Do trans-activists allow for trans-moderates?

[icehorse]

What is extreme or dangerous about it?

Because our society is built on trust and logic. Language is how we communicate with each other and it's a major vehicle for furthering trust. The word "woman" is a fundamental word in our language. It's central and primary. When you claim that "a trans woman is a woman" you are attempting to unilaterally undo society-wide, agreed upon meanings.

 

[Soandso]

Well, If I may brag, my IQ is nearly 70.
Perhaps you can join me up there some day.
Study hard!
Perhaps you'll even learn to avoid double posting.

I love the shade disguised as self depricating humor! Kudos!

 

[Soandso]

Because our society is built on trust and logic. Language is how we communicate with each other and it's a major vehicle for furthering trust. The word "woman" is a fundamental word in our language. It's central and primary. When you claim that "a trans woman is a woman" you are attempting to unilaterally undo society-wide, agreed upon meanings.

Words change meaning over time as new concepts are adopted. This is the way language has always worked all throughout human history

 

[icehorse]

Surgery and hormones can change sex to a large extent, although they're definitely not a perfect match for being born a certain sex. Still, medical professionals recommend sex reassignment surgery to a lot of trans people (but rarely to minors, as the link I posted has clarified) as part of treating gender dysphoria.

Surgery and hormones cannot change the DNA in the cells of our bodies.

There's no such thing as "my definition." This isn't some matter of opinion or personal preference, and I'm not a qualified medical expert either. Offering "my definition" here would be like a layperson's offering "their definition" of evolution or anxiety even though both have highly specific definitions offered by experts, based on decades of research.

Okay then, of the many definitions of trans that exist, which are the ones you are using in this conversation?

Calling it a disorder is more harmful than not nowadays because 1) this isn't how any medical organization classifies it, so it's simply incorrect given current evidence, and 2) classifying it as such is a common way of dismissing the necessity of gender-affirming care, instead proposing any of a multitude of unevidenced and ideologically slanted "treatments" in lieu of proper approaches.

I have seen a lot of trans people wish that there were a non-surgical treatment for their specific condition. If the treatment were as direct as getting therapy and calling it a day, many trans people's lives would be much easier, but that's not the case.

Why would calling it a disorder hurt the quality of care?

If enough evidence accumulated and medical experts classified it as a disorder, while offering treatments in that light, then hopefully that would benefit trans people and make treatment more effective. That scenario hasn't happened so far, though.

You're leaning heavily on the medical profession, and while I think we should all be a bit cautious in that regard, if it's not a disorder, then why do doctors have to deal with it at all? If not "disorder", how do doctors categorize it? A condition? We don't bring doctors into a situation when a person is healthy, correct? So again, what category does trans fall in to?

Hold on: now we've moved on to conspiracy theories about the medical industry in an attempt to discredit their established positions? I think the similarity between the above and anti-vax arguments is conspicuous.

Zooming way out, I often offer up a challenge to the world: "Name a societal ill that isn't caused by or exacerbated by oligarchs / kleptocrats."

It's important to notice that I can defend this claim without ever having to employ a conspiracy theory. So when I suspect profiteering is happening (which I do), that in no way means I believe there is a conspiracy. There are millions of pick-pockets in the world, do you suspect them of conspiring?

But for the sake of discussion, let's say that no profiteering is happening.

Let me reiterate a previous question: what does "sex assigned at birth" mean? It would appear to be an attempt to cast doubt on biology?

 

[icehorse]

Let's try another situation: say that an adolescent male is having a problem with phimosis (look it up, I won't describe it here). THe family has gone to a doctor, who recommended circumcision, in this particular case, and they took the precaution of getting a second opinion, which agreed. Now, the health-care provider, the family and the adolescent have all agreed to a surgical procedure on the boy's genitals.

Do you agree that they have the right to proceed? Of do you think that the government should be involved, and make the final decision? Which be effectively saying, "the kid can just learn to live with it until he's old enough to decide on his own."

I think this is an apples and oranges example. Phimosis is a directly observable, quantifiable phenomenon. Feeling like you're in the wrong body is not.

I'll ask you the same question I just asked: How would you categorize trans? A disorder? A condition? ...

