk.

I've always supported the right of people to get sex change operations more on libertarian grounds than feminist ones. From a feminist point of view I have often been uneasy when I listen to transgendered people talk about their desire to change sexes. One event in particular sticks in my mind where a M2F friend of mine talked rattled off a long list of negative masculine stereotypes in his reason to become a her. I remember thinking you don't have to cut your dick off to not be a jerk.

But on a more general level, I recall reading Mary Daly's "Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism" in college. I never found her argument persuasive. But it doesn't surprise me that some folks who claim the "radical feminist" label take issue with sex changes.

“it doesn't seem to me to be that far-fetched to accept that in a given number of cases, the way that the socialization process interacts with a person's inborn character is going to produce a gender-identification that is counter to what was intended.�
I kind of get what you’re saying… but I still can’t quite comprehend what makes someone a woman, other than physically being female (whether you’re born that way or became that way through surgery and hormone therapy). So let’s say I am a person with a penis but I like to wear makeup, dresses and high heels. Does that make me a woman? Or just a man who likes to wear makeup, high heels and dresses?

Oh, yes and I am quite ignorant on trans issues as well. I don't intend the above as an attack on any trans folks.

yeah... that breasts not bombs thing gives me a headache too.

I see two phenomena.

Limiting ourself to the example at hand, some people have a deeply private personal preference (as if she wants or abhors a sex change operation) and then they build a theory why this preference is vastly superior, and why people who make opposite decisions are bad, stupid or misguided.

Liberal feminist decry limits on choice and opportunities: should women work or stay at home? Should the girls be dressed in pink? Should people who feel that they have wrong sex undergo operations to change their sex? Personal! personal! personal! Not so liberal people (radical?) think that one should take sides.

The second phenomenon is that the same person between breakfast and lunch describes all the main evils in the world: Islamofascism, blogofascism, feminism, and after taking a lunch break, scribles what "a true feminist should prefer". Hey, true feminists are evil, why they should prefer what you prefer? And it continues with "what true friends of Black people should prefer", "what true friends of poor people should prefer" etc.

Occasionally it seems to create a cognitive dissonance so big that it backfires politically. GOP engaged in propaganda that we should "reform Social Security", in part because as it is "it is unfair to Blacks". Popularity of the idea in places like Alabama dropped like hell and the most conservative Republicans had to abandon it.

That's a cool response EG. I know that when I think of myself I think of myself in "masculine" terms and whenever I've had to dress up like a girl (most often when we go to straight dance clubs) I fell kinda like I'm in drag, especially if I'm wearing a dress. Oddly enough I love actual drag queens and their exaggerated femininity.

I was never the girl to want to play w/dolls and whenever my mother would take me shopping for clothes I'd always head to the boys section first because I thought their clothes looked better. All though high school I wore my dad's and my brother's hand me down pants and shirts (pants complete with belt). It was frustrating for my mother, (who would always pull the "it's my money" when she forced those flowery clothes on me) and for me 'cause I know she wanted a traditional girl. But she loves me and now she gets that I really just am not "feminine", though it really pleases her when she hears I bought something pink or I'm wearing a dress.

Even when I picture myself in my head I'm a lot more butch than I actually look, so seeing myself in a mirror is sometimes disappointing that I don't match to what's in my head. Though I did read a book by Joe Quirk called Sperm Are From Men, Eggs Are From Women and in that he detailed how sometimes in the womb female fetuses are doused with an extra bit of testosterone and male fetuses get that extra bit of estrogen. It doesn't make you gay or transgendered but it results in people like me, girls who like to rough house and skip the baby doll. (not saying that regular girls can't do this either, I just found that interesting 'cause it described me perfectly.)

You know, sojourner, I think that for a lot of us, or I should stop generalizing and say that for me, my image of transwomen was formed by mainstream media representations, until, of course, I actually met real transfolk. And that representation is a very femme-y one--high heels, hose, long hair, long nails, etc.

