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[Serious Discussion] Transgenderism

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Shohei Ohtani
If you guys fuck up this thread im going to make it my life goal to become GMT just so I can !kill myself.

And if anybody posts the peppy quote, youre fired.

So Ive been in contact with a lot of transgender people within my life, knowingly and unknowingly. As ive been throwing around the concept in my head, Im kind of realizing that its a little bit of a drastic change for something that could very easily be fufilled another way

Let me explain my story

Around 17 years old, I was on a roller coaster of emotions. Senior year stuff, a denied relationship and a break up happened, college auditions were hap[quote][/quote]pening, it was a lot. But around this time I was first introduced to the idea of transgenderism. I felt, personally, that I fit in the role of a woman much better, as I was not befitting of manly qualities. I wasnt strong or dominant, I didnt care much for manly activites, and at that time, I had a difficult time being emotionally open to men. The idea lulled around more and i slowly began to believe that I was born in the wrong body, and that I should be a woman. I expressed this to friends, who supported me, but I was always too scared to publicly admit it. I had a plan to do a big reveal during English class, at a free prompt writing thing (there was something special about it but I forget what.) I didnt, though.

And Im glad I didnt

As I got older, I sort of became engulfed in the "ultra liberal" college scene. I was able to meet a variety of people, all of which had so many different life experiences. It was here that I learned a crucial part of what makes my confusion happen. Suddenly, the things that I were afraid to express as a male were ok to express. I could be emotionally open with men just as I could be with women. I could desire to be cute rather than cool, and that made me no less of a man.

I realized at that point that gender is really only the stereotyping of what we believe each role should be. I was uncomfortable being a man because I had the belief that men had to fufill certain roles and have certain personality traits. And I wanted to become a woman not because of a desire to be of the opposite sex, but rather because I had idealized the stereotypes of a woman. Cross culturally, the stereotypes of what a man and woman are seem to doffer so much that its clear for me to see that gender is no fact, but only an aggregate of beliefs of what people SHOULD be. (Which isnt always correct)

So my question is, whats the appeal of transgenderism? There is nothing stopping any one person from expressing themselves in whatever way possible. People dong need to be physically male or female to express typically masculine or feminine qualities. You dont even need to do so to wear clothes for the opposite gender, or to love someone of another gender. It almost seems as if many of the issues that I encountered with this time in my life were solved by giving up the identification of gender and instead just being myself, because Im not fitting for a subjective label. A subjective label only oppresses me from being myself, and even if i run to another label hoping to find freedom, there is no greater freedom than letting society be in the backburner and letting your individual beliefs control who you are.

My name is Brian, im 20 years old, and im male. Do i fit the stereotypical roles of a man? Not in my eyes. But when I look in the mirror, i dont dwell on the fact that I am a man, but rather that I am an individual, not in need of labels, and not desiring to change myself just to fit into what I believe would be a "better label"

This post is kind of rushed, because im on my phone at 4:30 AM, but meh. I got out everything I wanted to say, even if it is a little unorganized.

NOTE: Im not intentionally attacking those who identify as transgender. Im not saying that youre/theyre wrong and should be ashamed. Im just curious as to what other perspectives there are regarding this, as well as wondering how my perspective meshes with the general group
B1rd
Stereotypes of men and women differ from culture to culture? No, they're very similar. Men are the workers and soldiers and women are the housewives. If it was just a cultural anomaly you wouldn't see such a pattern, so it's obviously based on practicality. Just like pretty much every culture has developed the sword. By practicality, I mean that each gender functions in the role that it's best at, and thus you have your traditional gender roles. So these stereotypes exist because they are beneficial for society, and also because they are traits that each of the genders commonly posses. You don't have to conform to these stereotypes, but you're not going to get rid of them either because they are based on unchangeable biological features.

Reditum wrote:

And I wanted to become a woman not because of a desire to be of the opposite sex, but rather because I had idealized the stereotypes of a woman.
Well there you go. Proper transgenderism is probably a lot more about actually wanting to become one of the opposite sex rather than just because of stereotypes. And I think physical appearance large aspect of it as well. A man dressing in woman's clothing is distasteful.
Bauxe
This really doesn't belong on a forum full of children under the age of 15.
B1rd

Bauxe wrote:

This really doesn't belong on a forum full of children under the age of 15.
Most people here are older than that. Or is it that this is too triggering for children or something?
silmarilen
I think this belongs here perfectly fine. There is a surprisingly (imo at least) high amount of transgender people on osu so a thread where they can talk and discuss things about it nice. A lot of people actually find out they are transgender way before they are 15 anyway. And like b1rd said, the average age of the forum user is definitely higher than 15.

