# Republicans' war on transgender people: Omnibus thread **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 3, 2022, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609 "2022-06-03T02:20:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 74
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 1:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1461 "2023-08-13T01:26:19Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > > [@Jackmannii](#): > > > > He and his fellow contrarians like Bhattacharya have been so “shut up” that they have huge followings on Twitter and popular Substacks with tens of thousands of subscribers (paid subscriptions on Substack go for $5-$50 a month, even more if you want to “show support” by being a Founding Member), while holding down posts at major medical institutions > > My point was that they were kept off the main stream media. Oh, bullshit. A quick check shows that Makary and Bhattacharya have been featured on CNN and (of course) Fox multiple times, and have garnered other MSM news coverage. Here’s Makary [doing his thing](https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/08/dr-marty-makary-americans-have-distorted-perception-of-covid-risk.html) on CNBC.\* > [@](#): > > They were raising questions Yeah, they’ve been JAQing off big-time to enthralled fans for quite awhile now. Poor, brave, suppressed heralds of truth they are not. \*There’ve been over 530,000 Covid deaths in the U.S. since Makary told us on CNBC in June '21 not to worry and be happy. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1462 "2023-08-13T01:37:06Z")
You’d think that the ‘Ignore them and they’ll go away.’ position was clearly discredited by the content of this thread before it became the magellan show . . . but apparently not. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1463 "2023-08-13T01:45:13Z")
…at least magellan’s posts are relatively on-topic, but all of the “stop feeding the trolls” posts are really starting to get boring now. How it used to work if a troll was boring you in a thread you would open a new pit thread and invite them to it. Feel free to do that now if you wish. That would accomplish the goal of getting them out of the thread. But the only reason magellan has pivoted to covid is that all of his talking points in this thread have been debunked. Which is the entire point of the debunking. They are posting for the emotional reaction. And when they don’t get it: they move on. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1464 "2023-08-13T01:57:34Z")
> [@ekedolphin](#): > > He is, probably literally, **jacking off** whenever someone gives him citations. Let’s all just block him and stop feeding the troll. - Typical Republican. Keeping it all for himself. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1465 "2023-08-13T02:05:04Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Sigh. I meant “we” as a society. The experts should be having a robust debate. And they should be having it publicly, as a way to engender trust They DID all that. And then some people who lost those debates, _because the evidence was not on their side_, decided, damn the evidence and go straight to the public. Lie to uneducated rubes about what the evidence said and how the debate went, claim they were suppressed, and boom - now they have a bunch of morons parroting their claims, some of whom are elected officials. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1466 "2023-08-13T03:55:42Z")
> [@Banquet\_Bear](#): > > …at least magellan’s posts are relatively on-topic, but all of the “stop feeding the trolls” posts are really starting to get boring now. Coulda fooled me. > [@magellan01](#): > > A good example isa Hunter’s laptop. ALL of your trusted sources buried it, downplayed it, or tried to explain it away. So, if I wanted to cite an opposing view back in 2020, it would have been The NY Post, Breitbart, Gateway Pundit, etc. All cites that you would have reflexively balked at. Later, cites to articles to Glen Greenwald or Matt Taibi might have been more successful, but I’m not even sure about that. > [@magellan01](#): > > That’s the right group. But they need to be embracing new information. That’s how science works. And one thing that gets in the way of that is when a medical issue gets political, as this has become. Hell, just look at what happened with Covid. There was a general consensus among the experts. But others, tops in their field, were unsure and eventually disagreed. They were shut up. When that happens, many fewer people who hold those views will decide to not speak up. Which is precisely the point of the tactic. In the end, brave people like Dr. Jay Bhattacharya from Stamford, Dr. Marty McGarry from Johns Hopkins, and others turned out to be right. Please explain. ---
**Author:** ![Banquet\_Bear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banquet_bear/32/373_2.png) [@Banquet\_Bear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banquet_Bear)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1467 "2023-08-13T04:12:38Z")
> [@Atamasama](#): > > Please explain. …they were being snarky about me in particular because I’m the only one who is including “citations.” The posts I’m responding too with citations are ones about transgender people. The “at least magellan’s posts are relatively on-topic” should have read “at least magellan’s posts _that_ _ **I’m responding to** _ are relatively on-topic, _ **and the one that wasn’t was a link to the appropriate forum** _.” I hope that helps. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1468 "2023-08-13T04:14:26Z")
