Jump to content

Menu

Help me understand--teen girls becoming boys


Ali in OR
 Share

Recommended Posts

This can all be so difficult. My son is transgender but his issues have zero to do with gender and he actually bucks the gender stereotypes for himself living as a male every chance he gets. I think the correct term for him is transsexual but that's not my call. I don't think I get to decide for anyone else who they are because I just don't know. I'm not living their life or know their stories. So, I am supportive of how anyone identifies. 

I can say I'm not comfortable with medical interventions on the very young. We started therapy for ds at 9 years old and dealt with some rather horrific years, but he didn't start testosterone until he was 17. He hasn't had surgery yet but wants to. I've told him he has to make all those medical plans himself as an adult (he's now 19) but I will 100% support him, be there, and help him recover. Right now he's in college and I'm sure sometime in the near future he will have top surgery but for now he's doing well. He goes to a clinic that absolutely does not do surgery on minors. They do allow hormones at 16 with parental consent. They are vigilant on blood work and check ups to make sure all is well. He goes four times a year. 

Even though I'm not comfortable with certain things, I would never think myself a better parent for choosing a different path. I think most of us do the best we can as we're going through this. I will always choose to be supportive of how others wish to identify and I will always choose to stand up for their right to be whoever they are. I get the very real issues of dealing with some doing serious medical interventions very early and I do wish we could come up with a way that it was reserved for the those who truly need it that young. I don't know if I believe all who are getting it very young today really need it but, again, I'm in that space where it's not up to me to decide that because I just don't really know. 

  • Like 11
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Tanaqui said:

 

If it's a friend-of-a-friend might I suggest that you don't know the whole story and it's entirely possible that there is some completely medical reason for this that you're simply not privy to?

 

Different poster here, and I know of someone who had the double mastectomy that young. Possibly 16 instead of 15, but definitely not of age. No medical reason as per their own statements and they were and are doing the hormones as well. 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Hoggirl said:

It is the medical/surgical aspect at a young age that shocks me.  I have a friend with a friend whose daughter is getting a double mastectomy at the age of 15 over her spring break. Obviously friend’s friend has to give permission for this given her daughter’s age.  I would label this mutilation.  I really cannot imagine a physician consenting to do this.  

This part worries me, too.  I have an acquaintance who takes her genetically female child for hormone injections, so the child can transition to male.  The child is 14.  

The child also has a mom that is very vocal about her belief that being female is a terrible burden and emphasizes all the terrible things that happen to women, (assault, harassment, unequal pay, etc).  I can't help but wonder how much influence mom has over the choice to transition away from female. Because after listening to mom talk, it feels like the kid is moving *away* from femaleness rather than toward maleness. 

  • Like 1
  • Sad 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

"More common" and "common" are two very different things, though.

There are about 20 million teenagers between the ages of 15 and 19 in the USA today. If about 1% of them are transgender males (a generous estimate - I rounded up the approximate percentage of transgender teens and then divided in half) then we have a population of about 100,000. Out of 100,000, 30 young people having surgeries is, like I said, barely a handful. That is less than a tenth of a percent of the teenage transgender population. (For comparison purposes, nearly half of transgender teens have attempted suicide at least once: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-transgender-teen-suicide/trans-teens-much-more-likely-to-attempt-suicide-idUSKCN1LS39K )

Edited by Tanaqui
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Tanaqui said:

For comparison purposes, nearly half of transgender teens have attempted suicide at least once: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-transgender-teen-suicide/trans-teens-much-more-likely-to-attempt-suicide-idUSKCN1LS39K )

And this is why I choose to stand by whatever supportive methods a family deems appropriate.  I can have my own ideas about what’s “right” or what’s “ideal” when we’re talking about minors, but my experiences with teens, teen suicide, and LGBTQ teens has made it that I will accept just about any attempts to keep teenagers alive.

That doesn’t mean I think lining up to take drastic measures for Q kids is the way to go. It does mean I can’t get inside and know what an individual is going through. I do know I would do nearly anything to save my babies, and I assume the same for other parents.

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

How many teenage girls having mastectomies is enough to start worrying? Keeping in mind that figures like the one from Tavistock showing an unprecedented explosion in the number of girls identifying as trans. 30+ this year = 600 (per year) in less than a decade if the trajectory of teen girls accessing gender clinics continues.

If increasing numbers of teen girls (especially same sex attracted and/or with ASD) are looking at themselves and the world and thinking suicide/self-harm or mastectomy are their options, that is concerning imo.

  • Like 11
Link to comment
Share on other sites

10 minutes ago, StellaM said:

I've seen it boiled down to 'better a live son than a dead daughter' and I think that is despicable emotional blackmail. There is a huge problem when hormonal and surgical transition is promoted as the only way to save 'our babies'.

