Are transgender people the gender they say they are?

[DaleCooper]

HRT has permanent effects on the body, whereas puberty blockers only have debatable debilitating side effects.

Puberty has permanent effects on the body. If you're fine with forcing trans people to go through with puberty and deal with those permanent effects for the rest of their lives, then I don't believe you when you say you long for the day when trans healthcare is more sophisticated, and I don't think you're arguing in good faith when you start talking about trans voices to other trans people.

I don't have much to say about the broader conversation here, but you've been using a lot of language that reflects a certain turn that the activism has taken recently, and I find it a bit concerning. You refer to puberty, which is a completely normal and healthy bodily process, as though it's a horrible disease. In an earlier post you referred to bodies being "ravaged" by puberty  Basically, I fundamentally reject the notion that a body's natural development is something to condemn, hate, or fear, and it's a very dangerous thing to tell young people. Growing up is tough enough as it is without hearing from prominent voices in the media and medical establishment that the body you were born into is "wrong" and is unacceptable unless a dramatic medical intervention is staged.

[parochial boy]

To be honest, the reason that trans activists get so aggressive is quite clearly because it is completely honest to be constantly barraged with the same arguments semantic arguments about the illegitimacy of their identities or the dangers of puberty blockers. I mean, how is this thread still going? everything that needs to be said needs to be said and yet the same people come back with the same arguments, which get the same responses, the same infernal circle.

As far as the puberty blockers go, I mean how many times has this been said? Yes, there are side effects; no, the side effects are not a concealed secret. The reason they are used is because the medical profession has evaluated the risks and benefits associated with their use and concluded that the benefits far outweigh the risks. Medicines typically do not get approved if this isn't the case, and the decades of longitudinal clinical studies tend to support this.

In this case - you treat these as a medical subject; there are plenty of treatments that are given to children that have potentially nasty and irreversible side effects, and yet we don't try to ban these because we know the benefits. What is not a reasonable argument is comparing them to things like tattoos or body piercings or other body modifcations that aren't being used in a medical setting

[John Dule]

As far as the puberty blockers go, I mean how many times has this been said? Yes, there are side effects; no, the side effects are not a concealed secret. The reason they are used is because the medical profession has evaluated the risks and benefits associated with their use and concluded that the benefits far outweigh the risks. Medicines typically do not get approved if this isn't the case, and the decades of longitudinal clinical studies tend to support this.

And nobody in this thread has questioned this, at least not to my knowledge.

[John Dule]

As far as the puberty blockers go, I mean how many times has this been said? Yes, there are side effects; no, the side effects are not a concealed secret. The reason they are used is because the medical profession has evaluated the risks and benefits associated with their use and concluded that the benefits far outweigh the risks. Medicines typically do not get approved if this isn't the case, and the decades of longitudinal clinical studies tend to support this.

And nobody in this thread has questioned this, at least not to my knowledge.

We should, though, regardless of our view of GnRH agonists and other "puberty blockers." It's a wildly inaccurate characterization of the history of medicine in the United States.

This is not just a matter of our health care system's strange vulnerability to becoming a means of profiting from pushing highly addictive psychoactive drugs under the guise of "treatment": the high-profile fuck-ups such as amphetamines, opioids, and benzos. There are even more boring examples: proton pump inhibitors, hip and knee replacements, orthodontics, tonsillectomies... the list goes on.

For those of you who can't stomach any assertion provided without a source and a list of credentials, see Jack Wennberg's work on geographic variation in utilization and supply-induced demand for health care.

I don't want to get drawn into a discussion about the reputability of American medical professionals, because the response will invariably be "They know better than you do." Nonetheless, overprescription and profit-oriented surgeons have demonstrated in recent years that the "trust the professionals" argument just isn't good enough.

[parochial boy]

As far as the puberty blockers go, I mean how many times has this been said? Yes, there are side effects; no, the side effects are not a concealed secret. The reason they are used is because the medical profession has evaluated the risks and benefits associated with their use and concluded that the benefits far outweigh the risks. Medicines typically do not get approved if this isn't the case, and the decades of longitudinal clinical studies tend to support this.

And nobody in this thread has questioned this, at least not to my knowledge.

We should, though, regardless of our view of GnRH agonists and other "puberty blockers." It's a wildly inaccurate characterization of the history of medicine in the United States.

This is not just a matter of our health care system's strange vulnerability to becoming a means of profiting from pushing highly addictive psychoactive drugs under the guise of "treatment": the high-profile fuck-ups such as amphetamines, opioids, and benzos. There are even more boring examples: proton pump inhibitors, hip and knee replacements, orthodontics, tonsillectomies... the list goes on.

For those of you who can't stomach any assertion provided without a source and a list of credentials, see Jack Wennberg's work on geographic variation in utilization and supply-induced demand for health care.

I don't want to get drawn into a discussion about the reputability of American medical professionals, because the response will invariably be "They know better than you do." Nonetheless, overprescription and profit-oriented surgeons have demonstrated in recent years that the "trust the professionals" argument just isn't good enough.

