It is correct that it’s legal to have genital reassignment surgery at any age as long as the doctor agrees, right? If the doctor is part of a recognized medical community that promotes it, then it seems like it would be legal.
I’ll ask again, why are you spending so much time worrying about this? Because you’ve been told to worry about it? Do you know anyone in your life that this issue is impacting?
We want kids that feel different to not feel like it would be better to be dead than to be different. We want those kids to know that it’s ok to be different and that there are people that support them out there, even if it isn’t their family. We are trying to stop kids from killing themselves.
What, exactly are you trying to prevent? Nobody is trying to make anyone trans, or gay. People are trying to help others not face the same challenges they faced. What is wrong with that?
Effectively no. A doctor who performs this surgery on a child is risking serious malpractice claims. A doctor can’t just do whatever they want to.
We already have remedies in place, creating a law is just posturing and it’s government overreach.
Let me ask you; should organizations of medical professionals be deciding what is safe medical practice, or should a politician who is trying to get votes?
Because I feel that not trying to reach a compromise is counter productive to trans rights. The right is very much against them, they are stronger politically, and they are more unified. The left is more disorganized, weaker politically, and can’t even agree that water is wet. I see things like laws against trans kids in sports and laws against trans therapies as symptoms of the left not wanting to compromise. The right hears “men will be in women’s sports” and “trans kids should be able to get bottom surgery” and they pass these restrictive laws. If instead the trans supporters had more nuanced positions, then an actual compromise could be reached. Something where both sides grumble a bit but neither one is motivated enough to do anything about it. But when trans supporters have the position that “gender identity is sufficient for sex-based sports” and “trans therapies should only be between a doctor and the child”, it greatly motivates the right and they can get these restrictive laws passed. The left cannot get their laws passed because they don’t have the political strength. By not compromising, they end up losing a lot and the trans community suffers.
You’ve just been told by multiple people that you are wrong, and you’re still using the “if”?
The right is eating itself, the Trumpists are at war with the old school scumbags on that side. Your concern trolling is not swaying anyone. 
So it’s the left and those who support LGBT rights that are harming the LGBT community and not those that are specifically trying to harm the LGBT community because they don’t want them to exist?
The right is a top down structure. The right gets upset about what they are told to be upset about. “The Left” that you are referring to is just literally everyone that doesn’t buy into this Right wing top town enragement enterprise. That’s why we are not as unified.
Blame the ones pushing harmful laws against the marginalized groups they hate, don’t blame the ones standing up for the marginalized. You’ve got it completely backwards. Just like those at the top of the Right structure want you to be. There is a reason people on the right all spout the same talking points, they come from the same place and are being intentionally pushed out to get people like you angry at people that haven’t hurt anyone just because they are different and can’t fight back by themselves.
And here’s how that post might have read 70 years ago:
I see things like laws against blacks voting and laws against blacks using the same bathroom as whites as symptoms of the left not wanting to compromise. The right hears “blacks will be in sports” and “black people will be able to vote” and they pass these restrictive laws. If instead the black supporters had more nuanced positions, then an actual compromise could be reached. Something where both sides grumble a bit but neither one is motivated enough to do anything about it. But when black supporters have the position that “people of all races should be on the same sports teams” and “black men should be able to look at white women without getting lynched”, it greatly motivates the right and they can get these restrictive laws passed. The left cannot get their laws passed because they don’t have the political strength. By not compromising, they end up losing a lot and the black community suffers.
Exactly. Well done.
Also, I wanted to add. How do you compromise on the topic of rights for a marginalized group, when one side wants to erase the existence of that group. You can’t compromise with extinction.
The best way to secure trans rights is to compromise on trans rights?
Do you have an idea how fucking stupid you sound right now?
Do they need to come around and knock on your door and tell you this? Do you go around your neighborhood and inform the occupants that you are not a sexual predator, in case they may have a “set of assumptions”?
Tell you what, you tell me where you are hearing that this is something that is happening, and I’ll tell them to knock it off.
Yes, ignorance is a problem. So are people spreading rumors. Maybe changing your mind won’t change much, but at least you will no longer be a potential source to promulgate these rumors in the future.
It doesn’t feel good at all to know that there are people out there who simply won’t listen to the information that is out there, and would rather run off their “set of assumptions” than to educate themselves.
But at least you know now, and given how easily you dropped your “set of assumptions” here in this thread, I find it likely that you’ve informed others about this set of assumptions. Knowing that you would no longer be spreading such dangerous misinformation in the public, and in fact confronting it and challenging it in the future does help.