 

To be clear, I “promote” no such thing, and don’t see it promoted in my circles. I simply don’t pretend to know better than someone else what is needed/best/right for their situation or that it’s any of my freaking business what their private risk assessment has been. I am certainly against dead kids.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

And this is why I choose to stand by whatever supportive methods a family deems appropriate.  I can have my own ideas about what’s “right” or what’s “ideal” when we’re talking about minors, but my experiences with teens, teen suicide, and LGBTQ teens has made it that I will accept just about any attempts to keep teenagers alive.

That doesn’t mean I think lining up to take drastic measures for Q kids is the way to go. It does mean I can’t get inside and know what an individual is going through. I do know I would do nearly anything to save my babies, and I assume the same for other parents.

 

There isn't really any good evidence that taking these kinds of measures actually improves the situation though - in fact it seems like it doesn't.  Recommendations for this kind of response don't really come out of trying to prevent suicide.  The other thing is, this is not how we respond to other people with serious issues who are suicidal, it really raises the question, why the difference?  The reason I think is tht it is being promoted on totally different grounds.

  • Like 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Carrie12345 said:

To be clear, I “promote” no such thing, and don’t see it promoted in my circles. I simply don’t pretend to know better than someone else what is needed/best/right for their situation or that it’s any of my freaking business what their private risk assessment has been. I am certainly against dead kids.

I think part of the problem is that we are treating kids as if they themselves know what is best--letting teens who often have underlying mental illness make major medical and life decisions based on peer influence and online discussion boards.

I have had way more experience than I would wish on anyone with suicidality in people close to me. People in a suicidal state do not have, at that time, fully functional reasoning ability; their brains are impaired. And it is these kids who, in spite of immaturity and suggestibility and brain malfunction are supposed to know how to fix their own problems? The same kid who thinks suicide is a reasonable solution can be trusted to know what is best for themself?

Love the kid. Support the kid. Teach self regulation and distress tolerance skills. Try to figure out possible physical issues underlying their mental health struggles. Be the adults and work to help the child live with the reality of their body and world and be who they actually are within that context.

I do not think that telling kids they have an infinite number of identities to choose from is at all helpful. Each of us has an identity--I am me, myself, a person who has a body and who experiences life. Some of my experiences that make up the me include my attachment to family, the places I have lived, the language I speak, the faith I embrace. Sometimes experience includes distress, including distress over one's body, distress over social roles and expectations, distress over peer relationships. Sometimes experience includes distress generated by our own nervous system. These experiences are all part of me, realities I can accept and work with and through in living my life.

  • Like 19
  • Thanks 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have to say I live in an urban area that is LGBTQ friendly and we know a number of trans teen and youth.  From what I've seen, transition surgery is not at all typical or standard in clinics here for minors under 18  I can imagine cases where health professionals, parents, with a youth might make a non-typical decision.  Having know a couple of families more intimately with a trans child or teen, from what I've seen these are very difficult transitions.  So I'd rather have a live son than a dead daughter might sound like emotional blackmail for some.  But it is reality for others.   These families are judged constantly just trying to parent the kid they were given instead of the kid that society expects.

I have seen a couple girls who were talking in more gender neutral terms during middle school identify again as female by adulthood.  Which is fine.  

Mental health professionals have certain guidlines for working with gender dysphoria youth.  I don't know why people assume they know better than trained professionals and loving parents doing the best they can in hard circumstances.  These discussions on this topic just go in circles.  So I hope it is closed soon.  

  • Like 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The thing I'm trying to wrap my head around is the general failure to recognize that there is a difference between someone struggling with that sense of wrongness of their gender assigned at birth that has been labeled "gender dysphoria" or "gender identity disorder", who as a result of that and/or the stigma faced by transgender people, then grapple with depression that is largely situational, many to the point of suicidality, for whom transition and acceptance is going to heal their depression, and someone who has anxiety and depression and a poorly formed sense of self, who reaches for answers based on the experiences of others and isn't going to have their imbalanced brain chemicals fixed by medical or social transition, which are going to be present regardless of gender. Never mind someone who may be transgender and have a mental illness which has nothing to do with their gender. The DSM has no guidance for professionals to suss this out.

 

  • Like 11
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, StellaM said:

Having had plenty of experience with suicidality in teens, I absolutely abhor the way it is weaponised in the service of particular approaches to gender. 

Suicidality in any cohort is a mental health issue requiring professional support to help a teen cope with intense emotion, increase resiliency and improve mental health - these are skills that generalise to any population at risk, including GNC teens. 