The difference is, famously in the case of opiates but also very much with things like joint replacements, puberty blockers are used as a fairly standard form of treatment in the non-profit oriented healthcare systems you get outside the USA. And yes pharma companies pushing expensive treatments exists in those systems too, but it doesn’t go anywhere near as far as in it does in the US. In that respect, the biggest case that you could make is that they are prescribed too quickly to children presenting symptoms of gender dysphoria, that’s a legitimate argument, but it’s a very different one to the argument that has been made that they shouldn’t be prescribed at all and don’t on the whole have the best long term outcomes for children suffering from gender dysphoria.

[John Dule]

As far as the puberty blockers go, I mean how many times has this been said? Yes, there are side effects; no, the side effects are not a concealed secret. The reason they are used is because the medical profession has evaluated the risks and benefits associated with their use and concluded that the benefits far outweigh the risks. Medicines typically do not get approved if this isn't the case, and the decades of longitudinal clinical studies tend to support this.

And nobody in this thread has questioned this, at least not to my knowledge.

We should, though, regardless of our view of GnRH agonists and other "puberty blockers." It's a wildly inaccurate characterization of the history of medicine in the United States.

This is not just a matter of our health care system's strange vulnerability to becoming a means of profiting from pushing highly addictive psychoactive drugs under the guise of "treatment": the high-profile fuck-ups such as amphetamines, opioids, and benzos. There are even more boring examples: proton pump inhibitors, hip and knee replacements, orthodontics, tonsillectomies... the list goes on.

For those of you who can't stomach any assertion provided without a source and a list of credentials, see Jack Wennberg's work on geographic variation in utilization and supply-induced demand for health care.

I don't want to get drawn into a discussion about the reputability of American medical professionals, because the response will invariably be "They know better than you do." Nonetheless, overprescription and profit-oriented surgeons have demonstrated in recent years that the "trust the professionals" argument just isn't good enough.

The difference is, famously in the case of opiates but also very much with things like joint replacements, puberty blockers are used as a fairly standard form of treatment in the non-profit oriented healthcare systems you get outside the USA. And yes pharma companies pushing expensive treatments exists in those systems too, but it doesn’t go anywhere near as far as in it does in the US. In that respect, the biggest case that you could make is that they are prescribed too quickly to children presenting symptoms of gender dysphoria, that’s a legitimate argument, but it’s a very different one to the argument that has been made that they shouldn’t be prescribed at all and don’t on the whole have the best long term outcomes for children suffering from gender dysphoria.

But I didn't say they shouldn't be prescribed at all. I've reiterated several times in this thread that I don't support a blanket ban on them.

[parochial boy]

As far as the puberty blockers go, I mean how many times has this been said? Yes, there are side effects; no, the side effects are not a concealed secret. The reason they are used is because the medical profession has evaluated the risks and benefits associated with their use and concluded that the benefits far outweigh the risks. Medicines typically do not get approved if this isn't the case, and the decades of longitudinal clinical studies tend to support this.

And nobody in this thread has questioned this, at least not to my knowledge.

We should, though, regardless of our view of GnRH agonists and other "puberty blockers." It's a wildly inaccurate characterization of the history of medicine in the United States.

This is not just a matter of our health care system's strange vulnerability to becoming a means of profiting from pushing highly addictive psychoactive drugs under the guise of "treatment": the high-profile fuck-ups such as amphetamines, opioids, and benzos. There are even more boring examples: proton pump inhibitors, hip and knee replacements, orthodontics, tonsillectomies... the list goes on.

For those of you who can't stomach any assertion provided without a source and a list of credentials, see Jack Wennberg's work on geographic variation in utilization and supply-induced demand for health care.

I don't want to get drawn into a discussion about the reputability of American medical professionals, because the response will invariably be "They know better than you do." Nonetheless, overprescription and profit-oriented surgeons have demonstrated in recent years that the "trust the professionals" argument just isn't good enough.

The difference is, famously in the case of opiates but also very much with things like joint replacements, puberty blockers are used as a fairly standard form of treatment in the non-profit oriented healthcare systems you get outside the USA. And yes pharma companies pushing expensive treatments exists in those systems too, but it doesn’t go anywhere near as far as in it does in the US. In that respect, the biggest case that you could make is that they are prescribed too quickly to children presenting symptoms of gender dysphoria, that’s a legitimate argument, but it’s a very different one to the argument that has been made that they shouldn’t be prescribed at all and don’t on the whole have the best long term outcomes for children suffering from gender dysphoria.

But I didn't say they shouldn't be prescribed at all. I've reiterated several times in this thread that I don't support a blanket ban on them.

Fair enough, I’m not accusing you of that, but certain other posters have very definitely made claims to that extent. Or that they should not be accessible until a time point that is too late.

[Antonio the Sixth]

I guess, but I don't think political discussions should use armed combat as their template for acceptable behavior.

The minefield was your metaphor, I just logically extended it. Obviously it's hyperbole on both ends. I have no idea what you're trying to accomplish here.