 

[Yerda]

Because our society is built on trust and logic. Language is how we communicate with each other and it's a major vehicle for furthering trust. The word "woman" is a fundamental word in our language. It's central and primary. When you claim that "a trans woman is a woman" you are attempting to unilaterally undo society-wide, agreed upon meanings.

No, when I say a transwoman is a woman I'm making a statement about gender identity. The idea that I'm threatening society by making this statement is one that you'd have to support with a lot more than a hand wave and a just-so story.

Also, in my experience most people have no issue with calling transwomen women, so it's hardly society-wide. The conviction that biological sex and gender identity are the same things isn't one shared by everyone.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

I think this is an apples and oranges example. Phimosis is a directly observable, quantifiable phenomenon. Feeling like you're in the wrong body is not.

I'll ask you the same question I just asked: How would you categorize trans? A disorder? A condition? ...

The same way that I would categorize gay. I know that I find men attractive, and do not find any females attractive, ever. I am a person who happens to believe that the mind is the product of a brain -- with which it interacts and thus is to some extent self-shaping -- and that the only actual "person" that I can be is the one that my brain/mind/brain thinks that I am. Therefore, I am a homosexual, because the object of my sexual attraction has the same physical body parts that I have. What I do not think is that there is somehow this "person with a disorder or condition" that makes him think he is attracted to males sexually, but isn't -- somehow -- really: that he just "imagines it."

Now, I don't know you. I don't know how you see yourself. If you are male and attracted to females, do you suppose that you might just have a "condition" or a "disorder" that can somehow be corrected while still leaving you as the same person? Do you imagine that there is any way that you could be persuaded to change that sexual attraction to the other gender? I don't mean submit, like perhaps for large amounts of money -- I mean really change that orientation, permanently. I'm willing to bet that you do not.

At the end of the day, I think one of the things it means to be human is the mind itself -- which we know to be quantitatively different from every other animal on earth, and qualitatively different from the vast majority of them. Take away my mind -- and while you may keep my body going with a vast array of medical bravado, I, the person who calls himself EvangelicalHumanist will no longer be there, will no longer exist.

And so, the transgender person is the person that they think and feel themselves to be -- not their body. I grant you, I don't know how I would cope with that, but I do note that transgender individuals have to do exactly that -- cope -- every day of their lives and in every (sometimes hateful) situation in which they find themselves.

And no, that is not a "disorder" or "condition." It is a brute fact of the brain/mind/brain that makes them to BE who they are.

 

[icehorse]

No, when I say a transwoman is a woman I'm making a statement about gender identity. The idea that I'm threatening society by making this statement is one that you'd have to support with a lot more than a hand wave and a just-so story.

Also, in my experience most people have no issue with calling transwomen women, so it's hardly society-wide. The conviction that biological sex and gender identity are the same things isn't one shared by everyone.

I wish you were just making a statement about gender identity, But regardless of your intentions, the statement has far broader implications.

I'm not attacking the idea of gender identity. Nor am I claiming that sex and gender must be the same.

 

[JDMS]

Let me reiterate a previous question: what does "sex assigned at birth" mean? It would appear to be an attempt to cast doubt on biology?

Sex assigned at birth is a medical term that existed before it was used for trans people. It exists because doctors often use external genitalia to determine the sex of a baby, and the baby may be revealed to be intersex later on.

 

[SomeRandom]

Let me reiterate a previous question: what does "sex assigned at birth" mean? It would appear to be an attempt to cast doubt on biology?

Pretty sure the term “assigned sex at birth” originated moreso to cover the butts of doctors who wish to avoid being accused of malpractice. Since not all intersex conditions are evident at birth, a doctor can simply say, well I assigned you X sex at birth based on the available data (genitalia present.) I didn’t realise you actually had insert intersex condition here.
Again, these conditions sometimes aren’t evident until the onset of puberty in some individuals.
It’s more of a “just in case” clause used by the medical community in reality lol

 

[icehorse]

The same way that I would categorize gay.

Well I would not categorize gay and trans the same way.

I would say that only mis-guided extremists think that gay is something to be fixed.

But what I'm hearing over and over again in this thread and in the world, is that trans people need professional interventions.

 

[JDMS]

Let me reiterate a previous question: what does "sex assigned at birth" mean? It would appear to be an attempt to cast doubt on biology?

