t-pull

I do think there should be more focus on the phenomenology of crossdreaming, trans and dysphoria. It's not what you do, it's how you experience how you feel.

If you can detach yourself from it enough to study it, it's actually very interesting.

The t-feeling pulls me. That's the feeling. Not sure exactly where it pulls me to, but it pulls me. Maybe the great frustration is that it isn't actually pulling me to anywhere. You could say it pulls me towards wanting something which can't be provided.

But it pulls my identity all over the place. The t-feeling is within me, and it is bigger than my comprehension of it. Never have I belonged to anything so strongly. It is not a choice. Never have I felt so much, 'like it or not, understand it or not, this is who I am'. It is not a choice. Everything else about me can be turned inside out, but the t-feeling seems fundamental.

It's in control, and I am more than happy to surrender to it. But there appear to be no terms of surrender. Just the pull, getter gradually stronger and stronger...

But then it recedes...for a while...

Fantasy girl in reality jungle

I have been reading my earliest Mirror Sister posts, from three years ago. It strikes me how good they are IMHO, how they say most of what I've been trying to say for three years, particularly well. The odd bit I'd change now, but not much.

Ah, it was all so fresh then - the crossdreaming identity and blogging as a medium of self-expression. 'Hubris, imagination and desire'!

Look at all this, first published on 2 November 2011:


'To see what is the lack in reality, there you see subjectivity. To confront subjectivity is to confront femininity. Woman is the subject. Masculinity is a fake. Masculinity is an escape from the most radical nightmarish version of subjectivity.' Slavoj Zizek

I like the sound of that one, even if I'm far from sure what it means exactly.

I have been watching a DVD of Slavoj Zizek's The Pervert's Guide To Cinema, which is a lecture illustrating Zizek's postmodern psychoanalytic ideas through his readings of scenes from films. Zizek's portrayal of the unconscious is enticing, liberating, frightening and depressing. In a word, it is dark.

I enjoy seeing this sharp intellectual dismissing the 'real world', in which Mirror Brother struggles so gamely, as a shallow fraud. Yet the deeper reality of the subconscious is truly terrifying. What can sweet Deborah possibly be within it, other than a poor Little Girl Lost? As Zizek puts it: 'It starts with "dreams are for those who cannot endure - are not strong enough for - reality". It ends with "reality is for those who are not strong enough to endure - to confront - their dreams".

Of course gender gets hopelessly twisted once the 'reality' of the external body is discarded.

Like many philosophers, Zizek performs impressive intellectual geometry, without troubling himself too much with substantial evidence. Nevertheless, much of what he says rings true for me.

The interior realm of fantasy and desire lures me. Especially as so much of the exterior world is either ugly or boring.

For me crossdreaming is not just about femininity, it is also about introversion. The auto- aspect of autogynephilia might seem unhealthy and selfish, but, unromantically, I do agree with Zizek that love of another is so much about projection. I sometimes think that it might be a kind of abuse of the other to involve them in all the intensity and complexity of one's own libidinal issues. What might Mirror Brother project on to women? Best let Deborah receive it; let the others be, to deal with their own issues.

The id manifests itself most keenly in sexuality. My sexuality is female, female, female.

I want to go there. Darkness ahoy - maybe. But it is the truer reality.'


Heady stuff!

So much of what I've written has been about asserting the 'truer reality' of crossdreaming fantasies. This is not the same as equating them with rl femaleness.

Now,though, I feel that reality's heavy hand has left me in a cul-de-sac. How to develop the fantasies, without compromising them with reality's strictures? Writing in a blog does not seem sufficient. The online realm is not quite the realm of dreams.

But there is so much vitality, so much self, in sexuality and fantasy.

Still a lost girl - maybe not so little - in the inevitable space between reality and desire. xxx

Divided

Fully acknowledging my transness feels like a kind of growing up. It feels like recognising what's deep within me, appreciating that other elements of myself were not so deep as I thought. Some of my pursuits were understandable, but misguided.

What I yearn to have been the case - what I still wish for others for the future - is for it to be cool at the time of puberty to say 'I am trans'. At this point you could find your community, do whatever you want that is trans, without any secrecy, guilt or animosity from others.

