Maturity and adolescence

I have a strong desire to settle on a position that accepts my transness in a deep, calm, mature way.

Transness is a challenge to really accept. It can, though, also feel like a comfortable, sensual private refuge, a kind of warm womb. So in which direction do bravery and honesty point?

I also have a screaming adolescent t-girl inside of me, stunted by years of confinement and now overflowing with tears, anger, passion, instinctive drive. She hates the very equanimity sought in my first sentence. Screaming adolescents regard equanimity as a denial of the intense vitality they experience.

To complicate matters further, as with many of us,  my t-feelings ebb and flow in waves. Furthermore withdrawal from outer world activity facilitates t-consciousness, and beyond some point further withdrawal is neither practical or desirable.

And then there is sexual desire, which, by nature, also runs counter to calm, wise, sensible attitudes.

So there is hardly a single clear voice from Miss Deborah.

Most strongly, though, there are feelings. It is these feelings with which I identify, which I have the urge to express.

I am not a commentator upon trans. I am trans.

Ultimate maleness?

There seem to me to be three basic paradigms of trans:

1) Trans people have some essential crossgender element in them (this can be partial).

2) Gender is a cultural construct. Trans is an instinctive resistance to oppressive constructed gender binaries.

3) Trans is a misleading delusion, caused by psychological disturbance.

I think there is too much focus on the debate between 1) and 2). Both are fundamentally supportive of trans. 3) is the negative one. Of course those who believe in 3) can be sympathetic and respectful, but ultimately they believe the trans self-perceptions are wrong. The difference should be noted, though, between believing the cause to be psychological, and judging that cause to be a fault, a disorder.

The difference between 2) and 3) might well be a political judgement. When does refusal to accept life as it is qualify as deluded, disturbed? Where does rejecting one's bodily gender fit on a spectrum between opposing the government and opposing the earth going round the sun?

Is it not true that, for all your feelings, ultimately your gender is that of your bodily sex? What assumption is made here, about gender being more than bodily sex? If a male-bodied person is psychologically healthy, what kind of male character, male role, should they accept as appropriate for them on account of their gender?

I think none. According to both paradigm 1) and paradigm 2), these notions of inherent maleness oppress.

Liberal reconstructions of masculinity ultimately reinforce masculinity. They say: 'real men do cry', 'one can be soft and sensitive and still be manly', inferring that it is right for males to be masculine rather than feminine.

Beliefs in inherent maleness should be distinguished from a pessimistic, but not dishonourable, individual stance that, society being as it is, it is prudent to ignore troublesome trans feelings. 'I am trans but I choose not to focus or act on that' is an attitude I respect more than 'trans feelings are dangerous delusions'.

I do not think that the fact of bodily sex indicates a fundamentally gendered character with which trans people are out of touch.

Ultimately, beneath societal norms, there is intellectual uncertainty, there are personal feelings, and there are choices we have a right to make.

T-feelings, oozing from the soul

Being trans is a matter of respecting deep inner feelings.

It is less a matter of what you do as a result of respecting the feelings, or of from where the feelings derive.

Respecting the feelings is not the same as making a scientific or political claim about them.

Oh, there is so such intellectual confusion and political diviseness, getting in the way of deep self-acceptance.

Intellectual uncertainty can blend with defensiveness. Of course we are tempted to belittle or just discard these feelings that present many difficulties.

Thrusting the issue of transitioning at trans people can make them even more defensive.

All my t-feelings scream 'female, female, female'. Not bigender, androgynous, gender fluid, but female.

The force of desire for male identification is not negligable. It might even be equal in strength, but it is not comparable in quality. It comes from a completely different place, not an internal feeling seemingly from nowhere, seemingly counter-rational. It is resistance rather than pull. I accept my outer maleness. It's a fact, like the other personal facts declared on my passport. Of course my gender categorisation has influenced my upbringing which has influenced who I am. I am not disowning this influence. But increasingly it feels like an outer layer of inner self, less fundamental than the voices screaming 'female'.

Trans feelings are intense and deep yet sensitive and subtle. They are very vulnerable to internalised cultural condemnation. I don't think it is helpful to subject them to harsh debate within the trans community.

Hot passion observes calm sense

Oh but how that last post ignores the urgency, the intensity, the passion, the heat, the ecstasy, the yearning, the pride, the frustration, the delight...

Tear through, girl, tear through the tears, tear through...

(This post serves as an example of what the last post was on about, I know...)  

Blogging about not blogging

Writing a blog is like walking around naked in your room with the curtains undrawn. You can be observed by strangers, but you're still on your own in your own personal space.

For me it's coming to seem like a weak compromise between taking a deeper plunge into online trans culture, and just living with my feelings alone.

Much as I enthuse about the potential of the online world as a liberation from rl restrictions (particularly bodily gender of course), I find the thought of getting involved in lots of new activities and meeting lots of new people exhausting and a little frightening. Like going to a party where I don't know anybody, as opposed to staying snug at home with a good book. And there's still a sense of 'really I'm just sitting in front of a computer', and I am not naturally a computer geek.  

But also my own inconsistency could cause problems for new online social endeavours. I am full of contrary feelings about my gender. Impulses in different directions ebb and flow, take hold of me quite suddenly and then subside, and I am thinking it is folly to claim to be able to manage and direct them. I am embarrassed about all the times I have declared a conclusion about myself, stated a new resolve, only to find that next day I just don't feel like that any more.

I am transgender, yes. I am a t-girl, yes. However I am more besides...

When I find myself reaching for the keyboard to get writing on this blog, should I be reaching for something else?

Unfixed position

The amount of acrimony in serious, non-porn online trans culture can be dreadfully depressing. I am tempted to give up on the discourse and just do my own thing alone. I don't think arguing in a political or theoretical debate is a good way of developing one's transness. I don't think taking up a fixed position and then enjoying attacking others from that position is a good thing to do in any context. To me, people who do so seem similar to each other, even when they are arguing against each other.

Sadly, tragically, human beings tend to be bad at helping each other in a broad way, preferring to form groups in opposition to each other.

What do I believe in?

1) open-mindedness

2) kindness

And to all good-natured, undogmatic trans people I would like to say 'yes, yes; me too, me too'.

xxx

So many of us

There have been many trans people recorded in history, but how many more of us have there been who kept their transness to themselves?

A vast secret tribe who never knew each other, never connected as a community. Who couldn't each develop confidently in the knowledge that they were who they felt they were, and that there was nothing wrong with that?

While I don't want to focus my development too much on inner identity, there does remain work to do, to deeply accept the trans identification. Male by body, male by experience, female by deep instinctive desire. The latter is the most nebulous criterion. I have to believe in myself to go with it. It helps if by going with it I connect with kindred spirits, rather than feel isolation. xx