Philosophy Discussion Forums | A Humans-Only Club for Open-Minded Discussion & Debate

[Stoppelmann]

I said at the beginning “There is no denying that there are people with a need to identify as the opposite sex and we should be in the position to honour that by allowing them to undergo the transition they want.” Adults should be able to do this.

Right!  So the issue is how to constructively enable them and introduce appropriate adaptations and safeguards, yes?

I'd expect that to include normalising it,  education playing a role in that. Childhood and puberty are times to learn and explore, but not make major life altering changes.   Medical interventions should be at an appropriate age, properly informed and with proper  medical  and psychological  assessment and ongoing supervision and support.    This is what the UK's NHS does, it's happening, and I assume it's fairly typical.  There's a lengthy specialist assessment, then the first treatment is psychological, after that if appropriate living for at least a year as your gender identity, then after that hormone blockers for a year, then after that irreversible hormones (minimum age 16), and then at earliest age 18, surgery and the legal right to change your gender identity. That's a graduated, monitored progression over a long period, partly because we know puberty is a time of change and confusion. There are obviously still some risks, but there are risks in not helping youngsters too.

It seems reasonable to me, how about you?

Please excuse my late reply, at the moment I’m struggling with Covid, which is playing havoc with my asthma, so I have a little less energy than otherwise.

If you want to normalise the gender-dysphoria that seems to be spreading exponentially like a virus amongst later generations, you have to rule out that the people suffering are not suffering from a "hysterical neurosis, conversion type" or "conversion disorder" as it is known today. There are various dissociative disorders that we know of, often the psychological response to a traumatic event, or something that is evaluated as such. Children and teens are more susceptible to trauma because their brains are still in development and they don’t yet have the psychological resiliency that adults do. The NHS now says, “A diagnosis of gender dysphoria in childhood is rare. Most children who seem confused about their gender identity when young will not continue to feel the same way beyond puberty. Role playing is not unusual in young children … Children may show an interest in clothes or toys that society tells us are more often associated with the opposite gender. They may be unhappy with their physical sex characteristics. However, this type of behaviour is reasonably common in childhood and is part of growing up.”

For me, medical interventions should be the last course of action, especially considering what we know about the side-effects of all medications, regardless of age. When you consider the excitement about the anti-covid vaccine, it seems odd that young people are given puberty blockers after a very short assessment stage, which has been the reason for closing Tavistock and various America clinics, after finding that teens were fast-tracked into medication. The NHS no longer says that puberty blockers are ‘reversible’ but instead admits that “Little is known about the long-term side effects of hormone or puberty blockers in children with gender dysphoria … it is not known what the psychological effects may be. It’s also not known whether hormone blockers affect the development of the teenage brain or children’s bones. Side effects may also include hot flushes, fatigue and mood alterations.”

Same sex spaces or services can be tricky. Public toilets, changing rooms and showers can have cubicles, that's easy enough.  And we can have third option unisex facilities too.  Nurses, doctors  and care workers come in two sexes already.  I'd expect if someone has particular needs the provider should do their best to help, that already happens. And there might be particular situations like prisons or safe houses where you'd want to either check the person has been through the above processes and got their gender certification, or have facilities for those who haven't.  Otherwise it's a judgement call, one which will hopefully become less necessary as society adapts.

I wish that it was as easy as you portray, but there have been publicised cases where vulnerable women have been called “transphobic” because they wanted same-sex carers for intimate care, which when I was nursing was straightforward, and you asked women (as a male nurse) if they were comfortable with you washing them. The same has happened to traumatised women in refuges when they pointed out that someone has clear male attributes and they feel threatened. In their special situation of having suffered domestic violence or rape, it shouldn’t be questioned.

The tricky part is where women have pointed out that self-ID can be exploited, as it already has in America and Canada, and the terminology of the legislation planned in Scotland makes it difficult for any woman to even mention their discomfort, without them being accused of hate speech. If you shut down people in a difficult situation like that, you open the doors for people who will exploit it, and if there is one thing that is certain, loopholes are always exploited.

Currently we're undergoing change and there's some turmoil, new ways of thinking being aired,  and jockeying.   We've seen it before, and during the relatively recent 'progressive' decades minorities have made significant progress and then things settle down, with new norms becoming integrated into the mainstream.  You'd hope it would get easier and easier, but we're living in a time when progressivism as the fragile mainstream veneer is on the defensive.  And 'radical' is now embodied by Q Anon,  Trump, conspiracy theorists, men's activism, white supremacy and  resurgent religionism.   If TERFS are worried about diluting the essentialism of their particular feminist ideology and activism if transwomen are allowed to join the gender club, I'd say there are bigger existential fish to fry.  It suits our common oppressors to focus on trans people as the scary 'other', and it's working.

What I am seeing is the shutting down of every attempt of women to get together and discuss their issues, based on the suspicion of transphobic talk, guilt by association, and plain bloody-mindedness. Just because a white supremacist agrees with what a lesbian says, doesn’t mean that the lesbian is white supremacist. The way women’s events are shut down is disturbing, and the violence that occurs is 90% caused by biological men in a manner that is far from feminine. The verbal violence against supposed “TERFs” is also rape language, which is very masculine.

