Quick Notes:
How and when did gender become such a heightened political issue? And what are the psychological implications for individuals and the collective? The origins of feminism, the LBG liberation movement, and the emerging transgender movement are explored within a psychological and cultural framework.
Links:
Books Beauvoir, Simone de (2009) [1949].
The Second Sex. Christine de Pizan in Epitre au Dieu d'Amour (Epistle to the God of Love)
Friedan, Betty (1963). The Feminine Mystique.
French, Marilyn (1977) The Women’s Room. Simon & Schuster
Stryker, Susan (2009-01-07). Transgender History. Da Capo Press
Bailey, Michael (2003). The Man Who Would Be Queen: The Science of Gender Bending and Transsexualism. Joseph Henry Press
10 reasons American politics are so divided: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/w...
Conversion therapy bans: https://www.lgbtmap.org/equality-maps...
Tumblr: A Call Out Post: https://4thwavenow.com/2019/03/20/tum...
The Controversy Surrounding the Man Who Would Be Queen (Michael Bailey’s book): https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
Film Suffragette (2015) Media Julie Bindel, 2004 article in the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/world/200...
Kimberly Nixon and the Vancouver Rape Relief Centre: Rupp, Shannon (February 3, 2007). https://thetyee.ca/News/2007/02/03/Ni...
Michigan Womyn's Music Festival:
/ 10153186431364831 https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/20...
Ken Zucker: https://www.thecut.com/2016/02/fight-...
Michael Bailey: https://chicagounbound.uchicago.edu/c...
The DSM, gender dysphoria, Ray Blanchard: https://ph.news.yahoo.com/meet-bold-s...
WPATH, Standards of Care, Version 7, Coleman et al., (2012), http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15532739.20...
World Health Organization. (2018). ‘International Classification of Diseases: Gender incongruence (ICD-11)’. Available at: http://www.who.int/health-topics/inte....
Griffin, L. & Clyde, K. (2019). Challenging Stigma in Sexuality and Gender. World
Extended Notes
● Those who don’t study history are condemned to repeat it.
● Stella fills us in on some early feminist history.
● People were willing to die over their political beliefs. It started out peacefully but it leads them nowhere.
● The radical extremist is problematic, but it’s sometimes desperately needed.
● What is political lesbianism? Sasha read that “every time a man and a woman have sex it is rape.”
● The public’s perception of black women vs. white women.
● Intersectionality needs more credit.
● Radical feminists are being dismissed, but they’re making absolutely valid points.
● How did the push for LGBT rights get started?
● How did the “T” come into the LGBT movement?
● Sasha makes a point on how the language around trans men and women has changed from the mid-’90s to now.
● Why is American politics so divided right now? Sasha weighs in.
● How we vote and what policies we agree with are not based on rational thinking.
● The 24/7 news cycle is not helping anybody.
● Stella and Sasha share the differences in news cycles/media in their respective countries.
● The CDC in America has strict guidelines on how to not make suicide seem glamorous to those at risk.
● Domestic violence shelters are often under strict orders to not reveal their location or to never allow men on the location because abusers will go to far lengths to find their victim and kill them.
● Even though most people are good people, you have the outliers and it becomes a case of “one bad apple spoils the bunch.”
● When something becomes so politicized and there is a control on “correct” language, you are forbidden to talk about what’s really happening.
● Stella breaks down the different terms prior to it being called gender dysphoria.
● Sasha feels like there is a political agenda/undertone that makes it difficult to get real work done.
● Let’s talk about the psychological impacts of shame.
● Can dogs be transphobic?
● What is sex health in the eyes of a three-year-old? Should you be providing puberty blockers to children so young?
● Although Stella believed she should have been a boy throughout her early days, she is so incredibly proud she is a woman and was able to give birth to her children.
