Anyone who objects to someone asking a question has their own problems. And for the record, I don't think this question is weird. I think the question is completely normal and something that most people on both sides of the discussion should really consider more. You ask a lot of questions and do a solid (but very simplified) job answering most of them. If you would like me to weigh in on any specific question, I would be perfectly willing to answer it for you, but there are so many details that if I don't know what you are actually wondering about (now that you have done some more research) I will wind up giving you essentially an entire book, most of which either you don't care about or already know. -A woman who has/continues to transition

I think if I was dropped on an island after already living in society I would still see myself as female. I'm also Intersex and trans female. Before I understood what gender is I already kinda knew my gender is female. Now, if I was raised on an island without really being exposed to our society I feel like my gender wouldn't really be firm because I wouldn't have anything to base it off of. Probably be more like a tom boy. I like your channel. Been watching it for a month now. I was on acid one night and started watching police cam videos and suddenly your videos popped up ❤

@@RoxanneBarbelo I think you're on the right track when imagining being raised on an island without society. As I think once you've been raised around social constructs, it's difficult to view the world without those lens. You can remove the person from society but not the society from the person. You'd have to start off with a clean slate somehow.

@@wrackfuljackal I was just thinking what it would be like if I grew up on an island and some ship discovers the island and the first thing they see is me, a hermaphrodite eating an octopus out of a coconut. I could see that being a scene in a Mel Brooks film Lol

@@wrackfuljackal I would discover every hallucinogenic plant on that island and wouldn't remember what a gender is after how high I'll be

I think trans people, by and large, have more practice explicitly thinking and talking about their gender than cis people. So most of them should be better equipped to answer this question than most cis people. And cis people and eggs have some catching up to do, so it's good exercise!

This was also my exact same thought, as a cis person.

I second that emotion.

I knew someone else would have beat me to it. It's quite actually quite strange to just ask it to us trans folx. :-)

Jupp, this guy understood the assignment!

This. Precisely the answer that popped into my head after the first few sentences of watching the video. At nearly 50, and having been on HRT for a total of almost one year, I can say that my chances for an 'audience' that matters (ie. not just people that pass by/interact with me for a few seconds on a random day, positive or negative) are being pared down rapidly with advancing time, I can honestly and succinctly say that I'm transitioning purely for myself and to solve my issues primarily (perhaps exclusively, but I am not thrilled with using definitives), not others. I think that this question was something that I was addressing as part of my decision in the first place without overtly asking it of myself, but there we are.

Maybe you would do exactly the same, but without people classifying it... that's what I believe. Like you wouldn't know if what you're doing is classified as feminine or masculine, you would just do what feels more natural/comfortable to you. That's what I believe when I think about it

I (trans) agree with this take. No notes.

exactly this, thank you

Positive and negative in this comment refer to relationship trends, in a statistical manner, NOT good or bad. This is a thing I studied in college, actually. The preservation of self and others in the case of being completely and utterly alone either relationally or literally. Society stops. That's the answer. If anyone has read the logs of Cabeza de Vaca, his name is Head of Cow, yes, you'll know that he underwent an overwhelming loss of self even in the company of a few of his comrades from Spain. His enslavement by the Natives of Florida really screwed his identity up and he became a prophet for them eventually. His entire sense of religious identity, a very strong piece of self at the time, and his sense of humanity altered significantly in inverse patterns. Other significant texts report the human condition becoming larger than ever before, humanity being first and foremost to survival of the mind. Suspect texts like the various Crusoe novels demonstrate an abandonment of self unlike anyone inside a society can ever undergo. If anything, I think being trans and being stranded would completely alter, in a positive effect, how much a person sees themself as whatever preferred state of identity. Of course, other mental degradations occur to affect that aspect of mental change, so who can say for sure whether the trans person's view of themself would be otherwise realistic or even possible in a healthy light inside a society. It could be either a vast improvement for mental health even in respect to mental decline or it could be a vast drop in self respect, leading to things like dysmorphia and internal shame. It's a complex question and answer because each party we talk to has a completely different result. It cannot be anything different because some people are more or less of any given identity than others. Even now I don't really count myself as non-binary or binary, somewhere in between man and non-binary. I think for myself I would keep going as I am and suffer only from the extended effects of being alone, eventually killing myself due to the expanded suffering of isolation. It would take years, though. For a gendered trans person though? Perhaps it would be a release from norms and the constant reminder that they don't *look* or *feel* right in respect to others, or perhaps the lack of ability to present visually would destroy their mental health. Much of our gender conformity is visual, which leads to mental conformity/non-conformity. I think the head comment is especially on point -- when isolated for extended periods of time, the person isolated stops being who they were before isolation irreversibly in many unhealthy ways. Are you trans if there is nobody to witness you but yourself? I think no but also yes, it depends. Trans just means transitioned from one identity to the another, but if we're real, many trans people were always who they were and transitioning just means presenting and acting how they want to in order to be more comfortable. But also, it's very hard to transition from hard-learned activities and thoughts, so maybe being trans is indeed existential in nature and will always be an identity marker for someone who transitions. Perhaps, hopefully, in the future transness will no longer be defined by mental aspects but by physical aspects alone when we let people be themselves without consequence.

This is interesting... in my own experience, before I started taking T and growing facial hair, I tried a lot harder to present masc. But after my beard came in, I started growing out my hair and wearing a mix of women and men's clothing. I identify as male and use he/him, but I am no longer worried about being called a woman or she/her pronouns even if I cross back over the gender binary. The best I can guess is the more man I saw in myself the more comfortable I became with myself and the less I felt I had to assert my gender to others. Now with just facial hair it's like it clicks in other people's head that I'm a man and use he/him. If there were no one around to perceive me, I'd still have a beard and wear a mix of clothes- the only difference is there would be no one else there to see me as a man. After transitioning, I no longer felt the need to run from feminity, as I began to accept and see myself as a man. And I think that I became more comfortable BECAUSE the people started to make assumption that I am male and that assumption (when right) can be very validating.

For me as a trans girl it is about being a girl. I think it depends on the person. You are the inverse of being a girl, while I am a girl, not the inverse of a boy, if that makes sense

Haha yes that's kinda where I sit too. I identify as a trans guy and I've socially and partly physically transitioned to what aligns with my gender identity, but I honestly do not really care about being masculine. Masculinity does not necessarily equal maleness, which may sound confusing, but it makes sense to me lol

​@@flickerwizz233 I'm Enby, and it's kinda the opposite for me.... I DEFINITELY wanna Min the Macho Masculinity....

That's how I feel too, as a cis guy. I'm a guy, I identify as one, but I don't feel any strong attachment to masculinity as a concept. I just an what I am, not like I'm really GNC anyways but yeah

This might be me as well.

Well said, I was trying to figure out how to comment what I mean without writing a whole novel and I think you got it exactly right.

This is exactly how I feel omg

I am a cis woman and I was about to write the same thing. Gender is performance, but I am the audience too

I’m sorry but this makes me think that there must be a Palpatine of gender and I find that hilarious “Society will decide your gender” “I AM THE SOCIETY”

Also forgot to add that you made a great point as well

I'm just living for the dessert island

@@HarkertheStoryteller mmmm dessert island… more cake and ice cream than your little heart could desire! 🤩 But I’d still take the island without the desserts. I’ll bake my own 😝

yeah to me the boxes are just obstacles, I dont really care what I am because my body is basically just a tool for me to do the stuff I like but people make a big deal out of it. Like seriously just call me what you want and let me get to the good part of life, the fact that its shoved in my face all the time makes is kinda annoying. Like imagine if people kept making you check one of two boxes you dont care about. Its like do you like the letter A or the letter B? What? why? let let to the good part already! its just a minor inconvenience for me personally but its one I would rather not have, it feels like im being forced to participate in something I genuinely could not care any less about.

I think it would be roughly the same for me as well!

Enby here - personally I think it would be torture. I would have this person inside that I would never get to show anyone else. I wouldn't even know that my gender is different from anyone else's which would suck because then I wouldn't know that it's unique. Your rarity is what makes our internal experience of sex special.

