Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

MRI scan can show if you are transgender. Apparently

126 replies

Guadeloupe · 22/05/2018 18:50

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/05/22/transgender-brain-scans-promised-study-shows-structural-differences/amp/

OP posts:
leyat · 28/05/2018 10:28

Oh I totally get that there's no such thing as a distinct male and female brain, & that there's no basis for innate gender (femininity/masculinity) but I was wondering more about what they are actually measuring here, and why they'd term any of it sex atypical etc. I read what I can but it's no substitute for a biology background...

Ereshkigal · 28/05/2018 10:33

Leyat

From what I've read it's mainly brain structure and amount of grey matter and white matter in certain areas of the brain.

They've also done things with people's responses to scents, which is apparently different based on sex (but also potentially sexual orientation.

Artemis7 · 28/05/2018 11:41

“The problem in my view is that the media popularizes these claims every time they are made without bothering to find out if they are true or not. When the new study they promoted is debunked they aren't interested in having anyone on to talk about it.“

Yes I agree. The problem is evolutionary psychology has become quite popular in psychology in recent years, and the media promotes it, just like they used to do with other dangerous theories. Evolutionary psychology of course, is basically just a revamped version of social darwinism, with much of the focus on trying to explain away males oppression of females, as something natural. They did the same thing with the races, the poor and women in the beginning of the last century, and claimed ‘science’ proved their theories were right. When this is considered in conjunction with the lefts cheering on of the sterilisation of non-conforming children (who usually grow up to be gay) under the banner of progressivism, I am reminded of the eugenics era. In the original eugenics era many on the left as well as the right were keen supporters of eugenics as something progressive. People from the targeted groups were also encouraged to voluntarily agree to be sterilised. The parallels between then and now really are quite striking. I think they are heavily targeting women in this recent incarnation, due to the gains we have made over recent decades, though if they could get away with it I have no doubt they would target other groups as well.

Another part of the problem is researchers get more funding for studies involving fMRI scanning machines, the machines are also quite expensive, so those that have them want researchers to use them as often as possible. This leads to floods of these (often useless) studies involving these machines, not just on this topic, but many others as well. Most people have no idea about this area and so accept everything that is produced as fact. The reason is they get overwhelmed with the jargon and think because something sounds complex, it must be true. Many also don’t understand that there are those that use these fMRI studies to try to justify their own dangerous world view. I am not saying that all fMRI studies are flawed, when they are carried out on topics that do not carry political connotations they can be useful. Such as the studies on taxi drivers brains changing after learning the knowledge and how people with mental health issues brain’s change after therapy. Logically the evidence of brain plasticity alone should be enough for these brain sex type studies to die a death, the reason it is not, is because those with a political agenda are pushing this narrative.

Ereshkigal · 28/05/2018 11:42

Logically the evidence of brain plasticity alone should be enough for these brain sex type studies to die a death, the reason it is not, is because those with a political agenda are pushing this narrative.

YY. Exactly.

GardenGeek · 28/05/2018 11:46

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

GardenGeek · 28/05/2018 11:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

WhyDidIEatThat · 28/05/2018 11:55

Anyone else find this kind of research sinister in a eugenics kind of way?

Bowlofbabelfish · 28/05/2018 14:13

Doesn't this prove transgender people aren't the sex they think they are - because they can distinguish who's transgender.

Their sex isn’t changeable.

What they’ve probably found (and to be honest I don’t think they have found what they think they have but let’s be charitable) is some signal that is either the cause of OR the consequence of the dysphoria. If you found something similar in an anorexic population you’d be asking: is this associated with the cause of the anorexia or is it a consequence of the anorexia? And what does it mean?
What it wouldn’t mean is that the person was fat. And what this doesn’t mean is that the person is another sex (of course, you can’t change sex) or even another gender. You can’t look at a brain and say it’s female - there’s no gender signal in there. There are on average across a large sample sex based differences between male and female brains physically. But again you can’t look at a brain and say it’s Male or female.

A bit like height. If I mention I have a human being who is five foot five in front of me, you might have a better chance of guessing their sexual if you said female. But itd be a guess even though on average men are taller than women.

Short answer: no. Smile

Pratchet · 28/05/2018 16:56

Doesn't this prove transgender people aren't the sex they think they are - because they can distinguish who's transgender

No

leyat · 28/05/2018 17:48

Thanks, much of that is really helpful!

TerfAndSerf · 01/06/2018 03:32

Hold your horses people.

The reporting of the study left out some crucial facts.....

intomore.com/impact/Transgender-Brain-Scan-Headlines-Are-Misleading-Eugenic/6c68f58eb6de4d0c

The small number of subjects (71), no non-binary controls AND the fact that THE ADOLESCENTS WERE ON TRIPTORELIN, which suppresses pituitary functions and leads to CHANGES IN THE BRAIN.

