American-Canadian sexologist Ray Blanchard is a key figure in anti-transgender extremism. This biographical page supplements the overview of the harm his biased and unscientific ideas have caused.

Background

While working at Toronto’s notorious Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), Blanchard accused me of spreading “misinformation” (Blanchard 2009), so let’s get all of Blanchard’s biographical details out on the table in order to make my point more clearly.

As I mentioned in the earlier article (James 2009), Blanchard is widely reviled by trans people. Blanchard once declared that a trans woman who has transitioned is merely “a man without a penis,” and said of trans men, “They get a kind of lump that in the best, most expensive, $100,000 cases, kind of, maybe, look like a penis from across a room.” (Armstrong 2004). Blanchard’s comments on trans people’s genitalia reflect a fixation on “phallometrics,” the measurement of penile length, width, and tumescence when subjects are exposed to erotic stimuli. The field of phallometrics was developed by Blanchard’s mentor Kurt Freund at CAMH to determine if army recruits were lying about being gay to avoid military service where gay men were banned from serving. Blanchard, who obviously gay, is considered an expert in determining the size and tumescence of male genitalia.

Blanchard and since-fired sexologist Kenneth Zucker weaseled their way onto the committee rewriting the section on sex and gender minorities in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V). Zucker is the world’s foremost proponent of reparative therapy to “cure” gender-variant youth. Blanchard seeks a broad expansion of the definition of “paraphilia” to expand this mental illness to include anyone attracted to someone who is not “phenotypically normal.”

Blanchard took umbrage at my publication of publicly available 2008 taxpayer-funded salary info and my comment that Blanchard and Zucker both left America for Canada during the Vietnam War.

Why is Blanchard so touchy about military matters, and what personally motivates Blanchard’s life’s work? What drives this key figure in the oppression of sex and gender minorities? Since Blanchard feels entitled to ascribe labels and motivations to others, let’s turn the tables. Why is Ray so reticent about revealing his own sexual interests and behavior, when his career involves “catching” people not being open and honest about their sexual interests and behavior?

Early years

Blanchard’s full name is Ray Milton Blanchard III.

Blanchard’s parent Angelina Celi was born in 1917. Blanchard’s other parent was Aviation Metalsmith Second Class (AM2c) Ray Milton Blanchard Jr.

Ray III was conceived in early 1945, and Ray Jr. was lost at sea on 19 March of that year in the Japanese attack on the USS Franklin (USS Franklin 2008). Ray III was born 9 October 1945, according to a bio Ray III paid to place in Marquis Who’s Who (Marquis 1984), a questionable vanity publication for narcissistic strivers (Carlson 1999).

Ray III identifies as Ray Jr.’s “first, only, and posthumous child” (Blanchard 2009). That’s quite a burden to bear. Here’s the scenario: young closeted kid with strong Catholic roots spends formative years alone with a widowed parent, who is understandably depressed about Ray Jr.’s being killed in action. Ray III’s namesake made the ultimate sacrifice, and Ray III gets Catholic indoctrination about carrying on the family name, hereditary line, and what-not. Ray III is taught by priests about sin and is expected to produce Ray Milton Blanchard IV after settling down with a nice Catholic girl. Only problem: Ray III thinks girls are icky.

Then the day comes when it’s no longer just Ray III and widowed parent. Enter a stepparent, a Navy veteran and a volunteer firefighter (Inquirer 1992). In a nice Catholic ceremony, Angelina (Celi) Blanchard marries Anthony F. Ruggero (1917-1992). They start their family in Hammonton, New Jersey, where Angelina and Anthony are residents. By the time Ray III in grade school, there are two stepbrothers, Jim and Bill, about a decade younger than Ray III. Quite a shift in family dynamics. Angelina Ruggero has a new surname, so Ray III is the only remaining Blanchard in the household, in memory of Ray Jr.

Academia and “fitness” for military service

Blanchard is a pretty brilliant person who puts great energy into living up to the high expectations for a sole surviving namesake. Knowing deep down that the Catholic ideal of marrying and procreating is never going to happen, Blanchard focuses on other forms of getting approval, like school. With the likely help of the Survivors’ and Dependents’ Educational Assistance Program, Blanchard goes to a great school, then on to grad school in Illinois in 1967.

Vietnam sidebar: Meanwhile, further south in Illinois, Blanchard’s future CAMH collaborator Kenneth Zucker is one of the key campus leaders in the Vietnam protest movement at Southern Illinois University, staging mock trials and declaring people war criminals in absentia (Lagow 1977). Zucker headed to Canada eventually just to be safe. Their future collaborator Richard Green had the same idea: “I left Los Angeles in 1964 to avoid the Vietnam War by going to NIMH [National Institutes of Mental Health]” (Green 2004). One interesting phenomenon with anti-Vietnam people: they were right once as young people in the 1960s, so they often think they are always right, even decades later. Green handed over the editorial control of Archives of Sexual Behavior to Zucker, to continue pushing their ideology about sex and gender minorities.

Hearing your whole life that your namesake you never knew got killed in war is pretty good incentive for self-preservation. As Blanchard asserts, avoiding the draft was a moot point, since Blanchard was classified 4-A, as the sole surviving offspring of a servicemember killed in action. As long as war was not officially declared, Blanchard was safe. Further, the draft was implemented for those ages 18 to 26, and Blanchard was at University of Illinois until 1973, the year he turned 28. That would have allowed for a student deferment even if war had been declared. As I said earlier, Ray moved to Canada in the midst of the Vietnam War (1973) and has remained, even after all the drama about the U.S. draft was resolved.

What Blanchard fails to address is the real misrepresentation here, the elephant in the room, and my original point: not the 4-A classification, but the 4-F classification. 4-F was the designation used to declare gay servicemembers “unfit” for military service (Dode 2004). In other words, 4-A was pretty much the best reason to be exempt; 4-F was pretty much the worst reason to be exempt. While Blanchard was never classified 4-F because of the superseding exemption, had Blanchard been drafted, there was a very real possibility of outright rejection at induction or dishonorable discharge for being gay, had he made it through the screening process. As of late 2009, the US military still has this as official policy. His father’s military service stands as the height of honor and the ultimate sacrifice, yet Ray might have been denied outright as “unfit,” or if he got in, he might have been discharged at the hands of military psychiatrists, the ultimate dishonor.

World War II sidebar: From when it was first implemented, the 4-F designation had become a badge of dishonor, using the eugenic terminology “unfit” for service. It included a broad range of physical and mental reasons. Even after the war, people labeled 4-F were subject to discrimination and were seen by many as less valuable than those who served. It created a significant rift and a social hierarchy that suggested all men were not created equal, a sentiment at the heart of eugenic ideology (Wake 2007).

The best way to understand Ray Blanchard as a human is to consider the mindset of gay priests. Good Catholics who thought girls were icky often saw the priesthood as the Catholic version of 4-A instead of the Catholic version of 4-F. Priesthood is the most honorable reason not to have a family. Being a sodomite was the most “unfit” reason.

Gay priests and gay psychologists serve the same purpose and hold the same position within an oppressive power dynamic. More on this in the following sections,

First published 2 November 2009. In this section:

Ray Blanchard motivations for oppressing sex and gender minorities https://web.archive.org/web/20130324133848/tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-motivations.html
Toronto: epicenter of pathologization of sex and gender minorities
https://web.archive.org/web/20130324133848/tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-hypotheses.html
Ray Blanchard’s problematic place in history
https://web.archive.org/web/20130324133848/tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-history.html
Notes, updates, further reading
https://web.archive.org/web/20130324133848/tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-notes.html

Armstrong J. The Body within, the body without. Globe and Mail, 12 June 2004, p. F1.

Associated Press (26 October 1996). Kurt Freund, 82, notable sexologist.

http://archive.southcoasttoday.com/daily/10-96/10-29-96/c06wn888.htm

Blanchard, Ray, Collins, Peter (1993). Men with sexual interest in transvestites, transsexuals, and she-males. Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease, Volume 181 – Issue 9.

Blanchard, R., & Bogaert, A. F. (1996). Homosexuality in men and number of older brothers. American Journal of Psychiatry, 153, 27–31.

