Something I want to share

[McAvoy]

I think it just boils down to what is considered normal. Normal in local communities, local society, overall society. A cis-man has to act this way to be a man, anything else is abnormal and fighting against that normalcy is not only abnormal but is directly fighting what it is be a man. Same goes for cis-women.

This is what I mean by gender having a social aspect to it. Every society has its own perception of what it means to be a man or a woman; so what happens to an individual who does not fit that perception?

To me that is just as bad as telling a trans person they have to be cis-gendered, because either way you are telling the individual they have to conform to society's perceptions.

Uhhh no. Being trans isn't societal, it's personal. It is who they are. Societal norms changes anywhere you go, practically almost town to town. Someone from the country would think going out and riding horses, hunting, shooting guns, sports, doing whatever is normal and anything that goes against that such as even being a Trek fan or being a gamer is not normal. Having long hair on a man may be considered not normal and that person is told to get a haircut. Society places those rules and those rules do change. Women can wear pants without anyone batting an eye for example.

But doing what you can so that outward appearence reflects who you are is not society. That applies to everything, not just the trans community.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

What this argument boils down to is "Kids are too young to know that they are trans". You know what that is? It's the "kids are too young to know they're gay" argument reheated and served in a new bowl.

If you have people in their 30's and 40's still trying to work these things out, what makes a 15 year old any better qualified?

So you'll restrict the bodily autonomy of the majority of all trans children on behalf of...whom exactly?

You bring up that straight, cisgender kids have a lot to figure out about their identities, but you'd never dream of putting a cisgender kid on puberty blockers to give him time to find out that he's *really* cisgender. No, that is a double standard you reserve exclusively for trans people.

I don't see how 'letting them figure it out for themselves' is a double standard.

Letting them figure it out for themselves is literally what trans activists are advocating for, and what the conservatives and concern trolls are fighting against."

Furthermore, the right's "concerns" about this are a smokescreen. They just don't want kids to grow up trans, period. If some kids end up killing themselves, and then their parents get to bury them in the wrong clothes with a deadname on their headstones, they view that as a bonus.

Okay, someone like that is a jerk. You will get no argument from me on that point!

But I think there are a lot of people that are leaning more towards the right because and they feel are not being addressed. They might not be anti-trans, but they have questions they feel like the liberals are not bothering to answer them.
[/quote]

I'm not a liberal, but I'm perfectly willing to answer anyone's questions about transgender children. They just might not like the answers.

[Nealithi]

I'm not a liberal, but I'm perfectly willing to answer anyone's questions about transgender children. They just might not like the answers.

You seem to come off more liberal than others. But in the name of discussion, here goes.

Most of the alphabet soup category I just do not care about. A persons interests and choices are their own until they harm another.

I am concerned on puberty blockers and shared bathrooms for different reasons.

Puberty blockers are something I just this year even heard of, so it sounds very new. One thing history has shown is we jump on new 'wonder' medicines. Then they cause some unexpected side effect and people are hurt. Forcing children to take an unknown drug for most of a decade sounds very dangerous.

Shared bathrooms. I have issues today (53) with public bathrooms with multiple stalls. Stemming from problems in grade school. Try to go to a toilet and use it and other kids roll obnoxious things under the doors and walls or climb over the tops to harass you for trying to go to the bathroom. This is all same gender yada yada. How much worse will it be if you put everyone together?

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

You may have just heard of puberty blockers, precisely because they don't concern you, but they've been used for decades to treat children with Precocious Puberty. They are well studied, safe, and hteir effects ar reverseable. And nobody is "forcing" childrent to take them. Children *choose* to take them, themselves, to deal with dysphoria.

Honestly? I expect it to be about the same. Most of the people I learn of harassing other people in the bathroom are transphobes trying to prove that somebody else doesn't belong their, up to and including taking pictures.

Does that answer your questions?

[TGLS]

Shared bathrooms. How much worse will it be if you put everyone together?