The problem that many oversee is that long-termed transsexuals, especially transmen, have come out on the side of women, because the activism is so aggressive that they don’t feel represented by those groups. If you add to that the flooding of lesbian date sites with transwomen complaining that lesbians don’t want to date them, social media full of trans people with extremely male attributes in girly poses, it is a caricature of what women are, especially if you acknowledge that women can be non-conforming and should be accepted as such. It is the extreme activism that is destroying what acceptance long-termed transsexuals had built up, and they are feeling it.

The “mainstream veneer” as you call it has virtually been taken over by post modernism, and almost every TV show must display some kind of divergence from heterosexuality, often above and beyond its perceived presence in everyday life. My wife, who is not interested in the subject, observes that in entertainment we seem to be going from one extreme to the other, because of the huge influence of activists in that area. The push is all the more aggressive because people are being told that there is a push back that is equally aggressive, which is simply a lie. There are many people who just feel that the majority is being overwhelmed by concerns for a minority, and attempts to increase numbers. This imbalance is not doing the cause any good.

[Belindi]

I experience a gut reaction against bigots who are at fault for refusing to recognise that people are just people whatever they look like.
It's shameful that bigotry causes some people to decide what permanent category they fit, to the extent of invasive medical or surgical interventions.

I experience a gut reaction against people who cannot engage in a discussion but fall into stereotyped statements that avoid the simple matter at hand. It is the inability to listen to the concerns of other people that causes the whole issue to become so inflamed.

All the same, I overcome my gut reaction and seek communication, balancing the opposites and locating the real problem: Men.

The claim that people are no more and no less than people is hardly to stereotype people.
To categorise some people as criminals is unfortunately necessary. People in unconventional clothing is not the same group as criminals.

[Stoppelmann]

I experience a gut reaction against bigots who are at fault for refusing to recognise that people are just people whatever they look like.
It's shameful that bigotry causes some people to decide what permanent category they fit, to the extent of invasive medical or surgical interventions.

I experience a gut reaction against people who cannot engage in a discussion but fall into stereotyped statements that avoid the simple matter at hand. It is the inability to listen to the concerns of other people that causes the whole issue to become so inflamed.

All the same, I overcome my gut reaction and seek communication, balancing the opposites and locating the real problem: Men.

The claim that people are no more and no less than people is hardly to stereotype people.
To categorise some people as criminals is unfortunately necessary. People in unconventional clothing is not the same group as criminals.

The fascinating thing about your replies is your inability or refusal to reply to what has already been said. You ignore the attempts to give a balanced view, especially ignoring the harm done by the minority, and you criminalise people protecting the safe spaces for known victims of domestic violence, rape, and murder, whose suffering outweighs that of the minority. Instead of inclusion, you seem to find invasion acceptable and are willing to accept exclusion of the very people for whom safe spaces were created, if they do not give up their rights willingly.

[Belindi]

I experience a gut reaction against bigots who are at fault for refusing to recognise that people are just people whatever they look like.
It's shameful that bigotry causes some people to decide what permanent category they fit, to the extent of invasive medical or surgical interventions.

I experience a gut reaction against people who cannot engage in a discussion but fall into stereotyped statements that avoid the simple matter at hand. It is the inability to listen to the concerns of other people that causes the whole issue to become so inflamed.

All the same, I overcome my gut reaction and seek communication, balancing the opposites and locating the real problem: Men.

The claim that people are no more and no less than people is hardly to stereotype people.
To categorise some people as criminals is unfortunately necessary. People in unconventional clothing is not the same group as criminals.

The fascinating thing about your replies is your inability or refusal to reply to what has already been said. You ignore the attempts to give a balanced view, especially ignoring the harm done by the minority, and you criminalise people protecting the safe spaces for known victims of domestic violence, rape, and murder, whose suffering outweighs that of the minority. Instead of inclusion, you seem to find invasion acceptable and are willing to accept exclusion of the very people for whom safe spaces were created, if they do not give up their rights willingly.

I criminalise nobody .The law criminalises. Refuges for people fleeing domestic violence are great and I approve of them with all my heart.
Criminals do invade and we need more policemen to apprehend them, and get them off the streets and out of the homes. What we don't need are laws or regulations that limit the life chances of people who don't fit the conventional mould by criminalising them or bullying them to change themselves .

[Stoppelmann]

What seems strange to me in this debate is that distinction is looked on with disdain, because when you visit your healthcare provider with symptoms, they will begin a process to diagnose your condition. Since there are a lot of different conditions that often share similar symptoms, your provider will create a differential diagnosis, which is a list of possible conditions that could cause your symptoms. A differential diagnosis is not your official diagnosis, but a step before determining what could cause your symptoms.

This has been very important in my field because there are, for example, atypical features that suggest an alternative cause of parkinsonism than Parkinson’s Disease. The symptoms may seem to indicate Parkinson's, but the differential diagnosis may come up with anything from side-effects of medication to Intracranial pressure. As an aside, it took doctors three years to discover that a friend of our didn’t have Parkinson's, but was in fact suffering from the pressure exerted by cerebrospinal fluid inside the skull and on the brain tissue. My mother-in-law was diagnosed with Parkinson’s but it turned out to be an atypical dementia, Lewy body dementia. There is also drug-induced parkinsonism. Parkinsonism caused by antipsychotic (neuroleptic) medication is sometimes referred to as neuroleptic-induced parkinsonism. The types of medications most likely to have this effect include some types of anti-nausea and antipsychotic drugs. These medications block the dopamine receptors in nerve cells. The resulting reduction in dopamine levels causes parkinsonism. Typically, when someone stops taking these medications, the symptoms of parkinsonism decrease over time.