Why I unthinkingly trusted the msm's reprsentation of transwomen when I have known for years that their representation of gender was supremely fucked up is a mystery to me, but I did. And what I've found since is that like cisgendered women, transwomen occupy a number of different spaces on the butch-femme line, and that many transwomen are very butch--they do not like wearing heels, hose, etc. They like wearing jeans and combat boots and having short hair. Or some combination of the above. I think it's a common misconception that transwomen are all girly, not just because of the msm, but because for a very long time, in order to appease the gatekeepers--the psychiatrists who could sign off on gender reassignment surgery--they had to conform to those gatekeepers' views of gender identity, and those views were often retrograde to the extreme, especially a few years back.

The friend I mentioned above has told me horror stories about friends of hers who, for instance, wore jeans instead of a skirt to one of her weekly appointments with the shrink, and was told that she therefore clearly wasn't really committed to living as a woman, and therefore had to have another year of therapy before her shrink would reconsider signing off on the surgery. The fact that those of us born with vaginas often slouch around in jeans apparently didn't matter. And this was not an isolated incident.

I can't pretend to be have expert insight into what makes any of us have the gender identity we do; my feeling is that my identity as a woman is born of having to construct an identity on the subordinated side of the gender hierarchy. It's kind of easy to see how that happened for me; I'm not sure how it happens for transwomen, but until I learn how, I can accept that though their path to womanhood is somewhat different than mine, they get there just the same.

Does any of that help?

Thanks, UltraMagnus! I wish I could take credit for it--I'm just grateful that my friend was so patient with me.

Here's my problem with the whole "Radical Feminists Hate Tranny's" argument: Who is defining what Radical Feminism is, and isn't feminism 100% about equality of the genders, no matter what they are?
I am fairly sure it's none of anyone's goddamn business whether a woman is a Genny girl or a Tranny girl.
I personally don't think it's the job of the BBC to tell me what Radical Feminists believe. It's also not the place of anyone in this world to decide for anyone else what she should believe or do with her own damn body. So if a Tranny girl wants to go all the way, who is anyone to be the judge? It doesn't change the fact that she is on our side when it comes to gender issues. If you feel threatened somehow then it's your own damn problem. Leave the trans-population alone, already.

“my feeling is that my identity as a woman is born of having to construct an identity on the subordinated side of the gender hierarchy.�
Yeah, EG, it makes sense. And re the girly image of trans women, it’s definitely true for me and I have never met a trans woman in person.

Gwen,

Thanks for pointing that out. Mistake corrected.

First time poster here.

There's an excellent scholarly article about transsexual identity formation by Aaron Devor at the University of Victoria. Here's a link to a pdf of the article at Devor's website:

http://web.uvic.ca/~ahdevor/14StagesBLOCK.pdf

I like this article because it is empirical: it's based on years of interviews with transsexual individuals. Too often, those who theorize about transsexual identity formation draw their conclusions first and then look for evidence to back up their conclusions. (Of course, that happens everywhere, but when the theories are about actual people, the ramifications of biased theories tend to be more painful.)

Devor points out that, in identity formation, individuals tend to look for two things: witnessing and mirroring. Witnessing is when someone different than you recognizes your identity; mirroring is when someone who you recognize as having the same identity in turn affirms your identity.

When someone is first dealing with being transsexual, their anxiety at least in part derives from not being witnessed as the opposite gender to their birth sex and not being mirrored by those with the same gender identity.

Let me add my own spin to all of this, based on my own experience. I don't think any particular masculine or feminine behavior is intrinsic or biological, but I do think that, at the heart of gender identity, there is a natural inclination to more easily emulate the behaviors of one gender over the other. I think that this preferential ability to mirror (in a different sense than above) the behaviors of one particular gender is present at a very young age and very quickly causes young children to take on the stereotypical behavior of one gender or the other. I don't think gendered behavior is inherited, but I do think that the preference towards one gender is so strong in most people that it can take several generations of behavior modification to erase some stereotypical behaviors, so in some ways, these behaviors have some of the same properties as inherited ones.

When someone is transsexual, that person is getting mixed signals: their brain wants to reinforce the behaviors of one gender naturally, but they are being socialized to emulate another gender. Sometimes one of these two opposing forces wins out, sometime the two reach a stable balance, but for those who eventually transition, neither side wins out at first, and the two sides never really reach a stable truce. As that person becomes aware of both pressures, they begin to search out for others like themselves, and that's when Devor's fourteen steps start to kick in.

