Introduction

Last week, I received an e-mail from a reader in Atlanta who’s facing the ‘is this all a fetish or am I transgender?” question (as you can see above, she described the dilemma in much more colorful language.)

We decided to investigate and create a test…

TEST: Is this all a fetish or am I transgender?

How often do you cry because you wanna be a girl so much?

1. Never.

2. Never...but that’s because my gender feelings come out in other ways.

3. Seldom.

4. Often.

None

Do you sometimes walk into the lingerie section of department stores for the erotic buzz?

1. Busted! I love it.

2. Never.

3. Occasionally.

None

How many times a day do you experience girl-envy when you see a pretty girl?

1. Constantly!

2. Sometimes.

3. Never.

None

Do you have a girl name?

1. Yes, but it’s overtly sexual and/or over the top… (‘Mimi fuck-kitten the cum slut!’)

2. Yes!

3. No.

4. Yes...and it's deeply important to me.

None

Do you have conflicting moments when sometimes it seems entirely logical that you are a woman and others where it suddenly seems ridiculous?

1. Yes.

2. No...because there is nothing logical about me wanting to be a woman.

No...because I know that I am - deep down - female.

None

Putting aside biology, which of the following roles do you think you’d be better at: Mother or Father?

1. Mother.

2. Father.

3. Not sure.

None

How often do your sexual fantasies involve fetish fabrics such as latex, satin etc?

(Please don\'t try to second guess the test. Having a raging latex fetish doesn\'t invalidate your transgender impulses.)

Almost always.

Sometimes.

Never.

A lot. But trust me...my need to be a girl goes way beyond any kinks I have.

None

How would you describe your testicles?

1. The family jewels.

2. I don't really have any thoughts about them, to be honest.

3. A ball and chain (except there's 2 of them) that condemn me to a life of loathesome masculinity.

4. Sometimes I wish I could just rip them off.

None

Does your sexual interest in femininity predate your transgender interest?

1. Yes.

2. No.

None

If you could be a woman but would not have access to fem clothing, cosmetics and silicone...would you still want to be a woman?

1. Not really, to be honest.

2. Yes, but I'd be gutted to miss out on those things.

3. No way!

None

Which of these 3 things would you want the most if you could be reborn tomorrow?

1. Richer parents.

2. I'd be much more handsome.

3. I'd be a girl.

None

Are you really prepared to transition?

1. Damn right!

2. Hell no!

3. Still thinking!

None

How do you feel about the fact that men are better paid than women?

1. Fucking outraged.

2. That it's wrong.

3. As Wiz Khalifa said... "paper over bitches."

4. Have more important things to worry about, thanks.

None

What colour eyes does your ideal man have?

1. Listen: men appear in my fantasies, but I don't care about their eyes.

2. Blue.

3. Green.

4. Brown.

None

How much of your time thinking about being a woman is in a purely sexual context?

1. Not all of it...but a lot of it.

2. All of it.

A little bit.

None

If you could live successfully as a woman - but hormones and surgeries would take 10 years off your life...would you still live as a woman?

1. Definitely.

2. Definitely not.

3. I'd have to think long and hard about it.

None

How much of your day is spent obssessing over gender?

1. 0%

2. From 1 - 5%

3. Above 10%

None

The idea of being a wife or girl-friend...

1. Really turns me on...especially to a dominant, older man who insists I be super feminine.

2. Seems right and natural (and it also turns me on.).

3. Seems utterly wrong.

4. I need more time to think about it.

None

Do you like penetrating women?

1. Yes...but I'd rather be the one being penetrated.

2. Love it.

3. I suppose... but it's not ideal.

4. I only like guys so obviously I don't like penetrating girls.

None

How do you feel when friends and family start taking photos?

1. Get that thing away from me because I can't bear to see my male self in photos!

2. Strut my stuff and start looking sharp, baby!

3. I just get on with doing what's expected of me.

None

1 out of 20

Time's up

First of all, why do some people see ‘sissy’ fantasies as challenging their transgender status?

1. The sexual desire to be a woman is so incredibly strong that it makes you wonder if it isn’t the main power source of your transgender desire.

2. You are keenly aware that some of your crossgender behaviour is overtly fetishistic (sissifcation, humilaition, transvestic etc.), making you suspect the whole thing is an elaborate fetish.

