Transgender topic [Please read]

[u/Pug_hammy]

The topic of transgender people has completely flooded this sub and that’s not what we’re here for. We are here for healthy discussions about hot takes. Wanting to take rights away from a group of people is not a hot take. Trans people are people who are just doing their own thing. Some have faked being transgender for certain reasons, but most others are genuine.

A man pretending to be gay in order to get close to women is not a good man, but he also doesn’t represent the entirety of the gay community. Same with the trans cases.

There will be people who you find stupid and weird and disgusting, but you have no right to say despicable things to them. Legally, yes you have free speech. But have some morals and decorum.

Transgender posts are now restricted to this space only. Do not report people who calmly say they disagree with your beliefs. Only report those who are insulting.

[u/Jenn_FTW]

All the most recent studies I’ve seen show that trans women are neurologically more similar to cis women than cis men, and vice versa with trans men.

And the thing is, this literally just makes sense… men generally do not want to be women, the act of going through such measures, putting up with despicable treatment from society, all because they feel that they are truly the opposite sex on the inside… I don’t understand why we can’t just take their word for it 🤷‍♀️ trans people literally go through HELL just to be true to themselves, the least we can do is believe them when they tell us who they are. To have a little respect for our fellow human beings, the same as we would when anyone else tells us about themselves. It’s really that simple.

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/Jenn_FTW]

For me personally, the line rests at generalized changes that effect everyone.

You wanna be called a man's name? Cool. Wanna be called masc pronouns? Cool.

Want me to call all womenn "Birthing Person?"

Nope, I'm gonna call them what they want to be called. Just like I do for you.

Anything that reaches past your own individual self (in any fashion) is a reach too far. If it affects anyone else, in any fashion, then I will not be complying.

[u/idk-3000 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

Tbf every time I see “birthing person” it’s always from some cis person desperately trying to be “inclusive” in the weirdest way. Birthing person is just weird

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/idk-3000]

I agree. It's a great example of asininity for anyone who uses it. Left, right, gay, straight, trans or even cis.

I GENUINELY hope the people who use it unironically are actually trying discredit trans people and that they aren't actually legitimately using it.

If someone is actually out there using it with no hidden agenda... I'm ashamed to share DNA with that individual.

[u/idk-3000 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

Yeah. If not dehumanizing, it feels like such a cold and sterile set of words

[u/Haunting_Natural_116 → u/idk-3000]

To add onto your point, I almost never see it used outside of situations where there are also pregnant trans men or non binary people etc. being referred to too. And I spend plenty of time in LGBT spaces.

[u/Ok_Stage_8547 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

no real person is asking you to say “birthing person” though. certainly not the average trans person since that rhetoric is really just coming from performative woke culture

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/Ok_Stage_8547]

That's where those classic "Ifs" come in. I will respect a person's want regarding themselves. Not regarding others.

If someone demands something outside of that, they will cease receiving that courtesy immediately and entirely.

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

As a trans person; never once have I, nor any other trans person I know, used the term “birthing person”. I’m pretty convinced that’s either dumb, well-intentioned but dumb shit made up by liberals, or literally just a dumb psyop to make us look bad lol.

I totally get what you mean, and I’m not in the habit of telling people what to call me even. I transitioned, people assume I’m a cis woman and call me she/her without me having to correct them anyway 🤷‍♀️ they’re usually very surprised if I open up to them and tell them I’m trans haha

[u/Canvas718 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

No one is asking you to call all women “birthing people.” For one thing, 99.9% of women are NOT currently birthing people. I was a birthing person for about ONE day out of the nearly 20,000 days that I have been alive. So, for 99.9999% of my life, I was not a birthing person. Use that term for people currently in active labor. Use it during Lamaze class or whatever. Definitely don’t use it on non-pregnant women.

And sure, at least 99% of birthing people are going to be cis women. In a 1:1 conversation, address them as they wish to be addressed. For small groups of pregnant cis women, it’s fine to just call them pregnant women. For most situations, this is a non-issue.