First time poster here.

There's an excellent scholarly article about transsexual identity formation by Aaron Devor at the University of Victoria. Here's a link to a pdf of the article at Devor's website:

http://web.uvic.ca/~ahdevor/14StagesBLOCK.pdf

I like this article because it is empirical: it's based on years of interviews with transsexual individuals. Too often, those who theorize about transsexual identity formation draw their conclusions first and then look for evidence to back up their conclusions. (Of course, that happens everywhere, but when the theories are about actual people, the ramifications of biased theories tend to be more painful.)

Devor points out that, in identity formation, individuals tend to look for two things: witnessing and mirroring. Witnessing is when someone different than you recognizes your identity; mirroring is when someone who you recognize as having the same identity in turn affirms your identity.

When someone is first dealing with being transsexual, their anxiety at least in part derives from not being witnessed as the opposite gender to their birth sex and not being mirrored by those with the same gender identity.

Let me add my own spin to all of this, based on my own experience. I don't think any particular masculine or feminine behavior is intrinsic or biological, but I do think that, at the heart of gender identity, there is a natural inclination to more easily emulate the behaviors of one gender over the other. I think that this preferential ability to mirror (in a different sense than above) the behaviors of one particular gender is present at a very young age and very quickly causes young children to take on the stereotypical behavior of one gender or the other. I don't think gendered behavior is inherited, but I do think that the preference towards one gender is so strong in most people that it can take several generations of behavior modification to erase some stereotypical behaviors, so in some ways, these behaviors have some of the same properties as inherited ones.

When someone is transsexual, that person is getting mixed signals: their brain wants to reinforce the behaviors of one gender naturally, but they are being socialized to emulate another gender. Sometimes one of these two opposing forces wins out, sometime the two reach a stable balance, but for those who eventually transition, neither side wins out at first, and the two sides never really reach a stable truce. As that person becomes aware of both pressures, they begin to search out for others like themselves, and that's when Devor's fourteen steps start to kick in.

Sorry about the double post.

I have been struggling with this issue myself for some time. On the one hand, i believe unequivocally in transgender legitimacy and transgender rights. On the other hand, I do believe that the vast majority, if not all, of gendered behaviors are at least partially socially constructed. And on the third hand, I have my own experience as a gender atypical person. Growing up I felt very much like a boy trapped in a girl's body, very much a tomboy, mostly guy friends, and all that. As I got older and discovered feminism, I became much more at ease with being a woman, but I still identify as a butch lesbian. Aside from the occasional women's t-shirt, it's all guy's clothes and mohawks for me. I consider myself masculine and my whole life rejected femininity as something that I was supposed to be, but I feel 100% woman. If feminism had never happened, though, if I had never seen that I can be whatever I want to be as a woman, I think I would probably have ended up a transman.

I can't profess to completely understand why I felt and feel the way I do, but I do know that there is a big difference between sex and gender. Sex is biological, and I don't mean the parts you were born with. Whatever part of the brain it is that tells you whether you are a man or a woman is immutable, and occasionally it doesn't match the plumbing, so to speak. I find that easy enough to understand. What I don't know is to what extent, if at all, that affects our gender, that is, how we present ourselves in the way we act and dress as either "masculine" or "feminine."

Where this stops being an interesting socio-biological question and starts being a social-political issue, I think, is with the somewhat recent phenomenon of butch lesbians transitioning to men en masse. There is no corresponding sex exodus in the gay male community, and this is leaving a lot of people with uneasy questions about to what extent some of these transitions have to do with latent sexism. Men are respected more, your masculine identity is supported instead of questioned, and society tells us implicitly oh so often how much better it is to be a man. My butch girlfriend exclaimed to me one day after she and her mom got into a big fight about the clothes she wears, "This is why people transition!" Of course, this isn't true for all FTMs, but it does make me wonder to what extent is might be for some.

For the record, I do know a few transpeople, but not well enough to profess deep insight into what they have and do go through.

You know, I always thought part of feminism was supporting the rights of women to be whatever they want to be whether that's a home maker or president or a man. Silly me.