Now, to Mirror Brother, Deborah seems distant to the point of being nebulous, covered by all the years of me not being directed by my own transness. See, I can't even describe it without confusion about who is 'I'. When I say 'I am Deborah' Mirror Brother is entitled to say 'hey, what about me, I think I'm pretty real, also I've been looking after 'myself' all these years, I deserve more respect'.

But no, Mirror Brother is not saying that. Mirror Brother is saying 'yes, let me be Deborah'.

But what is 'being Deborah'? Just writing a fucking blog?

Restlessness and confusion become the norm. Is that not the case for you too, t-sisters? Confusion and doubt prevent us from uniting with each other to combat that very confusion and doubt within each of us. Divided we descend. xx

Good feelings

I would like to record my feelings here, because, well, just because I want to. Before I get too much distance from them, or from the feeling that it is good to share such feelings.

Nothing very dramatic, just that today I experienced trans feelings that felt good. They felt deep, subtle, sensitive, important. I felt particularly connected to my inner t-femaleness. This was a relief, a rich and healthy pleasure. Accompanying the feelings was a poignant recognition of the unhappiness of having been cut off from my inner t-femaleness most of my life, experiencing it only in a thwarted, indirect way.

I feel happy and proud about my inner t-femaleness. Yes, there is another side to the coin, but the other side isn't the only side, and, especially today, it isn't the side I feel most keenly.

Those are the feelings. I notice an inclination to justify them, to counter unfavourable interpretations. What a negative context, having to argue for the legitimacy of my deep and sensitive feelings. These are feelings, not claims. I so wish there was a more nurturing culture in which such feelings could be shared. xxx

Identi-T

I am a t-girl.

If I say this to myself repeatedly, before very long at all I feel tearful. It is good therapy.

I've only got to rephrase it as 'I identify as a t-girl' and I feel safer as I move into the comfortable territory of intellectual theorising.

Nevertheless, here's some discourse...

Since I discovered Jack Molay's term 'crossdreamer' and recognised myself as one, identification has been very important to me. I am aware of theoretical critiques of 'identity politics', of psychological issues concerning identity, and I am firmly on the side of identity in the transgender context. People form identities around their family, their employment, their location, their country of origin, their favourite sport, their favourite music. To identify as trans in a similar way brings secret inner feelings out into a realm where they are fully accepted. It is not to say that 't' is scientifically imprinted on your heart, any more than your occupation or your favourite pastime is. The deconstructionists are always saying that there's nothing inherently wrong with constructed identities, so lets take them at their word and stop arguing about essentialism.

By identifying as a t-girl I am saying that I have a broad set of feelings in common with other t-girls. Yes, I know there are great variations, but there are enough affinities for me to think 'I am one of these people'. This counters a lot of defensiveness, counters desires to reject my own deep feelings. Certainly, though, identity and community should not be taken to the extent of uniformity and intolerance, of dress codes and 'in' and 'out' attitudes ( a criticism sometimes made of some gay cliques).

I am not, however, identifying as a girl. That would be invoking all the difficult issues about whether or not transgender feelings really are evidence of objective internal femaleness. I don't think I am entitled to claim authentic internal femaleness, nor to reject the possibility of this within me. We just don't know about this for sure.

But we can go with our deep feelings, and explore - and help to free up oppressive societal constructs of gender as we do.  

Problems:

1) Dysphoria: we have to beware of encouraging a horrible hatred of our male selves. Some trans radicals, such as Kate Bornstein, hardly ever mention dysphoria, while for many trans folk dysphoria is a suffering from which all stems. So if people would rather not explore and develop their trans feelings, for fear of worsening dysphoria, then fair enough.

2) Transitioning: to alter your body, and much else in your life, is a very big deal. You need to be confident that what you are doing is right, be sure that you are not confusing the reality of being an rl woman with a nice (though meaningful and important) fantasy. I can understand people thinking that if you identify as trans you should go for it fully, but I think that internal identification is very important in its own right, and bringing the pros and cons of transitioning into the issue confuses this, perhaps making people reject trans identity because they don't want to transition.

