Answered questions from second-wave anti-TERF lesbian standpoint. What does our animating experience of challenging the importance of gender mean now in this brave new world?

Stein's answer: it's different now. We grew up in a context of binary rigid roles, and threw them off. These folks grew up in a context of infinite choices, and can migrate towards the identity which works for them. ( )

A work of popular sociology focused on interviews with several trans men and a transmasculine lesbian undergoing top surgery. While Stein does her best to be sensitive and does a solid job discussing a wide variety of trans issues, this is very much a book written by a cis person for cis people. Stein lets her second-wave-feminist-lesbian tendencies out sometimes, which feels very dismissive. But she talks about nonbinary and gender-diverse identities with some enthusiasm, she acknowledges her own limitations, and she's obviously respectful of her subjects. This is a decent Trans 201 for cis folks, and in that context I'll recommend it. ( )

Sociologist Arlene Stein organizes her discussion of transgender issues around the life stories of four individuals she met in a Florida plastic surgeon's waiting room. The surgeon specializes in "top" surgery for F2M transgender people and others who don't like having breasts. The lives of Stein's subjects, Ben, Parker, Lucas and Nadia, seem fraught with anxieties and complications with or without boobs.

The narrative is at its best when Stein lets the individuals involved speak for themselves about what it is like to be a transman today. I wish Stein had found a larger sample size with more variety (her subjects are all white, twenty-something and raised Catholic). The book also includes an interesting final chapter on current trends in gender identity.

It can be hard for those who have never experienced gender dysphoria to understand why anyone would want to undergo painful and expensive surgery to remove a non-diseased body part. This text goes a long way toward explaining this often misunderstood phenomenon, and more. ( )