Blanchard, Bailey, and Lawrence theory controversy

The "BBL Controversy" also known as the "Autogynephilia Controversy" is an ongoing and heated line of discussion in the transgendered community. The subject, Blanchard, Bailey, and Lawrence theory, is a theory of transsexual taxonomy developed by Ray Blanchard, which classifies male-to-female transsexuals according to whether they have an autogynephilic or "homosexual transsexual" motivation.

The theory had not received much attention outside of sexology until sexologist Anne Lawrence, who self-identifies as an autogynephile, published a series of web articles about the hypothesis in the late 1990s. Lawrence has since published and lectured about the hypothesis.

The hypothesis received wider attention with the 2003 publication of Bailey's popular psychology book The Man Who Would Be Queen. The book is written for a public audience; instead of citing sources, figures, or statistics to support the assertions made, Bailey uses anecdotal evidence to illustrate the hypothesis. The book contains his casual observations as well as quotations from casual conversations.

Lynn Conway and Andrea James responded to Lawrence's essay. Then Conway started an investigation into the publication of Bailey's book by the United States National Academy of Sciences. Accusations of misconduct on the part of Bailey were leveled. Eventually, Bailey resigned from his position as head of psychology at Northwestern University.

Scientific arguments regarding Blanchard, Bailey and Lawrence theory.
Psychologist Madeline Wyndzen notes several possible scientific concerns with Blanchard's entire model. Critics such as Madeline Wyndzen suggest that, since correlations do not establish causality, Blanchard may be mistaking a symptom of gender dysphoria for its primary cause. She has said: Wyndzen notes that a significant concern raised by the history of this theory may be that it begins by assuming there is something wrong with transsexual people. This may distort what is meant to be scientific account. A scientific theory might begin with the objective question, "What is transsexualism?" Instead, Wyndzen notes that Blanchard asks in his research, "What kind of defect in a males capacity for sexual learning could produce anatomic autogynephilia, transvestism, ..".
 * Correlational evidence is used to make causal claims. Rather than causing transsexualism, transsexuals may fantasize about being their target sex to compensate for feeling disconnected from their identities.
 * No comparisons are made with control groups of typically-gendered women. Those attracted to their own sex, regardless of if they are transsexual, may pay more attention to themselves as sexual beings.
 * Correlations with sexual orientation are not sufficient to assert that there are two types of transsexual women. The evidence for two types of transsexuals may instead be correlations with sexual orientation that can also be found among non-transsexual.
 * Furthermore, the distributions of sexual orientation among transsexuals do not reveal two categorically distinct groups.

Criticism of the Homosexual transsexual hypothesis
In his 1966 classic The Transsexual Phenomenon, Harry Benjamin writes:

The term "homosexuality" has never impressed me as very fortunate. It indicates an exclusiveness and a finality that exists in only a relatively small group of men, those who are entirely homosexual. According to Kinsey, Pomeroy, and Martin, this group (the 6 on their rating scale) applies to not more than 4% of the total male population.

... If we allow ourselves the use of the term "bisexuality" in this 46%, it is evident that the term homosexuality is applied much too often. The reason is that even one homosexual contact in a man's life, if it becomes known, all too often stamps him forever as a homosexual which, of course, he is not.

Furthermore, homosexual orientation may be a symptom, as are transvestism and transsexualism, with a variety of possible causes and inceptions. These causes and inceptions may be anchored in an inherited or congenital (constitutional) predisposition or they may be an acquired condition.|

Leavitt and Berger noted:

"The homosexual transsexual label is both confusing and controversial among males seeking sex reassignment. Transsexuals, as a group, vehemently oppose the label and its pejorative baggage (Morgan, 1978). As a rule, they are highly invested in a heterosexual life-style and are repulsed by notions of homosexual relations with males. Attention from males often serves to validate their feminine status. For many biological male transsexuals, acts of intimacy with women are truncated, because sexual attraction and relations with women pose the homosexual issue."

