Do phalloplasties actually work?

[SilverTapz]

After wondering about this for a while, I ended up searching phalloplasty online and ended up on a Reddit page where people post their progress. I had never seen one before an was curious, I guess. It was actually quite shocking. People with what looks like no muscle left on their forearms, someone with a necrotic 'scrotum', someone where the stitches were wide open and the tip has turned black and left a gaping hole etc etc. People seem to be commenting saying that they look great, they've made the right decision etc, but honestly they look absolutely butchered. It's scary. And I guess my question is, do they actually function? Some of these people are so young and it's scary what they've done to their bodies. I can't help but think a lot of them will regret the decision. Is it mainly cosmetic? Can they orgasm? Honestly just very shocked by what I've seen!

Your first paragraph is a very good point, thank you. I still think it would be unfortunate if OP only asks these questions here, as it's not going to give her a range of views. But I do take your point about not invading trans people's space.

I asked the question because I was genuinely curious about the answer. OP might well have come back and said "actually I've also asked in X Y and Z spaces to get a range of views". Or she might have come back and said "I think phalloplasty is awful and actually what I wanted to do was talk about it in a place where I suspect my concerns will be shared". Both valid responses.

Yes. It occurred to me earlier - have some of these girls even seen a real penis?

They can discuss it. But I think it would be horrifying if someone was asking specific questions about the experience of having an abortion to a forum of people who a) have never had an abortion and b) are likely to be hostile to those who have, and expecting accurate answers. Surely most women would find that idea abhorrent?

Exactly, who knows?

If a man wanted to ask question of other men about abortion then I have no issue with that. Why do you think men will be hostile to those who have had abortions? Many men are quite pleased that it provides a way for them to avoid an unplanned child.

I think men should talk about abortion, looking at the abortion bans in the U.S. we certainly heard from lots of men who seemed to have little factual knowledge of what was medically possible, or necessary or dangerous to the health of the mother.

If we start from everyone having a solid grounding in medical facts then it’s a much easier discussion.

That just made my blood run cold

If a man wanted to get an answer to questions like "Do women regret abortions? Can they still have babies after an abortion? How long after an abortion can women have sex again?" you would be happy for them to ask a form of men and not involve any women? Really?

And obviously lots of men are pro-choice. But in this specific example, I'm comparing said forum of men to Mumsnet which is notoriously gender critical. So in the example, the form would be known for being anti-abortion.

I agree. But the best place to get "a solid grounding in medical facts" about abortion would not be a forum for men which is notably anti-abortion, just like the best place to get medical facts about phalloplasty is unlikely to be Mumsnet.

Maybe men discussing womb transplants would be a better analogy.

I’ve explained that’s not possible though.

A trans forum is heavily policed and no one is able to speak freely and detrans forums don’t exist.

This is in no alway equivalent to men talking about abortion!

Try and see it as more women with some life experience, some with medical experience and a few transmen (you seem to have ignored missed the trans person on the thread?) discussing the blatant exploitation of young women with mental health issues and see if that helps your aversion to this thread?

Thanks for helping it stay bumped though.

Not so long ago, people undergoing extreme cosmetic surgeries in order to create a facsimile of the body of the opposite sex, had to sign forms to make it clear that they understood that the operation in no way changed their sex. They would always remain the sex they were born. Now many of these young people genuinely believe they can change sex and that these surgeries are somehow getting them closer to the point that they ‘become’ the opposite sex. Not really surprising when they have had this drummed into them since school and my TRA and TikTok.

Just highlighting another manipulative tactic of the activists.

.....stopping trans people from existing....

The language suggests that anyone questioning gender ideology is motivated by bigoted attitudes which lead to genocidal intentions. It's deliberate. You wouldn't want to have something in common with the Nazis, would you?

It's manipulative and childish. Questioning whether radical body modification, which creates lifelong medical patients, is the most effective treatment for the mental health condition gender dysphoria does not make you an advocate for genocide and you should not take anyone who uses this argument seriously.

