Is there going to be a transgender person later in the story?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Men have oppressed women for thousands of years, and women only recently got the vote, yet you know nothing about it?

This is, of course, absolutely true, but the question was not who is oppressing whom but who imposes gender roles ("I'm far more familiar with examples of gender roles being used to promote/coerce conformance within the same sex. "). Surprisingly, it is far more gender-centric than you'd think at first glance. I.e. it is men that tell other men what "manly" and "manly activities" are, and it is women that judge other women for not being "feminine" enough, regardless of how much political power each gender holds. It also happens across genders, of course, and I can't imagine how you could measure which one is the larger effect, but gender roles are definitely imposed intra-gender.

Grey Wolf

[Lycunadari]

Being transgender has nothing (or very little) to do with gender roles. And gender roles are not the same as gender. Let's imagine a woman who's a soldier, likes big cars, football and never would wear skirts or dresses. Nothing of that changes anything about her being a woman, it just means that she doesn't conform to the present gender roles because all of these activities and interests are strongly male coded (at least in western societies.) Nothing in that description makes her trans. But if she was male assigned at birth, but identifies as a woman now (regardless of her interests), then she's trans.
In the same way you can have someone who was female assigned at birth, always played with dolls as a child, likes to wear dresses and uses makeup and still not identify as a woman but as a man or some non-binary gender. This person is also trans.
Both of them may or may not experience dysphoria but that doesn't make or not make them trans. All that's important is how they see themselves in relation to the gender they were assigned at birth.

So even if there was a society where all gender roles were reversed or completely absent, there would still be trans people, because gender identity is something that's just there (or, in the case of agender people, absent), it's independent from gender roles. A society without gender roles would make some things easier for trans people, though - it would be much easier for people to experiment what feels right for them if there weren't taboos for things like wearing skirts as a male assigned person, and there would be less gate keeping and stereotyping in the form of "you're wearing pants, you can't be a real trans woman" or "why do still like sewing, I thought you're a man now" or "you aren't really non-binary unless you (try to) look completely androgynous".

[aaronwp]

I don't understand that concept, either. I'll believe people that the brain part that tells them how their bodies look somehow got the wrong hormones and thus tells them that they have the wrong bits, which then leads to dysphoria, but I call that transsexual. (I actually know a ftm - transperson, and she wants to be a gender-nonconforming male after getting surgery, so I guess it is really about the body. Could still be about the fact that being a woman is not fun in patriarchy, but research on this is impossible as everywhere is a patriarchy, so, no control-group)

Transgender I don't see as something that should be treated by surgery. Rather psychotherapy.

I like your post because it has absolutely nothing to do with trying to tell an artist how to art, and instead it deals with issues that have real, actual answers.

The reason that this particular form of dysphoria is treated with surgery and hormones is because it gives the best results. Therapy is included in the package too, but when a person suffering from gender dysphoria, which is the underlying mental illness that most trans people have, is given hormones and surgery they're less likely to kill themselves. That sounds blunt, but it's true. If someone invented a pill that cured gender dysphoria tomorrow, then most of the medical world would stop recommending hormones and surgery, but so far this is the best course of treatment for gender dysphoria.

Gender dysphoria causes a lot of self-loathing and a compulsion to change gender. It literally wouldn't matter if a trans person lived in a society where the opposite gender were all slaves or prisoners. The illness would cause a compulsion to become the other gender regardless of disadvantages.

That's why it's a mental illness and not just people being quirky and queer. Gender constructs and disadvantages and society aside, a person could live their whole lives on a desert island with no concept of gender roles at all, and if they suffered from gender dysphoria, they'd still feel that something is wrong with them even if it couldn't be articulated.

[Themrys]

This is, of course, absolutely true, but the question was not who is oppressing whom but who imposes gender roles ("I'm far more familiar with examples of gender roles being used to promote/coerce conformance within the same sex. "). Surprisingly, it is far more gender-centric than you'd think at first glance. I.e. it is men that tell other men what "manly" and "manly activities" are, and it is women that judge other women for not being "feminine" enough, regardless of how much political power each gender holds. It also happens across genders, of course, and I can't imagine how you could measure which one is the larger effect, but gender roles are definitely imposed intra-gender.

Grey Wolf

My experience is that boys will impose gender roles on girls far more often than the other way round. I have, as a child and teen, been gender-policed thrice by boys (The times I can remember), and never by girls, and I certainly never told boys what they can or cannot do, nor have I ever witnessed other girls doing so. We can safely assume that gender roles are mostly imposed by men, as they profit from imposing them, while women don't.

@aaronwp: That is just assumptions - we do not have a society without gender stereotypes to carry out research in, and children are not commonly raised on lonely islands. One could, however, compare how many people are transgender in societies with more strictly enforced gender roles versus not so strictly enforced gender roles. I don't know whether research on this exists.

[Astrella]

Being trans has nothing to do with gender roles. And can we stop doing the "just do therapy" thing, has been tried, for ages and often in violent ways up to the point of literally lobotomizing trans people, and it *doesn't help*. A little bit of research easily shows that transitioning is not only the only thing that works, but also really successful on top of that.

My transitioning has to do with my body; hormones have cleared up my mental space a lot, removed all of the static essentially and made me feel so much less detached from myself. The physical changes make me more comfortable with my body.

I identify as a woman because it's a) the label I feel most comfortable with and b) it bests describes my position in society. I'm seen as a woman and treated as such. Messages aimed at women affect me, etc... In a hypothetical genderless society I wouldn't care about putting on a label, but we don't live in a society like that.

