Homosexuality
How many lesbian, gay and bisexual people are there?
The Government is using the figure of 6% of the population which Stonewall feels is a reasonable estimate. However, there is no hard data on the number of lesbians, gay men and bisexuals in the UK as no national census has ever asked people to define their sexuality.
Various sociological/commercial surveys have produced a wide range of estimates, but there is no definitive figure available.
What is sexual orientation?
Everyone has a sexual orientation. Sexual orientation is a combination of emotional, romantic, sexual or affectionate attraction to another person.
In other words, it's about who you are attracted to, fall in love with and want to live your life with.
The majority of women and men are heterosexual and they experience attraction and seek partners of the opposite sex. The words ‘heterosexual’ and ‘heterosexuality’ come from the Greek word heteros, meaning ‘different’ or ‘opposite’.
Some women and men experience erotic and romantic feelings exclusively towards members of their own sex, and such people are homosexual. The terms ‘homosexual’ and ‘homosexuality’ come form the Greek word homos, meaning ‘the same’.
Other women and men can experience erotic and romantic feelings for both their own and the opposite sex and such people are bisexual.
The term ‘homosexual’ was coined by a Hungarian doctor Karoly Maria Benkert in 1869 and introduced into English by sexologist Havelock Ellis in the 1890s.
Originally the term ‘homosexual’ was used by scientists and doctors to describe same-sex attraction and behaviour as a sign of mental disorder and moral deficiency. To obtain distance from such medical labels, the terms gay and lesbian are used today to describe women and men who seek same-sex partners. Although the term ‘gay’ is used to describe both women and men, it is mainly associated with men. Women are mainly referred to as lesbians.
Although the origin of the term ‘gay’ being associated with men and women is not clear, Gertrude Stein used it in her work “Miss Furr and Miss Skeene” to refer to two women. There is also a suggestion that it comes from 19th Century French slang for men – ‘gaie’.
The term ‘lesbian’ is associated exclusively with women and comes from the name of the Greek island Lesbos. The prominent Greek poetess Sappho lived there in the 7th Century BC and was famous for her passionate poems dedicated to other women. The term ‘lesbian’ has been used in English since the 19th Century.
What is homophobia?
Homophobia is the irrational hatred, intolerance, and fear of lesbian, gay and bisexual people.
These prejudicial feelings fuel the myths, stereotypes, discrimination and violence against people who are lesbian, gay or bisexual.
Lesbians, gay and bisexual people who are socialised in a homophobic society often internalise these negative stereotypes and can develop some degree of low self esteem and self hatred. This can be described as internalised homophobia.
The word homophobia was constructed by the heterosexual psychologist George Weinberg in the late 1960s. Weinberg used homophobia to label heterosexuals’ dread of being in close quarters with homosexuals as well as homosexuals’ internalised oppression. The word first appeared in print in 1969.
What is heterosexism?
Heterosexism is a term used to describe a bias exhibited by a society or community that is often subtle but nonetheless pervasive, whereby cultural institutions and individuals are conditioned to expect others to live and behave as if everyone were heterosexual.
Heterosexism, like sexism, is firmly entrenched in the prevailing customs, tradition and institutions of UK society. It serves to silence and erase the lives of lesbian, gay and bisexual people, creating a dearth of positive cultural images.
Similarly to homophobia, the term heterosexism began to be used in late 1960s. It highlighted the parallels between prejudice against lesbians, gay men and bisexuals, and other forms of prejudice - against women (sexism), people of different ethnic origin (racism), and against Jewish people (anti-Semitism).
Dr Gregory Herek, an internationally recognised authority on sexual prejudice (or homophobia), describes heterosexism as an ideological system that denies, denigrates, and stigmatises any non-heterosexual form of behaviour, identity, relationship, or community.
What is Multiple Discrimination?
Most of us don't belong to one community but several. We have multi-faceted identities - being black and gay, or disabled and transgender and a woman.
The different aspects of our identity are a source of pride and strength. But they can also make us the target of prejudice on more than one level. For example, a Black gay man might experience homophobia from some parts of the Black community, racism from some parts of the gay community, and racism and homophobia from everyone else!
This is known as multiple discrimination.
What is the significance of the name "Stonewall"?
The name "Stonewall" has been a by-word for the struggle for LGBT civil rights since the 1970s.
On June 28 1969, police raided the Stonewall Inn, a small, dingy "private club" in Greenwich Village with a clientele of mainly lesbians, gay men and drag artists. It was the second time that week that the bar had been targeted by police (the charge was the illegal sale of alcohol), and other gay bars had also been raided in prior weeks. Police officers announced that the employees would be arrested and lined up the Stonewall Inn's patrons to check identification.
As people were ejected from the bar, a crowd began to form outside, joined by passers-by. Many eyewitnesses recalled that the scene outside the bar was initially passive and quite light hearted. The first police van left without incident.