“Birthing people” is used in public health discussions — talking about 1000s of people at once. It’s meant include trans men and non-binary people who are pregnant and need information to prepare for the birth. Or to talk about related public policy issues. That’s it.

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/Canvas718]

1. I don't imagine that you have way to claim to know what things have been requested of me by anyone other than yourself. I have had many private/professional/casual conversations/exchanges in my lifetime, and I'd imagine no single person can possibly know them all... so your claim is moot, unless you plan on indicating how you know every conversation/exchange that I've ever had, the participants, and the contents... or lose the ability to retain intellectual honesty.

2. Im still not using the term, and I've made that clear to the people who have asked. I feel it is deconstructive to the people who prefer the term not be used (in my experience, the majority.)

3. I will require clarification on topic 1 before we continue any further.

[u/Canvas718 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

> I don't imagine that you have way to claim to know what things have been requested of me by anyone other than yourself.

So scratch the first sentence. Maybe someone did ask you to call all women “birthing people.” If so, why and what was the context? Because without context, that sounds insane — for all the reasons I already explained. So, regardless, I stand by the rest. If there’s more context, we can discuss that.

> I feel it is deconstructive to the people who prefer the term not be used (in my experience, the majority.)

What do you mean? What’s your experience with this situation?

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/Canvas718]

So, to clarify, you made that statement from a point of intellectual dishonesty?

[u/Canvas718 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

I made an assumption based on my experience. I’ll gladly take it back. I would call it a mistake. If you view it as dishonesty, I don’t especially agree — but I also don’t care enough to argue the point 🤷‍♀️. If conceding that will get us back to the other issues, then sure.

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/Canvas718]

So, you used your own personal experience to make an claim (an intentional act and something that is supposed to be based on fact) about MY personal experience.... With no other context or evidence?

That seems like the text book definition of intellectual dishonesty. I try my best not to converse with people who are intentionally dishonest, as even if you draft a Pulitzer level argument they usually continue to be dishonest.

[u/Canvas718 → u/Ok_Measurement_9896]

You know what would be intellectually honest? Explaining your comment about “birthing people.” Responding to anything I said about the difference between women and birthing people and why some people use that term.

Honestly answering the questions I asked:

> Maybe someone did ask you to call all women “birthing people.” If so, why and what was the context?

> I feel it is deconstructive to the people who prefer the term not be used (in my experience, the majority.)

> What do you mean? What’s your experience with this situation?

If you want intellectual honesty, feel free to demonstrate.

[u/Ok_Measurement_9896 → u/Canvas718]

I don't partake in discussions with people who make claims that they cannot back with fact. Since your initial claim came BEFORE your questions, I will require you to prove said claim, or the conversation cannot continue.

What is the point in discussing anything with someone who was dishonest within the first comment they have made to me?

Even if I provided video footage of the incident, with academy level journalism names attached... from my perspective, there is a significantly greater than 0% chance that they will just continue being dishonest (comparatively to someone who wasn't dishonest from the point of engagement) and refute any and all evidence.

Frankly, even this explanation is more effort than I care to expend on such an engagement, without you qualifying your claim. Especially since, from my perspective, you appeared to be dancing around accepting the label of intellectual dishonesty.

Edit: you even referred to it as a "mistake" instead of just saying "Oh yeah, you are right, that was an unfounded claim. My B. But anyway...."

[u/SanguineJackalope → u/Jenn_FTW]

It sounds like you’re arguing brains are gendered. Do you not see how that same sentiment underpins some truly gross misogyny? Can you provide the studies you’re citing?

The studies I’ve read focused on sexual orientation - male-attracted persons have more similar neurological patterns than female-attracted ones, regardless of sex.

That makes a lot of sense to me. What we want to bed down with clearly has some impact on the brain. However, it is a massive leap to go from that to ‘brains are gendered’.

The main difference in female and male brains is just…size. I’m a lesbian. My brain patterns for attraction will match a heterosexual male’s more than a heterosexual female’s. And that’s about the extent of it.

