Typically, a transfemale is defined as a biological male who identifies as female. Though sometimes it’s defined as “a woman who was assigned male at birth” — as if the “assignment” as male (determined by biology) is what’s arbitrary and the “being a woman” (determined by feelings) is what’s objective. Regardless of the wordplay in the latter definition, both imply that a biological male who apparently feels female (often including very young children who claim to feel this way) should be accepted as transfemale. However, the issue with definitions like these is that they’re too subjective, and can lead to hastily and counterproductively labeling young boys as “transgirls”.

An assertion that’s often made by trans supporters is that it’s not about gender stereotypes: that transgirls aren’t simply boys who feel like girls because they like conventionally girly things. However, with some “transgirls” that is exactly the case. For example:

Rebekah.

Corey.

Evidently there are “transgirls” who believe (and in this case, state very explicitly) that knew they were girls because they like dolls, pink, sparkles, nail polish, having long hair, etc.. In other words, the fact is that there are “transgirls” who believe — or are taught to believe by their parents, by transwomen or activists, by biased gender therapists and medical professionals (since increasingly biased ones are the only kind allowed), and by others around them — that they are girls specifically because of social conventions.

This mentality “I felt like I was a girl because I like the color pink, girls’ clothes, how they wear their hair,” and the like, is a product of a couple of things:

1. a society that is so regressive that it can’t come to terms with a boy not conforming to social conventions, so decides such a boy must actually be a girl.

2. childish oversimplicity: children are taught to associate pink, “girly” clothes, pretty long hair, etc. with girls, and so they think that anyone with many of these traits is basically a girl.

The latter demonstrates one of the issues with “transgirls”: how can a young child accurately determine that he’s a girl when he thinks that being a girl means having long hair and a conventionally feminine aesthetic? Evidently, he doesn’t know enough about the actual difference between males and females (versus manufactured social conventions) to make an informed decision about the matter.

Image by Elisa Boscolo from Pixabay

Unfortunate as it may be, it’s not surprising for these children to have such a backward idea about what constitutes being a girl or boy, because that’s the society they live in. They live in a society where many adults around them directly or indirectly encourage this idea. Rebekah’s mother said the happiest she’d seen him was when he was shopping in the “girls’ section” picking out clothes he liked. This implies that beforehand he was predominately made to wear only clothes said to be for boys.

Which raises the question of, why?: why didn’t his parents let him wear whatever clothes or whatever hairstyle he wanted even before they started considering him a girl? If people weren’t forcing him to behave, look, be a certain way because he’s a boy, perhaps he wouldn’t have been so distressed in the first place.

Another thing of note is that he was in ballet, which is an area that heavily reinforces traditional gender norms. The male and female dancers are usually in very dichotomous roles, outfits, dances — typically the male tends to be not much more than the supporting partner meant to accentuate the female dancer.

A male dancer who prefers the traditionally feminine garb, who prefers being lifted or dancing on pointe, who prefers the glamorous princesses’ characters, who wants to be in the corps de ballet generally won’t have those options. Unless he’s no longer perceived as male and is trained in dances mostly only offered to female dancers. Why can’t all dancers have equal opportunity to get whatever training, characters, or roles they prefer and are suited for, regardless of male or female?

Corey’s case even more clearly depicts the influence society’s restrictive ideals have on creating some of these “transgirls”. He also loves dolls, high heels, long hair, makeup, etc.. But while he was seen as a boy, he couldn’t engage in these interests in public without facing severe bullying by boys, girls, and even grown adults — such as the women who laughed at him and took pictures one time that he wore a dress to the store.

Corey wasn’t accepted as a boy who likes those things, to the point where he had to leave school due to the bullying. But as soon as people started seeing him as a girl who liked those things, he was able to return to school without any problem. The proclamation “it finally made sense!” is telling: in a society with such restrictive attitudes on what a ‘real man’ is, it “makes more sense” that Corey’s actually a girl in a boy’s body, because it apparently “doesn’t make sense” for a boy to like those things, dress that way, wear his hair in certain styles.

In this society, often the only options for a boy who does like those things are either to stop liking them, stop being seen a boy, or accept that he’s some abnormal freak who’s destined to be bullied. If these weren’t the only options, would he have felt the need to present himself as a girl to have his interests without constantly being mocked for it?

This strict adherence to gender roles is reinforced in many of the responses, as well. In both cases, a significant portion of the top comments are of how pretty the children are — how they’re “prettier than me and I was born a girl!”, and the like. As if that proves the point: as if that proves just how much of a girl these children must truly be, because of course, someone who’s actually a boy could not be so pretty.

