Transsexuality Questions What is a transsexual? What are the two types of M2F transsexual? If transsexuals fall into two distinct groups why are they consistently portrayed as a homogenous group? How and why did this change happen? What is the purpose of this website then?

Homosexual transsexuality Dr. Sam Winter asks "Why do you consider the term homosexual transsexuals an appropriate one?" "Homosexual" Transsexual is offensive because it implies that you're all men who simply like other men! Why don't you say "androphilic" instead? Why are you all buying into heteronormative hegonomy? Isn't it ok to live as a feminine boy or man? Aren't you all just flaunting your passing privilege and telling other transsexuals you're better than them? If you don't have anything to do with other transsexuals then why do you write about them? Why do you care why non-homosexual transsexuals transition? If the TS community benefits from HSTS inclusion aren't you hurting the community? Why are you being so divisive? How can you say that HSTS transkids have an unrelated condition when they take hormones and have sex reassignment surgery (srs) like other transsexuals? Isn't that alone a clear commonality? Could there be a third type of transsexual? One motivated by something other then autogynaphilia or hsts-type motivations? Many transsexuals insist that they fit neither type. Is hsts sexuality that of a homosexual male rather then a heterosexual female, or vice versa Are hsts especially boy crazy as it was suggested in The Man Who Would Be Queen? Are hsts better suited to prostitution or having meaningless sex? What causes hsts? Who is transkids.us?

Transkids.us Questions What... more faq questions? Everything you say is wrong because you didn't talk about F2Ms! How can you be "real" women if you're homosexual men?

What is a transsexual? Conventionally speaking, a transsexual is simply someone who physically changes their sex. Although transsexuality is frequently described, both by psychologists and transsexuals themselves, as a single psychological condition, it has often been observed that there are two entirely unrelated conditions which lead biolgical males to seek sex reassignment. It would be absurd to think that it simply occurs to someone out of thin air that they are not what they appear to be, but that is exactly the way transsexuality is often described, as if people with gender dysphoria just know they are not their physical sex is not the correct one or it doesn't match who they really are. But such a belief is clearly not justified by its own self evidence; normally such a belief would be self evidently incorrect. Assuming that the people making that sort of claim are not psychotic, they must have other reasons for wanting to change sex and other evidence for holding the conviction that they would be better living as the opposite gender. There are essentially two sets of reasons that lead people to gender dysphoria, and to seeking and benefiting from sex reassignment. These are etiologically unrelated, distinct conditions with entirely different and mutually exclusive symtomological patterns. The only commonality between the two conditions that lead to gender dysphoria is that they both benefit from the same course of treatment, but like any other medical procedure that can be used to treat more then one condition, the fact that both groups benefit from sex reassignment does not imply that they are the same or even related disorders.

