A gender setting: Inside the world of pandrogyny

In a previous blog I briefly examined the extreme art and music of Genesis P-Orridge and Throbbing Gristle. In the last decade P-Orridge began a performance art series called “Breaking Sex” with his partner and second wife Lady Jaye (who died in 2007 of heart failure complications arising from stomach cancer). The culmination of this art project can be seen in the documentary film The Ballad of Genesis and Lady Jaye (directed by Marie Losier).

Most of you reading this will be well aware of ‘androgyny’ (i.e., the condition of having both male and female characteristics in either bodily appearance, attitudes and/or behaviour). Those who describe themselves as androgynes often claim they don’t fit into society’s gender roles. Genesis P-Orridge has taken this one stage further and developed the concept of ‘pandrogyny’. According to a posting on the CrossDressers.com website:

“Pandrogyny is the conscious embracing of gender roles, sexual orientations, or cultural traditions so as to render the person’s original identity completely indecipherable. It is the ‘third gender’…a type of gender-neutral living being more akin to the OTHER…a pandrogyne is [about] making one’s life (a brief existence) into an art form. Is [pandrogyny] transvestism, transgendered behavior, or transsexuality? None of the above, as it turns out”

Along with Lady Jaye, Genesis P-Orridge decided to create a third being as both an artistic expression and statement (i.e., life – quite literally – as “a work of art”). They fused their psychological identities and underwent radical and irreversible plastic surgery to look more like each other (including reconstructive facial surgery [cheek impants, rhinoplasty, lip pumping], liposuction, and breast augmentation). In an interview with Tamara Palmer about Lady Jaye and the Pandrogyne project, Genesis said:

“We started out, because we were so crazy in love, just wanting to eat each other up, to become each other and become one. And as we did that, we started to see that it was affecting us in ways that we didn’t expect. Really, we were just two parts of one whole; the pandrogyne was the whole and we were each other’s other half. DNA is really the new battleground for evolution. If we want to survive as a species, if we want to hopefully colonize space and do incredible things, we have to completely reassess how the human body works and realize that it’s not sacred, it’s just stuff”.

The underlying philosophy of pandrogyny is about creating similarity, unification and resolution, rather than difference and separation. Genesis explained the concept further:

“When you consider transexuality, cross-dressing, cosmetic surgery, piercing and tattooing, they are all calculated impulses—a symptomatic groping toward the next phase. One of the great things about human beings is that they impulsively and intuitively express what is inevitably next in the evolution of culture and our species. It is the ‘Other’ that we are destined to become.”

In a different interview he went on to further outline what the pandrogyny project was all about.

“We are not trying to look like twins, though we wouldn’t mind that if it were possible. We are seeking to give an initial impression of visual similarity as far as we can. As a 56 year old biological male who is 5 foot six inches with a 30 inch waist, I can never reasonably expect to look identical to Lady Jaye who is a biological female who is 35 years old and 5 foot 10 inches high with a 24 inch waist. [However] we are committed enough to surrender our bodies to surgeries even if we end up not liking how we look. That is not what we are concerned with. We have no urge to try and ‘look better’, or younger, or more ‘glamourous’. Nor are we changing gender. Pandrogeny is about neutralising gender in order to REPRESENT a future possibility for thee species”

One of the central themes of their work is the “malleability of physical and behavioural identity”. P-Orridge’s work has been influenced by the ‘cut-up’ techniques of both William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin (a technique popularized by David Bowie in the 1970s). As P-Orridge explained:

[Burroughs and Gysin] began to cut-up and, incorporating random chance, re-assembled both their own and co-opted literature…They referred to the phenomena of profound and poetic new collisions and meanings that resulted from their intimate collaborations as the ‘Third Mind’. This was produced with a willingness to sacrifice their own separate, previously inviolate works and artistic ‘ownership’. In many ways they saw the third mind as an entity in and of itself. Something ‘other’, closer to a purity of essence, and the origin and source of a magical or divine creativity that could only result from the unconditional integration of two sources”.

Genesis first met Lady Jaye in the early 1990s and eventually fused their separate (art)works before combining their individuality. They have literally cut up their bodies to create the pandrogyne, a third body that is the sum of their two bodies and minds subsuming each other. Genesis says that the way that he and Lady Jaye look relates directly to the internal dialogue that describes themselves to each other. In an interesting interview with Douglas Rushkoff in the Believer magazine, Genesis was asked what the difference was between pandrogyny, transvestism, and transgnder. He replied that:

“The main difference is that Pandrogeny is not about gender, it’s about union. The union of opposites. One way to explain the difference is very easy: with transgender people the man might feel that he’s trapped – the person feels they’re a man trapped in a woman’s body, or a woman trapped in a man’s body – whereas in Pandrogeny you’re just trapped in the body. So Pandrogeny is very much about the union of opposites, and, through that reunion, the transcendence of this binary world and this illusory, polarized social system…When people have an orgasm together that’s a moment of Pandrogeny. And when people have a baby, the baby is pandrogynous, sexually. Because it is literally two people becoming one”

Genesis and Lady Jaye have both taken body modification to the maximum, but unlike most people that engage in extreme body modification, they have done it in the name of art, not beauty or vanity.

