Are Transgender Women Real Women?
We should treat transgender women with respect, just like we would treat every other person
Let me start by making a confession; I am not an expert in gender studies or LGBTQ matters. However, the beauty of living in a democratic society is that I can say my opinions freely without the obligation to be an expert. When a topic such as women’s rights or trans’ rights is always in the news for one reason or the other, it is normal that people form opinions based on their convictions and after considering points from all concerned parties. Although I am not an expert, I am not a novice either; I am a medical doctor and a clinical psychologist by training. My profession has given me the opportunity to do some studies on gender and sex. In addition, I have had the opportunity to interact with women, children, and members of the LGBTQ community. I have also interacted with people who are self-described ‚conservatives’ and are very much opposed to the LGBTQ community. These encounters or should I say experiences have left me with an impression about the rights of transgender people that I hope to briefly outline in this article.
A lot of the confusion and culture wars around transgender issues today centre on the issue of sex, gender, and gender identity. Everybody agrees that we are born with one of two sexes; male or female, which is determined by our physical anatomy a birth, and therefore we have no control over it. The issue of gender and gender identity though is more complex. Whereas we are born either male or female, some people feel differently from their biological sex, e.g.; a biological male who feels inside that he is female. These people are called transgender, and they express their gender identity in different ways including through their clothing or appearances, or even going through the process of surgically changing their biological sex, to fit the gender identity they feel they actually are. This issue of gender identity is also complicated by the fact that transgender people are at different stages in the gender reassignment process; whereas some have completed the process of gender reassignment, others have not and still have the genitals of their biological sex. Transgender people are humans and humans are generally complex. To simplify this complexity, I will sidestep all other issues and only focus on the issue of transgender women. Also, research has shown that (cite) male-to-female transgender transitions are historically more common than female-to-male transitions.
To answer the question of transgender women, we have to first understand what makes a person a woman. To be a woman is a privilege resulting from a complex mix of factors. Firstly, you have to be lucky enough to be born with the XX chromosomes, which automatically give you female genitals and most likely reproductive organs, looks, and hormones that are associated with females. Your biology and looks shape how society views you but also determine your gender roles — the roles you are expected to play in society depending on your sex. These gender roles include ideas about how you dress, behave, think, communicate, act, or even look.
Importantly, these gender roles and society’s expectations influence the social experiences that you have as a woman. Lived social experiences of women might be positive, such as when a man who has a crush on you at the bar orders a drink for you and the girls. They can also be banal, such as when a man holds the door open for you or lets you get through the door first out of politeness. On the other end, lived social experiences can be uncomfortable, such as when you get your first menstruation. I have heard countless stories of young women whose menstruation came unexpectedly in public and they had to go through the uncomfortable experience of having their dresses stained by blood before being helped by a friend or the odd stranger who points it out and gives them something for cover.
There are also negative lived social experiences, such as discrimination, harassment, sexual assault, violence, and rape that women experience in society. These negative experiences are horrible, condemnable, and unfortunate, and the fight continues to create a world that is free of discrimination. The chromosomes, gender roles, and lived social experiences are a full part of the woman’s experience, and one is not more important than the others.
So to briefly answer the question of womanhood, a woman is a privileged and unique class made up of people who share not just the same sex, but also the same gender roles and unique lived social experiences. Because the experiences women share are unique but similar, it interconnects them irrespective of where in the world they are located. A woman in Australia will have a similar story of gender, of how boys reacted to their puberty in high school, or of the workplace discrimination they experience as a result of their gender with a woman in the Democratic Republic of Congo, even though these women never met a day in their lives.
Transgender women face a barrage of discrimination, assault, and harassment that put them in harm’s way just because of their sexuality and how they choose to live. This is wrong. In a democratic society, everybody should have the right to be themselves and live the way they want in the pursuit of happiness and fulfilment, as long as this doesn’t infringe on the rights and existence of others.
However, all the discrimination and assault that transgender women face, do not equate them to being original or real women in the same way that all racial minorities who also face discrimination and harassment do not automatically qualify as women or everybody that faces discrimination does not automatically qualify as being black. I say this with the utmost respect for both transgender women and women who were born biologically female. The journey for a real woman starts from her birth with the female genital organ, but it also includes all the rights of passage that she experiences until her death, just because of her sex. A man can decide to change his sexual organs and physical appearance to look feminine, but just for the very reason that he was born male and lives a part of his life as a man, he missed out on rights of passage and all the early experiences that come with being a woman up until the point that he completes the process of transitioning.
When you join a race halfway, finishing at the same time as those who started the race from the beginning does not automatically put you in the same category even if you sweat as much or experienced more muscle cramps in the course of the race.
The best compromise is to create a separate category for people who joined the race after the starting line.
For every class stratification in society, for example, race, sex, religion, or even handicap, there are certain thresholds to be met in order to qualify as a member of that class. One reason for these groupings is that it maintains order by simplifying society. Research has shown that it is easier for humans to understand something when it is ordered according to a pattern. Because people in these groups share similar features, experiences, history, or other factors, there is a threshold to be attained before anyone can be called a member of one group or class.
Classifying society into groups also makes it easier to accord certain privileges or rights to certain groups, secure protection for others, or even address the collective concerns of members of the group. For instance, when I say gay rights, you instantly have an idea of what I mean because you are familiar with the idea of gay as a group and what their concerns might be. By definition, the threshold for being a real woman automatically precludes everybody that wasn’t born female (natal woman). Transgender individuals and activists want this concept changed in order to accommodate transwomen.
Firstly, the attempt to change a biological concept that has nature as its basis smacks of selfishness. More importantly, changing this concept will have some unintended negative consequences such as eroding some of the rights and protections that women have fought hard to gain. Just to illustrate this point, the debate on whether or not to let transgender women use the women’s toilet is a political flashpoint because it threatens a secure space where women can be vulnerable without fear of harassment from men. The thought of letting a transgender woman who still has their male sex organ into an exclusively female space is a legitimate cause for concern. To put this in perspective, an overwhelming majority of men who transition into women still keep their male sex organs.
I had mentioned initially that the best compromise is to put create a separate category for people who joined the race after the starting line. The purpose of this essay is not to diminish transwomen. However, as I have pointed out, there is a world of difference between the life course of a person who was born a woman and a person who decides to transition to a woman eventually. These differences start from birth and are so fundamental to the experience of being a woman that they cannot be ignored. It is not the fault of transgender women that these differences exist or that they were born men in the first place, but at the same time, you cannot choose to ignore the reality of these differences.
As I have made clear, transgender women receive an outsized share of discrimination and harassment in society, this is real. But it would be a mistake to confuse this discrimination or harassment with those faced by real women. None is superior nor inferior, and they both are equally condemnable (I do not condone either), but I am just saying that they are inherently different. In terms of this discrimination, I have understood that when you mount a direct challenge to an established order, especially one that is based on nature, you should of course expect some heat in return because nature fights back. If the transgender community thought everybody would just readily accept their redefinition of what a woman is in the spirit of inclusivity, then they really are underprepared for the long road ahead.
To move the needle forward in the fight for inclusivity, it is best to focus on practical matters, such as how to educate people on transgender rights, increase access to medical care for transgender individuals, reproductive care and rights for transgender women, provide access to bathroom and other facilities for transgender women, etc. What these have in common is that they focus on the transgender woman as a group of her own. Trying to change the definition of a woman to accommodate everybody who says they ‚feel’ like one is an exercise in futility, and it doesn’t make it any easier if they still have their penis.
