Ray Blanchard

Ray Blanchard is a Canadian sexologist who is in charge of the gender program at the Clarke site of the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, Canada.

Fraternal birth order
Blanchard has conducted research into the biological origins of sexual orientation, discovering the fraternal birth order effect. The more older brothers a man has, the greater the probability is that he will have a homosexual sexual orientation. The fraternal birth order effect is the strongest known predictor of sexual orientation, each older brother increases a man's chances of being gay by about 33% (Blanchard, 2001).

Theory of autogynephilia
Blanchard coined the term autogynephilia to describe men with an erotic desire to be women and proposed a theory that all transsexual women were either autogynephiles or extremely effeminate gay men who needed to become female to express their sexuality. He termed the latter group "homosexual transsexuals".

Within the transsexual community, there has been much controversy surrounding Blanchard. Many argue that he has promoted his theory by denying treatment to all transgender patients except those who he sees to fit his model. According to a 1984 article published in the Toronto Star, Blanchard denied services to over 90% of people seeking assistance for trans conditions at the Clarke Institute.

In 1998, the Canadian government ceased funding for Clarke's transsexual program. Up until that time, Blanchard's theory was practically unknown outside Clarke, but in the late 1990s, Anne Lawrence, a transsexual woman who identified herself as autogynephilic, began publishing materials in support of Blanchard's theory and advanced knowledge of the theory within the transsexual community.

Today, it is thought that only a small minority of transwomen identify with Blanchard's model, even though many of those who do claim that they are in the majority and that those who disagree with Blanchard have "political" and "biased" reasons for doing so.