[howinteresting]

"On the other side there are those saying that it’s saving the lives of minorities who’ve been forced to stay in the closet for too long. And then there are normal people, like you and I, who think both sides are crazy"

I think this fragment speaks for itself. It is not "crazy" to care about suicide rates or suicidal ideation. It is "crazy" to not care about that.

[faeriechangling]

Which side cares about them? Those who are stigmatizing a population with high suicide rates? Or those who have successfully spearheaded a societal shift which has led more people to identify as trans, while trans people collectively still claim high rates of suicidal ideation.

I don’t see any evidence that mental health in the transgender or general population has actually improved, I’ve seen numbers suggesting societal wide mental health is on the decline, and I have seen a pretty large increase in the absolute numbers of people who say their gender dysphoria makes them suicidal. I can find research that suggests transgender people who receive more medical treatment and societal acceptance are less suicidal than those who do not, but that doesn’t actually demonstrate that trans acceptance will lead to less suicidality and better mental health at the societal level. Or even really at the individual level, since correlation is not causation.

On top of all that, most past research of this sort is potentially non-reproducible at this point because the trans population has expanded so rapidly. Three times as many trans men started visiting clinics in the course of a decade. So the research will have to be done all over again to discount this possibility but this has not been done.

So I don’t know, I’m with Hossenfelder and her radical centrism because I think nobody is actually acting scientifically re: trans people and they’re just playing it by ear. What I detest is the unwarranted certainty and lack of scepticism people have on this topic; People are just guessing and are acting like they are not.

[howinteresting]

You've strung a lot of words together that are not attached to reality. Plenty of people are acting very scientifically with regard to trans people—there are hundreds of studies in this regard. "Correlation is not causation" is the beginning of the conversation about the relationship between the two, not the end. (Observational data plus a solid theory is a very powerful way to establish causation.)

The idea that social acceptance of transness is causing more people to identify as trans is is not entirely without merit, but needs to be thought about critically. It is true that people who have low-key gender dysphoria would treat it with increased salience if they became more aware that trans people exist, but that is very clearly a good thing. Society should generally allow people to be true and happy to their selves.

Moreover, while the general direction of social progress has been encouraging, the magnitude of it has been relatively small. We have a very long way to go before we can even begin to control for social stigma as a factor in trans suicidality rates. This last point is evidenced by comments in this very thread.

[grebel]

That first sentence is quite euphemistic though. There's a lot more to both sides that she quietly implies (by reference to "normal people" finding it "crazy") but doesn't outright mention.

[howinteresting]

The difference between the two sides is that one is correct and the other is not, and that what "normal" (uninformed lay) people think is not really relevant.

edit: Your response has no actual content in it.

[grebel]

Funnily enough, that's what those on the other side say too.

No matter what the topic, those at either end of strongly polarised collections of views do tend to believe that they are correct and everyone else is wrong and informed.

[howinteresting]

Thanks, Captain Obvious.

The fact that both sides think they're correct has absolutely no bearing on who is actually correct. For that we must turn to evidence. The evidence in favor of trans healthcare and identities is overwhelming, and the evidence presented by the other side is laced with non-evidenced religious beliefs like "someone being cis and unhappy is a better outcome for society than someone being trans and happy".

[grebel]

There are non-evidenced beliefs on both sides. The reason you think you are correct is because you assume that your beliefs are facts.

Indeed, your comments imply that you are fully immersed in this illusion and are unlikely to accept any suggestion to the contrary.