As a TS woman do I stand a chance against men?

Discussion in 'General Martial Arts Discussion' started by Maryreade1234, Aug 14, 2019.

  1. Pretty In Pink

    Pretty In Pink Moved on MAP 2017 Gold Award

    I'm like 60% sure that FF got in a little trouble because one of her opponents didn't know who she was and it wasn't explained.

    I am actually down for law changes. Anybody caught with PED's in combat sports should catch a charge in GHB if they win in the most obvious cases. Such as Dillashaw. I might start a petition.
     
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  2. Dead_pool

    Dead_pool Spes mea in nihil Deus MAP 2017 Moi Award

  3. IronMaiden1991

    IronMaiden1991 Active Member

    The only thing I wonder about with this is why you feel you need to emasculate men? Kinda horrible to have as your main pursuit.
     
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  4. IronMaiden1991

    IronMaiden1991 Active Member

    Which does nothing to help the transgender part of our society as a whole.
     
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  5. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    This is a common symptom of gender dysphoria in teenagers, namely the strong aversion to ones own biological sex or sex organs, or even sexual identity of themselves or peers. Male athletics comes with a certain overt masculine tone and attitude that must really bother the average teenage transsexual woman (before you ask I do not speak from experience but I read up on the subject once to help a friend).

    It makes perfect sense when you think about it, and it's not even limited to this particular class of dysphoria. People with body dysmorphic disorder can't stand anything about their physical self, including outward sexual characteristics.

    And then there is a dysmorphia for every single body part, including the face, hair ..

    Doesn't surprise me that a transexual in the martial world would have a strong anxiety against their biological sex peers, leading to a natural desire to vent it, even in unhealthy ways.

    This of course should only be done carefully and respectfully as others have suggested. And having been thoroughly tenderized by more than one biological female, I don't usually consider women weaker or slower at all.

    Statistically sure, maybe in aggregate ways, but those don't mean squat when you're a man facing down a heavyweight female with skill. Not sure I'd even notice if it was a transexual women with the same features. In fact for all I know, some of my past sparring partners might have been...hmm.
     
    Last edited: Sep 9, 2019
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  6. IronMaiden1991

    IronMaiden1991 Active Member

    Where did you get this information? Because wanting to attack OTHER men's masculinity is not something I have ever heard associated with Gender Dysphoria on it's own, I'd argue that's a whole mess of projection issues that need to be dealt with separately and in a healthy manner. Your own person is one thing, another's person on the other hand...
     
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  7. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    DSM-5, which if you're familiar with its history is a lot more capable of properly diagnosing these conditions than, say DSM-II. It's easy enough to run a NIH search for GD symptoms (which manifest is a lot of nonintuitive ways), but I can offer my opinion based on what I've researched.

    There are many issues going on in the head of someone transsexual, especially someone with GD (and these things are not necessarily the same, there are plenty of transsexuals without GD). The anxiety of what used to be called Gender Identity Disorder is now more properly defined as dysphoria.

    The symptoms of any kind of dysphoria have a very wide range of effects in terms of social behavior. The outcomes are not just in the head of the person, but their relationships to others. They are in the process of coping, often unsuccessfully, with the rejection of their own biological sexual form and traits, along with all sorts of things related to that biological sex: socially accepted actions, clothing norms, religious restrictions, and yes, even sports traditions like "shirts vs skirts".

    So that you understand what I mean, it's not that being transsexual woman or even suffering from GD means you "hate men". It means one of things a transsexual female with GD may add to their list of anxiety triggers is anything remotely male. And one of the ways people sometimes deal with their anxieties is fighting. That's me in a nutshell. If I was a female transsexual with GD, according to the DSM-IV, it's very possible I could let my anxieties cross over into some very unhealthy social activities, including getting into fights, practicing unsafe sex, drug abuse, suicide....there's a big list, unfortunately. And often it affects not just the person with GD but everyone who cares about them.

    Again, this is all my layman opinion based on being an ally and a lot of reading medical research. Take it as you will.
     
  8. Dead_pool

    Dead_pool Spes mea in nihil Deus MAP 2017 Moi Award

    Quick note, we don't use the DSM in the UK, we use the ICD, there are major differences in terminology and diagnostic criteria, between the two.
     
  9. IronMaiden1991

    IronMaiden1991 Active Member

    I'm more curious about it from a 'study' perspective, like how common it is and is there any quantified data on the matter, as this is a first . I'm not saying I don't think it's possible, more that I've not seen anything specific and would appreciate a source for further reading on the subject.

    I haven't gone as far back as DSM-3 in my reading so that may be an idea later. My point still stands though, and I hope that it can be addressed productively.
     
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  10. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    Oh there are many, many studies and a lot of data out there. Some of it is controversial.

    Transmysogyny and transfeminism are, I think, what you are looking for. They are the blanket psychological terms related to the phenomenon. In the first you have the fact that transexual women are almost universally ridiculed by men, often beyond to the point of physical violence reported all the time. Naturally, a transgender female wants to hit back at their oppressors, even by proxy in the form of a physical fight with males.