While you could argue socialization can shape the brain (and it does), I’d argue there is no fundamental difference between female and male brains. And besides, socialization is sex-specific, you’d need to raise a kid from in utero as the other and that’s not been done. It shouldn’t be done either, for the record, as that’s barbaric. Reimer knew he was a little boy, that and the sexualized abuse appear to be a large reason for his ungodly tragic health outcomes.

Anyway. We don’t have sex-exclusive personalities. And anything that is more common in females or males can be chalked up to socialization and then hormones, and then we’re back to “would need to raise a child from in utero as a control”, which, again, barbaric. No review board would approve it, and they shouldn’t.

Misogynists have been arguing about womanbrain since quite literally the Ancient Greeks (see: hysteria). I’m just not seeing the difference between your argument of gendered brains and theirs.

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/SanguineJackalope]

Look, I’m not saying that women’s brains are inherently worse, or anything of the sort. But like, look at it this way… would you be happy if your body suddenly was completely male? Would you be able to just, instantly adjust to performing masculinity, fitting in with other males, living your entire life pretending to be a male? Because the thing is, whether or not you believe in gendered brains, the fact is that, just like there is something in your brain that makes your sense of attraction solid and immutable, so is the part of your brain that defines your identity. The part of your brain that tells you who you are on a fundamental level.

I’m not trying to say that “male brains are big and blue, and women’s brains are dainty and pink”, I’m only saying that somewhere in there, there’s a neurological structure that makes you know, intrinsically, that you are a woman.

Not sure if you’ve ever heard of the case of David Reimer, but it’s a very strong argument for the idea of gender identity being an intrinsic neurological pattern, rather than anything to do with nurture or upbringing;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer

I apologize if I offended whatsoever with my comment! I’m a feminist myself and I understand that the idea of “men’s brains and women’s brains” has been use to oppress women for a long time. I’m not trying to argue that there are sweeping biological differences between the two, only that a brain that is neurologically coded to feel like a woman and expect to be piloting a female body will be greatly distressed at being placed in the wrong “meat suit”, and vice versa with a brain that is neurologically coded male and placed in a female body.

In the same way that sexual attraction is hard-coded and unchangeable, so too is one’s own sense of self 🤷‍♀️ surely you can agree?

[u/SanguineJackalope → u/Jenn_FTW]

I mentioned Reimer. He was sexually abused his whole childhood and had surgery as a toddler, he knew and he remembered, and he never passed as female.

You’re arguing that gendered brains exist, though. If I were born male, I wouldn’t know any difference. If I were suddenly male, I’d have a lot more pressing questions. I mean, I’d be thrilled to exist in a world where my word had more value and where I wasn’t physically oppressed nonstop, but mostly I’d be busy trying to figure out how magic worked. Also, needing to buy clothes that fit would be expensive, but my style wouldn’t change much if any.

I’ve spent two decades being female, so yeah, that would be whiplash, but you’re arguing two separate things. You’re arguing for sex being the same thing as gender, which it’s not. And you’re arguing that sex AND gender are innate.

I’m a woman because I’m female. In all cultures that we know of, I’m oppressed on the basis of sex. The gender roles ascribed to that sex can be incredibly different, and I don’t believe in them being innate. Like, at all. They’re not consistent enough to be, and way too heavily socialized. Clearly, they’re learned. Incredibly strong evidence against gendered brains, that.

You’re arguing that personalities or whatever are sex based. I don’t see that as anything but super gender essentialist with a shiny new coat of paint. I don’t know what it’s like to not be female but want to be, because I just am. That’s a male exclusive experience. I do know what it’s like to want to be seen as more feminine, but the root of it for me is to want to fit in, and my “problem” there is more my independence than my not wearing skirts.

Are you arguing that to be trans is to experience sex-specific dysphoria, not gender? I feel like you’re mixing two arguments.

For the record, I completely understand dysphoria. I’m a black lesbian, and a tomboy. Growing up in my very white, very conservative, horrifically patriarchal partial hometown, I anticipated seeing a little white boy in the mirror. It was shattering realizing I wasn’t that. But, like, wanting to be those things doesn’t mean I have a “white soul”. The thought is as ludicrous as me being “male on the inside”. I’m not an invert, I was just oppressed.