I disagree. Mostly because my concept of gender is completely detached from societal norms and completely attached to my inate sense of internal sex, as a nonbinary person.

Yes if you live away from the civil world you will be working 24/7

Doppio >>>> Diavolo.

​@@ravenmationsyt3443 I disagree, i think our internalized connection between gender and sex only exist because its ingrained in us by society.

I probably wouldn't even have the concept of weeks or months. I already am nearly unable to plan ahead for longer than maybe 3 weeks.

I think we're all that dude given enough distance from other people. I was that dude for like 20 years, and only recently decided to try being awake during the day, sometimes.

in a similar vein, the Dude from Big Lebowski is something I strive towards too

@@Claw.00 The Dude is a way better end goal than the Pulp Fiction guy. I plan to change my tragectory.

i know a handful of women that tend to be like that. doesn't seem to be a gender thing, unless you make it out to be. maybe it's a cultural moment, like in some places it's considered gay to wear pink shirt to work, while in many others it's completely normal. i've also heard that wearing earrings makes you gay, but in some places many men wear earrings, doesn't seem like they have more gays.

We are all The Dude deep down inside

Most people don't know this, but you can actually physically raise your voice over time by stuffing your body full of magnesium (as many different forms as you personally can tolerate in as many doses across the day as possible) and doing myofascial release (basically massage) on the front of your neck where vocal cords are. Testosterone and estrogen have vastly different impacts on bone density--T breaks down bones faster and causes minerals to accumulate in soft tissue all over the body faster than E. This breakdown of bone and accumulation of minerals in soft tissue is why testosterone makes your voice drop--it changes the frequencies that vocal cords resonate at by changing their density and mass. But when you take a bunch of magnesium and do a lot of massage on your neck, the accumulated minerals in vocal cords break down and are put back into bone, causing them to resonate at higher frequencies. You can also use the same techniques to de-masculinize your face (as testosterone does not actually thicken bones in the face but merely causes minerals to accumulate in the soft tissue on top of the bones) HRT doesn't actually redistribute fat itself--it redistributes the minerals that have accumulated in fat, with T and E causing minerals to accumulate more in different locations across the body. Detective Wiggles on youtube has a great video on this.

preach, sister. i'm in basically the same situation myself, but i can't even take estrogen because my liver is messed up for some reason

Yes! A lot of the times I'll venture to 'try and pass' as it were it's when i'm alone and just messing around tryna find what looks good

If you were in a house with no mirrors and didn’t speak would you think of yourself as a woman or a man?

@@michaelajames99 i personally don’t need a mirror or a voice to feel how nice sheets feel on my freshly shaven body or enjoy the look of a skirt on myself, and i certainly don’t need the labels “man” and “woman” to describe the way i think about my body

"I need to be perceived to be functional" is such good insight

@@snarkishark thank you!

WOW! You really answered the question that so many of us have wondered about! My trans friend basically asked me the desert island to help me figure out if I wanted to go on HRT (I did), saying it's not about other people. I have mixed feelings about what she said but it was an interesting thought exercise. I found it more helpful when she said "would you like to continue taking [natal hormone]?" and framed it as an *active choice* vs going onto the other hormone. THAT made my decision to go onto HRT clear. I'm still not sure exactly how I identify, somewhere on the genderfluid side of things, but probably not the way people usually mean that term, more like it's "fluid" like one big ocean where the gender comes in waves, not like my gender "flows" into a different gender fluidly but maybe ccertain areas on the gender spectrum become more pronounced in certain areas and moments like ocean waves but aren't easily distinguishable from each other, it's like more than one sine wave on that chart that is my gender (multigender) I think...

Your experience is valid, but you are overgeneralizing. *For you* it is impossible to be your full authentic self without other people. *For me,* as another nonbinary person, it's actually a struggle to be authentic *with* other people and I only feel totally myself when I am totally alone. "Humans are social creatures" is an overgeneralization that ignores people whose neurodivergence or life experiences is such that they have limited to no social drive or are even actively asocial. You might regard that as evidence of some kind of ill health due to the fact that *for you* it would be, but that's imposing health-for-you onto people like me whose needs are different.

What a great writeup! "I need to be perceived to be functional" is something I had slowly been finding out myself over recent months. This also goes for being able to work and get shit done, but that's an ADHD side and a different topic. As for gender, I have a similar experience of spending most of my life inside in front of a computer so similarly my identity as such hadn't processed much in that time. But talking to more people, especially non binary and trans showed showed me what is possible and how they can feel comfortable in their bodies. It took at least another year until I really started thinking about my own and I really had to spend some time imagining myself changing in various ways to find what I enjoy. In this sense I would argue both is required, the perception and influence of other people but also lots of introspection by oneself. As for my own experiences: In the past I never cared about being male, though over the last few years I enjoyed growing my hair out, wearing nail polish and wearing some more female clothing. In the present I am pondering getting HRT, mainly wanting to reverse my hair loss, while not actually minding the "side effects". I feel like I'm still moving toward the middle and am feel more and more comfortable with the thought. Though it is hard/impossible to speak for my future self, I believe I will not ever want to be specifically male or female. I'm not sure I want to say I identify with anything in particular, nowadays I just do what I like and that's that :D

Being seen as my gender makes me happy because it means people see me how I want to be seen. My body being shaped how I want it to makes me happy because I like it when I look how I want to. Being treated the way that I like, or having the role in society that I want, makes me happy because it fits with how I view myself

I absolutely love that because it gets to the heart of being human: some stuff just makes us happy and honestly, i'm so grateful to have those things!

​@@ThatDangDad one way I like to explain being trans is like playing a symphony in the wrong key. Life kinda sounds OK, but doesn't quite resolve well. Transitioning sets everything in the right key and the symphony sounds right. Even if there's nobody else to listen it. The symphony still resolves well inside us and gives us great peace of mind.

we are the audience with the closest 'front seat' to our own performance.

@@vansen-qod I am stealing this so hard. This analogy is amazing.

It's wild how vast and complex individual experience can be. Thank you for sharing ❤ that's pretty powerful. Been questioning myself on that actually, just putting off talking about my big hips and extrasensory perception plus the cost is a bit much atm. I also don't think knowing would change anything, but I could be scared of the answer. More accurately I probably fear *having* to explain it one way or another as opposed to being under the radar and not explaining. It's a bit existential, but I don't really want to invest in the answer without knowing either. Society is an asshole that way, we like our sorting boxes simple. Yet real life is rarely so.

Your whole story is horrifying, but the revelation that your parents KNEW you were intersex at birth takes it to a whole new level. I'm so thankful that you can live your authentic self now.

you were set on FIRE AT 12 YEARS OLD? that's like a whole new crime

Your life is so much like mine except I'm 35 and I'm not a parent. Also I transitioned. I have tits and a dick and I feel somewhere between m and f.

🙏❤️🙏

I was thinking about that too. He keeps saying gender as performance instead of a performative act and it kinda triggers me a little bit lol I know he probably means performative but still gives me the little "oof"

That video hits hard, and I agree, it's a good thing to on to.

​@@ElunaeIt's not just a matter of using the wrong word. Dad here is having the exact misunderstanding of meaning that Abigail talks about in that video. Gender is not "performance, done for an audience". It is "performative: doing it makes it so."

"Restricting gender affirming care in people with autism" Do those fuckers not know the comorbidity between the two...?

Yes! Although I would argue that the degendering of disabled people is actually a degendering tinted with a kind of failed femininity, like a sheer lip gloss with a hint of color. Disability itself, particularly in its more socially visible forms, has long been understood through a heuristic of ability as masculine (see "you kick like a girl" or "don't get hysterical," among others). In our binary society, to be incapable of masculinity is therefore to be shuffled into femininity, only for that category with its equally high standards of performance to also reject the disabled body. Because the masculine was impossibilized first, the feminine remains the lingering identity, but still one which doesn't want us either.

