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Sex Question Friday: Why Are So Many Straight Men Into Transsexual Porn? - Sex and Psychology
www.sexandpsychology.comEvery Friday on the blog, I answer people’s questions about sex, love, and relationships. This week’s question comes from a reader of the blog who was curious about why so many heterosexual men are pleasuring themselves to pornography featuring transgender and transsexual performers.I run a porn blog and I keep getting messages from men wanting to see tranny / shemale porn. I'm assuming these men are all straight-identifying, but maybe that's just my gay-identifying bias. I'm wondering what, if any studies or knowledge is out there about men who are attracted to and watch this kind of material or even look for them in real life? It does absolutely nothing for me, but this particular fetish is unavoidable if you frequent any kind of porn social network and it seems a lot of people are into this. What are your thoughts? Why might this be a turn-on for some, and what does it imply, if anything, about their sexuality?
“Transsexual” is a pretty dated term and this article is from 2012.
Might want to find something more recent and without that language to post instead.
“Transsexual” makes me think of this guy:
Top 3, if not THE top, character introductions of all time.
Hijacking top comment to also add that there are words for men who are attracted to femininity outside of the bounds of cisgender women: gynesexual (older term, less inclusive due to implication of a vagina) and finsexual (newer term, more inclusive and drops implication of a vagina).
It is quite likely that many of those men actually fall into these categories even if they have not accepted that about themselves as of yet. Others are bisexual, and even others are pansexual, and haven’t “come out” as it were.
Especially if this is relying on self-reporting and how often men want to appear straight, the number of men who are wrestling with such feelings but still put down “straight” is probably quite high.
Cuz I’m a motherfuckin’ gay fish.
Might be attracted to financial services, though…
They also may not even know. The whole thing is a political minefield and trying to join in any conversation without knowing all the words tends to trigger a massive overreaction from allies and bigots alike.
I mean it’s why I hate people who self apply the term “ally” because a lot of “allies” do more harm than help.
Allyship is to be determined by those who need allies, not the people who talk big and claim to be allies while doing fuck-all.
If someone from a minority community decides I am an ally to their cause and calls me an “ally” then I am an ally, not because I self applied a bullshit label to make myself feel better about cisgender white guilt or something.
My workplace has a corporate-sponsored advocacy network. Basically, they organize little fundraisers and events throughout the year, and march in the pride parade while wearing the company logo. It’s… fine, I guess. Certainly the most inclusive gesture of any company I’ve ever worked for. But the entire network is straight, white women who identify as allies.
I tried going to a few events when I first joined the company, but it’s real weird being the only queer person at the Lunchtime Dance Party Charity Fundraiser. Like, they didn’t even play any Kylie Minogue. WTF?
I would argue that one can be a self professed ally and still be an ally, even if you did it wrong.
Sometimes, just being willing to stand up and say “those people there? Those are my people, and I stand with them” is a powerful thing, even if the person saying it ends up being a fuckwit overall.
So, even folks that claim alliance to an oppressed group can end up a net positive just by inflating numbers, even when their specific views and actions aren’t well considered otherwise.
I get where you’re coming from though!
You make a pretty solid case yourself, pardner.
I consider myself straight, but ‘finsexual’ seems to be the most accurate. I’ve never heard the term before, but isn’t straight still accurate here?
I feel like straight applies. I’m a straight dude. Trans women are women, so I don’t need a special term to point out that I don’t care if a woman is trans or not. Hot women are hot. Cis, trans, whatever. Pre-op, post-op, doesn’t matter. Women are pretty.
Hijacking your thread to ask a linguistics question: what is the source and meaning of the fin prefix here?
Coined in July of 2014 on tumblr:
https://web.archive.org/web/20150324190159/pride-flags-for-us.tumblr.com/tagged/androsexual
The “fin” prefix means “feminine in nature” and so the opposite where you’re attracted to people “masculine in nature” is minsexual. This confuses a lot of people because normally a prefix isn’t also an acronym, it’s usually from a root word.
So, I think it’s a good replacement for gynesexual/androsexual, despite the slightly confusing nature of its origin.
