Yes, I myself am a “post-op” transwoman (if you really must know) and while the Harry Benjamin Syndrome idea is certainly interesting, it is innacurate to say that it is anything more than a theory, right now. We just do not know. Yet We know the processes involved in brain development. What actually results, is still in the hypothetical stage.

I think I know where some of the “male privilege”-crying transphobia comes in with interactions between these particular cisgendered women and trans women. I’m not sure, but I have a theory.

People raised as male are generally taught that it’s OK to hold opinions and defend them in certain sorts of ways. They are not encouraged to think of themselves as victims, as acted-upon-helplessly-by-other-people.

A person with the victim viewpoint will frequently find themself in a position of difficulty in relating with people who don’t assume they are helpless in various ways.

I’ve heard women being called complicit with the patriarchy for making their own choices, and caring to speak of them, many times. I realize there is internalized sexism, and that I am predisposed to spend less worry on it than many people because of my own genderqueer status, but there is also a normative, one-true-female-way current that rides on the victim ticket and I have a truckload of problems with it.

To this viewpoint, when a female-assigned person says “I’m not helpless, I can take responsibility for my own choices” it’s because xe’s internalized the patriarchy! When a male-assigned person, who has entered a female identity, says (or acts like) “I’m not helpless, I can take responsibility for my own choices” it’s because she’s carrying male privilege! This logic reads “self-confident” as “male.”