Taking Sex Differences in Personality Seriously (2019)

> The issue which people react so allergic to is the complete lack of tolerance by the transgender community.

I doubt that is the main reason. Society has been pretty clear for a long time that certain people found trans people too strange to accept them. Gay people have been treated the same way. I think most people that don’t like trans people are probably also uncomfortable with gay people even if they are more likely to say it’s okay to be gay.

> If someone points out that a man who really wants to be a women is in principle still a man then they get instantly labelled a bigot.

You can avoid being called a bigot by understanding the following basic concepts.

Sex and gender are two distinct ideas. Gender as described by Judith Butler is a kind of performance that you do. It starts in childhood where we give boys the color blue and toy trucks and we give girls the color pink and dolls. Men wear pants and never wear dresses and women wear dresses and skits and use a purse. A man never wears a purse and if he has anything close it’s called a bag, definitely not a purse.

The above are made up concepts. Clothes and bags and pink and blue are not biological reality, they’re just made up by society. They’re part of a performance of gender. You can change your gender just by changing your performance.

Sex is a biological concept that relates to what secondary sex characteristics your body presents. Hormone levels, genitals, etc. this is still don’t a binary concept as intersex people exist and are something like 1% of the population. It’s also unclear if someone completely changes their hormones and has surgery to change their genitals, what is the point of saying “you’re still a man”? Such a statement is likely to bring up feelings of pain and misery the person has had from people who have been intolerant towards them. It also is unclear if you’re referring to biological sex or gender, and trans people are often terrified that they’re not performing their gender properly.

It’s like going up to a fat person and saying “wow you’re fat” and then walking around saying “fat people are intolerant because they get upset when I call them fat”. Maybe on some level you’re right, but you’re being an asshole if you insist on saying that. And again, if a trans person has severely changed their sex hormones, the concept of “sex never changes” is shaky anyway.

So stop trying to tell trans women they’re really men. Such a statement completely misses all the subtle realities of such a statement, serves no productive purpose, and is rude as hell.

Respectfully, you’ve misunderstood me.

The biggest thing that helped me understand women was when I changed my hormone dose and added progesterone two months ago. The subsequent few weeks were a roller coaster for me. I had a short temper, was irritable, and couldn’t control my emotional responses. My therapist said “you sound like a pregnant woman”. (I’m not saying it’s the same, just pointing out that this is something my therapist said.)

I have a partner who is non-binary but AFAB, has had two kids, and is going through perimenopause. They have strong monthly cycles, which have increased in intensity in the last two years due to perimenopause. We met this year so it’s all I’ve known.

Once a month they get really irritable, have a short fuse, and a harder time controlling their emotions. (I’m not putting this on them, they’ve been telling me about it as we have to plan our dates properly during this time.) Their emotional response to their period is more pronounced than anyone I’ve dated, probably because they’re in perimenopause.

I never fully understood the extent to which emotional regulation became difficult until I suddenly added progesterone to my body. Then I experienced a similar moodiness due to a change in hormones.

What I came to understand was how strong these changes can be in women. I now realize that for some women their period can be really intense, and they really can have a genuinely hard time with certain things. Exactly like I would if I was going through that.

So one thing I understand better is how hormonal fluctuations can change your body and your mind. When I first met my partner I didn’t understand the extent to which things would get difficult for them during their cycle. Then I started taking progesterone and I experienced strong emotional swings. It “clicked” for me how bad it can get for my partner.

The other thing is that women just make more sense to me, just in conversation. It’s hard to describe but things click more than they used to. You can never fully understand another person, but the point of conversation is to communicate complex ideas and mental states to others. I find that easier now than it was. Sorry that’s subjective but it’s funny actually it seems like women are more likely to believe someone’s subjective experience without interrogating it and demanding it get resolved to some factual kernel hah.

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It’s not to be done lightly and I spent 18 months thinking about it before I started HRT, but it sounds like something you might want to consider! I never had strong feelings of being trans, it was something that just started to make sense to me more and more.

Anyway either way you’re right I think it’s a pretty neat experience!