The female-impersonators: $b A sequel to the autobiography of an androgyne and an account of some of the author's experiences during his six years' career as instinctive female-impersonator in New York's underworld; together with the life stories of androgyne associates and an outline of his subsequently acquired knowledge of kindred phenomena of human character and psychologyWerther, Ralph
History
The female-impersonators: $b A sequel to the autobiography of an androgyne and an account of some of the author's experiences during his six years' career as instinctive female-impersonator in New York's underworld; together with the life stories of androgyne associates and an outline of his subsequently acquired knowledge of kindred phenomena of human character and psychology
Werther, Ralph
Cross-dressing -- United States -- History; Gay men -- United States -- Biography; Transgender people -- United States -- Biography; Werther, Ralph, 1874-
The two classes of androgynes do not mix well. Just as the full-fledged
man is averse to attendance at a ladies’ sewing-circle. Particularly the
mildly androgynous fear suspicion of their secret if they associated
with ultra-androgynes. Coteries of ultra-androgynes naturally form.
Knowing their own nature, they readily recognize one another, although
down to 1921 at least, the sexually full-fledged have usually been blind
to the androgynism of daily associates, because they were never
permitted to learn of their existence.
(6) PSEUDO-HERMAPHRODITES are humans possessing in part both the male
and the female genitalia, or else organs so deformed that even
sexologists are unable to determine the sex until puberty. In half such
cases, the physician then pronounces the individual to belong to the sex
other than that with which he or she has identified him or herself. As a
rule, they subsequently live and clothe themselves per prescription. But
some, accustomed to the dress and usages of their first sex, choose to
identify themselves with it throughout life.
Pseudo-hermaphrodites are the limit toward which the ultra-androgynous
approach by slight gradations. Their frequency is not greater than one
in a million to ten million humans.
(7) FULL HUMAN HERMAPHRODITES—possessing both complete male and complete
female genitalia—have never been encountered. There exists in medical
annals, however, a pseudo-hermaphrodite who so nearly approached full
hermaphrodism that at one period he-she claimed to have lived as husband
and father, [Sidenote: _The Sex Scale._] and at a later, as wife and
mother. This reputed transposition is in accord with the observed
phenomenon[8] of an individual’s passing over from one sex class to
another at the climacteric corresponding to menopause in woman.
* * * * *
I have a theory that the sex class of an individual male depends on the
size, but particularly the vigor, of his physical reproductive
apparatus. I have ascertained such variety to be practically infinite,
and psychicly as well as physically.
There exist no sharp dividing lines among the six classes of males.
While the bulk of a particular class correspond closely to the
description, there are individuals on each side of such mode who
constitute slight gradations over to the next class. Thus each class
gradually and almost imperceptibly shades off into the next. There
exists indeed a sex scale along which all human beings can be
theoretically arranged. At one pole stands the tremendously virile
man—for example, the rough volunteer common soldier, as a rule intensely
polygamous; at the other the petite, cry-baby species of woman.
Androgynes and gynanders occupy exactly the middle section, looking
toward both the male and the female side.
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