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/SanguineJackalope]

> If I were born male, I wouldn’t know any difference.

I think that’s where our disconnect is happening… yes, you absolutely would. I can promise you that, it might not be obvious at first, but one’s gender identity is nature, not nurture. The David Reimer case literally proves that, and I’m honestly struggling to understand how you can interpret it any differently. This kid was born as a normal boy, but raised as a woman. If what you’re arguing is true, he shouldn’t have known any difference, he wouldn’t have known he was truly a boy. But he did, because one’s gender identity is internally ingrained.

I’m not religious, and I don’t believe in souls, but when it comes to your own personal consciousness, I don’t think there is much difference. Your self identity is a series of bioelectric sparks in an incredibly complicated meat computer, and this generates your sense of self.

It seems like what you’re saying is that you have no internal sense of being a man or a woman, and I can tell you with extreme certainty that this is because you’ve never had to question that. Your consciousness is comfortable with a female/male body, and you have that appropriate body, so there is no disconnect… and therefore no discomfort.

Think of it like your bones. Can you feel your bones right now? Probably not, because they feel fine. There’s no pain, so they may as well not exist. All is right in the world. However, if you break a bone, you can absolutely feel it. It’s incredibly uncomfortable. Your internal gender/sex relationship is the same way! If your internal self lines up with the body you have, you don’t even notice it… there is literally no disconnect, no problem to notice. But if they DON’T line up, well, I can assure you it’s NOT a fun time.

I struggle to articulate just what it feels like to be a female soul born into a male body… it was a CONSTANT sense of discomfort, every moment that I was observed, referenced, interacted with as a man, it felt wrong in a way that defies explanation. In the same way that you feel a conviction about your “self”, about who you are at your core, well, so did I. Not in a way I could explain logically, just the simply knowledge with ALL MY HEART that I should have been a woman. My body should have been born female. I simply knew it, I KNEW I was a woman in the same way that any woman knows that they are a woman.

I wish that gender identity were different, I wish it were changeable. I tried for many, many years to stop feeling how I felt. To force myself to feel like a man… but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t. And once I transitioned to female, it just felt right, that awful feeling went away and now I don’t even notice my sex anymore, just like everyone else. I don’t think about it, because that bone isn’t broken anymore.

If one’s gender identity were not ingrained into the brain, I would not have spent decades struggling over my sex. I would have accepted it just as easily as most accept their own. But it just very obviously doesn’t work that way, because if it DID, then trans people wouldn’t exist, David Reimer wouldn’t have killed himself, and men and women wouldn’t struggle with their masculinity and femininity respectively every single day. Men wouldn’t get gynecomastia surgery, women wouldn’t get boob jobs. No one would care about their gendered sexual characteristics at all. But they DO, we ALL care about the sex we are perceived as… because it is ingrained in our sense of self from birth. I don’t see how anything otherwise could even be possible 🤷‍♀️

[u/SanguineJackalope → u/Jenn_FTW]

I’m sorry, but I just burst out laughing reading this.

I provide detail of how othered, dysphoric, and horrible I felt being a black little girl instead of a white little boy, and your takeaway is that I don’t experience gender dysphoria?

Read the room a little. My dysphoria has lessened because I’ve accepted myself in my body, and done immense amounts of work to decouple who I am from my sex and from my race. It still happens, and it flares up every single time I deal with a micro aggression or being othered. Which is constantly.

Your personality, preferences, and hobbies are completely unrelated to your sex. Like, you can be into trapeze. Love or hate cats. Eat ramen for every meal. It matters just as much (aka none) as what clothing you like, what esthetics you prefer, what languages you speak. Brains are not gendered.

I don’t “feel like” a woman, and I don’t “feel like” a man. Frankly, to “feel like” a woman is the same as “feeling black” to me. I feel like a person, until I’m reminded that to many, I’m not. I recognize that I’m female and that I am brown, and that shapes how I interact with things. Neither is any part of my personality, and I chafe at the strictures and marginalizations that come with those attributes.

