This study of Californians also supports the observation that parents are quicker to adopt the view their child is in fact transgender if they are masculine females. “By the way, I have never had to do this with a trans boy. Johanna Olson-Kennedy when talking about having to go to court if parents weren’t on board with a transition says: Below is a quote reviewed in a previous topic around the fact some parents may prefer a trans child to a gay or lesbian one.
For example, parents appear more enthusiastic about medically transitioning butch daughters than effeminate sons. Why?Īlso, the idea that gender non-conforming females, likely to grow up to be lesbians, are more accepted by parents is debatable.
More young females are asking to go to these clinics regardless of the behavior of the parents. It does not explain why more females are coming to gender clinics than males in a ratio that is far higher than recent adult populations studies now. Response: This is likely be a correct explanation as to why there were more prepubescent feminine males brought to clinics previously. If the female’s innate gender identity is male, why would the lack of a penis, with it’s “societal” importance of a penis (Olson-Kennedy points out) to male identity, not be distressing?Ģ) Feminine behavior in boys is more stigmatized so parents are more likely to bring in effeminate males to be assessed than tomboyish females. Response: While this may be true, this explanation does not fully explain why the presence of a penis would create more distress in a dysphoric male than the lack of a penis in a dysphoric female.
Olson-Kennedy speculates that genital dysphoria may be more common in young trans girls because a penis is such a central part of what society associates with being a man.įemales then become dysphoric when they start to grow breasts because that is what is associated with womanhood. While they may have some validity, they also have problems as far as providing definitive proof of their assertions.ġ) Age of onset gender dysphoria happens later for females than males. There are a number of arguments as to why there is a very recent spike in females seeking treatment for gender dysphoria in puberty, and why their numbers are higher than those for natal young males. This chart is from TransgenderTrend who tracks and writes about this issue but this increase is indicative of a trend throughout the Western world.Īffirmative model advocates’ explanations for increasing numbers of trans identified females A connection with GD and early puberty in girls was not found in Aitken et al. Early hormonal puberty has been ruled out as a cause. Also, these hormone mimicking chemicals cause females to go into puberty earlier. Hormone mimicking chemicals in the environment seem like an unlikely explanation. They are mostly estrogen mimicking and theoretically would cause an increase in males with gender dysphoria. In adult samples, in almost all cases, the number of natal males either exceeds the number of natal females or the sex ratio is near parity. Most of the earliest gender transitions were MtF with the ratio balancing out recently with still more MtFs in most countries. It is relevant to note that while more people may be coming out the current observed ratio of females to males with gender dysphoria in youth clinics does not match the numbers of transitioners in the adult population in the most recent past.
It is important to understand what is driving this trend. Not all of them will necessarily medically transition, but more and more females are distressed enough about their gender to seek mental health and medical advice. While the explosion in referrals of children to gender identity clinics could be explained by greater societal and parental awareness and children feeling more comfortable in coming out, what is more difficult to explain is the drastic sex ratio reversal of females presenting with gender dysphoria.