I promise I am not a reactionary, but I am somewhat uneducated on the subject so I might say something offensive accidentally, sorry in advance about that.
So, does gender dysphoria stem from a disconnect between the body and some “gender socialization” function of the brain, which could be solved by getting socialized and treated by everyone as the correct gender from the start, or something that stems from a disconnect between the brain and the actual body parts and hormones, so the transition is needed to alleviate that, or both?
how do you propose to get such a study past IRB? there was a kid who had his genitals destroyed by a botched circumcision and he was very unsuccessfully raised as a girl. I don’t think you’re going to find people willing to do double blind placebo controlled hormone injections on kids at random or do literally anything involving feral children, and if you do find such a person please kill them.
edit: some letters
well maybe because there is other ways to answer that question? such as analyzing the brains structure and searching for the diferences between trans and cis people? studys of the psychological state of trans people before and after transition? children aren’t even that usefull here
These brain scans that transmedicalists harp on about simply show that there is no difference between a trans woman and a cis woman on an organic level, but not in the way that they are imagining. There is no “female brain”, neurological differences between genders are not absolutes, they are clusters. There are traits more common in women than men, but no two women have the same arrangements of these traits and all of these are found in men as well. It’s all just one big, messy spectrum. Trans people fall on the end of the sprectrum that more closely matches our gender identity, not our assigned gender at birth, that’s nice i guess, but it’s also really, really meaningless and has done nothing to explain an ethiology of transness or to improve trans healthcare. Like, it has literally done zero in that regard, whereas just asking trans people “are you happy with HRT?” produces pretty clear evidence that yes, almost all of us are, gender affirming care is clinically demonstrable to be fucking effective. Deal with it.
Buddy, you are (unintentionally, I’m sure) repeating some fairly transphobic talking points. How would you feel about a study analyzing the brain structure of gay people to try and search for differences between gay and straight people? Does that seem like a good study to you? Also, your response to silent_water is doing exactly what I hoped you weren’t doing when I wrote my last comment to you, namely, you’re saying that a trans person telling you to your face that hormones make them feel better, so there must be some biological component to transness sometimes might be, what? Mistaken? Lying? Or maybe you just think that my (and silent_water’s) physical response to hormones is somehow mediated through culture? That is the non-transphobic reading of what you’ve said, but if that’s what you believe you’re going to have to bring forth some evidence that someone’s physical response to a change of hormones could be solely cultural. Because I do not see any possibility that a change to someone’s endocrine balance would feel different based purely on social factors.
i just noticed i got a little emotional here, and i kinda doubled down after being proven wrong. and i might have said some really stupid things (that i should know are untrue) that also straight up conflict with my own experience on hrt… and i’m sorry. i really shouldn’t have said most to all of what i said, and i do realize that i sounded quite stupid here. i will try to be more reasonable in the future, but i said that to myself before. but well, here we are.
mentions of people who where also in this “discussion”: @JohnBrownNote@hexbear.net @Orannis62@hexbear.net @silent_water@hexbear.net
@AcidSmiley@hexbear.net just saw your comment sorry for wasting your (and everyone else’s) time
I don’t think it’s a waste of time, there’s a lot of good, insightful replies ITT and maybe it helps some people understand. Lack of understanding is what’s hurting us the most.
be that as it may, the transmed stuff is still brain poison and it’s worth learning to identify it. appreciate the apology though.