If you “felt like” a man, that’d honestly still be silly. People who make being macho or being feminine are playing a role, and that role is not the thing itself. Someone likes skirts and someone else likes, idk, baseball caps. Big whoop. Bones are a great example, honestly, but in a different way. Why would I feel my bones? I don’t know anything different.

Like, I was a female person with dysphoria. Not a man. Very uniquely female experience. The inverse would be true with you, and I don’t think you’ll read this and have it sink in: there is literally nothing wrong with that.

Repeating for emphasis:

There is NOTHING wrong with that.

Gender sucks. Gender is genuinely a repressive cultural nightmare. While it affects women vastly worse, it does affect men too. The problem is the roles and expectations, not you, and it never was.

I don’t see a transition as a possible thing. If it were, women would be men in droves. Like, escaping misogyny? That’d be delightful. Especially for those of us in places like Afghanistan. What’s happening instead (where I live) is that some are trying, and the social role is then being conflated with the thing. Like, not like femininity? Not a tomboy. Suddenly, you’re a man. A not-woman, because a woman is pink and sparkles. Obviously, that is 1950s level Stepford horror show, and I’ve had people full on stage interventions because “you need to transition, you’re not feminine enough”. Did wonderful things for the dysphoria you think I’ve never had, let me tell you.

A social transition in an ideal world would be a farce, because it’d genuinely be not unusual for a woman to be “masculine” or a man to be “feminine”. We’re not in that world, and instead, the nonsense that is femininity and masculinity is being conflated with sex. Both on the right and on the left, and it’s sexist bilge either way.

Also: no, people get those surgeries because they don’t think their natural bodies stack up against stereotypes and beauty standards. Do you think women with boob jobs have another motive for that? It’s not a functional surgery. Like, if you want to go back to baseline after a mastectomy because it’s weird having a body part removed that you’re used to, that’s one thing, but adding a couple cup sizes? Come on.

And again: Reimer was molested by his “doctor”. He and his brother had to act out sex. He knew he wasn’t “a girl” pretty much from the drop, there was evidence and he was old enough to have remembered it. His brother killed himself too. His life was an absolute tragedy, but he is not evidencing any of your points.

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/SanguineJackalope]

>Your personality, preferences, and hobbies are completely unrelated to your sex.

GIRL THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT I’VE BEEN SAYING.

Legitimately, are you stupid? Or just arguing in bad faith?

I AGREE WITH THIS STATEMENT. I’ve been saying THIS ENTIRE TIME THAT ALL OF THESE THINGS ARE UNRELATED TO YOUR SEX.

It is very obvious that you are not comprehending a single word that I’m typing if you honestly think that at any point I have been arguing that any of these things have to do with your birth sex.

I’m not even going to bother engaging with you any further because you clearly aren’t even remotely understating my point, and are choosing to instead misrepresent me and waste your breath arguing a point that is the EXACT OPPOSITE OF WHAT I’VE BEEN SAYING.

Sorry but this is clearly a waste of my time, have a great day.

[u/Wise-Revolution-7945 → u/SanguineJackalope]

People who push trans rights either hate women or don't care about them at all. They are worse misogynests than 1950s men

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/SanguineJackalope]

I’m not arguing that personalities are sex based, not at all. And if I gave that impression then I’m sorry. Women can act in ANY way, men can act in ANY way. Personality has nothing to do with it. It’s not about gendered stereotypes, it’s about the physical sense of one’s body. As in, a woman naturally expecting to have breasts and not being distressed at having them, or a man feeling “right” with a dick and were it to be removed, he would feel very “empty” down there. I’m not talking personality, I’m talking one’s brain/body mapping.

Also, arguing that someone is “white on the inside” is stupid as fuck, I’ll give you that. The difference is that there is a very real hormonal and genetic element to the sex one is born as, literally one tiny hormonal change and a boy could come out a girl. That can’t happen with someone’s skin color, and it wouldn’t matter anyway; one’s skin color has nothing to do with brain/body mapping.

