> I was interested about this too so I looked it up and was surprised at how lacking the research was.
Consider checking out Invisible Women, a great book discussing this topic in depth.
It also happens to mention that Viagra may be effective at treating period cramps.
This is pretty much exactly what Caroline Criado-Perez says in her recent book "Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men".
It's good to see that the awareness of this is spreading.
I don't know if this will help, but I just finished reading Invisible Women. It is an excellent read and it's absolutely appalling and infuriating to see all the places where women are just...not considered, and what the fallout of that is on a societal level. I don't think the word "feminism" occurs in the book, but it is very much a strong feminist statement with an absolute shitload of data to back it up.
Or just throw the whole boyfriend out, up to you.
One book that really resonated with me and my own experiences was Julia Serano's <em>Whipping Girl.</em> There's a lot of stuff that critiques feminism and talks about how masculinity and femininity are treated in society, but for you the most interesting parts will probably be her personal anecdotes. The most important thing you can take away from it is that everyone has a radically different experience.
When did your character realize they were transgender? When and how did they transition? How supportive or hostile was their environment, and how did they feel about themselves? Keep in mind that being transgender affects so many parts of your life, but in the end it is only one part of you. Trans people are people, just like everyone else, and we come in all different types and flavors. We can be introverts or extroverts, kind or cruel, insightful or oblivious, artists or accountants, saints or sinners. Figure out who your character is, who the playwright has written her as and how you are interpreting her, and then figure out how being a transwoman has shaped and influenced her. And after you've done that, I would go to your trans friends and ask if your interpretation has any unrealistic or offensive stereotypes. I can't imagine them being upset if you're sincere and coming from a place of respect. And if you don't feel comfortable, you can always ask reddit.
shemale...
I can call myself that... I dunno if you should...
Read Whipping Girl and give us an essay with your thoughts first.
https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Women-Data-World-Designed/dp/1419729071
Also worth googling is women’s second shift. It focuses on how labor isn’t divided equally in a marriage. Women take on not only more chores, but daily chores (dinner, cleaning, child care), while men tend to take weekly chores (mowing the lawn, taking out the trash). Not to mention they wind up maintaining their husband and children’s social calendar in addition to their own. Career wise, women are in danger of losing their careers and not doing well in interviews when they reveal to be engaged/married. Men get pay boosts when engaged married. Women are expected to abandon/sacrifice their careers for their family while men aren’t. The list goes on. But that book and that term second shift are a great place to start
Your body will thank you. Raised vegan, sometimes saw my parents “lapse” into vegetarianism, went to mostly vegetarian as an adult but rebelled by trying inconsequential quantities of meat. I had a myriad of mystery health problems that I couldn’t understand and neither could my doctors; I’m early 30’s. It was a horrible journey, but I feel like a new person on carnivore/zero carb and I’m only three months into it. Also everything is starting to make sense which is glorious.
I’ll be honest with you, changes in weight or muscles are not as visually dramatic for me initially. If your experience is like mine, your body will spend a lot of time nourishing deprived joints, bones and muscles in the beginning, but you’ll feel more energy and stronger. I also experienced extreme oxalate dumping which was tough. I wrote some of my experience here (kind of went on a tangent, tbh!): https://www.reddit.com/r/zerocarb/comments/df5qdp/optimizing_my_way_of_eating_for_further_health/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
If you have more questions, feel free to message me. I’m still learning about meat (I didn’t even know what each cut was or how to cook it) but I hope you enjoy that first steak as much as I did!!!
Oh I suggest some good reading for recovering vegetarians/vegans, message me if you’re interested in a book list but “vegetarian myth” by Lierre Keith is a good primer: https://www.amazon.com/Vegetarian-Myth-Food-Justice-Sustainability/dp/1604860804/ref=nodl_
Every facial recognition system to date has ran into the latter problem, some to extreme degrees. It is not rare by any stretch whatsoever.
