Social Autogynephilia and Schadenfreude.

Originally posted 2017-10-24 21:35:44.

Autogynephilia is ‘a man’s propensity to be sexually aroused at the thought or image of himself as a woman’. For many practical purposes we might restate that as ‘a man’s overwhelming desire to be a woman’, to ‘become that which he loves’ and so on. It is a man’s deeply-felt identification with the object of his desire. So what might social autogynephilia be?

 

 

 

Dr Ray Blanchard, in his seminal work on this, described the mechanisms through which autogynephilia (AGP) works. It comes in three sexualities: heterosexual, attracted to femininity; pseudo-bisexual, attracted to both femininity and masculinity, but typically only after transition; and analloerotic. These last are sometimes called ‘asexual’ and might even consider themselves to be so, but they are not; in fact their sexual partners are themselves. They do not interact sexually with other people. (Note here that AGPs are NEVER homosexual, that is, ‘exclusively attracted to men from childhood’.)

Four different types

AGP comes in four different types, according to Blanchard: transvestic, in which the subject dresses as a woman for relief; anatomic, in which he desires a woman’s physical body, typically the substitution of a cosmetic vagina for his penis, breast enlargement etc; physiological, in which the man desires to have a woman’s body functions, such as menstruation, lactation etc; and behavioural, in which the man desires to behave as he thinks a woman would. This might include mundane activities like shopping or knitting, but also it might include sexual behaviour — ‘sex as a woman’ in which the reward is playing a stereotypical woman’s role in sex — in other words, being penetrated by a man.

However, a few years ago, Drs Bailey and Lawrence added a fifth category, which they called Interpersonal Autogynephilia.  This has to do with the way the subject relates to those around him and it’s the one that’s most interesting here.

These types may be either complete or partial and each might occur in conjunction with others; indeed all may be present. Autogynephilia is therefore a complex, nuanced and multi-faceted condition and Blanchard, in teasing out the threads that constitute it, in its many forms, showed remarkable insight.

Yet there seems to me to be something that is not quite explained.

Asia, true matriarchy and social autogynephilia

In my travels in SE Asia I have become much more familiar with what a matriarchy is and how it works than most people in the West.

Matriarchy is the society of women and it is ordered according to a certain set of conventions and hierarchies. It is centred on not just women, but mothers. The most powerful individuals are grandmothers, while the most respected are the great grandmothers. Grandmothers, in the Philippines, are the ‘lolas’ and their word is law. Lola’s daughters are her captains and their elder daughters the sergeants. The group is structured and cohesive and at its centre is one purpose and one alone: maternity.

This is a collectivist, structured, organised corpus. Its basic unit, its cell, if you like, is the family of father and mother who are a couple but who actually spend most of their time in separate spaces. These cultures are matrilocal — that is to say, a young man on marrying will move into his wife’s family’s home, at east at the beginning of married life and typically, set up a home in the same compound when the young couple begin to have their own children. So each family unit like this forms a cell within the extended family or clan structure; and all of this operates under the same set of rules. It is all a matriarchy.

Patriarchy is not a plot

Patriarchy is just the society of men. It is not some bizarre plot to do down women; it is just how men organise themselves. There is nothing wrong with it; but it only accepts men within itself or the space it regulates and, of course, feminists cannot tolerate men having their own spaces.

It is not structured in the same way as the matriarchy. Its leaders are not so because of what they are, but because of how good they are. Perhaps, once, this was a matter of how good they were at fighting or hunting; now, in most of the world, other measures have taken over. These might be career or business success; professional acclaim; ability in sport or some other skill. In fact the measures are potentially endless.

In essence, patriarchy is individualistic, competitive and meritocratic. Although the group might form structure in the face of external threat, this is not the natural condition of patriarchy. Most of the time it is anarchistic, with control — where it can be exercised at all — being in the hands of the strongest, most knowledgeable or most able. Further, the hierarchical arrangements within the patriarchy, insofar as they exist, are completely fluid and the group will be led by whomever is most adept at whatever it is that the group is trying to achieve at that time and place. Today it might be hunting game; tomorrow it might be fishing; on Thursday it might be clearing forest; on Friday building new shelters.

