tranny boyz: cyber community support in negotiating sex and gender mobility among female to male transsexuals

Abstract

Female-to-male transsexuals (FTMs) are aware that manhood is a test that is separate from simple anatomical maleness. Failure to pass the test carries a penalty of exclusion from the desired rank as well as stigmatization as deviant for having attempted such a feat. Armed with this awareness, they are utilizing modern technology to form a community of virtual support, a study group of sorts, that will facilitate passing that test. This project identifies, through content analysis, various themes of concerns of female-to-male transsexuals who post on the Internet. The themes include concerns about gender status production, including issues such as “passing,” surgical worries, legal avenues and blockades, and social support. These themes relate directly to FTMs’ real-world ideologies about themselves as men. They recognize their central problem as one which debates the nature of manhood as either an ascribed or achieved status, and in self-reflexive fashion are able to see themselves as non-deviant in one gender category, yet deviant to onlookers while in another gender category. For FTMs, the fear is that even if medical and legal obstacles can be overcome, social obstacles and social stigmatization may not. Yet, in their cyber-community, a number of FTMs have found acceptance and understanding to be less elusive than what they find in the real world.