Transgender is it just me that is totally perplexed?

[Miranda Yardley]

I was also using the term broadly, purposely setting the bar very low because that is what the researchers did in their definitions.

Please elaborate?

 

[andysays]

This is a good question. The whole edifice looks like nonsense on stilts to me.

There are all kinds of objectionable assumptions in here, from the idea that homosexuality is a 'mistake' to the pathologising of fetishes, when fetishes are all over the place, particularly wrt clothing - a person with no kind of fetish whatever wrt clothing is probably in the minority in our society.

Do you actually understand what a fetish is, and how it differs from eg a preference?

This thread is rife with people making unsubstatiated claims which others are supposed to accept unquestioningly, but this is just bollocks, pure and simple

 

[TruXta]

Do you actually understand what a fetish is, and how it differs from eg a preference?

This thread is rife with people making unsubstatiated claims which others are supposed to accept unquestioningly, but this is just bollocks, pure and simple

What's wrong with it? There's totally a sliding scale between preference and fetish with no clear demarcation.

 

[snadge]

What's wrong with it? There's totally a sliding scale between preference and fetish with no clear demarcation.

Preferences are fetishes, plain and simple.

 

[TruXta]

Preferences are fetishes, plain and simple.

I'd say it's the other way around, but essentially of a kind.

 

[bimble]

Unless you're into Freud, which I'm very not, I think it's daft to say all fetishism is some kind of abberation / a 'condition', whilst liking frilly underwear on women is just, you know, totally normal.

 

[8ball]

I'd say it's the other way around, but essentially of a kind.

I’d say you’re both wrong.

 

[snadge]

I'd say it's the other way around, but essentially of a kind.

To me the words are interchangeable, usually fetish as a describer is used by people who are uncomfortable with the action, almost as a slur, we all have fetishes, ie sexual preferences that other people may not understand, the problem is when that word is used to describe sexual preference that is abhorrent, ie necrophilia. peadophillia and rape fixation.

 

[Red Cat]

Unless you're into Freud, which I'm very not, I think it's daft to say all fetishism is some kind of abberation / a 'condition', whilst liking frilly underwear on women is just, you know, totally normal.

Not sure why you're attributing that argument to Freud.

 

[bimble]

I just can't resist any excuse to bash Freud (its a pet hate thing). One of his celebrated theories was about how the meaning of the fetish is always.. a penis substitute.

 

[TruXta]

I just can't resist any excuse to bash Freud (its a pet hate thing). One of his celebrated theories was about how the meaning of the fetish is always.. a penis substitute.

True, but the term is much older and has pretty much always carried a negative connotation.

 

[TruXta]

I’d say you’re both wrong.

Care to share why?

 

[Red Cat]

I just can't resist any excuse to bash Freud (its a pet hate thing). One of his celebrated theories was about how the meaning of the fetish is always.. a penis substitute.

I've noticed.

Celebrated by who?

 

[bimble]

Red Cat Are you a Freud fan? This would just be a big diversion .. I think he and his ideas should never have been taken seriously by anybody and his influence on how we think about ourselves has been extremely negative, the fetish theory just a minor case in point.

 

[andysays]

A sexual fetish may or may not be pathological, but it's definitely more than a mere preference

Sexual fetishism or erotic fetishism is a sexual fixation on a nonliving object or nongenital body part. The object of interest is called the fetish; the person who has a fetish for that object is a fetishist. A sexual fetish may be regarded as a non-pathological aid to sexual excitement, or as a mental disorder if it causes significant psychosocial distress for the person or has detrimental effects on important areas of their life

 

[Red Cat]

Red Cat Are you a Freud fan? This would just be a big diversion .. I think he and his ideas should never have been taken seriously by anybody and his influence on how we think if ourselves has been extremely negative, the fetish thing just a minor case in point.

I think it's easy to Freud bash. He was of a time and place. He was extremely creative and wrote a lot, abandoned ideas, contradicted them, developed them. I don't agree that he can be summed up easily, or the foundation of modern psychoanalytic psychotherapeutic practice dismissed so easily.

 

[snadge]

A sexual fetish may or may not be pathological, but it's definitely more than a mere preference

That Wiki article is so biased it reminded me why I do not use Wiki as a source anymore, maybe check back on the same article in a month or so and it will have been edited to fuck by some other obsessive cunt.