@@lunarmagpie619eugenics in a nutshell. Because like it or not America has spent the better part years of the late 19th and early twentieth century obsessed on the perfection of the human race and all that reminded them they were not perfect were in many ways rendered inferior and undesirable in as many ways as they could possibly get away with. That not only included people of other races they wished to rid the world of but also the many flaws in their own. Including disabled people mentally or physically or socially as sexual orientation and people who were poor. Many people these deeds were unique to Germany and Adolph Hitler. Oh no, that came straight out from the privileged white class of American society by 1890. Margret Sanger was a Eugenics activist. And many notable people in this country from Woodrow Wilson to Henry Ford were very fond of her. It included what the ideal woman measured. What the Ideal man looks like. How many kids should you have if any. They debated that marriage would be allowed the working class but not the privilege of making babies. That was their plan with the pushing birth control. It was never about equality or feminism. They sold it to workers that way to sell the idea that you can’t make it on this salary and grow a family on a wage of one wage slave. Mentally unfit were sterilized. The sexual deviant were jailed and castrated or sterilized. Now you can see the autistic, borderline personality disordered and gays and lesbians kids are suddenly being persuaded that they are something that leads them to want to castrate themselves. What a sell. Indoctrination. Why these groups in particular? They fit the Eugenics agenda pretty well doesn’t it? Now his is a social construct. You can tell because it’s promoted in University in Europe first where top Psychology in child development aka DSD used hospitals and psychiatric methods aimed at treating people with ambiguity of sexual development are also the same people that thought sense of self gender were fungible. They would assign a baby a sex and tell parents to raise such an altered child the sex that they created. They would never have the pleasure of sex, of child rearing or any real sense of themselves. They were sold a life that was not truly viable. Now out of the playbook script of f yesteryear these very same people are now indoctrinating youth to do for them what they can’t force on the public because it’s a human violation of human rights. Convince yourself that you are not what you are. A true Transexual didn’t need anyone to tell them “hey maybe you really are a girl or tell a girl you’re really a boy. We actually wake up and look in the mirror and see to our horror like reminded we are not in the right skin suit. And have a panic attack. That would a disorder not a fad, it’s a crushing feeling. Especially if you like me are also intersex and already medically altered and cannot be reversed. Radical acceptance behavior training is the only thing keeping me sane. Don’t let anyone get you down that dark path. These kids were experimental versions of transgender phenomena. All the verbal que. None binary, binary non conformity, sex assigned at birth. Gender fluid. Straight out of the box terms used back in the 30s and beyond when referring to people who it’s ambiguous sexual development.

As someone who is autistic, I have been told that I can’t know my gender because my autism makes me less mature than others my age. I was 18 at the time. It’s really fucked up how infantilized so many disabled people are, especially by parents, caregivers, and teachers. Even if my autism did make me less mature than others my age (which I don’t think it does), if I am capable of communicating about my gender, then I am capable of deciding my own identity. And there’s literally no harm in respecting a person’s wishes to go by a different name and pronouns. If it’s just a phase, then everything goes back to the way it was before eventually. If it’s not, then people are being assholes for no reason. People need to learn to let others live their lives the way they want to

yep, once had a friend that was forced to stop transitioning because "testosterone is making [them] have psychotic breaks" they had been diagnosed with schizophrenia years before medically transitioning. also have seen a lotttt of autistic kids be told that they just dont UNDERSTAND their gender bc theyre autistic (used to work for child & adolescent psychiatrists)

Also as an Agender the only thing I would change is my chest. I find it physically annoying. It makes me get too hot and gets in my way. Things would just be easier with it gone, has nothing to do with everyone else.

​​@@dragonscale46 Fair point, though I'd argue that isn't really gender presentation because for you, it's not about fitting into a gender role and just about utility and comfort.

Same

@@paperbird9817 I agree with that. But top surgery is often considered under the umbrella of trans. So I figured it would be nice to let people know how I think.

Another agender person here and I think my presentation would likely shift some based on a shift in priorities. The first thing that comes to mind is skirts, light flows skirts. They’re much more comfortable in warmer temperatures (DESERT island) and if all my physical needs were met and I didn’t have to concern myself over the safety of others (on account of there being no others) then yeah comfy light skirts it is. TBH most of my day to day presentation is structured around pragmatism

I thought I was the only one! I’m so happy that there’s someone out there that validates my experience.

As a cis dude I think that's a nice way to put it. I just like the thought and 'romanticism' of the "though big guy with an emotional soft heart" and feel comfortable living that way. Thinking of gender as an aesthetic is a nice new perspective.

Yeah and for me both aesthetics are irrelevant to me, if pressed I say my assigned gender purely because I dont care and want you to move on from this thing that has really only ever served to be an inconvenience. Like seriously my body is just a tool to me, I dont care what it looks like that much so long as it allows me to do the things I like. Gender is weird and feels made up, I understand the concept of biological sex but gender is more like a cultural or religious identity almost. The problem is I dont understand those either, like I dont need any labels I have a name for that purpose already right? I care about having a male body as much as I care about having brown eyes or being 5'3, its only relevant for practical reasons for me. If anything height is more of a a thing since being short can be annoying when I cant reach something. All I really know about gender is that it is important to both trans and cis people for some reason so I try to respect it, but I do not really get why it matters at all.

I'm also trans and autistic and this is fascinating because I totally agree. I was born male, and I am changing my aesthetic to be more feminine but don't want to get any surgeries or anything. I want to look like my perception of what a feminine aesthetic looks like because that would just make me a lot more happy about my appearance, not become a full-blown girl or have any expectations to look or act like what a girl is supposed to be. I've also struggled with not feeling like a "girl" 100% of the time, and I wonder if that's due to just not being anything but liking how one gender looks. Some gender experts should do a paper about this view point because I would really like to see what other people think on it. Like if this kind of gender identity is more agender or non-binary esc instead of what gender you want to look like.

Wow I just posted my comment, this is way better than I put it. I feel exactly the same way.

Same

This describes my early childhood so well!

same

I definitely restrict my expression to get misgendered less, which is sad.

@@nuclearalchemy9220It’s realistic. If you want to live as a man you have to… live as a man. It’s a lesson I wish I learned 10 years earlier because denying it and dressing up for people on social media did nothing for me. Do not make my same mistakes.

that is really interesting, thanks for sharing!

oh thats really cool, thank you for sharing that!

wow interesting!

Thank you for showing me that I have solidarity even with men. Why are people so crazy about other people's hair?? I'm a woman, and I was given unsupervised use of a BLADE in MIDDLE SCHOOL because my mom decided I should shave my legs. *_?????????_* The worst part is it actually opened the door for a SH addiction (don't worry, I'm long clean now). My dad is continually weird about my choice to let my body be fluffy on my legs and underarms. Why do people care so much? It's so weird. Feels borderline pedophilic to me :|

Yes, as a cis woman I never enjoyed shaving and it actually makes me uncomfortable (itchy and lots of ingrown hairs) to shave. Yet I am left feeling incredible pressure to properly perform my gender by shaving and every spring time as I stop wearing long pants I have to fight against my feelings of incorrectness for having leg, arm and armpit hair. It's ridiculous and intellectually I know it, but still I feel this annoying feeling that I am not female enough if I don't do what I am 'supposed' to.

My brain instantly went to Sartre's the look and a lot of de Beauvoir lol.

If you can’t think of yourself as something that won’t be perceived by others, gender will always be part of your identity. Otherwise, you could end up discarding your gender if you were alone on an island for the rest of your life, as it’s really just a social label.

@@holynder3181 That will only happen if you're agender. For me, I would absolutely remain male. Every time I'm alone, I find out again through firsthand experience. That's if you stay healthy though. Once you are psychologically starved enough, you won't have a sense of any kind of personal identity whatsoever, temporarily lose language and social skills, and become a pure observer. I also know this through firsthand experience.

I say this as an autistic person so take this with a grain of salt but why does it matter how others perceive you? If they don’t like you what does it matter?

Masks were wonderful.

