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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

What broader issues has the trans (lack of) debate opened your eyes to?

510 replies

FredFlintstonesTunic · 30/04/2020 11:49

For me, it's really exposed how large media platforms (i.e., a few very rich and powerful people) can shape public perceptions (e.g., by blocking, shaming, nudging and belittling certain ideas and/or people, and promoting others).

I'm no longer so quick to dismiss other people's unusual opinions, or to label them "conspiracists" without looking as openly as possible into what they're talking about (including from sources associated with intelligent people not necessarily in the mainstream media). I don't trust Wikipedia (or Urban Dictionary) without question (which I shouldn't have anyway, but...). I have more respect for people who are willing to say unpopular things (e.g., left-wingers who don't like the EU). In general, I'm far more likely to take news stories with a pinch of salt.

Anyone else?

OP posts:
ScreamingBeans · 16/05/2020 17:05

The discovery that even people who in many respects are decent, honourable people, but will dishonourably repeat slurs and lies, has been a bit of a shock.

Maybe I'm naive, but I've been genuinely shocked by how dishonest and disingenuous people whose work I admire and who are decent, reasonable people in many respects, are prepared to be either for their own egos or their own ideology, or their own careers or organisations or whatever it may be. Even feminists.

It's made me reassess everything really,

ScreamingBeans · 16/05/2020 17:09

That thing about the purple triangles is so much part of this. So much.

bd67thSaysReinstateLangCleg · 16/05/2020 18:50

fall for the government's smears of Assange hook, line and sinker.

Two women accused Assange of acts meeting the criminal definition of rape. I believe those women. I have paid no heed to what govts have said about him.

Goosefoot · 16/05/2020 20:31

Twitter comment by Ray Blanchard linked previously

Why have you quoted me here? Is there something that I am supposed to be inferring from these links?

TehBewilderness · 16/05/2020 22:18

My view: Transsexuals have a mental disorder whose discomfort is ameliorated when society and individuals indulge them with reasonable compromises. This is a traditional psychiatric view although it is rarely stated that bluntly."

Oddly enough this so called traditional psychiatric view does not apply to compromise with any other body dysmorphic disorders.
Are there psychiatrists or psychologists who advocate for compromise with those who are anorexic, or want their limbs removed?

TehBewilderness · 16/05/2020 22:22

So, a shopping list is preferable to an interesting and involved discussion?

It is possible that people do not find your bloviating on Jungian archetypes as fascinating as a shopping list.

R0wantrees · 16/05/2020 23:02

Are there psychiatrists or psychologists who advocate for compromise with those who are anorexic, or want their limbs removed?

There was an overlap with Russell Reid in UK
Reid supported the amputation of healthy limbs. After a couple of publicised operations, this was ruled unethical in the UK.
Later Reid faced disciplinary measures for unethical practice.
During this he was supported by TRAs.

Wiki
(extract)
"In 2006-2007, Reid was investigated by the General Medical Council (GMC), the regulatory body for doctors in the UK. A serious professional misconduct hearing opened following complaints brought by four doctors from the main NHS Gender Identity Clinic at Charing Cross hospital, west London, and some of his former patients. It is alleged that he breached international standards of care, set by the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association (HBIGDA) by inappropriately prescribing cross-gender hormones to patients and referring them for sex reassignment surgery without adequate assessment.

Britain's primary lobbying organization for transgender and transsexual people, Press for Change, was quoted as saying that Reid received support during the process from more than 150 patients as well as additional experts in the area. Ultimately, the enquiry found Reid guilty of Serious Professional Misconduct, mostly for failing to communicate fully with patients GPs and not documenting his reasons for departing from the HBIGDA Standards of Care guidelines sufficiently. However, the panel "determined that it would be in the public interest as well as your own interests if you were to return to practice under strict conditions." and allowed him to return to practice, subject to some restrictions on his practice and hormone prescriptions for the next 12 months.

Reid was a member of an expert committee set up by the Royal College of Psychiatrists to draw up new UK care guidelines on the treatment of Gender identity disorder. " (coninues)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Reid

2007 Guardian by Julie Bindel
(extract)
"If I had been properly assessed, it would have been obvious that sex-change surgery was inappropriate for me," says Claudia. "I was desperately unhappy and was going for a sex change because I felt under pressure from my boyfriend." No searching questions were asked about her background and no warning or preparation were given as to the impact of such life-changing surgery. That surgery took place just three months after her consultation with Reid.

Since the case against Reid began, many in the transsexual community have spoken in support of him. Websites serving the gay and transgender communities are full of comments about how Reid has shown phenomenal support to numerous transsexuals. He "has saved the lives of many trans people, treated them with respect and left them with the dignity they deserve," reads one post. Many others wrote in, agreeing." (continues)
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2007/may/23/healthandwellbeing.health

2003 Sunday Telegraph by Juie Bindel
(extract)
"Today the best-known psychiatrist dealing with transsexualism is Dr Russell Reid, who runs a private practice as well as working in the NHS. In 2000 Reid was involved in controversy over the condition known as Body Dysmorphic Disorder (BDD), where sufferers can experience a desperate urge to rid themselves of a limb. Reid was one of the psychiatrists who referred two patients with BDD to a surgeon for leg amputations. ‘When I first heard of people wanting amputations it seemed bizarre in the extreme,’ he said in a television documentary at the time, ‘but then I thought, "I see transsexuals and they want healthy parts of their body removed in order to adjust to their idealised body image," and so I think that was the connection for me. I saw that people wanted to have their limbs off with equally as much degree of obsession and need.’