A factor that is often brought forward is the threat of suicide if a certain behaviour or wish isn’t affirmed. However, suicidal thoughts have many causes. Most often, suicidal thoughts are the result of feeling like you can't cope when you're faced with what seems to be an overwhelming life situation. If you don't have hope for the future, you may mistakenly think suicide is a solution. You may experience a sort of tunnel vision, where in the middle of a crisis you believe suicide is the only way out. There also may be a genetic link to suicide. People who complete suicide or who have suicidal thoughts or behaviour are more likely to have a family history of suicide. Although attempted suicide is more frequent for women, men are more likely than women to complete suicide because they typically use more-lethal methods, such as a firearm.

The DSM-5 indicates that risk factors for Suicidal Behaviour Disorder are mental illnesses such as bipolar disorder, major depressive disorder, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, anxiety disorders panic disorder and PTSD, substance use disorders (especially alcohol use disorder), borderline personality disorder, antisocial personality disorder, eating disorders, and adjustment disorders (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). Chronic pain and terminal or chronic illnesses, which cause impairment and loss of physical ability, may be co-morbid with Suicidal Behaviour Disorder. In recent years, there has been increasing attention to children and teens contemplating or carrying out suicide in response to bullying. It has been found that there is an especially robust correlation between cyber bullying and suicidality (Blaszczak-Boxe,2014). Cyberbullying can be overwhelming. Several peers bullying a child or teen is difficult enough, and causes emotional harm and psychological stress, which can have a long term impact. Cyber-bullying can involve an onslaught of abuse. Opening an email inbox and finding several hundred emails from people, many of which you don't know, making threats or mocking you, or postings on a social networking sight for a wide audience to see, would be overwhelming to a stable adult with well developed coping skills and supports. This type of situation has the potential to drive a child or teen to suicide. In a study done in Greece of n= 5614 subjects between ages 16-18, it was found that being a victim of bullying increased suicidal ideation, (Skapinakis, Bellos, Gkatsa, Magklara, Lewis, Araya, Stylianidis, & Mavreas, 2011).The veterans of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan having an extremely high suicide rate. The number of veterans who have died by suicide between 2005 and 2011 is approximately 49,000- this is five times more than the number of suicides among civilians, and almost seven times the number of combat fatalities in both of these conflicts from 2001 to 2013 ( Statistics Brain, 2014; Hargarten, Burnson, Campo, & Cook, 2013)
https://www.theravive.com/therapedia/su ... der-dsm--5

So, we can see that a differential diagnosis is of utmost importance and therefore in the run-up to medication for children with a supposed gender-dysphoria they need to be thoroughly examined. Evidence has been growing that this has not been happening for multiple reasons, but the gravity of the consequences demand an exhaustive examination, not just affirmation.

[Belindi]

Stoppelman wrote:

So, we can see that a differential diagnosis is of utmost importance and therefore in the run-up to medication for children with a supposed gender-dysphoria they need to be thoroughly examined. Evidence has been growing that this has not been happening for multiple reasons, but the gravity of the consequences demand an exhaustive examination, not just affirmation.

In the present state of the National Health Service exhaustive examination for gender dysphoria is unlikely to happen. The most effective action is to change cultural attitudes to both sex and gender so that those categories are not perceived to be permanent values. Body and behavioural dysphorias originate in culture.
For the sake of the many people who fear maleness in changing rooms, public toilets, hospital wards, and doctor's surgeries, what is needed is attendants and chaperones who need only be responsible adults.

[Stoppelmann]

In the present state of the National Health Service exhaustive examination for gender dysphoria is unlikely to happen.

So we accept that people will not be adequately assessed and consequently there will be a large number who are misdiagnosed, the medical treatment will be non-reversible, and we will have a wave of regret setting in once the young people come around to the fact that their transitioning was a mistake after all.

The most effective action is to change cultural attitudes to both sex and gender so that those categories are not perceived to be permanent values. Body and behavioural dysphorias originate in culture.

The results are already pouring in:
“Gender neutral Brit Awards sees only men nominated in top category“
“Transgender woman wins Miss Nevada USA pageant”
“Trans competitor beats 13-year-old girl in NYC women’s skateboarding contest”
“20 trans women have won national or international competitions or championships”
“Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas wins women’s 500-yard NCAA title”
“Transgender weightlifter smashes women's world records”
“Transgender Cyclist Wins Female Cycling World Championship”
“Transgender fighter Alana McLaughlin wins MMA debut”
“First transwoman wins Glamour's College Women of the Year award”
“Transgender woman wins Florida mini-tour event”
“Transgender rapist, jailed in 2001 for assault and gross indecency with a child, carried out four sex attacks on female inmates in jail”
“Transgender Rikers inmate sentenced to 7 years for raping female prisoner”
“Transgender woman, 18, sexually assaulted girl, 10, in female toilets in Morrisons”
“At Drag Con, an act called ‘Victoria Scone’ put on a performance of ‘Sweet Transvestite’, the lyrics of which include: “See I’m not much of a man by the light of day. But by night I’m one hell of a lover”. On what planet is this suitable for young children?”
“If the ‘trans’ population is as small as commentators are saying, how can it justify gender ideology being imposed on the whole of society? Self-ID’ prioritises the feelings of 0.5% over the safety and rights of over 50% of the population (women).”
“The Republic of Ireland is seeking to enable “children of any age” to legally transition.”

