When Exactly did Trans/Non Binary Become So Commonplace?

[miniaturepixieonacid]

This isn't to start (yet another!) debate on the rights and wrongs of gender identification, transitioning etc. Just pondering on how quickly and in what year it became so common.

I'm just watching an old episode of Waterloo Road (Drama set in a comprehensive school) where one of the characters (Casey Barry for anyone who watched it) realises that she wants to be a boy rather than a tomboy and everyone reacts as if it's extremely unusual. The other pupils mock and bully her, her brother gets violent and tells her she is disgusting and a freak and the teachers talk about what a difficult road she has ahead and how much support she will need.

The episode is set in 2013. Not the 1990s. Only just over 10 years ago. But in a Year 10/11 class in a comprehensive in 2024 this wouldn't even raise an eyebrow, would it. There will be several trans and non binary pupils (maybe even several per year group) and pupils would consider it normal.

I teach in a prep school (only goes up to Year 8) so we haven't actually yet had a single pupil transition to the opposite gender. There's one 10 year old who I could potentially see it happening to over the next couple of years but it hasn't yet. So I'm relatively unknowledgable about the whole thing.

Interested to know from secondary school teachers who have been teaching for 10+ years what year you think it was that transitioning and being non binary went from rare to a relatively popular trend.

In the early 2000s there were lots of reports about the presence of chemicals in food plastics which have been linked to changes in sexual differentiation and an increased risk of gender identity disorders. BPA was one such example and the main focus on the news was on the sensationalist term “gender bending chemicals”.
At the time it was predicted society would see a lot more young people presenting with gender dysphoria, and here we are.

My lovely niece is trans. It is who she is and we embrace her identity and love her dearly. However, if endocrine-disrupting chemical (EDC) that can interfere with the body's hormonal system have indeed contributed to her identity now then this is very concerning for us as humans.

You'll have to explain the homophobic bit. It doesn't follow.
And you're not a conspiracy theorist when you notice things that happen which leads to expected outcomes.
Mistaken perhaps - maybe i am?
Can you explain why rates of trans identifying people have risen nearly 5000% in a decade? Taking into account that its

• mostly teen girls (the demographic most prone to hating their body, & psychosocial contagions, even without being in the midst of an unprecedented mental health crisis)

• or adult men (who are over represented in prison stats for sex offences)
• middle age women and older people in general aren't suddenly coming out like men and young people, which you'd expect if it's just stigma falling away

-If it's stigma falling away why the moral panic about transphobia reaching new heights and I've even heard tell of trans genocide -Stigma lessened or genocide underway, which is it?

• Rates have risen in line with social media
• risen in line with mainstream media/ books/ tv/ schools/ charities /teen content without exception pushing it.

I hears a quote one time which went a bit like this
Dress how you please,
Date whatever consenting adult will have you,
But biological see is real

And I will add,biological sex is far more of a discrete category than gender identity. When it comes to policy and law, in the areas of reproduction, physiology and crime patterns, we should privilege material reality, it is measurable and predictable, over subjective feelings.
Trans people live your lives as you wish and be happy. But there are times when sex matters more.

As I say, maybe I'm wrong. Can you explain why?

Well, let’s not lump all autistic people together. I am autistic myself and have no issues comprehending gender identity. My cousin, who is much more severely affected finds it difficult to comprehend most things about the world. As an OT, I find ways to communicate on the level that is appropriate for the individual and, frankly, there are ways in which complex concepts can be explained in an accessible way to all people of all ages and abilities. What isn’t helpful though is when these explanations are tainted by own emotions and views and when subjects become taboo. The problem is not a concept or a phenomena, the problem is ineffective communication.

I'm wondering if we have a child that says they are the devil and wants horns to be attached to their skull, do we consider that normal or a mental health issue?

I think these are all mental health issues and need years of therapy. We are destroying futures.

I think fuelled by rampant homophobia- look at the mum who created Mermaids- better her son was really a daughter and not gay.

Completely agree.

Rampant homophobia and misogyny, that is. Tale as old as time, repackaged for the new century.