The first is not rare, either.
https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Women-Data-World-Designed/dp/1419729071
that link's a great summary. the issue of most studies being done on young, white, male college students is a massive one that the general public, most of whom have taken a prescription, know nothing about. women are just considered 'smaller men' to their detriment. children are, too. the issue for pregnant women is even worse; they're told to go off all drugs/supplements not because we know those things are bad, but because we know nothing at all. absence of evidence is not evidence.
there's a book i consider a must-read for everyone, about how everything in the world is made for men because they're considered the default human. it's Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Crialdo-Perez. https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Women-Data-World-Designed/dp/1419729071
It being performative and constructive doesn't necessarily signify any degree of choice by any means. Most (hardcore) constructivists concede that, though we may recognize the ways in which we socially construct concepts, that doesn't at all mean we can change them on a whim; they're not objective values, but neither are they subjective values, they're intersubjective. Which means a constructed social conception is far from implying any sort of "choice".
I reckon you probably know it already, but this book comes very highly recommended in case you want to look more into the concept of constructivism within queer theory/gender studies, and an insight into the performativity of gender.
Hello and welcome. I had gastroparesis before I had weight loss surgery, and one of the only consistent pieces of advice I was given by multiple practitioners was to reduce fiber intake. As the vegan diet is very high in fiber, it is not optimal, or even suitable, for someone with gastroparesis.
Let me say that I also felt very guilty about eating meat and even fish, but after doing some personal research, I realized that....life IS death. They are opposite sides of the same coin. You cannot have life without death, because all organisms are consuming something in order to live. That is just the natural law of life. Many of us assume that the most compassionate thing is to eat only plants, but in reality, growing plants is very resource-heavy work, too. Harvesting plants kills many animals, particularly in industrial agrilculture. Industrial agriculture also relies mostly on fossil fuels, which pollute the land and destroy watersheds. You really can't have sustainable plant agriculture without animal input from manure....the system isn't a closed loop.
I highly recommend this book: https://www.amazon.com/Vegetarian-Myth-Food-Justice-Sustainability/dp/1604860804 It is NOT perfect, and there are some logical flaws and hyper-emotional arguments made, but I think there is valuable information for those of us struggling with the ethics of eating meat.
The best advice I can give you is to eat soft eggs and nice flaky fish to start. Your body is going to be SO happy - and my guess is, it's going to tell you LOUD and clear what it needs.
Be well.
> wave of guilt and shame (all directed inwardly
> recommendations of useful sources, blogs, books, articles, etc. that maybe helped them come to terms with their identities
A book I found super useful to reassure me that internalised guilt and shame were mainstream, what the origins and causes were, etc, was: Julia Serano "Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity", second edition, 2016.
Hope this might be useful for you!
If you are interested in learning a bit more about sex and gender, including intersex, might I suggest the book Sexing the Body? I read it and it helped me understand how the two ideas are related, come together, yet distinct. It was fascinating. It's all much more complicated than the average transphobe would have you believe.
Sounds like you have a lot of exploring to do. I would experiment more and see how changing up your gender expression feels. It could be you just do not like social conventions surrounding gender and prefer to look androgynous. You could identify as pretty much any gender and still feel this way! Something someone suggested to me was adopting a male persona online and seeing if it was something I wanted to keep doing. It sort of expanded into different settings until I realized I wanted to live as a guy full time.
For what it's worth, my dysphoria did not get really severe until I started questioning things seriously, and then I realized I had been suppressing a lot. I also had a lot of feelings that I did not realize counted as dysphoria.
A book I really like is Kate Bornstein's My Gender Workbook.
Thank you for poking at male as the default. There is a great book, Invisible Women that shows how using male as the default has affected women with regards to medical research, designing cars and homes, availability and design of safety equipment, allocation of public works money, and so much more. Women make up fully half the population, yet we are underserved.
There is a great blog, The Man Who Has it All, that examines a lot of gender-specific “norms” by flipping them on their head. “I’m not a male doctor, I’m just a doctor!” - Evan, bring gender into everything, as always.
I would read Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez. Or The Will to Change by Bell Hooks!
Great reads that offer insight to how women navigate the world and perspective of patriarchal effects upon them.
Bell Hooks also deeply mentions how the patriarchy has hurt men; emasculated them and forced them into roles they were not meant to take.
Read this https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Women-Data-World-Designed/dp/1419729071 It’s free to download on libgen.is
It explains the discrimination within society where men is seen as default and superior.
