Surely their victimhood narrative causes more harm?

I'm late to this discussion but think it's very interesting and have been pondering some of these things for a while.

We seem to be at a point in history where there is a recognition of marginalisation, and the effect this can have on people, alongside an awareness/ destigmatisation of mental ill health which can go hand in hand with the above. This is mainly a good thing but the flip side is that people who perceive themselves as in a marginalised group will interpret their experiences within this framework and appeal to others based on this. I mean, we do this in a way by highlighting the plight of various vulnerable groups of women. It's not until you drill down into the issues that it's clearer who genuinely needs us to "be kind" and who is taking the piss.

I think a comment made by a poster on another thread is pertinent too - that a lot of troubled young people, being "aware of their privilege", maybe feel they need to have some kind of marginalised identity to explain or get sympathy for their distress. (Hope I'm not paraphrasing too wildly!) This may also relate to the high incidence of autism in teens who wish to transition - they do struggle, in a myriad of small but significant ways in everyday life, and appealing for support and understanding based on "being trans" appears to be a lot more successful than doing so on the basis of being boring old (genuinely marginalised) autistic people.

The interesting question is why? Why are so many people quick to support the TRA cause, in comparison to other movements or various appeals for societal support from other groups?
One thing that has always struck me is the way suicide and threats of suicide are taken so seriously in this group. Having had appalling experiences of mental health services (in the 00's) as a traumatised and undiagnosed autistic young woman, whereby talking about suicidal feelings was dismissed as a manipulative tactic, I find it incredible that these people aren't just dismissed as attention-seeking and manipulative (even where there is actually genuine distress and therapy would be helpful). In a way it's the thing that most makes me think they're not actually marginalised! (Perhaps the psychiatric system would be sceptical and dismissive of their distress, and that's why they don't want it classified as a mental health problem.)

It always reminds me of Neitzche's description of the change from a master to a slave morality.

It's like we've moved from a landscape where being brave, taking action, keeping it together, is admired, to one where being passive, being a victim, whining, and having inadequate personality development is admired.

So all these young people coming up are trying their hardest to fit into that mould.

The open letter from the Deptford Women's Project

This? archive.vn/bJCdw. Well worth a read.

The open letter from the Deptford Women's Project throws another beam of light on this, there are many aspects all tied up together. The sentimentalising and fetishising of deprivation. You can see bits of it on many threads across the board at the moment in the discussions of whether some are beginning to cosplay fuel poverty when they have no real concerns about being able to pay bills.

Years ago now, a comedian did a sketch on all this, about 'I wanna go on the train... put my shoes in the pile', in a tone of deprived whining about being excluded from the holocaust. I thought at the time it was extremely distasteful, extreme and unhelpful. However after years of being 'educated' relentlessly by this political movement and its proponents, I think now he probably had a much clearer view of what was going on than many.

Her book is brilliant, but also if you also wanted a good overview, here is a great interview with Helen Joyce from a few years ago, where she sets out very clearly the various problems and issues with gender identity ideology -

as much as I dated = as much as I dared!

When I was a teenager my daydreams were of heroism. I adored revolutionaries, fancied male politicos, idolised militant suffragettes and took part in Women’s Liberation actions (as much as I dated).

When did being a dreary passive-aggressive victim become fashionable?

Thanks for the book recommendation @Helleofabore I shall read it.

Spot on OP. This dramatisation and distortion conjures threats from nuanced debate so it becomes impossible to have a discussion. This needs to stop - the people it harms most are the very kids these TRAs say they support (though I suspect that bit is a feature rather than a bug, to keep them in the cult)

Sorry, maybe it was glitter family. I am not going to check.

Reminds me of that Jeffrey Marsh rainbow family clip.

We do indeed @ApocalipstickNow the mystery is why so many purportedly intelligent, educated, worldly adults point blank refuse to see it. When the inevitable happens and this implodes the damage caused by all this has to, and will be, laid firmly at the feet of every single one of those enabling it.

All it sounds like to me is

“no one else will look after you like I will”
”your family and friends don’t care about you- they want to harm you”
”no one loves you as much as I do”

and we all know where that leads.

I don't really know why they are telling people they are more vulnerable than they are, it doesn't indicate having their best interests at heart.

I live in a "progressive" area, identities are everywhere in the schools, two local characters are men in their 60s walking about in woman's underwear, nobody gets attacked. Still there is a cafe that sells itself as a safe space, windows full of posters about how vulnerable trans people are because... Brazil? How is that helping these kids?