Blanchard, Ray @ ASSTAR (2009). “DSM-IV Paraphilias Options: General Diagnostic Issues, Pedohebephilic Disorder, and Transvestic Disorder,” Annual Meeting of the Society for Sex Therapy and Research, Alexandria VA, April 2009, http://individual.utoronto.ca/ray_blanchard/index_files/SSTAR.html

Blanchard, Ray (22 October 2009) [via Maxine Petersen]. Response to “$325,000+ in salaries for Zucker & Blanchard to pathologize trans people.”
http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/zucker-blanchard-salary.html

Thank you for calling my attention to the misleading information posted on the Internet by Andrea James.
My 2008 salary included a one-time buyout for unused vacation time (I had about six months’ worth of it) and does not reflect my annual base income.
At the time of the Vietnam war, I had an unusual exemption. According to my draft card (which I still have) it was a 4-A. This exempted me from the draft, in peacetime, as the sole surviving male heir of a serviceman killed in a foreign war. The US Congress never declared war on Vietnam, so it was technically peace time for the purposes of this draft law (or policy, whatever it was). My father, Ray Milton Blanchard Jr, a sailor in the US Navy, was lost at sea on 19 March 1945, in the bombing of the aircraft carrier, the USS Franklin. My mother was a few months pregnant with me at the time. I was the first, only, and posthumous child of Ray Jr.
In brief, I did not come to Canada to escape the draft. I had no incentive to do so.
Regards,
Ray
[editor’s note: this base salary is only one of Blanchard’s revenue streams.]

Carlson, Tucker (8 March 1999), “The Hall of Lame”, Forbes Magazine.
http://www.forbes.com/forbes-life-magazine/1999/0308/063.html

As most of those listed in the book know, entries in Who’s Who are mostly self-reported and largely unchecked, making it the ideal place to tidy up an uneven educational or work history… Indeed, the first clue that Who’s Who is a vanity publication is the “Thoughts on My Life” feature that appears beneath some entries.

Diamond, Milton and H. Keith Sigmundson (1997). Sex reassignment at birth: Long-term review and clinical implications. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 1997;151(3):298-304.

Dode, Lee (2004). A History of Homosexuality. Trafford Publishing, ISBN 9781412015387, p. 87

The psychiatrists had several choices of phraseology if they considered homosexuality a personality disorder or the expression of another kind of personality disorder. They could term a person a “psychopath,” “schizophrenic,” “normally imbalanced,” “weak psychological origins,” “arrested aggressive,” “purposefully immoral,” “containing a neurosis” or maybe “another natural human trait” which psychiatrists knew would not be acceptable to military standards. All categories were considered by the military to classify the person as “4 F”, undesirable for military service. Habitual criminals were also considered “4 F”.
In WWII, there were 2400 Army doctors and 700 Navy doctors who served as psychiatrists, many inadequately trained with poorly trained back-up personnel. Their policy was to discharge, court-martial, or reassign suspected homosexuals.
Military intelligence officers interrogated suspected military men for the names of other gay military and places the homosexuals met. Many innocents were arrested and imprisoned. Congress passed the May Act in 1941 giving the military the power to arrest and close businesses, and it was used against gays and their meeting places. Imprisonment gave way to military discharges for “4 F”, unfit for military service.

Freund, K., J. Diamant, and V. Pinkava. 1958. “On the validity and reliability of the phalloplethysmographic (Php) diagnosis of some sexual deviations.” Rev Czech Med 4:145-51.

Freund, Kurt (1963). “A Laboratory Method For Diagnosing Predominance Of Homo- Or Hetero-Erotic Interest In Male.” Behav Res Ther 21:85-93.

Green, Richard (2004). In Memoriam: Judd Marmor, MD. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Volume 33, Number 4 / August, 2004, pp. 327-328.

“I left Los Angeles in 1964 to avoid the Vietnam War by going to NIMH.”

Hill D.B., Rozanski C., Carfagnini J., Willoughby B. (2006). Gender Identity Disorders in Childhood and Adolescence: A Critical Inquiry. pp. 7-34. In Karasic D, Drescher J (Eds.) Sexual And Gender Diagnoses of the Diagnostic And Statistical Manual (DSM): A Re-evaluation . Haworth Press ISBN 0789032147

Inquirer staff report (December 29, 1992). South Jersey Deaths: Anthony Ruggero. Philadelphia Inquirer

ANTHONY RUGGERO, 75, of Hammonton, died Sunday at home.
Mr. Ruggero was a former lieutenant with Hammonton Volunteer Fire Co. 1 and a lifelong resident of Hammonton. He was a World War II Navy veteran and a member of American Legion Post 186, Hammonton.
Survivors: his wife, Angelina; three sons, Ray Blanchard of Toronto, Jim of Haddonfield and Bill of Monmouth Junction; two grandchildren, and a sister, Marie Stretch of Ocean City.
Services: friends may call, 11 to 11:45 a.m. today, Marinella Funeral Home, 102 N. Third St., Hammonton; Mass, noon today, St. Martin de Porres Church, South Egg Harbor Road, Hammonton; entombment, Greenmount Cemetery, Hammonton.

James, Andrea (2007). Plethysmograph: A disputed device. Transgender Map.

http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/plethysmograph.html

James, Andrea (2009). $325,000+ in salaries for Zucker & Blanchard to pathologize trans people.

http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/zucker-blanchard-salary.html

Lagow, Larry Dwane (1977). A history of the Center for Vietnamese Studies at Southern Illinois University. Ph.D. dissertation; typescript in Hoover Institution Archives.

Ken Zucker, a member of the SIPC*, was reported in the student newspaper the Daily Egyptian as conducting mock trials. At least one person was found “guilty” of “all the war crimes he committed against the Vietnamese,” according to Zucker. Student body Vice President Rich Wallace later introduced Zucker at a Board meeting, where Zucker read a list of demands which called for immediate withdrawal from Vietnam first and foremost. On Wednesday, January 21, 1970, the Student Senate passed what was reported by the Dally Egyptian as a “hastily drawn” resolution supporting the SIPC.

*Southern Illinois Peace Committee, founded by Bill Moffett in 1967 as an anti-war splinter group of Students for a Democratic Society.

Lalumière, M.L.; Blanchard, R.; Zucker, K.L. (2000): “Sexual orientation and handedness in Men and Women: a meta-analysis.” Psychological Bulletin 126, 575-592.

Lawrence, Anne (1996). Taking Portlandia’s hand.

http://www.annelawrence. com/twr/portlandia.html [deleted by Lawrence]

Lawrence, Anne (2008). Shame and Narcissistic Rage in autogynephilic transsexualism. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Volume 37, Number 3 / June, 2008.

When John Bancroft, the head of the Kinsey Institute, criticized Blanchard crony J. Michael Bailey for marketing a lurid book as “science,” Lawrence leapt to Bailey’s defense online:

“Bancroft’s remark was followed by utter silence in the room, as though no one could believe that anyone would say something so tactless. It was as though Bancroft had stood up and loudly farted — people looked at each other in embarrassment for him. “
Lawrence, Anne (August 23, 2004). Bancroft’s “not science” comment.

According to another attention-craving eccentric who defends Blanchard, Lawrence is the source of false rumors that the author of this profile declared bankruptcy. I’ll have additional examples of Lawrence’s rage in an upcoming profile.

Marquis Who’s Who, Inc. (1984) Blanchard, Ray. Who’s Who in Frontier Science & Technology , p. 66. ISBN 083795701X

BLANCHARD, RAY MILTON, psychiatry institute research psychologist; b. Hammonton, N.J., Oct. 9, 1945; s. Ray Milton and Angelina (Celi) Ruggero. A.B., U. Pa., 1967; M.A., h4U. Ill.-Urbana, 1970; Ph.D., 1973. Cert. psychologist Ont. Bd. Examiners. Psychologist Ont. Correctional Inst., Brampton, Can., 1976-80; research psychologist Gender Identity Clinic, Clarke Inst. Psychiatry, Toronto, Ont., 1980–. Killam fellow Dalhousie U., Halifax, N.S., Can., 1973. Mem. Internat. Acad. Sex Research, A, Psychol. Assn., Can. Psychol. Assn. Subspecialty: Gender identity disorders. Current work: Taxonomy of gender identity disorders; psychosocial adjustment of transsexuals; phallometric assessment of sexual anomalies. Home: 32 Shaftesbury Ave Toronto ON Canada M4T 1A1 Office: Gender Identity Clinic Clarke Inst Psychiatry 250 College St Toronto ON Canada M5T 1R8

Newbery, Lillian (November 27, 1984). Trans-sexuals happier after operation, MD says. Toronto Star.

