Is being Transgender a choice?

[AgnosticBoy]

I'm of the opinion that gender expression is a result of social conditioning. I know I used the word "choice" in the title, but that's only because people tend to associate behavior that can be changed or conditioned as being a "choice" (borrowing from the debate on born this way vs. choice).

In this thread, I want to focus on being transgender. Based on my above opinion, I also believe that being transgender is also a result of social conditioning (i.e. childhood experiences, what they learn from society, etc). If I'm right then I think that the recent focus on transgenderism in the media, in Hollywood, in schools, could lead some children to become transgender. And there is nothing wrong with that.

I also bring these points up because when some parents complain about their kids learning about transgenderism in school, the reaction is that it won't impact (some say "groom" ) the child into becoming transgender. If my view is correct, I think the pro-trans crowd should acknowledge that it can potentially influence children AND there's nothing wrong with that.

For Debate
1. Is being transgender a result of social conditioning?
2. Edit: Removed. Teaching kids about gender identity can be a separate thread.

[brunumb]

Sal Grover and 'Giggle':-

A social media app created for “females only” and its founder are facing criticism and accusations of transphobia and racism after trans women and women of colour reported being denied access by the facial recognition software.

Racist as well? OK.

Now you are accusing facial recognition software as being racist. What next?

By the way, in a few years Australia will host the World Dwarf Games. If I self-identify as a dwarf shouldn't they allow me to compete even though I am close to 6' tall? If a woman can have a penis, surely a dwarf can be very tall.

[Purple Knight]

[Replying to Purple Knight in post #206]

Hate speech: "There are only two sexes and you can't change from one to the other".

Not Hate Speech: "I was gonna come here and be really fluffy and be really nice and say be really lovely and queer and gay - nah, if you see a terf, punch them in the [expletive] face".

The latter was from a transgender activist who has been cleared of intentionally encouraging the commission of an offense. Go figure.

It comes back to the very basic and human idea that if someone is a bad guy, hurting them is okay. That's why the first one is not okay (it hurts innocents who have not hurt anybody) and the second one is permissible (it hurts people who have hurt others).

I mean, it seems intuitive that it's true. We imprison people when they do bad things. We would be aghast if innocent people were treated so. So there absolutely is a double standard that pretty much everyone believes (unless they want prisoners let go) that hurting bad people is good, and hurting good people is bad. It leads inexorably to this situation where people can get trapped into the bad guy category because of how they look, what they say, what they think, and then hurting them is okay. It also leads to this society of sociality first and law second or never, where whoever can argue the best that they were hurt first, now gains the disproportionate power to hurt others (I guess in any amount, indefinitely) while no one may even say it's wrong. So even if you find a small slight, you win and gain a permanent status advantage. Thus people who are good at being social, convincing others that there is a slight, now essentially have anyone they want, permanently enslaved to them, because they can always find something the other person did wrong.

I don't see a consistent way out. Defining speech out of hurting people misses the issue, really. Speech can be hurtful. There might be good reasons not to criminalise it, but most people still understand that hurting people is wrong. If so, then those who want to hurt those hurtful people, are good and should be exalted as such.

Can you say it's disproportionate? Not if you're honest. If people who do wrong, can only lose exactly as much as they gained, they will continue to do it. If the maximum penalty for stealing $5 is a $5 fine, everyone will steal all the time because they can only win and cannot possibly lose. People have to be punished worse than what they inflicted.

Can you say, well, only what the law says is wrong, is actually wrong? No. Thomas Jefferson said the law can be wrong. The founders all thought the law could be wrong, and it could be good to rebel against it. You can take matters into your own hands, if you're right. This is why I'm an authoritarian. I think this is how rights first, government second, was always going to end: People all doing what they feel is right and kick the law to the curb it's wrong anyway. Authoritarianism can suck, but it doesn't necessarily suck. There could, in theory, be good laws, and then people would be obligated to follow them. Liberty must suck, because it maximises the different opinions and empowers everyone to act on them instead of the law.

[oldbadger]

Sal Grover and 'Giggle':-

A social media app created for “females only” and its founder are facing criticism and accusations of transphobia and racism after trans women and women of colour reported being denied access by the facial recognition software.

Racist as well? OK.

Now you are accusing facial recognition software as being racist. What next?

