Confused about Trans and NonBinary

[CactusMactus]

I am going to get terminologies wrong here... soz in advance.
Friends gown up daughter-at-birth has recently had top surgery to become trans. She has used pronouns 'they/them' for a while and continues to consider themselves non-binary.
I don't understand how that works. Surely if you are trans you have changed from she/her to he/him not she/her to they/them.
Does one transition to non-binary?
Genuin question...

No Mumsnet is a hotbed of reality and biological sense.

It's very hard to watch healthy young women opting for radical body modifications in the pursuit of self realisation. But, if they are adults we should respect their choices. They may never regret those choices and if they do, they will be the voices that influence the direction of travel of this type of intervention. I know this view is not unilaterally shared but very few opinions on this matter are.

I don't think I can agree with you on this.

Where does it end? If I have BID (Body Integrity disorder) I be able to have a limb removed as an adult so that my body matches my identity as an adult? Would it be ethical for a surgeon to remove a limb?

It's no different really.

I don't think it is ethical for radical surgeries to take place at all for identity issues.

I don't think it is ethical for radical surgeries to take place at all for identity issues.

I agree @lifeturnsonadime. And there was a surgeon in Scotland who was prepared to remove limbs from people who had BID and performed two such operations before the hospital where he worked withdrew permission for any further surgeries.

Non binary means that you are person who believes that human sex is binary i.e. male and female. This is the GC view and also the view of 99% of the world population.

People who are transgender believe that sex (which they call gender) is on a spectrum which can be chosen at whim on any given day without any physical or medical change to a person's body.

Non binary and transgender are indeed different.

Non binary is not a medical condition. Having breasts removed for cosmetic reasons is a personal choice but does not affect your sex. You will still be perceived by 99% of the world's population as female.

It's a drastic irreversible procedure which gains nothing. The poor young woman is very confused and will no doubt regret this when she reaches mature adulthood.

Yep, worst possible place to ask. You have to be anti-trans and have to believe trans people are an existential threat to cis women otherwise you’re silenced, you need to look to the voices of the trans and non-binary communities if you genuinely want to understand.

Some of my lovely new stickers 😍

Where would you go for reasoned discussion of these issues then? (This is an issue I have been avoiding getting clarity about for too long)

Yes I'm sure you will be "silenced" any second now...

I was [arguably] silenced by the Guardian - being banned for life from commenting there for expressing GC views too often. You are highly unlikely to have that experience here.

otherwise you’re silenced

Silenced? Thrown off the site? Deleted? Or just disagreed with? The fact is that most people who support the trans political agenda don't have the facts, or they've read unreliable TRA propaganda which is easily refuted by the women here, much more than in other online spaces where people are truly "silenced" for their views.

You are not "silenced", you just don't like to be corrected.

What I don't understand is the need for everyone to know.
Who cares if someone is non-binary - why don't they just get on with their life with whoever/whatever it is they want sex with - just do it - don't tell everyone. I don't care - nor does the rest of society.

Just call them by their name if you think you might say the wrong pronouns. It will sometimes happen so don't worry too much. On the subject of 'top surgery'..If someone is over 18 and decides to have surgery that's up to them. My cousin had this done about a year after coming out as a trans-man. He used to cry all the time as a young (female) teen about her breasts, how uncomfortable she felt, how big they were. She wouldn't go swimming or anything. It made sense when s/he came out as he later down the line. He's in his mid 20s now and much happier as a trans-man without female breasts.

The issue wasn't about getting the pronouns right (I have no chance of that). It was genuinely I didn't think one could be Trans AND non-binary.

Like being a vegan and a pescatarian.

Surely we should be working on removing gender stereotypes or "shackles" rather than cutting bits off bodies to fit into them.

Yes, this.

The day there's the same number of balls removed as breasts is the day I believe this isn't the most misogynist ideology.

Non binary comes under the "Trans Umbrella" because they don't consider themselves to be "Cis"

It's all a load of self absorbed attention seeking wank tbh.

Yes OP, you are right. They are of course very different.

The problem is that the 'trans' umbrella puts all of this under one big group which, incidentally, includes MAP (minor attracted persons more commonly referred to as paedophiles) and people with fetishes. It's so broad an umbrella it includes every kink and condition under the sun. Stonewall calls it 'acceptance without exception'.

A brief Google (throwing up only trans affirming results, natch, so no accusations of anti trans bias) tells me top surgery removes 93 - 95% percent of breast tissue.

I'm not convinced that 5 - 7% remaining tissue is quite enough to stop me using the term mastectomy.

Especially when brief googling won't reveal the truth about how many trans people live with unwanted side effects and debilitating pain after surgery.

Side note - I really wish more people would be more curious about the way big tech buries some information, but acts as if easy access to dehumanising and rapey porn is just the natural order of things.

“otherwise you’re silenced”
and yet here you are.

Sexual orientation between adults/peers I don’t care about, except in so far as people are discriminated against because of it. I have been politically active in this way for decades.

I’m seeking more clarity on trans issues and women’s rights as there are two oppressed groups here and there are apparently live issues re single spaces eg prisons. It is also coming up at work. The noise, vitriol and cancelling has made me
a) despair b) stay out of it and c) worry about the intersection of women’s oppression, adolescence and treatment.

Can you please post a link to this 'Umbrella' that includes MAPS? I have never seen that (and its appalling if so).

From a reputable source please.

No I'm not going to silence you, I'm up for a chat. Please explain how young women getting radical surgeries to make their bodies look less female is any different from a person having a limb removed because they identify as being a disabled person?

Or do you think both are OK?

I don't think that either of these things are a threat to me as a woman but I do worry about the message our young women are given by trans ideology and I worry about the rise in young women mutilating themselves because they want to disassociate with being female, don't you?

Generally interested in how we draw the line in terms of body modifications?

Breat implants? Bum implants?

Kylie Jenner looks utterly different to how she did as a teen. (And she also said she now regrets some of her surgery as she had it so young).

Its an interesting discussion. Not sure why its swinging to such an extreme example such as limb removal?

Does anyone else remember a segment from This Morning well over a decade ago now where a woman had blinded herself because she felt as though she was meant to have been born blind?
I can't find the clip from This Morning but I can find clips from US shows - I also seem to remember one about a lass who wanted (It was either an arm or a leg I think?) a limb removed because she just felt "wrong" having that limb.

Woman blinded herself - The desire to be blind started at age 6; s

Another woman who wants to be paralyzed; y

I couldn't agree more.
But society seems to be traveling in the opposite direction at the moment.
I suspect this period of surgery and hormonal treatment will be looked back on in amazement in years to come. But unfortunately I don't think a lot of people are ready to hear that yet. There's an incredibly persuasive doctrine that is supporting this.
I think it's a toxic combination of self autonomy (your body your choice) wedded to very strict ideas of identity.
I think it's curious that NB women are driven/encouraged to diminish physical feminity and NB men get off lightly in comparison. I do find it strange that the rejection of the binary still looks a lot like conforming to male hierarchy. Saying that - most of the NB teenage girls I know (DD is a teen) are pretty much indistinguishable from their (female) peers, so maybe (hopefully) it's going to be a diminishing pattern to physically alter the appearance.

I think there is a difference between identifying as something you are not. This is where there is a link between radical surgeries due to trans ideology and BID (removing limbs) which isn't the same for other plastic surgeries.

To be honest I'm not keen on any but there is a difference when it comes to wanting surgery to resemble something you are not or surgeries to change other aspects of your appearance.