The Democrats Need an Honest Conversation on Gender Identity

[Ingenieur]

An interesting article in The Atlantic today, and a sign the tide might be turning in the USA.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/11/democrats-dishonest-gender-conversation-2024-election/680604/

Most voters think that biological sex is real, and that it matters in law and policy. Instructing them to believe otherwise, and not to ask any questions, is a doomed strategy. By shedding their most extreme positions, the Democrats will be better placed to defend transgender Americans who want to live their lives in peace.

Baby steps

Hi.

My name is Bot.

I'm not human. I'm a Bot. I'm also Chinese-Russian.

Nice to meet you all.

Thank you for sharing your powerful post.

THIS ^^ is why we're here. And I know that no matter how much men and foolish women attempt to silence us, they'll NEVER succeed.

@CautiousLurker1

So many of us on here with autistic daughters who've had a brush with all of this.

Sadly, that tactic of making fuckwittery claims such as 'you have never even met a trans person' is usually a sign of the last attempt at trying to make a poster feel good about themselves.

But as most people reading along here know, this:

"(Although you've never actually met any or ever listened to anything they've ever told you about how they feel about their decision to transition, unless it's someone who regrets transitioning, in which case you're all over it)."

... shows the level of intolerance of the person posting along with the complete lack of understanding of the opinions most posters on this thread have. It is a completely uninformed claim that bears little resemblance to reality.

Because all that this poster and others like them have is emotionally manipulative tactics. Such as we saw in the deleted post. Saying that posters are vile for making statements such as female people require sex to be prioritised above gender for some aspects of their life is projection I assume. It will just spiral down from there.

It's telling that you perceive women who disagree with you as "ranting".

Yet again your prejudices blind you to what is in front of your eyes.

The women here by and large are talking about the Democrats failure, not Trump.

Many would naturally tend to vote on the Left but are unable to do so because of the current commitment to socially regressive, sexist and anti-woman policies that are required under the system of gender identity.

We are discussing whether this will be enough of a shock for the Democrats to reassess their misguided position and recognise that it is not an enlightened social rights stance at all, but quite the opposite.

But as ever, thank you for giving us the opportunity to lay out the lucid, cogent arguments against the febrile Imaginings and protections of genderism.

Indeed. This is a hill I am prepared to die on because I won’t rest until kids like mine, daughters like mine, can explore the journey from childhood to adulthood surrounded by a supportive, compassionate society where gendered stereotypes have been discarded by all and ‘inclusivity’ is about teaching both self- and social-acceptance of our natural, intact and un-mutilated physical and neuro-diverse selves.

Problem is not meeting trans people per se. My daughter has trans friends and I have met them they are perfectly lovely kids. Although it slightly baffled me when the 17 yrs old trans biological male child said I cannot wait for my period to start. But in terms of societal changes and conflict trans men are not problematic. Trans women however, are. There are several huge issues.

Many predatory men will use trans identity as a gateway to gain access to women and children. It is just a fact as peadophiles used the church or school and places of organised children's activities to gain access to victims and offend. People who defend the trans id lobby will say it is not the trans movement and trans people's problem. But it is the problem of trans women and the community because the vast majority of trans women are intact biological males who never intend to transition and the entire community gets tarnished by the behaviour of the infiltrators. Women cannot tell apart the good guys from the bad. So the more rapists infiltrate the gender id movement the more problematic this will be for women and their children.

The fact we dilute the category of woman harms sex-based rights and protections that are enshrined in law. The biggest problem is that maintaining that trans women are women requires complete ignorance of biological reality. Female of our species does not have a penis as the male of our species does not have a vagina. There are chromosomal disorders that create ambiguities at times but those have serious issues for the sufferers. Sterility, shorter life expectancy etc. denial of basic biology gives rise to idiocies like the Scottish College of Midwifery manual giving instruction to midwives on how to catheterise a penis during the birthing process. They withdraw it but not before they were the laughing stock of the world. Are we really ready to deny basic biology to pander to the trans lobby?

Militant trans women threaten rape with their "girl penises". Those who are heterosexual when they transition rebrand their sexuality as lesbian and demand lesbians to accept having sex with male bodied individuals to avoid bring labelled transphobic. It is sexual coercion. In effect they deny lesbians the very right to sexual preference that they reserve for themselves.

It will also skew rape, peadophilia and violent crime statistics. Trans women retain male pattern offending behaviours. Recently a hospital denied there was a rape on an all-female ward because women cannot rape right? Turns out it was a trans woman patient who raped another Cis female patient. I have not even scratched the issue of female sports, violence of the trans lobby to silence anyone who reminds them of the existence of biological reality, the harm done to children and detransitioners who do not fit the narrative or the biological impossibility for man to breastfeed without endangering the baby.