These two systems, matriarchy and patriarchy, cannot operate alongside each other in the same space; it would be like trying to run MacOs and Windows at the same time on the same machine. It just won’t work. So the two systems have their own social spaces. Women congregate around the home settlement and men roam away from it. That is why I call the groups the Home group — the matriarchal community based on women — and the Away group, the patriarchal association of men who operate outside the Home area.

Everyone grows up in the Home group, because it is centred on the mothers. Children live with their mothers. Admittance to the Away group, however, is competitive. There are standards of masculinity that must be met, in order to do so. The first, of course, is to have been born male. But then a series of other conditions must be met: boys must not cry too readily, exhibit fear or reaction to pain, are not allowed to wear girls’ clothes. If they are artistic, the ways in which this is acceptable are regulated — being a sculptor or perhaps a painter, or a photographer today, is one thing, but a ballet dancer? They must not appear to be too sensitive. Most importantly, they must not be overly attached to the company of women (no ‘mummy’s boys’) and they absolutely must not be sexually attracted to men or to affect feminine mannerisms, appearance, dress or behaviour.

 

So what happens to the boys who do manifest these things?

They stay in the Home group. They don’t get to join the Away group.

I’ve said before that this is not the end of the world. While low in status within the Home group, such boys may, through performing roles useful to the community of mothers, gain status in their own right and have a life-path — something that would be completely denied to them within the Away group even if they were allowed to join.

These, then, are the ‘not-men’ described by Don Kulick. They are male but they are not part of the Away group, which is made up of men. Instead they remain a part of the Home group, which is largely made up of women, is certainly run by women and is matrifocal and maternalistic.

Social autogynephilia can readily be seen in action here.

I suggest that social autogynephilia a function of Interpersonal AGP. But here, the reward is in filling women’s social roles inside the Home group — that is to say, within the collectivist, matriarchal community of mothers.

Observing a traditional Filipino village makes a number of things very clear: first, the sex/gender division. Where are all the adult and adolescent masculine males? Nowhere to be seen. That the women are in charge is a given and they will confirm it if you ask them. And there are just so many young males who could best be described as Sex (or, though misleadingly, Gender) Non-Conforming.

These fall into two groups:  extremely girly and not at all masculine boys, and masculine boys who affect femininity. These, collectively, are known as baklas, bekis or some equivalent, like kathoey in Thailand and since this is a collectivist social structure, they are thrown together; in all likelihood they will become lifelong friends.

Now all of these forms have their root in sexuality. These individuals are males and sexuality is the primary male system of reward. But individuals these categories of males want to appear to be women. Within the first group, the effeminate, extremely girly, homosexual young males,  are equivalent to the Western HomoSexual TransSexual (HSTS).

It is likely that, given a chance, these will grow up as transsexual ladyboys.  Crucial to understanding them is to note that almost all understand themselves to be girls in childhood, but some will delay ‘coming out’ till adolescence, usually because of school or paternal pressure. These are usually known as ‘Late Bloomers’ locally but some caution is required, since HSTS may also come out late, once they have escaped the strictures of school. But they will always have been identifiable as ‘gays’.

The more masculine amongst them may grow up to become gay men, of which there is no shortage in the Philippines, again because of social pressures. But note: these still have ‘green blood’ and are still androphilic. Within traditional society, they are as much baklas as a pageant queen.

The other group might show some enthusiasm for dressing up or competing in pageants in childhood, but they are not attracted to men; this is just role-play in a culture where boys compete pageants. This group, when they are around fifteen, however, will ‘come out’ as baklas. These are the Autogynephiles. However, although they may pursue sex with men, they are primarily gynephilic and always remain so.  Strictly, they are not actually homosexual but what Blanchard called ‘pseudo-bisexual’.

Women inside

Irrespective, however, of their outward appearance or sexuality, all of these individuals, if asked, will say that they are ‘women inside’. In context, this is something like ‘for whatever reason I cannot join the Away group, therefore I cannot be a man, so I must be a woman’. These are cultures where ‘non-binary’ social positions do not exist. One is either a man or a not-man: it’s a strict binary.