What are the two types of M2F transsexual? Its always been acknowledged in the scientific literature that there are two groups of transsexuals. In different classification schemes these are referred to as primary and secondary, early onset and late onset, true and marginal, core and non-core, ego-syntonic and ego-dystonic, and homosexual and autogynephilic. The first group is similar to homosexuals in development and are most commonly gay boys before they transition, and the second group is similar to heterosexual transvestites in development and most commonly transvestites before they transition. We therefore prefer to use the homosexual/autogynephilic terminology because while the others characterize the two conditions, this terminology articulates the nature of the two conditions and is etiologically more descriptive. Homosexual Transsexuals (HSTS) are transsexuals who transition young principly for social reasons. As boys they are very feminine and have a difficult time socially, romantically, and sexually, so they transition to fit in better and have more normal lives in those three areas. They are etiologically similar to homosexual boys with commonalities in childhood and adolescence. HSTS sexuality is uncomplicated, typical, and unconfused, they are simply attracted to and desire relationships with men. They tend to view transition as a way to facilitate other life goals such as being regarded as normal by peers, having an easier time getting relationships with boys, etc. Behaviorally as boys, they come off as obviously queer or feminine gays, not straight acting, but not necessarily flamboyant. Their early and extreme feminine behavior is always noted early in life by parents, schools and peers. They will only transition if they can pull it off successfully to the extent that no one would suspect that they were born male, because their aim is to become better adjusted in society. If people could tell they were TS after transition, they would be more socially marginalized then they were before. Given these practical concerns, if the decision to transition is actually made then it will always be in adolescence and they are substantially smaller and more feminine in build then average males, otherwise they would not be able to be physically female enough to be more successful as women then they could be as men (but of course if they were successful and well adjusted as males it wouldn't occur to them to want to transition, they would simply be gay). HSTS start out as homosexual, gender variant, not very well adjusted or socially and sexually successful boys, and hopefully end up as heterosexual, gender normative, well adjusted and socially acceptable girls. Homosexual transsexuals can be characterized as being both feminine and simultaneously very self selecting for the liklihood of success if they choose to live as girls rather than as gay boys. The objective of transitioning is to improve social and sexual functioning in adulthood. Autogynephilic transsexuals (AGPs) on the other hand, transition to satisfy an intense internal urge to be the opposite gender. This urge is sometimes described as a paraphilia, a fetish, or an inverted heterosexual drive where they, attracted to women, want to become the objects of their desire. They are attracted to the female physical form, so their core sexuality is heterosexual (as men), but since their preferred object of desire is not another person but themselves, they have a very atypical and complicated sexuality. They often find it confusing, and mysterious, and while they are in the vast majority of cases originally attracted to women, their perceived sexual orientation may shift. They are not physically attracted to men but may be interested in men for other reasons, to complete their autogynephilic fantasy of themselves as a woman. Autogynephilic transsexuals are etiologically similar to transvestites. They tend to view becoming a woman as a life goal in and of itself, one they are willing to abandon important features of their life such as a wife or children, job, and being seen as a normal person in order to accomplish. Behaviorally as men, they tend to be averagely masculine, straight acting heterosexuals. They can potentially transition at any age though most transition as adults. Unlike hsts who are never very successful socially as males, agps often marry as men, have biological children with their wives, and lead successful lives as men before they transition. Physically they are averagely male in appearance until transition, and rarely pass in a truly convincing way as women, which is not nearly as distressing for them as it would be to a hsts because their reasons for transitioning do not depend on how well they are going to be socially adjusted after they are finished. AGPs typically start out as heterosexual, gender normative, socially acceptable men and end up as homosexual (lesbian) or bisexual, gender variant, less than socially acceptable women, but given the specifics of their disorder, they are often still happier as female then male despite being less well off by most objective measures.

If transsexuals fall into two distinct groups why are they consistently portrayed as a homogenous group? In part this is because of the way the medical establishment has treated transsexuals historically and in part because of the way agp transsexuals have reacted to and engineered the social model of m2f transsexuality. The answer to this question requires understanding the social interpretation of transsexuality in terms of class dynamics and an understanding of the relative social positions of HS and AGP transsexuals. The understanding of transsexuality in western culture has been formed from the interactions between autogynephilic transsexuals and the psychiatric establishments accomodations to their needs: a socially mediated process. This social process has resulted in the erasure of any real understanding of homosexual transsexuals and the colonization of our cultural identity by autogynephilic transsexuals.

