[jart]

Yeah but if you're a trans woman for instance, there are benefits to going through some male puberty. You understand men better. You understand yourself better, to know that's not what you want. Also you never go through a puberty in exactly the same way as a cis woman. A lot of the effects are reversible, especially if you start at 18, since I don't think maleness fully develops until at least age 25. Treating people under 18 is a politically losing issue. When policies around it changed, that tipped the scales from the public ignoring trans women or seeing them as victims, towards many members of the public seeing them as monsters who are out to get their children. It's illegal in 27 states and the White House calls it child mutilation. Can you imagine what a burden it must be to live in a world where many ignorant individuals hold such a perception of you, due to no fault of your own, but rather physical characteristics about yourself you can't change?

[hemogloben]

> Treating people under 18 is a politically losing issue.

Treating people as 'a politically losing issue' is weird to me. There are certainly some nuances to <18 transgender care, but that statement doesn't address any of them and just suggests we embrace political cowardice.

> When policies around it changed, that tipped the scales from the public ignoring trans women or seeing them as victims, towards many members of the public seeing them as monsters who are out to get their children.

This is worse. It wasn't because politics around it changed, it was because republicans (upset that they could no longer target gay people), reused the same crappy arguments against trans people, and then wrapped it in a pedophilic flag.

The change in policy is just effective propaganda making people concerned that random doctors are allowing their children to get sex change operations without consent, when that isn't how ANY of this works. Children <18 can socially transition, get puberty blockers, and MAYBE get hormone treatment. WITH parent consent.

The fact that the media and comments like yours continues to pretend its a reasonable 'discussion' perpetuates the nonsense.

[jart]

We? Political cowardice? Have you considered that trans people might just want to live their lives, and not be force-teamed into your war? Trans has been a thing since the 1950s and that whole time flew under society's radar, happy minding their own business and not be noticed, until around 2020 when your war started.

[hemogloben]

Trans has been a thing since a whole lot longer than that.

Discussions like this often end up at WW2 and that's not what I'm saying here, but Germany in the 1920s was essentially the Gay/Trans hub of the world until it wasn't: https://www.netflix.com/title/81331646.

But even that's not the beginning of 'trans'.

The reason trans isn't 'flying under the radar', isn't because trans people got too proud. Its because one political party decided to shine the magnifying glass to turn trans into a political issue.

[Alghranokk]

Have you considered that trans people just want to live their lives? As we all know, transitioning, social, hormonal, reduces incidence of suicide. This also applies to under 18 individuals. Should such options and approaches suddenly be revoked and discontinued, it will naturally follow that some will die who otherwise would not have.

How many do consider reasonable to sacrifice in the name of political expedience?

[jart]

Back in the days when there were gatekeepers, doctors would actually refuse to treat you for gender dysphoria if you were suicidal. Because suicidal people aren't thinking clearly enough to be making such an important choice, and their actions could be seen as abusing the treatment as a means of self-harm. I think people also make that argument because they feel they need to be manipulative so that others will let them do what they want to do. If the world were more enlightened, we wouldn't have such issues.

[seethedeaduu]

> happy minding their own business

Trans women until VERY recently were forced to go into prostitution and were excluded by the wider society. Trans people were not force teamed into any war, or rather, this is partially right, they were forcefully forced to pick a team by the side that aims to take away their bodily rights, protections, and mark them as undesirables again.

[actualwitch]

As a person born in a country on the very same trajectory Trump is pushing US into now, let me share some insights written in our blood with you. In my country, there were people who thought like you, thinking you can give them an inch and that they will be satisfied by it. But the truth is they always need more to keep the fire of hate going. First, they will take the <18 care because it was the point with weakest support. Next, when that is done, the weakest point becomes your legal identity. Then, your legal care at all. Then other lgbtqi+ groups. There is this poem about "first they came for _", this is a great illustration of it in action. It ends with transgender people pushed into conversion therapy or exile, like in my country. You should really look into how life for us was like in "1950s" and up to now, because if you don't fight for this happy life you want to live they will just take it without asking you, like they did throughout the history. The only answer to authoritarianism is to make sure there are no weak points to attack, stand united and you have a path to win. You can learn from our mistakes, or you can learn from yours. The choice is up to you.

[jart]

There's no weak point here in California. Even Trump bends the knee to our governor.

I hope you make it out here one day, if you haven't already.