However the next person to emerge from the bar put up a struggle when police attempted to violently load her into a waiting van. The atmosphere quickly changed from passivity to defiance. The crowd erupted and began hurling stones and bottles at the bar. Some of the police officers retreated inside the bar, whilst others turned a fire-hose on the growing crowd of protestors. Police reinforcements were called and the streets were cleared.
During the day, news spread of the previous night's incidents and this led to further violent confrontations between police and protestors.
Whilst the Stonewall Rebellion was arguably a spontaneous act of resistance against police harassment, the 60s were a time of turbulent political and social change. Many excluded groups were taking a co-ordinated and decisive stand against oppression. The Stonewall Rebellion sparked new, highly visible LGBT civil rights movements across America and Europe.
In the UK various lesbian, gay and bisexual groups, organisations, clubs and bars use the name 'Stonewall'. For example, in the UK alone there is Stonewall organisation, Stonewall Housing Association, Stonewall Football Club, and The Stonewall Bar.
Transsexuality
How Common Is It?
Most of us are perfectly comfortable with the fact that we are male or female. In fact we normally never give it a thought. But there are a very few people who feel they were born with the wrong body – men who feel they should have been born women and vice versa. In many cases these people, referred to as transsexuals, remember feeling this way even in childhood. When the feeling becomes strong enough, the person may seek surgery to remove their testes or ovaries, may have their external genitalia surgically altered and take hormones to make them appear like the other sex. These extreme measures are accompanied by discomfort and risk, so no one would entertain them on a whim. Rather, transsexuals take such drastic measures because they feel so strongly and consistently that they should have been born the opposite sex.
The rate of occurrence of transsexuality is not accurately known. Because of the social stigma attached to being transsexual, arising from a widespread lack of awareness of the true nature of the condition, it is something that is often kept hidden. Therefore it is only possible to collect statistics on the numbers of declared transsexuals and such figures undoubtedly represent only a proportion of those affected. Not very long ago estimates of the rate of occurrence of male-to-female transsexuality might have been around 1 in 100,000 of the male population. Today, with the greater awareness and openness that exists, some estimates now put the figure at greater than 1 in 10,000. It is known that other chromosomal or intersexed conditions can have rates of occurrence of, or approaching, 1 in 1,000 of the population and it may well be that this is the true order of magnitude of transsexuality.
Rates of occurrence of known female-to-male transsexuals are significantly lower, typically being around 1/3 to 1/4 of the rate for male-to-female transsexuals. However, this rate has varied somewhat with time and between different parts of the world. This suggests that varying cultural factors might play a role in the decision to be open about the condition.
The Seven Criteria
John Money established seven criteria important for correct sexual development in the foetus after conception. These are:-
1. Chromosomal Sex (normally 46XY for a male and 46XX for a female).
2. Gonadal Sex (the structure of the ovary and testis).
3. Hormonal Function.
4. Internal genital morphology.
5. External genital morphology.
6. Assigned sex (at birth).
7. Gender differentiation.
Brains Are Born Like This
In transsexualism there is no abnormality known in the first six of these variables though it is believed that the prenatal hormone environment may affect areas of the lower brain, such as the hypothalamus, and, more controversially, the organisation of the cortex.
Because transsexuals are born with bodies that seem perfectly normal to other people, we may suspect that the source of these deep seated feelings about their bodies arises from their brains. A report by Dick Swaab and his colleagues at the Netherlands Institute for Brain Research confirms this notion (Zhou, J.N., Hofman, M.A., Gooren, L.J., & Swaab, D.F.A. Sex difference in the human brain and its relation to transsexuality. Nature, 378, 68-70, 1995). Swaab and his colleagues examined the brains of many individuals, including homosexual men, heterosexual men and women and six male-to-female transsexuals. They found that a tiny region known as the central region of the bed nucleus of the stria terininalis (BSTc) was larger in men than in women. The BSTc of the six transsexuals was as small as that of women, thus the brains of the transsexuals seem to coincide with their conviction that they are women.
Because the BSTc is so small none of the non-invasive imaging techniques currently available can measure it, therefore it can only be studied by removal of the brain after death. It has not, therefore, been shown exactly when this difference in the size of the BSTc arises, it may happen either before birth or due to “other factors” during the individual’s development. However the research does seem to establish that the brain is physically different.
A Biologically-Based, Multifactoral Cause
Dr. Harry Benjamin, who introduced the syndrome of transsexuality to the general medical community in the early 1950s, favoured a biological explanation of the syndrome, believing that the genetic and endocrine systems must provide a “fertile soil” for environmental influences. It is a viewpoint of this kind that Prof. John Money suggests in an authoritative paper ‘The Concept of Gender Identity Disorder in Childhood and Adolescence after 37 years’ where he states “causality with respect to gender identity disorder is subdivisible into genetic, prenatal hormonal, postnatal social, and postpubertal hormonal determinants” and suggests “there is no one cause of a gender role ..... Nature alone is not responsible, nor is nurture, alone. They work together, hand in glove.” The weight of current scientific evidence suggests a biologically-based, multifactoral aetiology for transsexualism.