Criticism of the notion of Autogynephilia
This portion of the theory has also been questioned on the grounds that it does not properly account for the behavior and self-identification of a great many transsexual and transgender women. Proponents of the hypothesis have asserted that "autogynephiles," persons who are assumed to fit this model, are willfully deceiving others in claiming to exhibit behavior that does not fit within it. J. Michael Bailey, a notable proponent, quotes Clarke Institute employee Maxine Petersen as saying "most gender patients lie" and he himself claims that "the most common way that autogynephiles mislead others is by denying the erotic components of their gender bending" (pp. 172–173). In addition, he has claimed that "Blanchard has shown in a couple of clever studies that non-homosexual transgender patients who deny autogynephilia still show evidence for it." On the one hand, the assertion that any transperson who claims not to fit into this framework must be "lying" has been widely criticized as making this model unscientific because it becomes unfalsifiable. On the other hand, there are clear examples of transwomen who vehemently deny autogynephilic motivation but show clear evidence for it. One famous example (Anjelica Kieltyka, whose pseudonym was "Cher" in Bailey's book and who subsequently attacked Bailey's interpretation of her behavior) became transsexual after a long history of fetishistic cross dressing and wearing of fake vagina's and breasts. Deirdre McCloskey,another well-known transsexual wrote a biography describing her long history of fetishistic cross dressing and interest in transsexual pornography. Critics and proponents of autogynephilia theory seem to differ in how much they credit the narratives of transwomen as accurate.

Another criticism of Blanchard Bailey and Lawrence Theory is that it defines gender dysphoria as a strictly sexual phenomenon. That is, it assumes that transwomen feminize their bodies in order to fulfill a sexual desire for the attention of heterosexual men or for their own fetishistic pleasure. This appears to be contradicted by the fact that the effects of testosterone-blocking medications (and later, removal of the testicles) reduce libido in many transwomen.

Transmen
Transmen, that is female-to-male transgender persons, are only briefly mentioned by Blanchard. According to data from his clinic, most transmen are of the "homosexual" type, that is attracted to women. He thinks it is unlikely that an analogue to autogynephilia exists among natal women since, according to proponents of the theory, "all paraphilias occur exclusively (or nearly exclusively) in men". The omission of transmen from Blanchard Bailey and Lawrence theory represents a limitation in its applicability. (Compare to Newtons laws for what happens when a theory is applied outside its data domain) Which means it is not a truly fundamental theory of transsexual etiology.

Scientific study sparked by the controversy
Many of these concerns were addressed in a peer reviewed scientific study conducted in the Netherlands by Yolanda Smith et al. which could have supported or refuted Blanchards theory, as well as Bailey, and Lawrences observations in support of that theory. Smith et al. found...

"One of the two purposes of the present study was to replicate and extend the evidence of the existence of different developmental routes in homosexual and non-homosexual transsexuals. In this study the two subtypes were indeed found to differ on many characteristics. Replicating some of the previously observed differences, we found that compared with non-homosexual transsexuals, homosexual transsexuals reported more cross-gendered behavior, appearance and preference in childhood, and they reported less sexual arousal while cross-dressing in adolescence, applied for SR at a younger age, and fewer were (or had been) married. Unlike Blanchard et al. (1995),we found no differences in height, weight or BMI."

The inclusion of the terms "homosexual transsexual" and "Autogynephilic transsexual" in DSM-IV by a subcommittee on gender identity disorders (GID) will be debated as part of attempts at GID reform in the DSM-V.

Ad hominem arguments.
According to the wiktionary Ad hominem is a shortened form of a phrase that literally means "argument at the man". An ad hominem is an attempt to discredit an argument based on the flaws of the person who made the argument. This controversy is rife with arguments that are by definition ad hominem. This is a non-comprehensive summary of the ad hominem arguments that have been posed. Listed in alphabetical order as determined by last name or alias. The fact that an argument is an ad hominem does not imply that it must be false. It does imply that it is a personal attack not truly connected to the issue at hand.