    Transfeminism (and I want to be careful here and not upset anyone) is a slightly more vague and political/controversial aspect that goes even further, where the transexual female feels a kinship with all women, since women have been oppressed throughout time. Like a kind of trans sufferagette.

    Combine these two traits and it's easy to come up with a female transgender who wants to fight men as a way of rejecting transmysogyny, embracing transfeminism, or both.

    I'll look for a study if I have time later that specifically mentions these but Google Scholar is your best starting point. A lot of these studies are in closed, paid subscription journals, but not all.
     
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2019
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  11. IronMaiden1991

    IronMaiden1991 Active Member

    Good because generally when people keep saying there's a lot of studies and evidence but don't bring it to the table I grow sceptical of their claims. Which journals would you recommend, as I would assume you've paid to see them or at least know which doctors I should be looking at?

    When I try Google scholar there's a lot to sift through for transgender and violence so I could be here a while. A few key bits of information provided would help.
     
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  12. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    I didn't forget about you. You're right, there is a huge volume of research on violence against. I tried to find you a good study that applied to violence or aggressive behavior of. Unfortunately it involves transgender men, but since we're talking about dysphoria in general and the various treatments, it seemed to fit. The clinical results of this study showed an increase of anger expression, if not necessarily any actual aggression. Whether we're talking male or female hormone treatments, the combination of hormones and dysphoria create a definite increase in what I guess you could call aggressive posturing.

    Put in metaphorical terms, transgender women with transfeminist leanings and or transmysogyny experiences are going to be more likely to express the desire to "fight", specifically with those members of their biological sex who exemplify the issues addressed by each of those areas, namely male and female dominance respectively.

    Does Testosterone Treatment Increase Anger Expression in a Population of Transgender Men?
    Does Testosterone Treatment Increase Anger Expression in a Population of Transgender Men? - PubMed - NCBI
     
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  13. Dead_pool

    Dead_pool Spes mea in nihil Deus MAP 2017 Moi Award

    Or testosterone levels are related to aggression...

    So more testosterone more aggression, and perhaps less testosterone less aggression as an average over the population.
     
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  14. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    Estrogen is also tied to aggression and a range of emotions, in both men and women. And the swing of balance between the two is a major cause of things like violence, mood swings, depression.

    You can see aggression from estrogen on display in most maternal mammals, in form of protecting newborns, many "new moms" in nature will fight to the death. Not typically humans. :)

    Estrogen-Producing Neurons Influence Aggression in Both Sexes
     
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  15. Dead_pool

    Dead_pool Spes mea in nihil Deus MAP 2017 Moi Award

    Maternal bonding is a very different thing to taking testosterone blockers/ extra estradiol.

    I'd agree that people can be quite aggressive for numerous reasons, and unless carefully monitored, any large changes can lead to short term emotional instability.
     
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  16. IronMaiden1991

    IronMaiden1991 Active Member

    transition is a second puberty, and we all know how that can be
     
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  17. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    Is it? I wouldn't really know, I'm a man and I don't take hormone treatments. I was just going by what the study said, it described the aggression levels in mice based on estrogen. That's where I got the "maternal" thing, not bonding, but aggression in defense of potential attack from predators or even male mice. And any man who has had a girlfriend or wife knows, especially if they are moms...aggression comes with their territoriality.

    Are you saying I should find a better study? I'll do my best, but it turns out most of the research like I said before is "against" as opposed to "of" and that was what she asked for. This is a very vulnerable population that in 2019, is lashing out.

    This brings to mind the science posited by Clarice Starling in Silence of the Lambs, for me. "Transsexuals are very passive". That movie came out almost 30 years ago. IT definitely doesn't apply to 2019.
     
  18. Dead_pool

    Dead_pool Spes mea in nihil Deus MAP 2017 Moi Award

    If I think your refering to what I think your refering too, I would be hesitant to refer to PMS as being "aggression". It also assuming testosterone doesn't rise during the cycle, which it does. HormoneCycle.jpg
     
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  19. Grond

    Grond Valued Member

    No, not PMS. I am referring to the special estrogen producing brain neurons linked to increased aggression in the brain study, found in both sexes. Different aggressive responses in different situations for both females and males, particularly females who feel threatened. The way I read that, aggression response to threats involves both hormones, not just testosterone but also from estrogen.

    This is kind of new research because these estrogen-neuron-aggression connections are basically unexplored and a bit non intuitive. We are used to associating rage and aggression with just the one hormone but it looks to be not the case.

    It's not accurate to think of just testosterone as the cause of the aggression it's more like a mixture, just with testosterone the bigger factor for males and estrogen the bigger aggression factor in females and postnatal females in particular due to their unusually high levels. And people with high levels of both would likely be the most potentially aggressive of all!!

    Layman's analysis, take it with a grain of salt.
     
    Last edited: Sep 19, 2019
  20. Mushroom

    Mushroom De-powered to come back better than before.

    Don't know if @Pretty In Pink remembers, but a couple of years ago on the BJJ Underground forum, there was a bit of a hoo-hah where as a M>F trans competitor, was outright asked "how far into the transition" she had gone through at the comp itself by the Judges. It did split the community opinion. Cant remember what occurred, I think she competed at another competition but not at the one where she was asked.
     
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