This is the real answer

@@crystalvulpine2314for some people it is, me included, but for a lot of trans people it’s all about the social stuff. I personally think these are two different categories entirely but we’re all in this boat together

@@stdesy Isn't that just sexism?

⁠​⁠@@crystalvulpine2314 I was wondering the same thing. If it’s social then what folks are saying is that it’s bad to be perceived as a certain gender.

It gets weirder when you have any sort of plurality going on, too. I'm my own audience. A small audience, but still an *audience*.

I actually just commented the same thing before noticing yours inspired by the Wynton Marsalis quote about jazz

As my partner has been known to say, "I am my own captive audience."

@@OdinsSage definitely stealing that one. It's a gift and a curse for sure 😂

doing my part to hopefully make this stuff easier to chew on :)

Oooooo...now that's good....nods.....mtf here

I remember panicking when I realized i was transmasc because i didn't want to be a beer-drinking frat boy type. I was really into my identity as a creative type. I blew my own mind when I thought "I'm already a guy, right? So I just.... keep doing exactly what I already want to be doing. I'll just live as a /male/ creative type." Basically, whatever you decide, whatever you experiment with, whatever you find joy in... by being masculine and doing a thing, you define that thing as masculine for others. My mantra was "Who I am as a man becomes what a man is."

dang, that's a really great observation!

And while I had been questioning my gender before covid, that time period largely gave me more time to think about it and my place in gender! I'm a trans guy now, and proud of it.

Very good point. I saw so much of this myself!😊

For myself, not much would change because I've always been just who I am, rather fiercely so. I never fit the ideal female gender though I am female cis, and I identify as such, for the most part. As a child I felt equally or more male than female, to my mother's great concern. Today we would call such a young girl a tomboy, and leave it at that, never questioning her gender identity. This fits into the social aspect of gender. I have multiple medical issues, chronic pain, disabilities, and a genetic disease that takes up all of my time dealing with, besides living in forced poverty because I have Social Security disability, so I don't really have time to sit around and worry about my gender. If I were on an island, I'd still be dealing with the same issues, nothing would change. And as one other person commented here, not having social pressures, one tends to be more themselves than they might be, and when it comes to my neurological issues and my neurodivergence, I would have to agree with that. I would be more myself, masking wouldn't be an issue. I find how we perceive ourselves, be it sex, be it gender, be it anything, does not change that much. It may grow, develop and become more nuanced, but we are who we are for the most part, usually. The fact that transgenderism is now linked to a part of the brain that is different physically and can be identified in autopsy regardless of whether or not a person has taken hormones or had surgery, pretty much says everything that needs to be said about this issue. We are who we are because that's the way our brains are wired. ❤

Similar thing happened to me, it wasnt covid, but I had quit my job to destress and to do some skill training at home, and during that time I got smacked full-on by years worth of trans feelings I hadnt fully conceptuallized.

is there a gas leak in your house? do you have someone you can call for support??

@ThatDangDad my comment wasn't written with intent to insult anyone. Just a genuine exclamation of something I'm disappointed to observe. If you attempt to insult me as a response, then I am even more disappointed. If you react to someone expressing on observation that's unpleasant for you to read, and take the unpleasantry you experience and attempt to get back at the person stating an observation, then you're not really built to be able to talk to anyone who disagrees with you. Disagreement is always uncomfortable for both parties. To take that uncomfortablility and take personal offence and attempt to make the other feel bad to even it out, then you can only ever withstand an echo chamber

@ThatDangDad by the way, my comment is primarily aimed at the other commenters. Not you so much. When I say "you" in the first comment, I'm talking about a "general" you. I'm not sure to what extent your mind is open or closed. But the people in the comments ready to listen or think is surprising because usually when people have the set of beliefs that they espouse, it almost always comes with an unwillingness to consider any view from any other place that they reliably know is out of their realm of belief. It's a quality that not just those with that view hold, but also some religious nuts think the same way. It can be found in a lot of places. And no matter what virtues may be claimed from the mode of thinking it comes from, it's never good to see such profoundly closed minds. Especially when you see how open they *can* be

I pinch 🦀

i love how you spelled philosophical

Oh fuck I swear I'll never spell philosophy or physics right first try

@@geckoram6286 hey i mean its pretty creative

I like some mild francephobia myself, the french can be annoying 😆

@@xWood4000 man I swear I wasn't drunk while writing that, I'll check it again. Although, gotta say, french people can be annoying sometimes

I fully agree with this

I'll just second this instead of writing the same thing. If I were taken there now I'd still be a trans guy but if I were never introduced into a society with gender conceptions then I'd probably feel more comfortable in my skin compared to how I currently am but my mind and how I interpret gender, even as someone who considers themselves nonconforming, is largely dictated by how society broadly and collectively views gender.

i was going to write a comment but it'd basically just be a less eloquent version of this so i'm just going to say yeah same

My thoughts exactly

I love the way you put this! I have a genuine question if you don’t mind answering it, otherwise feel free to ignore this. In my own exploration I also got to “I wouldn’t be transgender because gender wouldn’t exist to me”. But when it comes to self-expression (or what would, in our society, be called gender expression) such as taking hormones, styling yourself a certain way, or using certain mannerisms, how do we know that those preferences would remain the same? On one hand those things feel intrinsic to who I am but on the other hand they may be things I adopted in order to reinforce my gender identity and make me feel more aligned with that internal sense of gender. In case of the latter, if society had deemed things like testosterone (or the types of changes it causes in a body), short hairstyle, facial hair, suits etc as being feminine, then would those thing be what I was drawn to instead? As they would reinforce my femininity and allow me to feel more at home with myself as I embody it. I imagine that if gender as a concept never existed, then gendered styles, body types, mannerisms etc, would not either. There would be no clothes or hormones that would make me feel more feminine because it wouldn’t mean anything to be feminine. In our current reality, what is femme or masc is quite arbitrarily decided and under constant flux and redefinition. It them follows that those style preferences and performances as learned, things that may have been completely different if we were born in another culture, region or time period. We may be conditioned from birth to see some things as feminine so we do them to express that we are feminine people and vice versa. So do I prefer those things because of my gender identity, or do I have this gender identity because I prefer those things? It’s a chicken and egg type situation I guess. I hope this all makes sense. This is as much a question for other people as it is for myself and I’m really curious what you (& any others who have ideas about this) think.

I kinda feel this. For me, I don't think I ever did a great job of performing my assigned gender, but there were a lot of masculine things that I was encouraged to do even if I didn't do a great job of them. For me, I realized I was agender not because I quit performing my gender and found that I liked it, but because I stumbled into LGBT stuff on youtube, and upon being introduced to the idea of gender euphoria, I realized I was supposed to like it and never did. Sadly, I still haven't fully shaken off the habits I built up while learning to perform gender, but I'm getting better, and becoming more myself every year.

I think agender is just normal

@@bow-tiedengineer4453 That sounds more like you were a victim of sexism

​@@crystalvulpine2314 I do think my extended family is a little sexist, yeah, but the main reason I'm pretty sure I'm some flavor of nonbinary is that there's never been a single things that's given me that masculine gender euphoria feeling, and for the longest time I didn't really see any difference between men and women other than biology and societal expectations. Like, when I first found out about trans people, I didn't find it strange because I thought gender roles were important, I found it weird that anyone cared enough to bother asking people to use certain pronouns. When I was little, before my extended family bribed me to get my hair cut, I looked so much like my mom when she was my age, to the point that people would assume I was a girl, and rather than giving me the same sort of feeling of it conflicting with how I see myself that I've seen in both cis and trans people, young me's reaction was "Ah, yes, I'm so much like my mom, isn't that so neat?" Like, I was almost 18 when I realized that gender and gendered pronouns were anything more than sexist stereotypes and a way to sort people so people don't risk seeing the opposite genetalia in changing rooms and bathrooms. I support people doing whatever weird harmless things make them happy, and now I've seen how much most people care about their gender it's clear to me that supporting trans folks is more important than sorting people based on what their underwear covers, but it's still a little wild to me that anyone has such strong feelings about gender and sex. I'm just me, you're just you, and words like "he" and "she" are all just made up

@@bow-tiedengineer4453 That people's whole lives revolve around their gender is a sign of a sexism problem.

oh wow, it's so rare for me to come across another agender. Very nice to find a kindred soul.