I've seen it boiled down to 'better a live son than a dead daughter' and I think that is despicable emotional blackmail. There is a huge problem when hormonal and surgical transition is promoted as the only way to save 'our babies'. The fact is that there is very little research on other methods of coping with dysphoric feelings which may or may not persist, as such research is seen as poltically unpalatable. 

The rates in any case are not particular to trans kids but generalise out to include kids whose sexualities are non traditional, with GNC girls and bi girls most at risk. And - again - correlation is not clear, with one possible route to gender confusion and susceptibility to social contagion being co-morbid mental health conditions which sometimes include symptoms of suicidality. 

 

 

 

 

When discussions can't be had and research can't be done for political reasons (genuine ethical concerns would be a different matter) in a given area, my first question is "Who's profiting by preventing it?" Certainly not the people suffering in the situation.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 minutes ago, Ravin said:

The thing I'm trying to wrap my head around is the general failure to recognize that there is a difference between someone struggling with that sense of wrongness of their gender assigned at birth that has been labeled "gender dysphoria" or "gender identity disorder", who as a result of that and/or the stigma faced by transgender people, then grapple with depression that is largely situational, many to the point of suicidality, for whom transition and acceptance is going to heal their depression, and someone who has anxiety and depression and a poorly formed sense of self, who reaches for answers based on the experiences of others and isn't going to have their imbalanced brain chemicals fixed by medical or social transition, which are going to be present regardless of gender. Never mind someone who may be transgender and have a mental illness which has nothing to do with their gender. The DSM has no guidance for professionals to suss this out.

 

Yes, this is a big part of my concern.

When dysphoria has a sudden onset and presents alongside often pre-existing mental health difficulties, why assume that transition is going to resolve anything?

Why neglect the realities of peer contagion and suggestibility among teens?

This is very different from the case of someone who has had longterm persistent dysphoria.

  • Like 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

 

Mental health professionals have certain guidlines for working with gender dysphoria youth.  I don't know why people assume they know better than trained professionals and loving parents doing the best they can in hard circumstances.  

Mental health professionals do not all follow the guidelines. The guidelines themselves are not necessarily based on rigorous evidence.

Mental health problems are extremely complex, actual evidence based treatment is harder to come by than many imagine. Really the whole thing is a discouraging swampy morass.

  • Like 9
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 minutes ago, Ravin said:

The thing I'm trying to wrap my head around is the general failure to recognize that there is a difference between someone struggling with that sense of wrongness of their gender assigned at birth that has been labeled "gender dysphoria" or "gender identity disorder", who as a result of that and/or the stigma faced by transgender people, then grapple with depression that is largely situational, many to the point of suicidality, for whom transition and acceptance is going to heal their depression, and someone who has anxiety and depression and a poorly formed sense of self, who reaches for answers based on the experiences of others and isn't going to have their imbalanced brain chemicals fixed by medical or social transition, which are going to be present regardless of gender. Never mind someone who may be transgender and have a mental illness which has nothing to do with their gender. The DSM has no guidance for professionals to suss this out.

 

Yes, I still remember when our ds actually used the word transgender when he was 16. I didn't believe it or like it and thought it was just a symptom of his severe depression and anxiety. When dh and I met with the therapist she, thankfully, was very honest and said she didn't know if he was or not. She also told us he told her he wasn't 100% sure of it either. Her recommendation to us at that time was to try out the name and pronouns he wanted at home (but only at home) to see if it made any difference at all. I truly don't think any of us thought it would help. It didn't take all that long for us to see we were wrong though and within 6 months he wanted to transition socially to everyone else and within another 3 months he no longer needed medication for his anxiety and depression and he  seemed like a new, more normal and happy, person.

So, I know we were right in our we handled everything simply based on how he is today 3 years later. I do think there are many others who aren't so lucky and I think it's a very tricky thing today. I wish we knew more and there was more help out there. Ds has actually decided to double major and is adding psychology because he now feels that's where he needs to be because of the lack of good therapists - especially those for the LBGT community. 

  • Like 9
Link to comment
Share on other sites

42 minutes ago, FuzzyCatz said:

I have to say I live in an urban area that is LGBTQ friendly and we know a number of trans teen and youth.  From what I've seen, transition surgery is not at all typical or standard in clinics here for minors under 18  I can imagine cases where health professionals, parents, with a youth might make a non-typical decision.  Having know a couple of families more intimately with a trans child or teen, from what I've seen these are very difficult transitions.  So I'd rather have a live son than a dead daughter might sound like emotional blackmail for some.  But it is reality for others.   These families are judged constantly just trying to parent the kid they were given instead of the kid that society expects.

I have seen a couple girls who were talking in more gender neutral terms during middle school identify again as female by adulthood.  Which is fine.  

Mental health professionals have certain guidlines for working with gender dysphoria youth.  I don't know why people assume they know better than trained professionals and loving parents doing the best they can in hard circumstances.  These discussions on this topic just go in circles.  So I hope it is closed soon.  