Anyway, im not new to the whole transgender thing so ill try to come up with something to write here.
Ephemeral
I am 100% okay with serious discussion on difficult topics like this so long as it doesn't devolve into a shitstorm. Keep it civil and in check, and you're right as rain.

In fact, I'll even contribute to it.

During my last year of university, I went through a bunch of classes centered around "abnormal" psychology and the various nuances surrounding it. One of the issues raised in these classes was about the upsurge in people identifying as an alternate gender in recent years. It's become pretty prevalent - chances are that you know at least one person who is undergoing transitioning or seriously considering it these days, accounting for your social diaspora and the like. The thing that concerns me the most about this, is that a huge swathe of the people who believe themselves to be transgender, may not actually be.

Clinical psychologists are not particularly keen to immediately jump to gender dysphoria diagnoses in people that present with most of the symptoms of it. People who are going through a lot of stress or unhappiness tend to project an ideal state that they aspire to be onto something else, be it through veneration or obsession or something else - you'll typically find maladjusted people sinking their time very heavily in to one singular thing as it becomes a way of feeling better, of disconnecting themselves from their current lives and everything that makes them unhappy about them.

Gender is a HUGE target for this, as it typically represents a goodly portion of the identity upon which a person is based. It essentially offers a uniform "if I become this, I will be me but better" target for the ailing to latch on to. A panacea of mental ills, if that makes sense. I personally know a few people who have been through phases wherein they believed themselves to be transgender, and even wished to transition. Some did, even. They later found themselves out of the rut that had prompted that initial thinking to begin with, and with that discontent gone, their drive to change their gender identity went with it.

Don't get me wrong, there are plenty of people who legitimately suffer from gender dysphoria for most/all of their waking life and have been able to get treatment for it in recent years, and that is fantastic. I just worry at the trend erupting these days wherein people feel the need to push their inadequacies away into a closet and ignore them, opting instead to covet a changed in themselves that will magically make these things go away.

If you are in your teens, and you feel your life is awful and that your gender identity might be a reason for that, have a good, long look at yourself. What is it that you dislike about yourself or your situation? What about that is related to your gender, and how does that really influence how you feel?

It is okay to be who you are. You don't -need- to be masculine as a man, or feminine as a woman. If you are either of those things, it does not mean that you need to be the alternate gender physically to feel better, either. If you truly feel that you do, then that is entirely up to you. Just make sure that it is something that you are certain that you want to do, because transitioning is dangerous in a myriad of ways.
Railey2

B1rd wrote:

Stereotypes of men and women differ from culture to culture? No, they're very similar. Men are the workers and soldiers and women are the housewives. If it was just a cultural anomaly you wouldn't see such a pattern, so it's obviously based on practicality. Just like pretty much every culture has developed the sword. By practicality, I mean that each gender functions in the role that it's best at, and thus you have your traditional gender roles. So these stereotypes exist because they are beneficial for society, and also because they are traits that each of the genders commonly posses. You don't have to conform to these stereotypes, but you're not going to get rid of them either because they are based on unchangeable biological features.
There are greatly differing degrees of acceptance, especially when it comes to emotionality. This is what OP is referring too, if I understood him correctly.

@OP: You hit the nail on its head with this:

Reditum wrote:

I was uncomfortable being a man because I had the belief that men had to fufill certain roles and have certain personality traits. And I wanted to become a woman not because of a desire to be of the opposite sex, but rather because I had idealized the stereotypes of a woman.
I'm glad that you realized this before you made a costly mistake.

Reditum wrote:

So my question is, whats the appeal of transgenderism?
  1. Sometimes, biochemical (or was it neurological?) abnormalities occur during humans early development, which could explain why gender dysphoria is a thing. I'm not familiar with the current theories though, so asking Ephemeral would probably be a better idea. Excellent post by him by the way.
    People with a legitimate identity disorder, are of course motivated to follow through with a working treatment.
  2. Transgenderism becomes more and more associated with a general idea of open-mindedness and acceptance. Since this general idea gets perceived as very positive, transgenderism too gets perceived as such. I don't think that this reason is strong enough to serve as a sole motivator, but it might factor in for one or the other person.
  3. Appeal might be confused appeal as shown by your case, so theres that. There a many different types here:
    - people that want to escape themselves,
    - people that project their internal need for change on their gender,
    - people that suffer under their own maladjustment regarding classic gender roles and see transgenderism as an explanation for their suffering and solution alike,
    - people that take identification with trans-acceptance way too far and see symptoms in themselves that aren't there at all,
    - people might even do it because of peer-pressure (who knows).

