Frack's reference post

[FrackOff]

Hi All
I have been asked in various threads for references. I am starting a new thread as I've lost track of all the conversations. I wasn't going to bother as people usually don't want to read them but since one or two have said they really do want to read them with an open mind, here are a few.

Reidar Schei Jessen & Katrina Roen (2019) Balancing in the margins
of gender: exploring psychologists’ meaning-making in their work with gender non- conforming youth seeking puberty suppression, Psychology & Sexuality, 10:2, 119-131, DOI: 10.1080/19419899.2019.1568290

ABSTRACT
The past 15 years have seen the growth of puberty suppression as the prevailing approach to supporting gender non-conforming children and youth. Puberty suppression is considered to provide time for weighing up the pros and cons of medical transition. Research based on binary under- standings of gender has demonstrated that a carefully selected group of gender non-conforming youth benefit from physical treatment and gender transition, but the research that details how psychologists can best support young people during this time is limited. This is the gap addressed by the current research. The purpose of the present study is to explore the meaning-making framework within which some clinical psychologists and gender non-conforming youth approach discussions of puberty suppression. Five semi-structured interviews were conducted with clinical psychologists working with gender non-conforming youth. The data were analysed using thematic analysis. The results indicate that there is pressure on gender non- conforming youth, often coming from families, friends and mass media, to buy into heteronormative and binary discourses regarding gender and what constitutes a good life. The results also indicate that the participants deploy affirmative and exploratory therapeutic strategies in their work, in order to enable gender non-conforming youth to make informed decisions regarding puberty suppression. Participants emphasized the importance of therapeutic approaches that explore non-binary gender discourses, alongside the use of puberty suppression and other medical interventions that enable clients to fit more with gender norms. The therapeutic balance between affirmation and exploration may shed light on how both research within the binary tradition and critics of binary assumptions are in danger of oversimplifying the process of gender identity development. This research highlights the importance of understanding the complex negotiation of gender discourses that are in tension with one another.

I think you're a little confused Frack.

Do you mean a patriarchal surgeon wouldn't care that a boy couldn't have a female orgasm, just the presence of a fake vagina should be enough to make them grateful for a passive sex life as a receptacle?

Because it doesn't really matter who the surgeon is, that's the outcome. There is no other outcome. However feminist or gender critical a surgeon you might be.

I'm assuming someone who is feminist or gender critical wouldn't do the surgery in the first place. But then you're left with someone who has the face and upper body of a woman, and the genitalia of a prepubescent boy. Hardly better.

Frack, I’m not sure quite what you mean here. I’ll repeat Frack’s content warning as I’ve not pasted the whole post.

I had a close friend once who had been sexually abused as a child. She hated her breasts and cut them repeatedly with a razor. In the 90s she heard about the idea of being nonbinary and felt it fit her really well, but it was still very uncommon and stigmatised so she didn't feel she could do anything about it. She has identified all her life as a butch lesbian. Over the years she smoked and drank a lot due to her painful relationship with her body. A big reason for her smoking was to try and get breast cancer so she could have her breasts removed. She used to wish it on herself constantly. She had a lot of psychotherapy and counselling. She now has COPD. I think if there was space for people like her in treatment pathways she might not now be dying of a preventable disease. I'm not saying that would necessarily have involved removing healthy tissue but her gender could at least have been discussed.

Please clarify what you mean here, because you seem to be saying that your friend, a butch lesbian who has severe body issues related to CSA, would have been benefitted by a gender affirming treatment pathway, even though her issues have everything to do with what has been done to her by her abuser and by society, and nothing to do with being born in the wrong body etc, which is what we are lead to believe is the cause of gender dysphoria. you seem to be suggesting that the individual should be treated, rather than addressing the actual root causes of their distress.

Sorry, completely forgot my bold there. Frack’s quote is the second paragraph.

Well we don't know do we, because she never had the chance to talk about her gender

Well we don't know do we, because she never had the chance to talk about her gender

Human beings do not have genders. They have sexes.