Radical anti-racists have ideological reasons for opposing whiggers.

To them, the claim that someone can be 'born into the wrong race' is a deeply threatening concept.

Many anti-racists believe that the behaviors and feelings which are considered typically white or typically black are purely socially conditioned.

But if, as some in the whigger lobby believes, the tendency to feel black or white is something innate then it follows that racially stereotypical behaviors could well be 'natural' rather than as the result of social pressures and white oppression.

As an anti-racist, Julie Bindel therefore has a strong political motivation for her skepticism about Jamie Kennedy movies.

One of the reasons radical feminists often unfairly get the "transphobic" label is because they protest certain transwomen suppressing the right for biological females to have events in women-only spaces. Since certain women-only events have historically been co-opted by non-trans men until effectively quashed, they interpret this as an offront on women's autonomy and right to set limits. From what I understand, the same thing is happening in the queer community by marginalizing lesbian identities in favor of being lost in a broader queer-trans label. I am a new radical feminist and spoiled by heteronormativity, so please correct me if I'm misstating this issue.

I think that some semblance of gender identity can be inborn, but the social constructions surrounding them are sometimes fetishized by transwomen whose public well-being is hinged upon "passing" for female, hence the preoccupation with patriarchal lies about what women are. That preoccupation with oppressive constructions is what so many feminists find distasteful. Anyone remember an article by...Faludi, I think it was?...explaining how the The Citadel fostered a misogynist, homophobic culture, but ironically, the cadets would date transvestites and transwomen because they happened to fulfill this exaggerated misogynist construct of femininity propagated by military culture.

READ JULIA SERANO'S Whipping Girl!

This cannot be said enough. At this point it should be essential reading for anybody who claims to be a feminist, to at least have some grasp where transwomen are really coming from.

This is exactly the problem she has with several second wave feminist. She calls them trans-misogynistic. Its a pretty accurate description when you read stuff like this. Somebody was wondering the distinguishing characteristic between third wave feminists and second wave feminist (and there are VERY distinguishing characteristics if you are a transwoman). Well this woman from the BBC is an very typical of what many second wave feminist thought of transpeople, especially transwomen. Third wave feminist by in large while not have a complete understanding of transsexuality and transgender individuals, by in large grasp the concept that those of us who are cursed with these issues have more complex situations than just societal issues. They at least accept transsexuals for their given gender identity. Our societal issues largerly are based on the fact we often are forced into repressive situations by those who either do not believe us, threaten us, or our own fears. Our societal issue comes from the fact there is so much pushing us not to transition, when the reality is its the only way to actually live for us. There is something much deeper. (Just to note most major feminist blogs: Feministing, Salon's Broadsheet, Pandagon, and especially I blame the patrairchy, fall well within the third wave paradigm.)

There is still a reluctance by many transwomen to call themselves feminist largely because of some of the writing during the early 1980's against transwomen by second wave "feminist", and because of the controversy surrounding the michigan womyn's festival and the controversy over the "womens only spaces issue". The reality is this underlies the problems third wave feminist had against second wave feminist, and why there was and still is a bit of a backlash within the feminist community from third wave feminists who recognize that trans people are easily bear the brunt of societies gender issues, and a few remaining second wave "feminists" who seem to have major issues with transsexuals and often are transphobic and transmisogynistic.

While quite a bit of gender expression is socialized, gender identity is not. I should know, I am currently transitioning myself. I had to struggle with this conundrum for years. It is very difficult for many people to wrap their heads around, and to say that transsexual people do not struggle with this issue is beyond reason. But eventually we have to transition. The struggle and the stress gets to be that much and our gender identity wins out.

Gender expression is not why I am transitioning. No transsexual transitions for this reason. The problems go much deeper than that.

Also please don't use the word tranny.

The mainstream media is very bad about their portrayal's of transwomen in a particular light (it has been getting better in the US recently). Once again, read Serano. Or at least read her Bitch Magazine article on the subject which is in the anthology.

