Exploring The Science of Transsexuality

Through Knowledge, Justice…

If you would be popular, tell people what they want to hear.

If you would help them, tell people the truth.

This blog is on the science of transsexuality and transgender sexuality, including aspects of sexual orientation.  The blog also explores autobiographical themes where appropriate.  There are many myths and misunderstandings about transsexuality and transgender people.  Our scientific understanding of the transsexual phenomena has increased and dramatically improved over the past sixty years, yet much of what is available in popular literature is misinformation and disinformation.  Much of what the public, from all aspects of the ideological spectrum, including transsexuals and transgender people themselves, believe about the etiology and epidemiology of transsexuality is based on wishful thinking on one hand and deliberate distortions on the other.  Worse, many cherry-pick among the scientific papers, choosing those that, in isolation, appear to support a given thesis.  Many people have read misinformation and disinformation regarding the science, denying, decrying, and even weaponizing the science, often in emotionally inflammatory language (including vicious attacks on the characters of scientists and educators), that makes its rounds in the echo chamber of the web and social media.  Indeed, there are fora that will instantly ban any who discuss this science in any truthful way.  This blog is an attempt to correct this situation.

Learning an unpleasant truth is better than believing a comforting lie – Don’t let the “tribe” tell you what to think – Trust only evidence, not vehemence –Data, not denial

All information found in this blog is supported by peer reviewed science and referenced (cited) in essay posts covering a given topic found on this site.  Many topics are interwoven with other topics, as they are interlocking issues.  Please explore the entire site for a full explanation of each topic.

There are over three hundred essays on this site.  I recommend that one read the first several entries in the FAQ as an introduction and jumping off point via the links provided.  One can find a bibliography for this blog if you wish to quickly find papers of interest.  You may wish to review the Glossary if a word is unfamiliar.

Remember as you read this site;  Transsexuals are good people, worthy of our respect, and even of our admiration.  Nothing in this material is meant to imply otherwise.  If you are a transsexual:  You have value as a human being.  You have the right to be respected, valued, and even celebrated as the gender to which you identify and aspire regardless of etiology.

Early 20th Century TransHistory: Heroes and Villains

When I was being kicked out of my first rented room at age 18, one of the women living there, tried to shame me for being transsexual by claiming that transsexual surgery had been developed by the Nazi’s in Germany.  This was the first of many transphobic propaganda lies I would hear over the past 50 years.  Like many propaganda memes, this first one took a germ of truth and twisted it inside out.  As well as lies told by transphobes, there are also lies and myths shared within the larger “transgender” community and even among otherwise educated transsexuals themselves regarding our history, especially about the scientists and clinicians that shaped our medical treatments and choices to this day.

In this post, I will introduce and cover a number of historical people and events, debunking the lies and myths.  You may believe you know these stories.  But I believe you will be surprised and need to reconsider what you thought you knew and believed.

Magnus Hirschfeld and the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft

Hirschfeld was a gay Jewish man who was both an LGBT rights activist and a sexologist.  Hirschfeld sought the repeal of anti-LGBT laws since 1897 when he founded the Wissenschaftlich-humanitäres Komitee.  He established the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft in 1919 just after WWI at the beginning of the Weimar Republic, before the Nazi party and Third Reich.  The institute was a center for research, education, and even medical care.  It provided gender affirming medical care and supported alternative IDs for transsexuals.

Hirschfeld studied and wrote a number of books on homosexual and transsexual people.  He pointed out that homosexuals were gender atypical in behavior from childhood, demonstrating that lesbians and gay men were “born that way”.  In his studies of “transvestites”, a term that would be best translated today as “transgender” and “transsexual”, he pointed out that there were two types of natal males, one that was homosexual and extremely gender atypical the other originally gender typical but who “loved the woman inside”, an early description of autogynephilia.

When the Nazis came to power in 1933, they illegally raided the institute, stole and burned its library, and persecuted its staff.  Hirschfeld left Germany to save his life, first traveling on a world lecture tour and then settling in France.  He died in 1935.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magnus_Hirschfeld

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific-Humanitarian_Committee

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institut_f%C3%BCr_Sexualwissenschaft

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-forgotten-history-of-the-worlds-first-trans-clinic/

From this history we can debunk several propaganda lies and myths.  First, it was not the Nazis who developed gender affirming medical care, but had interfered with it (much like right wing bigots are doing today).  Second, LGBT activism has ALWAYS included the T, as far back as 1897, in total repudiation of the lies put out by those trying divide the LGBT community and convince LGB people to throw transsexuals under the political/social bus.  Thirdly, it puts to rest the myth circulated by some in the transsexual community that the two type taxonomy is an “invention” by Ray Blanchard, when it not only clearly exists, it was fully recognized as existing over a century ago by our staunchest gay activist/scientist ally.