How and why did this change happen? As the medical procedures available to people wanting to change gender became more sophisticated, research was done by psychologists into the type of people seeking such procedures and what type of individuals were most suitable. It was always recognized that there were different conditions which led to gender dysphoria, and since Harry Benjamin's The Transsexual Phenomenon psychologists have been attempting to classify gender dysphoric patients in different taxonomies. These psychologists generally understood transsexuality in terms of of the young, effeminate homosexual patients presenting for treatment, and the obviously masculine and heterosexual patients with transvestic fetishism, as not transsexuals but something else. At the time, they didn't have the conceptual understanding of autogynephilia to see why these typically older often married patients might in fact benefit from gender reassignment, and only saw the very apparent benefits to young homosexual patients who could successfully integrate as the opposite gender, so they denied agp transsexuals treatment under their obligation to do no harm. The problem with this was that it encouraged autogynephilic TSs to lie to their therapists about their history of transvestic fetishism, about their sexuality, about why they appeared so apparently masculine, about how they managed to live as socially, romantically, and professionally successful males for so many decades, and so forth. They would devise elaborate reinterpretations of their history, explanations that were generally implausible but that well intentioned and genuinely sympathetic psychotherapists often accepted. As these AGPs found success in using the system, more of them did so, people who were previously simply transvestites were tempted to transition. The psychological communities perception of transsexuality began to shift as their research population went from being nearly exclusively hsts to having both hsts and agps. The notion of primary and secondary symptomology and agp symptomology was well recognized with a great deal of research but without a proper theoretical understanding of how those conditions behaved. Ray Blanchard, after clinical research at the Clark institute, gave a research based conceptualization of the two conditions that lead to gender dysphoria and coined the terms homosexual ts and autogynephilic ts to replace primary and secondary with something both more etiologically meaningful and more politically correct. At the time the growing agp based "transgender" community was reacting against the term "secondary" so the new term "autogynephilic" would have seemed a more accurate and less inflammatory label since it had no value judgement suggesting one type was more real then the other and also suggested that both types benefit from gender reassignment. However by this time the most socially and economically advantaged sector of the transsexual population consisted of autogynephilic transsexuals and they found it psychologically and culturally advantageous to embrace an articulation of autogynephilia in terms of a concept of "gender identity" which maintained that one could have an internalized and hidden feminine "gender" while simultaneously living a seemingly normal social and sexual life as a man. Pragmatically, it was expedient to erase the distinctions between types of transsexuals. These new narratives were incorporated into the therapeutic process and were eventually acknowleged by the American Psychoanalytic Association in the DSM III when the diagnosis of Gender Identity Disorder replaced Transsexuality. The HBIGA (now WPATH - editor) which sets the standards of care for the medical community dealing with gender reassignment in its two most recent additions acknowledges that the patients lied and psychologists believed them on a very large scale, but instead of this drawing the validity of the current "gender identity" model question, they conclude that the hsts or "true" transsexuals as they were known at the time, must not have existed at all (except among ftms). So given that the "transgender" community is controlled entirely by autogynephilic transsexuals who have a vested interest in this "gender identity." model and the medical community of surgeons, endocrinologists, and gender therapists, is now tailor built around their needs, both are resistant to any acknowledgement of Blanchard's theory or the acknowledgement of homosexual transsexuality as a separate condition. If Blanchard.s understanding of autogynaphilia were accepted, it would undermine the "transgendered" communities construction of gender identity which they view as a route to legitimacy and acceptance. If hsts were acknowleged it would be even more damaging because it would reveal inconsistencies in agp personal narratives and the understanding of their own condition. Since their political and social identity is built around the notion that they were always really "female" because they "feel like women on the inside", that hsts who present far more cross gender attributes pre-transition, and are more convincing as women post-transition, do not share their unique psychology, would undermine the credibility of the way they think about their own disorder. So, many of the most prominent resources, organizations, activists and web page hosts among the AGP centered community have devoted a very aggressive effort to condemning and surpressing Dr.Ray Blanchard's theory. Dr. Anne Lawerance who was previously the most prominent figure among the AGP community caused a controversy when she accepted Blanchard's position and recognized herself as an autogynephilic transsexual. Dr. Michael Bailey's book The Man Who Would be Queen, written primarily about hsts but also describing agps, ignited an even more aggressive controversy in the agp community, to the point that most large sites on transsexuality now have pages and pages of material condemning the book and Bailey. Several individuals who are the most active in organizing agp ts events who run popular websites have even go so far as to go to Chicago to attempt to stir up allegations to get Bailey fired.