Also to say that there is a fetishized adherance to social constructs is completely offbase, and honestly, totally transphobic and transmisogynistic. Its like you never met a transwomen your entire life. Passing, and the concept of such, is largely an issue of SAFETY. Transwomen, by in large are one of the largest targeted groups for hate crimes in this country. Ask any transwoman why passing is really important...they will say above all its a safety issue. By in large transwomen do not all fall into the construct of being overly femme. There is an almost complete distaste with the fact there are men who fetishism us for the very perception you are stating with the military academy. We deeply despise the stereotypes that you seem clearly mindwashed with yourself. Transwoman, myself included, are by in large not like that.

Also these radical "feminists" (in qoutes because they are anything BUT) are RIGHTFULLY called transphobic. And you are dead wrong on this issue. This is essentially about the fact that transwomen, by in large are the most marginalized group, they are maginalized by the mainstream society and subject to outright and legal discrimination, they are marginalized by the exlusionary practices of the queer and lesbian community, and they are marginalized by the medical establishment we are so dependant upon just to become comfortable in our own bodies.

No offense Seamus, you are coming off as extremely transphobic, largely because you are reflecting a major problem with second wave feminism. This is an issue about hypocrisies by those who claim to be feminist. Those who demand equal rights and representation, at the same time deny rights to women just because of the genitals they were born with, and because they were cursed with transsexuality or intersex conditions. Gender is more than that, and real feminism, not this second wave "radical" feminism (which in reality is bigotry and its own form of misogyny when it displays this aspect), is about equal rights for all women. That is the differance between the third wave that respects transwomen, as women, and the second wave which still obviously is somehow attached to the concepts of birth sex matters more than anything else.

Its pretty obvious you are pretty new this issue. I suggest you read Serano before you post a single thing more on any trans issue. That is if you have an open mind, because as it stands, you are coming off as a bigot and extremely transphobic.

The way that we are exposed to the idea of transgendered individuals in media, magazines, and documentaries does create some conflicts within a modern feminist who believes that gender (not sex) is a socially constructed entity and that the social stereotypes associated with one pair of genitals or another does not define the sex or the individual.

I am a firm believer that gender is a social construction and a perception, not biologically determined.

As such, it is hard for me to grapple with the idea of children receiving hormonal suppression because they displayed behavior or preferences towards what society insists should be reserved for the opposite genitalia.

I am not a transgendered individual and so am completely ignorant to the very personal and intimate decisions that go on. I also feel that an informed adult should be free to choose surgery or whatever other means necessary to make them feel comfortable with themselves and their identities. That is really none of my business, and I support anyone's right to choose their own lifestyle.

However, when faced with arguments that playing dress-up, wearing gendered clothing or playing with gendered toys means that children should be given medically oppressive hormonal therapy because we sure wouldn't want a little boy to enjoy wearing dresses and makeup and playing with dolls SEEMS very counterfeminist.

We go on and on about how sick it is that children are given such gendered toys, how people and parents treat children of the different sexes vastly differently (encouraging little girls to cry, etc) and how these all tie into the social ideas of sex and gender which is very limiting.

I wouldn't call someone a bigot or transphobic for not understanding or sincerely feeling that gender is a social issue - not a biological one.

I support anyones right to dress or act however they choose regardless of what genitals they have or want or were born with. I support a transgendered woman's right to be legally recognized as a woman.

I still think that gender is a social construct and that it would be healthier to encourage children to pursue the desires and interests and shallow decisions such as what sort of pants to wear regardless of their genitals, instead of suppressing their hormones and bodies and telling them that their penis or breasts define them and should be hidden so that others will accept their lives.

OK, here's the real problem: the dichotomy of male and female.

Regardless of what things are natural and what things are socially constructed, the fact is, that two categories aren't enough to express our diverse human sexuality and gender issues.

Cheers to that, Elaine.

There's a lot of conflation going on in Bindel's article, and some here in comments, between "gender expression" (masculine or feminine traits or behaviors, socially constructed) and "gender identity" (which is what trans people report as a persistent sense that they're not in the right body / gender). Those things aren't necessarily related at all, and I think there are a lot of mistakes that happen as a result. Take the case of little kids -- it would be horrifying if kids were railroaded into hormonal transition just on the basis of gender expression, but I don't think that's what's happening in most of these cases. If you pay close attention to the stories of trans kids (and I've met some of them) they are pretty clear about their gender identity too -- and as is common for a lot of kids, they have gender expressions that match their identity, and may actually flow from it.Also, trans kids and teens don't hide their body parts just because adults tell them to, believe me.

