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I voted no, but I wouldn’t be shocked if I were wrong. Honestly, like virtually everything else, cross dressing is a choice we make to engage in a behavior we enjoy. Everyone has their own unique sets of temptations or preferences — that exist for whatever reason — but because we are humans with free will, moral agency, and intellect and institutions that set boundaries, then following through with acting on those things is a choice we make.
I’m not suggesting that all temptations/preferences are bad — some are not — but behavior always involve choice. Some people crave sweets; others salt. One might have a predilection for liking chocolate because he was “born that way,” but the decision about whether to actually consume chocolate on any given occasion is a choice.
That’s why the genetics of these things don’t interest me that much, because they can tend to make people think we are merely helpless products of our biological mandates and thus not responsible for the consequences of our choices. Or we use genetics as our excuse for bad/destructive behavior.
Again, I’m not saying CDing is bad, but for some, it might be depending on how they execute it. Kinda like alcohol. Or golf. Or chocolate.
Hi Hippie,
I suspect it might be coincidence. If you think about it, you inherited half your genes from your mum, and she inherited half her genes from her mum, so already your own gene make up is three quarters diluted compared to your grandma. Add in a cross dressing sibling to you grandma and the dilution is seven eighths from him to you.
If there was a cross dressing gene it would have to be really dominant to show up in these circumstances. And if it did show up, I’d wonder why only a few examples of cross dressing were in your family tree.
Don’t take this as anything more than a thought experiment. It’s massively more complicated – as Stephanie P has already suggested.
Marti xxx
Hi Hippie…
I voted ” possible”…I have never heard of anyone in my ” tree” being a crossdresser….but nobody knows I do either. I expect the further you go back, the more secretive it would have been due to lack of understanding..( even more than now!!!! )
In reality, there could have been a lot or I could be unique…..
…..and I always like to think grace is quite unique !!!!
Grace xx
I wouldn’t have a clue, I’ve done genealogical research on my family too and never found a trace of any crossdressers, but it wouldn’t be something that was talked about until recently I would have thought.
unique (in my family- I think)
Diana
I checked off I don’t know Hippie as I’m not aware of any. I know I’ve got a lot of nuts in my family tree but no CD’s to my knowledge.
When my father died, 20 years ago, I found a few dresses and other items in a bag in his work room. There were a few magazines that seem to point he may have been a CD. I never suspected. My mother got terribly upset when I pulled the dresses out and quickly said I should throw them away. So was he? I don’t know, but I do think of how much different our relationship would have been if we would have known.
Interesting topic, it seems difficult to determine if it’s hereditary empirically because most us keep it a secret. Does anyone here know how big is the group here at CDH or percentage of the general population are cross dressers? Just wondering if CDH ever host a conference, we could run into our relatives….that could show possibility of heredity. I can imagine a conversation like this ” Dad is that you?…wow amazing makeup, but that mini skirt and cleavage are a bit much don’t you think?!” 🙂
Hippie,
As one who is a firm believer that there are no biological basis to support crossdressing when seen as a behavior, my vote was “no”.
And before the nice ladies with torches and pitchforks arrive, I know that crossdressing can be a behavior related to other issues, like hormone imbalances, in utero feminization, etc.
By itself, it is, in my opinion, more likely to be originated by nurturing instead. A family where there are several CDs may share different educational/formative threads which may be less likely to discourage activities like crossdressing, to basically encouraging it.
A matriarcal family where being a female is celebrated would be a good example.
Other than that, a simplistic example would be a family where both parents attended the same college. They will cheer for the same teams, they would encorage kids to attend that same school, etc.
Or even closer to your example… Lt. Dan in “Forrest Gump”. His grand grand dad was a soldier, his grand dad was a soldier. His dad was a soldier. He was a soldier. Was that due to s biological “predisposition”? Unlikely.
Gabriela
Hi Gabriela,
I’m with you on this. Scientists have used identical twins often in trying to clarify the “nature versus nature” question. This research paper’s abstract suggests that at least some identical twins don’t even express the same gender – despite having exactly the same genes:
“Two pairs of monozygotic twins discordant for gender identity are described. The first set are 8-year-old males, one of whom enjoys doll play, cross-dressing, and taking the role of a female in fantasy games. His brother shows no feminine behavior, enjoys sports, and is more masculine in gestures and speech. The second set are 24-year-old females, one of whom wants to undergo sex-change surgery to male status. Her cotwin is a feminine woman desirous of marrying and bearing children. Differential childhood experiences are described for the cotwins. These highlight environmental influences, which may contribute to variances in masculinity and femininity, when genetic influences are held relatively constant.”