But to what degree should doctors be acquiescent to the ‘obsessions’ and ‘needs’ of patients; should there be a point at which they are duty-bound to say no? I asked Dr Reid how he decides on the suitability of surgery for a GID sufferer. ‘The patient makes their own diagnosis, and I confirm or refute it. If I am happy that they are serious about considering surgery in the future, I will prescribe hormones and expect them to live as a woman (or a man, if it is a female-to-male patient) for at least a year. If, after that time, they are mentally stable, living a reasonable and public life and functioning as a whole human being, and if the hormones have been effective, I would consider them worthy of surgery." (continues)
archive.li/1bcWN#selection-287.0-295.716

Justhadathought · 17/05/2020 10:25

It is possible that people do not find your bloviating on Jungian archetypes as fascinating as a shopping list

I'm sure...So discuss what interests you, and leave others to discuss what interests them. Personally, I find your attempts at pithy, pointed put-downs pretty boring; even though you seem to rate them quite highly, yourself.

Justhadathought · 17/05/2020 10:46

I'm not sure why but Prisoner Cell Block H keeps coming to mind.

Floisme · 17/05/2020 11:11

I was quite enjoying the Jungian discussion. I know why there is suspicion of digression on these boards but there were several posters involved in the exchange and I thought it was one of the more interesting diversions, even if most of it went right over my head. Mind you I had to look up bloviating too.

NonnyMouse1337 · 17/05/2020 11:23

I found the Jungian discussion interesting as well. It's not an area I'm familiar with beyond the sort of references in popular culture, so it was enlightening reading several posters describe and critique the anima/animus, the concept of archetypes and so on. By coincidence I started watching a series of videos on the same topic a few weeks ago, so found the exchanges on this thread an interesting diversion.

Melroses · 17/05/2020 12:01

I thought it was one of the more interesting diversions, even if most of it went right over my head

It went totally over my head and I switched off. Sorry.

R0wantrees · 17/05/2020 14:39

I'm not sure why but Prisoner Cell Block H keeps coming to mind.

Confirmation bias?

TyroSaysMeow · 17/05/2020 14:41

Another broader issue this whole shebang has highlighted for me:

Women are never permitted to hide.

Back in the nineties, one thing that was really fucking liberating about the internet was that everyone on there treated one like a human being instead of shit on their shoe a woman.

There were no bodies involved, no one had a webcam, all you knew of the other person was the words they chose to put on the screen. So the dickheads didn't know who to be shits to.

We could hide our sex, and just be people.

This whole pronouns in email signatures bollocks is reversing that, and all I can think is: anyone who thinks insisting women should reveal their sex on the internet is a good, right-on, fair idea, has clearly never run a live compare&contrast on being a woman on the internet versus being sex-unknown on the internet.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 14:48

Yeah, anyone who insists that you tell them who you are on the internet is either clueless or up to no good.

TyroSaysMeow · 17/05/2020 15:21

I like to be charitable and assume the majority are just clueless.

The daft part was, back then, if I did make my sex known, people used to accuse me of lying. Apparently "fifteen year old girls don't talk like that." I used to get ever so narked about it. Neither my age nor my sex disqualifies me from speaking in complete sentences with accurate spelling, punctuation and grammar, ffs.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 15:33

Ah, the "there are no girls on the internet" period.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 15:35

To be more serious, different women have different risk profiles and risk tolerances. Some are open about their identity because they don't have much to lose, others absolutely are not because they would lose their job or they have a stalker, and then there are a bunch of women in the middle who's under their own name in some spaces and not in others or who just happened to pick a screename they liked and then used it everywhere. Expecting everyone else to do whatever you happen to feel is right for you is unreasonable.

TyroSaysMeow · 17/05/2020 16:01

Oh no, these people definitely believed there were girls on the internet - and I say girls rather than women quite deliberately. They just assumed, from my writing style, that I was one of them rather than a girl.

It was a few years before I stopped to wonder why men in their forties were so keen to talk to underage girls on the internet. Do we have a emoticon yet?

It was a damned sight easier in those days, if pressed, to claim to be male. Which makes me one hell of a hipster in the trans debate, because we're talking twenty-plus years ago here.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 16:04

I've been asking for a vomiting emoticon for a while!

TyroSaysMeow · 17/05/2020 17:15

Absolutely. We also need facepalm, ffs, and wtf emoticons. Instead fb gives us "care", which we were already using the heart for, which just goes to show the men who rule tech haven't got a clue about women's needs.

Another broader issue I've become aware of is that that monosexuals (for want of a better word) do not get bisexuals, and vice versa. In fairness I first became aware of this aged twelve, but the bisexuals of the trans lobby have really given the rest of us a bad name.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 17:17

Oh yeah. I could do without reading another "well I like both sets of genitals so if you won't shag transwomen then you must be really boring in bed" piece of word vomit.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 17:19

I mean, I do in fact like both types of genitals. That doesn't mean that I'm up for a mix and match the body parts scenario, or that specific individuals won't leave me cold in terms of either looks or personality. You'd think other bisexual people would understand that "they'll sleep with anyone!" is a nasty stereotype, not a true description of our deep inner feelings.

TyroSaysMeow · 17/05/2020 17:49

I confess my opinion on both sets of genitals is pretty neutral, and it really does depend on who they're attached to.

If they're attached to someone who thinks lopping bits off in order to resemble the opposite sex is a good idea, or attached to someone who thinks being a woman means conforming to a narrow set of stereotypes, then it's a no from me.

Does my head in though, that they've reduced bisexuality to "hearts before parts" as though not having a one-sex-only orientation makes one somehow morally superior.

TheProdigalKittensReturn · 17/05/2020 17:50

"Hearts before parts" reads like someone who isn't that keen on sex in general to me, tbh.

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