Thread by @MariBrighe

I wrote a comprehensive literature review of AGP in grad school, including reading/analyzing Blanchard’s original study & conclusions.

The study design— garbage. The instrument design— garbage. And the conclusions were hilariously flawed.

Everything that’s followed is nonsense.

https://twitter.com/AmazonChique/status/1396180341400817665

To briefly summarize without digging out my paper

1. Blanchard’s study was TERRIBLY underpowered, his subject selection criteria contained tons of bias, & he utterly failed to account for social desirability biases. All things that any undergrad social science student could see

2. Blanchard’s: AGP survey instrument was based in yes/no questions. Like “have you you ever aroused by ___?”, so even a single instance of what we now refer to as “female embodiment fantasy” is scored as “positive” for AGP behavior.

Its designing for his desired conclusion.

3. Blanchard infers a broad typology of transsexuality based on his data...but his own data betrays his typology.

His own study showed a significant percentage of gynephilic trans women without female embodiment fantasy (FEF), and many androphilic trans women WITH FEF.

🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️

He also makes clear two more personal biases.

-He declares that true bisexual trans women cannot exist, calling them “pseudobisexual” & declaring their attraction to men an artifact of their AGP.

-He declares that reportedly asexual trans women are just excessive masturbators

So, in summary:

He designed a shitty study, with an instrument designed to get the answer he wanted.

And even then, he had to do A LOT of hand-waving of his data to make it fit his hilariously arbitrary and pathologizing typology.

Fuck Ray Blanchard.

It probably would have been a gross niche theory that people ignored.

But noted creepjob J. Michael Bailey at at Northwestern latched onto the theory and wrote a SUPER creepy book while trolling gay bars in Boystown in Chicago, and made a career out of defending it.

The book is so terrible that Bailey purportedly only narrowly avoided serious ethical and sexual misconduct sanctions by claiming that the book was never meant to be “scientific” and that the research involved was more akin to journalism.

As someone who studied queer theory and sexology in graduate school, it’s my firm belief that autogynephilia is essentially nothing more than a projection of cis straight men’s obsessive view of womanhood as existing solely to be objectified by men.

They literally cannot conceive of womanhood outside of being a sexual object for men. Therefore, in their minds, the only valid reason for transsexuality is to have sex with men.

(Blanchard & Bailey believe straight trans women are really just “extremely gay men.”)

Neither of them can imagine any reason for transitioning outside the lurid, & therefore assume that all trans women who say otherwise are lying or self-deluded.

It’s their own perverse sexualizing view of us combined with male arrogance & empathy failure.

That’s not good theory

Anyway, if you like these threads, drop me a few bucks in my tip jar so I can put a tiny dent in my 6 figure student loan debt?

ko-fi.com/maribrighe