Harry Benjamin

Dr Harry Benjamin was originally from Germany.  He moved to the United States just before WWI.  He was a friend of Magnus Hirschfeld and though straight, he was also an ally of the LGBT community.  When Hirschfeld came to the US on his world tour after the Nazis destroyed the Institute in Berlin, Benjamin sponsored and supported Hirschfeld’s lectures.

Benjamin offered gender affirming medical care in San Francisco and New York when very few doctors in the US even knew what transsexuality was.  One of his connections was Christine Jorgensen.

In his book 1966 book on transsexuality, Harry Benjamin carefully avoided to clearly, explicitly, differentiate autogynephilic transsexuals from homosexual transsexuals, though he did know about the difference, both from his connection with Hirschfeld and his how clinical practice; In his case histories one can clearly see and recognize both.  He correctly describes differences between “young” and “later” transitioning transsexuals as having different sexual orientations, life arcs, and motivations, but chose not to expand on the etiological differences.  For example, from his description of his “high intensity” category in his book, “The Transsexual Phenomena“:

“Intensely desires relations with normal male as “female,” if young. Later, libido low. May have been married and have children, by using fantasies in intercourse.”

Note that he describes “young” as exclusively androphilic, while “later”, meaning older transitioners, being gynephilic, as evidenced by marriage to women and fathering children, accompanied by “fantasies”.  He carefully avoids mentioning which sort of fantasies, which he actually knew were autogynephilic.  As a physician, he was primarily concerned with alleviating distress.  Thus, Benjamin’s typology was based on severity of gender dysphoria, not on etiology.  He describes each, but lumps the two types together at highest intensity level.  Below that level, only autogynephiles are described.

Benjamin was one of the first to recognize and treat a transsexual teen decades ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Benjamin

The propaganda lie that recognizing and treating transkids is a new phenomenon is debunked by knowing that Dr. Harry Benjamin himself treated such in the mid-20^th Century.  It is also important that the transcommunity recognize that Benjamin knew that there were two types of MTF transsexuals from his association with Hirschfeld and treated both with respect and gender affirming medical care.

Christian Hamburger

Dr. Christian Hamburger was the Danish endocrinologist that oversaw hormone treatment and the surgeon that preformed penectomy and orchidotomy on Christine Jorgensen.  So grateful was she that she took his feminized name as her own.  Sounds like a hero?

Don’t believe it.

Consider that in a 1954 book chapter “Transvestism” (The Homosexuals, The Citadel Press, New York) he reported that he had not created a neovagina for Jorgensen because, neither he nor Jorgensen wanted to facilitate sex with men.  Christine was an asexual AGP transsexual.  Hamburger was happy to castrate transsexuals but not help androphilic MTF transsexuals to have sex with their boyfriends and husbands.  Hamburger was a bigoted homophobe and by extension a transphobe against HSTS.  He wrote regarding the fashioning of neovaginas in transsexuals, “Furthermore, such an operation may be considered undesirable from an ethical point of view.”  and  “… from a eugenic point of view it would do no harm if a number of sexually abnormal men were castrated and thus deprived of their libido.”

Hamburger was no hero.

In this same chapter, may be found the origin of the myth that transsexual sex reassignment surgery was developed by the Nazis.  Hamburger references a 1949 paper, Huelke, H. H.: Ein Transvestit: Der Fall Heinrick B. Kriminalistik 3:91, 1949 which describes the castration and penectomy of a 35 year old transwoman, almost certainly that of someone treated at the Institute in Berlin before the Nazis destroyed it, but gives the date of the operation as 1943, which is likely a typo.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Hamburger

From his own words we see that Hamburger was a bigot and eugenicist.  Sadly, the myth that he was a hero to the transsexual community persists.