Excellent thread. I advise against closing it for the sake of an unknown minority that might take offense or start crying because reading about gender-disorders is evil. Value some quality.
Vuelo Eluko
this is how i operate call me a bigot or whatever, if you're a trans i will initially refer to you as the gender you most come off as, appearance-wise, voice-wise, etc. if I turn out to guess your birth gender correctly well too bad i'm not changing my perspective on the matter. you can't change what's in your DNA and your physiology, as much as you want it to be otherwise.

It's not a choice. We may as well start taking otherkin seriously as well and let Johnny the Quad-Gendered Omnifox live in a cage for the rest of his life because that's fair and equal treatment. Oh wait we pick and choose which mental illnesses to enable based on their prevalence so that will never happen. Sorry Johnny, get off your hands and knees and get a job, your equally serious problems aren't popular enough to be given any real consideration.

bollocks.

I don't care about gender stereotypes or whatever. I'm a 21 year old man who is comfortable with his masculinity and sexuality, and I don't see anything wrong with someone deciding they want to be a girly boy and wear pantsu and skirts or whatever. It's actually pretty attractive when done right. But when you start cutting pieces of yourself off and demanding the world see you a certain way and throw tantrums if they don't, I mentally dismiss you because it's such an entitled, sad, and honestly childish way to behave.
kirueggy
No problem with transgender people, I respect them, but when it comes to that gender at birth like what Bassist Vinyl (I think that's him above me) said that never changes, you're born a man you die a man you're born a woman die as a woman etc etc
Railey2

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:

this is how i operate call me a bigot or whatever, if you're a trans i will initially refer to you as the gender you most come off as, appearance-wise, voice-wise, etc. if I turn out to guess your birth gender correctly well too bad i'm not changing my perspective on the matter. you can't change what's in your DNA and your physiology, as much as you want it to be otherwise.

It's not a choice. We may as well start taking otherkin seriously as well and let Johnny the Quad-Gendered Omnifox live in a cage for the rest of his life because that's fair and equal treatment. Oh wait we pick and choose which mental illnesses to enable based on their prevalence so that will never happen. Sorry Johnny, get off your hands and knees and get a job, your equally serious problems aren't popular enough to be given any real consideration.
physiology is partially a choice nowadays and your DNA gets changed all the time whether you want it or not.

but I feel like thats not even the point. It seems that you are of the opinion, that sticking with something that you've been given, is something of value by default (because why else would you make a point out of DNA and physiology being set at the moment of your birth, and if that is not the point then what is the point?)

There is also a difference between obscure cultish movements (otherkin?) and identity disorders, although I'd argue that both should be taken very seriously (in different ways though). I can't follow your thought-process for the rest of the paragraph, so I'd be thankful if you explained that to me.

Generally, and this is my main concern, just try to be more sensible. Identity Disorders are something thats worthy of peoples sensibility, since they often come along with a very nasty sort of suffering or at least lots of vulnerability. Thats why sticking with it against someones wish might be a particularly bad idea in this case.
Vuelo Eluko
Why should it be treated differently? Johnny can't be an animal any more than a man can be a woman. Sure they can be more convincing with the farce but that's about where it ends. These people outcast themselves by choice, and there should be more ways for them to seek help in getting over their problems, rather than there being so many resources to facilitate it, and so many greedy people in the surgery field cashing in on their problems that get away with it because grey legal areas.

You are who you choose to be.*

*Some restrictions apply.
whymeman

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:

".....These people outcast themselves by choice......"
If that was the case, maybe it would have been easier to help them merge into society easily? Honestly, I have no problem with anyone as long as I can get along (minus wanting to kill, racism, extremely violent, etc). The real reason i've seen for them to outcast themselves into the dark is because of how the general public sees them. Not that long ago, the FBI (yes, THAT FBI) made a very retarded gender joke that also exposed their mission IDs against one of their own employees, a gay guy. Honestly, its really retarded how they think if making a joke is more valuable than their job and the safety of America. But, its even more sad for the fact they have no respect for someone that could be the one to save their life in the day of a crisis. If such mentality was easily fixable, then no one would have to outcast themselves for being very different in general, but sadly, its a long road in terms of social media and other factors.
Vuelo Eluko

whymeman wrote:

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:

".....These people outcast themselves by choice......"
If that was the case, maybe it would have been easier to help them merge into society easily? Honestly, I have no problem with anyone as long as I can get along (minus wanting to kill, racism, extremely violent, etc). The real reason i've seen for them to outcast themselves into the dark is because of how the general public sees them. Not that long ago, the FBI (yes, THAT FBI) made a very retarded gender joke that also exposed their mission IDs against one of their own employees, a gay guy. Honestly, its really retarded how they think if making a joke is more valuable than their job and the safety of America. But, its even more sad for the fact they have no respect for someone that could be the one to save their life in the day of a crisis. If such mentality was easily fixable, then no one would have to outcast themselves for being very different in general, but sadly, its a long road in terms of social media and other factors.
it's only because they make it such a big deal. literally noone else does. atheists dont go flipping their shit in public when people tell them to have a blessed day, extremely butch women aren't forming movements against being seen as men from time to time. People live and let live. When people lash out like this is when they are only making things harder for themselves because of their lack of understanding of how they should behave.