I can understand a social role (like a gender role) and a biological trait (sex). What I can't understand is this amorphous, vague space that "gender" seems to inhabit according to gender theorists.

I did my best to hopefully make it less amorphous for you. If I didn't succeed, I'm happy to further elaborate on any point that caused confusion. Obviously this is just my two cents as someone who has an interest in gender theories but doesn't have formal training in the area.

If gender is a social construct, then why do some trans people say it is inborn? If gender is comprised of mutable and changing social norms, then why is gender considered an immutable part of a person's identity? I'm sure you've memorized my litany of gender contradictions by now, so I won't go any further.

Yes. A lot of people, including people who are "on my side" as far as political divides go, have gender takes that I strongly disagree with. The ideas that gender is "inborn" or "an immutable part of a person's identity" are among those takes. I understand why some people have those takes, but I do think they're intellectually misguided and tend to muddy the discourse rather than clarify it.

Now, again, just like when this conversation started, it really feels like you think that the fact that people who disagree with you on gender also disagree among themselves is evidence that your own position is right (or at least, that every other position is wrong). This just doesn't follow. The fact that there are many different perspectives on gender doesn't prove any one perspective on gender right or wrong. It just means that a lot of people have a lot of takes (and statistically, most of those takes are bad), nothing more.

The attempt to parse out a difference between biological gender ("sex") and social gender is, in my mind, a failed political project. Even if these things make sense in the academic sphere to people who study this stuff, you must concede that it has not succeeded in winning over the general public or getting them to see things from the perspective of transgenders. Language can only work through broad consensus, and trying to weaponize it by constructing ever-changing terminology that forces speakers to walk on eggshells completely defeats the purpose of communication.

There's obviously a different time and place for different rhetorical styles in different settings. I'm not advocating for Joe Biden to start discussing trans issues the way a tenured queer theory professor would. There was a similar discussion with Joe Republic in another thread where I mentioned that many Democrats do seem to have developed the toxic habit of speaking in academic-speak when talking to regular voters. If that's the extent of your criticism, then we can agree, though you seem to take it quite a bit further. Anyway, I'm not talking to regular voters right now, I'm talking to you - and I'm sure you can stomach a more intellectually grounded conversation if you really want to.

That aside, I really don't think you can call the discourse on gender "a failed project". Trans acceptance has become significantly more mainstream in the past decade, and I think many people are slowly coming to terms with the idea that gender isn't as fixed and absolute as previous generations tended to believe. Of course that has generated a huge backlash, but that always seems to happen with this kind of social change.

I do agree generally that extending this Hegelian sort of "recognition" to trans people is a simple courtesy. However, to be brutally honest, it makes me sad. The people who extend these courtesies-- by using preferred pronouns, for example-- rarely accept the logical conclusions of the beliefs they espouse. We saw this on Atlas when the poll in this thread received a majority vote, yet a clear majority simultaneously rejected the idea that men can be pregnant. The term "feminine penis" that some people unironically throw around is still met with widespread mockery, even from self-described progressives. Men who say they support trans rights still are reluctant to put their money where their mouth is and actually date trans women. The list goes on. I'm sure you've seen trans Atlas users discuss their insecurities about how others (even their supposed "allies") perceive them. It's clear they've noticed the existence of this gulf between words and beliefs.

This is what courtesies do-- they pay lip service to tolerance and acceptance while masking people's true feelings. Extending weak linguistic courtesies without backing them up through behavior is dangerous to the mental health of a vulnerable population that depends upon recognition and validation from others in order to feel secure in their own body. I fear that doctors and activists are setting up many trans people for failure by implicitly asserting that transitioning will solve their self-image problems, when the other end of that journey may not bring with it the acceptance and recognition they desire. I sincerely hope I'm wrong about this, as I would never wish loneliness or depression upon anyone. Maybe someday gender reassignment will reach levels of technological sophistication that will render this entire debate moot. I hope you understand I'm being honest when I say that day can't come soon enough.

I'm not sure how to respond to this. There is a lot to potentially unpack, but I'm not really sure if those are tangents we want to get into or that getting into them would help us come into an agreement on the main point (especially since you've recently expressed annoyance at the fact that our discussions tend to go into tangents a lot).

All, I can say, I guess, is that I don't think anyone here is saying that referring to trans people by their preferred pronouns is going to solve all their problems. Obviously that's a fairly minor point in the grand scheme of things, and I'd much rather focus on the material ways in which we can help trans people feel more at ease in society (such as by making medical treatments that are proven to alleviate mental distress more accessible). Still, I do think that being able to think about gender as something separate from biological sex has to be part of how we move forward. In fact I don't advocate for that solely out of ~allyship~ with trans people or whatnot: as a cis person, I think I've come to a healthier understanding of myself by letting go of the idea that the category of "man" is something I objectively, intrinsically am, and instead thinking of it as a vague label that helps explain part of my social experiences but doesn't define me in any greater sense. Of course, my experiences are not universal, but I do think I'm not the only cis person who feels that way.

