AIBU to suggest it is time to stop the pretence that people can transition?

I have observed the whole trans cult (and as someone who has studied a lot of cults it is certainly a cult) I have been totally perplexed by this. How, intelligent people can have bought into something that goes against every ounce of instinct and common sense humans possess. How they can believe in something so obviously a lie, how they can have championed harm to both individuals and society.

I actually think it (together with the obsession in getting behind every cause going - often accompanied with little knowledge/critical thinking) is a way of filling a need for something bigger, to find a tribe with the same philosophy, for getting together with those of similar thoughts, to have (what you think are) your own thoughts affirmed. Religion used to fulfil this desire but has fallen out of favour amongst certain groups.

The attitude of being right, inability to logically explain, excommunication of heretics, blind faith. Universities are often places which enforce the cult of the day, limiting the thoughts theoretically the most intelligent.

Why do humans throughout history fall into this pattern time and time again. We need to understand this more to stop this apparent predisposition being exploited again and again.

We need some serious studies into this. Unfortunately the people who could do this have largely been captured - why do we think this is?

Your anecdotal account is not evidence.

And oddly enough, I do feel fairly vitriolic towards crowds of violent men in lippy and frocks who are carrying placards wishing rape and death upon women like me.

Well there are very few TW who actually have bottom surgery.

The vast majority keep their penises.

Fewer than one in ten have surgery.

I’ve tried to steer clear of the debate, particularly at work, because it seems so politicised and almost quite risky to express an opinion.

But yes, I’ve always found it very odd. Exactly as others have said, we don’t agree with anorexics who think they’re fat. White people who decide to identify as an ethnic minority are (rightly) criticised. I’ve never understood how this is different.

I’m not sure how I feel about the surgery to be honest. I would be very upset and concerned if a close friend or family member wanted to undergo body modification of any other kind which was this extreme and irreversible, but when trans people do it we are supposed to celebrate it?

If people want to wear dresses or make up or grow their hair long then fine, I don’t have a problem with that at all. But I do have a problem with someone telling my daughter that if she chooses not to wear a dress / grow her hair long / wear make up then she must be a boy!

I suspect the majority of people probably feel like me but wouldn’t necessarily say it to anyone except their very closest friends (or anonymously online!)

Haven't RTFT, but yes, I agree and I think 'trans' boils down to a few categories:

1. People with gender dysphoria. No idea why this is pandered to and not treated like any other body dysphoria (ie a mental illness) with therapy. We don't play along with people with anorexia nor those who want to chop an arm off.

2. AGPs and other fetishists. Used to be rightly denounced and shamed. Now celebrated 🤮

3. Autistic people who equate not fitting in, to not fitting into their 'gender'.

4. A bizarre regression in sex stereotypes insinuating that if you're a girl and like climbing trees and short hair, then you must really be a boy and if you're a boy and want long hair and like pretty things, you must be a girl.

5. Internalised homophobia: person would rather be the opposite sex, but straight.

Pronouns are a part of language, and language belongs to everyone. For the words we speak and write to be understood and not garbage they must have clear definitions. Pronouns aren’t there for the choosing. They don’t exist to validate an identity or feelings.

And as soon as you start referring to a male person using female words you sow the seed that that male person is, in some undefined way, female.

I agree it's a very difficult topic. I think there's confusion between sex (the biological reality - which isn't always clear cut) and gender, which is a social construct. I think it's sad that we're unaccepting of men who feel more feminine than is conventional, or of women who feel more male. If we were, I wonder if there'd be fewer people wanting medical intervention?

It is heartbreaking I've watched alot of stuff on destransitioners and I think the current model and the TRAs sell them a false ideal they can make you a 'cis' (their language not mine) woman or man. They need to find out if theres other factors causing how they feel before making that leap and understanding it could be the wrong. I can't imagine how hard it must be to try and go back again.

Yanbu. We got it wrong. Well the politicians who brought in the idea you could transition in law did.

How do you live “as the opposite sex”?

How do you know if the male person in the toilet has had surgery? Is on hormones? Is a fetishist who’s involving you in his fetish against your wish’s? Is a predatory? You can’t.

Neither of those things mean a person has changed sex, anyway.

I’m a woman who can’t have children. I’m still a woman. I’m still of the class of humans who produce eggs and can carry a pregnancy. Just because I cannot, does not mean I’m not a woman. I do not get offended by any of this in the slightest. I’m a biological woman who unfortunately cannot have children.

Right, but kids can be gay/ bi in same way as they can be straight at that young age?

My husband and I could not reproduce. We are still female and male. He is of the sex that typically produces small gametes and I the large. The fact we could not produce children was due to a defect with one of us; one of us did not produce the gametes we should have done and that was investigated and treated as an abnormality. It does not make us less male or female. That is what the definition is- it is about the potential to reproduce whether or not one does or chooses not to.

They're still children at that age!

You might know nice trans people, but in the last few days thousands of trans activists have been taking to the streets across the UK to march in protest against the Supreme Court judgment.

Among them have been a number of violent males carrying placards threatening physical violence against "TERFs" (aka women who say no to their demands) and threatening to stage a dirty protest using bottles of their own pee if they're told they can't use the toilets of their choosing.

These are the same men who regularly show up at women's rights demonstrations with weapons and balaclavas, to assault women.

Do you think it is unreasonable to want to keep those people out of women's single sex toilets, changing rooms, rape crisis groups and shelters?

What is the issue tho with kids at 10/11 being gay/ bisexual? Isn’t that something to be proud of - that they feel comfortable expressing themselves and feel safe to do so?

Exactly, I’ve never had a negative experience with a trans person (definitely met some cross dressers, they clearly had fetishes, but this was in the days when we knew we were looking at a cross dressers and were allowed to hold boundaries). I still don’t want someone I clearly identify as a male patting me down for a security check or sharing my space when I’m getting changed. Just the same as I don’t want any man as lovely as he is feeling around my bra at heathrow airport. I have a right to not be touched or vulnerable around men.

Why is that mans desire to feel validated more important than my desire to feel safe.

When we see that image of the man tattooed head to toe. With those lumpy forehead implants. Do we think he is a real alien?

When we see the man tattooed and with whiskers do we think he is a real cat?

The people who DRESS up as babies and soil themselves are they real babies?

https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-29832690

Some years ago a major trans charity declared that transitioning cured autism. It’s not harmless.

There are many mental health conditions that we don't empower or affirm. The reason being, the detrimental damage it could do to either the sufferer or those around them. Gender dysphoria should be treated as such

The downfall of society begins with the individual.

YANBU, OP.

I understand not needing or being asked to use pro nouns if don’t want to. But I just have a different opinion - if someone wants to be identified and this is important yo them - as he/ they or whatever, in my mind, I have zero issues with this. Same when someone gets married wanting to change from miss to mrs. But again, appreciate some may have differing views and respect this.

It's a false equivalence.

Homosexuality is natural and exists throughout the animal kingdom.

Mutilating one's body to imitate the opposite sex is a uniquely cultural and social phenomenon in homo sapiens.

Encouraging and enabling people to do the latter is immoral.

We should just be accepting that some men like dresses or sparkly clothes and some women like short hair or engineering. Someone's personality doesn't change their sex.

As a secondary school teacher the explosion of transitioning is scary. Autistic girls seeing it on social media as a cure all. Unhappy Kids seeing it as a cure all. Attention seeking kids seeing it as a cure all.