 

I think it's important to be able to discuss a 2000%+ increase in girls identifying as trans - especially in an unprecedented form (rapid onset) for which we have very little research (and attempts at research are branded transphobic). The trained professionals have no training in this, it's new, but some of them are making money by performing mastectomies on distressed teenagers.

This isn't attacking individual families, this is discussing a concerning societal trend. I have a teenage daughter and I am concerned about a world she is growing up in where an enormous spike in girls her age are deciding between suicide and mastectomies. Accepting that as progressive is horrifying to me, at a visceral level.

Constantly shrugging it off as not really happening much and kids are just so much more progressive with their gender expressions now, when we - like the op - see with our own eyes and are concerned, is not helpful to anyone.

I hope this thread stays open and people continue to discuss things in good faith.

  • Like 10
Link to comment
Share on other sites

36 minutes ago, Joker said:

Yes, I still remember when our ds actually used the word transgender when he was 16. I didn't believe it or like it and thought it was just a symptom of his severe depression and anxiety. When dh and I met with the therapist she, thankfully, was very honest and said she didn't know if he was or not. She also told us he told her he wasn't 100% sure of it either. Her recommendation to us at that time was to try out the name and pronouns he wanted at home (but only at home) to see if it made any difference at all. I truly don't think any of us thought it would help. It didn't take all that long for us to see we were wrong though and within 6 months he wanted to transition socially to everyone else and within another 3 months he no longer needed medication for his anxiety and depression and he  seemed like a new, more normal and happy, person.

So, I know we were right in our we handled everything simply based on how he is today 3 years later. I do think there are many others who aren't so lucky and I think it's a very tricky thing today. I wish we knew more and there was more help out there. Ds has actually decided to double major and is adding psychology because he now feels that's where he needs to be because of the lack of good therapists - especially those for the LBGT community. 

As I see things, your child has a seriously disabling dysphoric condition that makes it hard for them to function; this condition is successfully treated in their case through social transition.

Which is a wonderful thing. I'm willing to do a lot of bending over backwards to help make life workable for people with all sorts of disabilities. They are valuable and worthy human beings deserving of consideration and respect.

I'm confused though when simultaneously there is social pressure not only to accommodate the disability but to pretend that it isn't a disability after all and that female bodied persons really are completely male and male bodied persons really are completely female. I'm confused when there is legal pressure to place self identified gender over biological sex as the more fundamental category needing protection.

I'm totally fine with protecting trans people under disability laws. I'm not OK with erasing the categories of biological male and female.

 

Edited by maize
  • Like 9
Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, Hoggirl said:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2018/07/when-a-child-says-shes-trans/561749/

Here is a loooooong article I found from The Atlantic.  It’s very thorough and presents several POV.

A quote from the article is: 

It’s become more common for surgeons to perform top surgeries on teenagers as young as 16 if they have parental approval. The medical norms are more conservative when it comes to bottom surgeries; Wpath says they should be performed only on adults who have been living in their gender role for at least one year.

One other quote:

Despite the fact that she was a minor for much of the process, she says, her doctors more or less did as she told them.

It doesn't really surprise me. Doctors want to do SOMETHING (and I want to believe that the vast majority have their patients' best interests at heart).

Surgeons want to perform surgery.

Look at all the docs who prescribed unnecessary antibiotics bc they just want to do something or they feel pressured by the patient.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

18 hours ago, goldberry said:

I won't say much here, except that while I am in favor of transgendered people being treated with more respect, the trend of "trying transgender" as an answer to feelings of not fitting in with your peer group or with your sexual biology is concerning. I think that late or rapid onset gender dysphoria is a whole separate situation from early onset.  When they are treated exactly the same, I don't see that as helpful.

This is my stance on this too. I think early onset is often related to actual biological issues such as hormone issues prenatally, possibly chromosomal issues, etc. A real percentage of the population is biologically intersex even if they don't know it, and I think that relates to early onset gender issues. 

But this later stuff, i DO think it is tied to the hyper feminine stuff with girls marketing and the reverse with boys. I grew up idolizing guys with long hair and eyeliner and I wore baggy jeans and men's flannel shirts. But I never thought that made the guys girls or me a guy. NEVER crossed my mind. 

Now, it is like all girls are supposed to giggle and talk about glitter constantly and guys are supposed to do nothing but play violent video games and burp. 