Dr Mark Griffiths, Professor of Gambling Studies, International Gaming Research Unit, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK

Further reading

Ford, S. (1999). Wreckers of Civilization: The Story of Coum Transmissions and Throbbing Gristle. London: Black Dog Publishing.

Frederique (2011). You’ve heard of androgyny, but what about PANdrogyny? CrossDressers.com, September 13. Located at: http://www.crossdressers.com/forums/showthread.php?159912-You%92ve-heard-of-androgyny-but-what-about-PANdrogyny

Palmer, T. (2008). Genesis P-Orridge: The Body Politic. Current.com, December 29. Located at: http://current.com/1lkam4c

P-Orridge, G, (2002). Painful but Fabulous: The Life and Art of Genesis P-Orridge. Soft Skull Press.

P-Orridge, G. (2011). Pandrogyny and the overcoming of DNA. Sex, Gender, Body. Located at: http://sexgenderbody.tumblr.com/post/11588285014/pandrogeny-and-the-overcoming-of-dna

Rushkoff, D. (2012). In conversation with Genesis Breyer P-Orridge. The Believer. Located at: http://believermag.com/exclusives/?read=interview_p-orridge_rushkoff

Wikipedia (2012). Genesis P-Orridge. Located at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesis_P-Orridge

Each to their own: Five weird (non-sexual) addictions, compulsions and obsessions

On a recent rainy Sunday afternoon and out of sheer boredom I typed in the words ‘weird addictions’ into Google. There were a large number involving various sexual acts that I will leave for another blog. Today’s article briefly overviews what I found that didn’t involve sex along with a brief commentary on the extent to which these behaviours can really be said to be an addiction, compulsion or obsession.

Tanning addiction: Addiction to tanning – typically involving the repeated daily use of sun beds by women – is something that I have commented on a number of times in the British national media and relates to an apparent unhealthy dependence on tanning as a way of raising a person’s self-esteem. Back in the 1990s, the media often referred to this condition as “tanorexia”, and this term has now been taken up by some members of the academic research community. For instance, a study carried out in 2008 on 400 students and published in the American Journal of Health Behavior reported that 27% of the students were classified as “tanning dependent”. Personally, I am not convinced that this is a real dependence and/or addiction based on the empirical evidence to date, but I will look at this issue in more depth in a future blog.

‘BlackBerry’ addiction: There are countlessmedia reports of males in management and other professional occupations who are allegedly addicted to their Blackberry (or ‘Crackberry’ as the media often likes to term it). Symptoms include such things as (i) hearing a “phantom rings” and/or experiencing phantom vibrations, (ii) constantly checking e-mails and/or texts. Apparently, the content of emails and texts makes the person feel important and (like ‘tanorexia’) helps raise a person’s self esteem. Although I have often written and researched into ‘technological addictions’ I have yet to come across a case of genuine case of Blackberry addiction myself. If such an addiction does exist, there are also issues around whether the Blackberry is just a means to fuel particular addictive behaviour (e.g., texting) or whether people are addicted to the Blackberry itself.

Cosmetic surgery addiction:Again, there are many examples in the popular media of patients who allegedly have an addiction to plastic surgery.  There are certainly well documented cases of high profile individuals who have undergone countless operations in their desire to achieve (what they perceive to be) the perfect face and/or body (Michael Jackson, Cher, Jocelyn ‘Cat Woman’ Wildenstein, David Gest, Micky Rourke). Such people appear to be initially satisfied once they have had the procedure in question but then start to think “just one more (operation)”. Again, I am unconvinced that any of these high profile cases are “addicted” to plastic surgery but like ‘tanorexia’ there is certainly the desire to look good as a way of feeling good about themselves. However, there are cases of individuals who seek out constant plastic surgery because they suffer from Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD). BDD can affect sexes and typically manifests itself as a preoccupation with an imagined physical defect or an exaggerated concern about a minimal defect. This may lead the BDD sufferer to a cosmetic surgeon in an attempt to try to change or eliminate the perceived defect. The patient is never happy with the changes so it begins another cycle of surgery. The exact cause or causes of BDD is unknown, but most clinicians believe it to be a complex disorder with biopsychosocial underpinnings.