The question comes down to why there is a disparity in the first place based on something so arbitrary like genital shape. Something in society was built to create an imbalance
And while it's not specifically CF, if you're open to reading about how the world is basically designed for men and we just live in it (and more reasons to remain CF), this was a very interesting read https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Women-Data-World-Designed/dp/1419729071?ref_=d6k_applink_bb_dls&dplnkId=677f0330-bed6-42cf-a6aa-333c74291f77
Well, if you have any specific questions, feel free to ask, I'll share what I'm comfortable with.
In terms of just like, general thoughts, I'd suggest checking out the My Gender Workbook (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0415538653/ref=ppx\_yo\_dt\_b\_asin\_title\_o05\_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1). My counselor suggested this to me when I started really digging into my own identity and it really helped me out but I also know it's not everyone's cup of tea.
What my main take away from the book and thinking about gender is what society deems male/female. How even people who are assigned one gender at birth, who don't question their gender at all, still have specific actions they preform because of what society tells them. Or rather... I am AMAB and I used to get caught up in like... "I have to look a specific way" or "I need to wear a specific piece of clothing" but that isn't true. Someone who identifies as female, was assigned female at birth, they don't lose their female status by removing bras or not wearing make up.
I guess I just had these really deep ingrained ideas of what male/female is, so realizing that those were artificial, that someone somewhere decided these things helped me go, "ok, I can identify as female and not wear a bra, or wear make up."
I had another point I was going to talk about but I have since forgotten it. lol
I really don't like defending my gender identity here (and going by some of your responses, it looks like if I did I'd get frustrated with you rather quickly) so I'm going to link to a book that will answer most of your questions and concerns that I think you should read: Sexing the Body: Gender Politics and the Construction of Sexuality by Anne Fausto-Sterling.
It's a great way to learn about the history of sex and gender science, the differences between the two, how they are related and not related, and where the different concepts come from in the body.
>Feminism is rather specifically about resolving inequity, isn't it?
Yes, but inequity affects everyone in different ways for different reasons.
>I'm not terribly knowledgeable on on feminist takes on trans asks, but I had sort of put gender reassignment treatment (paid for by health insurance) more in the bucket of LGBTQ+ asks and assumed feminists as a whole might not have a strong or unified position here. Is that correct or am I off base?
Well first I'm a woman, so I don't see why Feminism wouldn't apply to me. Transgender isn't my gender. It's just an adjective that describes my gender. There is also a good book you can check out called Whipping Girl written by Julia Serano that talks about Feminism from a trans woman's perspective.
Also, are you familiar with the concept of Intersectional Feminism?
> I've just wasted all this mental effort for nothing
Nope. Questioning yourself is always important. If nothing else, it keeps us from becoming full of ourselves. And you've given more thought to this issue than most people devote across their entire lifetime.
Judith Butler wrote a number of books about gender (the first was Gender Trouble). One of her major points is that we are all performing gender - that it is something we are all copying, but there is no original - there is no platonic original casting shadows on the cave wall. This is a book that you will come across if you take gender studies classes. Back when I took those sort of classes, they were called "Women's Studies". This was the core of what I did for my second bachelor's degree (3rd was accounting).
On the thing of long hair. I grew long hair in high school. It was pure rebellion against my parents and teachers. After a few months, I went back to short hair because I hated how much effort went into taking care of shoulder length hair. I had to get up early in the mornings to have enough time to blow dry it before school (I had very greasy hair at the time and it would look like crap if I didn't shampoo daily - also I am lazy as all get out). When my parents asked why I went back to short hair, I basically, said "fuck you, you were right. too much effort." (it was a toxic family, and letting someone else be right = losing).
[sorry if this is just a vent post and you weren't looking for answers, i have a very hard time telling whether questions are rhetorical or not]
> I just want to be a girl, why am I hated so much? It's so illogical. I am not hurting anyone. I don't demand anything from anyone. I just want to be myself.
as a trans girl, just being yourself is an attack on the cishetero patriarchy.
this is a good thing. it's something to be proud of. but it's not easy to deal with.
transmisogyny is fundamental to the maintenance of colonial gender constructs, and therefore, the 'nuclear family' insofar as it exists in the popular imagination as a real thing. the existence of trans women, like that of intersex people and trans men, is an affront to the idea that men and women are and should be fundamentally separate and serve separate roles. unique to transfeminine people though, is the way we spit in the face of the idea of men being better than women, through the rejection of our alleged masculine birthright.
basically, people need to hate us and scapegoat us and torment us in order to maintain the illusion that their worldview is coherent. this book is an excellent primer and i consider it essential, but an extremely abbreviated 1-page tl;dr summary is available here. if you have q's i'm happy to answer in this thread or in DMs to the best of my ability.