The wanting them dead logic jump is also really weird. I have and know many people with chronic illnesses, for example, universally thrilled when there's a breakthrough in research that might help prevent more people suffering like they do - not once has one of them claimed that trying to prevent epilepsy means that they want epileptics to die, it's just mad.

Have just been thinking similar reading a thread from someone who poked the bear and is now crying that JKR called them out. Didn't she know how much danger she's putting trans people in when she responds to them, yada yada.

When JKR does something like this it's usually to dismiss someone with nuance and humour, but they take her completely seriously. She made some sarcastic remark about how people should not just burn all her work but give back their owls, and the replies are quite seriously raging that JKR thinks she owns all the owls now.

It's like taking candy from a baby. The drama and the ignorance is off the scale. There's no intellectual capacity there at all.

The "Trans" book is a good crash course!

It is the basis for focusing the questions. Because there are so many questions!

Yes and that's why it's encouraged by TRAs. The entire narrative relies on the 'trans child' and suicide ideation is part of it.

Yes - it's not a bug, it's a feature. I can't think of any civil rights movement that emphasises the vulnerability of the group being campaigned for. Gay rights, Black civil rights, feminism - all those campaigns emphasised the strength and determination of those particular groups. Imagine if Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech had been about Black people killing themselves if they didn't get equal civil rights.

So they do it deliberately. It's intended as blackmail. "Give us what we want or we'll kill ourselves." The remarkable thing is that it seems to work.

I see the oppression identifying as such a young person thing. This is a demographic that thrives on melodrama and my generation in the 90s was no different.

However, we all tended to grow up, it's turning into arrested development with all the silly activism and adults that should really know better.

Even "what trans is" has at least two main groups who, when you look at it, contradict each other.
1- people who very strongly wish to be the opposite sex. They may or may not have a "gender identity" but they believe that women have female bodies and men have male bodies, so in order to be seen as the opposite sex, change their appearance or body to facilitate this. They would probably have diagnosed "gender dysphoria".

2- people who believe any gender can be "inside" any body, so women can have male bodies and vice versa. Gender isn't necessarily related to appearance - in fact it's not clear what it IS related to - dated stereotypes are often cited. They don't believe any physical change is required to live as any gender (although like nearly all Western people they probably experiment with dress, etc). Yet it is still of utmost importance that society and law organise themselves around gender divisions, and never by sex.

There are various subgroups - Reddit has a lot of them which often seem to be in opposition.

The "Trans" book is a good crash course!

None of that explains "Why". Just the variety of "Whos".

I am, probably mistakenly, reading here at the same time as watching Ep2 of seried 3 of Pullman.

How Pullman takes the position in RL he does is a mystery.

The Magisterium seeks to take people's souls to enable complete obedience.

What, and where is the magisterium here that would take women's souls?

And who's next?

I really shouldn't conflate two things just because they are happening at the same time.

It helps to keep in mind that trans isn't one thing. The way I see it is there are 3 main groups, people who developed trans identities as children, this looks to be a tiny proportion, young people who develop identity problems around the time they're growing up, and particularly around puberty, and people, the vast proportion being men, who develop a trans identities as adults.

My very short version is that there is no Masterplan. Culture and society is undergoing many disruptions and there are lots of people out there looking to obtain control over others who see ways to exploit these disruptions, and it just turns out that using certain forms of identity politics is very effective in controlling others, with the use of trans identities as being incredibly effective.

Have you read this one zombie?

link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-022-02472-8

It has a section on the suicide narrative too.

Gender-Affirming Treatment of Gender Dysphoria in Youth: A Perfect Storm Environment for the Placebo Effect—The Implications for Research and Clinical Practice

Alison Clayton. 14 November 2022

You wouldn’t have got replies because your question requires a book to answer. There is no quick answer.

i recommend reading Trans by Helen Joyce for the history.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/3145470-Break-it-down-for-me?latest=0

This thread has more information and the later part of the thread has links to studies, articles and significant posts that can help fill in how things have evolved recently.

I would google Foucault and gender theory, and then Denton’s Report (add the word trans probably) to see a document detailing long term progression strategies that have been followed.

Sorry. There is just no easy answer and there are threads and threads of similar questions asked that you could probably find.

I posted it yesterday but got no reply. Can someone please help me understand who is behind this nonsense trans movement and why? Who is manipulating these people? Who is behind stonewall and what do they want? I can make sense of anything and the more I read on the subject the more questions I have.