One of the big reasons I'm glad we homeschool is avoiding that. My niece is the same age as my DD and she actually freaking quit her soccer team because it was mostly boys and they are "icky". Meanwhile, my DD is the only girl in her cub scout den and has never said a word about it, they just all hang out. And she can sit there, surrounded by boys, with long hair, and a sequined jacket over her uniform, and beat them all at the woodworking and knife skills 🙂  

 

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 minutes ago, maize said:

As I see things, your child has a seriously disabling dysphoric condition that makes it hard for them to function; this condition is successfully treated in their case through social transition.

Which is a wonderful thing. I'm willing to do a lot of bending over backwards to help make life workable for people with all sorts of disabilities. They are valuable and worthy human beings deserving of consideration and respect.

I'm confused though when simultaneously there is social pressure not only to accommodate the disability but to pretend that it isn't a disability after all and that female bodied persons really are completely male and male bodied persons really are completely female. I'm confused when there is legal pressure to place self identified gender over biological sex as the more fundamental category needing protection.

I'm totally fine with protecting trans people under disability laws. I'm not OK with erasing the categories of biological male and female.

 

I don't view my son as being disabled. I did when he had crippling anxiety and depression, but now he's just a normal, happy, thriving, college kid. 

I'm glad you know what you are ok and not ok with. I have my own things and they are different from yours. I do not think my transgender son, or any of the other transgender people I know, are erasing anyone. 

I don't see any need to go round this topic again here on this board. It gets us nowhere and just ends us with a lot of anger from many. I had a few things to share that I thought were relevant to the original discussion but I have zero interest in actually debating this topic again here. 

  • Like 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Ravin said:

The thing I'm trying to wrap my head around is the general failure to recognize that there is a difference between someone struggling with that sense of wrongness of their gender assigned at birth that has been labeled "gender dysphoria" or "gender identity disorder", who as a result of that and/or the stigma faced by transgender people, then grapple with depression that is largely situational, many to the point of suicidality, for whom transition and acceptance is going to heal their depression, and someone who has anxiety and depression and a poorly formed sense of self, who reaches for answers based on the experiences of others and isn't going to have their imbalanced brain chemicals fixed by medical or social transition, which are going to be present regardless of gender. Never mind someone who may be transgender and have a mental illness which has nothing to do with their gender. The DSM has no guidance for professionals to suss this out.

 

This is excellent. I think many people are tossing all the people in the same pot and treating them all the same. It takes a skilled parent and therapist to tease out these issues.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I will be interested in what these conversations will be like in 20 or 30 years, and compare it to how homosexuality has been viewed in the past (and may still be viewed by some as scandalous).

Is there really an epidemic of female teens wanting to be male, or has there always been and now they feel safer speaking out?

While I would not support surgical alterations of a teen, I really don't understand all the uproar or care why someone else's child identifies with a gender that does not match their biological sex.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Joker said:

I don't view my son as being disabled. I did when he had crippling anxiety and depression, but now he's just a normal, happy, thriving, college kid. 

Your child is thriving because of medical intervention and social accommodations.

That is how disabilities and accommodations work.

Take away the interventions and presumably the child would no longer be thriving.

I do not understand why this condition must be viewed as somehow entirely different from every other condition that causes distress and functional limitations requiring intervention and accommodation.

It may be that the word disability is itself problematic, it is a word that carries a lot of baggage. I'm using it to mean "a condition that requires intervention and accommodation in order for the affected person to thrive". It is the term used in our legal frameworks to provide for protections and accommodations for such individuals.

Edited by maize
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

12 hours ago, MissLemon said:

This part worries me, too.  I have an acquaintance who takes her genetically female child for hormone injections, so the child can transition to male.  The child is 14.  

The child also has a mom that is very vocal about her belief that being female is a terrible burden and emphasizes all the terrible things that happen to women, (assault, harassment, unequal pay, etc).  I can't help but wonder how much influence mom has over the choice to transition away from female. Because after listening to mom talk, it feels like the kid is moving *away* from femaleness rather than toward maleness. 

 

This is why I think doctors have an ethical obligation to be asking serious questions when the patient is a minor interested in physical modifications.  There are parents who carry their own issues, as well as parents who feel very pressured not to ask too many questions so that they don't appear as not being supportive.  Parents get attacked when they ask too many questions, even if they are simply trying to hash things out carefully with their children the way they would any other issue.  Doctors need to be the ones stepping up on this issue I think.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

17 hours ago, Bluegoat said:

The way things like fandom and body modification in general have been drawn into creating ones identity - it becomes too a capitalist activity.  

I do think capitalism and commercialism and money in general have always had, and continue to have a huge influence on the ideas of gender and identity, and I think it's in general a pretty awful thing. 

  • Like 6
Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, maize said:

Your child is thriving because of medical intervention and social accommodations.

That is how disabilities and accommodations work.

Take away the interventions and presumably the child would no longer be thriving.

I do not understand why this condition must be viewed as somehow entirely different from every other condition that causes distress and functional limitations requiring intervention and accommodation.

