Can someone please explain... (trans)

[WednesdayAllTheWay]

So I've been trying to follow this trans situation for a while but now having skin in the game in the form of a child (and also noting through work how more and more people are identifying as the opposite gender) I need to understand it better.
Feel slightly embarrassed asking but:

1. How exactly do the words sex and gender differ in this area?
2. What reasons do trans people give for wanting to change their physical bodies? As in what do people believe they will get from this that they couldn't get in the body they were born with?
3. What are children being taught at school about this?

Thanks!

How many 'experiments' (and by experiments I mean foetuses created) would have to occur to make this a reality

That someone thinks embryo and fetuses are righteous experiment fodder speaks volumes.

This thread continues to enlighten.

@Winesalot

How many 'experiments' (and by experiments I mean foetuses created) would have to occur to make this a reality

That someone thinks embryo and fetuses are righteous experiment fodder speaks volumes.

This thread continues to enlighten.

I have no problem at all with doctors helping infertile women to bear children.

You'll have to ask the surgeons.

Indeed.

Although I am interested in your opinions on the ethics of womb transplants in males? Given that it would be highly unlikely to be successful for a very long time into the experiment.

I know this might surprise you, but women aren't just an empty vessel into which a womb goes and then in that womb grows a baby. A woman's body is a very complex system, that has to be tuned just right to begin and sustain a pregnancy, even slight changes in hormone levels can mean the pregnancy won't continue. 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage, 1 in 200 pregnancies ends in stillbirth.

It's not just a case of 'let's put this organ in this human, doesn't really matter which sex, and watch that baby grow'!

@Passmeabottlemrjones

You'll have to ask the surgeons.

Indeed.

Although I am interested in your opinions on the ethics of womb transplants in males? Given that it would be highly unlikely to be successful for a very long time into the experiment.

I know this might surprise you, but women aren't just an empty vessel into which a womb goes and then in that womb grows a baby. A woman's body is a very complex system, that has to be tuned just right to begin and sustain a pregnancy, even slight changes in hormone levels can mean the pregnancy won't continue. 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage, 1 in 200 pregnancies ends in stillbirth.

It's not just a case of 'let's put this organ in this human, doesn't really matter which sex, and watch that baby grow'!

I don't agree that trans women are male.

And to complete the circle, I don't agree with you that trans boys and men are female.

Google's first hit for female: an individual of the sex that is typically capable of bearing young or producing eggs.

Freddy McConnell, anyone?

It's not just a case of 'let's put this organ in this human, doesn't really matter which sex, and watch that baby grow'!

Indeed. Presumably it's what happens when people don't take any notice of biology lessons.

Yeah, womb transplants reminds me of that transwoman who described their unsuccessful attempt to breastfeed a baby as being a turn on, and ten times better than anything a partner could ever do to you.

I'm curious what the "reasonable expenses", payable to a woman who acts as a surrogate, would be for a transwoman who had obtained a womb through experimental medicine. Surely the medical expenses would not be insignificant.

In women, experimental uterus transplants have been strictly one use only, and have been removed with the birth of the baby for the health of the mother.

@Datun

It's not just a case of 'let's put this organ in this human, doesn't really matter which sex, and watch that baby grow'!

Indeed. Presumably it's what happens when people don't take any notice of biology lessons.

Womb transplants for trans women are what happens when scientists have a very profound knowledge of biology.

I know that trans women are just as likely to yearn to be able to bear children as non-trans women. I hope that medical science can make that a reality for them.

I don't agree that trans women are male.

So the 'two trans girls' who are in talks with these Scandinavian surgeons for womb transplants don't have biologically male bodies? How come they are trans then?

How many 'experiments' (and by experiments I mean foetuses created) would have to occur to make this a reality?

I always think of the dead women who will supply biological males with an organ which is unnecessary to them.

And then I re-read Mary Shelley's Frankenstein ...

Womb transplants for trans women are what happens when scientists have a very profound knowledge of biology.

Well given scientists do not have a sufficiently 'profound knowledge of biology' to maintain successful pregnancies in females, I would say we are rather a long way off for transwomen - and when I say 'long way off' I'm talking Science Fiction long way off!

Trans women can (usually) father children. If it’s about the child rather than the parent, that should suffice.

Pregnancy is often risky enough anyway. Why subject your potential child to immensely higher risks than normal?

I am proud to be a trans woman, and although I pass, I am very open about it.
What do you pass as, Positrans?

@Alethiometrical

How many 'experiments' (and by experiments I mean foetuses created) would have to occur to make this a reality?

I always think of the dead women who will supply biological males with an organ which is unnecessary to them.

And then I re-read Mary Shelley's Frankenstein ...

This is a very literal example of the monstering of trans women on Mumsnet.

@Alethiometrical

How many 'experiments' (and by experiments I mean foetuses created) would have to occur to make this a reality?

I always think of the dead women who will supply biological males with an organ which is unnecessary to them.

And then I re-read Mary Shelley's Frankenstein ...

That's exactly what goes through my mind when I think of these bizarre experimental procedures.

Is having a womb transplant (which would necessarily have to be from a dead donor for a transwoman) an intrinsic part of being a transwoman then?

This has certainly been a wild ride. My fellow uterus-havers, you've been magnificent.

I'm off to find myself a gender identity that gets me out of current menopausal symptoms,

As a non child-bearing natal woman I would hazard a guess that the trans women you identify with would yearn to bear a child more than me.

It’s much easier to fetishise the idea of being a woman and motherhood if you are not a woman.

Pass? Erm. Masculinity drips off you so much that when you first talked about passing I assumed you must be a transman ( trying a bit too hard)

• EyesOpening So Positrans since sex is a spectrum and you and I are not the same (I have the ability to give birth and you don’t, I don’t have this gender identity thing but you do) and as you’ve said you’re female, I don’t believe I’m male then I must be one of these other, as yet unnamed, sexes? That's for you to resolve. Enjoy the journey.*

Well it would seem that sex I am was already named female a long time ago and the new discovery of this spectrum, where you and I are not the same, would require you to find a new name for your new sex category, otherwise you’re, to coin a phrase, invalidating my identity.

@SpiderGwen

This has certainly been a wild ride. My fellow uterus-havers, you've been magnificent.

I'm off to find myself a gender identity that gets me out of current menopausal symptoms,

I empathise, currently dealing with a menstrual migraine which I have now started to get every month. Apparently its a sign of impending menopause.

Fun.

@PotholeParadies

Is having a womb transplant (which would necessarily have to be from a dead donor for a transwoman) an intrinsic part of being a transwoman then?

The donor doesn't have to be dead. I think the first successful one was a donation from a mother to her daughter.

The only think that is intrinsic to being a trans women is to be someone who has a female gender identity but who was assigned male at birth.

I know that trans women are just as likely to yearn to be able to bear children as non-trans women.

Well, because of that pesky biology again, you can't have a clue, and I'm afraid never will have, about how it feels for a woman to yearn for anything specific to her biology. Only a woman would have that experience.

Male born individuals, can only understand what male born individuals might be yearning for.

Trying to breastfeeding using male bodies, taking women's bodies and trying to put parts of them into male bodies. That sort of thing.

I know that trans women are just as likely to yearn to be able to bear children as non-trans women.

I think it's likely that as adults, 'trans' children will be just as likely as any other adults to wish to have their own children.

Yet people like you are so intent on them throwing away their fertility before they are old enough to understand what it is they are giving up.

Why are you so keen to sterilise children Positrans?