So far on this thread:

so we haven't actually yet had a single pupil transition to the opposite gender. No one can change sex. Gender has an ambiguous meaning.

non gendered toilets Mixed-sex toilets

trans and non binary pupils Pupils who feel they are/say they are something that they are not, for myriad reasons

gender dysphoria Dysphoria = unhappiness, gender = too many definitions for the term gender dysphoria to have a universal meaning. Gender dysphoria can therefore mean unhappiness with secondary sex characteristics including genitals or unease with gender stereotypes

Part of the way this took hold was through euphemisms and unclear language that obscures reality. The language is still used even when deconstructing the concepts, which undermines that deconstruction. Use plain and accurate language.

thedankness I thought I was using accurate language. I don't believe it is literally possible to transition to the opposite sex. So I wrote 'transition to the opposite gender'. What would have been the correct thing to say?

i have a trans colleague who transitioned in the late 90s, and quite a few other friends who have also transitioned around the same time, so its not "new", but the increased visibility and numbers are very recent

i worry a bit that we are falling into the same "why are so many people gay now?" discussions that were had in the 70s (after the decriminalisation of homosexuality), because of course increased acceptance and visibility will allow people to be open who wouldn't have had the confidence to come out before. That cant be dismissed.

i also think that if we didnt make such a big deal about it and let people just experiment with their gender expression before we needed to slap a label on it then everyone would be a lot happier. In my experience in secondary schools, lots of kids just want some space to figure stuff out. This rush to label any kind of gender fluidity or questioning is doing no one any good.

Perhaps some people have felt uncomfortable with societal stereotypes.

It’s always felt like something agenda-linked, to me.

It arrived out of nowhere. I don’t know any trans folk.

Also wary of high-profile trans, like Caitlyn Jenner…

Also, I don’t claim to be right. It’s just what I think.

@miniaturepixieonacid I think it's a minefield tbh because people use the word gender to mean different things eg. as a synonym for sex (because sex is considered a rude word), someone's inner feeling and awareness of their sex/the sex that they are not, their presentation of themselves in accordance with secondary sexual characteristics and/or sex stereotypes of clothing, hair, makeup etc.

To answer your question, maybe "pupils who hold the belief they are the opposite sex", "pupils who claim to be the opposite sex", "pupils who want to change their name despite not having officially done so via deed poll", "pupils who change their appearance to conform with the norms of the opposite sex", "pupils who are taking drugs to prevent puberty from occurring" as suggestions off the top of my head?? Wordy but also more descriptive of reality. I don't think colluding in terms that cannot be defined or the desired redefinition of words (eg. woman!) is helpful.

People had far too much time on their hands during lockdown. The works got a bit weird since then I feel.

Boys Don't Cry came out in 1999 with Hilary Swank. This was based on the true story or a trans boy and his girlfriend who were murdered.
He was also raped by a group of men in town.

These aren't new issues, and yes kids and teens were bullied for it in 2015.

Yes, people used to not know any gay people either and suddenly people said it was trendy to be gay.

It's less hidden now. I feel as an openly bisexual woman who was scared to come out for the fear of judgement, that being yourself is really freeing, i don't care what gender you feel you are, whether it's the same as your assigned gender, different or you feel both, as long as you're happy, who the fuck cares?

Minding my own business, keeping in my own lane and letting people live however they want (as long as it's legal and not hurting anyone).

Let's just hope that as few autistic same-sex attracted female teens as possible get irreversibly damaged in the mean time.

Is it more common or do people just wake up and their first thought is 'now how can I find a way to talk about the topic at least 20 times a day'

Thinking back, when I was at uni I was vaguely aware of Cardiff Uni 'no platforming' Germaine Greer. I did sociology at A level so I'd heard of her, and Cardiff wasn't far away from where I studied, otherwise I wouldn't have even noticed that anything was going on. I had no idea what their objection to her was at the time, but the concept of "no-platforming" was newsworthy back then and I was disturbed by the trend.

This stuff definitely was no where near my former school at the time, and no mention at my own university, but clearly there were some noisy organised activists at Cardiff. I believe that this was around 2014/15.

Anyone had any bags arrive this week they'd like to swap?

It's the new version of the ~2010's pro ana (anorexia) or emo fads.

In my youth in the 1980s, the term "transgender" was unknown. There were "transsexuals" - people with body dysphoria who took hormones and underwent cosmetic bodily modifications (so-called "sex change") - but they were very rare.

More common were "transvestites" - non-dysphoric heterosexual males with a cross-dressing fetish. It's clear that many of the men now identifying as "transgender" are in this category.

As for women, female transsexuals were even more rare than the males. There was nothing at all like today's epidemic of young girls deciding to "identify as boys".

Coming out as gay or bisexual doesn't involve being chemically sterilised or having breasts/ genitals removed. What is happening to children now is appalling.
Read "Time to Think" by Hannah Barnes. Or the Cass Review, or "Trans" by Helen Joyce.

I do wonder if it's a result of the LGBTQ+ community being so huge and easily accessible with online allies available now combined with bullying. At the risk of sounding awful, a lot of people in the non-binary bracket were/are picked on at school etc (studies have shown) so this is a safe space for them I guess. I work with a team of around 10 and almost half are trans or non-binary. They also believe the community has a link to autism which I'm really not sure about if I'm honest but they have diagnosed themselves accordingly and say this!