Apart from the erasure of women from women’s events, the obvious ambiguity of women and girls confronted with rapists who identify as women, and the damage done, what do you think is going to be the result of changing cultural attitudes to both sex and gender?

For the sake of the many people who fear maleness in changing rooms, public toilets, hospital wards, and doctor's surgeries, what is needed is attendants and chaperones who need only be responsible adults.

You mean guards, but give them a fancy name.

[Pattern-chaser]

The results are already pouring in:
“Gender neutral Brit Awards sees only men nominated in top category“

This year. Last year, it was won by Adele, who proudly — and acceptably — declared her pride in being the woman who had won the award.

But what has this to do with transsexuality?

[Belindi]

In the present state of the National Health Service exhaustive examination for gender dysphoria is unlikely to happen.

So we accept that people will not be adequately assessed and consequently there will be a large number who are misdiagnosed, the medical treatment will be non-reversible, and we will have a wave of regret setting in once the young people come around to the fact that their transitioning was a mistake after all.

The most effective action is to change cultural attitudes to both sex and gender so that those categories are not perceived to be permanent values. Body and behavioural dysphorias originate in culture.

The results are already pouring in:
“Gender neutral Brit Awards sees only men nominated in top category“
“Transgender woman wins Miss Nevada USA pageant”
“Trans competitor beats 13-year-old girl in NYC women’s skateboarding contest”
“20 trans women have won national or international competitions or championships”
“Transgender swimmer Lia Thomas wins women’s 500-yard NCAA title”
“Transgender weightlifter smashes women's world records”
“Transgender Cyclist Wins Female Cycling World Championship”
“Transgender fighter Alana McLaughlin wins MMA debut”
“First transwoman wins Glamour's College Women of the Year award”
“Transgender woman wins Florida mini-tour event”
“Transgender rapist, jailed in 2001 for assault and gross indecency with a child, carried out four sex attacks on female inmates in jail”
“Transgender Rikers inmate sentenced to 7 years for raping female prisoner”
“Transgender woman, 18, sexually assaulted girl, 10, in female toilets in Morrisons”
“At Drag Con, an act called ‘Victoria Scone’ put on a performance of ‘Sweet Transvestite’, the lyrics of which include: “See I’m not much of a man by the light of day. But by night I’m one hell of a lover”. On what planet is this suitable for young children?”
“If the ‘trans’ population is as small as commentators are saying, how can it justify gender ideology being imposed on the whole of society? Self-ID’ prioritises the feelings of 0.5% over the safety and rights of over 50% of the population (women).”
“The Republic of Ireland is seeking to enable “children of any age” to legally transition.”

Apart from the erasure of women from women’s events, the obvious ambiguity of women and girls confronted with rapists who identify as women, and the damage done, what do you think is going to be the result of changing cultural attitudes to both sex and gender?

For the sake of the many people who fear maleness in changing rooms, public toilets, hospital wards, and doctor's surgeries, what is needed is attendants and chaperones who need only be responsible adults.

You mean guards, but give them a fancy name.

Doctors who are aware that dysphorias may be temporary, will not prescribe irreversible interventions.The NHS may be diminished but most individual doctors and doctors as a profession respect medical ethics.

Most of us don't accept that health is no longer available free to all, as it used to be when the NHS was unadulterated by the profit motive. The present British government will not last beyond the next general election.

Did you fancy that cultures were not in need of change? Already and thanks to heroic actions by some individuals , racism is in retreat. Thanks to Greta Thunberg and her followers and others speciesism is now seriously challenged. There's a lot left to fight for including stopping sexual predation, and sexual predation is a crime. Certainly we need guards to protect vulnerable individuals!

[Gertie]

Stoppelmann

I said at the beginning “There is no denying that there are people with a need to identify as the opposite sex and we should be in the position to honour that by allowing them to undergo the transition they want.” Adults should be able to do this.

Right! So the issue is how to constructively enable them and introduce appropriate adaptations and safeguards, yes?

I'd expect that to include normalising it, education playing a role in that. Childhood and puberty are times to learn and explore, but not make major life altering changes. Medical interventions should be at an appropriate age, properly informed and with proper medical and psychological assessment and ongoing supervision and support. This is what the UK's NHS does, it's happening, and I assume it's fairly typical. There's a lengthy specialist assessment, then the first treatment is psychological, after that if appropriate living for at least a year as your gender identity, then after that hormone blockers for a year, then after that irreversible hormones (minimum age 16), and then at earliest age 18, surgery and the legal right to change your gender identity. That's a graduated, monitored progression over a long period, partly because we know puberty is a time of change and confusion. There are obviously still some risks, but there are risks in not helping youngsters too.