It may be that the word disability is itself problematic, it is a word that carries a lot of baggage. I'm using it to mean "a condition that requires intervention and accommodation in order for the affected person to thrive". It is the term used in our legal frameworks to provide for protections and accommodations for such individuals.

Maybe it's viewed differently because when many talk of accommodations for trans individuals it's really about othering them and not really about accommodation. 

Many seem to say that trans individuals can be who they are but they need to do so in this other bathroom and in this other space and they need to call themselves something other than male or female. That doesn't really sound very accommodating to me.

How many other disabilities are treated the same way? 

  • Like 1
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

A person I knew from another culture told me their traditional culture had concepts of boy-girl or woman-man as a different sex / gender — accepted as far as I could understand as such.  Not related to surgery since it predated  that.  Possibly had had roles as shaman type people or other roles in society that were neither standard male nor standard female for that society.

I don’t think public lavatories were an issue for the traditional culture being described.  

I cannot speak to the truth of this, but found it interesting.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, City Mouse said:

I will be interested in what these conversations will be like in 20 or 30 years, and compare it to how homosexuality has been viewed in the past (and may still be viewed by some as scandalous).

Is there really an epidemic of female teens wanting to be male, or has there always been and now they feel safer speaking out?

While I would not support surgical alterations of a teen, I really don't understand all the uproar or care why someone else's child identifies with a gender that does not match their biological sex.

 

The way this manifests doesn't really support that it is suddenly people feeling like they can speak out - it occurs in clumps more like suicide pacts and eating disorders.  

No one really even has a medical sense of what "gender" actually might be, which is a kind of problem is saying it's a basic medical problem that has always been around.  There are plenty of sets of symptoms that have been attached to diagnosis, and then they find the way they imagined they were related was just completely false.  

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, goldberry said:

 

This is why I think doctors have an ethical obligation to be asking serious questions when the patient is a minor interested in physical modifications.  There are parents who carry their own issues, as well as parents who feel very pressured not to ask too many questions so that they don't appear as not being supportive.  Parents get attacked when they ask too many questions, even if they are simply trying to hash things out carefully with their children the way they would any other issue.  Doctors need to be the ones stepping up on this issue I think.

 

THis seems to be not happening though in many places.  I know the lady who runs the children's gender clinic here, and she's increasingly considered sort of a big deal in the medical gender world, getting interviewed as an expert etc.  Her view is that it's wrong to question the gender identification of kids and teens, even in therapy - it goes against the "affirm and support" model.  If you say this is wrong, she tells you that this is the accepted and approved correct protocol for this issue.  (Of course it is, because the more conservative clinics that encourage kids to wait or try and be happy as they are have been shut down and are branded conversion therapy.) But I don't think she is talking out of her a$$ on this, as in she thinks it but no one else does.  It seems to be the most common approach now.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, Pen said:

A person I knew from another culture told me their traditional culture had concepts of boy-girl or woman-man as a different sex / gender — accepted as far as I could understand as such.  Not related to surgery since it predated  that.  Possibly had had roles as shaman type people or other roles in society that were neither standard male nor standard female for that society.

I don’t think public lavatories were an issue for the traditional culture being described.  

I cannot speak to the truth of this, but found it interesting.  

 

It's difficult to compare these kinds of approaches to what we are seeing in our culture.  There are a lot of differences in the basic social structure etc that mean the issues are just different.  There is no question of people taking hormones or having surgery.  There are no claims being female is not about being the class of people who become pregnant, or being male is being about being the class that impregnantes others. There is no question, as you say, of ignoring sex-based protections in law or the constitution.  

So - what does that leave you with?  Cosmetic gender expression?  Most people don't care uch about that now - when they do it is generally because it is used to claim something about one of those controversial areas.

ETA:  there have been complaints by people from such cultures that they are being used as inappropriate examples in this public discussion - much as intersex people have complained.  So - there is that too.

Edited by Bluegoat
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

5 hours ago, City Mouse said:

I will be interested in what these conversations will be like in 20 or 30 years, and compare it to how homosexuality has been viewed in the past (and may still be viewed by some as scandalous).

Is there really an epidemic of female teens wanting to be male, or has there always been and now they feel safer speaking out?

While I would not support surgical alterations of a teen, I really don't understand all the uproar or care why someone else's child identifies with a gender that does not match their biological sex.

 

It's not about it being scandalous. Feminists have long been fighting for freedom from gendered presentation.

You don't have to believe the numbers, but they are there in black and white. 1 clinic. 2600% rise in referrals in less than a decade. The Williams institute estimates trans adults as 0.6% of the US population, why is it 10% amongst girls in the OP's classes? Transsexual people have always been among us, so too gender non conforming people (people who do not perform the cultural role assigned to their sex - either through choice or coercion), this is a new modality and these girls deserve careful and specific understanding imo.