> [@Banquet\_Bear](#): > > The “at least magellan’s posts are relatively on-topic” should have read “at least magellan’s posts _that_ _ **I’m responding to** _ are relatively on-topic, _ **and the one that wasn’t was a link to the appropriate forum** _.” > > I hope that helps. Yes, I understand, thank you. 👍 ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1469 "2023-08-13T04:32:19Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > > [@steronz](#): > > > > Even the counterpoints you’re picking here recommend gender affirming psychological treatment, which Republicans want to ban. And you won’t address this because you’re a coward for sure, and a transphobe for probable. ⁢ > > Huh? I’m 100% behind psychiatric care. I’ve said that numerous times in this thread. In fact, I’ve said I want _more_ of it. As I’ve also said, I care not what Republicans want. ⁢ Then you’re posting in the wrong thread. This thread is about Republicans and their culture war on trans people. It’s where we call them out for how they are hurting trans people. Many of us would like to get back to that, where we can come to this thread to see what bullshit they are spewing now. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1470 "2023-08-13T04:53:09Z")
I’ve spend the last 40+ years trying to insert into public consciousness the possibility of a person who was born with a given morphology, develops a sense of identification kinship with the people who have the other morphology, and doesn’t decide that either of those things needs to be fixed — that they will remain a male girl/woman or a female boy/man. I thought then, and think now, that it would give people more freedom and flexibility. It isn’t about positioning transitioning people — those who transition surgically, hormonally, or even just in their presentation via dress and grooming — as doing it wrong. I don’t have their experience and even after encountering my explanation of how I parsed my identity, most of them aren’t likely to say “oops, I shoulda done what you did” or anything. And I want to be an ally to my trans sisters and brothers. Yeesh, the shit they have to deal with!! But for those of you who scratch your heads and wonder if some of this could be made less necessary if society were less rigid in its gendering of people? Yeah consider my pathway. And what it adds as an option. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 5:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1471 "2023-08-13T05:28:48Z")
That’s basically what my friend, who identified as a “non gender conforming man” has chosen. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1472 "2023-08-13T07:35:42Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > I’m 100% behind psychiatric care. I’ve said that numerous times in this thread. In fact, I’ve said I want _more_ of it. You could certainly _use_ more of it. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1473 "2023-08-13T11:02:44Z")
Zing! Anyway, since **m01** is not concerned with what Republicans are up to when it comes to transgender people, he’s obviously in the wrong thread. I, RitterSport, now decree that this thread will get back to its main purpose – a breaking news thread about how Republicans are trying to destroy transgender people. (That decree means nothing, of course) ---
**Author:** ![ekedolphin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ekedolphin/32/10003_2.png) [@ekedolphin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ekedolphin)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 11:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1474 "2023-08-13T11:39:26Z")
> **[Murrieta school district mandates parental notification if child is transgender](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-08-11/murrieta-school-board-approves-policy-informing-parents-child-transgender)** > > Backers of the policy say parents are best suited to deal with kids experiencing gender dysphoria. Foes say school might be some students' only haven. But then there’s this bit of good news: > **[Court blocks Idaho law restricting trans students' restroom use](https://www.reuters.com/world/us/court-blocks-idaho-law-restricting-trans-students-restroom-use-2023-08-11/)** > > A federal judge temporarily blocked an Idaho law requiring public school students to use the restroom corresponding to their assigned sex at birth, in a lawsuit brought by the family of a transgender middle school student. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2023, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1475 "2023-08-13T22:45:41Z")