In the meantime though, I have to reject your premise: I think it is wrong to deliberately mislead others about your perception of them. Saying "he" or "she" may be a harmless courtesy-- but I don't think anyone does a trans person any favors by saying these things if they don't actually believe them. Personally, I roll my eyes at the phrase "male pregnancy" and I cannot imagine myself dating a transgender woman. Normally my private views on such a thing wouldn't matter, but apparently transgender people depend upon recognition from people like me in order to feel comfortable about themselves. I don't think people are generally happy if they feel they're being lied to, and they especially aren't happy when others clearly aren't backing their words of support up with genuine action. In this way, I believe that my pushback on this subject is for the best. The lives and mental health of transgender people should not depend upon the opinions of people like me.

Well, that's your premise though. If for you, gender refers to something objective, inherent and biological, then obviously referring to a trans woman as "she" would be deceptive. The point of this now month-long argument isn't to bully you into hiding your beliefs and lying for interpersonal convenience: it's to challenge your beliefs and hopefully adopt a different framework, which will also have the benefit of greater interpersonal convenience. I've already made the case that conflating gender and biological sex makes little sense if we're going to have the two concepts. I then proposed a definition of gender that, in my opinion, has a great deal of explanatory power. Finally, I showed you why adopting this definition would have social benefits in addition to its explanatory power. If I haven't convinced you on the first two points, I can't blame you for disregarding the third one. I just think it's a shame on all accounts.

[Antonio the Sixth]

But I didn't say they shouldn't be prescribed at all. I've reiterated several times in this thread that I don't support a blanket ban on them.

Out of genuine curiosity (you might have already answered, but keeping up the discussion with you is taking enough time as it is and I really don't want to have to read even more of this thread if I don't have to), do you have a problem with puberty blockers being prescribed (by medical professionals going through the properly appointed medical channels) to children when they are actually going through puberty, as a stopgap measure until they're old enough to decide if they want hormones? Because that's obviously the key issue here. Puberty blockers aren't going to do much good at 18.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

But I didn't say they shouldn't be prescribed at all. I've reiterated several times in this thread that I don't support a blanket ban on them.

Out of genuine curiosity (you might have already answered, but keeping up the discussion with you is taking enough time as it is and I really don't want to have to read even more of this thread if I don't have to), do you have a problem with puberty blockers being prescribed (by medical professionals going through the properly appointed medical channels) to children when they are actually going through puberty, as a stopgap measure until they're old enough to decide if they want hormones? Because that's obviously the key issue here. Puberty blockers aren't going to do much good at 18.

I hope Dule doesn't mind if I answer for him here--he's made it clear that he doesn't oppose that, no. What Klobmentum and others have been criticizing him for is that he does oppose the prescription of cross-sex hormones to minors, a course of treatment that has significantly more dramatic and irreversible side-effects (infertility, for instance). This is a question on which I'm agnostic myself.

Personally, Antonio, I don't think the intermediate phenomenon of "gender" that you lay out is actually necessary to support your position, which is more or less my position as well. If we all agree that both "sex" and "gender roles" manifestly exist and that they are clearly separate things--which, in this conversation at least, we all do, because none of us are strict-observance Judith Butler acolytes and/or followers of the Bobover Rebbe--then the idea that a person might wish to inhabit a series of gender roles other than that associated with the sex that they were determined to have at or before birth should be able to stand as it is. I think even Dule would be somewhat more receptive to that line without this interpolated theoretical construct; indeed, pre-1990 or so, "gender roles" was what both trans activists and feminist theorists meant when they said "gender" as opposed to "sex".

[Sol]

Anyway, the statement "trans (wo)men are (wo)men" is pretty silly for how utterly meaningless it is.  It just begs the question of what a (wo)man actually is, a question that trans activists answer with absurdly circular claims like "a woman is anyone who says they're a woman" lol

That slogan has always struck me as the trans equivalent of "love is love" in that it's a slogan intended more for the consumption and promulgation of well-meaning cis/straight allies rather than for the community itself. I wouldn't use it as a yardstick to measure gender in the same way I wouldn't the latter as a yardstick on sexuality.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Anyway, the statement "trans (wo)men are (wo)men" is pretty silly for how utterly meaningless it is.  It just begs the question of what a (wo)man actually is, a question that trans activists answer with absurdly circular claims like "a woman is anyone who says they're a woman" lol

That slogan has always struck me as the trans equivalent of "love is love" in that it's a slogan intended more for the consumption and promulgation of well-meaning cis/straight allies rather than for the community itself. I wouldn't use it as a yardstick to measure gender in the same way I wouldn't the latter as a yardstick on sexuality.

This is true, but the resort to tautological definitions when challenged creates the misleading and unhelpful impression that the people attempting to educate others on these issues think their interlocutors are stupid.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

Effects that reverse once you stop taking the drug aren't the kind of thing I was talking about. Though yes, that is a negative effect. Those negative effects are not large enough to justify just how risky you seem to think puberty blockers are.

I don't think they're particularly risky. If I did, I wouldn't want them to be legal (which I do).

Okay, that's good. The way you've talked about puberty blockers in the past gives off a different vibe, which is why I've been skeptical of you on this.