'normal' people see this behavior and they steer clear from it because it is very off-putting. If you can't accept yourself you can't expect others to do so.

Really it's ridiculous. In reality there's no difference between transgenderism and species dysphoria., beyond the fact that one is simply shunned and the other is shunned but also has some political momentum behind it.
whymeman
Yeah, but not everyone in a highly populated country is that mature to keep their heads straight. In cases like these, its more of a jump off bridge first than think of should you have done it thing. The bridge has already been jumped so they have to face the bottom for their actions. I normally like to think things through and I know we wish a lot of people could, but there's always some dumb mentality in the way of doing so that it makes us look more immature than 1st graders.

FFFFFFFFFFF, gtg to work.
silmarilen
You don't have to agree with a person's prefered pronoun, but just being nice can go along way. A lot of transgender people also have depression or something else that makes their life less enjoyable. Just acknowledging that you respect them can make their day a lot better. It's not like you have to go through a lot of trouble to do it.
As far as otherkin goes, there are still only 3 singular pronouns (he, she and they) and if they want you to use something else tell them that's not how pronouns work. You have to respect them, but they have to respect reality aswell. also as far as im concerned otherkin is just something made up by insecure teenagers on tumblr who do what eph explained.

The general public is still very negative towards transgender compared to something like religion and sexuality. Just look at osu and how much hate Jenny has recieved for example just for changing their username to jenny and comming out as transgender. Or how many people say "boys pretending to be girls" around the place.

Sure you're right that there are parts of the lgbt community that make way too big a deal about it, but not every person is like that. You shouldn't hate muslims just because those terrorists are claiming they do it because of their religion either.
Railey2

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:

Why should it be treated differently? Johnny can't be an animal any more than a man can be a woman. Sure they can be more convincing with the farce but that's about where it ends.
Johnny can become a woman more than he can become an animal. How is that not obvious? Becoming an animal would include altering your whole genetic foundation as well as completely overthrowing your physiological structure, while becoming a woman is making changes to primary and secondary sexual organs + altering your hormonal threshold. And thats not all, theres a huge difference between human-like and animal-like behavior, while the difference between manlike and womanlike behavior is doesn't even compare to that.
Treating these two as the same is plain wrong. One is possible to a significant degree, while the other one is considerably harder to do and would lead to many complications in terms of how the persons future would look like.
And this is just the practical view, I'm not even talking about the ethical aspects of this.


xxjesus1412fanx wrote:

The other issue i have is the identity crisis itself. Take any human being in the world and have them start blaming society for them not being recognized as who they 'are'. If a bunch of extremely butch women formed a movement because people keep seeing them as men, it would be ignored as it well should be. It's deplorable behavior and it's not something reasonable people do or should expect other people to do anything but ignore them it if they did it.
I was not talking about identity crisis when responding to your post. Theres a big difference between identity crisis and a legitimate identity disorder, one that can be professionally diagnosed (I think they are called personality disorders when being classified by either DSM or ICD).
Sadly, people who suffer from gender identity dysphoria can't choose what their felt identity is (which why dysphoria arises in the first place). I think you overestimate the power that people have over their own mind. If you have that listed under your "*some restrictions apply", then great. Because this is the time to think solely within this restricted category.


cleared up
SPOILER
Lastly, there is a difference between initially mistaking someone for another gender, and willingly treating someone as the other gender even though this person explicitly stated that this causes him discomfort. It is unreasonable to feel insulted the first time around, but the second time is different. If I cleared the misunderstanding up and explained my feelings about it, it is reasonable to assume that you have a harmful intention if you keep acting against my wishes. That is what not changing your opinion of someones gender can be, even against their wishes - a personal attack.

Not changing your opinion of someones biological sex is a different matter, since this is a question with an objective answer.

To sum it up, they should be treated differently because they want to be, because there is no better option for them, and because it comes at no cost for you.


EDIT: holy shit this needed some serious formatting. Thanks for clearing up the misunderstanding, but I think we still have lots of things to disagree over.
Vuelo Eluko

silmarilen wrote:

You have to respect them, but they have to respect reality aswell.
This is how it works with trans people as well.

