Rough Notes on the Astrology of Transsexuals

Preface: I don’t care about flattering anyone’s prejudices for or against the whole queer alphabet, drag queens, etc. All I’m concerned with is noting patterns. I am an autonomous pattern-sorting machine with incredible quantities of GEMINI POWER – Vivian Robson avers it “a cold-blooded sign, without affection and without morals. It is a kind of living question mark… Mental vivisection is a particularly Geminian habit” and indeed I am a psychic scalpel driven by a scintillating curiosity, thankfully held back by various planets which give me a heart-wrenching love of all things.

Signals: (Orb of 5° for Conjunction, Square, Trine; 3° for Sextile; 1.5° for others)

These seem to operate mostly in cases born since ~1980 – that is, since it’s become somewhat acceptable. [See Problem 4 next section.]

1. (A sense of) powerlessness (Mars afflicted by/conjunct Saturn);
2. Sexual fixation (involvement of Venus/Moon with Scorpio/Pluto – typically Moon in Scorpio at least);
3. Fuzzy, idealised sense of self (Neptune in 1st);
4. Identification with the object of love, idealisation of femininity (Neptune in aspect to Venus);
5. Bizarreness (Uranian influence – square to Sun pops up a lot, being the struggle (Square) to express your unique (Uranus) self (Sun));
6. Inclination to taboo subjects (prominent 8th House, particularly Venus and Jupiter therein). [I regard 8th as House of taboo because it’s the house of Scorpionic experience, roughly – NOT equivalent to Scorpio, but derived from the same source (See post on this coming soon).]
7. POSSIBLY: Neptune-Saturn affliction/conjunction (Harms sense of limits? Responds to encounter with limits by escape into intoxication and fantasy? Queers of all kinds are famously into drugs.)
8. Also note a tendency to lovingness (Jupiter in Cancer).

Problems: [Skip if you just want to get to the cases.]

1. You’re not seeing the people who have these aspects but aren’t androgynes, so we have no idea what proportion of people with these astrological complexes express them in this way. [Problem: What portion of persons possess the signals but aren’t queer?]
2. Without analysing every androgyne, we cannot know what proportion of them display these. There are ways of acquiring more or less representative samples but I’m not competent to apply them (if you are a statistician interested in this research, contact me). [Problem: What portion of persons are queer but display no known signals?]
3. Most of the subjects you’re seeing have chosen to come out about it – for reasons which must be apparent [it’s hard to find signals for concealed traits.]
4. The expressions of an astrological placement are inseparable from its context. Queers famous prior to 1900 display none of the traits of those famous post-1980. In cultures with a third gender, placements leading to deviation from the most common genders would change yet again. Also of note: The image of the masculinity being impersonated also changes – men of the 1980s differ much from their forbears in the 1880s. [Problem: How does context affect the expression of planetary complexes?]
5. I know sexual abuse plays a role in some people becoming queer but am unsure of what portion has been abused, except that it’s higher than the general population’s. I’ve never been inclined to find the details out. [Problem: I don’t know how to read every signal – there are signals for abuse, but I don’t know them off by heart]

Date clusters: ~1982, ~1988, ~1994 (~6 years apart, I note, and remarkably neat)

Cases:

Lily Wachowski of Matrix fame, 29 December 1967 at 03:00 – the second of two transsexuals whose charts I saw and the second with Neptune in 1st. Her Venus is conjunct Neptune in the 1st House, which determines the personality and the general impression of the world by (so it seems to me) determining our first reaction to new experience (Cardinal Fire – the first flash of something in its singularity). Hazy Neptune lends a sense of unreality to all this – to the self, to the general experience of the world. Of course 1 in 12 people have Neptune in the 1st House, but it’s lent force here by the conjunction with Venus, unhappy in Scorpio – tends to romantic obsession, makes for intensity where Venus wants to calm, domination where it wants to be reconciled. And so the fuzzy sense of self and world which led to her transition (because the new gender is always an ideal, an image divorced from the messy realities of the body – hence Neptunian) also produced the most popular work of modern gnosticism – false identity, false world (Neptune in 1st) gives way to heroic warrior destiny (Scorpio).