[John Dule]

Effects that reverse once you stop taking the drug aren't the kind of thing I was talking about. Though yes, that is a negative effect. Those negative effects are not large enough to justify just how risky you seem to think puberty blockers are.

I don't think they're particularly risky. If I did, I wouldn't want them to be legal (which I do).

Okay, that's good. The way you've talked about puberty blockers in the past gives off a different vibe, which is why I've been skeptical of you on this.

I've said they should be studied, mostly because the recent destigmatization of trans people has led to a larger sample size of individuals to study, which will allow for a better understanding of the side effects (if any). My worry is that these effects are not properly understood now because there have not been many individuals who used these drugs and are now old enough to provide a decent sample.

As for the other posts in this thread: I will try to respond tomorrow. Right now I am working on my first-ever legal brief. If I end up forgetting, don't hesitate to remind me. I like the direction this conversation is going.

[John Dule]

Yes. A lot of people, including people who are "on my side" as far as political divides go, have gender takes that I strongly disagree with. The ideas that gender is "inborn" or "an immutable part of a person's identity" are among those takes. I understand why some people have those takes, but I do think they're intellectually misguided and tend to muddy the discourse rather than clarify it.

Now, again, just like when this conversation started, it really feels like you think that the fact that people who disagree with you on gender also disagree among themselves is evidence that your own position is right (or at least, that every other position is wrong). This just doesn't follow. The fact that there are many different perspectives on gender doesn't prove any one perspective on gender right or wrong. It just means that a lot of people have a lot of takes (and statistically, most of those takes are bad), nothing more.

To explain how this got started:

Del Tachi made a remark about how the idea of "brain sex" is incorrect, and that gender is not in your brain the day you are born. Progressive85 then responded, saying that to suggest this is equivalent to "mocking" and "making fun" of trans people. This is what I took exception to-- a non-transgender user made a very innocuous and inoffensive remark that essentially endorsed the viewpoint of many trans activists, and yet he still got called transphobic for it.

The fact that gender activists disagree on these things doesn't "prove" my point and I never said it did. What it does prove, however, is that they should not jump down people's throats for misusing a word or disagreeing with them on the particulars of gender, since their own community cannot form a consensus on these things. For the record, Progressive85 later PM'd me and we buried the hatchet. Still, I stand by the point I was making there: You can't say that there are multiple valid positions on this subject for trans people and then complain when non-trans people take reasonable positions you don't agree with. I think if you re-read that exchange you'll see what I meant, and why I was so irritated by your interpretation of my comments.

There's obviously a different time and place for different rhetorical styles in different settings. I'm not advocating for Joe Biden to start discussing trans issues the way a tenured queer theory professor would. There was a similar discussion with Joe Republic in another thread where I mentioned that many Democrats do seem to have developed the toxic habit of speaking in academic-speak when talking to regular voters. If that's the extent of your criticism, then we can agree, though you seem to take it quite a bit further. Anyway, I'm not talking to regular voters right now, I'm talking to you - and I'm sure you can stomach a more intellectually grounded conversation if you really want to.

That aside, I really don't think you can call the discourse on gender "a failed project". Trans acceptance has become significantly more mainstream in the past decade, and I think many people are slowly coming to terms with the idea that gender isn't as fixed and absolute as previous generations tended to believe. Of course that has generated a huge backlash, but that always seems to happen with this kind of social change.

On the contrary, I would argue that the acceptance of transgenders in recent years is despite the discourse surrounding them, not because of it. I think the most appropriate way to view this cultural shift is as a by-product of gay rights, and a general move towards the socially libertarian "harm principle" in much of our social discourse. This is why gay marriage is no longer very controversial (as it harms no one), whereas abortion continues to be a major national division. It's also why the subject of hormone treatment and surgery for minors remains so controversial, because as we've gradually begun to accept that consenting adults may do as they choose, that principle clearly does not extend to underage people in a number of different ways (as I've tried to point out).

I'm not sure how to respond to this. There is a lot to potentially unpack, but I'm not really sure if those are tangents we want to get into or that getting into them would help us come into an agreement on the main point (especially since you've recently expressed annoyance at the fact that our discussions tend to go into tangents a lot).

All, I can say, I guess, is that I don't think anyone here is saying that referring to trans people by their preferred pronouns is going to solve all their problems. Obviously that's a fairly minor point in the grand scheme of things, and I'd much rather focus on the material ways in which we can help trans people feel more at ease in society (such as by making medical treatments that are proven to alleviate mental distress more accessible). Still, I do think that being able to think about gender as something separate from biological sex has to be part of how we move forward. In fact I don't advocate for that solely out of ~allyship~ with trans people or whatnot: as a cis person, I think I've come to a healthier understanding of myself by letting go of the idea that the category of "man" is something I objectively, intrinsically am, and instead thinking of it as a vague label that helps explain part of my social experiences but doesn't define me in any greater sense. Of course, my experiences are not universal, but I do think I'm not the only cis person who feels that way.