Transsexual Activistism: Right and Wrong Ways

Recent events have showcased how transsexuals (and it is transsexuals, not the larger “transgender umbrella”) are under severe political attack in Red States and now even at the Federal / National level with Trump about to become the President. It means that transsexuals must fight even harder for our civil and medical rights. But this also means learning to do it the right way.

Since transsexuals are a tiny minority (only one in 11,000 people) we have no democratic political power base in our own right. It means we must have allies. This means we can’t piss-off “swing” voters, as the political wonks would say.

Which brings me to the recent unfortunate action by a trans individual who is a convicted traitor to our United States, Chelsea Manning. Manning, along with several other MTF trans individuals staged a sit-in at a US House of Representatives Women’s bathroom in defiance of a rule instigated by congresswoman Nancy Mace, backed by Speaker of the House, to ban transwomen from women’s facilities. The rule was to harass incoming congresswoman Sarah McBride, who is transsexual. As I wrote earlier, McBride side-stepped the political / propaganda trap set for her by publically stating that while she did NOT agree with the rule, she would abide by it. But along comes Manning and crew who stepped right into Mace’s trap. Worse, for the transsexual community, Manning is easily vilified in the press because she IS a villain.

The (real) transsexual activists would be far better off if Manning would just stay home. Manning does not do these things to help us, but to garner publicity for herself alone. Sadly, Manning has supporters in the transgender and disaffected youth communities who clearly don’t know better.

Many clueless activists falsely believe that direct confrontation and disruptive protests will win us some sort of political points. I read one transsexual journalist supporting Manning’s action in glowing terms making reference to the HIV/AIDS protests of the ’80s & ’90s by ActUp. But she failed to learn the real lesson from those protests. The ones that embarrassed the powers that be worked, the ones that inconvenienced the public (blocking the Golden Gate Bridge during rush hour… or worse, embarrassed the LGBT community) failed. This is where Manning’s action followed the worst of ActUp’s actions, it embarrassed the transsexual community, not the powers that be.

So, what is the right way to stage effective actions? The LGBT community of decades past did it right in some of their actions. The best example was the AIDS Quilt. It was huge, but quiet. It deeply embarrassed the powers that ignored the epidemic on the one hand and brought simpathy, to the victims.

Gathering oral history for my TransHistory project, I collected an extremely amusing story from a middle aged transwoman in the late’70s recounting an event she participated in the very early ’60s. In those ugly days, there were laws targeting transsexuals and drag performers wearing the clothing of the “opposite sex”. The police would raid gay bars that held drag shows an/or were known as having transsexual patrons. My informant told me that the bar she frequented catered to the entire LGBT community, holding drag shows both professional and amateur. The clientele included many transsexuals of both sexes and both gay men and women, the lesbians often in butch attire. One day the owner of the club got word that the police were going to conduct a very public raid on the bar to round up the “queers in drag”. An action, a “zap” was planned to embarrass the powers the be.

The drag queens wore conventional men’s clothing of the type that was favored the the butch lesbians while these very butch lesbians got dolled up, with the help of the queens and the transwomen, in fabulous drag outfits and make-up. The cops publically raided the club, press in tow, and arrested the “drag queens” and some of the transwomen in male attire (being young transitioners, they “passed” as female, even in men’s clothing). When they got put in the slammer, they were at first put in the “wrong” cells… but it soon became obvious a “mistake” had been made.

As the story goes, the LGBT community razzed the cops in the street about “not being able to tell the boys from the girls”. Sadly, the raids didn’t stop for another couple decades.

For years I tried to find corroborating accounts or evidence of the above incident, supposedly in Chicago, but ultimately failed. I know the police did conduct such raids, in spite of it being perfectly legal to have gay sex in Illinois since 1961.

Further Reading:

Thankful for Sarah McBride

Chelsea Manning is NOT the Hero

Further Evidence of Politically Motivated “Science”

A few days ago, a new paper popped up on the Archives of Sexual Behavior entitled, “Further Evidence for the Dark-Ego-Vehicle Principle: Higher Narcissistic Grandiosity and Virtue Signaling Are Related to Greater Involvement in LGBQ and Gender Identity Activism”. The title set my teeth on edge, suspecting a political hit job.

I was right.

My regular readers have no doubt read many times my mantra of always looking at the actual DATA rather than trusting the title, abstract, or conclusions from the author. Sure enough, in this paper, the proper forms of pre-registered psychological science studies have been followed, but the premise to be tested is rather of the sort of “Have you stopped beating your wife yet?”