Neptune transited Lilly’s 5th House (of self-expression) at the time she came out as trans. I believe she has always felt her identity was somewhat false, and simply became trans because that’s what’s in the air at the moment. Other things can be said but I leave it there.

(P.S. Venus in Scorpio produces the high-contrast noir look of The Matrix – black + sunglasses are Scorpionic, also BDSM I think. The underwater colour scheme is Neptune. The Matrix is an expression of Scorpionic energy during Uranus and Neptune’s transit of Aquarius – Scorpionic intensity framed as Aquarian cool-headedness. Art criticism is worthless without reference to astrological fact! Note: The astrological origins of cyberpunk? Another article.)

Camille Paglia, lesbian, androgyne – 2 April 1947 at 18:57 – Libra Rising. Neptune in 1st opposite Sun in Aries. I note Anon #2 and Paglia have Mars and Mercury in Pisces.

Anonymous #1, MtF transgender – 27 December 1989 around dawn – Stellium in Capricorn Rising: Moon (by a hair), Uranus, Sun, Neptune, Saturn, Mercury. Uranus conjunct Sun (5° 30′, 5° 52′). Neptune + Saturn on Ascendant (11° 51′, 15° 05′ ; 14° 39′) . Jupiter in Cancer. Been taking hormone therapy for years. [Would like to distinguish between signifiers for drag queens, cross-dressers and people who opt for surgery. I note a distinction between intelligent, generally autistic ectomorphs (the classic .. and who are generally not as intelligent.

Anonymous #2, FtM transgender. This is a very interesting one – there’s a complex of planets producing an extreme masculine side obsessed with bodily autonomy (Mars in Aries 10th trine Uranus in Sagittarius 6th), and another complex producing a dreamy hypersexual oracular side (Venus conjunct Neptune makes an exceptionally squishy and impressionable person, Jupiter + Mercury in Pisces 9th House mean dreams and visions, muddy thinking). “Phobia of pregnancy… I would rather kill myself.” Periods were “nightmarish”. The masculine side of the personality is employed to kill the feminine chaos within her.

Anonymous #3, F androgyne, 1994, Capricorn Rising. Neptune conjunct Uranus in 1st; square to Neptune from Venus in Aries (Afflicted Venus – common in tomboys I would expect). Sun in Aries. All Planets but those in 1st are in Water or Fire Signs.

==Older

Mathilde de Morny – 26 May 1863 at 11:00 – Leo Rising. Female to Male. We see none of the standard signifiers aside from perhaps Neptune in Aries sextile Sun. Moon in Virgo trine Pluto in Taurus inclines to extremism is the pursuit of neatness – a rejection of messy femininity. She underwent both mastectomy and hysterectomy when these were presumably messier procedures than they are today. Best guess is Moon trine Pluto drove her away from femininity into the embrace of an idealised Neptune in Aries man-of-action masculinity. Jupiter square Mars gives a sense of stressful elation in self-assertion; trine Uranus in the 11th. It makes sense that the signifiers should be more intense (involve Pluto) in an era when transgenderism is scandalous. Planets in 3rd often make for a Man or a Woman About Town – short trips and communication, daily routines.

Marlene Dietrich – 27 December 1901 at 21:15 – Virgo Rising. A packed Capricorn 5th House (of sex and performance – explains the loose morals of theatre types?) including final dispositor Saturn – a hypersexual actress. Capricorn 5th at worst inclines to programmatic, notch-counting seduction. With Jupiter there, God help you. Bisexual because hypersexual. Venus in Aquarius 6th trine Pluto 10th and sextile Uranus 4th (opposite Pluto) – Aquarius wants a steady circle of friends or “friends”. Uranus 4th is an unusual home life. Leo Moon – the crossdressing seems like a footnote and perhaps a Leonine play on her assertive sexuality but here she is anyway.

