To not understand how this means a man can get a female passport?

[Brla]

A close friend of DH recently came out as trans. He’s had surgery abroad (FFS I think it’s called) and has set up an Instagram account with videos of the process and many, many, many outfits and make up videos. He has two sons and was married for 14 years before this.

I don’t really have an opinion as such on being trans. I think it’s likely that it’s a genuine feeling that I just can’t understand as I haven’t experienced it and don’t think it’s necessarily just a mental illness.

I don’t understand though that this person has not had his genitals removed or changed (not sure how you would express it) and yet has still got a new passport now saying F. Am I being thick for being unable to get my head around this? He still has a penis so surely that means he is male? How can he have had a passport issued as female?! Do you literally just need to apply and say you’re now presenting as female?

Isn't that the same 'knowledge' that tells anorexic people that they're too fat? or people with body dysmorphia that they're too ugly? Or someone with paranoid schizophrenia that everyone is out to get them?

The brain can play an awful lot of tricks on people. It can make people 'know' all sorts of things that just aren't true.

I've experienced it myself, I've had psychosomatic symptoms. I felt like I had something stuck in my throat. I completely believed I had something stuck in my throat. In fact, I knew I had something stuck in my throat. I felt it as much as anyone feels any physical symptoms of any illness. However I didn't actually have anything stuck in my throat, I just felt and believed that I did.

Why do you think that men 'knowing' they are women is any different to any other condition where people believe they 'know' something that just patently isn't true? How are you able to completely rule that out as a possible explanation for why some people are trans?

I find your ideas and comments about trans experience offensive yes.

Which comments? That's it's a mental health issue? That's it's a belief and not based in reality? That we should fix the mind and not alter the body for a mental health issue?

By describing themselves as being a ‘woman’ or as a ‘female’ as a male person, or vice versa, they are indeed denying the reality of their bodies.

You do realise this is just your opinion if what it is, right? You're not explaining anything to us, you're just guessing at how people feel.

again - there’s nothing inherently wrong or harmful about being trans.

Comparing it to anorexia or psychosis just isn’t appropriate.

I find yours offensive. Guess none of the offence matters 🤷‍♀️

It’s not my opinion of what it is though. Honestly . I am trying to explain what trans experience is. That’s all. I’m not the author of it. Trans experience is real and I’m just describing it for you as best I can, as it’s something that I happen to know a lot about and its very poorly misunderstood.

Read trans accounts. It’s not about “wanting” to be the opposite sex.its really much more fundamental than that.

because we just can’t imagine what that experience is like or what it means,

We can’t know exactly what that feels like to feel you are the opposite sex, as we haven’t experienced if.

Just as trans-identified males can’t imagine what it feels like to be a woman. Because they’ve never been one. At best, they can only imagine what it feels like, but this is a construct of their own.

You know alot but can't explain any of it. Wonderful.

ok,
trans people don't feel like their actual sex but they are their sex. They can't change sex.

The language you are using such as sex being observed or assigned is misleading. The reason it's observed is because there are two sexes and many years ago it was a very safe way to determine sex, the visible differences at birth. Now of course we can test for X Y chromosomes, which helps with rare babies with DSD's.

Men and women can't change sex.

But they are not imagining what it feels like to be a woman. That’s not what it is- it’s an unconscious/ subconscious understanding, recognition, apprehension of self as female.

Yes, the experience of someone who identifies as trans is as real as anyone else's experience.

But men aren't women and so they can't know that they are. At best it's a sincerely held but erroneous belief.

People don’t “identify as trans*, people just are trans.

You are not the author of the trans experience. Okay fine.
Equally, men aren't the author of the female experience. And so they cannot claim it as their own.
Why is it different?

Well the diagnosis is gender dysphoria. That would hold not matter how many gender identities exist.

Trans people aren’t claiming authorship of your experience, they really aren’t.

No it isn't. You can't have an understanding of yourself as female when you're a male. You just can't.
I can t have recognition of myself as a cat, because I'm a human. I am not cat. I do not know how a cat feels. I can only guess.

You. Are. Making. This. All. Up.

How do you know if you aren't trans yourself?

No it isn't. You can't have an understanding of yourself as female when you're a male. You just can't.

But they do. This is what it is to be trans. I understand it sounds mad to you because
you can’t relate to this experience. But this is honestly what it is- what it means to be trans.

Because I know what being trans is and that’s not what it is.

And never does @Lostcat explain why someone's internal gender should mean they can access a facility or sport that is segregated on sex. Not gender, sex.

It doesn't matter what you, Lostcat, think about transgender people, or what they believe or we believe or you believe, someone's gender is irrelevant when it comes to sex classification.

So the sex on a passport or any documentation should not state someone's gender and sex segregated means that, only for women, female people, or only for men, male people.

Do you, lostcat, have any problem with sex segregation?

lol sorry I read your post wrong.

you don’t have to be something yourself to understand and know about it. It’s a subject I know a lot about. If you don’t believe me , go read some trans memoirs/ histories- go talk to some trans people- you’ll see my descriptors match.

But how do you really know? If you're not trans? Assuming you're not.

An unconscious, subconscious understanding of the self as female. From someone who is manifestly not female. 🤯

I mean, god help us all

I mean, god help us all

why? Are you afraid of trans people?