Him? Him? That’s awfully presumptuous.
How do you know? Anyone can say that.
If I say that I feel like a woman, does that automatically make me female?
It kinda makes me wonder how transgenderism would manifest in a hypothetical society that didn’t bother with all the arbitrary distinctions we’re used to.
It could make your gender female.
Sometimes I feel like a 20 year-old, but there’s never one around.
What’s odd is, if I’m following him correctly, Grotonian seems to be arguing that letting a kid transition is a bad idea, because the kid might later want to transition back, and be scarred by the process. But his solution appears to be to allow the kid to present as one gender at home, and a different gender in public - in effect, switching back and forth every time they leave the home. I’m not clear on how switching from one gender to the other and back one time is supposed to be damaging, but doing it every single day is not.
No. But if you do feel like a woman, that could well make you female. Since the best way for us to know what you feel is what you say, if you say you’re a woman, it would make sense for us to treat you as one. Barring obvious lies, jokes, or whatever.
Which gender-neutral pronoun would you prefer? I, for one, am happy to accommodate your needs.
You have to ask the truck driver. And the other 7 billion-odd people on the planet.
You can call me Ray. Or you could call me Jay.
I dunno. What I will say is that if you throw yourself in front of a semi truck because of your convictions, I’d probably give you the benefit of the doubt. Doing otherwise would be kind of incredibly shitty.
One thing we do seem to know is that attempting to lock it down can indeed be damaging (the thread topic is my cite).
The distinction between man and woman are far from arbitrary…they dictate much of how we structure our society.
In a society that shunned gender roles people would exist on some kind of continuum, a pangenderism if you will, BUT we can’t get around the basic fact that for sexual recreation there are only really two possibilities: stick or hole.
I think people are downplaying the role of hormones in biological development and overstating the impact of the brain. A body/brain disconnect does manifest itself in certain people, but if you have testicles producing testosterone it is very likely you will develop male behaviors and if you have ovaries producing estrogen then you will very likely develop female behaviors. I am not quite convinced that we can put the brain before hormones in terms of gender development.
It may be, as non-politically-correct as it sounds, that a body/brain disconnect is simply an error in brain development. I hate to use that word but if this is the case we should not insist on radically restructuring our society based on a marginal group of people. We should respect their autonomy and right to live as they choose.
If this is what those who know him best agree is in his best interest, then I think they’ve found a solution that will guarantee his happiness and success and prevent his suicide. Perfect solution. Kid saved. Suicide prevented. It just wouldn’t have been my recommendation. But don’t worry about my recommendation.
My recommendation would have resulted in doing every single thing that’s being done for him, except he’d still go by “Jenny” at school and he’d use the girls’ bathrooms. Obviously, my recommendation is so drastically different from what was done that the kid would have no choice but to kill himself. Thank God a much better solution was found.
When you’re referring to adoptive parents, do you use the word “mother” and “father”? If you do, then aren’t you LYING when you do that? After all, “mother” and “father” have very specific and testable biological meanings that these people don’t meet. Of course, “mother” and “father” also have social and familial and cultural meanings that these people DO meet, and we as a society have decided that we are generally happy to use those words to represent the social meanings even when the biological ones aren’t there. And when necessary, we can specify “adoptive mother” or “biological father” to clear up any confusion.
And why do we as a society use language that way? Largely because not doing so would be a total dick move. Do you want to say to someone “well, sure you’ve raised this child since the age of 1 and changed all her diapers and loved her and cared for her, but you are NOT her mother. Words have meanings. I will not lie for you.”
If I refer to a MtF transgendered person as a “woman”, knowing full well that she was born male and has XY chromosomes and can not bear children, am I lying? Am I attempting to deceive anyone? Am I wrong? I think you’d have a heck of time making a convincing case that I am any of those things… instead, I am using the word differently than you seem to want to use it, and the way that I’m using it is both increasingly accepted as correct, and, (I claim), far more useful, polite and healthy.
I do somewhat agree with Grotonian that this issue, like many, is much less clear when applied to children. If an adult lives as a woman and calls herself a woman, she’s a woman as far as I’m concerned. But that’s assuming an adult who is taking this seriously, knows the implications and consequences of what they’re saying, and still makes a conscious and deliberate choice. Sufficiently young children aren’t capable of that level of decision making, which is the reason that any number of societal rules have exceptions for children. I hate hate HATE censorship in all ways… for adults. I believe in the right to enter into binding contracts… for adults. I believe that people have the right to smoke pot and drink and smoke cigarettes… if they’re adults. Etc.