Sullivan, Nikki (2008). Dis-orienting Paraphilias? Disability, Desire, and the Question of (Bio)Ethics. Journal of Bioethical Inquiry Volume 5, Numbers 2-3 / June, 2008, 183-192. See also Moser, Charles (2008). A Different Perspective. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Volume 37, Number 3 / June, 2008, 472-475.

Wake, Naoko (2007). The Military, Psychiatry, and “Unfit” Soldiers, 1939–1942 Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, 2007 62(4):461-494; doi:10.1093/jhmas/jrm002

Harry Stack Sullivan’s failure to protect homosexual men from medical and social stigmatization by screening them out of the armed forces.

Wise TN, Lucas J. (1981). Pseudotranssexualism: iatrogenic gender dysphoria. J Homosex. 1981 Spring;6(3):61-6. See also Prince, Virginia (1978). Transsexuals and pseudotranssexuals. Archives of Sexual Behavior, Volume 7, Number 4 / July, 1978, 263-272.

USS Franklin (CV-13) (21 February 2008). Ship’s Company Killed In Action.

http://www.ussfranklin.org/kia/sc.html
Ray M. BLANCHARD, Jr. AM2C 19 March 1945

Further reading:

Trans News Updates by Lynn Conway
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/News/News.html
http://ai.eecs.umich.edu/people/conway/TS/News/News.html#zucker

Transvestic Disorder and Policy Dysfunction in the DSM-V by Kelly Winters
http://www.gidreform.org/blog2009Apr22.html

Stop Sexualizing Us! By Julia Serano
http://www.gidreform.org/blog2009Apr22.html

http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-history.html

Ray Blanchard’s problematic place in history

Previous: Toronto: epicenter of pathologization of sex and gender minorities

All of Ray Blanchard’s work is about to be eclipsed by what will be Blanchard’s most enduring legacy: the broad expansion of “paraphilia” in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V) to further oppress sex and gender minorities as mentally disordered. Blanchard plans to expand it to include attraction to anyone who is not “phenotypically normal” (ASTAR 2009). Blanchard now wants to expand this disorder to include attraction to people who are too fat, too skinny, too old, too young, too tall, too short, too disabled, or any other characteristic that makes people not “normal.”

His taxonomy of trans women has already reduced all our relationships to paraphilia. People who love trans women have a paraphilia he calls “gynandromorphophilia” (Blanchard 1993), and trans women who get in relationships are merely using their partner as a paraphilic prop in a narcissistic fantasy (Sullivan 2008). This echoes outdated assertions that gay people can’t have a “normal” relationship.

It’s amazing to me that someone whose sexuality was depathologized by psychiatry the very year he got his Ph.D. would be so hell-bent on imposing that very oppression on others. Yet here we are. The biggest step backwards in the history of sexology is about to happen, thanks to Ray Blanchard. He probably won’t live to see what a problematic figure he will become within his own field, becoming like John Money: someone where it’s hard to separate the good from the bad. The DSM-V will be Blanchard’s “John/Joan” case (Diamond 1997): the cringe-inducing career misstep that will define his life and career to the lay public.

What’s most interesting is how these “experts” feel entitled to define and label others, then get their panties in a bunch when labels and motivations are ascribed to their own actions. It’s as if they use “science” and self-mythologizing to assert a “truth” about themselves and their unassailable objectivity. I’m sure Ray thinks that being openly gay would bring his own objectivity into question. Good science stands up to that scrutiny, though. With good science, someone’s professional or personal information is irrelevant. The only place the identity of the scientist comes into play is with subjective stuff like plethysmography or proposed taxonomies and terminology. When a subjective claim about an object of study is made, it is scientifically imperative to examine the subjectivity of the person making the claim. Hence this analysis.

Perhaps Ray Blanchard’s peers will see what a remarkable psychological case study he is. Better yet, perhaps some day Ray Blanchard will be a little more open and honest about himself. All this might help explain why he believes other people can’t be trusted to be open and honest about their sexualities.

Good scientists make full disclosures so peers are aware of potential bias and conflicts of interest in their work. Perhaps Ray Blanchard will finally start making full disclosures. It would be far better if he let everyone know that his entire career has been undertaken for the most personal reasons imaginable. But as we’ve seen in his case, Ray Blanchard is more interested in applying labels to others than acknowledging labels that apply to him. It is his blind spot and his hubris; the flaw that sends him stumbling away from sound science and down the unlit paths of pathology and oppression.

—

First published 2 November 2009.

http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-hypotheses.html

Toronto: epicenter of pathologization of sex and gender minorities

Previous: Ray Blanchard motivations for oppressing sex and gender minorities

Ray Blanchard’s mentor Kurt Freund (1914-1996) was also an expert in psychiatric screening of military recruits based on sexual orientation (Freund 1963). Freund ended up significantly shaping public policy and public perception of sex and gender minorities in the second half of the 20th century. Freund is the developer of the penile plethysmograph (Freund 1958). He was commissioned by the government to use it in the psychiatric screening of military draftees in his home country (now called the Czech Republic). People there were attempting to avoid conscription by claiming to be gay. Freund’s device was developed to see if gay erotica turned them on, simplistically assuming that erection = gay, non-erection = nongay.

Kurt Freund sidebar: Freund continued this work after he fled to Toronto in 1968, while Blanchard was in graduate school. Blanchard met him in Canada while working with sex offenders, and he would later become Freund’s protégé at what is now the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). Freund, who was almost exactly the same age as Blanchard’s father, obviously became a father figure for Blanchard, right up until Freund’s suicide (AP 1996).

Though the plethysmograph is considered as scientifically questionable as the polygraph (lie detector) and is not admissible in most trials as evidence, that didn’t stop Freund and his protégés from promoting its use for a range of applications, usually centering around catching people “lying” about their sexual interests. The device is attached to the genitals and a change in blood flow is measured while subjects are exposed to visual and/or audio stimuli (James 2007).Like Freund, Blanchard has done direct work with sex offenders, a population that most people consider the absolute worst of the “unfit.” Blanchard has certainly seen and heard things first-hand that would give anyone nightmares. Sexual assaults on children by stepfathers and other family members. Catholic priest sex crimes, committed by the types of authority figures Ray probably looked to as father figures in his own early life, men who disproportionately targeted gay boys.

Blanchard is the only smart guy currently working on sex and gender at CAMH. The rest of them range from utterly mediocre to downright inept. It’s got to upset Blanchard that someone less intelligent but more political like Ken Zucker makes a better base salary despite being younger. Zucker has been a politician since his days as a Vietnam War protestor, so Blanchard will always take the back seat in the leadership department. Blanchard does share two things with his less talented colleagues: rigidity and unmitigated arrogance. As with most pathological science, they have insulated and isolated themselves from mainstream science through academic logrolling and nepotism, creating little organizations and journals where they can make sure their worldview prevails unchallenged.Blanchard’s bid for immortality

It’s the end of the genetic line for Ray, a bitter pill to swallow for a sociobiologist. They often have this quaint heterosexist notion that “evolutionary fitness” is based on one’s number of offspring. So what’s Ray’s bid for immortality? Barring sperm donation, it’s going to be discovering and coining things, an unfortunate obsession found in a certain kind of academic. This goes beyond the “significant contribution” scholars are supposed to make as they move through the lock-step management chain of academia. Blanchard’s ideas are his children.

I imagine a number of questions turn over in Ray’s mind a lot:

Why am I gay?
Was my birth father gay?
How can I connect myself to a man I never met?
Why do attention-craving eccentrics rally around me and my work?
Why are cross-dressing psychologists so enamored of my work?
What do Maxine Petersen, Steven Pinker, J. Michael Bailey, Anne Lawrence, and Seth Roberts all have in common (besides psychology)?