I can understand why a deconstruction of gender roles might be beneficial for some non-trans people. The word "man," though, is not a social role-- it is a descriptor of a biological reality. But without even wading into that quagmire, I'll just say this: The implication in modern gender discourse that anyone who doesn't conform 100% to the stereotypes of their gender is "challenging gender roles" is just as narrow and confining as gender roles themselves. Does my beer-drinking, baseball-loving mother "challenge" gender roles with her interests? Am I "challenging gender roles" if I grow my hair long or learn how to cook? No. To say that is to ironically endorse a stereotypical baseline of what it means to be male or female. I have a few interests and preferences that some might consider "feminine," but that does not mean the label "man" applies to me any less. I don't think the application of that term is even remotely vague, because 99.8% of the time everyone will know exactly what it means.

Well, that's your premise though. If for you, gender refers to something objective, inherent and biological, then obviously referring to a trans woman as "she" would be deceptive. The point of this now month-long argument isn't to bully you into hiding your beliefs and lying for interpersonal convenience: it's to challenge your beliefs and hopefully adopt a different framework, which will also have the benefit of greater interpersonal convenience. I've already made the case that conflating gender and biological sex makes little sense if we're going to have the two concepts. I then proposed a definition of gender that, in my opinion, has a great deal of explanatory power. Finally, I showed you why adopting this definition would have social benefits in addition to its explanatory power. If I haven't convinced you on the first two points, I can't blame you for disregarding the third one. I just think it's a shame on all accounts.

I would just say that any social benefits of using the word "gender" are outweighed by the (possibly intentional) confusion it stirs up whenever it enters a conversation. You yourself are "proposing" definitions for gender in this thread-- definitions that you admit many (probably most) people don't share, including the transgender community-- thus implicitly conceding the fact that no generally accepted definition exists. Not to go all Cool Hand Luke, but what we've got here is a failure to communicate. If a word does not adequately and concisely transmit information to the listener/reader, it fails as a word.

Maybe as social conservatives become fewer in number and the gender activist movement becomes more organized and less obnoxious, a generally accepted definition of "gender" will emerge that will serve a utility in our language. Maybe we'll find that it actually describes something relevant to people's lives, and the "social" concept of a man will become divorced from the "biological" concept of a man. Right now, however, I don't see any such consensus-- and more importantly, I see no utility in that separation. Every explanation I have heard for the term has differed from the previous explanation. My only possible conclusion is that the word has become a catch-all term that the user imbues with their own predilections and eccentricities. I won't deny anyone their right to express themselves as they see fit-- however, as I said earlier, I absolutely draw the line at people being called out as bigots for not fluidly conforming their vocabularies to every definitional shift of this ever-changing, utterly subjective, and consistently divisive term.

[HillGoose]

yes, because gender can be whatever you want it to be, since it's not even a concrete real thing. it was just made up to divide everybody back in the prehistoric times.

everyone is the same.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

No.

[KoopaDaQuick 🇵🇸]

No.

I'm not going to take the opinion of anyone who calls themself a "North Carolina Conservative" seriously when it comes to my gender.

[Libertas Vel Mors]

No.

I'm not going to take the opinion of anyone who calls themself a "North Carolina Conservative" seriously when it comes to my gender.

Thank you, Ms. KoopaDaQuick.

[KoopaDaQuick 🇵🇸]

No.

I'm not going to take the opinion of anyone who calls themself a "North Carolina Conservative" seriously when it comes to my gender.

Thank you, Ms. KoopaDaQuick.

Sorry, man, but facts don't care about your feelings. Gender, at least in the 21st century Western world, is baked into culture a hell of a lot more than it is into penis and vaginas or XX and XY. Use the wrong honorifics, whatever, but it won't change the fact that society's opinion of what a man or woman is is so separated from human biology that more and more people are starting to accept the fact that we don't have to define something as woven into our culture as gender identity and expression by exclusively using biological markers.

[Antonio the Sixth]

To explain how this got started:

Del Tachi made a remark about how the idea of "brain sex" is incorrect, and that gender is not in your brain the day you are born. Progressive85 then responded, saying that to suggest this is equivalent to "mocking" and "making fun" of trans people. This is what I took exception to-- a non-transgender user made a very innocuous and inoffensive remark that essentially endorsed the viewpoint of many trans activists, and yet he still got called transphobic for it.

The fact that gender activists disagree on these things doesn't "prove" my point and I never said it did. What it does prove, however, is that they should not jump down people's throats for misusing a word or disagreeing with them on the particulars of gender, since their own community cannot form a consensus on these things. For the record, Progressive85 later PM'd me and we buried the hatchet. Still, I stand by the point I was making there: You can't say that there are multiple valid positions on this subject for trans people and then complain when non-trans people take reasonable positions you don't agree with. I think if you re-read that exchange you'll see what I meant, and why I was so irritated by your interpretation of my comments.

I understand the original misunderstanding came from, yes. I've since read Progressive85's posts and I agree with you that they were completely over the line and, frankly, deeply cringeworthy. It's pretty representative of everything I hate about online trans advocacy, and probably does serious harm to the cause.

