JazzG it’s hard to absorb any of this when the alternative is to be led by
I could give this stuff credibility if the chosen one was a saint. Not this cretin.
Claudius Which why I've said before this wasn't even a difficult election for the Democrats to win. They decided to go with someone who was senile in Biden and when he was forced to drop out they decided to go with Kamala...
Some of those charges bought against him were seen to be politically motivated by the electorate, I don't really know as I haven't followed the cases in that detail but some of the stuff coming out by the AGs did seem like they were out to get him. Some of those involved on the Jan 6 all got last minute pardons on the way out from Biden, that imo only adds credibility to the view that the charges have a political element to them.
Here in the UK the vibe shift is real as well, this coming from someone says JK Rowling is wrong and that a woman can have a penis. Rosie Duffield was ostracized by the Labour party for supporting JK Rowling and her views.
JazzG You are not missing anything, a trans woman is not a woman. And to make things even worse some think that anyone who says otherwise is a bigot or transphobe.
Ever been friends with anyone before and after they transitioned with hormone therapy and surgery?
Burnwinter so you determine who is on “the right side” and only then do you engage in good faith or even consider an opinion that is contrary to yours? I guess that’s very admirable. I personally have trouble telling right from wrong infallibly on every single moral and political issue in the world, but I am glad there are people out there who don’t.
Gurgen so you determine who is on “the right side”
Don't come the raw prawn as they say.
We've exchanged views for years. Many times you've agreed and disagreed with me without a hint of nuance. Most times you express yourself with perfect confidence you're "on the right side". And that's normal. You've got a problem with me doing it? Physician, heal thyself.
Burnwinter think you guys all know I used to be involved with the Daily Cannon website.
My one contribution, such as it is, to this debate is Lee - the guy who runs the site - used to be an angry Irish lesbian called Leanne. Having realised he was actually a man in a woman's body, he transitioned around 10-12 years ago. Once he transitioned, everyone accepted him for who he now was, an angry trans man. I don't see why this should be any different the other way round.
RocktheCasbah I've had three friends transition over the last twenty years or so ... three fairly complicated people, two women and one man. Today, they are all happier and more fulfilled than once they were, leading imperfect lives like the rest of us.
Just three anecdotes, but it induces vertigo to think of these cases while reading anti-trans preoccupations about bathroom intrusions and elite sports.
That stuff is just not at all in the picture for these people. I'm talking about an art gallery curator, software developer and a rural high school teacher, neither upsetting anyone nor infringing anyone's rights.
When you observe someone transition you see that "biological sex" is very far from static, binary and immutable. Tip different hormones into an adult body and, subject to many limits of course, that body's expression plastically changes.
That's nothing simple, but it's likely to keep on going because of hormones becoming a commodity. In the words of the recently deceased David Lynch, "fix your hearts or die".
If you want a real, proper social problem to worry about, may I recommend crystal meth addiction and psychosis. I'd be perfectly happy to man the barricades with a few wingnuts if it would keep that shit away from my communities.
Burnwinter When you observe someone transition you see that "biological sex" is very far from static, binary and immutable.
Biology in general. It turns out we modify ourselves all the time. Men taking testosterone isn't "natural," either, but it goes far beyond that. We are born into what Derrida called the prosthetic already-there. We are technical beings at the instant we are human, modified, extended, and reduced by the pharmakon of the nonhuman upon which our humanity is predicated. The skin barrier is porous, and the narrative of a pure, natural, organismic unity is a myth that defies all logic and, yes, even the so-called common sense logics that govern antitrans discourses.
No more skin grafts, no more hair plugs. No more literature, because it's not natural unless you can remember. No more vaccines, no more skateboards. Kill all knowledge, because only ignorance is compatible with nature.
You guys are so elite eh?
I don't understand. A man in a woman's body.
Like, that's the point where it ceases to make sense to simple minded folks like me.
flobaba In a few years time people are gonna look back at this and be like what the actual fuck was going on. Especially with the mutilation of kids, that is worst of all this. When someone is an adult they can do whatever makes them happy but leave the kids out of this.
Burnwinter I don't know anyone and I don't think it is relevant nor would I change my views. I do know of a man who transitioned into a woman. I'm happy for your friends and wish them all their best. But they are trans women are not women. They are trans women and there is nothing with that.
Mutilation of which kids?
Cass review in the UK found the evidence for puberty blockers and hormone therapy to be remarkably weak yet in some countries we have kids being operated on. Irreversible surgeries being done on kids without strong evidence, that is experimental surgery and mutilation in my eyes. Breast binders being sent out in discreet packaging to under-aged kids in this country without parental consent. Irreversible and we already have high profile cases like Chloe Cole coming out talking about their regrets.
Once they are an adult, whatever path they go down they should be supported.
@JazzG @flobaba Look mates, there's nothing elite or rarefied about my life experiences. I've been moving through a pretty normal Australian sphere. I'm not a private school kid, a trust fund kid, an academic at an elite university, etc.
But I do know quite a few trans people and as far as my humdrum acquaintance goes, the stuff that is said by conservatives is factually way, way off the mark. It is false and damaging.
I'd say I'm the simple soul who doesn't maintain a lot of complex ideas based on nothing about this.
The debate over whether trans women are women, or trans lives are human lives is over in Australia from a civic and social perspective. Trans women live legally as women after transition and lots of paperwork, go to work as women, etc. Nobody stopped that train here. I reckon that's because real trans people are leading unexceptional lives that don't look like anyone's lurid headlines.
There are substantial social and political issues associated with trans identity here, but none is caused by any pattern of trans people being socially malevolent or dangerous that anyone can point to. Just imagine how much we'd hear about it if they could!
The debate may be settled in Australia, but it's obviously not settled in many other places in the world. Gender fluidity is not as accepted a proposition as you might believe. Interesting that you've met and got close to so many considering their rarity. I've met one. He was cool. Wifey's friend and work colleague. Had a fiancee and everything. But he is a woman. Surgery, hormones. Still a woman. He did not grow up having a boy/man's experiences, and he is not biologically male. These are facts, right? I can't just wake up one morning and say I think I'm a woman, can I? And then project my thinking and beliefs into other people's realities. It's just you know, silly.
Oh, and what if I'm trans woman today. Can I decide in like 3 years that eh, been there done that, and go back to being a man? What would I be then? A trans untrans? Retrans? Food for thought.
flobaba Still a woman. He did not grow up having a boy/man's experiences, and he is not biologically male. These are facts, right? I can't just wake up one morning and say I think I'm a woman, can I?
I mean, why not?
People who transition do feel they've been assigned the wrong gender, that is why they do it. Of course it's not an easy process, especially not for kids, and there are a lot of guardrails on it.
Yes, it's a fact that a trans man who's "assigned female at birth" and transitions as an adult hasn't "had a boyhood" like you or me. Someone "living as a man who didn't have [all of] a boyhood" is a decent working definition of trans male identity, that's the point of it.