Ray’s bid for immortality has led to an enduring legacy. His work on male birth order and sexuality will probably stand up to further scientific scrutiny (Blanchard 1996). His work on handedness and sexuality seems to have promise as well (Lalumière 2000). This work makes even more sense when considered in context of his family dynamic.Blanchard and company will also be known for using CAMH to set up the world’s largest publicly-funded forced feminization sex dungeon and transgender reparative therapy clinic (Hill 2006). Applicants (supplicants, really) are carefully screened to include only the most indigent, low-functioning members of society, unable or unwilling to obtain services elsewhere. The regressive requirements at CAMH attract people who get off on humiliation, creating a convenience sample of the bottom 10%: the most eccentric and least successful segment of the transgender community (Newbery 1984).

Cross-dressing sidebar: Transgenderists like Anne Lawrence and Maxine Petersen serve as mini-Blanchards, reproducing the same desire for respect and control by seeking power over a community rather than for it. They are two key promoters of Blanchard and his work. Petersen is a rather dim person who seems genuinely baffled as to what the problem is; Lawrence, by far the smarter of the two, knows exactly what the problem is. Lawrence claims to be a community pariah because of the proselytizing for Blanchard. Both are in fact heroes in their own tiny community of what used to be called “pseudotranssexuals” (Wise 1981). They are, however, pariahs in the larger community. The conflict arises from their assertions that they are transsexual, citing Blanchard’s paraphilic model of gender variance as “proof” of their identities. The transsexual community has rejected both of them as respected authorities. In an apparently unintentional case of self-projection, Lawrence chalks up negative reaction to Blanchard’s ideology as “narcissistic rage” (Lawrence 2008). Petersen and Lawrence will continue to be Blanchard stooges because it’s the only place they get the attention and validation they seek. Lawrence has even written about being a “priestess” (Lawrence 1996), as if restrictive gatekeeping of trans health services is some sort of religious ritual controlled by nuns and priests.

Is there more to the story of how Ray’s life experiences shaped his ideology? You betcha. Can I tell you what else? Not just now.

While these issues have all made news over the years, they are about to take a back seat to the issue that will define Blanchard’s career: his planned expansion of paraphilia as a disease, as discussed in the next section.

Next: Ray Blanchard’s problematic place in history

Ray Blanchard motivations for oppressing sex and gender minorities
Notes, updates, further reading

http://www.tsroadmap.com/info/ray-blanchard-clarke.html

“Male gender dysphorics, paedophiles, and fetishists:” How Ray Blanchard sees us

The quotation in the title above is from a 1993 paper by sexologist Ray Blanchard. [1] Blanchard is affiliated with Toronto’s Clarke Institute, long known as “Jurassic Clarke” among transsexual women for its outdated and draconian rules imposed upon women in our community seeking health services. In Blanchard’s worldview, transsexual women are males whose condition is on a continuum with the other groups he studies.

Background: The Clarke Institute

The Clarke Institute is named after Charles Kirk Clarke (1857-1924). Clarke oversaw the two largest Canadian mental hospitals before accepting a government mental-health post. In addition to his desire “to keep this young country sane,” he sought to advance the psychiatric profession’s influence in making medical and political decisions.

Typical of “professionals” who are unable to see (or worse) unconcerned about larger systems which influence their realm of expertise or narrow interests, Clarke was an early proponent of eugenics, emphasizing the importance of restrictive laws that would limit the immigration and marriage of the“ defective.” [2] During his tenure, foreign-born patients made up more than 50 percent of the institutionalized population in Canada. [3]

As Katherine Wilson notes:

Psychiatric diagnosis on the basis of social, cultural or political affiliation evokes the darkest memories of medical abuse in American history. For example, women suffragettes who demanded the right to vote in the early 1900s were diagnosed and institutionalized with a label of “hysteria” (Mayor, 1974). Immigrants, Bolsheviks and labor organizers of the same era were labeled as socially deviant and mentally defective by prominent psychiatric eugenicists, such as Dr. Charles Kirk Clarke. [4]

Christened with his name, the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry opened for business in 1966. A young staff member recalls those early days:

My first impression of psychiatry in Toronto was that it was rather parochial in outlook and had a distinct British socio-biological emphasis and little interest and much scepticism about psychoanalysis. […] The Clarke, instead of being an ivory tower, seemed more like a cold cement fortress. [5]

Enter Ray Blanchard

Ray Blanchard came to “The Clarke” after studying sexual behavior in criminal men, pedophilia in particular. He began his work with Kurt Freund, who brought Blanchard into Clarke, and who himself is an expert in the area of “phallometric testing,” a “psychophysiological method for assessment of erotic preferences in males” — strap a “strain gauge” around a guy’s penis, show him pictures of whatever, and draw your own conclusions. Indeed, the Clarke Institute’s own literature states,

The Clarke Division Phallometric Laboratory was established by Kurt Freund, M.D., D.Sc., the first clinical sexologist to use penile plethysmography to assess erotic preferences in men. It is the oldest laboratory in North America for the phallometric assessment of sex offenders and paraphilics, and its instrumentation for the collection and processing of phallometric data is still the most sophisticated in North America, or indeed, in the world. [6]

The problem with penile plethysmographs (PPGs) is that they are like lie detectors (polygraphs): they measure a body response, but the data is open to interpretation. For this reason, they are often challenged as evidence in court, as with lie detectors. As the Skeptic’s Dictionary notes:

A man or woman may be aroused by the sight of animals copulating or be aroused by a film of a woman eating a banana and a man eating a fig in particularly provocative ways. Still, they may have no desire to engage in bestiality or have sex with a bowl of fruit. A heterosexual man or woman may be aroused by the sight of lesbians engaging in oral sex, but have no desire to have sex with lesbians or in the presence of lesbians.
Strong arousal need not imply strong desire for what causes the arousal; and weak arousal need not imply weak desire. Furthermore, no test can determine whether a person will act on his feelings and desires. [7]

This is the major controversy in Blanchard’s work: interpretation of data, and issues of his subjectivity, based on his assumption that transition is about erotic preference. While this may describe someone like Anne Lawrence, who considers her sex drive “that which moves us most,” many of us feel this is not an accurate or even correct description of our motivation for transition. Cause and effect may be difficult to distinguish.

Blanchard has headed both the department for sex offenders and the department for gender identity. In fact, patients have told me that in the past The Clarke was set up so sex offenders and transsexual women shared a hallway, offices, waiting room, and even staff, who would essentially just “change hats” whether they were seeing a transsexual woman or a sexual predator. Imagine the dynamic that created. It was under these conditions that Blanchard made many of his observations regarding people presenting with gender issues.

A reader writes:

Blanchard, like many researchers of his day (and sadly today as well) take their base assumptions from their formal training and experience. Homosexuality may be out of the DSM, but it was not that long ago that it was considered itself a psychopathology. The psychological community’s exposure to “things trans” was for many, many decades the paraphilia and festishism that spring from transvestism. Erotic preference is, I think, an important key to understanding all the “taxonomy” of Blanchard.
In his research approach (and many, many others’), their tacit assumption is the problem lies solely in the mind, be you a pedophile or paraphiliac or gender dysphoric (the “constructionist” approach versus “essentialist”). This naturally leads in the matter at hand to focusing on erotic preference as the “natural” dividing line.
Put yourself in Blanchard’s shoes (or Bailey’s for that matter). They genuinely and honestly do not believe the claims of people like ourselves that we are who we are. To them, we’re men, and it’s just that simple. They take that stance not even as a conscious effort — it’s just where they came from as psychologists. The fact they might use the pronouns we prefer is just a way of humoring the patient, but in no way implies or lends credulity in their minds to the legitimacy of their use.

Not only do they see us as men, but they also consider transsexual women to be liars, guilty of “systematic distortion.” Below is an abstract from a Blanchard paper (when Blanchard says “heterosexual” and uses male pronouns, he means transsexual women attracted to women):

The tendency for a heterosexual subject to describe himself in terms of moral excellence or admirable personal qualities was significantly correlated with scores in the ‘transsexual’ direction on all eight sexological measures; for the homosexual subjects, only one correlation was significant. [… It] is possible that the differences in the histories produced by transvestites and heterosexual transsexuals are exaggerated to an unknown degree by the motivation of the latter to obtain approval for this operation. The findings do not diminish the important distinction between these groups, but they do suggest caution in interpreting the self-report data that have been used in comparing them. [8]

We find ourselves in a no-win situation in changing their viewpoint. We are males to them, and when we try to explain why we feel this is not accurate, we are unreliable reporters who can’t be trusted.

