Conservatives: if you had a child who came out as transgender, how would you react?

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Thank you for illustrating my point above: Calling refusal to allow a kid to get a mastectomy "child abuse" is the undeniable logical conclusion of "trans rights" discourse.  Let's not pretend anything less is being demanded by the call for "affirmation."

Why are you framing your position as if you're simply drawing the line at gender-reaffirming surgery? You've made it clear that you would go as far to deny your child the opportunity to use their preferred pronouns or a new name.

I'm drawing the line at assenting to an ideology that leads to people using phrases like "gender-reaffirming surgery."

Why? Other than the fact that it's "ahhh new thing is different and scary to me"?

Yes, it's different and scary, which is an irrational reason to oppose something.  Just like it's irrational to not want to have your brain sucked out by a space alien. Who's to say it isn't actually wonderful unless you've tried it!

Seriously though, I think I explained my reasons already.

[Ferguson97]

Yes, it's different and scary, which is an irrational reason to oppose something.  Just like it's irrational to not want to have your brain sucked out by a space alien. Who's to say it isn't actually wonderful unless you've tried it!

This is a weird and disingenuous comparison to drawl, partly because transitioning is completely voluntary and having your brain sucked out by aliens is (presumably) involuntary, and partly because it's dehumanizing to compare a very normal and human experience to a fantastical and sci-fi experience.

Seriously though, I think I explained my reasons already.

No, you really haven't. You've just reiterated the conspiracy that there's some mass movement to brainwash kids into believing that they're transgender, and equivocated mere social transition with gender-affirming surgery. The reason that you have specifically mentioned mastectomies in nearly all of your replies here is because you're attempting to frame it as an inevitable next step after social transition. And you're framing it as such because you want to justify condemning social transition altogether.

[Trans Rights Are Human Rights]

You've [...] equivocated mere social transition with gender-affirming surgery.

Man, I in' wish it was that simple, but tragically, my social transition still left me bepeniled.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

Yes, it's different and scary, which is an irrational reason to oppose something.  Just like it's irrational to not want to have your brain sucked out by a space alien. Who's to say it isn't actually wonderful unless you've tried it!

This is a weird and disingenuous comparison to drawl, partly because transitioning is completely voluntary and having your brain sucked out by aliens is (presumably) involuntary, and partly because it's dehumanizing to compare a very normal and human experience to a fantastical and sci-fi experience.

Seriously though, I think I explained my reasons already.

No, you really haven't. You've just reiterated the conspiracy that there's some mass movement to brainwash kids into believing that they're transgender, and equivocated mere social transition with gender-affirming surgery. The reason that you have specifically mentioned mastectomies in nearly all of your replies here is because you're attempting to frame it as an inevitable next step after social transition. And you're framing it as such because you want to justify condemning social transition altogether.

I said *want* which I would have thought obviously implies "voluntary."  You implied my refusal to consent to your ideological program was ignorance and prejudice, and so I gave you another example of something that I would be ignorant about but nonetheless justifiably prejudiced against.

Something can be a major risk without being inevitable. If someone socially transitions, are they more or less likely to medically transition?  Am I to believe these are unrelated?  I am very doubtful of this, particularly when people who hold your position on trans rights do not believe social transition is enough and say that not providing medical transition is child abuse. If we lived in a world where medical transition was not promoted to those who have socially transitioned as the next step in becoming their true self, this discussion would be very different.

[Ferguson97]

I said *want* which I would have thought obviously implies "voluntary."  You implied my refusal to consent to your ideological program was ignorance and prejudice, and so I gave you another example of something that I would be ignorant about but nonetheless justifiably prejudiced against.

Something can be a major risk without being inevitable. If someone socially transitions, are they more or less likely to medically transition?  Am I to believe these are unrelated?  I am very doubtful of this, particularly when people who hold your position on trans rights do not believe social transition is enough and say that not providing medical transition is child abuse. If we lived in a world where medical transition was not promoted to those who have socially transitioned as the next step in becoming their true self, this discussion would be very different.

You still haven't justified why medical transitioning is bad. You can't just frame it as a per se moral wrong, you have to actually defend this position. Why is it bad for someone to use puberty blockers or take HRT, or even go as far as having a mastectomy?

[strangerinthealps]

Is your assumption that your kid would break their relationship with you if you tried to prevent them from embracing a trans identity?

Yes, and this is often the case for trans kids (and gay/bi/lesbian kids). Having the person who is supposed to love you unconditionally refuse to accept a fundamental aspect of your identity is really traumatizing.

There is no equivalence between Gays/Lesbians and Gender Ideology. That is a complete red herring.

Gender Ideology can only survive amid a cloud of conflicting beliefs.

You are who you are. You love who you love. You don't need to medicalize and disfigure yourself in order to express your identity.

Gender is completely fabricated. Biological sex is real.

Trying to tie your unique and individual identity to a list of genders is as foolhardy as trying to come up with classifications for every wave in the ocean.

[RINO Tom]

My son will be born around January 7th of this coming year, and I will obviously never stop loving him no matter what, and I will never stop accepting him within reason (no sane person "accepts" that their son is a serial killer just because "you should accept your son for who he is," for example).  I believe it takes age to have good perspective, so I would certainly advise caution to a minor about something as serious as this, along with many, many other things he might think he "knows" at this age.  The Best Man in my wedding is definitely gay, but per his own words he didn't really know until he was in his late 20s.

I am personally not overly convinced by the scientific evidence I have been exposed to that "gender" is this entirely constructed, fluid thing, and I actually think most genetic and psychological evidence (again, at least that I have seen) indeed suggests the opposite.  So, my "acceptance" for a transgender person - whether that person is my child or someone else entirely - would rest entirely on compassion.  Not on "deconstructing" whatever the hell it is en vogue to deconstruct at any given moment.  And that is fine, IMO ... it's the compassion that is the important part.

[SWE]

Not a conservative, but I would be deeply troubled. Who is this person and why are they claiming to be my kid?

[Senator Incitatus]

I blame the parents.

[BigZuck08]

     I would explain why I disagree with their choice, but I would also let them know that no matter what happens I will love them and I won't abandon them. If they are minors I would not help them in their efforts to transition, but I will remind them that once they are 18 they are free from my headship and can go through with this if they are still committed to transitioning.

Pretty much this.

[Goldwater]

Well, to start, they wouldn't. That would imply that I’ve failed as a parent.

Indeed, but not for the reasons that you think.

[MarkD]

"Just don't become liberal about every issue."

[Trans Rights Are Human Rights]

“The way it is, is that you’re either a man or you’re a woman. Obviously, we’d all like to be women, but you’re not allowed to. That sacrifice is what being an American is all about.”