Very soon in certain places in America, Transgendered minors will have no other option to void their bladders and bowels than to just drop trou in the hall. Of course, they’ll then get arrested for indecent exposure among other crimes. Why do I suspect that’s the whole purpose behind these laws? ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2023, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1476 "2023-08-14T23:01:04Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > “Parents are also lied to by activists and clinicians who present puberty blockers as _fully reversible._ How is time reversible? If a child goes on puberty blockers for 5 years, those important years of development are gone. Uh… no they’re not. That also ignores the range of _normal_ puberty. For boys that can, perfectly naturally, extend into the very early 20’s. In fact, 150 years ago the average age of puberty was greater than it is today. The person will continue, during those five years, to develop mentally and emotionally. They’ll be like the “late bloomer” children who are not trans gender. > [@magellan01](#): > > Their bones don’t gain any density. Untrue. Puberty blockers might _affect_ bone mineralization but they don’t halt it. Current practice is to monitor and assure proper calcium and vitamin D, and encourage weight-bearing exercise. Frankly, anorexia and bulminia can do more damage to developing bones than puberty blockers. > [@magellan01](#): > > Boys genitals don’t grow. Girls breasts don’t grow and their pelvises don’t expand. Um… _that’s the point_. The point of using puberty blockers is to _pause puberty_. Once the blockers are removed, however, puberty resumes and secondary sexual characteristics resume their development. > [@magellan01](#): > > If a boy wants to go on to sex-reassignment surgery as an adult, there is usually not enough genital tissue to invert in order to create the neovagina, so surgeons end up using tissue from the bowels.” Let’s first address “not enough tissue for a vagina”. That presumes that the only point here is that the person’s neovagina be able to accommodate a penis. Newsflash: that might not be relevant to a lesbian trans woman. Second, even for a hetero, bi, or pansexual trans woman they might feel that problems with creating a sufficiently large vagina are offset by things like NOT developing a deep male voice, adam’s apple, “mannish” skeleton, needing to remove a male beard and/or other male shagginess, and so on. The obsession with the crotches of trans people is largely an obsession of hetero cis people (including in some instances their cis gender parents), not trans gender people themselves. Third - “not enough vagina” is not restricted solely to trans people. Some people, through unfortunate errors of development, cancer, accidents, etc. wind up with insufficient vagina for penetrating intercourse. Using tissue from the bowel is, indeed, one solution but another is the use of dilators to stretch tissue, and there may well be others. Fourth - while that is a _possible_ issue, it is not guaranteed to occur. Timing, dosage, and duration of puberty blockers, as well as the fact individuals are all individual, are all factors and that is precisely why doctors and other medical people should be involved in their administration to maximize the desired effects and minimized what is not wanted. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2023, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1477 "2023-08-15T04:18:02Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > The obsession with the crotches of trans people is largely an obsession of hetero cis people I’ve been reminded that a lot of people other than magellan01 are reading this thread, so I’d like to reiterate this, and expand on it. A lot more trans people take hormones and have top surgery than have bottom surgery. Hormones really work. They make you feel (and smell) more like the sex you identify with. And top surgery has a big impact on how random strangers interact with you. But almost no one sees your genitalia. You, your romantic partner, and your doctor. That’s about it. Most trans people avoid public changing areas for all manner of reasons. I’ve been following a trans woman on another chat site who has been doing tons of surgery to reverse her unfortunate puberty. She’s also someone I’ve met IRL. She had the body of a large man. The first surgery she had was to remove her testicles. That made it much easier for her to control her hormone levels. (She’s also taking estrogen, of course.) She grew small breasts due to the hormone treatment. Then she started months and months of electrolysis. Then she had bottom surgery. But she opted for only external genitalia. No vagina at all, just labia and a clitoris. She’ll look female in a public changing room, and she won’t have to look down and see a penis. She was married to a woman before she came out as trans. She’s still married to that same women. What does she need a vagina for? Anyway, she chose this option because it was less surgically invasive, didn’t require her to first undergo even more painful electrolysis, and got her everything she will want. She said there are three main options, the one she chose, penile inversion, and constructing a vagina from bowel tissue. The last is the highest risk, but it requires less maintenance once everything has healed, and it can be self-lubricating. She’s just had facial reconstruction. That’s a huge deal, and just reading about it made me cringe. (Forehead, nose, chin, cheeks, and Adams apple all under the knife. Her brow ridge was ground down, for instance.) But the plastic surgeon is good, and her face looks a lot more feminine now. Looking at the before and after photos is weird, because it’s really hard to spot any differences, but the overall impression is now much more feminine. Let’s just say that if she’d been able to avoid male puberty, she’d have been able to avoid a great deal of painful and risky surgery. And her facial skin wouldn’t look like a man’s. And if she’d had a smaller penis to remove, that might have been a slightly lesser surgery, too. She said she burst out laughing when she read that her health insurance has a lifetime maximum of one penile removal. ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2023, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1478 "2023-08-15T08:28:32Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > She said she burst out laughing when she read that her health insurance has a lifetime maximum of one penile removal. That’s bad news for the Centauri. [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/bpcaYfH9TLc/hqdefault.jpg "Centauri have six ...") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpcaYfH9TLc) ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2023, 8:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1479 "2023-08-15T08:59:07Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > > - Less development of genital tissue, which may limit options for [gender affirming surgery](https://www.stlouischildrens.org/conditions-treatments/transgender-center/gender-affirming-surgery) (bottom surgery) later in life. > > Saying it’s “only an issue if the person goes on to transition” is a rather ridiculous argument. Can you _really_ not think of any other issues with having (say) a penis that is only partially between pre-pubescent and adult-sized? I’ve seen this brought up before. Does no one consider that, if a person does not transition and puberty blockers are stopped that their penis might continue to grow to adult size without further intervention (the “late bloomer” situation) but if the person _does_ transition their penis never receives the chemical signal to grow further. Is “not enough tissue” isn’t _just_ the effect of a puberty blocker but also due to _on-going_ hormone treatment? > [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Much of the safety claims rest on the blocker’s use for _precocious_ puberty. I.e., delaying it from (say) 9 until 12. And they are reasonably safe in that application, with caveats. But that safety data is not necessarily applicable toward delaying normal puberty. If a child start puberty at 9 it’s not considered precocious these days. More typically, it would be a kid that started puberty at age 6 or 7 and take puberty blockers until the mid-teens. > [@magellan01](#): > > Gender dysphoria is a real thing. Yet, according to one study, for boys who go through puberty without it being interfered with, 87.8% saw their dysphoria go away. And 63.6% grew up to be gay. So there’s seems to be a pretty strong correlation between having gender dysphoria as a kid and growing up to be gay. So I was thinking about this group and wondering what separates the ex-trans boys who grew up to be heterosexual from the ex-trans boys that grew up to be gay. Do we know? Alternative explanation: our society has some ridgid notions of gender-appropriate behavior rammed into children’s heads from an early age. Just look at a toy store/aisle in a store at all the color coding of toys. Expectations of behavior where boys are told not to cry and girls are discouraged from rough play. And so on. So a boy that _doesn’t_ want to engage in rough, physical play and is called “girly” might get the message that he isn’t “man enough”. On the flip side, a girl who doesn’t want everything she owns to be pink and does want to engage in rough-and-tumble play is told “young ladies don’t do that”. This can lead to confusion in a child (_if I’m not manly enough am I actually a girl?_) and some gender dysphoria until the kid works out that you don’t actually have to conform to ridgid stereotypes. Is that the case every time? I doubt it. But it’s a possibility for self-resolving gender dysphoria. The kids in this case aren’t confused by what gender they were assigned at birth, the problem is societal messaging. It’s also possible for there to be more than one thing happening - you could have precocious puberty AND non-stereotypical behavior. This is why it’s important for professionals to be involved - so that the entire child and their situation can be looked at and the proper path for that individual child can be laid out. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [August 15, 2023, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609/1480 "2023-08-15T11:01:17Z")
And to be clear, there are bad doctors and bad parents, and some kids will have bad outcomes. Just like it would have been a bad outcome of my friend had accepted chemotherapy for her adrenal tumor. But MORE kids have bad outcomes when politicians interfere. Because most doctors and most parents are pretty decent. And more options gives kids a better chance of a good outcome. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609.md?page=73) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/republicans-war-on-transgender-people-omnibus-thread/965609.md?page=75)