Judith Butler is the theorist who more or less identified the theoretical and linguistic basis for the transgender phenomenon as we know it today.

Her ideas are mostly influenced by Structural/Post-Structural theories, so if you are looking to get into that, you'll want to read up on de Saussure, Lacan, Foucault, Strauss, Derrida, Althusser, etc. The basics are as such: 1) Nothing exists outside of language (think of ONE thing that doesn't need to be filtered into language in order to be brought into the world -- even the most abstract concept is, as Derrida found, a center that pins the system of language in place), 2) language is inherently social -- it is not simply the process of naming things, it is a system that depends entirely on human societies, and it is a closed system so nothing outside of society (individual will) can affect it, 3) because language is social, and everything filters through language, everything is thus social -- this is how we get to ideas of 'social constructs' and what not. It's definitely a lot more complex than that, and I've sacrificed accuracy for the sake of simplicity

But let's get to Butler. First of all, the current transgender phenomenon is an aberration and perversion of the ideas that she set forth in her book, Gender Trouble. She argued that gender is a social construct that insidious power structures indoctrinate us into believing (she said we are girled and boyed at birth and are done so for the rest of our lives). She said that Gender is a type of performative language: they are roles that we perform usually because we are told to do so. Over time, and as we repeat these performances, the signs (signified/signifier) - that is, gender - becomes ossified and normalized, and thus it is hard to reject notions of gender and the rigidity of it. And the reason all these systems are at work is so that the world (through language) is intelligible to us.

For her, the ability to reject gender is to reject language and to reject intelligibility -- and is thus one of the most commendable things a person can do (if they're hell-bent on resistance). Of course, you can see how the trans phenomena doesn't fit with Butler's vision: a person who wants to 'trouble' Gender wouldn't call themselves or want to be called anything, much less transgender.

How does it relate to MGTOW? Because we are also, as men, indoctrinated to perform a certain role of the lover/husband/mate/male/boyfriend/sexual object, etc. Over time it becomes ossified, 'normal' as an earlier thread discusses, intelligible -- it becomes the world as we know it and as we have always known it.

Perhaps GYOW has more linguistic and theoretical implications than we think. If mainstream society commends people for coming out as transgender, for resisting overbearing power structures, then we are also committing a type of resistance, an apolitical one (as Butler would want it), and thus it's a quite commendable one.

But I doubt I'd get a Marxist feminist intent on overthrowing patriarchal power structures to agree with me

Sorry for the long post, and it's just another way to describe the red pill/blue pill phenomena, but I found it interesting nonetheless