If you get this, it's a lot easier to see how a social constructionist view of gender is not incompatible at all with making sense out of how and why trans people exist and transition. I'm trans, and I also believe that gender is socially constructed. That doesn't change the fact that I have a subconscious beacon that tells me I feel female. It's always hard to describe what that means, but no, it definitely doesn't mean "I want to put on pink dresses" or "I cry during chick flicks" or any bullshit like that.

What gets me is that, hypothetically, if we had a society like that you saw in THX 1138 where there is no specific gender difference then what constitutes transgendered?

This is a good question that illustrates the point nicely. You might be surprised that this is actually a pretty common mental exercise for trans people to do when trying to figure out how/when/whether to transition. It's meant to be a way of trying to imagine what feelings about our bodies and expression might be in a society that doesn't have all the pressures and oppressions around gender that ours does. Of course, it's kind of impossible to literally or exactly imagine how our selves would be constituted, how we would have grown up in the absence of gender. But I, and many other trans people, still have a strong conviction that we would at least need to change the way we live in our bodies, at the very least -- even if there were NO outside messages or pressures, even if I imagine myself as the only person in the universe, etc. It's kind of hard to imagine or explain.

I could expound for hours on trans-ness, identity politics and what it all really means, at least in my mind, but I won't. Suffice it to say, f Julie Bindel for trying to tell me what to do with my body.

Having agency over your own body and health should be the case for everyone, but unfortunately that doesn't seem to be on the agenda for some people.

I think that the majority of feminine and masculine characteristics are socially conditioned. I know someone who is trans who said that he wouldn't have to transition if it wasn't for social stereotypes.

The problem is that most people think there are two categories to sexuality and gender: male and female. Sexuality, however, can't be put into categories and some people blur those lines. The reason they feel they must transition is because society does not allow them to express their gender the way they want to in the body that they were born.

Actually, before I became a feminist, I WAS indeed familiar with only one male who identified as female, and he did fetishize my body more than any misogynist I've encountered in my personal life. He was my boss, and I was too young and dumb to do anything about it. His actions represent a MINORITY of transwomen I'm sure, but that is the reason not all biological women want it to be mandatory for transwomen to be admitted into women's spaces--it's for the same reasons they want to be free of MEN sometimes. Not all men contributed to negative experiences for women, so should they be mandatorily given the right to hang out in a battered women's shelter? Should lesbians be forced to let me into cordoned-off events because my experience of growing up as a girl trump their experience of growing up as lesbian girls? Give me a break.

The patriarchy devotes an awful amount of time, energy, and money to socializing males into a masculine gender identity and females into a feminine one--but it is not all-powerful or foolproof. Given that many if not most gendered behaviors are socially constructed, it doesn't seem to me to be that far-fetched to accept that in a given number of cases, the way that the socialization process interacts with a person's inborn character is going to produce a gender-identification that is counter to what was intended.

It's important to distinguish — as so much of the often-sloppy work on the subject does not — between gender identity and gender expression, a distinction that equates more or less to that between the language faculty (and the attendant principles and parameters) and the way in which language is used.

Gendered behaviour is most certainly the product of socialisation; hence the significant cultural differences in what constitutes "masculine" and "feminine" dress and behaviour. Gender identity, on the other hand, shows remarkable resistance to even extreme social pressure.

It's interesting that these things are conflated even years after the only study that ever purported to prove that gender identity was a product of socialisation (John Money's notorious John/Joan study) was demonstrated to be a complete fabrication. The history of the genital mutilation and forced feminisation of intersexed infants demonstrates quite well how one's gender identity — the consciousness of oneself as male, female, or something else — cannot be broken even when everyone in one's life from early infancy on tells one differently.

Much of the fear of — and resistance to serious research on — TS/TG/IS people in some quarters seems to stem from the tendency to conflate these two very different things.