To sum it up, they should be treated differently because they want to be, because there is no better option for them, and because it comes at no cost for you.
I've never willfully referred to trans as the gender they are trying to get away from, it's just what i naturally do, even after several times being corrected like i have been by jenny in teamspeak. I can't easily keep these things in the front of my mind at all times in casual conversation, it becomes unnatural to do so, and I become inclined to not just talk period. and unless I seriously train myself to each individual i meets' pseudo-gender title, I'm going to slip up at some point.

Obviously this is a flaw on my part, I speak too quickly and think too little. But it's still a cost if I can't speak quickly naturally and concisely in my typical new jersey fashion without being 'offensive'.

And this kind of thing is pretty much always going to happen especially IRL because 99% of trannies are just not convincing in the slightest to me.
Railey2
that sort of mistake is ok in my book. Also messed up the quotes, fixing now
silmarilen

xxjesus1412fanx wrote:

silmarilen wrote:

You have to respect them, but they have to respect reality aswell.
This is how it works with trans people as well.
It is realistic to change your appearence to that of the other sex and be treated as such.

For a lot of people this isn't possible though for other reasons, which is one of the major reasons that the suicide rates are so high. They accepted reality and they decided that they couldn't live like that anymore.
Vuelo Eluko

Railey2 wrote:

becoming a woman is making changes to primary and secondary sexual organs + altering your hormonal threshold.
The surgeons cashing in on this fad are the ones who would agree with you that poisoning yourself and carving your body apart like a turkey is anything close to actually being the opposite gender. But being the opposite gender is not this simple. Not even close. A mans physical form, from their brain wiring to their bone structure.

so many differences in the bone structure it's hard to list, musculature, how hormones are produced in the body [which gets completely destroyed by feeding them into your blood fyi] and actual ability to perform the gender specific roles of impregnation and giving birth are not things you can imitate. Even if you took your brain out and put it in an opposite gender body, your brain would still be that of the gender you were born with. It would still be wired to accommodate and recognize parts of the body that aren't there anymore.

So no, you can't change your gender anymore than you can change your species. You can only make the farce more convincing. Turning your willy inside out is a twisted parody of what it means to actually be a female.

silmarilen wrote:

For a lot of people this isn't possible though for other reasons, which is one of the major reasons that the suicide rates are so high. They accepted reality and they decided that they couldn't live like that anymore.
accepting reality would be realizing they can't be a different gender and. doing this is the opposite: It's trying to escape reality in any way they can, with suicide being the obvious path.

"Accepting" and "Suicide" should never be considered in the same breadth outside of terminal illness. Transgenderism is far from terminal: You can work past it, you can live with it. It's not going to kill you unless you let it. They are in the same water as people who check out of the life boat over facebook bullying.
Railey2
its all about getting sufficiently close, I'd say. I wouldn't call it a twisted parody, since there are many cases where you'd never guess that someone got his gender changed. It doesn't have to be perfect, I totally agree that making it perfect would be impossible by current standards. But the goal is not becoming a biological 100% woman in the end, the goal is resolving Gender Identity Dysphoria. And for that, you only have to get sufficiently close (to a point where the patient can bring their thought and real identity in line enough to be just fine with who they are).

The case still stands, getting to that point with "becoming" an animal would be way harder + theres good reasons as to why this is not considered as an option (safety concerns, ethics, wtf-factor).
Faust
I'm gonna take a guess and say that it's mostly the "wtf-factor" but hey.

I am enjoying the thread so far, don't mind me.
ProgrammerSocks
I originally wanted to make a big post about post-modernism making the concept of gender a joke, people not addressing dysmorphism properly, and those who feel forced to adopt either a "male" or "female" body/mind/personality/soul/etc. when biology is far more complicated than that.

But I can't help but feel like it'd be a bad idea to jump on so many topics when the thread already lacks a direction. Is it a discussion about the causes and solutions for dysmorphism? A discussion about how we address transgender individuals as a society? A debate on the value of common ideological approaches to transgenderism on a philosophical level?

Personally I'm still worried this is gonna devolve into name-calling and insults, but it's cool that people are discussing so many different things in a civil manner. After all, listening to other opinions and educating ourselves can only mean good things for everyone involved.

Railey2

Soner wrote:

I originally wanted to make a big post about post-modernism making the concept of gender a joke, people not addressing dysmorphism properly, and those who feel forced to adopt either a "male" or "female" body/mind/personality/soul/etc. when biology is far more complicated than that.

