GID?

In my bio on Helium, I confided a history of GID. That is Gender Identity Disorder, for those of you who did not know.

There are a number of problems with that particular label for a condition that is poorly understood at best and entirely subjective at worst. Other terms that can be used are Gender Dysphoria or Transgendered, and like GID, there are issues inherent in their use as well.

The reason I used GID in my bio is because it acknowledges the inherent relationship between gender and identity. The reason I have reservations about it is of course implicit in the third component of the term, disorder.

By my understanding, based on my experience, we all suffer from Gender Identity Disorder, because we have imposed weird and arbitrary limits on the gender component of identity with absolute disregard for the fact that gender is a spectrum that can extend to extremes beyond masculine and feminine.

For the most part, sex is a binary characteristic. There are a few instances in biology where life gets more complicated than “male or female” and in humans that can produce intersexed physiology.

That comes with a whole set of issues that fall outside of the gender question, but I suspect that interesexed individuals might be the only ones who would really get me when I said that the problem I grew up with was not being born male but being born not female.

Basically, what I mean by that statement is that my gender identity is not in conflict with my physical sex, my physical sex is simply too limited to accommodate the gender of my mind or soul.

I expect for most people, that explanation explains nothing, so let me elaborate.

Men and women, as individuals, all have a range of characteristics some of which are perceived to be masculine and some of which are considered feminine.

I have enough masculine characteristics to be able to cope with life as a man, but far too many feminine characteristics to be able to function solely as a man.

To make matters worse, the characteristics that are the most significant parts of me, the things that define me as a person and reveal the most truth about who I am, are predominantly female.

While this is something I have always known intuitively, and worked hard to compensate for as a man, it is supported by every gender trait and aptitude test I’ve ever taken.

In the medical community, there is much debate over the influence of nature versus nurture on the formation of gender identity; my experience is that those are two out of a million influences that contribute to the matter.

We see that humanity is divided into male and female, and use that to separate individuals, but the traits that are used to divide us also serve to unite us as men and women.

Sex is a singular difference, but over the course of human existence people have tried to divide the rest of the universe equally into male and female.

It does not work.

It is a useful metaphor for the many things in life and nature that complement each other, but taking it as far as we have has succeed only in ensuring that most people will never realize more than half of their potential as human beings.

Maybe we have a predisposition—to be male or female, based on genetics; or masculine or feminine, based on which genetic traits are active or what traits are encouraged or discouraged while we are growing up—but a true human being is much more than the consequence of his or her programming.

Half of what we are comes from the father, half from the mother, so on a genetic or spiritual level, we are each a fusion of male and female.

Biology requires our bodies be specialized to sire or bear offspring, and our bodies may have adapted around these roles for reasons that help ensure the survival of our species, but it could not possibly mean that we are required, as individual men and women, to forfeit half of our potential as human beings.

Some differences are going to exist; the differences in our bodies always subject us to differences in our experiences. That is not an insurmountable obstacle; differences in individual experience can be overcome in many ways, the simplest by sharing our experiences in stories.

Vicarious experience is limited only by an individual’s imagination; when supplied with the details of other peoples’ real life experiences, a person with a strong imagination can relive virtually anything.

Language has provided us with a way to share experiences, and technology might follow, providing us with the means to record our actual perceptions, and the day may come when technology can alter our very genes, or the way they express themselves.

Right now, we can pick up a book or watch a movie and relive the experiences of a man or woman. Someday soon, we might be able to experience virtual reality as the opposite sex.

A few generations from now, it might even be possible to literally change sexes through genetic manipulation. The difference between men and women is entirely circumstantial.

There is nothing in our nature that prevents us from overcoming them except failing to develop our full potential.

Being a man or being a woman is nothing more than a job assigned to us at birth. In my case, I had the predisposition to do one job, but I was given the other.

I gained enough experience on the job to function as a man, but the only thing that prevents me from functioning as a woman is my anatomy.

Because of sex-based gender discrimination, I am required to restrain myself in every thought and action to limit myself to the role I inhabit.

Is it really surprising that it tends to drive me crazy?