 

[bimble]

I don't want to go down a Freud-bashing route, it would keep me entertained for days but I think everyone else would get bored quite fast and its not relevant to the thread really. Highly recommend the book 'Why Freud was Wrong' though (by Richard Webster), to anyone interested in the subject. Especially around his 'methodology'.

But where does the term 'kink' fit in with all of this i wonder.. Is that the missing bit between fetishism as a sort of disease and just 'preference'?

 

[snadge]

I don't want to go down a Freud-bashing route, it would keep me entertained for days but I think everyone else would get bored quite fast and its not relevant to the thread really. Highly recommend the book 'Why Freud was Wrong' through (by Richard Webster), to anyone interested in the subject. Especially around his 'methodology'.

But where does the term 'kink' fit in with all of this i wonder.. Is that the missing bit between fetishism as a sort of disease and just 'preference'?

Kink is used by people that use fetish as a slur, to accept others fetishes without demonising them.

According to a majority portion of the populace, anything other than missionary position sex between a man and a woman is a fetish, to gain populace to attack any type of sex that they vehemently disagree with they will use the word 'kink' to describe sexual practise that they may not agree with but will accept for support in their puritan mission.

Also fetishism is not a fucking disease lol.

Are Sexual Fetishes Psychologically Healthy?

Here is an interesting article although it does contain this gem.

Though some of us have a predilection for something, the fetishist cannot technically climax without his or her fetish present.

I would love to know what is meant by that.

 

[smokedout]

I think that lesbians are being called transphobic for not wanting 'trans women' as partners has a far more blatant bearing on this.

I'm fairly sure Jeffries made claims along those lines long before a handful of daft kids starting talking about that stuff on tumblr.

 

[snadge]

BTW if anyone is interested in the explosion of FtM referrals today maybe take look on Tumblr under the tags MlM, Achilles or follow the shitty Yaoi anime series, especially Yuri on ice.

10 years ago Tavistock was dealing with young girls with eating disorders, now they have 70% FtM wanting to be be gay boys (note not men).

Tumblr is a fucking cesspit for young people and is a fucking peados dream, there is a lot more going on with this phenomenon that we can first see.

 

[8ball]

Care to share why?

Because the definition of fetish.

Though I guess you could argue that everyone might be an outlier on some possible scale...

 

[smokedout]

Great critique of Nuttbrock here:

Autogynephilia and the Typology of Male-to-Female Transsexualism: Concepts and Controversies

I've reproduced the quote below about the age relationship. I have noticed a lot of the younger transgender males display characteristics of physiological and anatomical autogynephilia, in particular focus on hips, pregnancy and lactation. This is very consistent with behaviours of older transgender males, formerly transvestites. I think it's great that society has become more tolerant of males who wish to transition, now if we can achieve this would them claiming on some level to be 'female' we might get somewhere.

Nuttbrock et al. (2011) proposed an "important, albeit highly theoretical, hypothesis — that transvestic fetishism may be a historically fading phenomenon" (p. 256). Their conjecture derived from their study of transvestic fetishism — the most prevalent manifestation of autogynephilia — in a diverse group of transgender males, including a discrete subgroup of nonandrophilic cross-dressers. Because these cross-dressers, unlike most other participants, were primarily older and white (Hwahng & Nuttbrock, 2007), Nuttbrock et al. found that transvestic fetishism was correlated with older age and white ethnicity as well as nonandrophilic orientation. Accordingly, Nuttbrock et al. argued that transvestic fetishism could theoretically be primarily a generational phenomenon, because among older white MtFs, "dressing in the female role was frequently a highly secretive and exotic phenomenon . . . [which] may largely account for the[ir] higher levels of transvestic fetishism" (p. 256). Nichols (2014) made a similar argument concerning autogynephilia generally, albeit without offering either evidence or explanation: "Autogynephilia is disappearing . . . . Blanchard's theory is not a description of an essentialist phenomenon but rather of a cultural one, a presentation of gender bound by time and place" (p. 72).

Reports of the impending disappearance of autogynephilia, however, appear to be premature. Erotic cross-dressing and other manifestations of autogynephilia have been documented for centuries, in both Western and non-Western cultures (Lawrence, 2013). Adolescents with transvestic fetishism continue to be referred for clinical evaluation in the twenty-first century (Zucker et al., 2012). Moreover, some MtF transsexuals who have completed sex reassignment and live publicly as women report that they continue to experience autogynephilic arousal (Lawrence, 2005, 2013), suggesting that the secretive cross-dressing invoked by Nuttbrock et al. (2011) is not a prerequisite for such arousal. Concluding that autogynephilia is disappearing because it is more often reported by older MtF transgender persons makes as much sense as concluding that Alzheimer's disease is disappearing because it is diagnosed primarily in older adults. Autogynephilia seems likely to remain a clinically important phenomenon for the foreseeable future.​

That's not a critique of the study though, it just questions a speculative theory the authors drew from the evidence they found, and seems to misunderstand the difference between disappearing and disappeared.