Since the paper is open access, I invite my readers to read it for themselves (holding their nose if needed) rather than going through it to showcase the obvious homophobic and especially transphobic dog whistles and selective examples of the rare examples of LGBT misconduct at public protests, etc.

The paper’s rather in your face bias against LGBT people led me to wonder just what other papers the authors, Ann Krispenz and Alex Bertrams has published. The list included,

Krispenz, A., Bertrams, A. Understanding involvement in environmental activism: relationships to pathological narcissistic grandiosity, virtue signaling, dominance, and sensation seeking. Curr Psychol 43, 30011–30026 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-024-06575-4

Krispenz, A., Bertrams, A. Further basic evidence for the dark-ego-vehicle principle: Higher pathological narcissism is associated with greater involvement in feminist activism. Curr Psychol 43, 14619–14633 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-05451-x

Bertrams, A., Krispenz, A. Dark-ego-vehicle principle: Narcissism as a predictor of anti-sexual assault activism. Curr Psychol 43, 3585–3598 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-04591-4

Are you noticing a pattern? How about if we add this paper?

Krispenz, A., Bertrams, A. Understanding left-wing authoritarianism: Relations to the dark personality traits, altruism, and social justice commitment. Curr Psychol 43, 2714–2730 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-023-04463-x

The common thread is that all of these papers are character smears of activists that those who would oppose their efforts would attach the slur of “woke”. The authors further declared,

“The authors declare that they have no financial conflict of interest. AB declares that during the conducting and the publication process of the current studies, he was a member of the party FDP.The Liberals (FDP.Die Liberalen) Switzerland and the Network for Academic Freedom (Netzwerk Wissenschaftsfreiheit). No funds, grants, or other support was received.”

The “Network for Academic Freedom” is a right wing group opposed to “woke” as can be seen in their own declarations of principles, from Wikipedia: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netzwerk_Wissenschaftsfreiheit

Most of their prior papers were published in Current Psychology which given that the average number of days from submission to acceptance is only 18 days (!) is a rather easy journal to get published in. That this current paper targeting and smearing LGBT activists was published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior can only be explained by noting who is the current editor, who rightly or wrongly, has been severely criticized by the LGB and especially T community.

Reference:

Krispenz, A., Bertrams, A. Further Evidence for the Dark-Ego-Vehicle Principle: Higher Pathological Narcissistic Grandiosity and Virtue Signaling Are Related to Greater Involvement in LGBQ and Gender Identity Activism. Arch Sex Behav (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-024-03019-9

Report to the French Health Ministry Supports Gender Affirming Care Model for Transsexual Youth

In direct refutation of the transphobic propaganda meme of the last few years, that Europe is moving away from the Gender Affirming model for transkids, France has come out in full support for puberty blockers and cross-sex hormone replacement protocols.

Reference:

François Brezin, Kanetee Busiah, Clara Leroy, Elodie Fiot, Candace Bensignor, Cyril Amouroux, Marylène Caquard, Audrey Cartault, Sarah Castets, Clémence Delcour, Marie Devernay, Eva Feigerlova, Marie Hoarau, Béatrice Lebon-Labich, Anne-Sophie Lambert, Stéphanie Rouleau, Marie-Agathe Trouvin, Vanessa Vautier, Laetitia Martinerie,
“Endocrine management of transgender adolescents: Expert consensus of the french society of pediatric endocrinology and diabetology working group”,
Archives de Pédiatrie, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arcped.2024.08.003

Some Data On Body Changes from Cross-Sex Hormones in Transsexuals

The very first thing to note about this study is that the average of the transwomen BEFORE they started hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is 28 ± 5 years. We know that the average age of transition for homosexual transsexuals (with respect to their natal – birth sex) is 20 with essentially none doing so after age 25. So, given that more than half of the 16 Male-to-Female transsexuals in this study were over the age of 25, the number of homosexual transsexuals (HSTS) in the study was likely a small minority, if any, since the youngest subject would have been ~23. Keep this in mind when evaluating the results of muscle mass and strength measurements before and after HRT, since we know that non-homosexual transwomen are averagely masculine in body composition while HSTS are well documented to be hypomasculine before HRT onset. So, with this in mind, this study is about the effects of HRT on non-HSTS transwomen, not HSTS.

