Help with talking to a 12 yr old about trans issues

I really, really enjoy your posts.

@nepeta yes absolutely - I see this more widely too with young people: they are increasingly unwilling to challenge things like received ideas or beliefs in the face of genuine evidence. So for example they will always tell me confidently the canard that coursework is better for female and minority students, because that’s a longstanding thing that circulates (without evidence) around the education system.

So when you produce detailed data and say, well that’s what people like to say, but actually these X number of very good data analysis studies here actually prove the opposite — in previous generations you’d see them be really keen to jettison old ideas and take the data on board. Whereas right now, they will look at you and kind of go “ah” with funny looks; and next thing you know they are all lobbying the department for more coursework because “the student Union says it’s better for women and minorities”, and you just end up explaining the data all again and they just look at you again with those “ah, right”, looks and don’t seem to take it in. Facepalm time.

You get this with lots of other stuff too - just kind of an entrenched unwillingness to jettison what they think sounds like it ought to be right, despite all evidence and data that it isn’t. It’s something I’ve really only seen happening in a widespread way within the last few years.

That’s one reason that I’m pessimistic about this blowing over any time soon. Gender ideology is like the flipside youth version of Trump MAGA and conspiracist movements - wedded to bogus ideas circulating around the internet and “fake news” and impervious to reason and evidenced data - it just brushes it off.

Just like whatever scientific studies you produce a great number of people will be taking ivermectin because they read stuff on the internet and they don’t believe in your science anyway, so much of the gender ideology circulating amongst young people is impervious to actual medical or factual evidence because whatever you argue it’s automatically “transphobic”. It’s exactly the same kind of movement duplicating the same methods of social contagion, and just as deeply antithetical to reason or scientific materialism or data.

No, I don't.

Do you? Have you seen any that have fully transitioned?

@stopwaitingforpermissiontobeyou - but you said you don't know any young people who have transitioned. I work in education too, yes really, and I see living proof of the profile of young people that get referred to the Tavistock, as I mentioned earlier. And of course I treat them with respect, as I treat all the young people, but I can also see the harm that they are doing to themselves wearing breast-binders etc. And actually I'm shocked at my colleagues who don't see it as a safeguarding issue (whereas breast-ironing, which rarely happens, is)

Because I work with young people

Unlike most in these type of posts, I don't talk about things I don't know.

The key word in your middle paragraph is “young”, @stopwaitingforpermissiontobeyou

Have you ever wondered why this is the case?

You work in education but you have never encountered a child who said they wanted to transition?

Unless you work in EY, I find that extraordinary

@stopwaitingforpermissiontobeyou

Pansexual is a sexuality. Completely different issue.

Which incidentally - I don't agree with at 12. This is why I struggle with people having opinions on the whole concept when in actual fact they are unable to separate gender and sexuality.

It's my occupation.

Of course you can.

No. I don't believe so. Which I appreciate doesn't fit into the narrative, but I don't believe it's a black and white issue.

Same happens at my kids school.

stopwaiting you are answering really thoughtfully about trans children - can I ask you a wider question? You are adamant that children should be able to identify as their preferred gender; if such a child grows up still identifying as the opposite gender, should a male who identifies as a transwoman be placed in a female prison if they commit a criminal offence?

Do you guys honestly believe you could go into a school with a printed out policy and the headteacher would agree that oh yes we are uncertain and nervous, thanks so much for your help? truly?

@OldCrone Yes, other than disappearinggirl, I disagree with every point

My point about dying was that religion, or the afterlife, is a belief.

I believe you can be born in the wrong body, yes, but I can't compel others to believe.

In the same way that someone who is not an atheist, which I am, doesnt agree that we go on to heaven. However I don't correct them. Why? Why don't I do that?

As per the periods, that wasn't you. I'm still missing this bloody quote function (I've started tagging for that reason) A poster up thread said they would explain to OPs DD that the periods might be making them think differently.

This is a brilliant resource to share with your children's schools who may feel uncertain or nervous of what their policy on these issues should/can be legally:

https://twitter.com/sexmattersorg/status/1519717992019410944?s=21&t=XDRDwCe-O5u4NC9nadwcwg

I agree.

I also don't think we should be telling boys that they can identify into girl's spaces. It's doing both the boy and the girls a disservice.

I agree. It's not that I think the trans child is particularly likely to be predatory. But it's not fair to any of them to tell them it's fine for a male person to identify into girls' spaces and the girls should just accept this to be kind, even if they feel uncomfortable getting changed next to someone with a penis. I think we should treat the trans child kindly of course, and many schools seem to be able to find a separate space for them to change in if they wish, which seems a good compromise

Thanks, I appreciate that. I really do.

I come from a standpoint of someone who works in education.

I have never, in a number of years, seen someone transition.

I have known two adult transitioners - incidentally, both F-M.

One of my kid's friends thinks she's "pan-sexual" she's 12 FGS. She's never had sex. It's just what she THINKS she should say to look cool, not be called a bigot.

What on earth are you on about? Where did I mention periods? And what do you mean you disagree with all of the above? Do you disagree with everything everyone else has said on this thread?

What has someone dying got to do with any of this?

Are you saying that you believe that people can be 'born in the wrong body'? You are free to believe that, but you can't compel others to believe.

This is why I hope you don't work in education.

Praise from MN is one thing but you have a professional responsibility.

I don't agree with transition, not at that age.

I just don't object to transgender in principle.

BTW - again, your posts are some of the best I've seen. Can I ask your background?

Yes!

I also don't think we should be telling boys that they can identify into girl's spaces. It's doing both the boy and the girls a disservice.

And the fact that schools are teaching this crap is what is confusing our children so much. They trust and believe what they are taught by teachers, if it's taught as fact, rather than belief. That's fucked up. It's becoming embedded into education, at all levels.

stopwaitingforpermissiontobeyou I think you're saying that we should let people live their lives as they want to, as far as we can. And also that we don't necessarily need to tell someone their comforting belief is "wrong" even if we don't believe in it ourselves (the religion/heaven example).

I agree with you in general on these points and it sounds like you're a kind person.

If teenagers being trans was only about clothes, hair and preferred names, I'd agree with you that we might as well let them get on with it. The problem for me is the link to medical treatment. I'm really worried about teenagers (and very young adults) undergoing irreversible medication and surgery which they may later regret.

So why do you think it wasn’t a “thing” before sexology, artificial hormones and plastic surgery? And, crucially, why do you think “transsexualism” (as opposed to “cross-dressing”), became a thing nearly exactly coexistent with the development and use of antibiotics?

Before antibiotics, any surgery at all was rare, and likely to kill from infection. It’s only in the post-antibiotic era that unnecessary and routine surgeries became possible.

How far would the idea of being “transgender” persist if we could no longer synthesise artificial hormones or perform surgery? With the rise in antibiotic resistance, that might well happen at some future point.

These are perfectly valid and widespread philosophical, psychological, historical and medical fields, and questions that scholars have been writing books on for centuries. You can’t erase these whole domains just by crying “Please don’t! We must not say these things!” People have been saying and writing long books about them for yonks. The questions aren’t going to go away, just because you don’t like them!

What are you going to do, erase vast swathes of library holdings on sociology, psychology, history, medicine, gender and sexuality studies and feminism? (Though this is in fact what some people would like to do!)