"Alma"
This blanket statement was used by Diedre McCloskey to discredit Bailey by the number of people he spoke to.

"Bailey portrays himself according to Rodkin as an "impartial social scientist," who looks at "aggregates," "lots of similar cases." According to Rodkin, Professor Bailey "has the goal of finding commonalities among groups of individuals.

You bet. Professor Bailey's "lots of similar cases" were a half dozen Hispanic drag queens and prostitutes he met in bars in Chicago."

This statement by Kelly Novak, on a page owned by Andrea James intimates that "Alma" is racially slurring Hispanics.

"Another fine example of Pseudoscience can be seen on page 183:

"Alma has also noticed, as I have, the large number of Latina transsexuals. In Chicago, there are several bars that cater to Latina transsexuals. About 60% of the homosexual transsexuals and drag queens we studied were Latina or black."

Really, the reason why there was a high number of Latinas in the study is that Latina bars were used for the recruiting. Non-transsexual Hispanic people should take this as a racial slur."

Bailey, J. Michael
Lynn Conway, Anjelica Kieltyka, and "Maria" accused Bailey of having had sexual relations with "Maria". Lynn Conway accused Bailey of having practiced clinical psychology without a license. In a 46 page report Dr Conway made many accusations of misconduct. Summarized in her own words "In summary, the new complaint contains hard evidence implicating Mr. Bailey in, among other things, (i) deliberate failures to examine counter-evidence to the theory he was studying, (ii) open defamation of those who put forward counter-evidence to that theory, (iii) the making of “remote clinical diagnoses” of mental illnesses in persons he has not ever even met, (iv) libel, (v) flagrant abuses of the power of his office and (vi) the deliberate suppression of complaints by colleagues about such conduct."

Blanchard
One notable ad hominem swept up Blanchard, Lawrence, and Bailey. It appeared on Lynn Conway's website. This was offered to "debunk" an idea of Anne Lawrences.

"What inner demons drive Lawrence (and Blanchard) to continue doing such things to the trans community?

Andrea James may have the answer:

Andrea notes that "Lawrence has significant bias based on personal erotic interest. The incident involving examining an unconscious Ethiopian patient for signs of genital amputation led to Lawrence’s resignation as a medical doctor, so it seems pretty obvious to most people that Lawrence’s “theory” is in fact an attempt to make unusual sexual interests like Lawrence’s an indicator that Lawrence is a “real transsexual,” as Lawrence has defensively claimed to be."

"Like Bailey, Lawrence’s “science” is really an exercise in identity politics, an attempt to expand a traditional definition in order to match their self-identities. Thus Bailey continually represents himself as a “single heterosexual male” instead of a divorced closet case, and Lawrence is a “real transsexual” instead of a surgical fetishist with a kink for ritualized genital modification."

Need we say more?"

Conway, Lynn
Like many other people involved with this controversy, Conway has been the subject of ad hominem attacks that center on her emotional reaction to The Man Who Would Be Queen. In a paraphrase of Bailey, Dreger implies that critics of Bailey's are "autogynephilic transsexuals":

"Bailey is more blunt in his assessment: he says that if there has been an injury from his book—a book he sees as positive in its honesty and in its acceptance of transwomen’s realities—it has been a narcissistic injury suffered by a small number of autogynephilic transsexuals who wish we would all deny the truth."

- Bailey to Dreger

Dreger, Alice
James has written

"In the meantime, I will periodically begin the work of discrediting both Dreger’s “partial history” and her. With luck, farsighted activists and academics will soon see through Dreger’s petty, self-aggrandizing nonsense and pathologization and see both for what they are. That’s when Alice Dreger will finally get her wish. She will be a part of history, as an unfortunate historical footnote. (Emphasis added)"

She has also written about Dreger:

"Hack journalists want to be in their stories, and hack historians long to make themselves part of history. Alice Dreger craves the fame and attention that have largely eluded her, and her preferred methods and dealings include complaining, rumor-mongering, and trolling. Dreger fixated on me after she was unsuccessful in suppressing a 2006 speech I made at Northwestern. I believe the record shows that she instigated a personal feud with me in hopes of positioning herself as somewhat relevant again in academia, part of her attempt to recast herself as a bioethicist. Normally, I don’t bother dealing with kooks and academic nobodies like Dreger. I’ve learned they’re just not worth the effort. I did not issue a public response to Dreger's antics until August 2007, about 18 months after she began fixating on me."