@@LeynaLhuff high five :) we exist!

Yeah this is a weird hypothetical for agender folks because the answer is so obvious. I'd just be me all the time. I wouldn't have to get anxious about formal events with dress codes. I wouldn't have to get stressed about people behaving a certain way around me because of my perceived gender. I'd just get to be me and not have to perform a gender because I have to in certain situations because society expects it or I have to in order to get a job or not be judged by family for 'not making an effort' etc I would love nothing more than existing in a world where gender didn't exist. I have a body. My body is not 'me'. I suppose I just don't do self-expression. Maybe it would be interesting to see if I was more comfortable doing this alone on a desert island. If I found a feather I'd probably stick it in my hair. But because it pleased me and it wouldn't be misinterpreted by an observer.

I've been identifying as non binary period for a few years now, and kinda felt like agender is kind of right for me as a label, but on the other eI love presenting in pretty gendered ways on some occasions (I love to do hyperfem makeup and outfits to combine with my weird androgynous hair and posture and personality), so I didn't think it was quite right either. But when it comes to this hypothetical my immediate answer was also "I'd just present the same ways I do now, be myself the same way i am now". And reading your comment I've felt pretty reflected on the label the way u explain it. Either way I don't care so much about labeling myself the perfect way anymore, but just existing howhever i please and trying not to project what i feel other people will gender me as on my own thoughts about who i am or how I can present to be "accepted" or read as non binary. To me, I'm CLEARLY that, and that's what ultimately matters.

I cannot explain how much I love you talking about yourself like a d&d character

God that is so true, I think the pandemic really affected myself and others in a way with gender of seeing less reason for it, as outside of the day to day of society, gender is kinda pointless to some extent. Also, as someone who is non-binary (and identifies under the trans umbrella), I am fully multiclassing, didn't need to mix/max or respec, just had to alter the build moving forward.

Normally I'd have rolled my eyes and clicked past, but That Dang Dad has shown he's a fair bet as a good actor.

Most questions are not anti-trans rhetoric. People just falsely ASSUME they are right away. :/

Yeah, I would think the same thing. I like being male as defensive... something people find oddly feminine, it lacks the rage needed to be male according to conservatives. The person who makes no aggression and is defensive holds the notion of the "Den mother" a bear or wolf that protects the cubs... a mom. It was what I heard as an AMAB guy, being the level head of people who could not act mature... a mom. It was literally my title. Very interesting, I lacked the rage and was too compassionate to perform as male, also being gay added to that. It was a group of far-left people but put on me by conservatives, we just all thought it was fun so it got adopted.

Well I was kind of a douchebag for 20 years so i'm making up for lost time lol

​@@ThatDangDad You're doing an outstanding job making up! I love your content and I hope your reach will grow even more! Thanks for the reply ☺

​@@ThatDangDadbetter late than never! reflection & thoughtfulness are strengths that are difficult to maintain because they require so much effort (and lbr time). all i ever want from people is for them to think about things more deeply. the fact that you were an "asshole" for 2 decades and managed to pull thru gives me a lot of hope for the future

@@ThatDangDad So many people don't ever acquire the self-awareness, tools, or will to examine themselves to that degree. That kind of work is HARD and lots of people dip a toe in, realise how much effort it will take, and just... don't. Thank you for not only putting in that hard work, but also for being publicly transparent about your journey and bringing these conversations to your platform.

ALSO- I've begun breaking down the concept of passing, which as a trans voice coach is a topic that is brought up a lot. What I have decided about passing and the desire for it is that it is not contradictory to gender liberation or even abolition. It isn't a uniquely trans experience to want to be understood and believed for who you have found yourself to be. I want to be understood, even if it's just me understanding myself on a deserted island.

I feel the same way

yes, this is one of the reasons i like it being framed as "doing gender." time and place inform culture, which is the thing that determines gendered possibilities. the idea that male and female or man and woman are fixed, static things is clearly absurd just by looking at say, a "man" from spain and a "man" from the u.s.

I love puns, I loved your joke! At what temperature and atmospheric pressure are you genderfluid?

@@samsibbens8164 definitely at STP, SATP is pushing it though.

Hey, I identify as genderfluid as well! Do you mean that the change in the way you think of your gender was able to be literally observed in real time? I'm very curious about the subject, because I do know that I indeed experience occasional substantial changes in how I perceive my gender. Sometimes I may experience intense body dysphoria, but some days later I will feel very satisfied with my body. It's very confusing to me. I also can prefer different expressions of gender identity at different points (though this is mostly in video games where I have full control over clothing style lol).

whats the test? Im asking because gender stuff is finally forcing me to deal with it, and the more information I have the better also i'm just curious

i read most of this and i think this is a really good way of putting it. and that study seems really interesting

I'm someone who spreaks to your words a lot. I am 42, trans, and non-transitioned. My specific situation when it comes to gender is that I have mental conditions outside of anything related to gender dysphoria, and it's caused me to be analyzed many times in my life for many reasons. It's also had me equipped with a lot of techniques for calming anxiety, introspection, and self-discovery. I have two symptoms of my transgender that I don't find a lot of other trans people seem to talk about, so I think they might be unique representations with my list of conditions, but they tell me some things. The first is limb-ghosting. I feel parts of my body differently on a physical level than they appear. I can feel a different shape to my fingers, the top of my head (of all places) the shape and size of my torso, and so on. The feeling I get isn't "it feels male vs female" I simply feel those things 'different shaped' than they really are. It represents as a numb or 'itchy' feeling in places where my feeling of my body lies inside the bounds of my physical body. I've had this phenomenon studied with tests under EKG monitoring. The feeling of my body lines up with the second different... I dream in female and the shape my body 'feels' when I'm awake lines up with the body I 'get' when I"m dreaming. In dreams I appear always as a female half-fox furry hybrid thing. Get all the laughs out, we can deal with the gender dysphoria because the furry thing is a whole other can of worms. But I have had this 'form' in my dreams as young as 4 years old... and I know this because I also suffer from night terrors that caused PTSD in me as a child. The earliest dream I can remember is burned into my memory because it is the cause of a deeply-rooted trauma. But in that dream I was a 4-year-old girl. This is before I should have 'formed a gender identity' and before I have been 'tricked by doctors into believing I'm trans.' I've been a curiosity to a few doctors in my life, and have become pretty phobic of seeking medical care for worry that I'll want to be examined more. I donated my brain to science, so hopefully that'll help people enough in the future figuring out why my brain is different or whatever. But for me, on a daily basis... it's the exact antithesis to this question. I'm basically a hermit, outside of my wife and 2 cats. I have friends that I hang out with on the internet, but it's a very small circle. But I isolate myself because I feel LESS like myself in public. It's the reaction of other people that is the reason I doubt myself, or hate myself so deeply. So I AM on a 'desert island' scenario, or as close to one as can reasonably exist. Being alone is how I feel NORMAL about my gender... how I get to feel female. I feel more masculine every time I step outside my door. That feels oppressive. If I display an inch of myself in public I am ridiculed instantly... so I've learned to stop burning myself.

this is exactly what i was thinking. If i was born there i would not care because those social gender norms wouldnt have ever been built in my mind to cause me to want to follow them.

​@@KitZunekaze Childhood trauma before your personality has fully formed can cause a fracturing of self perception, development of an "inner world", multiple personalities independant of each other, disphoria, and a host of other things. Your self perception does not match reality.

​@@darketernal3piss off

Needs? Needs. I'm intrigued by that choice of word. Could I ask what makes you say you have medical transition needs? (Fair warning: I am coming from a position of disagreement, as a Christian who believes gender is determined much before someone's born, aligns with their bodily makeup, and cannot be changed. I understand debating a topic of identity can be very stressful and painful. If you don't want to do that, by all means, ignore me. I'm here to understand your viewpoint and provide a different viewpoint to you. I'm not here to hurt or stress anyone.