The results, as reported in the open access paper,

“Skeletal muscle size increased in TM (21% after 6 years) and decreased in TW (7% after 5 years). Muscle strength increased 18% after 6 years in TM (p = 0.003) but was statistically unchanged in TW. Muscle fat infiltration changed (p < 0.05) almost completely toward the affirmed sex phenotype after 1 year of therapy in both TM and TW. The most notable changes in fat volume distribution were that TW increased total adiposity but decreased visceral fat volume, whereas TM showed increased visceral fat (70%) and liver fat but relatively stable total adipose tissue levels. Although arterial stiffness and blood pressure did not change, there was a significant increase in triglyceride and LDL cholesterol levels and a decrease in HDL levels in TM after 6 years.”

It took only one year for muscle volume to decrease in transwomen, but the strength was only slightly decreased. No further changes occurred in later years. These transwomen essentially retained their full adult male strength even after years of HRT.

Further Reading:

Its Just Not Fair (Essay on Transsexual Sports Participation)

A Passing Moment (Essay on appearance difference between HSTS and non-HSTS transsexuals)

Reference:

Lundberg TR, Tryfonos A, Eriksson LMJ, Rundqvist H, Rullman E, Holmberg M, et al. Longitudinal changes in regional fat and muscle composition and cardiometabolic biomarkers over 5 years of hormone therapy in transgender individuals. J Intern Med. 2024; 1–15. 27 November 2024 https://doi.org/10.1111/joim.20039

Thanksgiving 2024: Sarah McBride

“First they ignore you. Then they ridicule you. And then they attack you and want to burn you. And then they build monuments to you.” — Nicholas Klein, 1918

Nicholas Klein was a lawyer, politician, and labor union activist. His comment still rings true and give me hope in these dark days for transsexual rights in the English speaking countries. For decades, transsexuals were ignored, then ridiculed, and currently attacked.

This Thanksgiving, I am thankful for Sarah McBride, the first transsexual congresswoman. I am thankful that she is so politically astute and educated. Even before she takes office in Washington, she is insulted and attacked by transphobes in the GOP. But she wisely did not take the bait, avoiding the trap set for her.

The bait and insult was calling her a “biological male”, the attack was setting a congressional rule that she couldn’t use any of the women’s bathrooms, locker rooms, or other facilities designated for women. Strangely, they also assumed that she was pre-op, making references to “male genitalia”. I don’t know if she is or isn’t… but it’s not anyone else’s business. The trap was the attackers hope that she would lash out against these insults and injustice so that they could then portray her as a “crazy tranny” who is “violating women’s privacy”. She side stepped it, saying that she would comply with the rule, though she in no way agreed with it.

McBride also posted a photo of herself in a women’s bathroom, signaling to the transsexual community that she did indeed disagree with the rule.

All in all, she demonstrated her skill as a both a politician using her enemies attacks to show how petty and ugly they are and as a representative of our community, ready to show the world that transsexuals are dignified and deserve respect. We could not ask for better representative, not only in Congress, but in the public spotlight.

Further Reading:

Essay on Ridicule: It Was Just A Joke

Essay on Attacks during the First Trump Administration: Transsexuals as Political Pawns

References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Klein

Website listing legislative attacks: https://translegislation.com/learn

Transsexual Teens Rarely Stop Hormonal Treatment or Regret Starting

A new paper in a the JAMA Pediatrics ( a top flight journal ) tells the tale. Early Presenting / Early Onset transsexual kids very rarely regret having been on puberty blockers or cross-sex hormone replacement, as the abstract explains,

“…very high levels of satisfaction and low levels of regret with puberty blockers and gender-affirming hormones as well as high levels of continuation of care were reported. Of these 220 respondents in the main sample, 9 were regretful of having received blockers (n = 8) and/or hormones (n = 3; 2 of these individuals reported regret with both), of whom 4 have stopped all gender-affirming medical care and 1 has continued to receive blockers but plans to stop. The 4 others have continued care, suggesting that regret is not synonymous with stopping care.”

As I’ve said, over and over, we need to pay more attention to what subjects DO rather than say. Of 220 subjects, only 4 had stopped HRT. That’s less than 2%. This statistic fits very well with previous studies which also showed that transsexual teens were very unlikely to stop HRT. You can well imagine the consternation of the transphobes as this type of data continues to roll in.