I also forgot to mention, but the term also exists because babies with ambiguous genitalia are often surgically altered to fit one sex, and they sex is what is put on the birth certificate, or "assigned".

 

[SomeRandom]

Because our society is built on trust and logic. Language is how we communicate with each other and it's a major vehicle for furthering trust. The word "woman" is a fundamental word in our language. It's central and primary. When you claim that "a trans woman is a woman" you are attempting to unilaterally undo society-wide, agreed upon meanings.

Lmao! Go back a hundred years and see how far your modern English skills takes you in conversation.
Fundamental words have completely changed from their original meaning and continue to do so
A static language is a dead language
Like damn dude, calm your farm.
Pretty sure the term woman has also undergone various changes throughout the centuries. Society survived

 

[icehorse]

@JDMS and @SomeRandom - I can accept your explanations as to the origins of the phrase.

But trans-activists often claim that sex is malleable, and so the fact that the phrase is used in definitions of trans appears to be a tactic to cast doubt on the medical practice of assigning sex.

No doubt there are rare cases as you mentioned. Rare cases do not undo the basics of biology.

 

[icehorse]

Lmao! Go back a hundred years and see how far your modern English skills takes you in conversation.
Fundamental words have completely changed from their original meaning and continue to do so
A static language is a dead language

Yes, languages evolve, of course. That's different than attempting to force changes by decree.

 

[SomeRandom]

@JDMS and @SomeRandom - I can accept your explanations as to the origins of the phrase.

But trans-activists often claim that sex is malleable, and so the fact that the phrase is used in definitions of trans appears to be a tactic to cast doubt on the medical practice of assigning sex.

No doubt there are rare cases as you mentioned. Rare cases do not undo the basics of biology.

Well I can’t comment on the claims made by trans activists, since I am largely unfamiliar with them
And I hesitate to take people’s word on them. Not saying you are lying or anything, it’s just that I hear a lot of different things is all. So I would like to see some kind of verifiable data before commenting, that’s all.

As to biology, to understand the basics of biology as you put it is to understand that we have to include these so called “rare instances” to complete our actual understanding of biology

Also fun fact, there are some intersex conditions that occur at roughly the same amount of times as redheads in our species.
You going to accuse redheads of undoing biology?

 

[SomeRandom]

Yes, languages evolve, of course. That's different than attempting to force changes by decree.

Who’s decreeing, exactly?
I hear this complaint a lot but I haven’t actually seen folks demanding these alleged changes.
I’m sure it happens but a lot of the time when I look into the claims it’s just folks demanding a bit of etiquette

 

[We Never Know]

Lmao! Go back a hundred years and see how far your modern English skills takes you in conversation.
Fundamental words have completely changed from their original meaning and continue to do so
A static language is a dead language
Like damn dude, calm your farm.
Pretty sure the term woman has also undergone various changes throughout the centuries. Society survived

"Pretty sure the term woman has also undergone various changes throughout the centuries"

If you're pretty sure give us some of the various changes of the term "woman" throughout the centuries.

 

[icehorse]

Who’s decreeing, exactly?
I hear this complaint a lot but I haven’t actually seen folks demanding these alleged changes.
I’m sure it happens but a lot of the time when I look into the claims it’s just folks demanding a bit of etiquette

As one example, I would say the claim is at the foundation of transwomen being allowed to compete in women's sports or use women's restrooms.

But for the sake of discussion: if you DID hear it a lot, would you defend it?

 

[SomeRandom]

"Pretty sure the term woman has also undergone various changes throughout the centuries"

If you're pretty sure give us some of the various changes of the term "woman" throughout the centuries.

In the old English (and I mean actual old English not Shakepeare lol) the term was Wifman or Wimmin. The meaning was basically wife man, since women historically speaking, weren’t always considered fleshed out individuals by society. Instead they were considered merely the property of men, you are aware of this, yea?

If I recall my English class correctly we have the Norse to thank for the English word “Woman” in its modern sense. I think it also comes from a German root word, but don’t quote me on that

As society struggled with and then eventually accepted that women were actual human beings with their own unique thoughts, feelings and identities, so too did the meaning of the term evolve to keep up. And lo and behold, society has yet to collapse

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1995/11/24/that-was-no-woman-that-was-my-wife-person/d7e63499-be91-41d4-943c-93599f647472/#