It seems unlikely the authors of the articles actually saw the presentation or read the research, as the study does not show transgender brains are inherently the same as cisgender ones of the same gender. Rather, the researchers suggest that there may be a difference within functional connectivity patterns of the brain among transgender adolescents who were on Triptorelin, a GnRH analog that suppresses puberty, as compared to cisgender adolescents of the same sex assigned at birth.

Uh yeah. You reckon.

Adolescents who have been given a drug which causes changes in their brain structure have different brain structures to those who haven't been given the drug.

And check out the side effects of this shit! 😱

bnf.nice.org.uk/drug/triptorelin.html

huha · 01/06/2018 03:36
Hmm I'll admit I haven't RTFL. But seriously 😳 Transgender is a choice. Not a medically diagnosed "condition".
Kyanite · 01/06/2018 06:05

Is this the one where all they're actually doing is showing that there are similarities between the brains of male homosexuals and women?

Pratchet · 01/06/2018 07:24

That article by a trans'woman' demolished the study.

It followed by 'we want all the hormones and surgery anyway' of course.

EmpressOfSpartacus · 01/06/2018 07:40

Thank you to the scientists on the thread - I'm learning a lot here & appreciate having it all translated!

Surely the last thing the TRAs want is a brain scan that could actually confirm whether somebody's trans, though. It would blow self-ID right out of the window.

thewitchofwentworth · 01/06/2018 07:44

I don't believe they'll ever find a biological reason for transgenderism because one doesn't exist. But it should be noted that TRAs really don't want a biological reason for transgenderism to be found either because that means there would be something to test their claims against.

Note in that intomore article that Eli Erlick that he is disparaging towards 'straight' trans people (i.e. gay men and lesbians who are transitioning) and questions the study because 'non-binary' people aren't included. This gets back to the whole divide been the "trans trenders" who think anyone can be trans if they want to and transsexual who believe you have to have gender disphoria. Erlick is definitely a trender.

His last two paragraphs reveal this. To quote,

"We can expect that if there was a definitive way of telling that someone is transgender, we would be required to do it to obtain necessary medicine. We should not have to go through brain scans to “prove” that we're trans to get hormones or surgery."

Also, note that Eli Erlick is an accused rapist. An ex-partner of his (a trans-identified female) accused him of raping her in a facebook and Tumblr. It didn't reach the mainstream press however, just a couple of right-wing blog sites and his career continues untouched.

jellyfrizz · 01/06/2018 10:02

I was surprised to find myself agreeing with Shon Faye on this:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/may/30/trans-born-this-way-transgender-prejudice-brain

SarahCarer · 01/06/2018 10:18

That is an excellent and persuasive article by Shon Faye, notwithstanding the inference that anyone not actively campaigning for the trans cause is a bigot. Otherwise excellent

Pratchet · 01/06/2018 10:18

Appropriation of homosexuality again. Whether it's innate or not, it adversely affects women's rights.

Note the recent upsurge in conversations about whether homosexuality is innate? Including in MN? Not a coincidence. They want to start a narrative of 'it doesn't matter' and then appropriate it.

SarahCarer · 01/06/2018 10:23

I know I'm a broken record but I would like to see a control group of autistic people in these studies: Since gender identity develops socially and we know that there is a high correlation of autism and GID. I am mystified as to why this is continually overlooked and ignored.

PoulaFisch · 01/06/2018 10:26

jellyfrizz and SarahCarer

Shon Faye generally gets on my tits, but that article made sense. Accepting LGBTQ+ people for who they are, rather than obsessing about why, just seems far more genteel and civilised.

Pratchet · 01/06/2018 11:03

Who they are = male or female not the opposite sex

jellyfrizz · 01/06/2018 11:19

Gender is not sex.

I agree that accepting someone's gender identity does not mean accepting that they are a different sex.

thewitchofwentworth · 01/06/2018 13:54

jellyfrizz and when they start demanding that we seem them as a different sex and that they always were a different sex? Because that is what we are now being asked to accept.

We know that gender is not sex, the problem is that gender is replacing sex so gender is becoming sex.

MrGHardy · 01/06/2018 18:43

"A couple of questions that come to me as someone with the barest scientific knowledge would be: Did they have a control group? How had the trans participants been transitioned for, had they taken hormones? How did they control for the impact of brain plasticity? Further, how can they be sure that the results are due to nature and not a change caused by behaviour?"

I had the same thoughts, but then in the end - so fucking what?

Woman is not a feeling in a brain. Having similar thoughts does not give you the biological and physiological reality that 'woman' entails. Moreover, how do we know this can't change over time (e.g. once you are through puberty your scans suddenly show you are homosexual and not trans). Or what if there is a woman who the scan says thinks like a man but she is female and feels like a woman.