No point providing a link, the full article is behind a pay wall, grr.
Marti xxx
Sure, here it is:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24179079/
-as I said, you can’t access the full paper without paying, There are links to related research, but again, only summaries
Marti xxx
Thanks, thats all I needed. Here is a link to the full report for free. Its in PDF format so you can read it off-line so you dont have to tie up your phone line.
Thanks very much Hippy, end of the evening for me, but I’ll pm you later about it.
Marti xxx
I might be missing something, but how could one possibly comment on inheriting cross dressing, when, as I see it, no one in their right mind in your family tree, is ever going to admit to being a CD? This would particularly be true in earlier years, where being a CD would bring great shame to yourself and your family, resulting in possible job loss and who knows what other negative things. Yes, I realize there probably were exceptions where people came out in the open and out of the closet.
Fast forward to 2021 there are more of us out in the open and out in the public on a daily basis, so I guess that will make family tree tracing easier.
OTOH, I do wonder. With cross dressing being so common among engineers and so many engineers in my family tree, there has to be more than one CD in my family tree.
I voted “I don’t know.” I have three brothers and one male cousin. Three of the four are of the Duck Dynasty persuasion. They have beards, big bones and large frames and take pride in their macho appearance and behavior. They are God-fearin’, gun-totin’ LGBTQ-haters, and that includes CDs. Not that they couldn’t be closeted crossdressers, mind you, but I would faint dead away if I ever found out one of them lives a secret CD lifestyle.
I’m the polar opposite. Scrawny, clean shaven, and the furthest thing from macho you ever wanna see. But in all the years, they’ve never confronted me directly about my macho-deficient demeanor. Don’t ask, don’t tell, I guess. After I’m gone, I’m sure they’ll be cleaning out my apartment. If I don’t get to do that one final purge before the final curtain, I can just imagine what they might say. I don’t think I want to know.
As to the family generation preceding me, my Dad and all my Uncles are gone long ago, so I’ll never know if they had CD tendencies.
So, if crossdressing is an inherited trait, then I have no idea who I could have inherited it from.
I don’t think so, I don’t know of any others in my family extended or otherwise. Gay and Bisexual, yes, but crossdressers, none that I know of, and I never heard of any like the uncle “no one talked about”. As for the generation(s) after me, I can’t think of any CDer’s either. I can’t imagine I am the only one though.
Possibly!! Tho I was still only 7 or 8 yrs old, I still reckon I can recall my Dad coming out of the bedroom of our holiday house and prancing around the living room wearing a bra over his drab.
Nothing else mind, but the memory has never left me and I have to wonder what else may have gone on behind closed doors?…
What is also relevant is that several years later, when in my early teens and having been caught dressed by some relatives, he gave me the big stern taking to about how “boys don’t do that sort of thing”.
I voted could be possible ,on a couple of occasions while my parents were away or may have been out , I found in my dad’s draw in the dressing where he kept his handkerchiefs, a couple of suspender belts and stockings ,what were they doing there ? they were the only items I ever found . Very Strange !!
Michelle xx
I selected i dont know as i cant conclusively determine one way or another either yes or no. But some in my family left a lot of possible clues and suggestions especially in my paternal grandfathers side. Of my two grandmothers one was an only child (her mother dying when she was a child) and my other grandmother was adopted so very (!) few possibilities to observe. My paternal grandfather was the only one of 3 to marry and have kids and my maternal grandfather had one brother who married but i never met any of that branch(and i certainly tried) so i have no idea. Not a large selection of relatives to look at.
But lets also be real, not many in the generations born before 1900 would ever openly admit to being anywhere on the LGBTQI+ spectrum….ever. And if any were , i sincerely doubt they would leave obvious clues – writings , clothes, partners willing to tell all . Back then you were expected if you were a standard looking model of a human, to marry and have kids…lots and lots of kids. So a paternal great grandfather had 8 kids 4 boys and 4 girls that lived into adulthood. They were Catholic. Two!!! only, married and had kids, one male and one female. The others remained resolutely single. No military, no religious profession, just single. The one male had 3 kids 2 girls and a boy. one girl died young. the other girl graduated from a big time university in the midwest around 1900…and never married. i have pictures of her. .she was beautiful by 2000 standards. Never married.
Lets also be real here. Back then the terms in LBGTQI were hardly if ever used…except gay…for quys. And that word and all its disgusting alternatives were used to describe any male who didnt fit the accepted model of what a male was supposed to be. You liked other guys? Gay. You were effeminate? Gay. etc. etc.