By the way, in a few years Australia will host the World Dwarf Games. If I self-identify as a dwarf shouldn't they allow me to compete even though I am close to 6' tall? If a woman can have a penis, surely a dwarf can be very tall.

It's just that you watch such strange videos.........that's all.

[Kylie]

Evidence sugests that the brains of trans people are closer to being like the brains of their identified gender rather than their biological gender. In other words, a trans man's brain is more like the brain of a man than the brain of a woman. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2 ... 112351.htm

In this study, Dr. Julie Bakker from the University of Liège, Belgium, and her colleagues from the Center of Expertise on Gender Dysphoria at the VU University Medical Center, the Netherlands, examined sex differences in the brain activation patterns of young transgender people. The study included both adolescent boys and girls with gender dysphoria and used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans to assess brain activation patterns in response to a pheromone known to produce gender-specific activity. The pattern of brain activation in both transgender adolescent boys and girls more closely resembled that of non-transgender boys and girls of their desired gender.

It was also shown in a study that the majority of boys with gender dysphoria, when left to go through puberty without intervention, turned out to just be gay males. Perhaps the study you referred to merely identified differences in brain activity between straight and homosexual individuals.

Care to link to this study?

Also, if true, perhaps that can be explained by the tremendous anti-gay attitudes in society.

And what about all those trans women who don't transition until AFTER puberty?

[brunumb]

[Replying to Purple Knight in post #206]

Hate speech: "There are only two sexes and you can't change from one to the other".

Not Hate Speech: "I was gonna come here and be really fluffy and be really nice and say be really lovely and queer and gay - nah, if you see a terf, punch them in the [expletive] face".

The latter was from a transgender activist who has been cleared of intentionally encouraging the commission of an offense. Go figure.

It comes back to the very basic and human idea that if someone is a bad guy, hurting them is okay. That's why the first one is not okay (it hurts innocents who have not hurt anybody) and the second one is permissible (it hurts people who have hurt others).

The first one is merely a statement of fact. It does not hurt anyone. If some individuals gets their knickers in a knot over it, that's their problem, not mine.
The second is a direct incitement to violence driven by hate. It's not okay under any circumstances.

[brunumb]

Care to link to this study?

This might be it, but I don't keep track of all the sources I encounter.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10 ... 32784/full

Also, if true, perhaps that can be explained by the tremendous anti-gay attitudes in society.

You must live in the Middle East, or maybe a very sheltered environment.

And what about all those trans women who don't transition until AFTER puberty?

What about them?

[brunumb]

Sal Grover and 'Giggle':-

A social media app created for “females only” and its founder are facing criticism and accusations of transphobia and racism after trans women and women of colour reported being denied access by the facial recognition software.

Racist as well? OK.

Now you are accusing facial recognition software as being racist. What next?

By the way, in a few years Australia will host the World Dwarf Games. If I self-identify as a dwarf shouldn't they allow me to compete even though I am close to 6' tall? If a woman can have a penis, surely a dwarf can be very tall.

It's just that you watch such strange videos.........that's all.

How does that even remotely address my response to your claim?

[Kylie]

Care to link to this study?

This might be it, but I don't keep track of all the sources I encounter.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10 ... 32784/full

MIGHT be? How about you go and actually find it, and then come back to me instead of posting random stuff and hoping it says what you want it to say?

Also, if true, perhaps that can be explained by the tremendous anti-gay attitudes in society.

You must live in the Middle East, or maybe a very sheltered environment.

No, I live in Sydney Australia.

If you aren't aware that there are still a lot of anti gay, anti trans sentiments in society today, then I'd say you are the one who is in a sheltered environment.

And what about all those trans women who don't transition until AFTER puberty?

What about them?

They kind of destroy the point you were trying to make, don't they?

[brunumb]

Care to link to this study?

This might be it, but I don't keep track of all the sources I encounter.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10 ... 32784/full

MIGHT be? How about you go and actually find it, and then come back to me instead of posting random stuff and hoping it says what you want it to say?

Not random stuff. It does say what I claimed. Try reading it.

[brunumb]

If you aren't aware that there are still a lot of anti gay, anti trans sentiments in society today, then I'd say you are the one who is in a sheltered environment.

That will always exist, but until recently it had reached an all time low. People of opposite political persuasion can hate each other. You can't legislate against hate. Unfortunately, the actions of activists are turning the tide as people become resentful of being forced to accept an ideology that is contrary to reality.