Are Transgender People Mentally Ill?
I watched Larry King Friday night, and the transgender actress Alexis Arquette was on the program promoting her documentary “She’s My
Brother”. Arquette’s documentary chronicles her transition from male to female.
During the discussion, the host and Alexis started to talk briefly about Chasity Bono.
Everyone already knows Chasity Bono has undergone hormone therapy.
Chasity has decided to transition from female to male.
“Chasity” is now called” Chaz”. I was shocked when I heard the news that Chasity wants to become a man.
I wondered why? Why would Chasity want to become a man? Is Chasity mentally ill or does she just want the media’s attention?
I feel Chasity Bono is veryt unhappy about her life.
Chasity never became successful like her famous, beautiful, extraordinary, talented, mother Cher.
I think Chasity has had a hard time living under the spotlight and glare of the media and public.
Just look at Chasity, she is so obese, she clearly isn’t taking care of herself.
Of course it is Chasity’s choice to transition. I am not questioning that.
However, the hormone therapy is irreversible, and this is a decision Chasity must live with for the rest of her life.
According, to the American Psychiatric Association, “gender identity disorder”, is still considered a “mental disorder”.
The term “gender identity disorder”, also known as “gender dysphoria”, is the “clincial term” that transgender activists are upset about.
Transgender activists disagree, the term “disorder” is a loaded word, and a form of discrimination.
Here are the criteria for gender identity disorder from Wikipedia:
In the United States, the American Psychiatric Association permits a diagnosis of gender identity disorder if four diagnostic criteria in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4thEdition, Text-Revised (DSM-IV-TR) are met. These criteria are:
- Strong and persistent cross-gender identification […]
- Persistent discomfort about one’s assigned sex or a sense of inappropriateness in the gender-role of that sex […]
- The diagnosis is not made if the individual has a concurrent physical intersex condition.
- Clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.
If the four criteria are met under the DSM-IV-TR, a diagnosis is made under ICD-9 code 302.85. See the classification and external resources sidebar at right for other diagnostic codes for gender identity disorder.
Since I am not transgender, I don’t understand why some transgender people want to mutilate their genitals?
Isn’t that just a bit drastic to mutilate the body because do to “how” they feel in their “mind”?
The understanding I have is that transgender people feel the body they were born with is not in sync with their mind.
I admit, I am ignorant about transgender issues. I only wrote about this issue because I am trying to understand this issue better.
I understand some transgender people do not want to have the gender reassignment surgery.
Some transgender people prefer to just live their lives as the opposite gender.
For some transsexuals, the hormone therapy is the farthest they will go when transitioning. Also, gender reassignment surgery is not cheap.
Another issue, I find interesting is why are “transgender people” linked with gays and lesbians?
I don’t understand?
Homosexuality and transgenderism are two completely unrelated and different issues.
Why are trangender people lumped together with gays and lesbians?
Homosexuality relates to being sexually attracted to a person of the same sex.
To be transgender means to want to “change” the “physical body” so it appears like the opposite sex.
Gayblackcanada 
Your headline is a statement which is deceptively phrased as a question.
Factually, Chas has never become successful like his famous mother. Please cite where Chas has said that this is a goal of his — to become famous like his mother.
Factually, cross-gender hormone therapy that is pursued long enough will indeed produce effects that are irreversible. Please provide evidence you use to support your suggesting that Chas will regret irreversibly changing his body.
It is factually correct that the APA classifies GID as a ‘disorder’. But this classification medicalizes the transition, and provides legitimate avenues to transitioners to receive medical care and supervision in their transition.
In referring to the gender reassignment surgeries, you use a term that has a negative connotation and is emotionally loaded — ‘mutilation.’
Additionally I see no evidence you have any concept of GRS procedures used on female-to-male transitioners. How many male-to-female transitioners have a phallus surgically constructed? Most? Half? Some?
That you lack basic understanding of the transgender experience is evident from your post. I urge you to get ‘Transgender 101’ before attempting to write another post on a subject for which you have very little factual information.
And when you do write another post, please work harder at losing the ‘ohMiGawd!! trnsgenders are just so ICKY!!’ tone that I felt this piece contained in spades…
Chaz Bonos birth sex is male – his gender was female.
This post is offensive. You can just Google “trans 101” instead of making an ignorant post that is hurtful to trans people.
I must admit, Orville, this post surprises and disappoints me coming from you. But then again, I haven’t read that many of your posts. Maybe this is just par for the course.
There is one question that I would address, though. Lumping transpeople with gay people. While you are correct in that they are definitely not the same thing (SRS in Iran comes to mind), they are seen by the heterosexual dominant group as deviant, and something misunderstood as far as being different from themselves. Transpeople are as much a sexual minority as gay people, so from their standpoint it would only make sense to band together with gays and lesbians in order to afford greater protection from heterosexism.
So to answer your question, it really all depends on your POV. From the hegemon’s POV, it’s all the same thing: not straight (technicalities aside). Kinda like black people are all the same from a 19th-century white hegemon’s POV. Since they are all oppressed from the same people in very similar ways, banding together makes a lot of sense.
I do not understand the need to change the body either. Sorry, I agree with Orville. Gay is gay hard to change that. Embrace the skin your in. I read on another post – “how could they be trapped in a another sexes body if they do not know what it’s like to be of another sex”? Reagrdless of surgey, I do ot believe that that is gonna change their psychology. Forever an ongoing battle. You can change the outer man/woman but not the person inside.
> You can change the outer man/woman but not the person inside.
Because that already is, Lang B.
Thanks to a neurological mapping transsexual people know exactly how their body should be built and it feels mutilated. Expacially puperty is a nightmare. Its not a specific gender role a transsexual person favors, its becoming a whole person.
You question was asked about gay people all not that long ago. Yes, many transsexuals have mental problems but they mostly come on because of people like you who have a long way to go as to understanding them and their challenges.
Not all “transgender” people are the same. It’s convenient for people to lump those who are different into a category, and some of the people so lumped tend to dominate that conversation. Transgender itself is a rather meaningless term despite the constant drumbeat coming from certain quarters to the contrary.
The reality is that some “transgender” people are mentally ill, and some are not. There are completely different groups being talked about here as if they are the same. Some of the people included in this group have biological birth variations, and others are tranvestic fetishists. Not even close to the same classification, but that’s the sort of thing that happens when people get to labeling others they don’t understand. The practice of calling them all “transgender” is a grave disservice to everyone tarred by that broad brush.