It’s not a case of Body Dysmorphic Disorder.
Gender identity is not subject to being defective. It’s what you are.
This question is often brought up for the case of BIID and other disorders, where a person self-mutilates or seeks surgical removal of body parts. That and the case you bring up of anorexia are different from treating a transgender patient, in that the result of the trifecta of counseling, medicine, and change in life role is a happier, healthier person. Whereas anorexia has clear and present health dangers. Comparisons others have made in the past between “chopping off your arm for BIID” and transgender surgery are also not valid, because the result of the transgender surgery is a person who can have a more functional body as a result, not a less functional body.*
At the current state of medicine the best treatment for transgender persons is to let us transition. This has largely unchanged since Benjamin wrote his capstone work in 1966. In the future that might not be the case, but the future is not here.
Beware that there is an ongoing “debate” (I use the quotes deliberately) where a few posit that quality of life studies mean nothing, that psychologists have no ability to objectively judge patient outcomes, and that the only acceptable metric for success is a huge reduction in suicide rates and attempts. Something not studied by the vast majority of quality of life studies of before/after transition, due largely to methodological problems. I’m setting the countdown clock until someone brings this up.
- Barring surgical accident or misadventure, which can happen in any surgery.
Edited: Oh, you did go to the BIID/BDD route while I was typing. I’m pretty sure I explained all this before.
It’s not at all irrelevant and hand waving it away dismissively doesn’t make it so. Research and effort into how the brain works and develops is ongoing and what is now “science fiction” and “irrelevant” can quickly become relevant and that totally ignores deciding how to allocate research dollars to begin with.
Why this and not other things? Throw pedophilia or sadism in that list. Would you be against treating that sort of brain wiring or would you rather treat the effects with prison?
With regards to your very small sample it depends. What is the harm and benefit to those states of beings and what are the harms and benefits of treating those states of beings? For example, let’s say my sex-drive is low. Is it immoral to discuss that I or my wife may want it changed? Is it immoral to change it? I don’t think it is.
I don’t think homosexuality or praying has the same impact on the body as a sex change does. People talk about a teenager hooking up with an adult as some grave sin because of the “inability” to give consent. Yet that same teenager can radically alter his or her body to an extent vastly greater than a little bit of sex. The reason being, in part iirc, due to the prevalence of suicide if transitioning is denied.
So I don’t see what the issue is with regards to discussing the modification of the brain circuitry itself.
Defective are your words. “It’s what you are” is exceedingly lame. That same sentence applies to every entity in the universe. If I have cancer or a vestigial tail I want that stuff gone. Well, maybe not the tail. If I think my left leg doesn’t belong and I want it removed I want something that will convince me otherwise. My brain isn’t seeing reality for what it is. Or something. Regardless I’ll take the pill before the bone saw.
If the best treatment is transitioning then that’s the best treatment and I have no issue with that. I want people to be happy with who they are. However, I’m not convinced in the future that other options won’t be viable. Now, is it immoral for society to work on these concepts?
Back to the original topic. The fact that Beggs was booed is cruel. What a terrible position to be in where you feel like you are a boy, you want to wrestle boys, and yet the government is forcing you into a socially no-win situation. Life is hard enough. Reasonable rules can be implemented and enforced to let everyone participate.
All of the things I mentioned are, in my understanding, fundamental to who a person is – change that, and the person essentially ceases to exist, replaced with someone different (if similar in a lot of ways). And unlike pedophilia or sadism (which may or may not be fundamental to a person’s identity), they do not increase the chance of harm to anyone else. Changing someone’s identity like that strikes me as not only science-fiction-y, but profoundly immoral, except perhaps in a very, very limited set of circumstances.
But Una’s answer is (not surprisingly) much better than mine. Thanks, Una!
Why do you subjectively omit traits from being intrinsic that you find disagreeable yet assert that traits you find neutral or positive are fundamentally intrinsic? That isn’t consistent. I’d argue that religion and other forms of ideology aren’t intrinsic. I’d also argue that certain forms of religious practices or ideologies are vastly dangerous to society.