It seems reasonable to me, how about you?

Please excuse my late reply, at the moment I’m struggling with Covid, which is playing havoc with my asthma, so I have a little less energy than otherwise.

Sorry to hear that! Hope it's not a bad case and you get well soon. No worries about replying.

If you want to normalise the gender-dysphoria that seems to be spreading exponentially like a virus amongst later generations, you have to rule out that the people suffering are not suffering from a "hysterical neurosis, conversion type" or "conversion disorder" as it is known today. There are various dissociative disorders that we know of, often the psychological response to a traumatic event, or something that is evaluated as such. Children and teens are more susceptible to trauma because their brains are still in development and they don’t yet have the psychological resiliency that adults do. The NHS now says, “A diagnosis of gender dysphoria in childhood is rare. Most children who seem confused about their gender identity when young will not continue to feel the same way beyond puberty. Role playing is not unusual in young children … Children may show an interest in clothes or toys that society tells us are more often associated with the opposite gender. They may be unhappy with their physical sex characteristics. However, this type of behaviour is reasonably common in childhood and is part of growing up.” 

For me, medical interventions should be the last course of action, especially considering what we know about the side-effects of all medications, regardless of age. When you consider the excitement about the anti-covid vaccine, it seems odd that young people are given puberty blockers after a very short assessment stage, which has been the reason for closing Tavistock and various America clinics, after finding that teens were fast-tracked into medication. The NHS no longer says that puberty blockers are ‘reversible’ but instead admits that “Little is known about the long-term side effects of hormone or puberty blockers in children with gender dysphoria … it is not known what the psychological effects may be. It’s also not known whether hormone blockers affect the development of the teenage brain or children’s bones. Side effects may also include hot flushes, fatigue and mood alterations.”

I'd hope you realise that by 'normalise' I meant remove the fear and bigotry and let children understand it as just one of the ways people can be. It played out the same way in the UK when Thatcher banned the teaching about gay people as it implied it was 'normal', it was supposed to be part of The Gay Agenda to turn our sweet innocent normal children gay. Thank goodness we got over that, as part of the overall normalising process. You'd hope such attitudes were dying out, but up it pops again, just in time to be a cause for the 'anti-woke' backlash.

And yes, the point of the psychological assessment would be to look deeper, and if appropriate offer less invasive treatments. This isn't a perfect science, and all treatments can be problematic, but bottom line having a trained team assess the risks/benefits of treatments vs not treating is clearly the best way to go.  Like I'd want a minor considering breast implants or vaginal cosmetic surgery to at least have some sort of psychological intervention too, or there's male circumcision on children and babies is apparently culturally acceptable for reasons I disagree with. We mess with kids bodies for far less good reasons, but trans people are our target du jour.

A different psychological aspect is our innate tribalism. An evolved gut response to the 'other' as a potential threat, or as someone who has to prove their trust-worthiness. We more readily give trust and empathy, the benefit of the doubt, to those who are similar to us, or share something important with us. Tho tribal gut instincts can be roused by pretty much anything, it's that easy to manipulate. It's the way we're made, and we can rationalise it almost as easily. This is something we ought to be taught about, and learn strategies to deal with, especially in our time of social media when a mob can spring up overnight if you press the right buttons, and you can easily seek out and funnel only confirming information into your world view building. It's a huge problem in many ways.

Gertie wrote: ↑Yesterday, 3:59 pm Same sex spaces or services can be tricky. Public toilets, changing rooms and showers can have cubicles, that's easy enough. And we can have third option unisex facilities too. Nurses, doctors and care workers come in two sexes already. I'd expect if someone has particular needs the provider should do their best to help, that already happens. And there might be particular situations like prisons or safe houses where you'd want to either check the person has been through the above processes and got their gender certification, or have facilities for those who haven't. Otherwise it's a judgement call, one which will hopefully become less necessary as society adapts.

I wish that it was as easy as you portray, but there have been publicised cases where vulnerable women have been called “transphobic” because they wanted same-sex carers for intimate care, which when I was nursing was straightforward, and you asked women (as a male nurse) if they were comfortable with you washing them. The same has happened to traumatised women in refuges when they pointed out that someone has clear male attributes and they feel threatened. In their special situation of having suffered domestic violence or rape, it shouldn’t be questioned.

There are different ways to think about different specific situations, and to look only at one side is wrong, as you have pointed out. Continually picking out the negatives ignores the legit concerns of others. So how do you feel about a traumatised transwoman escaping an awful, violent home with nowhere else to go being made to feel ostracised and insulted in her last resort place of safety, being treated as if she's the aggressor not the victim. Or even not being allowed in, because some people can't get past seeing her as an aggressor when she's a victim. That's horrible too. But if we can provide facilities or workarounds, neither have to go through it, until these stereotyping attitudes become less ingrained. Like with the NHS, services should be taking a responsible and practical approach to difficult situations, competing needs don't have to clash. 

And hopefully, this time of change as feelings run high will settle. Most people aren't freaked out by women doctors any more, or think a gay teacher will molest their kid, and so on. 