Dr. Winter asked us "A question -- why do you consider the term 'homosexual transsexuals' to be an appropriate one? Dr. Sam Winter is a researcher and a friend and advocate to our counterparts in Asia. So when he asked us: "Have accessed your site. Well done! A question -- why do you consider the term 'homosexual transsexuals' to be an appropriate one? Most of the transkids I have met as grown ups (in Asia) are attracted to people of the same birth sex but identify as the 'other' sex (the sex other than their birth sex). That sounds heterosexual to me." we thought it might be a good idea to make this more clear for everyone who reads the site. Kiira replied: Thank you for the very kind compliment. All of the authors of "transkids.us also identify socially as heterosexual as well. But the website is not about social identity because that discourse has been established and dominated in the west by autogynephilic transsexuals. Our website is targetting at the medical, psychological and academic sector and it is not about "identity" but about etiology and the need to establish a separate social and academic understanding that transkids and agp transsexuals are two separate and different groups, with different medical and social needs. This is because the treatment methods here in the west are unhelpful to transkids, many of whom are labeled with the "CGID" diagnosis as children. We have problems with the term "homosexual transsexual" in some ways too, because it obscures that as they get older transkids are not socially seen as "effeminate gay boys" but rather as feminine girls. But understanding that there are children who show this etiological pathway is neccessary in our culture in order to improve the medical understanding of our population. For instance, I am an adult former "transkid" and I am also technically intersex and my medical diagnosis would be something like "progestin affected female" so if I talk about medical aspects of that group of people with doctors and academics I would use that term to explain my etiology, I would speak their language. But socially, I am a heterosexual woman who was also raised as a boy until age 14 when I redefined my socio-sexual identity as female. Intersex people who redefine themselves to a more workable sex do so for the same reasons as HS transkids. But we all have to learn to communicate in the most effective way with the people who can help us better with our situation. So we have adopted the medical terminology which is used because it is the effective thing to do. The website is really quite political because we want to change things for the better here - it isn't about our personal lives at all. We did that purposfully because we wanted medical and academic people to see and understand the website and that has actually happened. We've received many compliments and we are very proud that the site will be featured in Dr. Simon LeVay's next edition of his textbook _Human Sexuality_. I hope this explains our motivations a little better. all best from, Kiira Triea transkids.us

"Homosexual" Transsexual is offensive because it implies that they're men who like other men! Why don't you say "androphilic" instead? For some reason, several websites run by autogynephilic transsexuals have strong objections to the term "homosexual transsexual". It's not fair for them to insist that we use "androphilic" to describe ourselves, its just another way that they appropriate and attempt to control our identity. Though we do not "fit in" well enough as gay boys when we are young to make this work for us, we acknowlege that we come from that population and are etiologically related. The transsexual aversion to the term "homosexual transsexual" strikes us as somewhat homophobic. The reason transkids.us prefers the term homosexual transsexual over androphilic transsexual is because it's more specific and it accurately reflects the etiological development of this population. Androphilic can also be used to describe AGPs who are bisexual or AGPs who are attracted to men exclusively post-transition (pseudo-androphilia) or other variations. Homosexual is useful because it denotes exclusive orientation towards men before transition, as a homosexual, and in fact the majority of hsts were at some point in their teens gay boys (though those that transition earlier, obviously were not). It is not to say that hsts are homosexual males, we're not, its to say that hsts have a version of a homosexual pattern of development as opposed to a transvestic patterns of development that agps have.

Why are you all buying into heteronormative hegonomy? Isn't it ok to live as a feminine boy or man? Gender non-conforming children and teens are not packages of anomolous socialization who have been thoughtfully provided for the purpose of illustrating theoretical concepts of human gender related behavior. We are young people with problems which very often cause extreme developmental and social difficulties. Projecting various flavors of essentialist social theory upon a culturally devalued population, whether motivated by homophobia, feminism or religious fundamentalism, serves only to further stigmatize us during the most vulnerable part of our lives. With few exceptions, we do try to live as feminine boys prior to transition and certainly, most of us would be happy if that worked. Our social and developmental choices are not motivated by concepts of gender identity or the acquistion of femininity which concern other types of m2f transsexuals. We are motivated to acquire a practical social and sexual life.

