Being wrong the right way: A multiple case study of three transmasculine persons’ experience with the Danish health system

This article examines how three transmasculine persons experience and navigate the treatment system in the Danish welfare state with an explicit focus on the system and its role in the production of subjectivity. Based on a multiple case study with three transgender persons, we analyse how transmasculine persons navigate a system they characterize as predominantly based on a binary understanding of gender. We conclude that the treatment system subjectifies transmasculine persons in a particular way that encourages them to perform a more traditional masculinity in order to be culturally intelligible and in order to be assessed eligible for treatment. We map the struggle of subjectivity embedded in these practices. The study contributes theoretically by shedding light on the subjectification processes producing not only boundaries between normal and abnormal (such as binary and non- binary), but also between legitimate abnormal (binary transgender) and illegitimate abnormal (non-binary transgender). We discuss implications for treatment as well as for further research.