Contributed by Ela Bambust.
Because the objective reality of trans people has been politicised, the title of this piece will get different reactions out of people depending on their position on the political spectrum, presumably ranging somewhere from “VINDICATION” to “Oh god this one could do some damage,” and I’m here to tell you that you’re probably wrong either way.
Gender, as myself and others have mentioned before, is annoyingly complex, an interplay between biology and identity that seems to serve no immediate function from an evolutionary perspective. The problem with this is that it becomes very difficult to pin it down, and as soon as something can’t be easily pinned down and defined, people will happily start arguing. And where there’s room for argument and debate, there’s room for bad actors.
Which is how we got here. One side of the table will argue that being trans has no biological underpinnings, that it is purely “ethereal” and therefore something that can be taught or unlearned. The other side of the table, in a desperate bid to — checks notes — not lose their human rights, has taken the stance that transness has a biological underpinning. That one is Born This Way, as the philosopher Gaga put it. A lot of our language and arguments hinge on this. “Realizing” you’re trans. “I was always a woman and didn’t realize it yet.” The idea of being “A man stuck in a woman’s body.” This language is pervasive and, it must be said, true for a lot of people.
But I think it’s incorrect to assume this is the universal narrative.
Because it’s not the case for everyone. And if it’s not the case for everyone, then the argument falls apart. And if holes can be poked in it, you can bet your bottom dollar that someone with a bad haircut and a podcast will have a go at it.
There are some people whose gender fluctuates later in life. People for who identity as a whole is more complex, for who identity is an ever-changing, ever-fluctuating creature. People for whom the question “who am I?” is not a cute inspirational poster with some hobbies on it but a gruelling 1500-page dissertation that will be outdated by next year.
So we arrive at my core thesis.
Being Transgender is a decision. Before we continue, let me make one thing very clear: for many people that decision is whether or not to stay alive. It is the decision to be oneself, truly, deeply and simply. For many, gender is simple. For many, it is a realisation, followed by the decision to honour that realisation.
But that doesn’t mean that’s what “Being Trans” is. For many people, breakfast is bacon and eggs, but, well… you see where I’m going with this.
Identity, much like gender, is annoyingly complex. There are a minimum of 7 (or is it 8, now?) billion answers to the question “Who are you?” And for many, that question changes on a day to day basis. There’s another argument here, of course, the question of why one would even care, why we would need to prove the reality of our existence to avoid persecution. We shouldn’t have to, and the burden of proof lies with those who wouldn’t want us to be, but that’s not the reality we live in. We live in one where we need to explain, in great detail, who, why and what we are. That we are the gender we say we are.
Gender is a part of your identity. It informs your physical, social and psychological experience of being alive. Contrary to what you might think when you look at the title of this article, you can’t simply decide to be something you’re not and then be that thing. Deciding you are a pilot doesn’t make you qualified to land a plane, after all.
That’s the gotcha a lot of detractors lean on. “When I was young, I wanted to be a dinosaur, that doesn’t make me a velociraptor,” some will jeer snidely.
But what if you’re nine years old and you’re faced with a physical reality that does not work for you? That you see your peers talk about the upcoming years, the adults who have gone through it, and realize that you are about to undergo something that will cause you physical and mental harm for the rest of your life?
For some, this isn’t about wanting to be something at all. Some decide to push through these years regardless, either because they don’t know there is an alternative, or because they are scared of the consequences.
Being trans is, I think, a decision. When I was born, a doctor looked between my legs and proclaimed me a boy. They hadn’t done an ultrasound to make sure I wasn’t intersex. They hadn’t checked my chromosomes. They sure as hell didn’t ask me, but I don’t blame them for that one. I wasn’t in a talking mood.
But twenty-six years later, I was faced with a decision. I recognised an underlying pain that had been with me my entire life, and I decided to do something about it. That pain, as I understood it, belied a part of my identity that had been under-developed but not absent. I decided to frame it differently. I was always a woman, you see. Just one in a body that didn’t match how I felt.
“But,” I hear you think, “but you mentioned earlier that that’s not how it works!”
No. That’s not what I said. Scroll up if you have to, I’ll just be down here, waiting smugly to go ‘I told you so,’ because I’m petty like that. My point is that, while that’s not the universal narrative, it’s mine.
But it is important to recognize that I decided to frame it that way. Because, and that’s the kicker here, none of this is provable. “Male brain” vs “female brain” is nonsense, we develop our brains based on a whole range of factors, and there are enough people for whom this isn’t going to work that a biological approach is going to lead to short-sightedness at best and flat eugenics at worst. The only path forward we have is taking people at their word.
I like to use the example of the chair.