James, Andrea
The following was written by Kira Triea a commentary on an interaction, or several interactions on an online forum(s). In her commentary she intimates that James is an Autogynephile which would be perceived as an insult by James. These are two reactions to transkids.us opening posted on www.calpernia.com BBS which is run by Andrea James.

"The first comes to the wacky conclusion that Paul, and his sister, the owner of the ISP who Kiira advised us to buy our website from, is a right wing conspirator hired by Michael Bailey. Paul is real sweet and repairs computers, hires GLBT people and sells website services from his ISP to bands, bookstores, flower shops and transkids. The writer complains that we do not identify ourselves much on transkids.us and then Andrea James proceeds to trash the only two people she can identify in 3D, Paul and Kiira, and then says that we should all be "vectored and exposed". Another post said that we "need to be infiltrated and taken out". They mean "outed" and harmed, since we are vulnerable to being hurt socially by autogynephilic transsexuals who take a dislike to us. This is not funny at all it's actually really scary because they have often been in the military where they learned this language."

"Andrea James continues to threaten and intimidate transkids.us Andrea James has posted on the web forums she runs, calpernia and genderpeace and called for picyures and information about the authors of transkids.us and made a stupid page of incorrect information about myself and Kiira, since we are the only people she can know any information about since Kiira was a publicly out activist for over 10 years and we are known to be friends. Over a year ago a transsexual found Inoue's private web pages and posted her picture to a creepy chaser site, which hurt her badly. James encouraged more destructive behavior this time again. The attitudes in this thread are typical toward us and the lesbian women who have been bothered by transsexuals at mwmf and toward intersex people, like the aissg group who had to make a web page explaining that transsexuals and girls with ais were not the same, as Australian transsexuals were explaining for their political purposes, but which harmed ais people."

She has been accused of "intimidation" in the context of arguing against her point of view by Alice Dreger as well. An example of the type of things Dreger has written can be found in "The Blog I write in fear.," where she writes about James alleged intimidation of others and goes on to write:

"It’s clear from looking at Ms. James’s productions that she is much more invested in self promotion than her alleged cause [the most repetitive lament in her work is that Bailey didn’t consult or cite her] and I wish the students [inviting Ms. James] could see that and realize there are far better choices [see the end of this post] if they want to hear from a leading transgender advocate. As a sex/gender scholar, and as a person who has for years advocated for the rights of transgender children and adults, I’m quite disappointed to see someone who has viciously intimidated scholars and so harmed the cause of transgender rights being welcomed."

Kieltyka, Anjelica
On many occasions Kieltyka (known as "Cher" in The Man Who Would Be Queen) has been said to be a prime example of Autogynepilia. Notably by Bailey on page 156 of The Man Who Would Be Queen.

"Nevertheless, I think that Cher is a wonderful example of the second type of transsexualism, less because she is representative than because she openly and floridly exemplifies the essential feature of this type, which is Autogynephilia"

She has reportedly been accused of stalking by Conway.

"the recent incident at the Be-All (a transsexual convention) where Conway accused me of stalking her. I was at the bar over there and she was among my friends and I … heard that she was going around saying that I was stalking her. … Anyway, it was a nonevent that Professor Conway tried to turn into a “staged event” – an opportunity to discredit me."

- Kieltyka, 2006a

Lawrence, Anne
Anne Lawrence has been involved in this controversy longer than most people. So she has had many many ad hominem arguments directed at her. In particular this one which also takes swipes at two other people.

"What inner demons drive Lawrence (and Blanchard) to continue doing such things to the trans community?