Like I said. If you have a better source for the definition of gender then I'm all ears. I've literally never met a trans person in my entire time in the community who has questioned the WHO's definition on it, and seeing you do so is honestly bizarre.
>Didn't know youd been on HRT three years,
Of course you didn't know, but you were more than happy to assume things about me before you found out. And what I said wasn't offensive. You just don't understand what I meant. What I said is the accepted scientific and medical consensus on how gender works. Gender is and always have been a social construct. Yes it is related to sex in some ways, but that doesn't stop it from being a social construct. I'm sorry if you find scientifically accepted definitions to be offensive, but that is a YOU problem. Not a "lot of trans people"'s problem.
I'm honestly still furious with how you are treating me and I really don't want to talk to you anymore, but I will leave you with a book suggestion to go read. Sexing the Body by Anne Fausto Sterling It's written by a queer nb woman and feminist. The book is great and as a feminist I agree with the concepts within.
Other than that I really don't think we have anything more to discuss.
For a good understanding of trans identity start with some Judith Butler and then move on to Julia Serano. For a broader understanding of gender... I dunno The Feminist Mystique changed the world a lot.
>I can't talk about conservation when it comes to hunting because its not a topic I understand much
Good on you for admitting that, that is rare on reddit. I respect your choice to be vegan.
If we were to stop sustainable hunting nearly every state run conservation program would crumble. Even the Fish and Wildlife service relies on us for almost all of its funding. Things like studying soil erosion, animal migration, population studies... Yeah it all comes from us. It's something that very few people realize or appreciate.
No one appreciates nature more than people who spend a lot of time outdoors.
I actually do try to avoid as much store bought meat as I can. The animals live in shit conditions are shot full of steroids. Even something like pen raised venison and wild deer are wildly different tasking.
I disagree with you on the ecological effects of veganism though, and so do a number of people who are smarter than I am. This was an eye opener that I read in a college sustainability class.
As for the suffering of animals, I sympathize. But, I want to eat meat. I do my best by being as respectful to the animal as I can and I never take shots that I cant guarantee.
You didn't fail. The people that mislead you did.
A plant based diet is not actually very ethical.
Read The Vegetarian Myth and you'll learn how multiple colluding industries have leveraged your good intentions, ultimately robbing you of your health.
I just started listening to this book because it's free with audible. There is data on using man as the universal and the way gendered language affects our thinking. https://www.amazon.com/Invisible-Women-Data-World-Designed/dp/1419729071
It's a good book so far, not perfect.. but very intriguing.
> Thinking back there's been a ton of insensitive remarks from my parents about the topic of trans people and even generalizations and stereotypes of homosexuality. They've told me ok multiple occasions though that they'd always love me no matter what, and have told me that if I was gay they'd still love me (and of course being definitely interested in girls, I couldn't think I was possibly gay).
Blarg. Friggin' Boomers. I'm sorry.
That said, if you were a trans woman who was attracted to other women, that would actually make you gay, in an amusing turn of events. ;)
> Thank you again for the conversation, it's helped a lot.
No worries at all. Questioning is terrifying, and nobody should have to do it alone.
That reminds me! My New Gender Workbook is a resource I've heard recommended for people who're questioning hard. I haven't read it, but it might be helpful for you.
> Btw something I haven't mentioned, between the ages of 13 and 15 (start of middle school and throughout) I had around 3 concussions and I definitely feel like they've had an impact on my personality, and I really don't know how much that plays into all of this.
It doesn't. TBI's are completely different things; to my knowledge, there's no known association with any gender or sex stuff.
> But I have many memories before those concussions happened of either wanting to do things that girls did like makeup and having strange and intense feelings at the thought of gender transformation
Pre-puberty? That's interesting. I suspect your gender therapist would be interested, when you get one.