This might be controversial to ask, but in your opinion(s), to what extent is an individual able to choose their gender identity? Clearly there are those who feel a certain way whether they would choose to or not, but other than that...? I should make it clear I mean no disrespect towards anyone who is trans*, as I have trans* friends I love very much. As I say, I recognise that there are many who do not and cannot choose their gender.
Personally, I feel that we cannot choose our gender identity in the same way that we can choose our sexual orientation. You just realize one day that it is a certain way, and then you have to choose where to go from there. It makes no sense to me why anyone would willingly choose to "become trans" or adopt a different gender identity. The cost far outweighs any perceived benefits of "free will to choose my own gender!" or "blazing my own path!" mentality. So no I don't think we choose to be trans. We only choose to transition - to fix a body which otherwise doesn't match who we are. Same way as if someone was born deaf, and they chose to take advantage of modern medical technology so they could hear again. Sure it isn't the same as naturally working ears, but it's the best they can do. In the same way that's how I view being trans. It's a complex medical condition, not a chosen lifestyle or philosophical "statement." Anyone who does make their gender a statement, will (I believe) eventually decide against it or will regret it. That's my opinion, at least.
I absolutely see where you're coming from. It's true that in today's world people would likely not wish such a thing upon themselves, but suppose we are talking a world where gender and physical sex can be full altered without any great trauma, and society was fully accepting. I guess in some ways this goes back to the idea of physical sex and gender being different things. Thanks for your input. All the best to you
To the extent which a person can choose their race. The thing people need to realize is that "dysphoria" is not unique to trans people. If a cis person gets magically swapped into a body of someone with different sex characteristics and lived a life being known as the gender they aren't, they'll most likely experience what most trans people call dysphoria. (Although I acknowledge that not every trans person experiences dysphoria) I'm pretty certain that no cis person would ever do anything medically to change their body to align with that of the people that have the opposite gender assignment. Hope is makes sense.
Idk, in a way I feel like I am choosing my gender in the sense that the majority of the world only sees the binary (male and female). As a genderfluid/non-binary/genderqueer person I am choosing to transition to male. When I look in the mirror I see myself something like a man, and I don't mean I mentally/spiritually/what have you see myself something like a man, I look in the mirror and I literally see something like a man (keep in mind I am afab). I don't see the sex traits of being female or having a gender at all. Others might say that I'm not choosening to transition to this, that it is what I have always been, but it still feels like a choice to me. When I was still identifying and trying to be female I was distressed and experienced some dysphoria over the fact that I had more facial hair than most teenage girls my age, and more than some guys I knee. I hated my voice, which was deeper than most girls I knew. When I heard it I always hear a gender neutral or male voice, though everyone else didn't seem too. But at the same time I was feeling dysphoria towards boobs and having a vagina. Its only years later when the dysphoria resided and I began to love myself that I realized I liked being male better than female, its after a year of thinking and experimenting that I have decided/chosen to present myself to the world as a trans male, even if I don't feel male every day of the year. I feel like I am choosing this gender, though I am sure there are many people who will argue with me about it.
I don't think it's a choice at all. I think you can choose how to present yourself, and you can choose to live as a certain gender, but you can't choose your gender identity. You're either cis or you're not, and if you're cis and you "choose" to be trans, that doesn't change the fact that you're cis. You can choose to present yourself as a different gender and live as a different gender, but if your transness was literally a choice, you're not trans.