The belief in an ineffable essence of gender is a religious one. Are you suggesting that health services should medicate via theocracy? Cos usually, this does not end well.

so frack, you're saying that her hatred of her body was in addition to suffering from child sexual abuse and she would have suffered it anyway, or suffering from child sexual abuse triggered her hatred of her body?

We just don't know.

What I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender. I don't get it. Is it not part of identity or is identity a problematic concept too?

I had a close friend once who had been sexually abused as a child. She hated her breasts and cut them repeatedly with a razor. In the 90s she heard about the idea of being nonbinary and felt it fit her really well, but it was still very uncommon and stigmatised so she didn't feel she could do anything about it. She has identified all her life as a butch lesbian. Over the years she smoked and drank a lot due to her painful relationship with her body. A big reason for her smoking was to try and get breast cancer so she could have her breasts removed. She used to wish it on herself constantly. She had a lot of psychotherapy and counselling. She now has COPD. I think if there was space for people like her in treatment pathways she might not now be dying of a preventable disease. I'm not saying that would necessarily have involved removing healthy tissue but her gender could at least have been discussed.

Was it a man who sexually abused her? It almost always is. Maybe we could stop men doing unspeakable things to young girls. It's a radical thought but it's what radical feminists, who you claim are like "white colonialists", want to stop. Then your friend wouldn't have needed to talk about her gender, because it wouldn't be an issue.

hat I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender.

Because it's based on stereotypes, that girls do things this way and boys to things that way. That games and toys can only be played by one sex. it's total nonsense.

Frac can you explain gender without stereotyping?

What I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender. I don't get it. Is it not part of identity or is identity a problematic concept too?

There are no situations under which it is useful to organise society by sexist stereotypes that virtually no one, other than a handful of trans ideologists, conforms to.

It would make as much sense to divide hospital wards on the basis of who likes canoeing and who plays the violin for example.

What I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender. I don't get it. Is it not part of identity or is identity a problematic concept too.

I'll bite, even though it's pointless because you already know from dozens of posts replying to you hereabouts.

Because you use "gender" as the equivalent of "soul" and it does not exist as you define it. Nobody has an inner essence of man, woman, boy, girl. We reject theocratic notions for the most part here.

Feminists use the word "gender" to refer to a set of structural power relations, in which men (actual men) form the oppressor class and women (actual women) form the oppressed class.

We object to "identity" being the primary factor in social organisation because only those who already possess structural power are able to impose "identity" on others. It's a supremacist concept and the constant misdirection onto "marginalised identities" is sleight of hand to disguise who actually wins and loses. Clue: women aren't doing the winning, including those suffering racialised discrimination.

HTH.

By the way: this is your thread about puberty blockers. Please explain why you are enthusiastic about their use in minors but object to surgeries in adults.

What I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender. I don't get it. Is it not part of identity or is identity a problematic concept too?

My objection to the concept of gender is that 'gender', as I understand it, consists of the social and cultural expectations which are placed on us because of our sex. I have always objected to the implication that because I'm female I should be decorative (dress in pretty clothes, style my hair, wear make up etc) and that I shouldn't be interested in things like maths and science.

Gender is not part of my identity. It has been imposed on me and I reject it. My likes and dislikes have nothing to do with what sex I am.

What I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender. I don't get it. Is it not part of identity or is identity a problematic concept too?

Well, my problem with the concepts of gender identity and gender presentation is that they’re old-fashioned and sexist. They feed into feminine and masculine stereotypes. I know I’m a woman because of my biology but the concepts of identifying / presenting as one make no sense.

I have a very short haircut, I live in jeans & trainers most of the time but also like dresses in summer, I work in tech, I do my own flatpacking & I’m teaching myself to crochet. The idea that having a female body should dictate my hobbies, hairstyle & tastes in clothes - or alternatively, that my hobbies, hairstyle & tastes in clothes should dictate whether I’m a woman or a man - goes straight back to stereotypes from the 1950s & beyond. It’s offensive.