I don't care if an individual identifies with a different gender, I think what that means needs to be parsed out much more explicitly before law changes or body modifications. What is gender, what does it mean to identify with one and what relation does that have with the physical reality of living in a sexed body in our society?

  • Like 3
  • Thanks 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

It’s trendy to be trans.  I’m not interested in the pile on either. I think what I think and I don’t care if it’s PC or not. 🤷‍♀️ 

I don’t care what people want to be called.  I will call them he or she, pick one and stick with it .  I don’t care, but I’ll go to jail before I’m forced to use nonsense words. 

I don’t care how people want to dress.  Make yourself happy.  But I don’t believe it’s ethical for doctors to alter bodies for this. It doesn’t really change biology.  It’s a lifelong battle with negative health consequences. 

There are many ways to be male or female.  Those should be accepted.  The medical approach trend is very sad. 

Edited by laundrycrisis
  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

56 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

A lot of cultures shoved gay men off into a 'third gender' role, because being a gay man was pretty much unacceptable. 

A lot of people like to romanticise these things, but honestly, they remind me more of Iran and their treatment of gay men than anything else.

 

I don’t think it had anything at all to do with Iran.  

Right now “transitioning” to another gender seems to be what is being romanticized.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

13 hours ago, StellaM said:

Having had plenty of experience with suicidality in teens, I absolutely abhor the way it is weaponised in the service of particular approaches to gender. 

Suicidality in any cohort is a mental health issue requiring professional support to help a teen cope with intense emotion, increase resiliency and improve mental health - these are skills that generalise to any population at risk, including GNC teens. 

I've seen it boiled down to 'better a live son than a dead daughter' and I think that is despicable emotional blackmail. There is a huge problem when hormonal and surgical transition is promoted as the only way to save 'our babies'. The fact is that there is very little research on other methods of coping with dysphoric feelings which may or may not persist, as such research is seen as poltically unpalatable. 

The rates in any case are not particular to trans kids but generalise out to include kids whose sexualities are non traditional, with GNC girls and bi girls most at risk. And - again - correlation is not clear, with one possible route to gender confusion and susceptibility to social contagion being co-morbid mental health conditions which sometimes include symptoms of suicidality. 

 

 

 

 

The bolded says what I have been thinking for a long time.  Conversations are just shut down because of the suicide risk.  

  • Like 5
Link to comment
Share on other sites

OP here. Just want to say that I really appreciate the conversation and think it is more valuable when there are different views, so thanks everyone for participating civilly. A few days ago I didn't even have the vocabulary to describe what I'm seeing, but thanks to you all I'm much more aware of these trends now. Thanks.

  • Like 7
Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

Nope, I don't keep folders of data. Some posters here are way more organised in that way though, so maybe they can ? 

All I know from my reading  is that transgender individuals are no more and no less likely to be intersex than people who are not transgender, and that many intersex organisations (most of whom fight to NOT medicalise children and are against surgery on minors etc) strongly dislike being used in discussions of trans issues, which they see as separate.

Just wondered if you remembered where you had seen it. Iv'e seen a few sites saying that, but no actual statistics. And given that many people who are intersex don't KNOW they are intersex, I figure it would be hard to really calculate anyway. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

55 minutes ago, StellaM said:

 

Iran gives gay men the chance to transition. In a homophobic society, it is not unusual to find gay men 'hived off' form 'real men', and cast as a third gender, rather than accept them as also 'real men'. Just to say that 'third genders' aren't always as progressive as they are made out to be.

I agree that some girls are romanticising transition. 

 

 

Well, I think this related to one of many North American Native American/ Indian nations / tribes local to my area.  With 3 main options of roles.  Having a third option that had a place in the society sounded more positive than negative.  In a world that mostly involved hunting fishing male.  Child care gathering cooking female.  It gave a third option.

we no longer live such lifestyles and limited jobs— but recognizing that someone may be not clearly in either the male or the female gender, sex, role seemed like it fit reality better than the idea that as in title to thread “teen girls” are “becoming boys”.

Maybe at some point surgical procedures and DNA manipulation will be so complete that there won’t be a difference, but currently no matter the pronoun and names used it isn’t identical.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Numbers I've seen put people with intersex conditions at around 0.06% of the population and the Williams institute estimates trans identifying people at 0.6%. So, even if every intersex person also identified as trans (they don't), it'd be around 10% of trans people who would also be intersex.

Now, I've seen some trans organisations saying things like pcos are a form of intersex so I'm not sure there's that much accurate data.