What moral axiom is violated for changing the state of being from displeasurable to pleasurable if no harm to society or others is occurring. The limited set is choice by the way. The choice of transitioning and treating the body that’s self offensive or treating the brain that perceives the body.
Let’s go back to sex drive or depression. If I’m depressed or have no libido why can’t I rationally analyze that current state of existence and make the decision, it may be a gamble, that I’d be happier with a different state of existence? How is making that choice or talking to a physician about options profoundly immoral.
I think the desire to be perceived as tolerant overrules peoples desire to be strictly rational. Apparently necessary virtue signally incoming! I have no problem with people doing what they deem necessary, in most cases, with their own bodies.
What do you think of suicidal thoughts? Should the state assist with the cessation of life if the mind can be treated and a happy life would be the outcome? Or should sanctity of mental status of this moment be the overriding moral axiom society should be governed by?
I don’t know the answers to most of this, and it probably deserves it’s own thread if you’re really interested in discussing it.
Setting aside the discussion on transgender rights, this is incorrect. An athlete who is taking steroids (or other substances banned in competitive sports) to treat a legitimate medical condition can receive a therapeutic use exemption. You may recall a story last year about gymnast Simone Biles taking a banned substance to treat her ADHD, and not losing her medals over it.
I don’t know what you’re wanting here. Positing that someday in the future there might possibly be a way for the average transgender person to live a long and happy life without transition has no bearing on this topic.
Threads naturally evolve a bit over time. At least we aren’t spammed with Betty Crocker’s finest works.
Plus I think everyone’s in agreement that Texas’s law isn’t the most fair for any of the wrestlers involved.
One difference between BIID, anorexia, and the like is that the transgender people are not delusional. An anorexic thinks she (occasionally he) is fat even though her ribs are showing along with various other bones. Someone with one of the body dysmorphic disorders thinks a leg attached to their body is not theirs, or that a normal face is deformed. A transwoman pre-transition has no such delusions - she knows she has a male body, likely a very functional and even a good-looking male body that is without deformity. That is actually, part of the problem - the transwoman knows, very clearly, that she has a male body. Maybe if she was under the delusion she had a female body she might actually be less distressed.
The point being that they aren’t denying the physical reality of their body, unlike the other disorders you’ve mentioned.
I think it’s because the history of trying to change people’s brains and/or thinking in such a manner has been pretty goddamned horrific in practice. That might be different in 50-100 years, but up to this point the results have been terrible. This makes people reluctant to discuss the notion even in theory.
The question is whether or not there would be an actual choice.
If it were possible for a pill to reprogram a homosexual with heterosexuality would that option truly be a choice, or would there be coercion to conform to the norm? If there was an option for a transgender person to take a pill and become happy with their biological birth gender would they be allowed an actual choice or would pressure be applied for them to take that particular treatment?
Given what has happened historically to force people to conform to societal norms fear about coercion is not baseless.
Seriously. What is so complicated about this? I’d have expected if any transgender issue could find an across-the-board consensus on the right thing to do—it would be this one. It’s irrational to seek to complicate it. The Texas superintendents screwed up, that’s all. Let them undo the damage they just did.
Texas’ “logic” on this subject essentially boils down to “because transgender people are icky. How can we contort logic and contrive reasons so we don’t openly reveal our bigotry?” Same as the goddamn bathroom “controversy.”
Particularly for minors…
Believe me, I know that line unto sickness. But that won’t wash no more. As Roland Deschain would say, “The world has moved on.”
This is very relative and inconsistent. The truth is, when I was in high school, I bet the kids who started on the football team made a lot more testosterone than I did. Why couldn’t I go to the doctor and get my T levels boosted to the same as theirs? It clearly isn’t a level playing field, but we’ve decided that genetic differences = fair while artificial boosts = unfair.
The very premise of sports is unfair. The very premise of sports is that you can only win if you have the right genes and then train heavily to maximize your genetic potential.
Someone who is born with the wrong gender, or the wrong genes, doesn’t get to win. We’ve decided that every athlete who can’t compete with the athletes with better muscle building genes, better nerves, and genes for more size is going to lose. That’s considered fair.