What I'd like someone to explain to me is why people don't like the concept of gender

because if I was pushed to define how feminine gender is defined in society I'd say

• submissive rather than assertive
• prioritises looks
• likes impractical things like high heels and long nails
• inactive rather than active
• controlled rather than controlling

(how would you define feminine gender by the say?)

those stereoptypes get pushed on to us because people assume that woman = feminine

it's what males who insist that they are women because they have a feminine gender do too in fact

is perpetuates harmful stereotypes of women (and men come to that)

My problem with gender Frack is that it has absolutely fuck all to do with who I am. I don’t need a gender to be myself, because I don’t need a box to fit into, or opt out of.If I had a gender then I’d be constantly worrying about how to stay within it, or how to stay out of the gender boxes I hadn’t chosen. Instead I prefer just to do me without having such superficial concerns.

Why do you think gender is a good thing? What do ou think people gain from having a gender identity? Is there a certain benefit to having a gender identity that one wouldn’t get if one doesn’t have one?

maybe you should start by telling us what you understand gender to mean. I understand gender to mean the rules, norms, behaviour and expectations society imposes on us based on which sexed body we have. Do you agree with this description or do you think it’s something else?

Gender is imposed on women and girls through men's violence. It is a social hierarchy that subordinates women to men. Why would anybody except a misogynist support that?

maybe you should start by telling us what you understand gender to mean. I understand gender to mean the rules, norms, behaviour and expectations society imposes on us based on which sexed body we have. Do you agree with this description or do you think it’s something else?

Yes I'd like to hear Frack's answer to this too.

I'd mostly like to hear Frack's answer to why Frack thinks children should be subject to puberty blockade but adults shouldn't be subject to surgery in order to realise their "identity"?

Since Frack, frackself, started this thread to tell us all why puberty blockers are so fandabbydozy.

I'd also like to know why Frack thinks children should be subjected to medical experimentation while adults should be able to enter wrong sex spaces on the basis of nothing more than saying some magic words?

It is a common position amongst trans privilege activists and I've yet to see any who can explain why so maybe Frack can enlighten me.

I’d also like an answer to this question:

If trans people come in all forms, including adult males with beards like Alex Drummond and Muscato, and we are now accepting of these people as trans, why do we need to alter the bodies of children and prevent them from becoming this form of trans?

And to follow up on this: why aren’t all these fully grown adults who are determined for society to accept them as trans just the way they are not completely horrified publicly about what is happening to children? Is this “middle-aged bearded trans erasure”? Where’s the outrage I wonder?

I had a close friend once who had been sexually abused as a child. She hated her breasts and cut them repeatedly with a razor. In the 90s she heard about the idea of being nonbinary and felt it fit her really well, but it was still very uncommon and stigmatised so she didn't feel she could do anything about it. She has identified all her life as a butch lesbian. Over the years she smoked and drank a lot due to her painful relationship with her body. A big reason for her smoking was to try and get breast cancer so she could have her breasts removed. She used to wish it on herself constantly. She had a lot of psychotherapy and counselling. She now has COPD. I think if there was space for people like her in treatment pathways she might not now be dying of a preventable disease. I'm not saying that would necessarily have involved removing healthy tissue but her gender could at least have been discussed.

This makes it sound like you believe that "has been sexually abused" is a gender, which, what? There are two issues in the story you're telling, child sexual abuse and the impact of homophobia on lesbians. Neither are solved by encouraging lesbians (or anyone else) to have their breasts removed. Do you really not see that the fact that anyone would even attempt to frame your friend's situation as meaning there was something wrong with her "gender" is completely ass backwards? Gender does play a role, and that role plays out in that situation in sexual abuse of young girls, often by family members, being endemic and patriarchal beauty ideals making life hell for women in general, and even worse for butch women than is the general case.

None of this means that your friend has a problem with her gender. It means that society does. The abusive treatment meted out to women who don't conform and the related assumption that the problem lies with them and not with society? That is gender.

I echo NotBadConsidering's question:

Why do adult males not need any surgery, cosmetic changes, even clothing choices whilst children are being sterilised with drugs and put on a path to surgery that will remove sexual organs, to be trans?

That's the most important question Frack.

Frack are you seriously suggesting that surgically removing breasts and trying to do your damnedest to disguise yourself as the opposite sex is a solution to men's sexual assaults on women????

Dear god.