Considering these things, a contributing factor to the misalignment some “transgirls” like Rebekah and Corey feel towards their sex could be the constant bombardment of the message from all sides that their interests and their gender can’t cohabitate comfortably. This message is both explicit — “you’re too pretty to be a boy” — as well as implicit — pink, glitter, long hair, etc. always being associated with girls.

It’s like if a Black child were to say “I don’t feel like I’m Black because I’m well-spoken, and Black people aren’t well-spoken. And because ever since I was young I enjoyed the way White people dress and wear their hair,” and the people around him are like “yeah, you’re too well-spoken and you act too White to be Black. You must be transWhite”. It’s a similar thing here: these boys saying they feel like girls because of things such as liking pink, long hair, and clothes designed for girls, and people around him saying “yeah, you’re too pretty and act too much like a girl to be a boy. You must be a girl.”

Ironically, these regressive ideals are not only perpetuated by traditional conservatives. Indeed the latter group often has a lot to say about what it means to be a “real man” — and often a lot of shame towards men and boys who don’t fulfill those expectations. But it’s equally as regressive when liberals define gender as “social and cultural differences” between males and females (according to Google) or “the range of characteristics pertaining to, and differentiating between, masculinity and femininity” (according to Wikipedia). If either of these definitions is accurate, then the only logical conclusion is that a male by biology is female by gender so long he’s what society arbitrarily considers to be feminine.

It’s self-contradictory how often gender is defined as social differences between males and females, or defined as the spectrum of masculinity and femininity, considering how often trans supporters insist that a transwoman is something other than simply a feminine man. If the latter is true and a transwoman isn’t simply a man who likes “womanly” things (a sociologically feminine man), then gender is not social differences between males and females (or masculinity vs. femininity). Which raises the question: how then is “gender” different from “sex”?

If a transwoman is simply a feminine-presenting biological male (based on a culture’s idea of “feminine”), then:

1. this means a person can be female in one country and male in another.

2. this means the concept of transgenderism is nothing more than regressive conformism: men must act like what society says men must act like, and if they don’t they must no longer be considered men.

Conversely if a transwoman is any male who feels like a woman — regardless of what society says, regardless of objective standards, regardless of how he presents himself (e.g. even if he still looks / behaves / dresses every bit like a conventional male) — then a person can be a transgirl as a child and not a transwoman as an adult (or vice versa) because feelings and especially children’s feelings are unstable and impressionable. Impressionable enough that a young boy can easily “feel like a girl” because he likes things people around him say only girls are supposed to like.

People who question transgender ideals are often accused of not accepting transpeople the way they are. However, encouraging transitioning in children is the opposite of accepting a person the way he is. What the people around Rebekah and Corey are doing is about as praiseworthy as telling physically healthy children who are so unhappy with themselves that they’re suicidal: “yes, you’re right that you’re fundamentally flawed. The solution is becoming skinny / taking steroids / getting iris implants / taking hormones / taking blockers / getting surgery / having breast augmentations / etc.” instead of helping them to feel harmony with the way they were literally born to be.

How is the solution to a delusion a healthy person has about being flawed the way he is to encourage the delusion? This is the opposite of self-acceptance. It’s treating the delusion as healthy and the body as unhealthy and in need of being fixed, when in reality it’s the mental perception that’s the issue. Likewise in cases like Corey’s and Rebekah’s, being male isn’t what needs to be changed; what needs to be changed is the notion that a person can’t have certain interests, dress a certain way, etc. as a male.

Not always accepting that a young boy who says he feels like a girl is actually a girl isn’t bullying “transgirls”. It’s being concerned for the sake of the child, esp. considering how often there’s later regret. How often the scenario is “I was depressed, then I decided it was because I was actually a girl and that helped. But then I was depressed about looking too masculine, then I took hormone blockers and that helped. But then I was depressed about not having girl parts; then I got implants and that helped. Then I was depressed about having boy parts, then I got SRS and that helped. But then I was still depressed.”

There are boys unhappy because they’re not allowed to express themselves the way they’re inclined to, or even because they feel uncomfortable in their bodies. But hastily labeling such children transgirls (hasty here meaning at any point before he’s an adult able to make an informed decision on the matter) is no more progressive than shaming them is. It shouldn’t be that the only options for boys who are not stereotypically masculine are being pressured to “man up” or being labeled transgirl, non-binary, genderqueer, or anything other than simply a boy who’s not stereotypical.

Progress would be to stop bullying boys who like conventionally feminine things; move beyond the associating of pink and long hair with being a girl; stop letting children make premature decisions based on these simplistic, regressive ideals; and consider teaching children self-acceptance before encouraging them to believe that a fundamental part of themselves — the healthy body they were born into — is flawed.