Let’s see if we can discuss transgender issues without name calling. I think we can!

Maybe I’m being as naïve as when I thought we could discuss veganism vs meat eating in a civilised manner? Oh that’s right, most of us DID feel that we could discuss it in an adult manner. But is this subject even more volatile?

This post has come about because someone just called me a bigot for using the word “him”. I wrote a long response, then thought, “Actually, this is an important discussion to be having, so this needs to be a post.”

[EDIT: Since a lot of what I said has been misunderstood, I’m going to make a few clarifications, while I still can. The original text will be kept, for the sake of transparency. (No pun about the TV show Transparent is intended, but possibly that’s where some of my info on trans identities has come from.)]

First, the back story

How far back is back? I probably don’t need to go back as far as the noticeable rise in prominence of the LGBT community, and the social consequences of that. I’m sure most people will have noticed that.

So I’ll just go back to the post and comments in question. The post was by @atreyuserver, about how when she moved from Venezuela to Argentina, she noticed a much greater acceptance of other gendered people, specifically a child in her daughter’s class who was biologically male but identified as female.

She was using the words man and woman, and I find it troubling that children would be regarded in the same context as adults, as far as deciding what their final gender / sexuality might be.

So my response was:

At 6 years old, he/she is not a man or a woman, he/she is a child. In the up to 12 years before he/she becomes an adult, many things may change.

I'm all for acceptance of everybody's gender / sexuality, whatever it may be, but it scares me that people think it's normal for a child to decide they are trans at such a young age.

“With love and simplicity everything is possible, because the most valuable struggle of people is to reach and celebrate their right to be ..., simply BE.”

If this child decides later that he is actually a man after all (which he may well do, if there is no pressure on him to continue to be trans) I hope the same sentiment will apply.

In a later comment, I went on to say:

I agree with you that having the freedom to express yourself, and to be fully accepted, is wonderful. Everybody is entitled to that, whether homosexual, heterosexual, hermaphrodite, bisexual, transgender, transvestite or something different.

I support equality for all, not one group favoured over another. I also support a person's right to explore different parts of their gender identity / sexuality at different times, and change their minds about how they identify. I've seen people attacked on Steemit, because they're not the "right" kind of transgender. That to me is very sad.

The next response was a comment from @tygertyger

You say you support it and yet you make sure to call her a him! So you really do not support the rights of all. You only support them if they fit your box! Fact is that most grown up trans people will tell you that they knew from very early childhood that they were trans and they suffered horribly having people tell them they were not! And yes there are the occasional crazy parents that push an agenda but you have crazy people who push crazy religions on kinds and other stuff as well! This makes trans kids no more or no less real! and yes you also have the occasional child who changes their mind but most do not, and yet so many of you people hang on the minority ignoring the vast majority as if your life depended on it! Puberty blockers are there to give a child time to make sure but it will not kill you or anyone else to allow a child to live in the gender they need to express it might however kill the child if you do not. So stop being a bigot ..

Was I being a bigot?

I truly don’t think I was, but maybe I’m mistaken. After all, my knowledge of the LGBT community is not as good as someone who is part of it. But surely the way to greater understanding is to be able to talk about it, without name calling?

My response

I typed quite a long reply to you, and then realised this is a discussion that needs to be had a bit more widely. So I'll turn what I wrote into a post and drop the link here in a day or two. But in short, calling each other names doesn't open up any kind of discussion or understanding. I have no interest in putting other people down. If I spend my time discussing something, I want it to be in an open minded way that increases communication. I hope we can do that, it will just be a little later.

My longer reply

First, I want to stress that this is my current opinion, but I want to engender wider discussion of this issue, and I’m open to the possibility that my opinion could change with greater knowledge.

"Him" is a word, not an attitude of mind. Him/he/man are words that have been used for centuries to refer to humankind of all sexes. Saying it shouldn't be so doesn't make it not so, or allow you to infer anything about the attitudes of those using them. You think I'm being bigoted. I think you're being either pedantic, overly sensitive or looking for offence. But let's put those personal opinions aside and talk about what actually matters.

First off, I didn't say "him" to the child's face, but in the spirit of having a conversation with an adult. I never said trans kids weren't real. I never said anyone should be forced into anything. All I said was that was whatever his/her FINAL decision was, it should be honoured. How is that bigoted?

A question for you that has been puzzling me.

Please take this is the spirit it's meant, of increasing my understanding, not as an attack. Through most of my life, the shortened word "trannie" has meant a transvestite. In other words, a man who likes (no, needs) to periodically dress in woman's clothing. Such a person may be homosexual, or heterosexual, or MAY be transgender too but is not necessarily so. Agreed so far?