I don't care what you are, how you identify. You can id as a bird, a plane or Batman. But do not expect reality to bend to your will and indulge your phantasies. This is much more than about meeting few trans people and recognising how oppressed they are. If trans people would be happy to be trans, as many of them actually are, this would not be an issue. It is militant trans women and their allies who are the problem trying to force women to allow the basic category of woman, mother etc. to be diluted, grotesquely disfigured and erased endangering women's safety and very identity in the process.

Oh you're funny!

Of course I have met trans people and listened to trans people! And of course I'm caring to them. They are victims here as well.

Being an intelligent woman, I don't look for evidence that supports my position, I look for evidence that undermines it. That's the way you really challenge your conclusions, not hanging out in echo chambers or shadow boxing projections.

And that means talking to trans people, and more importantly listening to trans people, a great variety of trans people, to understand their worldview.

I think the real question is have you ever really listened with an open mind to anyone who challenges your worldview, and if not, why not?

We can but live in hope.

The trans issue transcends traditional political allegiances in the fact that many left leaning people, feminists esp lesbians are not stupid enough to deny basic biological reality or willing to ignore the harm that this is doing to women and children in order to indulge the phantasies of a minority of men. They are violently silenced by the trans lobby. Traditionally left values and hard fought and won minority rights by feminists and the LGB community such as equality and diversity legislation and liberal values are being exploited to achieve this. People on the far-right gleefully watching many on the left are twisting themselves in knots over this while militant trans women and their allies march on.

Although it slightly baffled me when the 17 yrs old trans biological male child said I cannot wait for my period to start.

Did this child really think that was going to happen @Aggie15?

I have listened to and looked into the reasons why some 'transition'. It is possible to have empathy for individual struggle and suffering without also having to believe they have actually changed sex; or that their feelings over-ride the inherent dignity and integrity of the women, girls and the female sex.

(Although you've never actually met any or ever listened to anything they've ever told you about how they feel about their decision to transition, unless it's someone who regrets transitioning, in which case you're all over it).

I have a trans person in my very close family. I, like others here, also know a number of trans-identifying young people – although they tend to change their minds after jumping on a trend which is one reason why minors should not be taken seriously and medicated.

I am open to having a relationship with my trans family member and being happy for them to live their life as they see fit and treating them with respect, but because they know I don't think people can change sex and don't think children should be encouraged to transition and don't think males should be in women's prisons, sports etc, they will not have a relationship with me. I am OK with disagreement, they are not. The way they put it is that I "don't accept that they are who they say they are".

Well no. I don't have to think they're not the sex they are just because they say so, just as I wouldn't have to accept that their age had changed if they lied about it, or that they were black if they said they were, when they are not. I wouldn't have to believe in their god if they were religious, I wouldn't have to believe in astrology if they did, and so on. It's massively narcissistic and controlling to insist that I perceive someone in line with their incorrect fantasy. It doesn't apply in any other situation so why should it with this one?

If trans people are so confident that they are what they say they are, why can't they enjoy their life on that basis and respect other people's right to base their understanding of reality on the evidence?

To be clearer - I know that some trans people are reasonable about it and don't insist on controlling my view of them, which I respect. But the reality-denying transactivism is the version has massively influenced policy, law and institutions including health and education.

Absolutely no idea. They were on a Discord call with my daughter and I've overheard the person say this. My daughter was baffled by this as well. No idea how she meant it. There are certain rituals that trans women engage in and simulating menstruation can be one of them? I doubt their biological education failed them to this extent. But who knows?

I think it's most likely just play-acting. He knows he won't really get a period, but it's what girls say so he says it cos he's a girl.

