In U.S. culture today there is a conflation between sex, gender,
and sexual orientation. It is my argument that this conflation spans back into
the 19th century and the beginnings of sexology. In this era there
was little distinction made between sex, gender, and sexual orientation which
helped to create a discourse around these identities that often muddied them
together or failed to accurately describe the significance of behavior and
expressions within cases of “deviant sexuality”. Beginning with Ulrich’s
description of the Hermaphrodite and moving through the vague language of
Krafft-Ebbing into Herschfield’s discussion of the transvestite, it is clear
that this conflation was the norm in scientific works of the 19th
century. With this foundation for modern discourses around sexuality in mind, I
argue that trans* communities are intrinsically connected to gay, lesbian, and
bisexual communities and therefore should be considered as part of GLBT
movements.
Karl Heinrich
Ulrichs is often cited as the forbearer of the modern gay rights movement. His
work which argued for the rights of Urnings particularly in marriage challenged
the church’s laws against same sex unions in the 19th century.
Urnings were understood men attracted to other men. Ulrichs took this
definition a step further by saying that an Urning had a female soul. Though
this philosophy breaks down when concepts around female passivity come into
play, it is nonetheless notable that this definition is one of the earlier
written examples of a conflation of sex, sexual orientation, and gender. Ulrichs
continues to gender the souls of lesbians (Urningens) as in opposition with
their assigned sex. When applying modern language to this categorization
system, one might assume that Ulrich’s meant to imply that homosexuals could be
understood as transsexual as well. However, with contemporary feminist views
about the separation between sex, gender, and sexual orientation it seems heavy
handed to make this assumption.
In fact, Ulrichs
had another category for human sexual attraction that he termed the
Hermaphrodite. In this category there is perhaps the deepest level of confusion
around whether Ulrichs means to link the three categories of identity we are
discussing together or if Ulrichs was speaking outside of binary notions of
sex, gender, and sexual orientation altogether. It may be interpreted that by
hermaphrodite, Ulrichs is referring to someone who is bisexual and or
transsexual. Unfortunately, with the language he uses, it is unclear whether or
not Ulrichs is explicitly labeling these individuals as both or one of these
identities. What is clear is that Ulrichs claims the hermaphrodite has two souls;
one male and one female. One could argue that in this definition Ulrichs means
to refer to what in modern language we might call genderqueer, but the precise
meaning is lost because of the conflation between sex, gender, and sexual
orientation.
After Ulrichs had
published his work on the subject, Richard Von Krafft-Ebing took to writing
diagnostic manuals around sexual deviancy borrowing heavily from Ulrich’s work
to diagnose and describe cases. Krafft-Ebing believed referred to homosexuality
as inversion and bought into Ulrich’s concept of the male souled lesbian and
the female souled gay man. Much of his discussions on these categories of
people seek to explain their sexual orientation by stereotyping their genders
as more congruent with the opposite sexes supposed natural gender inclinations.
Already confusing at this level, Krafft-Ebing’s descriptions of cases continue
to mix-up instances of biological sex variation, gender expression and identity
incongruence, and “deviant” sexual orientation. Particularly in instances of
cross-dressing, Krafft-Ebing has a tendency to assume that this violation of
normative gender is indicative of the opposite sex’s soul residing within the
patient and therefore homosexual orientation. Note that sexual orientation was
not seen as a hard and fast identity in the same way that is can be discussed
today, but rather as a collection of behaviors that indicated inclination and
desire.
Perhaps the starkest
case of this line of assumption from gender expression to biological sex to
sexual orientation can be seen in his accounts of “The Woman-Hater’s Ball”. The
scene is set by describing the event as a “Grand Vienna Fancy Dress Ball”,
however, Krafft-Ebing notes early on that the dress is surprisingly casual for
its advertising. From there, he voyeuristically and not without an exploitive
tone, describes the partygoers in great detail. Largely, he comments on their
femininity and grace, apparently in order to shock readers by disclosing in
narrative style as he “discovers” that each of these women is “male”. It is
unclear whether or not he intends to describe these partygoers as deviant in
sexual orientation, gender, or sex specifically other than that he assumes that
they must all be homosexual and as this description occurs beneath the heading
“Cultivated Pederasty” it would seem that he is also assuming that these men
are pederasts.
To deconstruct
what is happening here, we will look at the chain of assumptions that lead
Krafft-Ebing to label the partygoers as pederasts. First, he explains that
these individuals are exhibiting feminine gender expressions. Then, he says
that though they are expressing femininity that they are truly male because
community members can identify them as such, largely because of their deep
voices and vocations. He then links the cross-dressing behavior and assumed
maleness to homosexuality by assuming that in order to express femininity one
must have a female soul. He takes it one step further to say that these men
must be tricksters because of the lengths he assumes they have gone to in order
to disguise their maleness and that therefore they must also be pederasts and prostitutes.