I remember very clearly spending an evening with two feminine baklas and a quasi-masculine one. The last was a tall, rather suave looking young male of 24 who wore a suit and had very neat hair; he was  boyishly handsome rather than feminine. Nevertheless, he explained to me, intensely, that he was a ‘woman inside’ just like the other two (who were full-on) and that ‘as soon as he got a chance’ he would grow his hair, put on a dress and be a ‘long-hair’ like them. The fact that he was holding my hand and rather earnestly stroking it as he explained this made the moment quite memorable.

The point is this: no matter how they came to be so, all baklas, bekis and so on  consider themselves to be ‘women inside’.

All Women

Let us refer back to the society in which this is happening. This is a matriarchy, a collectivist, structured, hierarchical community in which the authority figures are ALL WOMEN. Every single one. If Lolo (grandfather) is not away working then he is a focus of affection, not of authority. He is like the ‘abuelito’ of Spanish culture, the beloved elder male who soothes away hurts and sorrows and whose shoulder is always there for the children. ‘There, there, little one, abuelito will make it better, don’t cry’; that this is almost exactly how people in these cultures regard God — except for scale — should explain a few things to those of non-Catholic backgrounds.

Every young person looks to the adults around him or her to help define their life goals. And here we have a group of young males who, for some reason, usually either their powerful affinity for women’s company or decisive attraction to men, cannot be a part of the patriarchal Away group. So which individuals will be their role models? The women.

This leads Autogyneohilic boys to desire to play a role in society that is normally reserved to women; and this is what I call social autogynephilia. It is male reward in playing, and being accepted in, an elevated-status role usually played by women.

In the Philippines, this is well understood and the strict hierarchy of the matriarchal Home group limits the ability of such males to rise above women; nevertheless I know of instances where they have become head ‘men’ of their village.

In the West

In many parts of the West, traditional society has been completely erased. This has happened because women moved out of the matriarchal Home space and entered the Away group of career, profession and politics. Now as soon as a group of women establish themselves, they also establish a matriarchy centred on themselves, and a hierarchy within that. Once they numerically dominate any given social space, they abolish the de facto patriarchy (ie, the loose association of males) and establish a collectivist, rigidly controlled, hierarchical society based on women, which is the matriarchy. This then polices the behaviour of all the individuals, including the men.

When this happens, the strong men leave. Men are naturally reluctant to argue with or overwhelm women; the opposite suggestion is a blatant feminist lie, as is the myth of Western rape culture. There is no such culture, but the fear of being accused of rape — which men themselves regard as the most heinous crime — has been a very profitable tactic for feminists.

The misrepresentation of violence

If you don’t believe me, just look at the statistics for violence. In the crucial 15-25 age range, young males are many times more likely to be assaulted and even killed, than young females. The disparity is overwhelming. Yet rape, and even much less severe assaults on women, are regarded as far more odious than even life-threatening or fatal assaults on males. Males are dispensable and always have been and human society is evolved to protect the females, who are crucial to survival. So assault on women is regarded as being far worse than that on men.

Something similar applies to prostitution. I have yet to hear of anyone protesting about the numbers of young men who serve as prostitutes for older men; yet when women do it, it’s an outrage. Even if they enter the profession willingly, they are still being ‘exploited’.

So even within sex work, there is a double standard. And in any case, why is sex regarded as qualitatively different from any other form of work? Why is it worse to earn one’s money on one’s back in a comfortable bed, doing something that is intrinsically pleasant, than to work in the hell of a coal mine and to die at 50 of pneumoconiosis? (And nobody who has not been in a working coal mine has any idea how bad it is. None.)

It is because human society is gynocentric; it places the protection of women and of their reproduction above everything else. This is because, without women, there can be no future generations. The denial of this, and worse, the feminist persuasion of society that the case be otherwise, is the slickest ruse they ever pulled.

As women have moved out of their traditional Home group and the social roles they played there, then, they have transformed the areas they have colonised into de facto Home groups — matriarchies. That is what has happened to universities and colleges throughout the West. They have been transformed into feminist matriarchies within which all of the authority figures are women and all behaviour must conform to rules laid down by women.  And make no mistake, they are spreading this into all places of work.