Yes, there is. It’s called the AMA.
In a bit of prescience on their part, they have a video right on that page that you may find educational.
This is entirely possible, but not within the United States. If you are concerned about what happens in other countries, then passing laws in this country really won’t have much of an effect.
I really don’t see how it is a transgendered person’s fault that you have carried this ignorance with you, but now that you know, you can stop with the ad hominem attacks and insults against transgendered individuals, right?
They sound like someone trying to justify bigotry and hatred by saying that they’d gladly reject those things if only they were asked in the right way. And if not, then they have no choice but to support those things.
What compromise are you seeking here? They already don’t do what you don’t want them to do.
You now know that they don’t do what you don’t want them to do, so you can’t complain that the words have not managed to reach your ears.
Maybe they should just stop existing altogether? Would that be a reasonable compromise that would make the transphobes that you are representing happy?
When people hear that @filmore is a sexual predator, they don’t want you around their families. That those rumors have no basis in fact don’t matter, it’s what people are “hearing” from other hateful ignorant people.
How do you want us to stop hateful ignorant people from lying?
You seem to know them well, as you are regurgitating their talking points verbatim. What suggestions do you have?
Once again, your ignorance is showing, as they don’t.
I mean, they really aren’t, but who are you wanting to shove into that room?
Maybe if we compromised and agreed that only half of transgender people will need to cease to exist?
No that probably won’t be a good enough compromise…
A minor quibble - I think I’m not on board with your analogy on the narrow issue of sports participation, which I do think is more nuanced. The challenge is to educate people to accept trans people’s identity, the fact that the physical body at birth is not the determinant of identity. So to me the minority who take a hard line that it’s transphobic to suggest that there should be any restrictions on trans women competing in “female-body” sports are being inconsistent and fighting the wrong battle. Sports are (in large part) about competing physical bodies, and about mental qualities that are shared among all humans, but not about gender identities. When the entire point in fighting transphobia is that the physical body of a trans person does not start out in accord with their identity, to insist that identity should be the sole qualifying determinant for purely physical competition just seems odd and inconsistent to me. I don’t have any perfect answers, though, especially when sports are such an important part of life for young people.
But people really don’t take that line. Sports is a place where compromises have been made, mostly in good faith, on both sides, as to what it takes to change one’s gender for the sake of participating in that sport. It is nuanced, but transphobes don’t do nuance, they just do hate.
The transphobic line that men are changing their genders so that they can be competitive in sports is simply a lie, but it is one that is lapped up readily by people like @filmore’s associates who share the “set of assumptions” that he chose to share with us, who I hope will now have some of their ignorance fought, since he now knows better.
Now, there does become the question of, if someone transitions, does that mean that they need to be banned from participating in sports? If not, then a compromise can be, and has been reached. If we want to revisit this compromise, then we can see if there are improvements we can make to it. If one thinks they should be banned from participating in sports, then there is no compromise to be reached with someone who takes that line, so they have no need of being part of the discussion.
Right - so that’s why my point was that @Thing.Fish’s (otherwise excellent) analogy with discrimination against Black people doesn’t hold up in this narrow respect.
[ And I made a late edit to my prior post to the more accurate - “the minority who take a hard line…” ]
Ah, nevermind, I see that I misinterpreted @Thing.Fish’s direction with that post, and so also misinterpreted your reply.
But the whole sports thing is a big wedge for the transphobes, and it is often played for far more than it’s worth by them.
The general rule is that doctors can do whatever they want to with regard to their practice of medicine; if they do harm, the remedy is to file malpractice suits and/or take away their license after the fact, not to pre-emptively pass laws telling them how to do their jobs.
So if I wanted to perform gender reassignment surgery on a child, I would be legally able to do so because I hold a valid medical license. In that case, the ethical issues discussed here wouldn’t be relevant because I’m not a surgeon and the child would undoubtedly die on the operating table. I would most certainly lose my license and be sued into bankruptcy, because I should have known that I was not capable of performing the surgery, but I would not have committed any crime.
More realistically, if a surgeon did perform the surgery on a 10 year old, and that patient later came to regret their decision and sued the surgeon, the surgeon would almost certainly lose, because he violated the AMA guidelines. Medical society guidelines don’t have the force of law per se, but courts tend to be very deferential to them when deciding whether a doctor’s actions were reasonable or not. They’re not just meaningless “suggestions”.
You may think this system is a bit loosy-goosy, but it’s the way we’ve always done it. I don’t know why you’d think this particular procedure requires some special system.
I agree - but that’s all the more reason not to take a misguided hard line on the matter.