Nowadays, there seems to be no talk of transvestites, only of transgender. Of course transgender has been around for a long time as well, but it wasn't as common as lesbian, gay, bi, transvestite.

[EDIT: Do I really have to spell out that I wasn’t saying transvestite and transgender were the same thing? I was saying that they are so different that I would like it if people always used clear language to differentiate them. On another note, thanks to the commenter that referred to transvestites as cross dressers. That’s an easy to understand clarification. The commenter who referred to transvestites as drag queens and later as frank’n’furter, on the other hand, seemed disrespectful and inaccurate. Here’s how I would see the relationship between these categories:
• Cross dresser = a person of either biological sex who sometimes or always likes to dress in a manner that is more the societal norm for the other sex (ie quite a large group)
• Transvestite = someone who has a psychological need to cross dress at times (ie a subset of cross dressers)
• Drag queen = a more flamboyant subset of cross dressers, who may or may not be transvestite.
Not saying I’m right, just saying that’s how I see it.]

My question - how do you know that a child who is not yet sexual is transgender and not transvestite?

Children are suggestible. They can have trouble distinguishing between what is real and what isn’t. I’m not saying that there are no trans children who correctly identify themselves, but that there could also be a lot who jump to an incorrect conclusion. As a society, do we not need to protect those children, just as much as we need to protect truly trans children?

[EDIT: I still stand by this question. From the outside, how can we be sure a child is trans? Yes, a trans child may well know exactly what they are at a young age. But many other children might THINK they are the other gender, for a variety of other reasons, including being a (potential) transvestite.]

And that sparks another train of thought.

Let's take the example of a boy who likes to wear dresses and has a more feminine attitude in a lot of ways. Some possible scenarios:

• He is left to go through puberty naturally, he finds he is actually heterosexual, and just likes to dress as a woman sometimes. In these (hopefully) more enlightened times, this is something a female marriage partner could understand and accept as an integral part of their marriage. Good result.
• He goes through puberty, and finds he isn’t drawn to women as sexual partners, but he also doesn't feel the need to live as a woman all the time. He has gay relationships, sometimes lives as a woman, sometimes as a man. More enlightened times, etc, etc. Good result. [EDIT - with hindsight, I see I was sloppy and misleading here. What I meant and should have been more specific on was: In these (hopefully) more enlightened times, this would be an understood and accepted lifestyle choice.]
• He/she goes through puberty, and finds she still has a deep need to live life as a woman. Surely she can still go through the process of reassignment? Not what I would call a good result, exactly, as the physical trauma of that would be substantial, but an acceptable one from her point of view, maybe the only acceptable one.
• He/she makes the decision to take puberty blockers, so never finds out for sure what changes, if any, puberty would bring. He/she goes through reassignment, physical trauma, and NEVER knows whether there was actually another viable option. Now this is the scenario that worries me. How is this a good result?
[EDIT: Please note I said SOME. I am aware that there are many other potential outcomes, but as far I can see, these are all still possibilities.]

Another question

It would appear that there is a huge increase in transgender people. There is no biological or evolutionary reason for that that I can think of. So what is the reason?

Investigating the reasons isn't attacking the people affected. If one person is trans, that's how they are and it needs to be accepted. But if a whole generation is trans, there is probably something wrong, and it needs to be talked about.

[EDIT: I’m not saying a whole generation is at this time. I’m saying what if that were to happen? Could we talk about the reasons then? Or shall we talk about them now? I note that one commenter referred to it as a birth defect. I was surprised that’s how the LGBT community regards it. But if so, all the more reason to look into why it’s happening.]

In summary

I think most reasonable people would agree with acceptance for all, regardless of gender or sexual orientation.

But that doesn’t mean we can’t openly discuss why this is happening.

There is a difference between acceptance of the reality and difficulty of some people’s lives, and getting bent out of shape because someone used the “wrong” word or said the wrong thing out of ignorance.

And there is a difference between acceptance and pushing an agenda. Between acceptance and creating an expectation.

What do you think? Am I being a bigot? If so, why?

Can we discuss the many aspects of this without taking offence and getting defensive?

Thanks for reading

Images from Pixabay or by myself or @sift666, unless otherwise stated.

Follow me for more health, nutrition, food, lifestyle and recipe posts. For an archive of 2016 & 2017 posts, by category, see my last post of 2017.

Contact me in SteemitChat to ask about one on one nutritional coaching or EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) sessions by Skype. (Then put a comment on my most recent post, so I know to find you.) Steem, other altcoins or Paypal accepted.

If you’re from New Zealand (Aotearoa) and are looking for other kiwis, use #teamnz as one of your tags // check out other posts with #kiwi or #teamnz tags // follow @teamnz // or join the South Pacific channel on Discord. There is an old list of kiwis on this post.