The tricky part is where women have pointed out that self-ID can be exploited, as it already has in America and Canada, and the terminology of the legislation planned in Scotland makes it difficult for any woman to even mention their discomfort, without them being accused of hate speech. If you shut down people in a difficult situation like that, you open the doors for people who will exploit it, and if there is one thing that is certain, loopholes are always exploited.

On that basis any rule is pointless. Yes there will always be creeps and abusers and loophole exploiters, but stereotyping groups in that way isn't right.

Gertie wrote: ↑Yesterday, 3:59 pm Currently we're undergoing change and there's some turmoil, new ways of thinking being aired, and jockeying. We've seen it before, and during the relatively recent 'progressive' decades minorities have made significant progress and then things settle down, with new norms becoming integrated into the mainstream. You'd hope it would get easier and easier, but we're living in a time when progressivism as the fragile mainstream veneer is on the defensive. And 'radical' is now embodied by Q Anon, Trump, conspiracy theorists, men's activism, white supremacy and resurgent religionism. If TERFS are worried about diluting the essentialism of their particular feminist ideology and activism if transwomen are allowed to join the gender club, I'd say there are bigger existential fish to fry. It suits our common oppressors to focus on trans people as the scary 'other', and it's working.

What I am seeing is the shutting down of every attempt of women to get together and discuss their issues, based on the suspicion of transphobic talk, guilt by association, and plain bloody-mindedness. Just because a white supremacist agrees with what a lesbian says, doesn’t mean that the lesbian is white supremacist. The way women’s events are shut down is disturbing, and the violence that occurs is 90% caused by biological men in a manner that is far from feminine. The verbal violence against supposed “TERFs” is also rape language, which is very masculine.

I expect there's bad behaviour on both sides, as the revered sage Donald Trump pointed out, but I'm asking you to consider a broader perspective of the history of women's and minority movements. If you want your group's voice to gain traction, especially in the early days, you need to get noticed. The vanguard of movements is generally led by the peeps who feel most strongly, are highly motivated, angry and desperate. They are usually the ones who take the risks, act badly, provoke, and get arrested, mocked, villified, and cause a stir. But they get movements started because they care that much, and a movement begins to coalesce. I don't agree with all groups' actions, but they are the ones who get the issues put on the table. That dies down though as progress is made, less motivated peeps join the convo and some of the ideas and changes become integrated into the mainstream. Part of the social process of integration is the mainstream calling out hate speech, like rape threats and bigotry, saying this isn't right.  Being meek and reasonable, in the early days at least, don't get **** done.

Anyway, I'm not trying to discount the fact this is a difficult time of 'transition' and some people behave badly, they do. Rather than go back and forth on every instance I'm pointing out that other groups' struggles have had a similar history, which is easy to forget when you're in the middle of the latest one. It will settle down as progress is made, unless the backlash succeeds.

The “mainstream veneer” as you call it has virtually been taken over by post modernism, and almost every TV show must display some kind of divergence from heterosexuality, often above and beyond its perceived presence in everyday life. My wife, who is not interested in the subject, observes that in entertainment we seem to be going from one extreme to the other, because of the huge influence of activists in that area. The push is all the more aggressive because people are being told that there is a push back that is equally aggressive, which is simply a lie. There are many people who just feel that the majority is being overwhelmed by concerns for a minority, and attempts to increase numbers. This imbalance is not doing the cause any good.

I assume you understand that representation is an aspect of normalising and accepting the existence of minority groups, of 'others'. Not everybody personally knows a Muslim or trans person for example, and their views are influenced by the representations they see in the news (usually bad) or on TV or other media. Where they can see they are just ordinary peeps, nasty and nice, with struggles and talents just like you and your family, friends and neighbours. It's fine, and hopefully there will come a time when we stop noticing, because it's just people. It comes from a well intentioned place, and overall has important role to play. The anti-woke backlash sees it as somehow oppressing 'normal' people, the straight cis white majority, unless they dominate they are being victimised. ******** to that.

[Stoppelmann]

Alicyn Simpson, who works at the UPMC Children’s Hospital Gender program, describes the possibilty of uterine transplants from LIVE DONORS being given to men who are trying to become women. “Most transgender women would choose to have female physiological experiences.”

Just which healthy young women are going be targeted to be “live donors”?

[Stoppelmann]

The results are already pouring in:
“Gender neutral Brit Awards sees only men nominated in top category“

This year. Last year, it was won by Adele, who proudly — and acceptably — declared her pride in being the woman who had won the award.

But what has this to do with transsexuality?

It has to do with the misrepresentation of the situation of transpeople. Normal people, especially women, suffer a higher degree of erasure, abuse, violence and misrepresentation than transpeople, although we are told otherwise. There is an ideological push that manages to suggest that transpeople are the most oppressed group ever, and that the reaction to violence from them is unreasonable.

[Stoppelmann]

Doctors who are aware that dysphorias may be temporary, will not prescribe irreversible interventions.The NHS may be diminished but most individual doctors and doctors as a profession respect medical ethics.

Most of us don't accept that health is no longer available free to all, as it used to be when the NHS was unadulterated by the profit motive. The present British government will not last beyond the next general election.