That's an interesting piece from Lawrence though which seems to be reaching for an 'authentic' transsexuality, particularly the comment about researchers noticing "androphilic MtFs had a more feminine appearance than nonandrophilic MtFs."

This strikes me as a particularly reactionary notion, suggesting that a transwoman can only be authentic if she is attracted to men, like a proper woman. There is no room for trans-lesbians in the theory of autogynephilia, they are all fetishists so the doctrine goes. This seems to suggest autogynephilia not only depends on essentialism, but assumes that the defining feature of the feminine essence is sexual desire for men. Blanchard, being quite conservative, is likely to agree, after all his work is underpinned by essentialism, as Lawrence explains:

The postulated etiological distinction was this: Androphilic MtF transsexuals were extremely feminine androphilic men whose cross-gender identities derived from their female-typical attitudes, behaviors, and sexual preferences. Nonandrophilic MtF transsexuals, in contrast, were conventionally masculine, fundamentally gynephilic men who resembled transvestites in that they experienced paraphilic arousal from the fantasy of being women (autogynephilia); their cross-gender identities derived from their autogynephilic sexual orientations.

It appears some gender critical feminists are quite happy to accept a theory underpinned by gender essentialism as long as it gives them a chance to smear transwomen as male perverts.

 

[TruXta]

Because the definition of fetish.

Though I guess you could argue that everyone might be an outlier on some possible scale...

A fetish is merely a particular kind of preference.

 

[snadge]

I will say this again, I fully support the Trans people that are called Truscum within the community, these are the Trans people that DO suffer from Dysphoria and have had medical intervention to help them come to terms with the schism in their existence, they usually just get on with their lives and nobody knows any different and if they do, they accept it as an extremely brave thing to do. These people have my full support, I would die to protect them from harm

What we have now is what is self classed as Trucute, non transitioning people that are extremely fucking vocal, labelling people as transphobic for not wanting to have sex with someone with genitals that do not interest them, it is not just happening with lesbians but with gay men, CIS men and CIS women also. Trucutes penned the 'Die Truscum' meme on Twitter etc and are now adding 'Die Cishet', as I said before Tumblr, deviant art and a few other sites are enabling this.

 

[snadge]

A fetish is merely a particular kind of preference.

It appears some gender critical feminists are quite happy to accept a theory underpinned by gender essentialism as long as it gives them a chance to smear transwomen as male perverts.

If transwomen still have a cock and demand people that are not interested in cock accommodate them they are fucking dodgy as fuck.

How people still support them demanding this is beyond me.

 

[bimble]

snadge i can't even figure out how to look at tumblr , its an alien world. But "tucute" as a rallying call? jesus.

 

[snadge]

snadge i can't even figure out how to look at tumblr , its an alien world. But "tucute" as a rallying call? jesus.

It's fucking awful to be true, so many predators on there the place should be fucking nuked, it's the place to be if you are young and struggling with the reality of the cruel world, it is chock full of cultish behaviour and power tripping and is a go to place for fucking dodgy predators.

 

[smokedout]

If transwomen still have a cock and demand people that are not interested in cock accommodate them they are fucking dodgy as fuck.

Can you give an example of one trans activist organisation, or any high profile trans-activist, claiming that lesbians who don't want to sleep with transwomen who've retained their penis are transphobic? Or an example of somebody transgender accusing someone of transphobia because they wouldn't have sex with them?

See whenever I look I seem to find far more people talking about how transwomen demand lesbians sleep with them than I can find any transwomen actually demanding this.

 

[Shechemite]

Can you give an example of one trans activist organisation, or any high profile trans-activist, claiming that lesbians who don't want to sleep with transwomen who've retained their penis are transphobic? Or an example of somebody transgender accusing someone of transphobia because they wouldn't have sex with them?

See whenever I look I seem to find far more people talking about how transwomen demand lesbians sleep with them than I can find any transwomen actually demanding this.

What did you make of the links I and others shared above to mainstream sites like everyday feminism?