Lauren Hare and Vincent Harvey from the Prince Henry's Institute of Medical Research in Australia, have just published some interesting results from a genetic study of transsexuals. (Yes, I know, not transvestites, but bear with me.) The basic result was that they believe they have identified a gene which codes for androgen uptake which may be different in people who are male-to-female transsexuals. Specifically, they suggest this gene reduces the effect of testosterone on the developing brain and leads to 'undermasculinisation' as they put it. That is, males with this gene variant will develop brains which are more like female brains and this is a possible cause of their later gender identity issues.
The work ties in well with recent research that shows the brains of transsexual men and women have brain structures more typical of the opposite sex than of their own apparent sex. It also ties in with finger length studies which also suggest a hormonal influence on development. Generally, although the evidence is still weak, there is increasing support for the view that transsexuality is a natural, if rare, condition caused by hormonal influences in the womb and possibly continuing after birth.
It also ties in very nicely with what I have believed for a long time about transvestitism - that the root cause is the 'feminisation' of particular brain structures in an otherwise 'normal' male brain.
The really excellent thing about all this scientific work on the causes of transsexuality (I'm sure they'll get 'round to transvestitism eventually) is that it seems to be causing a shift in the thinking of the medical profession - away from the bizarre and inadequate psychiatric explanations to do with 'fetishes' (as in the infamous 'Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders' - the psychiatrist's diagnostic bible) and weird Freudian hangover notions like 'a preoedipal failure to complete individuation from the mother'. There are now groups like GIRES (the Gender Identity Research and Education Society) which are helping to promote a much more scientifically justifiable view of gender identity issues.
Spread the word, everyone.
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3 comments:
If anybody is ever going to find an answer to the question what causes one man to become a transvestite and another not to, I think it will be: multiple factors. At best, studies may show at some point a correlation between, say, hormone levels during pregnancy and TV-ism, or parent-child relations and TV-ism. But the correlation will never be perfect, and that still does not prove how you, or I, became a TV, and neither does it reliably predict that any child subjected to the same hormone levels or parent-child relationship will become a TV. A bigger chance to become one, maybe, yes.
Personally, I am not even sure where my TV-ism ends and where other personality traits begin. Some of what one might see as "TV" behaviour would actually also be there if I were not a TV, I think. It would just be in a different form. Admiring oneself in a mirror for instance. In women, that is considered normal, healthy behaviour. In daily life, I occasionally enjoy caveman behaviour like most men, which is considered normal albeit smelly. But in a dress, I definitely need a mirror. So, if I were a woman, I would be ok, as a man, a narcissist, as a TV, just a TV?
I think that the scientists "obsessed with fetishism" are not really doing such a bad job — after all, the vast majority of males who wear women's clothes are, indeed, fetishists. They just wear them because they wish to engage in sexual intercourse with other males who have the complementary fetish (i.e. an attraction to males in women's clothing).
This might feel "wrong" to you because the vast majority of things written on the Internet are by people who are NOT in this group. The fetishists are usually not introspective, and even if they are, they most certainly don't waste time writing articles about their condition. They don't participate in CD/TV forums. In fact, we wouldn't be aware of them unless we enter dating sites (or Facebook!) where they proliferate in search of the next sexual partner — just like other kinds of fetishists.
As a result, when scientists look at the crossdressing phenomenon as a whole, what they see is a vast majority of fetishist crossdressers, and a small, minority group, who are somehow "different". Because this group is so comparatively small, it's not unnatural that only more recently it has been thoroughly studied, and explanations for their behaviour have been looked for.
Still I rejoice together with you that science has finally started to study our minority group as well :)
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