He claims that it is not uncommon for homosexuals to suffer from “genital
neuroses” which one can interpret as being similar to body dysphoria so often
attributed (perhaps over enthusiastically) to trans* people today. The problems
with his logic are not difficult to point out especially from a modern
perspective. However, is it important to recognize that his assumption that
gender should equal sex should equal sexual orientation are not far off from a
lot of today’s discussions around homophobia and Transphobia in that the
identities facing the brunt of social angst challenge the linkage between these
three concepts.
The last example
I would like to submit regarding historical conflations of sex, gender, and
sexual orientation comes from Magnus Hirschfield’s groundbreaking work entitled
Transvestites: The Erotic Desire to
Cross-dress. While it is tempting to spend the rest of this paper
summarizing the numerous progressive ideas that Hirschfield’s book brought
forth, instead the focus will be on the books title. Hirschfield uses the word
Transvestite in a way that is nearly opposite of Krafft-Ebing’s ideas of the
cross-dressing behavior at “The Woman-Hater’s Ball”. Instead of associating gender
transgressions like cross-dressing with sexual orientation, Hirschfield seeks
to separate the two and his definition of the transvestite seems more in line
with present day understandings of transsexuals rather than cross-dressers.
Hirschfield
routinely makes the argument that one’s sexual orientation should not be
assumed based on gender-expression, but that instead the two should be seen as
largely separate outside of mainstream stereotypes. In fact, where
cross-dressing is seen by Hirschfield much as it is today as often based in
fetishistic behavior, transvestism is described as something that is internal
to the individual and has little to do with sexual arousal. Instead,
transvestism is seen by Hirschfield like transsexuality is seen today, as a
part of a person’s identity that means a person’s sex assigned at birth is
incongruent with their expected gender identity. Hirschfield notes that there
is something incongruent about the person’s sex assignment and their gender
assignment that is helped by transitioning in various ways across genders.
Clearly, this definition is more in line with modern definitions of a
transsexual versus a cross-dresser. So, it is not as much Hirschfield who is
making perpetuating this conflation of sex, gender, and sexual orientation, as
it is the society he lives in. Hirschfield aims to debunk some of this mixing
through his work.
Though examples
like Hirschfield’s work exist, today’s U.S. society often falls into the trap
of some of his predecessors of confusing sex, gender, and sexual orientation.
All too often, stereotypes allow us to make conclusions about a person based on
one facet of these three aspects of identity or our assumption of one of these
aspects. Prior to the Stonewall Uprising and arguably the beginning of the GLBT
movement, there was less labeling of individual identities under the queer
umbrella and for the most part, the communities were relatively united.
Post-Stonewall, understandings of distinctions between gender, sex, and gender
orientation became more prevalent which partially contributed to the labeling
system we have today. It is not the aim of this paper to devalue this system or
to comment on the worth of identity labels. Rather, it is my goal to highlight
the similarities between modern GLBTQ communities and to reaffirm the necessity
of maintaining relationships between and within each community under the larger
umbrella.
As can be seen
from the limited historical accounts above, conflation of sex, gender, and
sexual orientation has long contributed to discrimination of gay, lesbian,
bisexual, trans*, and queer individuals. Stereotypes that lead people to jump
from an assumption or knowledge of someone’s “deviant” gender expression and
assumed identity can lead to inaccurate conclusions about their sexual
orientation or about their biological sex. The order of these indexes may
change and interweave depending on the situation, but regardless, they can all
lead to moral judgments placed on the individual under scrutiny which can in
turn lead to acts of discrimination, hate speech, or other violence both mental
and physical upon the person. Because being a gay man or an assumed gay man
comes with stereotypes about gender and value judgments about whether or not
you are properly enacting your gender, gay movements that seek to challenge
discrimination are linked to movements of trans* individuals because each
discrimination has foundations in gender expectations.
Today’s GLBTQ movements may have a tendency to dismiss one or more
communities beneath that umbrella as being irrelevant to issues typically
associated with one community over another. This practice is flawed for several
reasons. Firstly, to fall under the trans* umbrella does not exclude a person
from also being a member of gay, bisexual, lesbian, pansexual, queer, or
heterosexual identities because trans* identities are related to gender and not
sexual orientation. Secondly, all identities under the GLBTQ umbrella have
faced discrimination related to gender, sexual orientation, and sex assigned at
birth whether or not individuals transgress normative standards under each of
these categories or not. Regardless of reality, because of historical
conflations of these three facets of identity, the persecution of GLBTQ
identities are inter-related and interwoven with stereotypes related to this
conflation. Ultimately, the perception that to fall under this umbrella means
that one must be deviant in sex, gender, and sexual orientation links these
communities together and should be seen as a uniting factor between them as
movements for equality progress.