@@DreamtaleEnjoyeryes needs - I’ll try to explain a bit. I was sold by your rambling parentheses bc mood lmao. The first very basic counter example is that many trans people lack gonads so if you take them off hormones they will medically suffer instantly. Instantly. I do not recommend it. Secondly, to address the earlier transition trans ppl since it is relevant and I am one lol. So the first concession I’ll make is that yes, trans people will be physiologically alive without transition: our basic body temp regulation, blood pressure, respirations etc would not fall outside of normal physiologically range deprived of it. Yet that is not how we use “needs” most frequently, otherwise people wouldn’t need money, knowledge, wisdom, or God. No, when people ardently claim to “need” something it is usually because their quality of life is fundamentally worse without it. Ik it can be challenging to understand, as I struggled with it too, what “being transgender” truly means. I won’t do biology 101 bc been there done that (although willing to talk about it if you’re curious), but I will do a material analysis of the ways transitioning is soothing much of the pain of existence. And isn’t that just something we’re all trying to do. In no particular order: Is there a need to be present and engaged with the world? Yes, and yet before hrt I moved through every day in a disassociated daze punctuated with bouts of severe depression. Nothing but hrt changed that. Should we live our lives entirely disconnected from our bodies? Maybe Christianity would say yes, but I would entirely disagree: our body and life is all we have. From a medical standpoint, that type of disassociation can be literally dangerous; from a philosophical/historical/psychological perspective, the extreme prioritization of religious life over any physical concerns explains the prevalence of trans+ (gender fuckery) religious leaders throughout all of history around the world. From a personal standpoint, I can also add the profound pain and suffering of being unable to truly process people touching you, good or bad, and the simple joy of touch and human connection after transitioning. It’s striking. Would you rather we didn’t experience love? Now, I’m not saying that trans people can’t/dont fall in love without transitioning as those are unrelated processes, but what I am referring to is what it means to be loved, and to love fully. The former requires others to see and know you for who you really are, and the latter requires you to be fully embodied and yourself. Both of those require transitioning in some regard. It’s kinda in the “name” of transness, hence why it used to feel like a bit of a circular definition, but it remains true. I think of all the ways my life is immeasurably better since transitioning, and I wouldn’t change it for anything. Yes I wish the world sucked less, and yes I wish life was easier, but it is what it is and I’m ultimately grateful. It is a truly transcendental, transformative, and religious experience. I use the word religious instead of spiritual to denote the social aspect of it. It’s intense, and yet it is the easiest thing in the world to actually live it. So much of your daily suffering is gone: you wake up happy, you enjoy eating food, your sex life gets better because you’re just more yourself and more present. The daily minutia of living becomes so beautiful that sometimes it is shocking. I’ll say it’s a need because I’d hate to return to my native hormones and that constant brain fog and depression. I’d just feel vaguely ill, all the time. I’d probably spiral back into alcoholism and apathy, perpetually ruin relationships, etc. No, I could not live a happy and healthy life as my birth sex and so I transitioned. That’s just it. I know it is terrifying to think transitioning is a choice that anyone can (theoretically) make, but that is something we all have to sit with occasionally. Anyway this is uh way too long but hopefully explains a little bit. I’m cutting myself short bc it’s almost 2 here

@@anonnonny3142 Almost 2, pfff, it's 4 am for me. It's the internet, none of us have sleep schedules :p Anyway, back on topic-of course I understand that after transition is started there'll be ongoing medical needs. I'm not gonna argue that! Especially since I have a conspicuous lack of a medical degree, lol. I'm specifically talking about the need to START transition on a physically healthy body. Now... may I dare to present the possibility of a coping mechanism? That maybe, that brain fog and depression you experienced (also I'm so sorry you went through that) could've come from a different source, and you misattributed it to gender dysphoria? Therefore the relief you found from transition would be a sort of placebo effect. Your brain wholly believes the problem is resolved, so the symptoms should disappear, so they do. I'm genuinely asking if you think there's any chance that could be the case for you, or any trans individual. As for your questions: yes, of course I agree people need to be present and engaged with the world. Though I wonder what originally triggered your loss of that. I sincerely doubt as a little baby you were dissociated and depressed because of which entirely arbitrary color your parents dressed you in, so I wonder when that really started? Of course we're getting really personal with that, so feel free to leave me wondering. Again I'll agree, and say that no, nothing about Christianity says we should be disconnected from our bodies! I personally view my body as a tool to interact with the material world and everyone in it, which is obviously vital for so so many reasons. Though I'm fascinated with what you said about touch. You experienced touch & connection differently before and after transition? Do you want to tell me more about what that was like? And as for the last one I actually agree with the first half (others need to see you for who you are to love you) but disagree with the second half (needing to fully embody yourself to love others). I mean honestly that bit gave me some Big Feelings because of my personal life, and how I don't feel truly loved because I don't feel anyone really sees all of me. But as for the second half, I don't really see how giving love has anything to do with your identity! You can give love to anyone at any time, regardless of who you are and who they are. Overall thank you for responding, I love a good friendly disagreement.

@@DreamtaleEnjoyer ugh fine I’ll continue answering lmfao, who needs sleep. To answer your points one by one, first stating with depression. I’ve thought about it quite a bit, but it’s actually shocking because it’s true. I very quickly started seeing the world in new eyes. I’d wake up every day energized and excited to face the day, and I could feel the fog begin to creep as my levels dropped during the last few days. I was on an intentionally low dose at the time, so I know that my levels likely dipped below the healthy range at those times. No, I do not actually consider myself “cured” of depression: I still have episodes fairly frequently and am in fact barely getting out of one again, but they’re much more manageable. There’s more to live for once you start enjoying life. I am, coincidentally, studying towards a medical degree, but I’d love to conduct some studies on biochemical dysphoria as a whole. I don’t have the time to work on it now, but I’m slowly setting things up for it to be possible in the future. As for the second, I truly don’t know. Believe me when I say it but a large majority of my childhood memories and dreams were third person. I had a relatively happy tho not ideal childhood I guess, but I don’t think that’s it because it was there before. The earliest “developmental” memory I have (ie one that splits my behavior into before and after) was being chided by my grandmother and mother for needing so much attention and being impossible to please (both true; this may have also been around the time my grandpa was killed in a hit n run by a drunk driver, but my memory is foggy). And so, I vowed to myself to not need it or really anything from them, to fully suppress it all. Ofc, it’s not an even process, but I was a fairly dissociated and depressed kid: my first ever favorite song (like age 3) was about hope in the face of loss sung by a holocaust survivor who died tragically. My next favorite song (age 7 was when it “took over”) was by Metallica lmao. As a kid, I don’t remember ever being unaware of gender. I saw it as some secretive/yet important performance. And at the time, I was extremely fem: I loved all things Barbie, I liked perfumes, women’s clothing, and really women. I can easily pin so many crushes on women to my early childhood, it’s insane. And yet, here I am years later a trans man. I’m bisexual, so there’s that: could’ve known that from my ~weird~ feelings towards gay porn at age 12, but here we are. Of note in that story (at least to me) is the patterns of my psychosexual development mirroring that of guys my age more than girls. The touch thing is actually super easy - your skin and hair change on hrt. So does your pain processing, overall getting sick (ie man flu phenomenon, it’s a thing), body temperature baseline, sweat, physical bodily sensations (ie people start liking different things, moving your muscles feels different, your body literally changes to grow things, etc) and so much more. Hormones are just “activators” of different parts of your genome - your body literally rebuilds itself to slowly start to resemble the opposite sex with hrt. And in that you’re happy and less dissociated (and horny if you’re on T, but maybe depressed in the first few months of E) and you got a recipe for “it’s different”. My pain tolerance and endurance went down a bit on T, but my body temp, appetite, and metabolism went up. The difference in sensation itself is hard to describe, but I did used to feel a “skin dysphoria” so ig I’ll try. E skin is extremely soft, while T skin is rough: the soft plushness of estrogen felt weird to be interacted through, like I was confined inside in a straight jacket unable to escape. The skin felt wrong, too young and soft for who I expected to see in the mirror when I looked for myself. By the way, I do find gender to be “developmental” and likely some combination of predispositions and environment. It still doesn’t change much. Emotions also feel different post hrt: I feel a much bigger breadth to anger now but less depth to it. It feels social (in the sense of relatively precise communication tool) to me now, and more moderated. I am also probably sad less frequently, but that’s also a factor of hrt. My cognitive patterns shifted too, which of course affects emotions. This is both likely hrt-resultant and arising out of social factors and roles, but the fact remains. The former is mostly what’s an attenuation of prior testosterone-formed pathways in my brain, while the latter is the social conditioning that we are all subjected to and the weird ass experience of watching the expectations shift in front of your eyes. The rest I’ll respond to tmr, it is quite enjoyable to talk to you too. I love any good faith discussion.