But I can't help but feel like it'd be a bad idea to jump on so many topics when the thread already lacks a direction. Is it a discussion about the causes and solutions for dysmorphism? A discussion about how we address transgender individuals as a society? A debate on the value of common ideological approaches to transgenderism on a philosophical level?
I want to hear all these points and have all those discussions...
Granger
Alright, ima dump what i know (which is quite a lot i think)

Gender Identity Disorder is classified as Neurological disorder.
The reason for this is, that the brain of transgender inviduals is in fact the sex they identify as, their body is not ill per se (nor is the brain, just mismatched), its the brain that is "malformed" and belives it should have a female body (body image mapping). Studies involving MRI scans of the brain bring evidence for this, a MtF's brain is in structure closer to a cis females brain than to a cis males brain, however these studies have relatively low sample sizes due trans people being rather rare.

This happens due hormone fluctrations in the womb, which are caused by external circumstances (stress, diet, natural hormone inbalances of the pregnant woman as example are all suspects), late enough to not influence the body but early enough to affect the brain. Here it is important to know that the X/Y chromosomes do not cause a body to develop as the respective sex, that is completly done by the two sexhormones estogen and testorone.

Id like to bring up cais (complete androgen insentivity syndrome) people here to make a example, altough these people are not related to transgenderism. These people are born as female, identify as female and often dont even know of their syndrome untill the question why they're infertile comes up and they take a DNA test, which reveals that they have XY chromosomes. Their disorder causes their body to outright ignore any testerone they might be exposed to. This is proof that the XY chromosomes do not determine as which sex one develops as and merely provide information which hormone should be supplied.

This also sets transgenderism apart form otherkin and the likes, it is perfectly possible for hormonal imbalances to happen and mess up the developement of the embryo whereas it is impossible for a animalistic identity to form this way as this would involve dna from the respective animal.

In case of a FtM, the embryo is exposed to a disproportinally large amount of testorone during the brain developement stage, causing the brain to develop more like a male one.


Dysphoria is split into two parts, social and bodily dysporia and they respectively are caused by missed expectations on how the body develops/is for bodily and how one is treated and adressed as for social. Often transgender peoples dysporia is relatively minor until the onset of puberty where the differences between the sexes become more appartent and social sepperation happens more and more. Dysporia is a difficult feel to describe but a sense of wrongness (this should not happen -> Why am i growing breasts/a beard?!) or disassocation (this is not who i am) comes close.

The point of the transistion process using cross sex hormone replacement and surgeries is to alleviate the dysporia to a point where it is gone or atleast no longer hindering the patient from functioning normally in life.

One might ask, why change the body if it is the brain which is malformed? Of course, you'd be objectively right, the body is perfectly healthy after all, but the reason for this is simple: Its been tried to fix the identity and the brain, unsuccessfully. The former involved standart psychology practicises such as getting the patient to accept and live with their flaw or more drastical methods of conversion (conversion theraphy) which involved changing ones identity trough drilling (Men are strong, be proud of being a man) and testorone supplements which is considered morally questionable and proven to be ineffective if not even contraproductive. To my knowledge, fixing the brain was only briefly attempted untill it was accepted that humanity does not know enough about how the brain works to make effective operations, nor has sufficent methods of doing so without crippling the patient in question. Here too is moral controversy involved, how justifyable is it to change ones self in such a way?

This leaves only changing ones body to more closely resembe the opposites sex, trough hormone replacement theraphy, which was proven effective but have limited effect on older transistioners, the earlier (but not before a natural puberty would occur) the effectiver it is, should this happen before a trans person experiences their sexes puberty they'll end up with a body exactly like the opposite sex, bar the genitals, completly bypassing issues such as having the typical males bone structure for mtfs. Notable here is, that HRT is generally more effective for late transitioning FtMs than for late transistioning MtFs as testerone is a dominant "aggressive" hormone causing many irreversible changes relatively fast such as the voice drop, activating hair follicles or changes to the bone structure.

The transistion process does not only involve HRT but also surgeries namely, removal of secondary sex characteristics (Mastectomy, the removal of the breasts and electrolys/laser for removal of hair follicles (not a surgery but ill include it here anyway as its related)) and sex reassigment surgery. For female to male trans people are options such as Metoidioplasty and Phalloplasty available while male to female trans people have penile inversion surgery and more advanced surgeries such as the

(blahlah blah im tired, more tomorrow.)
EneT
Keep this thread going please. As someone who is ignorant of all this gender identification stuff, I'd like to keep learning more.
Granger
Still editing and adding to that post. Check back tomorrow or so, i plan to make a compresive collection of objective facts with that post. A lot of the arguments between pro and contra transgenderism are based on muh feels and muh oponion so i hope to migate some of it. Riince as example seems to have strong oponions on that matter but not really know all that much.

And no, there wont be a TL;DR.
Vuelo Eluko
ill admit i dont know much but i dont feel strongly enough about it to bother learning or changing my opinion on the matter either.
Granger
In that case, can i ask you to at least be openminded?
Shota
If I would have any say in this, I would say this topic should be heavily watched or shut down. It's already going down south fast due to narrow mindedness. When this was first made for teaching people about something new and that they can't understand.