“Define a chair” is a fun little gotcha in the trans community, and I do agree with it to a certain extent, though most don’t follow it to its philosophical conclusion.
A chair, some will say, is an object with four legs, something to lean on, with a place for sitting. “So,” I might ask, “is it possible for a chair with fewer or more legs to exist? For one to be made without a back? If a chair doesn’t have a bottom, is it still a chair? Can a horse with a saddle that has lumbar support be considered a chair?”
“Obviously,” you would say, “no, a horse is not a chair.”
But it is, going by your first definition.
Obviously a horse is not a chair. Chairs were made for sitting. But it does point to something: that the definition of things is not just based on observable facts. There is a missing ingredient here: Intent.
A chair, after all, is something that was made to do one thing, and one thing only:
To be a chair. Not something made according to certain specifics (form) or for sitting on (function) but simply for the existence itself. Sure, it might be made for sitting, but the craftsman does not think “I will make something for people to sit on, and we can figure out later what it is”. The craftsman sets out to make a chair. Perhaps they are an artist making a statement, and they make the chair out of paper-maché, impossible to sit on. Perhaps they’re a designer and they make a chair with one big leg (who knows what they think).
These are both chairs, after all, united not in form or function but in intent. They have been, by their creators, identified as chairs and we take them at their word.
Sure, most of the time, you can go off of that visual identification, but not always. Sometimes, what looks like a chair might be, say, an art installation. Or it might be a stool. Or a horse.
Who, then, is the arbiter of a person? What craftsman?
Sidestepping the obvious and philosophically slightly boring theological approach, the answer is: we are. “What is a woman?” Is answered by simply as she who has decided to make herself one, be that physically, psychologically, socially, emotionally or in whatever other way you like.
We are our own creators, after all.
“Hold on,” I can feel, through my throbbing keyboard, some of you thinking, “that carries some implications with it.”
Well, I do love implications.
“Doesn’t that imply that you can just decide not to be trans? Doesn’t that mean that conversion therapy should work?”
Well.
Sort of.
WAIT!
Here’s my argument: conversion therapy works in the sense that it can make one decide not to be trans (or gay, for that matter). It can’t change facts, however, like the pain that comes from ignoring objective reality.
I don’t subscribe to the notion that gender dysphoria (the incongruence between the body and the gender identity) is a good universal litmus test for being trans. Don’t get me wrong, if you experience gender dysphoria, talk to your doctor about it. But not everyone does.
That said, conversion therapy won’t take away dysphoria. It might make you decide “not to be trans” and if we have to take people at their word if they tell us they’re trans, we need to take them at their word if they tell us they aren’t, either. We can try to convince them to stay alive, however, because often all that kind of therapy does is force people to try to live as if they didn’t experience the world the way they do.
You can decide not to be trans, but it doesn’t stop you feeling. If you think you’d be happier if you were a woman, that feeling won’t go away just because you decide you aren’t one. If you hate your reflection because it shows someone you aren’t, if you feel weird when someone calls you by a certain name or pronouns, that can’t be fixed by choosing not to. Your identity might be a choice, but your experiences are not.
We go back to the chair. If I take the legs off, is it still a chair? If I take the back off, is it a backless chair, or is it a stool? That depends on the intention again, of course. If someone comes into my house and smashes my furniture, my reaction will be “oh no, my furniture!” not “oh no, my loosely distributed firewood!”
So why… all of this? Why redefine transness to be something as ethereal as a decision? Why not leave it in the realm of the vaguely biological? There is judicial precedent for the biological argument working after all.
Because it simply isn’t just biological, and those who would see us removed from the public eye are banking on the semantics to support them. There are enough people out there for whom it is not cut and dry that they can be trotted out and used as ammunition if we try to keep it simple, so we have to be nuanced.
For me, being trans was the decision to stay alive, but there are so many ways it can take shape.
The decision to be happier.
The decision to acknowledge dysphoria.
The decision to be different.
The decision to fit in.
The decision to yield to pressure;
The decision to acknowledge identity.
The decision to change identity.
The decision to “be yourself”, whatever that might mean.
It is my deeply held, sincere belief that you can decide to be trans. That there is no need for a diagnosis of dysphoria or euphoria. That you can simply decide to transition and see what life is like when you make sweeping changes to your identity, gender or otherwise.
Will some people regret it? Invariably.
But here’s the kicker: you can decide to be a parent, too, and there are a hell of a lot more people who regret that one. That doesn’t mean it’s not a decision, or that it’s not worth taking. There is only ever one way to find out: to decide. To live. To be. To try. To experience.
So go ahead. Decide.
To find more of Ela’s work, you can follow her on Twitter, Instagram and Scribblehub and support her on Patreon.
You can also buy her latest book, Any Other Name, here on Amazon.