3. Your first crossgender experiences were sexual – therefore it’s sequentially logical that later transgender experiences grew out of what came before.

Let me save you hundreds of hours of therapy!

To finish with this whole question of  fetish or  authentic transgender impulse? you need to understand that the question is a complete waste of time.

3 reasons why the ‘fetish versus transgender’ question is a pointless question…

1) Personally, I have come to suspect that the transgender impulse of late onset transsexualism does have a sexual origin.

But notice my use of language…

‘I SUSPECT.’…

The reason I ‘suspect’ and not ‘believe’ is because in the end… IT’S IMPOSSIBLE TO PROVE EMPIRICALLY.

Using logical ideas like ‘the sexual impulse came first therefore it must be the prime cause’ is logical… but can not be confirmed as genetic or neurological or biological reality. Until we have a much greater knowledge of the brain and the way it directs sexuality and gender…the causal mechanism of your transgender impulse is impossible to know.

That’s why you should never trust writers who talks about this issue in the language of fact. There are no facts. We do not know if the desire to change gender is a paraphilia and we don’t know that it isn’t. I don’t know, Raymond Blanchard doesn’t know, Julia Serrano doesn’t know…

…Only God knows.

Therefore, all this time you are spending on the fetish versus transgender question is a waste of time because the answer is, at this point in scientific history, unknowable.

Reason 2: even if it was a ‘fetish’… it would be clinically irrelevant.

While the discovery that a certain type of transsexualism begins with a paraphilia would be a delight to Blanchard and the conservative movement, it wouldn’t make any difference to your treatment options. Why?

Because whatever the cause of your gender crisis, we know that the resultant symptoms are so severe for the individual that it is completely irrelevant whether the whole thing began with a fetish or a genuine female essence.

Think about it this way…

…Imagine a person you love is suffering from skin cancer and I spend all my time obsessing over the causes. Imagine I’m harping on about that holiday in Ibiza when we all double dropped ecstasy on the beach in 40 degrees celsius…and I’m sure that this is the cause of the skin cancer.

You’d be forgiven for swiftly interceding and telling me that you don’t give a fuck how it started… you just want it treated.

It’s the same for a gender crisis. Whether it’s caused by a fetish or a curse from God or a trapped female inside is irrelevant. A full blown gender crisis is a serious event with major repercussions for mental and physical health and has to be dealt with by well established clinical means – none of which are affected by the suspected sexual origins of the condition.

Reason 3: Ok…you’re transgender. So what?

The word ‘transgender’ has become one of the most redundant, meaningless words in the modern lexicon.

This is because it does not imply transition or a mental condition or even a lifestyle…it simply means that you ‘identify’ as a specific gender. In fact, it doesn’t even mean that any more because you can identify as having no gender or two genders or however you want to mix it up in the McCombo gender menu.

There are bald, middle aged dudes on Youtube who make no effort to pass or have hormones or surgeries or wear female clothes. And they say they are transgender women. I don’t have a problem with that (ok…I do…but I’m not going to get into it here) but I mention it because I want you to see how being ‘transgender’ doesn’t necessarily mean much at all.

Therefore, even if you reach a definitive decision: ”this is not a fetish…and I am transgender…” the next logical question is… “So what?” All that means is a process of identification in your mind – a process which consists of a bunch of words.

So, this is the third reason why the ‘fetish or transgender’ question is pointless: it’s asked by sufferers of gender dysphoria looking for answers and solutions, and the decision you’re transgender doesn’t diminish your gender dysphoria or tell you what you need to do.

And that leads me to my lasting sensation about this question: that it’s the wrong question.

The right question

The conversation you need to have with yourself is this…

Dear Self, whatever the origins of this fetish/transgender thing in the past, it’s really starting to fuck with my present. I now have to face the fact that right here-right now I’m in a gender crisis with gender dysphoria on the side. Therefore, the real question I need to ask is…

Has this thing now grown to such proportions that I need to seek treatment…and if it has…what treatment would be best?

There are many possible ways to treat gender dysphoria…

• General counselling
• Transition
• Acceptance & Non transition
• More female expression
• Hormones
• …And much more.

The above is what you need to obsess over: that’s your future! Trying to obsess over the origins of the dysphoria will not help you…obsessing over the solution will.

Further Tests

• Test: Discover Your True Gender
• Measure Your Femininity
• Repeat this test: Evaluate Fetish vs Transgender Discourse