[actualwitch]

Based on my perception of where US is now in terms of government, where its going and how seriously people are taking what is happening, I don't plan on going anywhere near it today or in the ~10 years to come. That is an optimistic timeline where trumpism is eventually stomped, btw. If you think it matters what individual states legislate when the entire country's government is being transformed into authoritarianism before your eyes, you are well on your way into pessimist timeline.

[HK-NC]

Odd that the idea of a child making permanent life changing decisions about their body hasn't been mentioned, you're so convinced you're right about all this.

[Llamamoe]

> Also you never go through a puberty in exactly the same way as a cis woman. A lot of the effects are reversible, especially if you start at 18, since I don't think maleness fully develops until at least age 25. Treating people under 18 is a politically losing issue.

Imagine trying to make the same argument about forcing cis women to go through male liberty to "understand men better". It's ridiculous.

Further, studies show that the main predictor of bone structure is whether you started HRT before or after the beginning of puberty, and that outcomes get worse the more it progresses. At 18 you still get some change, but you really need to either block puberty or start HRT before it for optimal outcomes.

And if you don't want to give HRT to trans children, at least get them on puberty blockers. There's pretty much zero evidence suggesting they do anything worse than temporary and reversible reductions in bone density.

[jart]

The first rule of medicine is to do no harm. It's an ethically grey area to intervene with something the body is doing naturally that isn't putting the person's life at risk. The technology available today for gender transition is crude compared to what will be available in the future. I know intersex people who are pretty unhappy because medical professionals chose the wrong intervention in childhood. Only adults of sufficient mental faculties who are under the care of a doctor should be making these tradeoffs. That's how trans worked for ~70 years before recent political activism forced the medical industry to loosen its standards.

[seethedeaduu]

Kids can't consent to being forcefully and irreversibly mutilated under the wrong puberty.

[Llamamoe]

Puberty blockers are routinely prescribed for other indications, and there are countless other treatments with more risks that are prescribed to children every day.

[viamiraia]

As a trans woman who has talked with many other trans women, the majority, including me would prefer not having gone through male puberty at all. The benefits do not outweigh the gender dysphoria. We would love to go through puberty the exact same way as a cis woman, but it's not like we don't realize HRT and current methods have room for improvement.

The effects are only partially reversible, and only after tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars in surgeries, hair removal, voice training, other treatments.

I understand it's a politically losing issue now, but I believe it's due to misinformation, outrage porn, and unfair application of rigor, from mostly the anti-trans side but even allies and trans folk themselves sometimes. To that end I hope this does not feel like an attack - let me know if you have any questions that you think my perspective would help.

[jart]

Look forward to the future. Superintelligence will invent better treatments for trans people. However there's not going to be any better treatments if trans becomes illegal due to the backlash caused by folks agitating for the use of the comparatively crude treatments available today on children. Trump has setup a legal regime for annihilating everyone in the medical community who's been providing trans care. You better hope there are still people around who are willing to help when the dust settles from all this political fighting.

[znpy]

> Treating people under 18 is a politically losing issue.

This is the key point, imho.

In the transgender rights discourse no margin for error is admitted, but there is like in any other human field (of course).

There have been several cases of people being given a "gender disphoria" blanket diagnosis (eg: the case of Chlementine Breen[1]), which later caused issues. And of course some of those people are transitioning back and started doing activism against the trans rights movement.

It's weird that minors are not allowed to do something trivial as drinking a beer or driving a car yet they're allowed to take on irreversible changes (sometimes involving surgery) to their bodies.

This is hurtful to all people involved, and until this point is not understood, the attrition will continue.

[1]: that case is a textbook example of "no margin error admitted" because in order for their voice to be heard they had to resort to talking to the extreme opposite political side.

[seethedeaduu]

The convenience of a hypothetical cis peerson is worth more than the lives of 100 trans people it seems.

The wrong puberty is irreversible mutilation. It's not weird at all given that kids are being given treatment for cancer.

[znpy]

> The convenience of a hypothetical cis peerson is worth more than the lives of 100 trans people it seems.

Complete nonsense. The ratio is generally the inverse: there are 100 cis people and 1 trans person. Those are just the numbers, otherwise trans people wouldn't be a considered a minority.

Actually you're the one arguing that the convenience of one trans person is worth more than the life of 100 cis people.

[seethedeaduu]

I didn't know that the ratio of cis to trans people who were "falsely" "convinced" to take hormones were 100 to 1.

Having the right hormones and not being permenantly mutilated by the wrong ones isn't simply "a convenience".