To think that the majority of trans people are neurodivergent

Yep your story tallies with the girls I teach. What I wonder is why did becoming trans become the” thing to do” all of a sudden, if you know what I mean. Or do you think actually there never used to be any way to make you feel less of an outsider until trans came along. When I was a child in the 90’s and 2000’s no one even knew this word really, it was more understood as transvestite. When did it become mainstream?

I can well believe that most young girls who believe they are trans are ND or have a background of trauma, or both.

Middle aged straight men though, no. Other issues at play there.

So to say it as been 'reclaimed' with no further qualifications is inaccurate then,

I don't and neither do you. I gave my opinion. You can tell because I said "I thought it had been reclaimed", not "It has been reclaimed". That's based on the opinion of the gay people that I know. I have no idea who you know or what they think.

That the word has two different meanings to two different generations

From an earlier point on the thread. I have an Aspergers diagnosis and I genuinely don't care if anyone calls me ASD, uses person first language or not (I'm not actually sure which way round us ment to be offensive), I just can't stand this deliberate thin-skinnedness and offense seeking.
If someone has no bad intention, accept that as good enough.

And ... your point is what?

Older generations views are not relevant? 😵‍💫

That was what I said after I said that I thought it had been reclaimed. I didn't just say "it's not a slur".

This is exactly why I identified as transgender for so much of my teens & young adulthood.

Friendship circles of transgender people feel very special. Like you're not alone. As a neurodivergent person that is very very powerful.

I now don't identify as transgender and whilst I am happier as a woman I am also the loneliest I have ever been. I don't fit in with my neurotypical peers and it's really, really difficult.

@RedToothBrush that's a really good post and informative.

Douglas Murray I feel has made some really good observations on the subject and his issue with the pro trans agenda as a gay man.

I can absolutely see the problem now with the ' LGBTQ' banner as opposed to LGB.

But that sounds like a generational thing, as many others on this thread have described.

I’m a teacher and I agree with you, the kids I know who are trans are autistic or I would say are undiagnosed. I work at a girls school and I’m not joking when I say that it also seems to run in friendship groups and seems to start with one member then increase. One class I taught last year there were five children who were trans. I have no issue with this but considering the national percentages it does seem disportionate at my school and I wonder if some teenagers who are neuro divergent who aren’t happy with themselves anyway because they find it hard to fit into society have latched onto this concept of being trans as a way for them to try to work out why they feel they don’t feel like they “ fit in”

You said earlier that you were surprised to hear it being described as a slur.

Who gets to decide that something 'has been reclaimed'?

Because not one single gay person I know agrees with that.

There's no sense of what is a normal range for identity formation and sexual attraction and whether this differs in autistic kids. There should be.

And that is how "gay" was used when I was a teen. Giggles when it was used in old literature, used as a nasty slur by nasty teens. different words, different generations. I don't think queer was even in our consciousness really. So it is hardly surprising if generations younger than mine have coopted it in a very different way

Late development of sexual attraction or lack of sexual attraction is known as being common in autistic kids.

Yet kids are being taught they should have sexual feelings at an earlier and earlier age. It's something that's really unhelpful as part of this.

@Choochoo21

I totally agree. I much preferred playing sport and being one of the lads. I never went as far as shaving my hair or binding however I would dress like a male. As an adult I've had a bilateral mastectomy without reconstruction due to breast cancer. I've also had to have some women reproduction parts removed as a cancer prevention as I carry a genetic mutation. I am in theory a lot more masculine in body than most women now in regards to feminine body parts. However I 100% identify as a woman, I am not especially 'girly' but I would never deem myself as wanting to be or to transition to male. It scares me to what I may have done as a teen had transitioning been more mainstream as at present. I am not ND but I still think I could have easily been swayed as I never fitted in amongst the girls.

Edit: I also was very confused as a teen because I couldn't work out if I were gay as a result of being more of one of the boys. When I finally discovered I was attracted to boys at around 17 life made a little more sense.

Yanbu. They are sterilising autistic and gay kids in plain sight.

I think a big issue is that for such a long time, autism was assumed to be a mostly male phenomenon. As late as 2004, I remember reading a psychology textbook that claimed there was a male:female ratio of 20:1 for Asperger's Syndrome. We're playing catch-up, and that means that teaching about autism and puberty has focused on boys. Female-specific aspects of how autism manifests are missed and misattributed to gender dysphoria.

For example, there seems to be very limited awareness that struggling with the sensory experience of menstruation is usual for autistic girls, because they are autistic. It's known that disordered sensory processing may mean that the sensation of a runny nose from a cold is an overwhelming constant source of distress for an autistic child of either sex, but no-one puts this together and realises that periods can trigger the same type of distress. So many times I have been told that girls can know they're "born in the wrong body" because they can't stand the constant sensation of blood leaking out of them onto a sanitary towel or the anxiety about it leaking through their clothes. That's the sensory processing disorder! I solved this for myself through tampons, by the way. Internal sanitarywear means I can't feel the blood leaving my body until the tampon is saturated.

If hating the sensation of blood leaking from you means you're in the wrong body, then I must have been born with the wrong body and the wrong type of face then. I used to rub my nose raw when I was little and had a cold, just trying to stop my nose running.

The word queer was used in the voice over of one of the nye London displays, can't remember if it was 2024 or 2023.
Surprised me but assumed its a sign the usage has changed.

What does enby/NB mean exactly? I mean, I'm a biological woman, I was born female. But I don't have any feelings of identity as a woman or a man. Does that mean I'm NB?

I argue that it hasn't been reclaimed because so many still use it offensively and so many find it still offensive.

I've been on a long long journey with this.

It's littered with myths and untruths which 'transallies' repeat long after those who trained them backtrack.

It's awful.

Not only that one of the worst is the 'its just like being gay' narrative. Yet one of the most negatively impacted groups by trans ideology are gay people.

Time and again you then get 'LGBT allies' telling someone they don't know is gay, that they shouldn't have a problem and it's like section 28.

It's like gay people can't advocate for themselves and are told, that because of their sexuality they must have certain politics. By people who claim to be supportive.

We still haven't tackled a legal definition of trans or a legal definition of woman. They can't be a fuzzy feeling because this isn't legally coherent. These are important because the equality act rests on the understanding of sex. If we can't legally define we can't defend rights. It's particularly true for homosexuals - if sex is replaced by gender they lose their protected status of being same sex attracted. It potentially criminalises them for refusing to even consider an opposed sex partner and leaves them at the mercy of having to work this out (potentially with implications to their safety).

Again this isn't transphobic. This is a practicality issue. One that possibly because it's about beliefs - can't be legislated for as anything but a belief. If it's a belief then in a free society, by default there is a right not to share that belief or have that belief imposed on you.

This all day!