And for crosssdreamers, who say their trans feelings are restricted to the realm of the sexual? Fine, identify as sexually trans, as trans in the very important area of sexuality, that is big enough. But be open, don't be defensive - 'it's just a fetish, nothing more' etc.' If it's just a fetish, that's cool, but if you keep finding yourself needing to insist that it's just a fetish, be willing to examine other possibilities thoroughly and honestly.

Jack Molay himself wrote (here):

'We have not come to the point where we are able to look at crossdreaming as something natural, something that is OK, something that should be enjoyed as a positive and life affirming side of ourselves. I believe too many of us (me included) still suffer from internalized transphobia, where there are still parts of us which are looking for a way out.'

Hence the importance of identity, and the community that hopefully develops from it (but see my recent post here!), to counter such internal resistance. And thus the need for constant reaffirmation.

I am a t-girl.

Elleoquence

After all that discussion, here's some dancing, by Deb Rubin. xxx

Crossdream Life: online potential unfulfilled

Crossdream Life forum, at which I have been a frequent contributor, seems to be dying a very slow death.

There is reluctance to write about such declines, as acknowledgement of decline is likely to confirm and exacerbate it (note that I am not actually posting this on Crossdream Life). But it is right to acknowledge something of importance that is actually occurring. I don't think not acknowledging it will prevent further decline. Whenever a new member arrives one wants to support their initial enthusiasm, hoping that this new person might yet help to turn things around. But sooner or later (increasingly, usually sooner) they stop coming.

Before I go further, I should wholeheartedly thank CDL's founders, Jason and Jack, the friends I've made at CDL, and all who have contributed positively to the forum. There have been many good threads, many thoughtful and stimulating contributions, and the forum certainly has been a positive element in my life.

Crossdream Life has attracted 762 members. The hope of such forums is, surely, that now kindred spirits have such a base, they can support each other and create something positive for themselves. While CDL may have performed a positive temporary role in individuals' trans journeys, in the long run I would say that a new community/culture was not created.

Why not? To me the failure seems apiece with the tendencies in  human endeavor in general. Complexities in the nature of life and in human nature undermine good intentions. Revolutions go wrong, marriages break down etc.; things that are successful for a while decline or get corrupted. We see this in the early stages of the extraordinary new development in human culture - the internet. The exciting new world so full of potential soon becomes beset with problems.

In online culture there's a particularly strong sense of what isn't being said. How are people feeling when they're not contributing to the forum, when they're not writing their blog?

With trans, for many of us, there's an extra particular element of 'sometimes you're really into it, sometimes you're just not', making what is expressed only a part of an individual's picture.

Between us, the Crossdream Life members have failed to create a community which make us feel thoroughly good about being crossdreamers:  a community that reassures as well as stimulates. Something which counters the inclination to withdraw.  

Certainly the internet provides lots of opportunities for online socialising. Most of these seem a little intimidating, though, and just not the kind of thing that a lot of us enjoy. Like going into a nightclub where you don't know anybody. And of course there are also sites that provide opportunities for up-front online sexual liaison. But with these even more so, for many people such kind of set-up is not appealing.

For me it was important that Crossdream Life was not the kind of site people visit when they are drunk and then disown the part of themselves that went there the next day. Crossdreaming is sexual trans, but there are all sorts of contexts for sexuality, not all dark and sleazy. Sadly, some crossdreamers have regarded crossdreaming as being indelibly associated with addictive, unnourishing online sex and porn.

Factors that deflected Crossdream Life from going in the direction I would have liked were:

1.  People wanting to 'cure' themselves of crossdreaming.
2.  Focus on transitioning.
3.  'My dysphoria is a horrible affliction. How insensitive of you to try to be positive and enjoy your crossdreaming.'
4. Endless debates about the causes of crossdreaming.

Of course changes in online culture have played a part. Facebook took a lot from online forums, and now there is tumblr, etc. This I find wearying. If I have to keep following the fashions, becoming au fait with the latest all the time, I'm more inclined to think I'll save myself the bother by leaving all well alone.

I remember that in a thread on Crossdream Life a couple of years ago I extolled the joys of crossdreaming and regretted a general feeling of despondency on the forum. A member called dkool replied that many crossdreamers feel negatively because they don't know where to take their crossdreaming. Increasingly I have come to appreciate what dkool meant.