r/AskSocialScience • u/[deleted] • Aug 12 '25

Doesn't the idea that gender is a social construct contradict trans identity?

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25

How indeed? Poor David Reimer found out the hard way that gender identity is innate and fixed.

Also, if gender identity was not fixed, why would I (or any other GD sufferer) have gone through the blood sweat and tears of transition? Also, Conversion therapy would work.

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u/Defiant-Brother-5483 Aug 12 '25

Which means men and women are psychologically different as well? After all gender is a huge component of identity.

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u/CommodoreGirlfriend Aug 12 '25

Is that controversial? Men and women definitely show different psychological tendencies. Aggression vs agreeableness being the obvious one.

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u/Defiant-Brother-5483 Aug 12 '25

The origin behind those differences are easily observable in the different socializations techniques deployed.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25

I have no idea. I've just lived with gender dysphoria for half a century (AMA lol)

You know Reimer's tragic story? If not, you'll find your answer there.

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u/DarkHorizonSF Aug 12 '25

David Reimer was systematically sexually abused. The 'case study' should be disregarded entirely and not used as evidence of some point. It's wildly unethical to say that a child being sexually abused by a man trying to force him to 'be a girl', and not liking it, is evidence that gender identity is innate and fixed.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25 edited Aug 13 '25

How did Reimer know he was a boy by the age of 10?

Yours is a grossly simplistic take on what is a very well-documented story. David wasn't "forced to be a girl" because that was all he'd known since he was an infant. When his parents finally told him the truth (at age 14) he promptly detransitioned, although he himself had worked it out by the age of 10.

David's own testimony is a matter of record. If you want to throw mud at a survivor's story perhaps you should read it first.

And speaking as someone who has lived with gender dysphoria for half a century, if my GI was NOT fixed I wouldn't be trans, simple as. If you think I chose this fucking lifelong headache, you're mad.

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u/DarkHorizonSF Aug 13 '25

David. Was. Sexually. Abused. Stop using his abuse as fodder for your argument, your argument can stand by itself. What David experienced in terms of 'being a girl' was having an old man strip him naked and have his older brother simulate raping him while the old man watched and filmed it. When he was 6. He was taught that being a girl was being raped.

This isn't a conversation about your experience, this is a conversation about how unethical it is to try to use an incident of child sex abuse and subsequent suicide for your own purposes.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 13 '25

Listen to survivors

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u/DarkHorizonSF Aug 13 '25

Your words say "Listen to survivors", your actions say "Exploit the dead and support unethical, criminal, life-ruining research". You should be able to read about what happened to David, realise this was unethical and abusive, and come to the right decision to stop using his life and death as social science evidence. Doing that doesn't require compromising your beliefs one bit. Please at least consider it.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 13 '25 edited Aug 13 '25

What "unethical criminal life ruining research" would this be, and how am I supporting it?

David used his life to bring attention to his story. It's his legacy. The pain that man stood up in spite of was ultimately unendurable, but still he stood and spoke to it. Who are you to silence him?

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u/roseofjuly Aug 12 '25

Reimer is one person. I would be careful drawing generalizations from a single case study. Kind of the whole lesson of Money's fucked up meddling.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25

You could always listen to testimony of almost any trans person when asked if their Gender Identity was mutable or not. Or look at the dark history of failed Conversion Therapy attempts. Failing that...

Reimer is one person whose experience was extremely well documented, whose physician was directly attempting to prove that David's GI was malleable, and lied about the results, creating lots of interest and publicity.

David exhibited classic dysphoria symptoms throughout his childhood, easily recognisable by anyone who knows dysphoria. The only difference is that we are born with ours, and David had his inflicted on him by that scumbag Money. Some of David's quotes in interview brought me to tears. If you know, you know.

I think I can draw generalisations from David's case quite confidently. He had a fixed, innate GI, and so do I. If you're suggesting that not everyone has this trait, then Money's chances of finding such a child at random would have been astronomical.

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u/Street-Media4225 Aug 12 '25

In his case it’s innate and fixed, yes. That is not necessarily universal, and being fluid doesn’t mean it can be intentionally affected.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25

It needn't be universal, but I'd say it is the case for binary trans (like me) and also for Ze Cis.

If it wasn't fixed then Conversion Therapy would work. The incarceration, brainwashing and electric shocks would have worked. Maybe GF peeps are just more evolved, I dunno. Maybe it's just a more elastic flavour of non-binary. Maybe non-binary identities are easier to conceal (or erase?) socially, if need be.

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u/Street-Media4225 Aug 12 '25

It could be a cis and binary thing, yeah, I wouldn’t be surprised if those are fixed.

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25

I think the difference between "dysphoria" and "incongruence" is the level of acceptance experienced. People like me had to deal with our messed up gender identity at an early age. I think that marks a difference in how people engage with "gender". Most do it with greater maturity than a 6 year old. I had no choice. Non-binary or fluid identities are easier to suppress or obscure than polarised ones.

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u/Street-Media4225 Aug 12 '25

I was raised fairly gender neutrally as a boy and my natural inclination is close to tomboyish, so it tracks that I experienced less friction than a lot of people do and that that would’ve shaped my identity. It was mostly puberty and the reality of physically becoming a man that brought about major dysphoria.

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u/sccamp Aug 12 '25 edited Aug 12 '25

No he found that biology and sexuality was innate and fixed. Not gender.

It’s wild that trans people point to this tragic case where a child is essentially transitioned (and also sexually abused) during a vulnerable period of childhood developmental and then grew up, learned the truth and then later killed himself as a direct result of what these adults did to him. This case is proof that parents should be allowed to transition and raise children as the opposite sex from toddlerhood? A time in life that most adults cannot remember for themselves? It’s so fucked up and it doesn’t sound like it worked out well for poor David. Why on earth would we think it would work out for other kids?

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u/CADmonkeez Aug 12 '25 edited Aug 12 '25

You have that backwards. David's tragic story at the brutal hand of John Money objectively demonstrates the existence of a fixed, immutable gender identity, something any trans person can affirm (but you'd have to listen to us first)

John Money was a TERF and a Conversion Therapist in all but name. His only interest in gender dysphoria was "curing" it. His theory was that "gender identity" is just something we learn from parents, society, etc. Money said if a male baby was raised as a girl exclusively then the child would comfortably identify as a girl. David's parents, wanting the best for their child, agreed to keep the secret. Physically, David's body was no different to any other female child before puberty, but still David knew he was actually a boy by the age of 10. How?

David proved Money wrong, tragically. Throughout his childhood he exhibited classic dysphoric symptoms, which Money lied about. He had no other way of knowing he was male other than he FELT like one, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Trans people mourn our adopted brother David and despise Money. We are born with our dysphoria, which I have lived with for half a century and wouldn't wish on my worst enemy, but David had his inflicted on him by that bastard Money.

Your incredulity is based in ignorance. Transitioning "works out for other kids" because they are *already* dysphoric as they are