Aren't you all just flaunting your passing privilege and telling other transsexuals you're better than them because you're cuter? This kind of perception is very common amongst transsexuals who are motivated by autogynephilia and the desire to acquire femininity and is typical of how hsts issues are re-interpreted within a transsexual context which has meaning to autogynephilic transsexuals and not to homosexual transsexuals. In the often somewhat oddly "reversed" context of autogynephilic narrative, femininity is redefined in terms of status and heirarchy, as a personal goal and not as a connected social history. Casting transkids as "privileged" because they are defined socially as feminine is a reversal of how things work in the non-transsexual world where femininity grants less social privilege, not more. In a paraphilic value system where femininization is the objective then it can be seen how those who are spontaneously feminine would be considered fortunate but the relationship of homosexual transsexuals to concepts of "passing", attractiveness and femininity are simply very different from those of autogynephilic transsexuals. Being a member of a very devalued social class from a very young age is not a privilege, it is a huge social liability.

If you don't have anything to do with other transsexuals then why do you write about them? Why do you care why non-homosexual transsexuals transition? We don't naturally have anything to do with the other transsexuals, having a completely unrelated condition. However, the so called "transgendered community" or "transsexual community" insists that we belong to their political identity, just as it has insisted that intersexed people are part of the "transgendered" community. What is even more damaging is that autogynephilic transsexuals systematically if unintentionally undercut any recognition of hsts as an independent condition in the medical community, by reinterpreting their own histories to more closely resemble ours despite obvious inconsistencies, and by promoting a model of transsexuality which erases the distinctive features of both conditions. The agp community leaders and organizations appear to believe, perhaps correctly, that "young transitioners" as they call us, give them more credibility if we're seen as part of their group for political purposes. This subsumes hsts transkids into the agp led community that truly has nothing to do with us and only makes our lives more difficult. So, we are not choosing to be involved with other transsexuals, they've chosen to involve us in a hostile way that prevents us from having our issues addressed meaningfully. We very much wish that we did not have to cope with the difficult problems agp transsexuals have created for us and that we were free to simply focus on the unique problems of our own.

If the TS community benefits from HSTS inclusion aren't you hurting the community? Why are you being so divisive? What community? There is no "transsexual community" which actually includes hsts or transkids. What exists is the public misrepresentation of our lives and histories as they are presented by autogynephilic transsexuals. Whenever hsts try to explain our differences or even just interact politely while maintaining our identities with non-homosexual transsexuals, on the rare occasions we might show up at a "transsexual support group" or online transsexual forum for instance, then we are called "divisive" or called names or even physically threatened. The transsexual world controlled by agp transsexuals is not tolerant of hsts because our very existence is threatening to people who have lied about "being us" in order to acquire and maintain their social identities. So yes, we are being divisive, not of any actual community, but from a social system which really harms us. Depriving a community of the political advantages it reaps by appropriating the experiences, identities, histories and lives of another community is hardly hurting them so much as its trying to prevent them from further hurting us. This is legitimate, we have a right to speak for ourselves and not be spoken for by the agp dominated "transsexual" or "transgendered" community. We need to separate the social and medical needs of hsts from those of agp ts because our specific issues have been subsumed and erased by them for their benefit.

How can you say that HSTS transkids have an unrelated condition when they take hormones and have sex reassignment surgery (srs) like other transsexuals? Isn't that alone a clear commonality? Benefiting from the same medication or operation in no way implies having the same condition, especially when the desired result of the treatment is different. Female hormones for instance have four common uses: to "feel more feminine" and satisfy autogynephilia, to make a biologically male body look female to make it more attractive to straight men, or to prevent ovulation, or to suppress the effects of menopause. No one would think that the third and fourth reasons (which are obviously unique to biological females) have anything to do with each other or to the first or second reasons, and its equally absurd to think that the second reason which applies to hsts transkids has anything to do with the first reason which applies to agp transsexuals. Likewise with srs, agp transsexuals claim to want srs to "make them feel complete" or to confirm their gender as female, often insisting that their desire for srs has nothing to do with sex, whereas hsts transkids want srs so that they can have sexual relations with straight men more easily, so it's one procedure that addresses two separate issues for two separate populations.