Development Of The Foetus
Following conception a foetuses bearing an XY chromosome pair develops into a male, while a foetus with an XX chromosome pair develops into a female. Other sex chromosome combinations are possible such as X0 (Turner’s syndrome), XXX, XXY (Klinefelter's syndrome), XXXY, XYY and so on. Wherever there is a Y chromosome, the likelihood is that the foetus will develop along male lines. In early development, the foetus possesses two tracts, the Wolfian duct which will develop into the internal male genitalia and the Mullerian duct which develops into a female tract. In the foetus with a Y chromosome, once the testes have formed they secrete a peptide Mullerian inhibitory hormone (MIH) which induces regression of the Mullerian duct and a steroid hormone, testosterone, which stimulates development of the Wolfian tract. In the absence of the testes, the female system develops unimpeded and the Wolfian tract regresses naturally. Thus development of the female is passive, while the male development must be stimulated. This is known as the ‘Eve Principle’ and all occurs within the first trimester of pregnancy.
Genetic Disorders
Certain genetic disorders can occur however. The most common are:-
1. Testicular feminisation: In these subjects, there is an absence of androgen receptors. Thus testes develop normally (under the influence of the SRY gene). Mullerian inhibitory hormone is produced and the female tract regresses, testosterone levels are normal but they cannot exert an effect and so the Wolfian tract and the external male genitalia do not develop. The external genital morphology is therefore female (the testes do not descend and are present internally) and under the influence of testicular and adrenal oestrogens at puberty, breast development occurs.
2. Pseudohermaphrodites: In these subjects, the enzyme 5a-reductase is absent and so testosterone is not converted to dihydrotestosterone. This results in normal development of the internal male system, but the external genitalia are not fully masculinised and the baby is taken for a female. At puberty, levels of the weaker androgen, testosterone, rise sufficiently high for it to stimulate the external genitalia to grow.
3. Congenital adrenal hyperplasia: This is caused by the absence of the enzyme 21-hydroxylase in the adrenal necessary for converting androgens to cortisol. Since cortisol normally exerts a modulating negative feedback effect on the adrenocortrophin (ACTH), in the absence of cortisol, levels of this pituitary hormone are high and stimulate adrenal hyperplasia and excessive adrenal androgen production which in females causes masculinisation of the external genitalia. These subjects have normal internal reproductive tracts and surgery is usually employed in females.
4. A fourth example is due to clinical treatment. In the 1960’s and 1970’s, threatened miscarriages were treated with synthetic progestrogens, and some of these were derivatives of 19-nor-testosterone, which had potent androgenic side effects. Female offspring had an empty scrotum.
It Existed Long Before It Found A Name
The historical records of human behaviour clearly indicate that transsexualism existed long before it found a name. But until modern medicine recognised, defined, and developed therapies for this condition, transsexuals were left to cope with their difficulties by more or less unsatisfactory, and often tragic, means of their own devising. The term transsexual, originally coined by Dr. D.C. Caudwell in 1949, is not a very good one as the condition has little to do with sexual orientation, so the term causes much confusion in the mind of the general public. The reasons for crossing the gender divide are about just that – gender, not sex. The main issue is to produce a change in attributed gender to that which matches the persons own gender identity.
We live in a world where, due to stereotyping, dress codes are different for women and men. There have always been women and men who felt themselves to be other than their bodies ordained and who expressed this in the way they lived their lives. In the so called primitive societies such people became shamans. In another time they would have been persecuted as witches. There is a certain magic to having a foot in both camps and at various times and places in history this has been both revered and feared. There are many historical references to transgendered behaviour. Looking back to Greek mythology we find the son of Hermes and Aphrodite being transformed into a being that was both male and female – Hermaphroditus. St. Joan of Arc was burned at the stake as a witch for dressing as a man.
Modern Treatment
It is only since 1931 that surgical and medical knowledge has enabled physically normal men and women to be surgically reassigned to the opposite sex. Since then, there have been a number of famous cases – Christine Jorgenson, Renée Richards, April Ashley, Mark Rees, Caroline Cossey, to name but a few – but the majority prefer to remain anonymous, their transformation a secret known only to a few close friends.
The dysphoria that some experience is so strong that they feel they have no alternative but to change the way they live. Once this is done, their energy can be channelled into living that life to the full. Until then they live with a handicap. The gender dysphoric person has degrees of dysphoria, just as they will have degrees of coping skills and of success and failure. The transvestite will keep their dysphoria in check by living in their assigned gender but with periodic forays into dressing in the mode normally associated with the opposite gender, either privately or publicly. The transgenderist may live entirely in the desired gender role without the need for surgery. A transsexual on the other hand, will want surgery to complete the process.
The currently accepted and effective model of treatment for the condition of transsexuality utilises hormone therapy and surgical reconstruction and may include counselling and other psychotherapeutic approaches; speech therapy; and for MtF’s, electrolysis. In all cases, the length and kind of treatment provided will depend on the individual needs of the patient and will be subject to negotiation between the Consultants involved, the patient’s General Practitioner and the patient.
Much more information can be found on the website for the Gender Trust.