Very interesting piece about intersex conditions.

https://medium.com/@radfemflareon/the-intersex-masterpost-bb5a6250e6d6

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 hours ago, StellaM said:

 

I don't know any girls who want to 100% inhabit sterotypical female sex roles.  

Right?!?

Who would want that? And I'd say the same for guys. My brother mentioned recently how disturbing it was to him that people expected a bunch of stereotypes out of him especially after his teenage growth spurt put him well over six feet tall.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Pen said:

 

But yet apparently believe they are.  

 

That's kind of what I mean by parsing it. What exactly are these girls describing when they say this? Because we all know that it isn't the material reality of inhabiting a male body.

This is why I listen to destransitioned women.

  • Like 4
Link to comment
Share on other sites

9 hours ago, LMD said:

Numbers I've seen put people with intersex conditions at around 0.06% of the population and the Williams institute estimates trans identifying people at 0.6%. So, even if every intersex person also identified as trans (they don't), it'd be around 10% of trans people who would also be intersex.

Now, I've seen some trans organisations saying things like pcos are a form of intersex so I'm not sure there's that much accurate data.

Very interesting piece about intersex conditions.

https://medium.com/@radfemflareon/the-intersex-masterpost-bb5a6250e6d6

Numbers I've seen put intersex as a a higher percentage of the population than that. Ambiguous genitalia only is about that low, but if you combine all the various forms of intersex it is edging closer to 2 percent of the population from the statistics I've seen. https://www.intersexequality.com/how-common-is-intersex-in-humans/

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, OKBud said:

 

You misunderstand. It is illegal to be gay in Iran. So if a man wants to be in a relationship with another man, one of them has to "transition to female." If they do not, they will be  jailed and possibly put to death. Because homosexuality is punishable by death in Iran. 

There's a lot to unpack there, but certainly right off the top, we can all (yes?) agree that this is not a progressive policy. In the US and other places, policy makers tend to conflate transgenderism and homosexuality as being under the same umbrella, but in Iran the policy conflates them by pointing out that one is the "cure" for the other. [and many in the West de facto think that as well...]. They truly believe they are doing gay people a huge favor by coming up with this brilliant solution to their gayness!

And the sundry... Native People are not a monolith... approaches to two-gender spirits are something else altogether. The "third option," as you say, does not by definition address either the sex or the sexual orientation of the participating tribes/individuals...some may and others may not, but it's not inherent in the paradigm to do so.

 

I’m totally not understanding why people keep writing about Iran with regard to a comment I made that in my mind had nothing to do with Iran.

?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, LMD said:

 

That's kind of what I mean by parsing it. What exactly are these girls describing when they say this? Because we all know that it isn't the material reality of inhabiting a male body.

This is why I listen to destransitioned women.

 

Perhaps, to some degree, the tendency (sometimes a required policy which could get someone fired if they didn’t follow it) I see in my geographic area (I’m in same state as OP, I think) to use the preferred pronoun, to accept the person as the gender they state they are, and more, all gives it a lot of attention and makes it seem like becoming the other sex has been  achieved—or, with some hormones and surgery, will be, fully achieved. 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 minute ago, OKBud said:

 

Iran was just brought up (the context being that some approaches in the West are creeping toward Iran's approach), and then you seemed to be saying in your quote reply of that, that Iran's approach is related to the Native American two spirit approaches you're familiar with. 

 

I just got up and have to get ready to leave house.  The only times I have intended to mention Iran is to tell StellaM and now you that I am NOT not not not referring to Iran. I’ll look back later maybe when waiting for an appointment at what I wrote.  I have been having a lot of trouble with autocorrect changing what I have written.  

No, what I wrote was not about Iran. Not meant to be about Iran.  

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@OKBud

Stella wrote that what I wrote reminded her of Iran.  I wrote to clarify that what I wrote was not about Iran.  

I can see how you could have misunderstood.  

But to me it is like I was writing about a dog breed, not certain which breed, nor if what I’d been told about a dog breed was accurate—and then people keep replying about elephants and telling me I don’t understand about elephants.

Riff on about Iran if you like, but could you please leave me out of that. 

I wrote:

12 hours ago, Pen said:

Well, I think this related to one of many North American Native American/ Indian nations / tribes local to my area.  With 3 main options of roles.  Having a third option that had a place in the society sounded more positive than negative.  In a world that mostly involved hunting fishing male.  Child care gathering cooking female.  It gave a third option.

we no longer live such lifestyles and limited jobs— but recognizing that someone may be not clearly in either the male or the female gender, sex, role seemed like it fit reality better than the idea that as in title to thread “teen girls” are “becoming boys”.

Maybe at some point surgical procedures and DNA manipulation will be so complete that there won’t be a difference, but currently no matter the pronoun and names used it isn’t identical.

 

Later.

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...