Instinct, Conditioning or Genetics?

Survival in a gender-oriented world

Joanne (Peta) Wilson/Australia

Throughout the world, today and in all recorded history, there have been males who have shown, in one way or another that they may have preferred to have been born female. Indeed, it is also true that some females seem to have shown a preference that they had been born male but the evidence suggests that the former considerably outnumber the latter.

In recent times and certainly since the 1950's, cross-gender oriented males have been allocated tags, although it is also true that some psychiatrists and psychologists identified the traits well before the fifties. Since that time, however, the terms 'transvestite' and 'transsexual' have come into common usage.

History records almost no transsexuals before Christine Jorgensen but that is not to say there were none. Transsexuality is a state of mind even more than it is a physical possibility, and therefore there would have been thousands of TSs before the operation became a medical possibility.

History also records hundreds of examples of men who, for one reason or another, dressed in the clothes of women. Significantly, the hundreds recorded were more or less famous, since their escapades made the history books, but there would have been thousands more whose obscurity precluded them historical identification.

Since sex reassignment surgery became a reality TSs have been divided into what are commonly known as pre-op and post-op. Many of those who are pre-op will remain so all of their lives and yet are still transsexual. They are either afraid or unwilling to undergo the traumatic and painful operation, or they see no need to do so. Some will elect to live and work as women full-time, even without the operation. Generally, they are those who pass easily as women. Others will spend their lives as superficial males because they cannot be what their minds tell them they should always have been.

Conversely, there are many who live and work as full time women and yet would not call themselves transsexuals. To some extent the variation depends on their preferences in sexual partners. Most, but not exclusively, TSs prefer males and TVs prefer females.

It is complicated and often inappropriate to apply the words "homosexual" and "heterosexual"to TSs and TVs. Most pre-and post-op TSs, for example, insist they are heterosexual because they are and always have been women and, as such, their partnership preference is for males. But some TSs (and TVs) use their "femaleness" as a cover for being homosexual of which they are profoundly ashamed. Being a "man" justifies their sexual preference for males.

There are a large number of TSs who have taken the step into womanhood late in life, perhaps having spent years as TVs. Many of these have struggled through marriages and the raising of children only to finally break with traditional expectations when life became totally intolerable. Examples of these are well documented in autobiographies; Robert Cowell, ex-British fighter pilot; travel journalist Jan Morris; and musician Wendy Carlos.

Today many TSs make their move into womanhood much earlier, many in their late teens and early twenties. Such is the courage afforded by publicity and the understanding afforded by awareness. I know a 46 year-old TS illustrator with a 19-year-old TS "daughter."

We know only too well that most TVs are heterosexual in that they prefer female sexual partners all of their lives. In fact, it seems such males prefer everything female. Virginia Prince referred to them as femmephiles.

For the heterosexual TV happiness often depends upon the attitude of the sexual partner. Thousands of TV marriages end in divorce because the wife cannot accept that her spouse likes to be a woman occasionally/often/regularly. That's not surprising. The lithely muscled youth she married looks altogether different in a bra, panties, high heels and a dress. Interestingly, for many women who do accept their husbands transvestism, there is a marked improvement in the overall quality of the relationship. But clearly it is not easy for a girl to find that her man had a chink in his armor.

Defining the possibilities and probabilities, however, brings us no closer to understanding why so many men, hundreds of thousands of them, prefer to be women, whether it be part-time or full-time.

There are many, many theories though, and much speculation. Something we do know is this: from conception all men, and all women for that matter, carry within their minds and bodies elements of the opposite sex. There are feminine characteristics in all males and masculine characteristics in all women. So how much does instinct, genetics and final conditioning play a part in what, eventually, we turn out to be?

Consider the following quote from an Australian women's fashion magazine of the late 80's, "...women have borrowed the odd piece from the male wardrobe for years but now you can put the whole lot in your wardrobe."

Imagine those lines, reversed, of course, in a men's magazine. It just could not happen. Not yet, anyway. The magazine mentioned above was an issue devoted entirely to men's clothing for women. The photo captions were interesting.

"...the new masculine look takes the offhand way men dress and puts it with oversize coats, cropped pants and strong lace-up walking shoes.

"...simplicity of men's styling in just three pieces.

"...Iooks like Dad's checked suit, which is exactly the point. Pull down a roomy hat, add a brolly, briefcase, spotted cravat and beat Dad at his own game.

Imagine the outcry if Dad had tried to beat his daughter at her "own game?"

It's so easy for the girls. When a girl is sick of femininity, when she feels tomboyish, she strips off the make-up, ties back her hair, dons jeans a sweatshirt and that's fine. But when a male is sick of masculinity he can't simply do the reverse. No skirts, high heels and make-up for him. Not in public anyway.

In the mid-eighties though, some of the kids were trying to change that. Certain rock stars and groups helped in away. So did the movie "Tootsie." An article in the "Weekend Australian" newspaper in 1984 profiled the Sydney and Melbourne androgynous set, who claimed they were "fighting back."