Further Reading:

Transsexual Teens In UK Gender Dysphoria Treatment

Australian Study of Gender Dysphoric Teens

More Proof That Transsexual Teens Persist

Reference:

Olson KR, Raber GF, Gallagher NM. Levels of Satisfaction and Regret With Gender-Affirming Medical Care in Adolescence. JAMA Pediatr. Published online October 21, 2024. doi:10.1001/jamapediatrics.2024.4527

More Proof That The CDC is…

Clueless!

As I’ve explained before, one can NOT simply ask teenagers if they are “transgender”. Far too many will falsely answer “yes”. But are they? Of course not. This 3% number is far too high. It does NOT indicate the number of “trans” teens. It only indicates the popularity of falsely claiming to be. Using surveys like this and then depending upon them to deliver insights into actual trans “anything” data is a sign of utter cluelessness. This paper is totally useless for our needs.

The real number of trans teens is ~0.002%.

Further Reading:

Lost in the Crowd

How many transfolk are their really?

New Math

Falsely Claiming to be “Trans” is Cool (NOT!)

Update on Transsexual Prevalence

The Numbers of “Transgender” Teens Can’t Be Trusted

Reference:

Suarez NA, Trujillo L, McKinnon II, et al. Disparities in School Connectedness, Unstable Housing, Experiences of Violence, Mental Health, and Suicidal Thoughts and Behaviors Among Transgender and Cisgender High School Students — Youth Risk Behavior Survey, United States, 2023. MMWR Suppl 2024;73(Suppl-4):50–58. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.su7304a6

Only Exclusive Homosexuals Associated With The Fraternal Birth Order Effect

A new open access paper published yesterday showed the non-intuitive result that bisexuals do NOT exhibit the Fraternal Birth Order Effect,

“These results suggest that birth order effects may be specific to homosexuality and not common to all minority orientations.”

The study used a ratio of same sex to opposite sex sexual partners to parse the subjects into homosexual, bisexual, asexual, and heterosexual groups. The authors defend using this method instead of self-reported ID,

“Some researchers might take the position that the only basis on which one can validly classify subjects as heterosexual, homosexual, and so on, is their self-report that such is their identity. As we have already indicated, we disagree with that position on epistemological and psychometric grounds. We believe that sexual orientation is a latent variable, and that the issues involved in its measurement are essentially the same psychometric issues involved in the measurement of any mental (as opposed to physiological) trait. In our view, the main shortcoming of our classification of sexual orientations is not that it is behavioral but that it is only behavioral.”

I too have argued for years that self-reported identity is unreliable and should be replaced with actual sexual history, especially for transsexuals, but even for non-transsexuals as in this study.

Further Reading:

Essays regarding the FBOE

Transsexuals Misrepresenting Their Sexual Orientation

Reference:

Kabátek, J., Blanchard, R., “Birth Order and Family Size of UK Biobank Subjects Identified as Asexual, Bisexual, Heterosexual, or Homosexual According to Self-Reported Sexual Histories.” Arch Sex Behav (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-024-03004-2

Anecdotes of Transsexual Career Options

The very first time I met other transsexuals, it was at the Stanford Gender Dysphoria Clinic’s “Grooming Seminar” in early 1976. I was a struggling 18 year old community college student living on a meager allowance from my family, with the proviso that I NOT visit my home town so as not to “embarrass” my family. I had no idea of what my career options were, nor how I would support myself in the future. But, I was still hopeful that my life would be a happy one. I had not yet hit bottom… that was yet to come.

During the “Seminar”, which was part of what Dr. Norman Fisk, the psychiatrist at the clinic, had referred to as,

“a program for patients encompassing many factors related to a total overall rehabilitative experience. These include vocational counseling and guidance, psychological and psychiatric supportive therapy, grooming clinics where role-appropriate behaviors are taught, explained and practiced, legal assistance, and, probably of most benefit, an opportunity is afforded to meet and interact with other patients who have successfully negotiated gender reorientation or who are in various phases of reorientation. This program employs some former patients as counselors to persons with gender disorders.“

In truth, it was a sad sick joke. The seminar speakers often didn’t have a clue to the needs of transsexuals and often were confused as to the etiological type that they were dealing with. As the majority of the program’s clients were autogynephiles, most of the programming was tailored for them. In this first seminar, Dr. Donald Laub Sr. gave a short speech, which included some friendly banter between one of the audience who was both a client and a colleague, a physician around the same age as Dr. Laub.

