Scientists have been transing mice by manipulating their genes, hormones and brains. Feminisation and masculinisation of the brain are complex processes, and things can go differently, producing trans. Knowing the processes in mice and rats may help understand people. Did you know we are more closely related to mice than to cats?
We know these rats and mice are trans, by their brains and behaviour. In behaviour, it is most noticeable in reproductive behaviour- courtship displays, control of territory, mating, and caring for the young. In anatomy, some parts of the brain are different sizes in males and females, with differing numbers of brain cells and connections.
Someone on facebook signposted this article in Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology News, and this paper. Only extracts of the edited paper are available, but here is the author manuscript.
The language is clear to those who know it. Masculinisation was thought to be “the direct induction of transcription by ligand-activated nuclear steroid receptors”, but is now found to be more indirect. Testosterone turns into oestadiol (something I take every day) and the oestradiol activates genes in the brain, which start a masculinisation process.
Testosterone becomes oestrogen? Oestrogen makes you male? Hormones are cultural signifiers. There is a great deal of mythologising about testosterone, currently being used to exclude trans women from women’s sports. It is more complex than the myths.
The DNMT gene produces the DNMT enzyme, which prevents masculinisation of the brain. Scientists injected DNMT inhibitors into week-old female rats, and they acted like males, even though brain sex was thought fixed by that point. In another experiment, they deleted the DNMT gene, and those rats also acted like males. I wanted to know how big the DNMT gene was. It is 97,944 base pairs on human chromosome 19. That gets me no further than “It’s pretty small”, really. Small mutations can mess up the process. Possibly, I have a woman’s hypothalamus. I already knew about the BSTc.
The immune system affects brain development, and microglia, inflammatory immune cells, play a role in masculinisation.
I don’t like to think something went wrong in my brain development. Trans is simply a variation in human development, not wrong in any sense. Not less valuable, as every human has different gifts, and when our needs are met our gifts can flourish, benefiting the whole community. Not morally wrong. I hate the thought of monitoring the foetus genome to correct LGBT tendencies. Even if it were possible, it would be bad for society. Society should promote queer acceptance.
Some people are trans. The anti-trans movement spends a great deal of time denying that or minimising it- it’s only a matter of “men’s feelings”, which they imply don’t matter. Or it’s “gender ideology”- we think we are trans because of false beliefs, and if the beliefs could be expunged nobody would think they were trans, so nobody would be trans. To refute that, all you have to do is look around. Some people deny trans in history, but it’s there.
Transing mice won’t convince the gender critical conspiracy fantasists, but it might be one additional bit of evidence helping to show anyone with an open mind that Some People Are Trans. If you’re wondering if you’re “trans enough” to need to transition, it may help to know some mice are trans. Trans people are as valuable and deserving of rights as anyone else.
Clare Flourish 
Any research into the ‘cause’ of us being trans (or gay, or asexual, or bisexual etc) makes me incredibly nervous. It echoes research that tries to find the genetic or other cause of diseases and disorders, as if Queerness is also a disease, and, as you allude to, could very easily be used to try and erase us even before birth. The baseline assumption is that we are an aberration, a pathological departure from the ‘norm’. As you point out, arguing for equality based on biologically essentialist arguments isn’t necessarily good. It’s very much a double-edged sword.
I’m also quite sceptical of the idea of brain sex. The brain isn’t a sexed organ, although hormones and I think social processes do affect its development (and also effect gene expression re: epigenetic processes). I think it’s very malleable – as the mice research seems to show. If you haven’t read it already, I highly recommend ‘Delusions of Gender’ by Cordelia Fine. She does a great job of debunking a lot of the science on brain sex, and demonstrating the way that psychological and social factors influence the brain and gendered behaviours, in a much more empirically demonstrable way than is the case with biological factors. It’s a really great book.
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Yes.
A friend and I were wondering- are there trans animals? Animals have same-sex activity, including pair-bonding. But if they have cross-gender activity, observers might just record, this is male activity and occasionally females do it too. I think “some animals are gay” is a reasonable argument for gay acceptance. Not a clinching argument, but it might convince some people.
I haven’t read “Delusions of Gender”, but I did like “Testosterone Rex” also by Fine. Her feminist project seems to be around arguing that treating women differently to men is cultural, and the reasons given for it don’t stand up.
I am materialist. I don’t believe in a mind or soul, so- I am a biological woman. Somewhere in my biology or my brain is The Trans Thing. If it is brain malleability, that does not mean my brain could or should be malleabled back.
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