Addiction to chewing ice: On first glance, ice chewing might seem to be a completely made up behaviour yet compared to the other activities on this list, there is quite an established empirical literature. Ice eating is known in the scientific literature by the name of pagophagia and is a particular expression of the more general phenomenon of pica (an eating disorder whose name derives from the Latin word for magpie, a bird known for its peculiar eating behaviours). Pica is defined as the persistent eating of non-nutritive substances for a period of at least one month, without an association with an aversion to food. Pica more often occurs in pregnant women, children, and adults of lower socioeconomic status. Other types of pica in addition to ice chewing include the eating of clay and soil (geophagia) and starch (amylophagia). Pagophagia is also closely associated with iron deficiency anemia. Empirical reviews suggest that pagophagia (and pica more generally) is part of the obsessive-compulsive disorder spectrum of diseases. Some case studies even suggest that ice chewing compromises their ability to maintain jobs or personal relationships. Although there are some claims in the literature that pagophagia can be addictive, the more likely is that it may be a compulsion in extreme cases.

Compulsive lying: Telling lies is widespread yet there appears to be some empirical evidence that in extreme cases it can be chronic, compulsive and/or pathological. Often, compulsive lying may be an adjunct to other mental illnesses such as Munchausen’s Syndrome (where a person persistently seeks medical treatment for illnesses that do not exist) or pathological gambling (where persistent lying is needed to prevent others realizing there is a gambling problem). Other sufferers may include those with False Memory Syndrome where the person actually believes the lies that they tell. Writings relating to pathological lying first appeared in the psychiatric literature over 100 years ago and have been given names such as ‘pseudologia fantastica’ and ‘mythomania’. Pathological lying has been defined by Dr Charles Dike and his colleagues at Yale University as “falsification entirely disproportionate to any discernible end in view, may be extensive and very complicated, and may manifest over a period of years or even a lifetime”. It s thought to affect men and women equally with an onset in late adolescence. There are no reliable prevalence figures although one study estimated that one in a 1000 repeat juvenile offenders suffered from it.  A study published in the British Journal of Psychiatry reported differences in brain structure between pathological liars and control groups. Pathological liars showed a relatively widespread increase in white matter (approximately one-quarter to one-third more than controls) and suggested that this increase may predispose some individuals to pathological lying.

These five activities were just the tip of the iceberg. I also came across alleged addictions to heavy metal music, teeth whitening, body modification (piercing and tattoos), animal hoarding, and reading. They will have to wait for another time.

Dr Mark Griffiths, Professor of Gambling Studies, International Gaming Research Unit, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK

Further reading

Chatterjee, A. (2007). Cosmetic neurology and cosmetic surgery: Parallels, predictions, and challenges.Cambridge Quarterly of Healthcare Ethics, 16, 129-137.

Dike, C.C., Baranoski, M. & Griffith, E.E. (2005). Pathological lying revisited. Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 33, 342–349.

Edwards, C.H., Johnson, A.A., Knight, E.M., Oyemadej, U.J., Cole, O.J., Westney, O.E.,  Jones, S. Laryea, H. &  Westney, L.S. (1994). Pica in an urban environment. Journal of Nutrition (Supplement), 124, 954-962.

Griffiths, M.D. (1995). Technological addictions. Clinical Psychology Forum, 76, 14-19.

Griffiths, M.D. (2008). Internet and video-game addiction. In C. Essau (Ed.), Adolescent Addiction: Epidemiology, Assessment and Treatment. pp.231-267.  San Diego: Elselvier.

Hata, T., Mandai, T., Ishida, K., Ito, S., Deguchi, H. & Hosoda, M. (2009). A rapid recovery from pagophagia following treatment for iron deficiency anemia and TMJ disorder accompanied by masked depression. Kawasaki Medical Journal, 35, 329-332.

Heckman, C.J., Egleston, B.L., Wilson, D.B. & Ingersoll, K.S. (2008). A preliminary investigation of the predictors of tanning dependence. American Journal of Health Behavior, 32, 451-464

Joshi, S. & Lalbeg, V.K. (2011). Texting mania – A social dilemma. International Journal of Research in Commerce, Economics, and Management, 1(3), 132-135.

King, B.H. & Ford, C.V. (1988). Pseudologia fantastica. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 77, 1-6

Kirchner, J.T (2001). Management of Pica: A Medical Enigma. American Family Physician, 63, 1177-1178.

Osman, Y.M., Wali, Y.A. & Osman, O.M. (2005). craving for ice and iron-deficiency anemia: a case series. Pediatric Hematology and Oncology, 22, 127-131.

Yang, Y., Raine, A., Narr, K., Lencz, T., LaCasse, L. Colleti, P., & Toga, A. (2007). Localisation of increased prefrontal white matter in pathological liars. British Journal of Psychiatry, 190, 174-175.