Could there be a third type of transsexual? One motivated by something other then autogynaphilia or hsts-type motivations? Many transsexuals insist that they fit neither type. There is every reason to believe that there are only these two etiological explanations. This is not only because only two types have been observed but because there are simply a limited set of circumstances under which someone would be motivated to change gender. The first question to ask about motivation is this: With no further explanations, and only external observations to go on, would the average person think that a particular individual living as a male would clearly benefit from being female, fit in with less confusion, have more opportunities socially and relationship-wise, and generally function better as a female? For HSTS transkids the answer is "yes", so their motivation is a simple rational choice of how to maximize their chances for living a decent life. The easiest way for them to be taken at all seriously in daily life, get a long term boyfriend or husband, or any number of other things not inherently related to gender but needed for them to live a meaningful life, is to transition. The conditions needed to justify a rational choice decision to transition are very specific in terms of behavior and personality and physicality and sexual orientation; all major aspects of presentation and lifestyle would have to be radically gender variant for males and gender normative for females in order for this to make sense. An average heterosexual male clearly would not meet these criteria, or for that matter, a typical homosexual male wouldn't either (though they might be closer). Really it only makes sense for a tiny portion of young noticeably gender variant, physically feminine androphilic biological males, and some of those become hsts because it makes sense on that level. Obviously anyone married to a woman or with anything close to average male physical phenotype, couldn't reasonably claim that transitioning was plainly in their self interest on this level. For these non-hsts transsexuals, they must be motivated by something (its not like they're transitioning spontaneously) and that motivation has to be something else. They clearly don't have any external reasons to transition as hsts do, so the reasons must be of an internal psychological nature. Regardless of how they want to frame it, it comes down an internal desire to be female (which they usually term gender dysphoria). That desire would be completely ridiculous and irrational if it was arbitrary and these are not generally psychotic people, it would have to be very intense and very much more essential to personal fulfillment then commonly recognized major desires and goals in life. This also means that they must regard it as somehow pleasurable or satisfying in and of itself (whereas hsts transition just facilitates getting other things they want but they don't regard transition or being female as separate goals abstracted from their social lives). The only desire of this type of the intensity needed is sexual, so autogynephilia is not only the most reasonable explanation for why non-homosexual men want to be women, it's also the only explanation one can rationally expect to find. Nothing else is going to satisfactorily fit the actual phenomenon of non-homosexual transsexuality because there is such a very limited set of conceivable ways doing something like changing gender could actually make sense to someone. Appealing to an internal gender identity is popular but its very flawed: See Alex's essay about gender identity.

Is hsts sexuality that of a homosexual male rather then a heterosexual female, or vice versa? Asking a question like that assumes that sexuality is gendered beyond sexual role. Having never been a normal gay male or a normal straight woman, no hsts could reasonably say whose sex drive their's more closely resembled, or if there were any differences at all. It can't be verified either way and it's really not relevant to anyone's actual experience, sexual, social, or personal.

Are hsts especially sex crazed or boy crazy as it was suggested in The Man Who Would Be Queen? No more then what you would expect from any sexually frustrated teenager who has trouble getting a boyfriend. Much of the standard transsexual narrative involves the denial of sexuality because this is expedient for people whose sexuality is as different as a AGP sexuality. In contrast, hsts wish to integrate their sexuality into their social lives in a meaningful way and this is very frustrating and difficult as teenagers and young adults. So in comparison hsts would seem to be more sexual then other transsexuals but probably not more so then the general population if you adjust for age and the length of time they have been single.

Are hsts better suited to prostitution or having meaningless sex? Of course not. J. Michael Bailey suggested in The Man Who Would Be Queen that this was the case without having any real theoretical basis for saying so. Vulnerable populations of kids who are at greatly increased risk of getting kicked out of their houses or having to run away at a young age often have no way to support themselves legitimately and nothing to sell but themselves, so of course they are disproportionately represented among prostitutes. This is part of the reality of having a marginalized class status with few economic options, not any special inclination or ability on the part of hsts kids; few people want to be prostitutes but many people do it when they have no alternatives. To say that hsts are especially suited to prostitution is like saying that people in famine ravaged nations are especially suited to starvation. As to meaningless sex, everyone prefers to have meaningful sex but given that hsts effeminacy makes them less attractive to gay men and their genitalia and/or history makes them less attractive to straight men, its usually very difficult for them to get a meaningful relationship with someone who cares about them before they finish transition, obtain surgery. Given limited options sometimes meaningless sex can be better then none at all. This again is an example of social conditions that hsts are subjected to making certain behavior more likely rather then any predisposition to engage in such behavior.