What I would actually do if I encountered a 6- or 8- or 12- or 16- year old with a outside-the-norm gender identity I don’t know, and I certainly don’t claim to be an expert or even remotely knowledgeable at all, but I don’t think it’s offensive or ridiculous to say that the rule you apply to adults does NOT automatically apply to children.
(That said, I certainly agree with CNN’s coverage choice in this instance…)
That doesn’t make them not-arbitrary. Heck, there are societies with structures largely dictated by religious beliefs, and religion is awesomely arbitrary.
Yes, but so what? Who you sexually recreate with (and how) is a personal matter. I’m not even implying that this would (or should) change, but for example let’s say the hypothetical society saw no reason half the population should wear pants and other half skirts, figuring instead that individuals should choose whatever suits their comfort, budget and work requirements.
This isn’t a matter of political correctness or “we’re all the same” bullshit. Fuck that crap. Nevertheless, a great deal of what we socially invest in the importance of gender is meaningless.
Yes! And thank you.
Thank you again for this. It really does help me a lot to have some factual data here.
Now, in some ways, even the facts don’t matter, as I’m politically in favor of people having as much right as possible to determine their own pathways in life. Frankly, if anyone wanted to declare themselves of the other sex – and made a serious determination to live that way – no weekend flings – then I would support this, and would fight against laws that would ban it.
But the facts make it more important, because there are young boys and girls who are suffering from these issues. It goes beyond mere choice, and into real medical need.
Just as I despise the right-wing political stance that homosexuality is a “choice” or a “life-style,” so I am learning – thank you once more! – that the right-wing emphasis on sexual identification as a “mere choice” is also a load of hooey. Even if it were just a choice, I’d still support it, but I support it all the more because it is so much more than just a choice.
Not very long ago, I had dinner with someone who is a school counselor, who explained some of this to me.
It was useful, because (alas) up to then, I had only heard right-wing hate radio (San Diego’s Roger Hedgecock, specifically) who was (oh, what a great surprise) lying his damn ass off about this. He was stirring up hate and fear, saying that boys would now be able to declare themselves girls at the drop of a hat, and then go into girls’ restrooms…
Ordinary, honest ignorance is hard enough to fight. (I have a shit-load of it, and need all the real and useful education I can get – and thank you for providing it on this topic!) But intentional dishonesty, of Hedgecock’s variety is worse: it’s just plain evil.
We don’t have a great deal of data on gender variant children and youth for the obvious reasons. As far as I can tell, the general consensus, given the data we do have, is that some, perhaps many, gender variant children will “desist” by the time they hit puberty. Many will be gay or lesbian. Those who “persist” as puberty begins are likely to continue to identify as transgender. Since no one considers blockers or hormones, much less surgery, for prepubescent children, this isn’t a major issue. It’s quite possible to simply live with the child one has, whatever the gender identity expressed. However many gender variant kids there are, there’s simply no rush of little boys–or older ones–trying to get into the girls’ room by pretending they’re girls, if only for the day. This just doesn’t happen.
My child is a persister. And yeah, it’s scary as hell to think she might possibly change her mind later in life. But no, I really don’t think she will. And I know, as well as I know anything, that she would not be alive today if we did not accept her as the incredibly brave, beautiful, and amazing girl that she is, in spite of what is in her pants.
The Department of Education in my state, by the way, encourages schools to allow children the use the bathroom that accords with their persistent and consistent gender identity. I suspect gender fluid kids would be encouraged to use the private bathroom in the nurse’s office. Kids whose parents have issue with transgender kids (and it’s usually the parents, not the kids) are also welcome to use the private bathroom in the nurse’s office.
Well, from what I’ve read, the kid born Shiloh Pitt-Jolie is younger than even six, and has, according to Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, directly asked for short haircuts, boy’s clothes, masculine pronouns, and the name John. The parents are apparently being accommodating, even cutting off Brad’s mother for doing the opposite. AFAIK, they’ve done nothing, and aren’t considering doing, anything irreversible at this point, surely due to age.
Thoughts?