Fast forward a few years to 1979 when I first meet Joy Shaffer, age 23, who shared her recent experience meeting Dr. Laub as she sought SRS surgery from the Stanford clinic. During her interview, she expressed her desire and plan to go to medical school, expecting some encouragement, but instead got cold water, “Wouldn’t you rather be a secretary?” This to someone graduating from CalTech with honors in biochemistry after having socially transitioned her Junior year?

Joy had also written to Dr. Robert Stoller, in the hopes of getting advice, and perhaps some help and encouragement to get into medical school. But, instead of encouragement, he wrote back that it would be impossible for a transsexual to ever be admitted to medical school. That even if she tried to hide that fact (go stealth), she would be read instantly (he had never even met her) and still be denied admittance.

So, it was “OK” that a mid-life doctor with a wife and family to get a “sex change” but it was not ok for a young transsexual to become a doctor?

Rewind a bit back to 1976. At the very same first seminar at the Stanford clinic, I met a post-op named Karen. (Yes, that Karen.) She had the dubious good fortune to have gotten into another program to help transsexuals retrain for careers more suited for women. They had trained and found her a job as a restaurant hostess at a Denny’s. Karen was obviously transsexual, totally clockable, built like a football linebacker and acted like one. Where they found a hostess uniform that fit her was a mystery never to be solved. While Karen wasn’t the brightest bulb in the pack, and not the safest for HSTS to be around, she didn’t deserve to be exposed to public humiliation like that.

Later that same year, I got a job as a secretary. The following year I got a job as an electronics assembler. The clinic approved and signed me off for SRS. (Which I couldn’t afford given such employment.)

Fast forward again to the early 1990s when I was working to organize the transsexual community in Portland, Oregon. At a meeting held at a diner, we are discussing goals and strategy. I’m the oldest at the meeting, in my mid-30s, the rest being in their 20s, mixed AGP & HSTS. An eager to please HSTS is hanging on my every word but we find no agreement as she wants me to help her in her favorite cause, ending the laws against prostitution so that she and other street HSTS can make a living. I’m horrified, but try to explain that my life, my goals, were and are to get OFF the street and to help others to do so as well. This was not motivated by moral objections, but direct experience, up close and personal. My goal as an activist, ever since my earlier work with the ACLU Transsexual Rights Committee was to reduce the stigma of being transsexual and to pass and protect anti-discrimination laws so that young transsexuals don’t have to work the street. One of those efforts was to help young transsexuals find and keep good jobs. In spite of our disagreeing, she insisted that we be friends and gave me a warm hug at the end of that meeting.

A few years after that meeting, I helped a young AGP get a job at my employer, a firm that I had been at for four years and had risen to mid-level management in flat panel display R&D. Big mistake. She got read and to refute the “we can always tell” mantra thrown into her face by her co-workers in the fab, she outed me as an example of one that they “couldn’t tell”. That got us both fired. (Though, officially, I “resigned”.)

In a newspaper article sometime in the late ’90s about a program to help young transsexuals in San Francisco, a youngster was profiled who had been helped to get off the street and into a hair styling school. On the one hand, I was pleased with the idea of such a program, but on the other, dismayed that they were channeling young HSTS into stereotypical careers with little room for future development.

Also in the late ’90s, Joy Shaffer, who in spite of the discouragement from Dr. Laub and Dr. Stoller, had gone to medical school at Stanford, now had a private practice. In her office, on the wall, was the letter from Stoller, proudly displayed in a frame next to her medical school diploma.

In the early 2000s, I raised millions of dollars of venture capital to found a high tech company to develop technology I had invented, technology that, quite literally as well as figuratively, “changed the face of the display industry”.

I still believe in programs to help young transsexuals find jobs. But could we not help them to also find careers with growth potential?

Further Reading:

It Was The Best of Times…

Cognative Disssonance and Vector Transform Miscalculations In Transgender Space

Essay on experience with Karen

Essay on ACLU Transsexual Rights Committee

Essay on being a full time lobbyist in Oregon

Further External Reading:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PenTile_matrix_family