What confuses me is that we seemingly resolved this issue a few posts ago, but then you brought that very same issue back into the discussion out of nowhere, when you asked: "If gender is a social construct, then why do some trans people say it is inborn? If gender is comprised of mutable and changing social norms, then why is gender considered an immutable part of a person's identity?" How are these fair questions for me to answer now that we're talking about the substance of the issue exactly? Like, at the end of the day, if someone claims gender is innate and immutable, I'm going to disagree with them, regardless of whether they're trans or cis. Such a disagreement shouldn't prove anything about the merit my perspective.

On the contrary, I would argue that the acceptance of transgenders in recent years is despite the discourse surrounding them, not because of it. I think the most appropriate way to view this cultural shift is as a by-product of gay rights, and a general move towards the socially libertarian "harm principle" in much of our social discourse. This is why gay marriage is no longer very controversial (as it harms no one), whereas abortion continues to be a major national division. It's also why the subject of hormone treatment and surgery for minors remains so controversial, because as we've gradually begun to accept that consenting adults may do as they choose, that principle clearly does not extend to underage people in a number of different ways (as I've tried to point out).

"The discourse surrounding them" can mean a lot of different things here. As I said above, I certainly agree that there's a lot that's wrong with the discourse around trans issues. A lot of people on the internet are obviously positively eager to lash out at anyone who says anything that might remotely be constructed as disagreeing with the most up-to-date orthodoxy on the issue, and we see shades of this in posters like Progressive85 and Klobmentum. The worst of those types spend their time on Twitter harassing actual progressive advocates who do meaningful work promoting trans acceptances, and I'd be happy to tell you all my thoughts about these miserable creeps. As a proud atheist, I'm sure you can see why it's unfair for a whole political movement to be defined by its most cringeworthy proponents online, so I hope you can sympathize a bit with my position here.

Is the gender-constructivist perspective, in and of itself, a liability for trans acceptance? I don't see any evidence for that. Of course the "live and let live" libertarian instinct is always going to be the strongest angle of attack for LGBT acceptance, given that it's so central to the American ethos. And conversely, it's not surprising that "think of the children!!" is always the last refuge of conservatives when they start losing a culture war, since people are understandably particularly sensitive to potential harm to children. I don't think how things have played out in this regard contradicts my argument at all. As far as gender-constructivism goes, though (that is, after all, the point of this discussion), I think it is becoming normalized in a lot of circles, and not just in turbo-woke spaces. In plenty of places thinking of trans women as women and trans men as men is intuitive and doesn't entail the kind of insincerity or doublethink that you seem to associate with it - people have just internalized the new understanding of gender. Of course that's not the case for most of US society, and no doubt there are places where this sort of discourse generates backlash, but I don't think it's nearly as ubiquitous as you're making it out to be, and I think it will become more and more normalized as time goes on.

I can understand why a deconstruction of gender roles might be beneficial for some non-trans people. The word "man," though, is not a social role-- it is a descriptor of a biological reality.

You're just casually stating as a fact the thing that is the point of contention in this discussion. Come on, don't go all Ben Shapiro on me here.

But without even wading into that quagmire, I'll just say this: The implication in modern gender discourse that anyone who doesn't conform 100% to the stereotypes of their gender is "challenging gender roles" is just as narrow and confining as gender roles themselves. Does my beer-drinking, baseball-loving mother "challenge" gender roles with her interests? Am I "challenging gender roles" if I grow my hair long or learn how to cook? No. To say that is to ironically endorse a stereotypical baseline of what it means to be male or female. I have a few interests and preferences that some might consider "feminine," but that does not mean the label "man" applies to me any less. I don't think the application of that term is even remotely vague, because 99.8% of the time everyone will know exactly what it means.

I'm not sure where you read all that in what I said, but no, deviating from gender roles in some minor ways is not the same thing as challenging gender roles. The latter implies intentionality as well as a degree of expected societal backlash that obviously doesn't apply to your examples. I wouldn't say I really "challenge gender roles" myself in particular, as I don't go out of my way to act one way or the other in particular (although glad we agree that longer hair looks better and cooking is cool!). And I'm not attached to the label of "man" but I don't really take issue with people ascribing to me. If you are attached to the label, that's totally fine and valid, and I don't think adopting a constructivist framework makes that masculinity less real for you (especially since presumably everyone will recognize you as one regardless). You have nothing to worry about here.

I would just say that any social benefits of using the word "gender" are outweighed by the (possibly intentional) confusion it stirs up whenever it enters a conversation. You yourself are "proposing" definitions for gender in this thread-- definitions that you admit many (probably most) people don't share, including the transgender community-- thus implicitly conceding the fact that no generally accepted definition exists. Not to go all Cool Hand Luke, but what we've got here is a failure to communicate. If a word does not adequately and concisely transmit information to the listener/reader, it fails as a word.