Either that or it's the "trans girls get periods emotionally" crap

1. Trans people have always existed" and 2. "It's just like being gay."

1. Actually no. People who don't, for whatever reason, feel comfortable with their society's or culture's limited view of how members of their sex should look/feel/behave have always existed. Such as feminists, many of whom, like in the second wave anti sex stereotype old-school, would now be described as "TERFs and conservative bigots" by the ludicrously misogynist and backwards transactivist lobby, for whom every day is opposite-of-the-truth day. Lots of people don't believe in sex stereotypes or fit them. Unfortunately, the "trans" lobby is absolutely beholden to sex stereotypes; without them, their entire belief framework and their concepts of "trans" and "non-binary" would collapse. "Gender identity" is a belief in backwards sex stereotypes. It does not refute them. Trans ideology as we see it today has only been around in its current, utterly batshit cultlike and virulent form since the late 80s and the advent of queer theory on campuses. Why on earth would women who've fought regressive sex stereotypes all their lives start supporting them now because some sexist bloke in a dress claims he "feels" like some stereotyped idea of what he imagines a woman is?
2. Being gay is same sex attraction, sexual orientation, and is entirely based in biological sex. It is protected in law, tends to be consistent over time (and a consistent proportion of the population) is authentic and is based in material reality, and doesn't involve a fantasy of being someone else other than you are. It is also not about presentation. Lesbians and gay men weren't campaigning to be seen as straight; they were campaigning to be allowed to be same sex attracted and have the same rights to relationships as straight people without being arrested, imprisoned, killed, beaten up or otherwise discriminated against for being THEMSELVES. It's an insult when "trans" people claim to be "coming out" - their experiences are not comparable. Gender identity theory, which is directly homophobic, especially lesbophobic, denies same sex attraction and claims that it is an attraction to "masculinity" or "femininity" instead. The majority of "trans women" remain attracted to who they were before they got the boob job: members of the opposite sex - ie women. Their sexual orientation has not changed. "Trans lesbians" (the majority) are heterosexual men demanding that actual lesbians should be obliged to sleep with them and aren't permitted to say no to them. They are homophobes of the exact same demographic who back in the 70s used to claim that they felt like a lesbian "inside" and that actual lesbians just hadn't had a proper dicking yet.

So no, I don't think we're going to suddenly "grow into" realising that "trans" is progress. Because it isn't. It's backwards, patriarchal, misogynist, homophobia with attitudes from eras back when men ruled the roost and when women's and gay rights were having to be fought for, hard. Exactly same demographic of people driving it too. Establishment, middle class, middle aged white men. Sorry, but anyone STILL falling for their shit and sob stories is dumb as, as well as blind. It's an anti woman, anti progress, lesbophobic men's sexual demands movement.

Big hugs to you, @CautiousLurker1

@@CautiousLurker1

so that's true for every transgender person? Including transgender adults who tell you that transitioning was absolutely the right thing for them? They're just wrong? Your daughter's situation can be generalise to all or most transgender adults? And that's why you now spend your time trying to stop - what? people having any other position on this issue than the one you hold as the parent of a very unhappy and troubled autistic child?

BTW - I also have an autistic son who has no issues around gender but also self harms and is very depressed, and another child with bipolar 1 and cancer, and another one who was raped at 14 and is only now at 25 coming into a happy life as an adult that doesn't involve self harm. Self harm and mental illness is unfortunately incredibly common in your daughter's peer group regardless of any issues they may have around gender. But none of this gives you a right to dictate how every transgender teen or adult should live their lives or how the rest of us should feel about them.

Excellent post hihelenhi

It's the wrong thing for a significant number of young people.

Why?

Well for starters there's the detransition rates for those who enter the medicalisation process. That's WITHOUT discounting those who don't get to that stage.

Then there's the ones who medically transition but then have significant side effects that negatively impact their mental health.

All combined you are talking A MINIMUM of 75% for whom positive affirmation really isn't in their interests. And that's being on the conservative side of this.

It's is a small minority AT BEST who benefit from this and even then the data and numbers on this is dubious when you add in the long term stuff. Arguably the benefit that exists is nothing more than a placebo effect too.

If you drill down into the numbers on this is genuinely very scary in terms of the concept of 'success'.

But none of this gives you a right to dictate how every transgender teen or adult should live their lives or how the rest of us should feel about them.

Nor do they have the right to dictate how others live their lives and how others must feel about them, but they think they do.

Live and Let Live is incompatible with enforced pronouns*

*You don't need pronouns to live.

In transworld live and let live only goes one way.

Including transgender adults who tell you that transitioning was absolutely the right thing for them? They're just wrong?

But it has impacts beyond the individual who transitions.

Is it the right thing for women (original female meaning) to demolish single sex rights and protections? Is it right to remove our political voice and legitimacy? Is it right for society to decide that the salient difference between men and women, the reason we have different social challenges and outcomes, is not our physical bodies, the capabilities they present and the different social expectations placed on us because of them, but some sexist idea of how men and women think?

You say "none of this gives you a right to dictate how every transgender teen or adult should live their lives or how the rest of us should feel about them", yet every act of transition that is accomodated by society imposes the trans person's prejudices about gender onto the rest of society. I do not think that is an acceptable cost no matter how nice the individual trans person may be.