The office I work at remodelled one pair of bathrooms into a non-gendered bathroom. They made the walls and door touch the floor and removed the little gap between the door and wall. Honestly, they should have done this from the beginning.

[CmdrKing]

Shared bathrooms. How much worse will it be if you put everyone together?

The office I work at remodelled one pair of bathrooms into a non-gendered bathroom. They made the walls and door touch the floor and removed the little gap between the door and wall. Honestly, they should have done this from the beginning.

I’ve never worked an office but stories like this, and from friends who dealt with absolutely harrowing bullying and abuse when they were younger in school bathrooms, are exactly what I was thinking of. Turns out that segregating bathrooms rather than letting them be individual lets a lot of stuff be swept under the rug because “surely single gender bathrooms are safe!”

[phantom000]

I think it just boils down to what is considered normal. Normal in local communities, local society, overall society. A cis-man has to act this way to be a man, anything else is abnormal and fighting against that normalcy is not only abnormal but is directly fighting what it is be a man. Same goes for cis-women.

This is what I mean by gender having a social aspect to it. Every society has its own perception of what it means to be a man or a woman; so what happens to an individual who does not fit that perception?

To me that is just as bad as telling a trans person they have to be cis-gendered, because either way you are telling the individual they have to conform to society's perceptions.

Uhhh no. Being trans isn't societal, it's personal. It is who they are. Societal norms changes anywhere you go, practically almost town to town. Someone from the country would think going out and riding horses, hunting, shooting guns, sports, doing whatever is normal and anything that goes against that such as even being a Trek fan or being a gamer is not normal. Having long hair on a man may be considered not normal and that person is told to get a haircut. Society places those rules and those rules do change. Women can wear pants without anyone batting an eye for example.

But doing what you can so that outward appearence reflects who you are is not society. That applies to everything, not just the trans community.

Err, I'm not going to say you're wrong, because you are not. You are right. But I feel like you are missing a subtle point.

To say that gender identity is entirely social would be a huge mistake! But to say society has nothing to do with it would be inaccurate.

I think even how we perceive ourselves is influenced (not controlled, just influenced) by society because in the end society is what we are trying to either fit into or alter to fit us. Even a social outcast could be said to be influenced by it. The Counter Culture of the 1960s adopted what they saw as the antithesis of what was considered proper adult behavior.

Maybe I am going off in a completely different direction but I do wonder if these is a social aspect to these issues that is not being considered.

[phantom000]

I'm not a liberal, but I'm perfectly willing to answer anyone's questions about transgender children. They just might not like the answers.

Puberty blockers are something I just this year even heard of, so it sounds very new. One thing history has shown is we jump on new 'wonder' medicines. Then they cause some unexpected side effect and people are hurt. Forcing children to take an unknown drug for most of a decade sounds very dangerous.

This is what concerns me and why my default position is 'let them grow up first' because how much damage could a person do even by accident? True, these drugs aren't exactly new and have been used by doctors for decades. They are generally considered safe and the effects are reversible but how much of that is because they have been used by certified doctors under controlled circumstances?

Allowing someone to self-medicate their own hormone therapy, especially someone who is going through puberty, sounds like a great way to do all kinds of long term damage. There is a reason why we allow adults to smoke and drink but not teenagers.

[Nealithi]

You may have just heard of puberty blockers, precisely because they don't concern you, but they've been used for decades to treat children with Precocious Puberty. They are well studied, safe, and hteir effects ar reverseable. And nobody is "forcing" childrent to take them. Children *choose* to take them, themselves, to deal with dysphoria.

Honestly? I expect it to be about the same. Most of the people I learn of harassing other people in the bathroom are transphobes trying to prove that somebody else doesn't belong their, up to and including taking pictures.

Does that answer your questions?

Concerns more than questions. And I am less concerned on puberty blockers knowing they are older than initially believed. As later answers noted, some places are fixing some issues on public bathrooms. Though most of my problems are from children not adults.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

Further information on trans adolescents and the use of puberty blockers: https://twitter.com/DadTrans/status/1788663797059596764