But we're not really talking of androgyny here, although psychological androgyny may well be a factor. A speaker at a national TV/TS seminar in Great Britain back in 1974 said, "Man's evolution is not yet finished. Both his mind and his body exhibit sexually ambiguous traits. He is, in a sense, an 'intersex' species. The transvestite, according to the Jungian theory of the anima - the Eve within every man - is calling forth his Eve from the subconscious and giving her a body - his own."

But what is it that keys in the possibility in some men and not in others? Such men, it is generally considered, have a high degree of "opposite gender" in their personalities and very likely because of a mild, but significant, hormonal imbalance. That is, the degree of "femaleness" in men varies.

The only outlet for such males, the only way possible for them to express such femaleness, is through clothing. Or, conversely, it is impossible for such men to call forth their Eve's while they are naked and perhaps even more impossible to do so while they are dressed in male clothing. The clothing is massively symbolic.

It is precisely this variance of femaleness which determines the level of intensity of the cross dressing need; for some, occasionally, for others, permanently. And it may well be the level of this femaleness which splits transvestism from transsexualism.

A young boy who feels this femaleness profoundly and permanently is obviously going to feel "like a women trapped in a male body" - a very common expression among TSs.

Another young boy who feels it only occasionally will be less driven by such feelings but nonetheless puzzled. Because the levels of intensity are less it will be possible for such a boy to restrain himself - to a greater or lesser degree once again.

But regular exposure to the Eve component will produce a harmony and a balance which is effectively impossible to deny.

A youngster wearing his sister's clothes in secret will not understand what he is feeling other than that it feels "good." The boy who wears his sister's clothes with her permission, perhaps even approval, will feel even better because she helps remove some of the guilt. Moreover, he is balancing what he sees her do so often with impunity - she often looks like him - he rarely looks like her.

It is precisely this need for approval which is represented so often in TV fiction - not the punishment kind, but the approval kind. The mother/son, aunt/nephew, sister/brother relationship so deeply craved.

So - genetics? Yes, because the boy is born with this femaleness level. Instinct? Equally because he cannot deny such profound feelings.

Conditioning? A different story entirely. Family pre-conditioning exists for both boys and girls but to a much more intense level for boys than for girls. So much more is expected of them. Girls have the choice, boys don't.

Which simply explains wh wanting to be a girl is such hideously guilt-ridden emotion. It's absolutely against family, societal conditioning.

In time, when, and if, the young 'female' man grows out of his guilt, he faces new barriers which are, again, almost exclusively one way. A young woman can, at any point she chooses, abandon make-up skirts, high heels, long hair, jewelry and all the outward trappings of womanhood and remain employable, socially acceptable and generally free from ridicule, even if she looks like a man. The worst she can expect is that she will be considered eccentric. In her mind she may well have "changed sex." She can continue to use female toilets and travel on a female passport causing nothing more than a raised brow.

But the male equivalent cannot expect to be accepted in the male toilets in a skirt, high heels and make-up nor can he easily travel on a male passport without serious questioning at most customs gates. Moreover, he will be labeled much more harshly than eccentric and will be constantly exposed to harassment at the least and thuggery at the worst. All of this because of conditioning. A woman may aspire to maledom - a male may not aspire to femaledom. Not in the western '"civilized" world anyway. Not yet.

But... in time, more understanding in parents is probably as important an area of education and enlightenment as any. Parents who have different expectations. Parents who recognize and heed the warning signs. Parents who are prepared to forgo preconditioning.

I mentioned earlier that I know a TS womann with a TS daughter. Although divorced and living separately, the woman and her ex-wife remain close friends. Early after the separation the woman steadily became aware that her then nine-year-old son was not like other boys. She discussed the subject with her ex-wife who, similarly aware, had also noticed. The boy, quite rightly, had never been precluded access to the person who was once his father. The couple worried that it might simply be this access and awareness which was in fluencing their son. They consulted a psychiatrist who examined the boy over a period of months and finally suggested the boy should live with his ex-father for a time. The psychiatrist suspected that the boy had inherited his father's "femaleness" genes and, therefore, instincts, and that no amount of conditioning would change him. The boy, at age fifteen, moved in with the TS. Relieved of the inhibitions caused by his own concept of what should been his relationship with his mother and his sister, the boy soon asked the TS if he could wear a dress sometimes. Under the circumstances the woman could hardly refuse. With neither encouragement not discouragement, the boy was simply allowed to find his own way through the gender maze.

The "sometimes" became often, and the often, regularly. Underwear, high heels and make-up were added to the dress. The boy's inate femaleness was allowed to surface. His mother and sister saw him as a girl often, always with love and understanding.

The boy was asked to complete his remaining eighteen months of high school and to keep his other needs within the family for that period. During the same period he was not coached in the manners and habits of women but seemed naturally to acquire them. He was allowed to go out as a girl but only with either his mother or the woman as chaperone.

With his schooling behind him the psychiatrist recommended the mandatory year of living as a woman before he would make any further recommendations.The boy, at first, could not even apply for a job or further specialist training (he wanted to become a hairdresser because it would mean misrepresenting himself.

However, a mutual friend of his mother and the woman was eventually told of what was going on and, running a single operator women's clothing shop, agreed to take the boy on as a part-time female assistant.

The boy, now girl, still lives with the woman, some seven months post-opt He works for the boutique operator full-time as the assistant manager.

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