Men's IssuesVICE - "The Straight Men Who Have Sex with Trans Women" (i.e, gay men who lie to themselves)

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[–]reluctant_commenter 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

but we all know that a straight man and a lesbian are fundamentally two very different things when you look at the big picture.

Hmm, well in their biological sex they are, but both look at women and go: "hot women" so they have that in common, haha. Whereas a straight woman and a gay man would both look at a man and go: "hot man," GAMP men would look at an average man and go: "ew" and look at a transwoman and go: "hot shemale."

This tweet got filed away in to my malthusian abundance of knowledge: https://twitter.com/BlanchardPhD/status/1373694372466810880

Yeah ok that would favor the latter of the two possible definitions of GAMP, the two being:

  1. bisexual with a very specific type (assuming that they're also attracted to women)

  2. aroused by an idea, biological men are not a necessary or even fundamental part of that attraction

I probably just need to read more of the literature about GAMP to get a better sense of which of those two definitions is more accurate; I haven't bothered yet. I keep wasting my life on far more trivial pursuits, hahaha. But, that's the logical point that I'm at. I think the question is very clear with AGP-- they are aroused by an idea, s/itsafetish, the AGP doesn't make them LGB. GAMP.... it is possible that they are a more heterogeneous group than you would think, and some are actually #1 (and thus included in LGB) and some are actually #2 (and thus, not LGB and more "pure paraphilia" I guess you could say).

[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

GAMP.... it is possible that they are a more heterogeneous group than you would think

I'm coming around to this. Attraction to cross-dressed men as well, no hormones, no surgeries. Might be considered the same phenomena, maybe a different one. We certainly just encountered that "abstract idea" locus with MLTW. I've seen other people into other completely abstract ideas too, they're quite abundant. Things that simply just don't exist. Things you can't hit with a hammer IRL.

AGP doesn't make them LGB

I agree. Some AGP have sex with men because having sex with men is a thing that women do, and anything that's stereotypically women is up for grabs with AGP. Even knitting. Men as props, as you put it, is the right way to understand it, IMHO.

Same way that men having sex with other men in prison does not make them LGB. They have a libido and they've been deprived of women. If you get out of prison and you never touch another man again, not LGB. What you do isn't necessarily what you are, and I can give tons of other examples of that as well.

So off the ontology for a moment, especially since this is the wall we've been beating our heads on. More information, that AFAIK does not yet exist, may be useful. I'd also like to get some MLTW (men who like trans women) opinions on this. Maybe they've got a forum somewhere I need to find. They certainly have more motivation to understand this topic, but they're also very close to it emotionally.

Are MLTW men, even if we consider them your #1 type, similar enough to your run-of-the-mill bisexual to be included in LGB? I think they're different enough that they would actually have their interests better served if they went off on their own. That's not me just being a stubborn prick, I really think it would be the best option for them. I don't want to see the world in a binary either LGBTQ+ or not fashion. They can still have overlap with LGB, and I think they do, but having just one toe in the LGB waters isn't really enough.

[–]Destresse🇨🇵 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

I've been reading your explanations on this and it makes me wonder, are these paraphilias exclusive to male sexuality?

I've never heard of women feeling this way.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

With regards to specifically autogynephilia (AGP) and gyneandromorphophilia (GAMP,) yes, these only exist in men.

In women, there is the concept parallel to AGP of autoandrophilia (AAP,) where a woman is sexually and romantically attracted to herself, but as a man. I've collected some anecdotes for it. Many people doubt it exists, but I'm not aware of any formal research trying to chase it down. There is also the concept of autohomoeroticism (AHE) in women, and this one is recognized in sex research as being a real phenomena, where a woman has a paraphilia insofar as she desires to participate in gay male sex. Some women have obtained sex reassignment surgery on account of this.

Ultimately, the number of paraphilic women in this sort of thematic cluster is much, much lower than the number of men. The women seem to very well be there, but are heavily overshadowed.