Thank you! Not gonna lie, that was underwhelming. Also, I really hope the double f and double m variants don’t stick, because that is a hot mess. While the new terms clarify language and improve communication, the doubles just make communication hard and imprecise.
Yeah I agree on that, the doubles make it way more confusing, and its confusing enough to people since the prefix is an acronym while people are scanning dictionaries trying to figure out a root word that doesn’t exist.
Thank you! I actually learned about those two terms recently, I appreciate you putting those out here!
My husband is finsexual and it’s nice to have a more accurate word for it :)
I thought “trans” was short for transsexual? Could someone bring me up to speed here?
In what way is it outdated?
It used to be transsexual, but now it’s transgender owing to the differences between sex and gender.
What I’m reading when looking it up is that “trans” is an umbrella term for both.
Are there any good references for this?
Also seems to be that you could be transsexual without being transgender. What if you identify as internal male but feel like your body should be female? Is that not possible? Maybe I’m overthinking it.
I think that’s probably possible but I don’t think transgender or transsexual would be the way to describe that? I don’t know, I like language and think I’m up to date on terms but I’m probably not compared to those inside those spaces. But then again with threadiverse as my main social media I might as well be lol.
And before that wasn’t it “transvestite”?
Eh, sort of. Transvestite refers to someone who wears clothes of the opposite gender (trans = across, vestir = to clothe, to wear), and really that mainly applied to men wearing women’s clothes, because a woman wearing pants is questionable, but a man wearing a dress? There’s clearly something wrong with them!
As clothing “norms” became more old fashioned, that word fell into disuse.
Thank you. That made me remember this video by Matt Baume and after rewatchijg I should have known that.
trans is short for “transgender.”
Is this incorrect, then? (See: “Etymology 2”)
It is correct, but the former has become a slur over time, nor does “transexual” match because it’s not about who you desire, it’s about who you are. Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, finsexual are all about what kind person(s) you desire sexually. It’s a mismatch and it is now a slur.
So it means transgender. Unless you’re an asshole.
Huh, I would think the “-sexual” was referring to your sex. Odd. I guess it became guilty by association with those other, similar-sounding words.
I often wonder about the contemporaneous use of that word, and I think it’s mostly geared toward a particular audience by writers who mostly don’t know better. Perhaps because they or their editors are afraid to use the word “transgender“ due to the politically charged nature surrounding it at the moment, and believe (falsely) that using the word “transsexual” yes, somehow, less offensive.
I really wish they wouldn’t.
However, considering that this article is 14 years old, the use of this term is most likely a product of ignorance. And, as usual, I’m probably overthinking things.
No its not dated, generally transgender is used instead but many trans folks still use transsexual especially those that have undergone bottom surgery.
Let me clarify - I think it’s being used in an outdated way in this article.
Wouldn’t a “transsexual” be someone who has a strong sexual preference for transgender people?
That’s not what the historic definition of the word is, but I don’t know if people are trying to reclaim it and redefine it so I can’t speak on that.
I do know that it is seen as offensive generally.
I’ve learned that transgender is an umbrella term which could range from men who like to wear a dress, to drag queens, to people transitioning out of the gender assumed at their birth. Is this correct? And what would be the term for the latter group?
Crossdressing is not the same as being transgender. There can be overlap, but there’s plenty of men who like to crossdress.
Not as far as I know. I’m a bit of a layman on the topic, trying to learn as well. But, AFAIK, Transgender is someone that has or is in the process of transitioning to a different gender than the one assigned at birth. It doesn’t require specific actions (dress change, hormones, surgery, anything), only that the person decides they’ll assume their true gender.
So, in the order you presented: crossdresser, drag queen, transgender.
Crossdressing is not the same as being transgender.
There’s plenty of drag queens who are cis men and not trans women.
That’s what I said. Hopefully that came through?
There isn’t an order to it. It’s not some progressive timeline of you start crossdressing, then you start doing drag, then you transistion.
I’m sure some people have followed that path, but crossdressing and drag should not be seen as strictly done by transgender people.
Not a time order, the order in which the OC presented their 3 examples. What to name:
I hope what I meant is clear now.