Andrea James may have the answer:

Andrea notes that "Lawrence has significant bias based on personal erotic interest. The incident involving examining an unconscious Ethiopian patient for signs of genital amputation led to Lawrence’s resignation as a medical doctor, so it seems pretty obvious to most people that Lawrence’s “theory” is in fact an attempt to make unusual sexual interests like Lawrence’s an indicator that Lawrence is a “real transsexual,” as Lawrence has defensively claimed to be."

"Like Bailey, Lawrence’s “science” is really an exercise in identity politics, an attempt to expand a traditional definition in order to match their self-identities. Thus Bailey continually represents himself as a “single heterosexual male” instead of a divorced closet case, and Lawrence is a “real transsexual” instead of a surgical fetishist with a kink for ritualized genital modification."

Need we say more?"

McCloskey, Deirdre
Deirdre McCloskey has been the subject of many ad hominem arguments related to this subject. The most common one being based on her biography. For example Bailey in page 217

"The current popular literature on transsexualism is noteworthy in its ignorance of the distinction between autogynephilic and homosexual transsexuals. The biographies and autobiographies of famous transsexuals, including those of Christine Jorgenson (The Christine Jorgensen Story, Susan Stryker and Christine Jorgensen, Chicago: Cleis Press 200) and Deirdre N. McCloskey (Crossing: A Memoir, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999), focus on the standard transsexual story ("I always felt like a female"), even though I would guess that both Jorgenson and McCloskey were autogynephilic."

This has been cited and used to defame McCloskey by many people.

"Maria"
This blanket statement was used by Deirdre McCloskey to discredit a number of the people Bailey spoke to.

"Bailey portrays himself according to Rodkin as an "impartial social scientist," who looks at "aggregates," "lots of similar cases." According to Rodkin, Professor Bailey "has the goal of finding commonalities among groups of individuals."

You bet. Professor Bailey's "lots of similar cases" were a half dozen Hispanic drag queens and prostitutes he met in bars in Chicago. "

Triea, Kiira and "transkids.us"
In a long document "Kiira Triea (Denise Tree) and the "transkids" hoax" James catalogs various points in the life of Triea, such as her various gender and sexual identities, her youthful attempt at a musical career, her use of Linux. One statement that really stands out is "I am not the first to point out that Triea's adamant claims of not being transsexual are especially interesting in light of which "type" she is if she is in fact transsexual. Triea displays many hallmarks of others who claim to have "autogynephilia" "

Collectively the "transkids" have been the subject of an alleged ad hominem attack, in the form of the denial of their very existence. In particular, there is "Stephanie Alejandra Velázquez".

"Velasquez claims she was an "extreme" transkid. She seeks to cast herself as the outermost or ultimate type of gender-variant person, as a strategy to rob others of their subject position in what she likes to call the "Transsexual Discourse."

She and I would certainly agree that assimilated women who are not public about their transitions are grossly under-represented, and most of them would like to keep it that way at this time.

Velasquez seems to like the "autogynephilia" group because they affirm her belief that she is "more transsexual" than they are (or the "other pole" of this constructed "extreme").

Velasquez is kind of like those people who claim they are an extreme homosexual because they had sex a few years earlier than anyone else they know, and who claim they are more gay than people who came out later in life."

The point of all of this is in James's words "Now that computer forensics on the boy2woman.com fakery got that site shut down in late 2006, the next major fake site to vector and expose is transkids.us. Similar investigations in the past have led to the demise of Changez Le Monde and other bogus sites by people claiming to represent young transsexual women."

Others
Similar arguments have been used throughout the transgendered community, as sides were chosen over this issue.

Critics argue that those who embrace this model as an identity are participating in their own pathologization. The pathologization of socially unaccepted erotic interests has a long history, and recent clinical diagnoses such as "egodystonic homosexuality" and "nymphomania" have fallen into disrepute. Other transsexual and transgender people who describe erotic elements to their feelings take issue with Blanchard's terminology because it diagnoses a psychosexual pathology.