@@anonnonny3142 I'm not gonna say much, I'll wait for you to finish everything you want to say before I respond but- I have to- Dear stranger I believe you are traumatized. I can't even describe the brain shock you threw me into when you said "I had a relatively happy childhood" then went on to describe being criticized for BEING A CHILD (seriously, name one child who doesn't need tons of attention and isn't impossible to please) and dissociating and repressing your feelings because of that????? My friend that is childhood trauma!!! You are traumatized!! That is not a good childhood! I'm going to bed too, goodnight. I'm just still in such shock you just said that so casually, I'm not even gonna get into how shocking it was to see an equally casual mention of being exposed to corn at such a young age. Goodness...

Yooo I that's a really cool perspective. Your explanation made my understanding of gender become a little more holistic. Thanks a ton🔥💪

That's so interesting! I am also autistic and non-binary, but I lean more towards the masculine side (for me, he/they is it's own gender lol). Sometimes looking in the mirror I can identify with what I see and sometimes it's completely foreign, my self-perception is always shifting. I also struggle with introception but I only recognized the physical aspects of that, like hunger and temperature, before seeing this comment. What's facinating is that i gravitate towards dressing in all-black, plus black hair, black nails, ect. It gives me a sense of coherence in an otherwise ever-shifting gender performance. It just goes to show how different people with similar experiences can be, especially on the autism spectrum!

So… a version I can offer of this as a cis gay man is one of archetypes. Our community has the bears, the twinks, the otters, the daddies, the bulls, the pigs, the gym bunnies, and on and on and on. Archetypes that carry with them ways of behaving, ways of speaking, ways of moving through the world, ways of the world seeing you, ways of the world treating you. It’s not quite a gender per se, but it’s a decent analogue. And if you asked me if I’d still try and be a bear on a desert island? Yeah. I would. I’ve chosen to express multiple archetypes in my time and done so with pretty decent success. And I know which I’ve settled on. I know how it makes me feel in control of my life and able to define my own identity. I think on a desert island, I’d still find myself performing that archetype for the feeling it gives me, even if nobody was around to perceive me. At least until it ceased to be practical.

I think the answer is different depending on whether we assume we've previously been in society. In my current form, I'd 100% still compulsively perform femininity. If I'd never known a world where you get punished for having body hair or wearing the wrong cologne or having the wrong bones...?

This is a really great question.

This made me pause, but I’m ultimately not sure about how to interpret/approach the question. Personally, I view trans ppl as falling on the male-female sex spectrum which entirely comes out of the sexual differentiation of humans. To that extent, if you fundamentally changed the function of sex/reproductive biology/etc then yes different people would be trans. However, if you just changed social expectations, I don’t think the groups would change too dramatically: they would, of course they would, but I’m not sure there’s any meaningful way to distinguish them from the “current” trans people. Idk just my $0.02

You mean like how pink used to be for boys as a masculine color or how ruffles in clothing and makeup were? 😅 History says not really, but it depends on where your viewing from. Looking to the past, we could say all men were trans based on our modern interpretation, but we know they didn't think of themselves that way.

To further that point, we know trans people have existed in every population since earlier than Egypt. Trans is a disenfranchising relation to your bimodal morphology (if your body looks closer to male or female and the assumed roles of each) trans people have always been fewer due to gender also being bimodal and not binary. (It isn't binary if 0 and 1 isn't all we ever see. Even if it's rare, just a single 2 or something between 0 and 1 makes it bimodal at least)

@@anonnonny3142 sorry. I was worried it might have been too short worded. Though I think you helped with the answer. I spose the hypothetical was still in the realm that reproductive biology would still remain the same. I spose this question initially came when I was trying to understand gender abolition. Not saying I fully get it but I really like the idea of being able to live as your authentic self as easily as possible.

you're so right for this. Skirts really do be spinny :D

I think you should watch the video again

And gender identity isn't all that important to me. Easy since I'm a cis man, but still... I just don't care that much about it. I think that's why this video is framed as a question to trans folks. Of course trans people aren't the only ones who care a lot about their gender identity, but it is pretty certain that they do care and have thought about it. There's more diversity out there and on more dimensions than most folks realize.

So the humanist viewpoint really totally invalidates the very ideas of hetero- and homo-sexuality. You can't claim that you're attracted to any particular societal construct, when people who are unhappy with the fundamental limitations of the human experience decide to defy them, whenever it's convenient, and relapse, whenever it's convenient. E.g. I couldn't claim that, I am attracted to men, since their most formative years are characterised by profound sexual humiliation and fear of abandonment, since that isn't true for trans men, who got the benefits and drawbacks of being a girl in their most formative years (supposing they didn't live as transsexual). I also cannot trust a man to use his own experience of suffering as motivational fuel to seek to protect me from further harm, because the trans man will betray me for the own benefit, citing "well, SOME men are really selfish, too, sometimes! (...in other, disparate contexts)", acting the woman, but still claiming the valor of the man. Yes, the female body regards the male as foreign, this is probably true for trans men as well. And the more male foetuses you ask it to sustain the growth of, the more the oestrogen bombardment increases in an effort to kill it, and the statistical chance of a non-breeder homo-- or trans-person increases. There is an overweight of little brothers among gay males, and you can easily imagine, that is further exacerbated by their familial position and relationships, in particular, we also see sibling age gaps of 6 years or more, as pushing for a homosexual development. I am further reminded of that TikTok rainbow family, where the mother looks like she may have eaten a couple of Russian battle tanks - and she seems to not be particularly happy, as a female promised so much sex and exaltation, to grow up to find, that only the most sick and perverse fetishist, would even touch her with a barge pole. So, in rage and complete denial, she decides, she is so sexy and fuckable, that she should go right ahead and make 7 kids with him... And every last one of them becomes a non-breeder, in particular the obese girls seem to be severely struggling with their mental health, just as their mother did, throughout her own youth. John B. Calhoun's "science" experiment of Universe 25, was bought and paid for, by anti-homosexual campaigners. It does by no means reflect, the corruption of rodents into "Pretty Ones", that was merely the result that they paid him to create. In reality, the so called "utopia" was nothing but a prison colony, with occasional "air raids" and similar torture-like stimuli, that functioned like a violently forced speed-domestication outside of a human connective element, to drive the critters insane. And he was happy to accommodate his buyers, because he lost any chance he may have had, to make him self sexually attractive to other men in repressing his homosexuality in his youth, and now he was ugly, old, lonely and bitter - the kind of degrading "consolation" man, that he also, would never settle for. The sunk cost fallacy of internalized homophobia. As a young man myself, I would have been more than ashamed, and purely terrified, of having a "second rate" boyfriend with, e.g. effeminate mannerisms, a scrawny build, a gay haircut, etc. My motivation has always been contempt of the females and their harmful, selfish narcissism, and you can't combat that, by sticking your peepee in a dog turd, I thought - it will only enrage and excite them to further attacks on your dignity. Over time, I have learned, there are certain moderations to this principle. One example, that became available later, was how there where ZERO girls who wanted to have sex with pedo-baby face Justin Bieber with the gay haircut - until they could rely on EVERY girl wanting him for themselves... At that point, he had become the safe boyfriend option, for girls to safely harass homosexuals over, since they already knew, Justin was never going to stick his peepee in them, anyway - Free heteronormative supremacy! It's really just a question of making yourself sexually unavailable, from the safety of some type of fortress, that they can't hope to assault, then you can trigger the absolute Niagara from their nethers. And there was a boy called Fritz 20 years ago, who would've been the perfect candidate for this "ugly duckling" stunt - petite, timid (easy for a girl to threaten and control), gender challenged, buckteeth of the ever-fornicating rabbit, and thoroughly, repulsively gay in his expression - guaranteed garbage can fodder, for the female supremacists, BUT also precisely the kind of man, they would eventually need for a husband to safeguard their family and kids. He would really have been the perfect lifetime husband for me, that would have been so immensely gratifying for the both of us, to punish the females with consequent sexual abandonment. And if he had been a child today, his misery would have been explained away as gender dysmorphia, and he would have been tricked into sacrificing the only thing, that could make him attractive to me, in favor of those who would never want to consider him sexually powerful and attractive, and still don't. It's a powerful fear, that can make you ignore the reverse side of the coin, and lust only for the infinite sexual pedestalization that girls enjoy, to not even stop to consider, that trans women will never have that benefit. But you don't care about ruining my life and humiliating me, by destroying a sexy boy, one of the only ones, who could not only pull off the mind trick, but also hold such a powerful spite for women as to stay loyal to the flag, no matter what they say and promise. Shut them down at every turn, instead of trying to replace me with a girl , who only loves herself, in the utimate humiliation of my value as a human being - something that would 100% cause mass unaliving! Because you think I'm a weak f-slur, nasty unfuckable manbearpig, and I should just get over myself and put up with the abuse and humiliation?... Now, that I'm old, what other life could I hope to have anyway? (conveniently ignoring the fact that females deliberately ruined my youth and sex appeal with homophobic molestation and trauma, for the sake of their entitlement issues and power trip)... No, obviously, it could never be a sexual victory for a 9 year old boy to marry a 42 year old man, no matter how insanely intent he may be, on being the diametrical opposite of a selfish girl. Spite is strong enough to last a lifetime, causing unlimited atrocities... but it's not strong enough to make it seem desirable to have sex with an adult. In terms of pornolisciousness, it could never hope to compare to the prideful, validating sex, "that -girls- real people get as a reward for existing! It will ALWAYS be degrading and harmful, to settle for unnatural undesirables, like adults, eew!" - kind of exactly like your suggested gender transition would be, sunk cost fallacies not withstanding, permanently, and irreparably destructive - and to the legitimate benefit of no one, but a few virtue signallers, that don't care anyway, and the people, who already embarrassed themselves, by throwing their lives away and mutilating themselves undesirable, who are now desperate to save face, by normalizing the loss of something that infinitely valuable, to not be the only idiot children, that fell for it.