Karen Gurney writes:

The problems I see, with the Blanchard position is that:

(a) it falls into the fundamental trap of trying to put overarching labels (either/or) on a group which is the epitome of diversity itself;
(b) it fails to recognise the physical intersexual nature of transsexualism – the incongruence between the phenotypical and neurological sexes;
(c) it seeks to attribute the psychological manifestations of neurological sex solely to “sexual desire” and does not reflect the John/Joan evidence which was so revealing of the shortcomings of psychological thought in regard to then accepted notions that gender is constructed;
(d) it is inherently disrespectful of the experiences of the majority of us who live with transsexualism, and especially those who pioneered the way by undergoing essentially primitive surgeries (as the transsexual men forgotten by Blanchard and Bailey still do) which did not produce wholly functional genitals, sacrificed all sexual sensation for the sake of harmonising “mind” and body, and were carried out in often ill-equipped clinics in faraway places (I have a friend who had her surgery in Casablanca in the early 1960’s);
(e) it is predicated on the notion that sex assignment at birth is immutable and hence is opposite the medical rationale applied to many thousands of intersex individuals each year that, where sex is atypical or ambiguous, a medical construction is a valid response, and the legal position that such a constructed sex is valid (I do not seek to justify the ethics of such assignments where they are carried out shortly after birth but point to the many XY females who are happy in their opposite gender role and are accepted as females for all purposes); and
(f) it fails to account for the experiences of a significant number of intersex individuals who do not fit into a theory which is based on the dichotomy of both sex and gender and whose gender, like their sex, is ambiguous.

In 1998, the Clarke merged with three other mental health and addiction facilities: the Queen Street Mental Health Centre, the Addiction Research Foundation, and the Donwood Institute. Collectively, they are now known as the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) [9]

Perhaps we should think of The Clarke the way they think of transsexual women. They can change their name and act like a mental health facility, but deep down they are still the same fossilized institution that pathologized homosexuality and continues to pathologize those who do not fit society’s standards for male and female.

From Blanchard to Bailey

From Blanchard’s work comes Bailey’ popularization of Blanchard’s observations and theories, where we become exotic or pathetic males driven by sexual urges to drastic ends. As Katherine Wilson notes:

Much psychiatric literature about transgender people is shockingly similar to that published about homosexuality before it was depathologized. It is based on a presumption that cross-gender identity/expression is by definition pathological, is focused on unsubstantiated theories of psychodynamic (mother-blame) cause and anecdotal case studies of institutionalized subjects, denies the existence of healthy productive TG people in society, and ignores anthropological evidence of accepted cross-cultural TG roles. These tired old myths were debunked for sexual orientation 25 years ago and have been recycled to target transgender individuals. [4] (emphasis mine)

As we continue to see more work into the field of biologic and genetic investigations of sex and sexuality, it is very important to do what we can to help those undertaking this work to understand the larger systems in place, outside their realms of expertise. To ignore the historical context and the important ethical and political issues involved in this type of research has shown to be disastrous throughout history.

These people may consider themselves above criticism, especially critical comments by those from whom they make their livings, but they do so at their own peril, and at the peril of society.

It’s impossible to separate ideological commitment from the highly specific historical contingencies bearing upon psychology and medicine in this time and place. This can certainly be demonstrated in Clarke’s work on eugenics, which diffused through society and later accreted around fascism and Nazism. Those of us outside psychiatry, and those of us directly affected by the profession, must raise these important issues and maintain a rigorous critical viewpoint. In that way, we can hope to avoid having what appear to be “facts” misinterpreted, by both researchers and the public.

Bailey’s interest in biological and genetic causes of sexuality and transsexualism does not occur in a vacuum, and he is not as “objective” as he’d like to think. As occasional Bailey co-author Richard Pillard notes:

No scientific knowledge is risk-free, and this must surely include genetic investigations of sexual orientation. One might take a sort of perverse comfort in knowing that homophobia, like racism (and all the xenophobias), exists regardless of whatever might be considered “the facts” of the moment. Research on human sexuality will, by its nature, evoke resistance and fear, to some extent legitimately. [10]

Draft version. Many thanks to those who contributed materials. Please contact me with comments.

References

1. Erotic target location errors in male gender dysphorics, paedophiles, and fetishists. Freund K, Blanchard R, Br J Psychiatry 1993 Apr;162:558-63

2. Keeping America Sane: Psychiatry and Eugenics in the United States and Canada, 1880-1940. Ian Robert Dowbiggin. Cornell University Press, 1997.

3. www.americanscientist.org/bookshelf/Leads98/benjamin.html

4. http://www.transgender.org/tg/gidr/tf3023.html (citing Dowbiggin, 1997, pp. 133-177).

5. http://www.psychoanalysis.ca/clients/cps/essays/tps%20history.html

6. Clarke website.

7. http://skepdic.com/penilep.html

7. Social desirability response set and systematic distortion in the self-report of adult male gender patients. Blanchard R, Clemmensen LH, Steiner BW, Arch Sex Behav 1985 Dec;14(6):505-16

8. www.gicofcolo.org/gd/writings/faqpsy.html

9. http://www.camh.net/

10. “The Genetic Theory of Sexual Orientation” in the Harvard Gay and Lesbian Review, Winter 1997, pp. 61-67.

My Experiences at the Clarke Institute

Editor’s note: Leslie has graciously honored my request for submissions from women who had dealings with the Clarke Institute in Toronto. Leslie’s story tells the sad tale of the Clarke’s faded glory. Now that they do not hold any purse strings, they have no power to speak of over local transgender populations. Leslie found them to be “a bunch of dirty old men, masquerading as clowns… stuck in the ‘ivory tower’ mentality of an old, fossilized institution which has grown arrogant and believes it is above questioning.”
“The Clarke” may have changed their name to Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), but they remain as out of touch as ever with the patients they purport to help.
Thanks to Leslie for sharing her important story with such thoughtfulness and detail!

My Experiences with the Clarke Institute’s Gender Identity Clinic

First let me say that I did not have a bad time during my 4 visits to “the Clarke”. On the first occasion they were helpful; the second, polite and mildly complimentary; the third depressing because it was the support group full of depressed people and the last, just plain irrelevant.

I have always been a woman, but was in denial until September 2000. Once I admitted that my condition was gender dysphoria I had to do something about it. Three friends had been to the Clarke Clinic and I knew of no other place where the condition was dealt with. After almost a year of trying out herbals, which did nothing, I had a check-up with my family doctor and broached the subject. He readily agreed to refer me to the Clarke. That was in August 2001 and the appointment came up in April 2002.

During the intervening months four things happened. A friend offered me a bottle of Premarin and I eagerly began taking it on October 9, 2001. From a Yahoo group I found out about a doctor in Toronto who would prescribe hormones. He in turn found me a caring psychiatrist. I was forced out of my home by my family. So when I went to the Clarke it had already passed the time when I needed them for anything.

The biggest crisis in my life came on Valentine’s Day 2002. I was forced out of my home by my adult son, with my spouse’s agreement. They were extremely unhappy that I was “crossdressing” – never in front of them and never to the extent of interfering with my family’s welfare. They refused to consider any information I gave them and wouldn’t talk about it. Being ejected without warning was a total shock to me, and I looked around for help and support. The Clarke’s information package said they could help in a crisis, so I e-mailed and got an appointment with their only TS employee one week after my ouster.

First Contact

I had female clothes, but since the issue with my family seemed to be the clothing I wore, albeit always outside of the house, I stayed in self imposed male clothing for the first month of my separation from my family. I went to the appointment, February 21, 2002, dressed as a man, but still on hormones and still knowing I was a woman. I was received courteously by Ms Maxine Petersen and given ample time to tell my story. Her reaction, and that of everyone else, was that it was plainly wrong for this to have been done to me. I explained that the combination of my spouse and adult son against me made continuing to live there impossible. I was not about to get into a fist fight, something I had never been good at.