That or just remove the narrow minded comments. But, something like this shouldn't be allowed to stay.
dNextGen
of course it is straight wrong just like those gay-marriage things

what the fuck this world has turned into? the one who gave the idea of these fucked up things should just be buried into oblivion

yes, im being serious here
Granger
Yeah, nah. Dont kill this thread just because someone made a uneducated and negative point. I wish GD would have more topics like this one to actually discuss things rather than do whatever circlejerky stuff happens here.
Shota
It should be killed or just have the negative comments removed. What if someone that went by that title (trans) was to read this and see all the negative words by narrow minded arrogant people? Plus once people are dead set on being narrow minded there is nothing you can do to fix it besides blocking them or ignoring them.
dNextGen
i cant see the point why opposing such heresy like transgender gets one labelled as "narrow-minded" or "uneducated"
Granger
Too late, a trans person already saw this topic. And is not offended in the slightest.
Besides "It might offend someone, remove!", is gross tumblr mentality, please dont. Negative as prositive, pro and contra are both esssential to a discussion, remove one of them and you end up with a echo chamber.

And for you dNextGen, id appredicate if you'd contribute instead of just flinging shit. Fine, think its a bad thing, but where is your reasoning? And try to not use words like hersery and degeneracy and such, you can express your negative oponion without being insulting.
EneT
Whether someone is Trans-gender or not doesn't matter to me in the least bit tbh and doesn't affect whether I like them or not, but what I don't understand is why they are trans in the first place. What goes on in their mind to make them associate themselves to being of a different gender. There really isn't any problem with this thread so far anyways, other than dNextGen, no one has really been demeaning towards them. Riince has mainly stated his opinion on the matter that he is against trans people; he may lack knowledge on the subject but that should be everyone elses' responsibility to educate him the same way I would like to.
Shota
Hmm I just don't want this to turn toxic that is all. I was just trying to prevent it before it happens. Don't bite my head off for trying to be nice.
deadbeat
i'm trying to move away from moving threads unless it's really needed. naturally people are going to have different opinions on this. as long as shitstorms don't happen, it's fine.
if this thread does start turning toxic, then action will be taken
Shota

deadbeat wrote:

i'm trying to move away from moving threads unless it's really needed. naturally people are going to have different opinions on this. as long as shitstorms don't happen, it's fine.
if this thread does start turning toxic, then action will be taken
Thanks dead c:
I was just worried that's all hah.
I'll jump off this topic now since I only caused harm without meaning to.
Vuelo Eluko

Shota wrote:

If I would have any say in this, I would say this topic should be heavily watched or shut down. It's already going down south fast due to narrow mindedness. When this was first made for teaching people about something new and that they can't understand.


That or just remove the narrow minded comments. But, something like this shouldn't be allowed to stay.
you're a bit too young to be so passive aggressive. don't let people bring you down; stand up for yourself once in awhile!
Mahogany
Please don't close this topic. There have been a good few very interesting and well thought out posts. So please don't turn this into a shitstorm.

Personally, I don't know much about Transgenderism at all. At the same time, I have absolutely no problem with it as long as you're not hurting anyone, and I support your decision to be whatever the hell you want to be.

I think the problem is people still aren't used to the idea in society, and that's always been the problem with things deemed not acceptable. I believe that in time, people and society in general will come to accept and accommodate Transgender people more. They're not going to just go away, so it's going to have to become accepted at some point in time, especially as the internet has become much more mainstream and the likelihood of knowing about or meeting someone who is transgender would increase. And as we all know, all it takes for something to become acceptable is good education, less hatemongering, and more openness from these people. The general populace will eventually listen, and start coming to terms with it. (Within reason, don't force it on people or they'll just hate you more)

In summary, I believe Transgenderism will become acceptable over time. Not a question of if, rather of when.
Yuudachi-kun
I think the internet trans community are more pretentious assholes than me.


Also tumblr is shite.
Dainesl
One of my best friends in real life is transgender, and they've told me about how they are treated based on appearance from what people around them have said, fairly standard stuff. However, I noticed that this person has been given many questions about it, either because of curiosity or some other matter that was brought up at the time of conversation, but was always respected by the person they were talking to about such issues.

From what I've seen over here, and in many other discussions over the Internet, transgenderism is somewhat accepted in society, but judging by some comments, mainly the one before mine last, it appears as if some people do not accept this natural occurrence. I'm not sure as to why this is, but I think (as many others do, apparently) that it's due to societal norms not being followed strictly, which I don't exactly think is a good attitude to take towards such a thing.