==Drag Queens (Gathered from RuPaul’s Drag Race)
RuPaul – 17 November 1960 at 18:52 – Gemini Rising. Neptune conjunct Moon and Mercury in Scorpio (sextile Pluto), Uranus square Sun. Mars in Fall opposite Saturn. Jupiter conjunct Venus in 8th – I think this means finding beauty in the taboo, illicit things: “RuPaul realized at age eight that he was gay. When he went into the hospital for a hernia operation, he saw a nude man and had so vivid an emotional response that it was an epiphany.”

Trixie Mattel – 23 August 1989 at 08:00 – Virgo Rising. Neptune conjunct retrograde Saturn square Venus. Retrograde Saturn perhaps gives trouble with limits? P.S. (5 of 7 inner planets in Exaltation or Rulership (just barely missed 6).

Jinkx Monsoon – 18 September 1987 at 01:43 – Cancer Rising. Uranus square Sun, Neptune square Venus, Mars square Saturn. David Roell says there are 3 kinds of gays – those who want to be bizarre, those who want to retain youth, those who want to dominate (ultramasculine). Trannies must have swallowed up part of the 1st demographic.

Farrah Moan – 11 September 1993 at 04:30 – Leo Rising. Venus conjunct ascendant – Venus tends to prettiness and a desire to be pretty in either gender. Neptune conjunct Uranus trine Sun under 1/3rd of a degree apart, square to Jupiter and Mars ~1 degree. Also inconjunct to Venus (sextile to Mars/Jupiter) under a degree.

William Belli – 30 June 1982 at 00:55 – Aries Rising. Unlike the other charts. Only things that might be relevant are Mars conjunct Saturn and Moon in detriment conjunct Jupiter in Scorpio 8th, which I believe would lead to extremely pleasurable (Jupiter) obsessions (Scorpio/Moon) with taboo subjects (8th). Take or leave the 8th House component of that reading.

Morgan McMichaels – 28 May 1981 at 22:25 – Sagittarius Rising. Neptune opposite Venus sextile Pluto (trine Venus). Moon opposite Jupiter conjunct Saturn. Mars in detriment opposite Uranus – will to strike out.

Adore Delano – 29 September 1989 at 10:00 – Scorpio Rising, Pluto and Venus conjunct Ascendant (Venus in Detriment). Mars in Detriment (Libra) square Saturn-Neptune in Capricorn, Jupiter in Cancer (opposite Saturn-Neptune). Sun conjunct Moon in Libra (Sun’s Fall). Libra is 12th House. Jupiter in Cancer is a position of love. Whole chart is a big T-square. Poor thing.

AJA (Jay Rivera) – 4 January 1994 at 07:30 – Capricorn Rising. Mars-Venus-Mercury-Sun conjunct ascendant – 7 degrees away, more loosely conjunct Ascendant, Neptune conjunct Uranus – all in 1st. Pluto square Saturn, Jupiter sextile Venus-Mars.

Carmen Carrera – 13 April 1985 at 09:10 – Cancer Rising. Neptune on the Descendant, 5°01′ square to retrograde Venus & Mercury (approaching), sextile Pluto. Jupiter conjunct Moon in Aquarius 8th (Fixed Sign) sextile .

Courtney Act – 18 February 1982 – no birth time. Moon COULD be conjunct Neptune depending on that. Venus square Pluto – romantic obsession – and more loosely Mars conjunct Saturn (powerlessness again).

==Others

Conchita Wurst – 6 November 1988 at 17:52 – Gemini Rising. Neptune square Moon-Venus conjunction. I think this means troubles resulting from identification with the object of love.

Roberta Close – 7 December 1964 at 06:40 – Capricorn Rising. Jupiter opposite Neptune-Venus conjunction in Scorpio, Pluto-Mars-Uranus conjunction squaring Sun. Saturn in Aquarius – Aquarian placements contribute? (Thinking of Carmen Carrera – I note both are Latin American)

And for fun Dennis Rodman – 13 May 1961 at 00:10 – Capricorn Rising. Whoa nelly – Uranus square Sun (the struggle to be your unique individual self), Pluto square Mercury (obsessive rumination), Moon square Mars (impulsive self-assertion). He’s very clear about who he is, he’s just bizarre.