Now, both my father and his father were very involved in theater. Sure,lots of males are. So was I. This is just another clue. My father died when i was young , years later my mother confided that she suspected some of his close friends were gay. Except what did ‘gay’ mean in 1950? Just another clue.
I dont know, just a number of clues. Now about that study. Was it reproduced independently? Studies dont mean much if they arent shown to be reproducable. That is the scientific method that gave us cell phones and vaccines. Studies are nice but there have be more than one to suggest common validity.
I voted i dont know as i certainly dont have enough clues to know for sure but im still caually searching and still reading. And still suspecting there is something more than just nurture.
I am of the opinion I was born this way, I started very young and despite numerous attempts at purging and trying to leave this thing behind it always comes back. A description I often use is, if you had blond hair but wanted black, you could dye it, no problem you have black hair, until it grows and the blond would show at the roots. so you would have to dye it again, and keep on doing that. And so it is with crossdressing, no matter how I tried it always came back, just like the blond hair, because (I believe) it’s genetic. Like having blue eyes or being left handed, you don’t get a choice in the matter. So going back to the original question, as I believe it is genetic, it must have been passed to me from my parents…….. Now I don’t know if I am the first ‘genetic mutation’ or if there is a history within my family. I suspect if I were to go back far enough and take in a wide enough sample of the family I would come across another crossdresser, but that may just be coincidence!
I voted I’m not sure, maybe back in the 50’s and 60’s they never talked about that sort of thing, it was possible all hushed up and kept out of sight, i do have a gay brother who served in the military, we didn’t know about him until maybe the turn of the millennium he kept it secret too,
We all live and learn, they say you can’t judge a book by it’s cover x
Hugs Rozalyne x
Someone asked if there any statistical numbers on cd world wide. No, because of the secretive nature of cd no one has ever attempted to document the numbers. However, statistical analysts have done some probability numbers based on loose assumptions. Their estimate is that 5% of the world’s male population cross dresses in some form, from underdressing, private or secret dressing to full out public dressing.
Now let’s look at that numerically. Numbers are rounded for simplicity.
World population (rounded up): 8 billion (8,000,000,000) Male population (rounded up): 4 billion (4,000,000,000) Five percent cross dressing: 200 million (200,000,000).
Even if these numbers are over because of rounding or incorrect assumptions there are still huge numbers of cross dressers worldwide. Now you can see why the cd businesses exist. There are a lot of men that want to buy panties. WE ARE NOT ALONE!
To take the math a little further a similar, but unprovable, estimate is that 5% of cross dressers are gay, 2% are bi and 3% are tg. The criteria for these numbers are VERY fluid and inexact so there is little faith in them. However, if you suspend critical suspicions and take it at face value that means 10% are not hetero or 20 million (20,000,000). Leaving 180 million (180,000,000) heterosexual cross dressers.
How this fits in with genetics and nature vs nurture I do not know. I personally believe that genetics plays a part but nurture is also part of it. Did we inherit the behavior, was it an accidental gene malfunction or did mommy encourage it?
😮
Beth
My dad and his brother were both crossdressers and kept it very low profile. My crossdressing stated in the fifty’s and I also kept it A secret to everyone but the one i married. My nephew just came out as A crossdresser but only after his father passed on as he was an ex marine sergeant and a policeman and very intolerant. So can it be inherited? Maybe so.
I voted that is was possible. I would never know for sure, but I highly doubt it. Most men had toxic masculinity in my family tree.
I posted this exact same thing about 6 months ago. I know for a hard fact that some of my family are queens, cd’s and gay. I had suspicions of a few but it wasn’t till I stumbled upon some thing that were truth to those suspicions. Only one of them I now communicate with. I thought it was awesome to find out that one of my favorite uncles is a drag queen and knew some of the most famous drag queens over the year’s. Anyway nice duplicate thread, it’s always a good conversation piece!
That’s a beautiful question but I don’t know if Anyone in my family was a crossdresser I only knew my mother’s side of my family she raised me since I was 9 years old after she finally divorced my abusive father only met his side of family couple times it wouldn’t hurt me if I had another family member like me I’d enjoy being with her as a woman also
Yeah, we use one them DNA and genealogical family tree companies. Cost a bundle but family split the cost. Well they found all kinds of stuff. They found photos, they found log books, I mean they found a ton of stuff. Like my family is not all white, some were some real bad, some are famous and everything in between. Like a cool thing I found out that I had family that faught in the american revolution war. That some cool stuff to find out about.
We got the idea from this PBS show called Finding Your Roots.
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