Did you fancy that cultures were not in need of change? Already and thanks to heroic actions by some individuals , racism is in retreat. Thanks to Greta Thunberg and her followers and others speciesism is now seriously challenged. There's a lot left to fight for including stopping sexual predation, and sexual predation is a crime. Certainly we need guards to protect vulnerable individuals!

I'm sorry to say that if a necessary differential diagnosis is not possible, I do not have the faith in doctors that you have.

Racism isn't in retreat, the situation has just been turned around and now even words can be racist by association. The latest example was the word field, which was removed from a documentation because of its association with field workers, which was the occupation that many African Americans were given (cotton fields). How abstruse can the discussion get?

You conveniently overlook the numerous examples I have given of how much transpeople are in the limelight, suggesting that their suppression is probably not the way many activists claim it is. On the contrary, women are continually being shut down by transactivists if they even suspect that the predominance of trans issues over women's issues is going to be discussed.

[Stoppelmann]

Sorry to hear that! Hope it's not a bad case and you get well soon. No worries about replying.

Thank you, I am now at least negative and can move about, although its effect on my asthma remains at the moment.

I'd hope you realise that by 'normalise' I meant remove the fear and bigotry and let children understand it as just one of the ways people can be. It played out the same way in the UK when Thatcher banned the teaching about gay people as it implied it was 'normal', it was supposed to be part of The Gay Agenda to turn our sweet innocent normal children gay. Thank goodness we got over that, as part of the overall normalising process. You'd hope such attitudes were dying out, but up it pops again, just in time to be a cause for the 'anti-woke' backlash.

First off, I am sure you mean well, and fear and bigotry is always wrong. And of course, it was high time for the acceptance of gays in society, but there is a different issue at hand here.

The problem is, as I have demonstrated with the numerous headlines I posted to Belindi, there are so many examples of trans and queer people in the limelight, that I think it is a complete misrepresentation to say that trans have more problems being accepted than others. In fact, the diversity of sexual preferences that is accepted and portrayed in the media has never been so big. What has caused a “backlash” if you want to use that word, is the fact that a clear bias in favour of trans appeared all over the place, and the problems were completely denied. It was up to women to make room for trans people, without any attention to the fact that there was no differentiation. Now that statistics are finally being differentiated, it turns out that the proportion of sex-offenders in prison that claim to be trans far exceeds even the proportion of male sex-offenders. Most of the trans offenders had previously been recorded as female sex-offenders. This confirms the intuition that women have had when the encountered transwomen, and of course they are not all sex-offenders, but the ambiguity of the situation makes women and girls vulnerable, as the headlines also showed.

And yes, the point of the psychological assessment would be to look deeper, and if appropriate offer less invasive treatments. This isn't a perfect science, and all treatments can be problematic, but bottom line having a trained team assess the risks/benefits of treatments vs not treating is clearly the best way to go.  Like I'd want a minor considering breast implants or vaginal cosmetic surgery to at least have some sort of psychological intervention too, or there's male circumcision on children and babies is apparently culturally acceptable for reasons I disagree with. We mess with kids bodies for far less good reasons, but trans people are our target du jour.

Of course nothing is perfect, especially when the NHS has been run down for the last 12 years. But the fact that too few statistics have been kept on the effects of transition, especially on those in regret, and the playing down of the numbers of people who discontinue hormonal treatment due to complications, shows the bias I am talking about. It is a strange phenomenon, that trans issues have become the hill to die on for many people, especially academics.

A different psychological aspect is our innate tribalism. An evolved gut response to the 'other' as a potential threat, or as someone who has to prove their trust-worthiness. We more readily give trust and empathy, the benefit of the doubt, to those who are similar to us, or share something important with us. Tho tribal gut instincts can be roused by pretty much anything, it's that easy to manipulate. It's the way we're made, and we can rationalise it almost as easily. This is something we ought to be taught about, and learn strategies to deal with, especially in our time of social media when a mob can spring up overnight if you press the right buttons, and you can easily seek out and funnel only confirming information into your world view building. It's a huge problem in many ways.

I agree with you with one important difference: Our tribalism has also been affected by post-modernism, and the tribe is no longer the traditional tribe, just as the family is no longer the traditional family. The tribe can now be the group of activists that I go about protesting with. The family can consist of the group of friends I hang out with, or have casual sex with. So, the triggering you speak of happens there too, and in my opinion, with a bigger reaction than in a traditional family. The number of ideologies that have sprung up is alarming and explains the number of conspiracy theories that get spread about. Many ideologies have religious traits, among them gender ideology.

There are different ways to think about different specific situations, and to look only at one side is wrong, as you have pointed out. Continually picking out the negatives ignores the legit concerns of others. So how do you feel about a traumatised transwoman escaping an awful, violent home with nowhere else to go being made to feel ostracised and insulted in her last resort place of safety, being treated as if she's the aggressor not the victim. Or even not being allowed in, because some people can't get past seeing her as an aggressor when she's a victim. That's horrible too. But if we can provide facilities or workarounds, neither have to go through it, until these stereotyping attitudes become less ingrained. Like with the NHS, services should be taking a responsible and practical approach to difficult situations, competing needs don't have to clash.

And hopefully, this time of change as feelings run high will settle. Most people aren't freaked out by women doctors any more, or think a gay teacher will molest their kid, and so on.