Consequences

One consequence of this is that men may drop out of work. Men are naturally disinclined to compete against women, because they regard doing so as unfair. Faced with the choice of under-performing and being under-appreciated against women, when they know well they would succeed against other men, with whom they would cheerfully compete tooth and claw, they might just go fishing. There is no status to be gained in competition with women; it can only be gained in competition with men. Why not just kick back and go for a ride on the Harley? Drink a few beers?

The other consequence of this female colonisation of the spaces previously the reserve of the Away group, especially in academia, is that, from the moment they enter primary school till the time they graduate from university, young males may have no male authority figures or role models at all. Not one. And this has been exacerbated by the collapse of marriage and the feminist assault on the traditional family, which has removed fathers from families.

At the same time, because these are matriarchies and powerfully hostile to masculinity, male heroes in literature and the arts and even in terms of the leaders of the disciplines are ignored, to be replaced by female ones. And this is not done on an egalitarian basis. It is not a matter of ‘we’ll study half men and half women and deal with them fairly’. It has become, ’if we discuss men at all, it is to paint them as monsters and masculinity as a pernicious evil that must be done away with’.

Should it be any wonder that the young males being processed by this system would end up believing that what they should be is in fact, women? Why not, when they are conditioned to believe that every reward, they are being told they should seek, should be denied to them, because they are male, when it would be readily, and moreover, rightly, available to them if they were women?

Born in the wrong body much?

It is clear that in traditional, true matriarchies, which are not based on the hatred of men but on the love of children, there is a form of social autogynephilia operative. Boys who cannot fit within the Away group, or with the young adolescent males waiting to join it, may remain within the Home group and become ‘baklas’. But it should surprise no-one if they pursue the life goals of the women around them. They cannot themselves have children, but they might, by other means, raise their status. These means, principally, are to do with making money and helping to feed, house and clothe the Home group — which are, paradoxically, male roles.

The pseudo-matriarchy that has been formed in the West is not a true matriarchy at all, because it is not based on the love and nurture of children and the nuclear and extended family, the clan and the tribe, which supports that. Instead it is founded on hatred of men and the absolute determination to eradicate masculinity, along with, to boot, the very nuclear family itself, which is the basic building block of matriarchy.

Feminism is a toxic culture and so, if social autogynephilia begins to operate with in it, this too is toxic in nature. Stymied in their attempts to become powerful men, males may become powerful quasi-women, ready to simply shove real women out of the way; after all, they are ‘not-men’ and do not have ‘male privilege’ (a canard anyway) so they may legitimately compete with women — voir Fallon Fox, a former US Navy SEAL and trained barehand killer, beating actual female opponents to a bloody pulp; and nobody dare challenge this because that would be ‘transphobic’.

At the same time, we see young females being exhorted, from appallingly young ages, to ‘change sex’ and become ‘men’. While this is clearly not social autogynephilia, we could see it as a form of social androphilia, in which women are encouraged to adopt male gender, as a part of their conditioning to become the ‘men’ in a pseudo-genderless society, wherein real men have been erased and weaker but nevertheless still potent young males present as women, or at least, as unmasculine, in order to get sex.

Social Autogynephilia in the West

It seems clear that there is a socio-political dimension to autogynephilia that might not be obvious when addressing individual cases but which becomes so when looking at group dynamics.

However, there is a massive irony here. Today, feminists complain that Autogynephilic men are invading their spaces and even coercing lesbians into sex, by ‘shaming’. In this, women are made to feel bad about not being prepared to have sex with a person with a penis who ‘identifies’ as a woman, because that would be ‘transphobic’.

Yet if I am right and social autogynephilia is in play then we would have to recognise that it is actually an artefact of matriarchy — both the real one as found in traditional societies and the ersatz one created in the West. The irony, that feminists, through their overt campaign of man-hatred and a blatant attempt to destroy the nuclear family, might have created the very monster that they now complain of, does provoke a certain grim schadenfreude.