Harry Benjamin's Syndrome
http://joanneproctor-hbs.blogspot.com/2009/03/tg-hbs-war-of-words.html
HBS-NZ is an affiliate of the Organization Intersex International.
<http://www.intersexualite.org/OII-English.html>
(OII)
The friction between TG - HBS is likely to continue, with mutual
misunderstanding, foolish accusations and finger-pointing from both
sides unless some sanity is brought into the debate.
As the official OII spokesperson on HBS issues It would be nice to
create a little understanding between the two warring (TG - HBS)
parties. This will only be a short post, but there are some historical
points to consider. Firstly, here is the Identity paradigm's take on
transsexualism, easily recognizable as the WPATH position of today,
and the APA's so called second path to 'GID'.
"A full time cross dresser may eventually achieve the goal of his
lifetime's longing and quite changing back to his masculine clothes
and role. Some such people have for so long felt so utterly out of
place on the role of their external genitalia that they demand the
body,, as well as the clothing of the opposite sex. Properly speaking
they are not transvestites but transsexuals. Their compelling desire
is for hormonal and sex reassignment so they can live full-time in the
gender role for which they feel, they themselves, always have had the
matching gender identity." (Money and Ehrhardt. 1979. Baltimore. Man
and woman, Boy and Girl. Johns Hopkins University Press. p20.
Now note Benjamin's description. (Below) It is about embodiment: not
gender roles!
True transsexuals feel that they belong to the other sex, they want to
be and function as members of the opposite sex, not only to appear as
such. For them, their sex organs, the primary (testes) as well as the
secondary (penis and others) are disgusting deformities that must be
changed by the surgeon€ ’˛s knife. This attitude appears to be the
chief
differential diagnostic point between the two syndromes (sets of
symptoms) - that is, those of transvestism and transsexualism."
Benjamin's description was written in the mid 1960's and was not
influenced by identity theory. It was and remains a perfectly valid
depiction of HBS. It recognizes that the HBS experience is primarily
an embodiment issue and that gender change, whilst a part of the
experience, is not the primary part.
Largely due to his 'misinterpretation' of the Reimer case, Money's
identity theory had become the psycho-medical paradigm by the end of
the 1970's. Problems arose because the identity paradigm could not
accommodate Benjamin's description of 'true transsexualism' (now HBS)
as a different phenomenon from the one described by Money and
Ehrhardt. Thus the HBS experience became subsumed into identity theory
and relegated to its margins.
The HBS movement is nothing more than an attempt by a marginalized
group to reclaim its voice. It is not an attempt to steal the voices
of others, or to deny their experiences. There is no real need for the
anger that many TG supporters direct at HBS, or vice versa, because
neither group is a threat to other unless TG people start claiming HBS
as a TG issue.
These tensions could be easily resolved with a little mutual respect
and a recognition from both sides that the problems are, to a
significant extent, caused by the mistakes and misapplications of
other people's theories in the first place.
For other perspectives on the subject go Here
<http://womenborntranssexual.com/2009/03/05/transsexual-vs-transgender/>
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