So in that context, any pharmaceutical intervention is cheating. Full stop, end of story. If we make an exception for someone who feels they are the wrong gender, we need to make an exception for anyone who feels they should be 7 feet tall and jacked like Arnold Schwarzenegger.
On a serious note, size dysmorphia is a real thing. Just like when a transexual person looks in a mirror and desires deeply to be another gender, I myself desire deeply to be 7 feet tall and ripped with enormous muscles. I’m sure I can find many, many people who are with me on this. And I shouldn’t be denied medical treatment for my condition.
Didn’t the X Men cover pretty much exactly this idea, back when Jean Grey wasn’t a Stark?
Una, I know it must be frustrating to say the same things over and over, but I want to thank you for your efforts. On this issue, you haven’t just fought my ignorance, you’ve crushed it. Right until I read your very well researched, clearly articulated links, I just assumed MtF transgendered individuals had an unfair advantage in athletics. It wasn’t based on anything other than gut feeling, I suppose. Now I see that I was completely wrong.
And it makes me very happy to be wrong. Very. So, from this mostly lurker on the boards, thanks again!
Why do you assume that?
Is that another “gut feeling” thing or is there a factual basis for that?
We know that in some disorders a person can be less sensitive than normal to sex hormones, that what’s happening with Androgen Insensitivity Syndrome. I would expect, given how humans vary, that people falling into the normal range will also vary in their sensitivity to androgens. Could a more sensitive than average person have relatively low testosterone but be really ripped, and someone with less than average sensitivity have high testosterone but struggle to put on muscle?
Not exactly - isn’t that the whole premise between diving sports into male and female categories, that a Y chromosome gives an unfair advantage over those who don’t have it?
And if your T levels fall below the norm for your gender you can, in fact, go to a doctor and have the boosted up into the normal range.
You’re allowed pharmaceutical treatment to bring yourself into a normal range, not to exceed it.
The factual basis that you know and knew when you started picking at my post is that different student athletes have different innate potential. Some have more than others. Maybe the difference is your sensitivity to anabolic substances like testosterone and not the raw amount produced, or your sensitivity to insulin or HGH or 50 other things.
My point is that while we lack the means for therapy to overcome most of these differences, we can fix low T and lack of enough human growth hormone. And a few other things. So roundabouts 99% of students of both genders - not just the tiny number of transexuals - are effectively unable to play high school sports at a nationally competitive level because of these genetic differences.
Medical therapy can compensate for some of these differences, albeit crudely by pumping athletes full of high levels of PEDs.
If allowing someone to be a different gender is considered a respected medical treatment, raising their self esteem and lowering their chance of suicide, why can’t we allow kids to become bigger and stronger than their natural genetics would otherwise allow?
I don’t see any difference.
Well, injecting people with higher than normal levels of human growth hormone, in addition to inducing undesirable cosmetic effects, can result in significantly shortened lifespan, type II diabetes, sleep apnea, high blood pressure, visual disturbances, and various other problems that, it seems to me, are more likely to decrease athletic potential than increase it (although several professional wrestlers, including Andre the Giant, have suffered from a naturally occurring overdose of HGH, most of them get their condition treated. Andre did not, and wound up not only with severe joint pain and agonizing back problems, he died at 46 due to heart failure brought on by the condition).
Normal levels of these various naturally occurring substances are “normal levels” for a reason - much below or above those levels have nasty consequences.
The difference is that for transgender athletes the levels are being changed from normal for one gender to normal for another gender, but are still in a normal range for a human being. Which is why, after a suitable adjustement period, transmen should play sports with the cismen and transwomen with the women.
I should also point out that an athlete that has a natural deficiency of HGH would be allowed to have HGH administered to bring the level of up to human normal. You’re allowed to supplement to a normal level, but no more. Cismen aren’t allowed additional androgens unless they have a legitimate deficiency. So, for example, post-testicular cancer a male athlete could have testosterone supplements sufficient to bring his hormone levels back into the normal range, but NOT additional testosterone above that amount,