I don't know much about transgenderism myself seeing as how I don't go out of my way to research the emotions, thought patterns and other things that go into a person deciding they wish to identify as transgender, nor am I transgender myself, but I believe that it's a healthy and normal situation that should probably be discussed more in public so as to reinforce positive and accepting attitudes towards people who are affected.

(edit: someone posted before me and I didn't mean to reference their post, meant to reference the one before that. sorry.)
Nadfee
Ah well I have a couple of close friends that are transgender and since I fast-read through your post I'll just give my opinion about labels and such as I have a little experience myself.

It seems like most people at my school (and probably the majority) label each other/has started labeling each other (I'm 15 so I guess that's normal) and I can definitely feel a sense of being "outside" of the norms. Everyone has expectations even though they might be negative, the only thing you can do about it is really to train yourself to not think about norms and expectations but to tell this to other people, but to give such an advice to a friend might go super-well or turn into a shit storm (depending on how open your friend is). I personally don't have anything against people who are transgender. I fully respect them and their expression, their interest and their opinion about stuff and I feel like anything a transgender person would be interested in should be fully respected as if it was other daily life interests.

I had a similar situation where I felt uncomfortable back when I was younger (7-8'ish) because some expectation we're already starting to appear from my friends such as "you have to be really strong" and "you have to run as fast as us or you suck". It might not be super-similar to your previous situation but I can understand the feeling.

Although I've never felt the feeling of "abandoning" these male expectation I can certainly recognize the feeling of this labeling. For the past 4 years my life has been full of games and almost NOTHING else, no sports, no extra-curricular activities, nothing. Recently I've began to better myself, forget about the past, focus on myself and learn to develop yourself as a person, on your own will. I think that's the key to be a strong person and to forget about labels.
It's as simple as.. "move on, look forward and NEVER backwards." - No strings attached. - That's how it went for me atleast

If I understood the topic correctly it was more of the feeling of being labeled as a transgender and how it affects you. I can't say for sure any of I said really had anything similar but I hope my opinion mattered to anyone. I felt like joining in as my parents really hate transgenders and every time they take up the topic about "how disgusting gay people" are I immediately try to argue back. I really hate very close-minded people that have absolutely no respect.

OT: I also joined in because I have to improve my English writing skills if anyone don't mind. It seems like spending some time writing in English would benefit me and open my thoughts a bit to other opinions in this thread!

P.S My opinions is probably not too deep and I don't have much knowledge about the scientific part of peoples personalities so I apologize if anything I said is useless..
DooM
I think that people should start reasoning with the mentality of:" Everyone should do and say whatever they want or say and live on with the consequences"
Simple as that, if you wanna do it, do it, there's nothing wrong with it just know that some people might see you in a different light but it's normal and like other things you'll get a hold of it .
People tend to see with different eyes what's not common sense for them, it's just how people are
EneT

DooM wrote:

I think that people should start reasoning with the mentality of:" Everyone should do and say whatever they want or say and live on with the consequences"
Simple as that, if you wanna do it, do it, there's nothing wrong with it just know that some people might see you in a different light but it's normal and like other things you'll get a hold of it .
People tend to see with different eyes what's not common sense for them, it's just how people are
That's not a good mentality. With that mentality you could claim that Hitler and every tyrant in existence was right. Some things are objectively right/wrong.
Yuudachi-kun

EneT wrote:

Some things are objectively right/wrong.
No, nothing is because things being right or wrong is inherently based on your opinion.
DooM

EneT wrote:

DooM wrote:

I think that people should start reasoning with the mentality of:" Everyone should do and say whatever they want or say and live on with the consequences"
Simple as that, if you wanna do it, do it, there's nothing wrong with it just know that some people might see you in a different light but it's normal and like other things you'll get a hold of it .
People tend to see with different eyes what's not common sense for them, it's just how people are
That's not a good mentality. With that mentality you could claim that Hitler and every tyrant in existence was right. Some things are objectively right/wrong.
Yeah your right but im talking about doing something that doesnt hurt anyone or do any harm at all you know
B1rd

EneT wrote:

DooM wrote:

I think that people should start reasoning with the mentality of:" Everyone should do and say whatever they want or say and live on with the consequences"
Simple as that, if you wanna do it, do it, there's nothing wrong with it just know that some people might see you in a different light but it's normal and like other things you'll get a hold of it .
People tend to see with different eyes what's not common sense for them, it's just how people are
That's not a good mentality. With that mentality you could claim that Hitler and every tyrant in existence was right. Some things are objectively right/wrong.
Hitler did nothing wrong.
E14
You should attend Gender and Sexuality Orientation seminars.. Trust me, it will really help to shape your personality especially at work.
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