The traumatised transwoman escaping an awful, violent home may seem no different to a woman or a child suffering the same, but the difference is in the way men and women deal with trauma, and biological males can traumatise women by their reaction to trauma, which is very much not feminine. I have seen this in a medical environment where a transwoman suffered a brain tumour and dropped all attempts at feminine behaviour, became violent and scared the living daylights out of everybody, not just the women. I had to be called in to manhandle the patient into her room before she hurt anyone or herself, and before she was taken to the psychiatry, because she was too strong for the female staff to handle.

There are also recorded examples of transwomen hollering out their frustration, slamming doors, and even roaring at fellow patients, which was completely different when a woman did something similar. Above all, the already traumatised woman patients didn’t have the feeling that they were seeing a suffering woman, but an angry man. We can’t overcome the intuition we have when seeing a person and assessing their sex, it is automatic. This is where needs clash, and the worst thing is that woman who spoke of their anxiety in the vicinity of that angry transwoman was told to leave.

I expect there's bad behaviour on both sides, as the revered sage Donald Trump pointed out, but I'm asking you to consider a broader perspective of the history of women's and minority movements. If you want your group's voice to gain traction, especially in the early days, you need to get noticed. The vanguard of movements is generally led by the peeps who feel most strongly, are highly motivated, angry and desperate. They are usually the ones who take the risks, act badly, provoke, and get arrested, mocked, villified, and cause a stir. But they get movements started because they care that much, and a movement begins to coalesce. I don't agree with all groups' actions, but they are the ones who get the issues put on the table. That dies down though as progress is made, less motivated peeps join the convo and some of the ideas and changes become integrated into the mainstream. Part of the social process of integration is the mainstream calling out hate speech, like rape threats and bigotry, saying this isn't right.  Being meek and reasonable, in the early days at least, don't get **** done.

That sounds much like the way that Communists told us that they had to kill the Czar and all his loyal subjects, including anyone they suspected of being loyal to him. But then there were those that were associated with those who were loyal to him and then those that were associated to the ones that were associated to the loyalists, and so it went on. Post-modernism comes across like that, and I’m afraid that they have raised their flag on this issue as well. It is this influence, I feel, that is taking things out of perspective and radicalising the discussion so that debate is ruled out. As I have said before, many long-termed transsexuals have come out on the side of women, because of the nature of protest and the language used to intimidate women.

Anyway, I'm not trying to discount the fact this is a difficult time of 'transition' and some people behave badly, they do. Rather than go back and forth on every instance I'm pointing out that other groups' struggles have had a similar history, which is easy to forget when you're in the middle of the latest one. It will settle down as progress is made, unless the backlash succeeds.

I’m afraid that this movement is pre-empting the “backlash” before it occurs and attempts to shut down women, whom they are supposedly trying to emulate. Surely, if you want someone to share your problem, you don’t intimidate them? Besides, isn’t it cowardly to attack women although it is quite obvious that men are the problem?

I assume you understand that representation is an aspect of normalising and accepting the existence of minority groups, of 'others'. Not everybody personally knows a Muslim or trans person for example, and their views are influenced by the representations they see in the news (usually bad) or on TV or other media. Where they can see they are just ordinary peeps, nasty and nice, with struggles and talents just like you and your family, friends and neighbours. It's fine, and hopefully there will come a time when we stop noticing, because it's just people. It comes from a well intentioned place, and overall has important role to play. The anti-woke backlash sees it as somehow oppressing 'normal' people, the straight cis white majority, unless they dominate they are being victimised. ******** to that.

As I have said before, this debate suffers under misrepresentation. If you look at the rainbow flag, which was the symbol of diversity, it has now been reduced to a background for the groups that felt that it wasn’t diverse enough and wanted “their” group represented. Apart from completely misunderstanding symbolism, it shows the narcissistic traits of a movement that is behaving in an authoritarian fashion, cancelling whoever they don’t like, attacking anyone they suspect of being critical, and then they wonder that there is a backlash.

[Stoppelmann]

On day 10 of the disciplinary hearing of Amy Hamm, the Canadian nurse under investigation for allegedly transphobic off-duty activity, the lead counsel for the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM) spent a large amount of time trying to discredit one of Hamm’s witnesses.

barbara findlay KC, counsel for the BCCNM, who requests that her name be written in lowercase letters to signify something about oppression, put forward that Dr. Miriam Grossman does not meet the criteria to qualify as an expert witness in these proceedings, calling her “spectacularly unqualified,” and stopped just short of accusing her of practicing conversion therapy.

Grossman is a child and adolescent psychiatrist who is vocally opposed to the medicalization of young people who believe themselves to be transgender. Grossman’s practice now focuses almost entirely on providing exploratory psychotherapy for what she calls “gender-confused youth.” Findlay took exception to Grossman’s refusal to call these children transgender, and also to Grossman’s therapeutic approach that seeks to help the distressed young people accept their bodies without the need for invasive medical intervention.

“Grossman expresses her goal of therapy as to have [gender-confused youth] become more comfortable with the bodies they were born with,” said Findlay. “In Canada, that might be called conversion therapy, and that’s illegal.”