🙏❤️🙏

That last one with the trans rats was fascinating. I'm reminded of those in North American indigenous cultures where the role of what usually translates to "two-spirit", regarded as some combination of male, female and/or "other" are well respected as religious leaders and intellectuals.

Hi, how do I become your patient?

Could you share that rat study? I'm interested in reading more

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Not shaving brings you dysphoria? Fascinating. No matter where on your body you mean, that's purely societal ideas of femininity. I wonder if after some amount of time you'd stop caring, or if there'd always be this idea in the back of your head that that hair is somehow masculine.

As a cis woman, I'm very aware that every moment I've spent shaving, waxing, and plucking is because I've been explicitly told over and over that my hair makes me less of a woman. I think part of the spirit of the question is, would those things still dysphoric if no one's around to have ever told you they weren't female traits?

@@PrincessNinja007 I think if taken to the logical extreme, if women were allowed to have hair, then it wouldn’t affect me, assuming men and women were equally hairy on average. Two differences can trigger dysphoria. Differences assigned by biology and those assigned socially. Even if we have a scenario where it’s socially okay for women to have body hair, on average men have more so that disproportion would still cause dysphoria (for me). Same as other features. So I think no matter what I’d still by dysphoric. The only way to completely remove that would be to not have met another human of the opposite sex. Either that or I’d still feel wrong but would lack the ability to properly articulate what was wrong.

​@@PrincessNinja007 Im a trans woman, and I feel like there is a blueprint lodged in my brain of how my body is supposed to look. Not "supposed" in a cultural sense, because there are parts of this blueprint that drastically diverge from the cultural norm. But its just what my brain expects my body to look like for whatever reason and things that mismatch that like facial hair and lack of breasts cause a very different degree of dysphoria than things that aren't different but also socially perceived as diverging from expected feminine presentation. Like for whatever reason my genitals are not at odds with my mental blueprint. I haven't had bottom surgery and i probably never will. Despite having tackle down there not being very the done thing for women in our society, it doesn't cause me dysphoria. I do try to hide any bulge when i go out because I'm aware of how it will be perceived, and if i was unable to hide it i'm sure it would cause me embarrassment and anxiety as to how people would react. But it's very different from the other things that are just hard no's for my brain like not having boobs, which was a big deal before HRT. Even though breast forms shoved into a bra looked outwardly identical, i hardly ever wore them because they just drew my brains attention to the absence of real boobs. But as soon as boobs did start growing, even while they were still soo small they weren't noticeable to anyone else my brain immediately got a lot happier. So yeah, there are definitely things that i do because of social pressure, like tucking my bulge. Probably similar to you shaving your legs. They are things we've been told by society aren't acceptable for women to have visible. But it i was alone on an island i would never tuck or shave my legs. But i would still 100% shave my face if i possibly could, because my brain hates facial hair on me whether or not any other human sees it

Yesss exactly.

Thank you for this comment! I had previously been a huge proponent of Whipping Girl before I had just recently watched Alexander Avila's "A People's History of Gender" and Abigail Thorne's latest essay. I've even been seen defending Serrano's work on the basis that Biological Sex is Real™ only to now feel like I have egg on my face 😅. I suppose that's what growth is. They're both constructs. The concept of gender identity largely first popped up in order to continue trying to reify binary sex even after it was proven binary sex doesn't really exist. (As per Avila's video, I hope im representing that correctly!) I think in some capacity, I liked Serrano's work because it made me feel like I could point to something Real and Respected and Scientific and say Look, im a real trans because my "subconscious sex" marked in my brain says Woman™ on it! It was validating to hide behind biology. But it's even more validating now to know I don't need biology to feel comfortable in my body. Knowing that gender is only a thing we do and a thing done to us means doing gender more kindly when we have to and one day not having to do it at all.

@DrAnarchy69 Great point and also super well written, allocisheteropatriarchy is such a word and I looked it up and while I could find other instances of it being used on the internet, no one seems to have a written definition Was this a word that Judith Butler coined? I’d love to know :))

I do think Julia Serranos more recent video about gender is better explained than her book. The book was weird about nonbinary people that wasn't AS present in her more recent video. It was basically just the idea that transness like all aspects of ourself are influenced by a multitude of nature AND nurture factors with no one originating point. There may be some biological and biologically intrinsic inclinations, cultural factors, social factors, personal life stuff. Which is as good as it gets I think.

For those interested in the referenced Abigail Thorn/PhilosophyTube video, it dropped on Nebula a couple days ago so should be hitting KZfaq sometime in the next week!

To let you in on a secret: it’s possible. You can just go on hrt to achieve whatever level of masculinization you want. Cis people are largely stupid so so long as you keep your hair slightly long, keep shaving, learn at least a bit of vocal control, you can get away with it for a long time. Even with people you know very well. Start low start slow. And then, you can stop: the permanent effects stay, others change. It all depends but your feelings on this may change through time and it’s ok.

I'm AFAB non binary (agender) as well and i can tell you that once i hit menopause i felt so much more comfortable in my body. Due to my estrogen crashing my body feels better to me hormonally. If i had known about all the gender things when i was younger (i came out at age 48) i probably would have asked for a small dose of testosterone.