I remember asking if it was possible to be a transsexual and live as a man all or most of the time for the rest of my life. She said she didn’t know… which was a wise answer. We discussed an appointment for my spouse, but she said it would be better for her to see the social workers. Maxine felt unable to deal with irate wives herself. She told me my spouse would be able to come to my April evaluation days as long as I signed a release. While I passed this information on, I found that she had no wish to be involved in either way.

I felt affirmed and relieved that my personal understanding of my enforced leaving home was a sound interpretation. Of course, nothing further could be done to help me get back home without at least minimal cooperation from my spouse. Sadly, that was not forthcoming.

Second Contact

By the time my official evaluation came up I had seen my psychiatrist a couple of times and found him professional, caring and very helpful. He had counseled about 65 Trans patients during his long career. By this time I had given up hope of ever being re-united with my family and had transitioned to full time living as a woman, on March 13, 2002.

April 15 and 16, 2002, were my days at the Clarke. I didn’t know what to expect, and was prepared to walk away if I didn’t like what I found. I was pleasantly surprised. They no longer put sensors on the genital organs and show dirty pictures to test for gender dysphoria. That would have been sufficient for me to walk out…

First, I saw Maxine and was greeted warmly. I felt a lot more confident than at my last visit, as I was reconciled to probably losing my marriage, though not by my choice. I gave her my two photos as requested, “crossdressed” (actually neither was that as they both showed me as a woman), my questionnaire and my biography. We chatted for almost an hour and she rather apologetically asked me what turned out to be the key question at the gender clinic: “What do you think about when you are masturbating?” I told her. I was rather amused that they considered masturbation habits to be relevant to the diagnosis of gender identity.

My next interview was with Dr. Choy. He was also friendly and apart from saying with a smile that I had jumped 2 or 3 steps ahead of where I should be it was a pleasant experience. He also asked about my masturbation fantasies and I told him the same story.

Finally I was seen my Dr. Dickey, chief psychiatrist of the gender clinic. He was accompanied by his nurse, an older woman. He was very relaxed and gave me his opinion that gender dysphoria was a condition from birth. He also asked about my masturbation fantasies and I gave him the same answer. That was the most significant question I was ever asked, but clearly shows confusion between gender and sex. Or, perhaps an attempt to prove the validity of the autogynephilia theory of Dr. Ray Blanchard.

He asked me what I did about facial hair removal and I said I shaved. He advised me to start my electrolysis now. It wasn’t bad advice, but I didn’t have the money and they of course pay for nothing. It amused me that he felt he had to tell me that women don’t have facial hair! I was offered a piece of paper that he proposed was a “pretend ticket” for sexual re-assignment surgery and asked if I would take it. Of course the answer was yes – a no-risk, no-brainer decision since they didn’t fund it any more anyway. I guess I passed the test.

He asked me for any comments on their service to me and I had to mention that it had taken 7 months to get an appointment. He pulled a sad face and I sympathized that they had budget and staff cutbacks. He seemed glad to have the understanding and support from me… say, who was the therapist here?

In response to his inquiry as to any final questions I might have I asked this: “I don’t mean to be impolite, but can you tell me why I might ever want to come here again?” He took it well, thought a minute and came up with three possible reasons. First, if my psychiatrist didn’t work out they could provide that for me. Second, if I needed a letter for surgery, after a full two years of full time experience of course, they could do that for me, or provide the supporting letter. Third, I could attend their support group.

I had not heard the last item mentioned yet that day, but now it had become the “Jewell in the Crown”. I knew about it, so I said, “But, I can’t go there yet.” He seemed taken aback and said, “Of course you can go. You can go as a man; you can go as a woman; you can go dressed as a bunny rabbit!” While I was amused, and I think it was just his wacky but well meaning way of telling me that there was no dress code, it did make me wonder about this man. I later characterized them all as a bunch of dirty old men, masquerading as clowns!

After the hour the nurse walked me out to the locked door – this is a high security facility. She asked me if it was my own hair (no, I’m bald) and complimented me on my good taste in clothes (white blouse and tan knee-length skirt). She spoke rather distastefully of the “crossdressers” they sometime saw who dressed too flamboyantly.

The next day I was scheduled to see Dr. Betty Chan, Endocrinologist and Internist, at her office away from the Clarke. I say scheduled because even though the printed copy I had with me said 10, they had me down for 11 am. So I went and had a coffee first.

I had brought a photocopy of my latest blood test results, which she seemed glad to have. I was interviewed briefly about general health, and my HRT regimen. Then I was asked to strip down, in private, put on a paper dress and lie down for a physical examination. She was very discreet and gave me the same courtesy she gave all her female patients. She checked my blood pressure and said it was too high so I should ask my doctor to double my spironolactone and halve my Premarin. (The first my doctor agreed with and did, but he laughed and dismissed the second as typical of the Clarke’s extreme conservatism.) When I was about to leave I asked for my blood test results back and she seemed a bit taken aback that I wanted them, but photocopied them and returned my copy. She told me I didn’t need to come back, which was good as I had no need or intent to return anyway! To be fair to her, I should mention that she had a cold and was probably not feeling well.

The months went by and I was busy moving and re-establishing myself as a woman, in my new community. I knew the support group didn’t meet in July and August, and I had nothing back from the evaluation days. I e-mailed Maxine on May 14, 2002, asking about both and received no answer until late July. She told me then that she had been very ill and off work, which I sympathized with in my return mail. The recommendations following from the evaluation had not been sent out during her time off to recuperate, but she said they were the standard ones: continue transition; be under medical supervision for HRT; wait full 2 years before surgery. She gave me the date of the first support group meeting, and I resolved to attend it.

Third Contact

Wednesday September 18th, 2002, at 6 pm I went up to the 4th floor of the CAMH building and found over a dozen people waiting to be let in behind the locked door for the first meeting of the season. All were male to female types. One of them I knew already and said hello to her. I wore women’s cargo pants and a top and most were similarly dressed. A couple wore skirts and blouses, conservative and tasteful. Many made no attempt to look like women. Some looked scared.

We were taken to a crowded room which had about 18 chairs, for 16 of us. There was no coffee or other refreshments. We were asked to sign a confidentiality agreement. Nothing that took place in that room was ever to be revealed outside or we would be banned! Was I joining a secret society? I could understand that since this group was open to every variety of crossdresser, transgender and transsexual, privacy was important for some. Maxine was in attendance, but said little. She introduced a student who was really to be in charge, a nice young woman who was pleasant, but detached. I had the feeling that the prevailing atmosphere was, “We know you aren’t really women, and you know it too, but we will all pretend so you can feel good about yourselves.” I didn’t feel good. I knew I was a woman and found them condescending and oppressive.

We went around the circle introducing ourselves. There were 2 or 3 post-ops but most had not transitioned yet. Some were depressed, some hostile, some paranoid. I felt uncomfortable as I had none of these problems. My intro was brief and to the point: hormones begun October 9, 2001, transitioned March 13, 2002, surgery scheduled November 21, 2002. Most of the people told stories of doom and gloom. Problems in women’s washrooms, hair removal that hadn’t worked, rejection by families, severe depression not fully responding to treatment…

I told my little story about the two Pentecostal evangelist ladies who had visited me a few weeks before and didn’t understand what I meant when I said I wouldn’t be acceptable in their church because of my “gender dysphoria”. I’d had to say something to enlighten them, so I made the explanation that “I used to think I was a man, but I haven’t had any surgery yet.” They immediately told me that I should remain the way God made me and not do anything to alter my body. They took my hands and prayed for me very movingly, always using “her” and “she”. I had initially marveled that these were so untypical of many Christians who criticize and ridicule transsexuals. It struck me several hours later that they were convinced I was a genetic female who had at one time been tempted to masculinize myself!

I made the point that while I have a very femme body and pass easily, I believed that the most important ingredient was confidence. It could have happened to any one of them if they just believed in themselves. A few people were impressed favourably. Most just sat there… they preferred to tell their sad takes of woe and receive sympathy. The leaders did very little to guide the discussion or give helpful advice to anyone. They looked bored. They told one woman that she transitioned backwards because she did it at work before she transitioned at home. I felt sad for her. It wasn’t a confidence builder. I felt very much out of place. I’d gone into every possible situation before and since my transition and felt completely at home, but I wanted to get out of this artificial and stultifying place. When it was announced that our time was up at 7:30 pm I was glad to get out of there, and never went back. They had nothing to offer me. If I went weekly I would have been depressed!