Stella. I really hope you get a chance to see this comment and I would LOVE if you’d respond. I listen to your work and I think you’re really brilliant. I’ve been listening to your Q&As the last couple days and you’re just moving through these complicated and unique dynamics with great dexterity. There’s nothing canned about your responses to these situations. However, one thing I’ve noticed you haven’t addressed is what to say to these young girls who are on the verge of desisting or contemplating detransition about “feeling like a girl”. So, so many FTM detransitioners (particularly on Reddit) talk about how they want to detransition after seeing through the gender ideology grift - but they struggle because they can’t embrace their femininity. I wish these women were told that they don’t have to “find” or “embrace” any of those stereotypes to be women. I know that lots of detrans women begin to explore femininity without dysphoria and desist - but if you look at Reddit/detrans -so many young women want to desist or consider relapse after detransitioning because while they don’t feel “trans”, they don’t “feel like a woman”. Perhaps if many of these women were told that expressing themselves however they like is womanly - (short hair, boyish clothes, etc) so that they don’t feel like they need to change how they express their style in order to accept their body. Not all women who desist want to grow their hair longer.
I will think on it. It’s really true about the emphasis they place on how they appear. It’s as if how they look (or want to look) determines the gender that they really are. Is it - “If I don’t want to wear feminine clothes, I must not really be a female”? It’s alarming. Below - I’ve copied and pasted two of the posts on r/detrans reddit that went up just in the last 24 hours. It blows my mind. Do you think they really believe that if they don’t like stereotypically girlish things, then they mustn’t actually be girls? It blows my mind as a Gen X’er - I grew up knowing girls could be different girls and still be - female. Maybe that was because I grew up in a major liberal city. I know you have some personal experience with this, was that your belief?
1. “I wish there was more acceptance for masculine straight women. I probably never would have transitioned in the first place, if I would have gotten the love and acceptance for being a masculine woman. Especially as someone who has always had masculine features bodywise and facially, not just personality traits. Instead I was just bullied and ridiculed by both women and men. It's funny how I was accepted as a feminine gay man but not as a masculine straight woman. I'm a lot more comfortable with my body now, although I wish I didn't poison it with t. But you can only move forward. Sadly I think a lot of the gay trans men nowadays are transitioning for the wrong reasons.”
2. “Feelings of failing as a woman (FTMTF) I wonder how many have felt from other people, society etc that they haven’t been able to be a simple typical woman, that possibly having been naturally gender non-conforming has been a bit difficult for other people around. For me this is one of many themes that play a huge role in my transition and detransition. I always felt and knew that people were having trouble categorizing me neatly and how to socialize with me. Without any intentional attempt I was often mistaken to be a boy, I was just being me. Some girls said that they didn’t feel like I was one of them. Some guys straightforwardly asked me if I was something else, if I felt like something other than a woman. Some were just curious, some wanted to hurt my feelings. This was in the middle of 2000s, when nonbinary as a term didn’t even exist yet and few people had ever seen trans people even on TV. It was a huge shame, being something completely ”other” and failing to perform as who I was supposed to be, to what I was born to be. Failing to perform as a typical woman for everyone’s enjoyment and peace. I didn’t have innate gender dysphoria, I had felt that my sex was just fine, I was female, I was a woman. But other people acted like there was a mistake, that I didn’t follow the lines I was supposed to and I had to do something. I was extremely confused. So when I was unable to train myself to be ”a lady” on top of having complex trauma and other issues, I felt that trans identity was the natural answer and salvation that would finally make me normal, that I could finally blend in. I guess I’m pretty angry at the moment. It was hard being a woman before transgender trend and it’s even harder now because we feel forced to alter our bodies to fit into strict gender roles, so that women stay feminine and men stay masculine. And after having done so, after altering my body, what kind of a woman am I now? People often mistake me for a transwoman, they think I have a penis. It feels utterly absurd, failing to still being seen as who I am, just a bit differently. I’d be more than happy to hear if anyone has any experiences or feelings that are similar to mine, or anything, really. Thanks for reading this vent.”