Well, this whole clusterf**k of trash-fire threads on Talk Elections Atlas Forum Blog Dot Org is certainly not how I would set out to talk about gender with normies on my own. The terms of the discussion were largely imposed on both of us by OPs basically looking to stir up drama, so it's not surprising that this is what happened. Of course, that is the norm almost everywhere online, unfortunately. But I get the impression that in everyday, normal conversations, people are a lot more open to these ideas, as long as they aren't preached to them. Like, if I had a trans friend, and a cis friend was confused about her, I'd say something like "yeah, she was born male but now she lives as a woman" and I feel like 90% of people would be fine with this and use the right pronouns from the get go.

Maybe as social conservatives become fewer in number and the gender activist movement becomes more organized and less obnoxious, a generally accepted definition of "gender" will emerge that will serve a utility in our language. Maybe we'll find that it actually describes something relevant to people's lives, and the "social" concept of a man will become divorced from the "biological" concept of a man. Right now, however, I don't see any such consensus--

I don't see a consensus either, but that argument goes both way. There's no longer a consensus on equating gender with biological sex either, though, and trying to impose gender-essentialism on society would be as much of a tall order for you as trying to impose the gender-constructivism is for me. Ultimately, when linguistic consensus breaks down, we have to try to be sympathetic to each other's perspective, but also make our case for why our own is better. The fact that there's no consensus isn't an argument in my or your favor - it's the reason we're debating the topic in the first place.

and more importantly, I see no utility in that separation. Every explanation I have heard for the term has differed from the previous explanation. My only possible conclusion is that the word has become a catch-all term that the user imbues with their own predilections and eccentricities. I won't deny anyone their right to express themselves as they see fit-- however, as I said earlier, I absolutely draw the line at people being called out as bigots for not fluidly conforming their vocabularies to every definitional shift of this ever-changing, utterly subjective, and consistently divisive term.

I guess I haven't made a good case for it. I'm still convinced that the thing I'm advocating for here is both perfectly logically consistent and very intuitive to a lot of people. To me, something clearly breaks down when you argue that there's such thing as "gender expectations" and "gender roles", but then say gender itself is just biological sex. That makes it seem like the reason women are held to given roles and expectations is directly because they have XX chromosomes or vaginas or whatnot, when there's clearly a mediating social force at play in them being identified as women and womanhood itself being associated with those expectations and roles. Gender as a sort of medium though which these social understandings get transmitted and amplified seems like a concept with a lot of explanatory power to me. Again, I can't speak for anyone else here, and I'm sure there are plenty of trans people who disagree with me. But at the same time, I'd appreciate it if you could give those ideas some thought in isolation, abstracted from the context of cringeworthy online woke scolds, because I do feel like this has been a barrier to mutual understanding as well.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

The terms of the discussion were largely imposed on both of us by OPs basically looking to stir up drama, so it's not surprising that this is what happened.

I'm not imposing terms of discussion on anyone. I made this thread because of how many people voted No in the 'Can a man get pregnant' thread. I suspected that fewer people would be open about their disbelief in trans people's genders if the question were phrased more broadly, so I made this thread to compare what people say they believe (this thread) to what people really believe (the other thread, which I didn't make).

Drama only started because transphobes can't help themselves but rub it in our faces. When they do that, I am going to respond, as will other people. Sue me, call me a turbo wokescold, whatever.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The terms of the discussion were largely imposed on both of us by OPs basically looking to stir up drama, so it's not surprising that this is what happened.

I'm not imposing terms of discussion on anyone. I made this thread because of how many people voted No in the 'Can a man get pregnant' thread. I suspected that fewer people would be open about their disbelief in trans people's genders if the question were phrased more broadly, so I made this thread to compare what people say they believe (this thread) to what people really believe (the other thread, which I didn't make).

Drama only started because transphobes can't help themselves but rub it in our faces. When they do that, I am going to respond, as will other people. Sue me, call me a turbo wokescold, whatever.

I didn't mean you specifically fwiw, this is like one of 3 or 4 threads when the same conversation has been going on, so I'm thinking about it as a continuum. That said, it's undeniable that the knee-jerk over-the-top outrage toward anyone who expresses anything other than full agreement with your perspective isn't moving the conversation forward.

[Klobmentum Mutilated Herself]

That said, it's undeniable that the knee-jerk over-the-top outrage toward anyone who expresses anything other than full agreement with your perspective isn't moving the conversation forward.

Disagree with me all you want, but what I say isn't over-the-top or knee-jerk, first of all. I don't care if people disagree with me and I'm not arguing with the vast majority of people who disagree with me, whether they disagree slightly or fully with me. I argue with people who are ignorant of the facts and the trans perspective, people who are outright bigoted, or fair-weather people who claim not to be bigoted while being more harsh towards facts and the trans perspective than they are towards the outright bigots. It's a message board, it's a topic I'm passionate about, knowledgeable of, and personally affected by, so I post in these topics. How over-the-top!

Besides, I'm not the one bumping these threads when one of them goes dormant for a week or so. The people who do that are generally the ones doing it so they can reiterate how silly the transgenders are with their pronouns and their childhood mutilations.

[The Mikado]

How has this thread gone on 7 pages when it just goes pointlessly in circles?