A long time Clarke girl told me later that the Clarke’s method was to deliberately intimidate, so you would be able to stand up to the scorn and ridicule of the outside world. I found that strange as the outside world was a very comfortable place for me to live and be at ease in. Only the contrived Clarke atmosphere was hard to take. There is such a thing as anticipating trouble, so that it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy… I think they do their clients no favours by this “programme”.

Fourth Contact

I was expecting a 6-month recall interview and sure enough, a week before I went to Thailand for my surgery the envelope arrived. It had been sent to my old address in Bowmanville. I checked, and I had advised the Clarke of my current address in August. More surprises ahead! Inside, the letter said, “Dear Andrew”, which was never a name I owned or used. Furthermore, the date of my appointment was to be November 20, the day before my surgery, when I would already be in Thailand. I had mentioned that at the support group, but obviously it hadn’t made it into the system.

I phoned and left a message explaining why I wasn’t going to make it on that date on their voice-mail, then e-mailed and cc’d to Maxine. Within 20 minutes I had a reply, apologizing profusely and thanking me for my “generous offer” to keep in touch after my surgery. Since it was worded so winningly I decided that I would contact them on my return, once I felt up to it.

You can read my surgery story at http://www.kindredspiritlakeside.homestead.com/lesley.html .

In early February I e-mailed Maxine and said that I was ready have the interview. She asked me to come in on February 28, 2003. I told her I was the biggest success story she would ever have sitting in her office. I showed her my psychiatrist’s letter to my surgeon, and my surgery photos. I offered to e-mail them to her, and did so at her request. She was interested in my psychiatrist and said she would invite him to join their new advisory committee. I told her I knew about it, but I wasn’t interested in applying to join the committee.

I discussed “what the Clarke could do for people” and asked why they doubled the Harry Benjamin standards. She told me about a few F to M TS’s who had dropped out of the programme and come back years later to thank her for not giving them hormones and thereby causing permanent sterility within months. That was the basis of their “higher” standards. I mentioned that a few handouts would really help clients: steps in transitioning; friendly electrologists; legal name change etc. She agreed it was a good idea. But after over 25 years in the business of “helping” Trans people they had nothing to give them.

Maxine was surprised to hear that the SRS surgeons in Thailand don’t follow the Harry Benjamin Standards. I was surprised that she was so unaware of that fact, and that many hundreds of people from all around the world prefer to go half way around the world rather than submit to the humiliation of the treatment gender clinics like the Clarke mete out.

I told her I try to steer as many people as possible away from the Clarke and to my own doctors, who give excellent service. She just shrugged. In light of their meager resources and diminishing budget I asked if I could volunteer and help them in some way. She said no, the only possibility was the advisory committee. I suggested that since they were not my support group I thought they should at least pay for parking, since I was aiding in their research. I was frostily told that they never did that.

So we didn’t part on the friendliest of terms, which was not my intention. She is a nice woman and as helpful as she can be within the restrictions the institution places on its staff. It seems the idea of being responsible to their clients is offensive to them. They are stuck in the “ivory tower” mentality of an old, fossilized institution which has grown arrogant and believes it is above questioning.

In Conclusion…

When they were the gatekeepers for government funded SRS they had great power. Now they are irrelevant, but still keep on in the same authoritarian way. Perhaps it is a good thing to have them to care (?) for those with serious co-morbid conditions beside gender dysphoria. It seems that many in the “support group” have fallen through the cracks of the health care system and they at least have something there. I know several people personally who went away from the Clarke weeping, yet found help elsewhere. There is no way of knowing for sure, but I believe the number may be quite high. They are success stories in the Clarke’s book, because they left the programme voluntarily and didn’t make the “mistake” of transitioning and SRS. At least the Clarke interprets it this way as they have lost touch with them. I’m told some former clients have committed suicide in despair of ever getting help, but I can’t verify that.

Would I go back if invited? Probably, but they won’t like the questions I ask and I doubt if I will hear from them again. I am not going to be put onto their committee and thereby neutralized as a critic of their practices and policies. It’s too bad they are so insular as they are the only “official” gender clinic in the province of Ontario. This means that every doctor has them in his reference book, and will send patients with gender issues only to them, unless they have specifically asked for another doctor.

I got what I wanted and needed without any help from the Clarke. It felt pretty good that I had gone through the evaluation and was treated with courtesy and compliments. It’s easy for me to “blend in” with feminine features and only 5’8” tall, but I wonder, do the big, angular girls have such a good experience from the Clarke?

Maxine did admit grudgingly that “maybe” I was one of the ones who didn’t need a full 2 year “real life test”. I’m told she took more like 5 years to make up her own mind. I knew after a week that this was the only life for me. I resent the fact that these people deliberately hold back very promising candidates for hormones and surgery just because they won’t treat them as individuals. It’s a “one size fits all approach” but we are not all the same! They don’t trust us to tell the truth about our transition dates. You have to change your name to an unmistakably female name (mine wouldn’t do) and show education receipts or pay stubs to prove you have lived it. Apparently “Big Brother” knows best… in their book.

I was 3 months on hormones before I found my hormone doctor and only 5 months full time before my psychiatrist recommended me for surgery. That would be considered irresponsible by the Clarke, but for me it was appropriate and worked. I like the way my psychiatrist put it better: “Any nurse, or secretary, can go down a check list and tell you when you have qualified for hormones or surgery. I assess you on the basis of my 23 years of working with trans clients and you are a classical transsexual.” I would never have heard that kind of statement at the Clarke.

My surgery experience is posted at http://www.kindredspiritlakeside.homestead.com/Leslie.html

Sincerely and lovingly,
Lesley Carter

Lesleycarter2000@yahoo.com

Update – November 2005

I’m now 3 years post-op and living a happy and anonymous life in the community with my partner. I accompanied her just a year ago to the same SRS surgeon I used and her results have been equally good. I’ve had little contact with the CAMH Gender Clinic but sometimes talk to their clients.

One girl who went on their advisory board confided in me that they were still rigidly standing by their old principles and she doubted they would ever change. I had anticipated that. Another contacted me because she was due for an appointment and couldn’t get a reply back from them. She eventually did, and I had lunch with her in the CAMH Cafeteria. It’s a huge 12 story building with all sorts of addiction and mental health clinics. It might have been my imagination but I thought we got a lot more rude stares from passers by than I had in other restaurants.

My opinions of this venerable old institution have changed very little in the intervening years. I still think they do more harm than good, but in a time of penny pinching by the government perhaps that problem will solve itself. What we need is more private physicians and psychiatrists who will give proper care to those who wish to transition and the means of finding them easily. Too many doctors would rather not touch anything as controversial as feminizing transsexuals. Even the Clinics who do give care to transsexuals are notoriously conservative. One of them has a used needle disposal system in their patients’ washroom, with a notice that they operate a needle exchange. However, they still insist on a minimum 3 month wait after first contact before prescribing hormones and have turned some down. One candidate who was turned down for health reasons came to me for information. She has been happily on “offshore” hormones for 6 months with no ill effects and is planning on SRS next year. Why are hormones considered more dangerous than illegal injectable heroin?

Our provincial government is considering re-listing SRS as a surgery that is funded by our health care system, but moving painfully slowly in that direction. If they do I want 3 new standards built into the plan: 1) free choice of the preferred surgeon (with a reasonable maximum limit on the price of course), 2) approvals by nothing more restrictive than the Harry Benjamin Standards – http://www.hbigda.org/soc.htm , and 3) allocation of sufficient funds to clear the 7 year backlog and provide enough surgeries to meet the real needs, not the 10 a year that it averaged before. Not to be too much of a pessimist, but I have my doubts that they will ever actually pay for it again.

My experiences

by Sharon

In the mid 1970’s, when I was in my early twenties, I sought the assistance of the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry’s gender identity program.
The conflict between my gender identity and my sex arose at about age 9. By age 12, I had come to understand that I was in fact a girl, and that I needed to change my body to conform to the way I felt inside.