What causes hsts? We are not especially concerned with the cause of homosexual transsexuality because it is not really relevant to establishing any meaningful understanding which will benefit us while we are growing up. Our approachs for dealing with our social situation as children and adolescents are very practical and so our arguments for improving social and medical understanding of our population are based on social and humanistic criteria: what will enable us as children to have an easier time fitting into the world socially and sexually as adults? (While the original authors of the Transkids website were not "especially concerned" with etiology, Kay Brown's science blog, linked above, does go into the various etiological theories that have been proposed by various researchers over the years. - editor.)

Who are transkids.us? The first version of transkids.us was produced a group of hsts teenagers and adults from several countries. They have gotten older and moved on with their lives. We did not provide photos or personal information here because our social lives are easily damaged. Further, at least one AGP transsexual "activist" vowed to "vector and destroy" those who spoke out on this topic. Now with the untimely death of Kiira Triea, transkids.us is maintained by Kay Brown, aka: Cloudy. It continues to be the only website which analyzes in detail the social existence of homosexual transsexuals (transkids) and their relationship to autogynephiles and the understanding of transsexuality in our culture We welcome any email though especially if it is interesting and polite.

What...more faq questions? Since we've opened we have received a lot of attention from transsexuals discussing transkids.us on transsexual webforums and a few emails too. Most of these questions seem like the writers did not read our website at all. We thought that we explained everything pretty well but perhaps some things are unclear and also, some of the questions and criticisms about our website are very interesting and illustrate some of the points we have made already.

Everything you say is wrong because you didn't talk about F2Ms! It seems really strange to us that this objection keeps coming up over and over from so many agp transsexuals. But perhaps not if you understand how an all encompassing theory of transsexuality depends on everyone's participation, whether they like it or not. We did not receive any complaints from any F2Ms btw. The reason we did not write about F2M transsexuals is because they have not participated in a social dynamic which erases and harms us. We don't talk about F2Ms because transkids.us is written by hsts and is about homosexual transsexuality. Our social situations are different and there is no organized social group and social dynamic which F2Ms participate in which harms us. If there were, we would have to write about them to try and improve our situation. We write about autogynephilia because agp transsexuals have proactively attempted to, among other things, prevent any discussion of the differences between the two different types of m2f transsexuals. As we have explained elsewhere on our website, our social invisibility is required for autogynephilic transsexuality to be socially privileged. If they were not doing that and if we were not involved in a social system of erasure and misunderstanding which actually harms us, then talking about autogynephilia would be as irrelevant to our social well being as F2M discussions would be, because we are two obviously delineated populations.

How can you be "real" women if you're really just homosexual men? We think it's a little funny that one of the objections to Ray Blanchard's typology of transsexuality, and to Michael Bailey's book, is that they are characterized as defining hsts as men, when this is exactly what most agp transsexuals do whenever we try and objectively describe how we are different from them. It's paradoxical that hsts are considered the "gold standard" (a phrase used in a ts discussion group) for transsexual legitimacy, but only if we allow that standard to be interpreted and represented by agp transsexuals. If we present our own interpretations then we are characterized by autogynephilic transexuals as "homosexual men". One of the most amazing characterizations we've seen the autogynephilic transsexuals make about us in reaction to our website questioned how an hsts could "be a gay man trapped in the body of a woman" (phrase taken from a webforum discussion). Naturally, if someone could believe in the concept of a woman trapped in the body of a man, despite all social and physical evidence to the contrary, then they could also believe in the notion of a gay man trapped in the body of a woman, though it's hard to imagine how that would manifest as either a personal problem or a social difficulty. But the idea that such essentialist definitions are meaningful highlights the contrast between the autogynephilic dependance on internally held and socially imposed "gender identity" with our concept that genders and identities are socially constructed mutual understandings between individuals and the culture that they exist within and that identity is a process, like a conversation, and not an assertion which needs to be explained, rationalized or validated.

Love us? Hate us? Confused? We welcome your questions and comments. Write us at: (transkids.us)