My experience is that boys will impose gender roles on girls far more often than the other way round. I have, as a child and teen, been gender-policed thrice by boys (The times I can remember), and never by girls, and I certainly never told boys what they can or cannot do, nor have I ever witnessed other girls doing so. We can safely assume that gender roles are mostly imposed by men, as they profit from imposing them, while women don't.

Women do benefit from policing less privileged women and it does happen all the time, e.g. lesbians, trans women, black women, etc...

[brian 333]

Give a year and a half old kid a toy truck. A boy will begin to crash it into things while a girl will make it talk.

By the time they are teens you can argue that gender roles have been acquired, but boys and girls act differently in patterns that cross cultures. Whole books have been written about this. There are male and female characteristics. For example, girls rarely fistfight compared to boys, and when they do they hate the other girl forever, while boys fight one day and are best friends the next. There is a completely different mindset at work here and it is clearly based on gender differentiation.

One such difference is in the way boys and girls compete. Boys compete physically and girls compete socially. Boys need no excuse to turn anything into a race. They often compete in running, throwing, lifting, or in any task to which they are set. Boy games are games with a winner and losers. Girls, on the other hand, will slow down to let the slower girls catch up rather than race, and I've seen young girls divide things so that every girl gets the same amount, (something boys seldom do, and usually only under direct supervision!) But girls will 'exclude' one of their group in punishment or as a power play.

Nobody has to teach children to do this. And it's done in every culture. Boys and girls are naturally different

There are people who do not conform to the standards, but this does not negate the fact of the standards. It is true that some male/female characteristics are culturally acquired, but some mental patterns are derived from biology.

Modern PC Police will tell you that boys and girls are exactly the same. Well, since about 1990 or so it's been completely legal for girls to play 'boy' sports in Louisiana. Aside from one kicker the year of the ruling, I know of no other girls who have taken advantage of the rules change. Girls and boys are not the same, biologically, or psychologically, and not all differences between the attitudes of the sexes can be attributed to cultural conditioning.

[Keltest]

I just spent 20 minutes typing up a densely reasoned argument on a viewpoint midway between "gender roles are natural" and "only men benefit from them."

However, the forum imps destroyed it as I attempted to post it.

It was highly polished. It was beautifully worded. It disappeared with such finality that I am now too frustrated and disgusted to try to put it back together again right now.

So, I'll just say -- good points, all, and thanks for the interesting discussion.

Wait, the autosave didn't keep it alive? That sounds like an actual issue that the administrators would be interested in hearing about.

[Serpentine]

Bulldog: This really isn't the appropriate place for this - in fact, there is a very explicit appropriate place way up in Friendly Banter - so I'll send my response by PM in a bit.

Protip: any argument that starts "boys do X, girls do Y" is just begging to be proven wrong. The most you can say is that science has observed that boys are *more likely* to do X, or that more girls *have a tendency* to do Y. You may make the observation that 40% of boys play some sort of contact sport as opposed to 20% of girls, and that that is a significant difference, but that is not any basis to judge any individual boy or girl on that generalisation. It is also extremely difficult to separate nature from nurture - you may talk about teenagers being influenced, but studies have found clear differences in the way boys and girls are treated from the moment they're born - talking about how big and strong a baby boy is as opposed to how pretty and sweet a girl baby is, for instance, or the fact that adults are far quicker to call back a little girl from climbing or doing something active than a little boy. These things add up.
Now, I do believe that there are some trends and tendencies that can be observed in the sexes. But these are statistical, not determinative, and are far, FAR from universal. For example, I believe that all things being perfectly equal, in some imaginary utopia where the sexes are treated equally and there are no gender-based expectations or enforcement, you would probably still have more male soldiers than female and more female nurses than male. But I also believe that the difference would be far, far less than it is now - more like 40/60 than 10/90 - and that we shouldn't confuse "more likely to" with "will" or "must".

[martianmister]

Give a year and a half old kid a toy truck. A boy will begin to crash it into things while a girl will make it talk.

Aren't this the most precious thing...

[Koo Rehtorb]

Surely people who have been alive for 18 months are completely blank slates.

[Zmeoaice]

We can safely assume that gender roles are mostly imposed by men, as they profit from imposing them, while women don't.

Women benefited from gender roles far more than men, since they are being kept safe, secure and their well being is taken into consideration more, while men are/were obligated to keep women safe and do the hardest jobs to provide for the family.

[oppyu]

Well this thread is clearly headed to a very dark place. Do the forum staff do preemptive locks?

[Keltest]

Well this thread is clearly headed to a very dark place. Do the forum staff do preemptive locks?

I believe someone usually lights up the Sherriff Signal and Roland comes down with his mighty glower of moderation until the thread gets cleaned up.

[CaDzilla]

Women benefited from gender roles far more than men, since they are being kept safe, secure and their well being is taken into consideration more, while men are/were obligated to keep women safe and do the hardest jobs to provide for the family.

That's the exact same argument the totalitarian government in the Handmaid's Tale used to oppress women

[jere7my]

That's the exact same argument the totalitarian government in the Handmaid's Tale used to oppress women

So you're saying it's stood the test of time.

[Synar]

Not touching the present discussion with a one kilometer pole,
but just dropping to say that The Giant already expressed that there propably will not be any because that is not an issue he is knowledgeable about (at least at the time).