Detrans forums do exist. There's three on Reddit alone.

I agree that no one place is likely to get you a fully unbiased range of answers. But asking actual trans people who have undergone phalloplasty – whether they regret it or not – WILL get you more accurate answers than asking on Mumsnet.

I believe qualified medical professionals do look at Internet forums sometimes. People go on websites to argue (and attempt to police) people they disagree with all the time.

There are a few, assuming they are telling the truth about who they are

You’re just repeating the same thing over and over again and I have already responded, it’s getting boring.

Anyway, I have made my point and – despite what some on the thread seem to think – I genuinely had no intention of derailing any thread, so I will bow out now. But OP, if you are genuinely interested in the answers to your specific questions, I urge you to also ask them on forums for trans men, and women who formally identified as trans men but have now detransitioned, where you're more likely to get accurate answers.

You mean, are doctors making money out of selling these meds and procedures? Sometimes by circumnavigating the law by offshoring their company, and using loopholes in EU law to provide drugs to children, etc?

They understand it just fine, they’re just wilfully misunderstanding because the actual horror and barbarity of what they advocate for is too much for them to accept. They use false equivalence, it’s common amongst this community.

Well, as pp suggested, I went and had a look on the reddit detrans thread. It's very, very sad. I hope the young people there get the support they clearly need.

This post (I don't want to link it so as to protect the privacy of the person making it) may be informative for the poster claiming that 'of course' trans people are aware of the risks:

'I need help I’m desperate, I was Ftm for 4 years and I used T for 3 and a half years. I had a hysterectomy and ovariectomy 3 months ago and I’m so sick, I feel desperate. No one had informed me well of everything that involved removing the uterus and ovaries. I want to detransfer. I’m so sick. Have any of you had experiences of detransition after hysterectomy and ovariectomy? I’m only 22 years old and I’m so sick. I was so traumatized by removing the uterus and ovaries that I woke up from past traumas and realized I was in a real nightmare. It was nothing real. My psychologist had given me in a single session of time and in 15 minutes of time the documentation to be able to access testosterone, I had recently turned 18 years old, despite knowing that I had a diagnosis of Borderline personality disorder for years and I had had a very difficult adolescence, with an attempted suicide and substance abuse. I was 16 years old at the time of abuse and before that moment I had never thought I wanted to be FTM. Then I met a trans friend right at a time when I was very sick and that seemed to me the only solution to be fine, I wanted to be saved from all that. I felt my beauty as a condemnation and finally I destroyed my body. I hate myself so much for this. I have been in therapy with a psychologist for 3 months and unfortunately we realized that my past traumas such as abuse and more had convinced me of all this and of being FTM because I simply hated my body for what had happened to me and for the attention they reserved for me. I didn’t want to exist anymore, but I was so beautiful and I loved myself. I thought that in that way men would stop reserving those things for me, so that I could be safe.'

Another one:

'I’ve been in a whirlwind since having bottom surgery last year. I transitioned at 14, and I always felt like I was just following the next appropriate stage in my transition. And I always felt so much happier and closer to what I thought was my authentic self. And bottom surgery has snapped me out of it. Im realizing that I was an ultra tomboy, sure, and I definitely thought I was a boy as a kid, but now I’m adult with my whole life ahead of me and I’m mourning not having normal genitals anymore. And I’m mourning not even really having a girl childhood. '

‘Stopping trans people from existing’ a very well used falsehood on the TRA bingo card. The childishness of their responses only serves to reinforce that they are not sufficiently informed to be able to consent to this horrific surgery.

’Give me what I want or I’ll kill myself’, ‘by not giving me what I want you obviously don’t want me to exist’, ‘refusing my demands is literal genocide’ these people are mentally unwell, how many more examples of it do we need?

You need to read OPs post - she came here after being horrified by what she saw on a forum for trans who had had this procedure.

“Lived experience” is a very partial filter, as we know very well. Objective scrutiny is less likely to be biased than subjective. One thing about these boards is the very thorough way research is carried out and shared. We have indeed educated ourselves.