At about this time, the newspapers reported the first experimental organ transplants, and the enhancement of topless dancers’ breasts using silicone injections, which led me to speculate whether or not the same methods could be used to make my body female.

Unfortunately, I was very tall for my age – already over 6 feet, and still growing rapidly. I knew that this would be great obstacle to passing as a woman, and it was a tremendous source of anxiety.

I needed to start shaving at a younger age than most boys I knew. Had I been a boy, this might have been a source of pride and self-confidence, but I was a girl, so it was hell.

At about age 13, I read a newspaper article about transsexualism, and the existence of endocrinological and surgical treatment. It was a great relief to know that I was not alone, and that medical treatment existed. Through my adolescence, I never wavered in my desire to be female in all respects.

The Clarke made clear from the outset that research was the major focus of their program. I was supportive of their conducting research, but I soon realized that they offered precious little in the way of treatment, and then only to the small fraction of applicants they accepted into their program.
They scheduled numerous appointments for all manner of tests and interviews. I was interviewed by at least two of their staff psychiatrists, including Dr. Freund, who tried to console me by pointing out that this problem was not my fault. I already knew that. The other psychiatrist focused a lot on my height, and pointed out that I would have a lot of problems, which of course, I already knew.

Several of my appointments were at nearby hospitals for various medical tests. I recall that one of them involved some sort of an imaging scan. I handed the test form to the technicians, one of whom giggled when she read on it “transsexual”, Fortunately, all other medical professionals I encountered at the hospitals treated me with respect.

My assessment by an endocrinologist led to the one bright spot in my Clarke experience. He was new to their program, and I recall that they talked him up as being a leader in his field, and something of a coup to have on their team.

I found him understanding, and willing to help. As part of his assessment, he asked to see me completely in the nude, so that he could get a sense of what hormones might do for me. While acknowledging that my height was an obstacle, he expressed the opinion that my body could be successfully feminized using hormones. This was music to my ears!

Even better, he offered to start me on estrogen right away, and I was thrilled to accept. At my first opportunity the next day, I presented my prescription to a local pharmacist, but there was a set-back. I was told that they could not provide the prescribed dose. At first they refused to explain the problem, but eventually told me that the unit of measure was out by a factor of 1000, e.g. micrograms vs milligrams. Fortunately, they were able to reach the endocrinologist by phone and quickly resolved the problem, but it was a nervous moment.

It felt wonderful to start on hormones. Soon, I had a follow-up meeting with the endocrinologist, at which he asked me a favour – would I be willing to meet some of his medical students, to provide them an opportunity to meet someone like me. He wanted to include that experience in their training, in the hope of promoting better understanding. Recalling the giggles from the imaging technician, I could see the potential benefit, so I readily agreed. We had the meeting, and it went very well. Needless to say, I was feeling much better about the Clarke’s program.

With the completion of the medical tests, my appointments reverted to the Clarke. As I recall, one of the staff asked how I liked their new endocrinologist. I responded very positively, and expressed my joy at finally having been prescribed estrogen. Upon hearing this, the staff member freaked, and next thing I knew, I was confronted by more senior staff, who told me that the endocrinologist had not been authorized to prescribe the hormones to me. They demanded that I turn over the unused portion of the drug, else they would drop me from their evaluation.

I felt I had no real choice in the matter, so I reluctantly complied. It was a huge let down, and from that point, the Clarke experience was just something to be endured.

One of their evaluations required that I present myself dressed as woman for an interview with one of their staff, which was to be videotaped. Since I had not transitioned, and would not have passed in public, they agreed that I could change into my feminine attire on the premises. They left me alone to change in the studio where the interview was to be taped, but soon I noticed the cameras slewing to aim at me. The bastards were taping me dressing! I complained, afterward, but they just sloughed it off. It was now becoming clear that I was much more of a test subject to them, than a human being.
One of the final tests involved the plethysmograph. A contraption designed to measure penile response while the subject is shown various pictures. I was told not to speak, and to focus my attention on the pictures. I was surprised to find that some of them were from the session for which I had dressed as a woman. I remember little else about the test itself.

Afterward, I chatted briefly with the test conductor, as we walked down the hall. Trying to make the best of the awkward situation, I commented that I guessed it was valuable to have the opportunity to obtain scientific data on transsexuals. To which he responded that few true transsexuals were available for study, in contrast with homosexuals, who were available “by the wheelbarrow”. Clearly, I was just a data point to him.

Finally, I met with Dr. Steiner and several other of the staff, who told me, “You are not a transsexual, and you do not need a sex-change, at least not now.” Dr. Steiner warned against rushing to feminize myself on hormones, because in her opinion that accounted for most of the sex-change. I was told that I required years of intensive psychotherapy, and they offered to recommend some doctors. I told them, “thank you for nothing”, and walked out.
I was little more than a research subject to them – research that spawned such nonsense as Dr. Blanchard’s theory of autogynephilia.

Within a year, I found a gynecologist who readily agreed to my request to begin hormone treatment. My body responded wonderfully to estrogen, and within two years, I had a pleasing bosom, and my hips had filled out – finally skirts fit properly! Having greater access to my female emotions was great, as was losing my male sex drive.

In the end, I found the prospect of transition too daunting. I was not at all confident that I could overcome the problems of my great height. I did not have the emotional strength to deal with the rejection of family, and the abuse of strangers. Living as a man is hell for a woman, but living as a woman seen by everyone as a man, likely would be even worse.

Nevertheless, I completed facial electrolysis, and I love the softness of my skin. My hair is shoulder length, femininely cut, and I love it! I have never for a moment regretted feminizing my body. After twenty five years, I could not imagine not having breasts. For me, some feminization has proven much better than none. It made my life bearable, though far from happy. Successful transition is the only way to have a chance at true happiness.

I am fortunate to have meaningful and intellectually stimulating hobbies, into which I can escape for brief periods. I am also fortunate to have a few good friends.

Sharon

—

Toronto Star, Tuesday, November 27, 1984
Trans-sexuals happier after operation, MD says
By Lillian Newbery
Toronto Star
Page H2

The vast majority of men and women who had surgical sex changes in Toronto say they prefer their new gender.
Most support themselves in society without welfare or unemployment insurance.

Dr. Mary Steiner, head of the Gender Disorder Clinic and the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry, said recently the favorable results probably reflect the strict evaluation given those who seek such surgery. Only 1 in 10 men who request it are approved.

The Gender Identity Clinic assesses individuals who dress as the opposite sex, long to be the opposite sex or believe that inside they really are the opposite sex, research co-ordinator Leonard Clemmensen said during a recent research open house at the institute on College St.

In the most extreme cases, called trans-sexuals, the sense of belonging to the opposite sex is “longstanding and unalterable” and leaves them feeling constantly unhappy.

“If the patient has been definitely diagnosed as trans-sexual, has no other major psychiatric disorder and has proven ability to function in society as a member of the opposite sex, then the clinic may recommend sex reassignment.”

The Gender Identity Clinic contacted 38 women who became men and 41 men who became women, representing 77.5 per cent of all sex reassignments coordinated through the provincial institute in the past 15 years.

The study included only people who had the surgery a year or more before and the average time between the date of surgery and follow-up was 47.4 months.

Only one of the group said she was “unsure” if she still wanted to live as a female and none said they wish they hadn’t had the sex change. All but five said they prefer their current gender and would undergo such surgery again. One homosexual male changed to a female, three heterosexual males changed to females and one female changed to a man said they would “probably” choose the change if they had the decision to make over again.

One of the aims of the program has always been to end up with people who are self-supporting in society, Steiner said. Usually they hold jobs on a lower level than before the sex change, although some have returned to their old jobs.

Of 79 studied, 69 sustain themselves in society without welfare or unemployment insurance benefits.

All the 38 women who underwent the sex change had been attracted to females before the surgery. Of the 41 men: 32 known as homosexual trans-sexuals had been attracted to other males before surgery; nine known as heterosexual trans-sexuals has been attracted to females.
Thirty-nine of the 79 live with a member of their own biological sex in a stable relationship.

If you had dealings with the Clarke Institute and the Gender Identity Program, particularly with Ray Blanchard, we hope you’ll contact me to share your story.