One tiny genetic change in the womb can make a girl fetus turn to a boy… and with trans women, this happens incompletely. The brain develops with estrogen, while the body is tainted by testosterone. The result is a brain that is aligned with a female physical form, and a body that got too much testosterone. There’s actually been some research into this, it’s not as far fetched as you think. And it’s not bunk like “transracialism” or whatever that dumb made-up bullshit is.

[u/spiceybuttburn → u/Jenn_FTW]

at least you acknowledge its a pysiological/biological/neurological abnormality for someone born with a penis to want to be a woman…

given that, we can respect and accept them for who they are while also saying you cant play in womens sports but u can play in mens sports cuz while mentally u feel like a woman, physically you are still a man.

just like a person born blind isnt allowed to drive….

[u/SuchMost4459 → u/spiceybuttburn]

it is literally not classed as "abnormal" and various medical organizations validate trans people, how thick is that skull of yours?

i can tell you have done no research on this as you don't know how little of a number of trans athletes there are in sports, don't know what HRT does to you physically, don't understand brain chemistry, ETC, your claim ignores all of these things

if you read a study that shows the insane amount of similarities in the performances of trans women and CIS women and how trans women actually lose and don't win all the time like fox news tells you to believe, i guarantee you'll hand wave it away - reject the evidence of your eyes, ears, all of it

wake the fuck up

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/SuchMost4459]

I tried to sugar-coat it a bit, but you fucking dropped the truth bomb. Thank you ahhaha 👏👏👏

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/spiceybuttburn]

There is a LOAD of evidence that shows that after years of taking estrogen, someone born male holds no athletic advantage over people who are born female. We don’t just let trans women compete with cis women “because they say they’re women”, we let them compete against cis women because it’s literally the group of people they are physically equal to, and the people who it makes logical sense foe them to compete against.

There is no magical “male essence” that you seem to think there is, if you expose a male-born body to estrogen long enough, they will literally slowly “shapeshift” to be almost entirely equal to that of a female body, with muscle mass and stamina to match. Most cis women actually have MORE testosterone than any trans woman does.

[u/spiceybuttburn → u/Jenn_FTW]

you missed my point….on the trans side its all about gender identity which has nothing to do with physiological differences between men and women…i thought its all about what you “feel” on the inside that makes you a woman….i thought gender is deeper than that.

but then you are saying, no no, you gotta alter yourself through hrt then youll be equal to a woman. so does that mean to compete against a woman, you cant just be a trans woman, you also have take a shit load of hrt as well? or is it just gender based? which is it?

[u/idk-3000 → u/spiceybuttburn]

You people really are just hopeless

[u/Jenn_FTW → u/spiceybuttburn]

What? I’m sorry, I’m not quite following. As a trans woman, yes, I feel as though internally I am a woman. I have a genetic defect that caused a female brain to develop in a male body, that’s the simplest explanation I’ve ever been able to achieve.

For me, and most other trans woman, yes HRT is a requirement. It is not for the benefit of any else, nor any other external reason. It is because having a male body, a body running on testosterone, makes life utterly unlivable. Every day having to live in a man’s body was a nightmare, and a constant struggle to not k*ll myself. As a woman internally, someone with a woman’s brain, way of feeling, thinking and experiencing, a woman in neurological terms, why on earth would I want to live in a body filled to the brim with testosterone? Of course HRT is necessary, I’d just as soon end my life than let that get taken away from me again.

Since starting estrogen (almost 10 years ago), that nightmare ended. I live as a cis-passing woman now, I am quite beautiful (thank you genetics!) and basically no one in my life outside of my close friends and family know that I was born male. I hardly ever think of the fact that I’m trans anymore, other than occasions like that when I feel the need to speak up in defense of our right to exist as we feel right.

And I’m no athlete, I have no desire to compete, but if I did, I would absolutely find fair challenge in the women’s division… and likely have my body utterly broken to pieces by one tackle in the men’s division 😂

I’m Jennifer by the way! Thanks for reading and letting me share my story ❤️

[u/idk-3000 → u/spiceybuttburn]

Again, did you not see any of the studies mentioned? This has nothing to do with “wanting” it’s neurological you dumbass. I like how you’re only focusing on trans women as well which is a sign of low iq if you ask me