So, saying that being trans or gay is innate is… a bad thing? TERFs are literally the opposite of biological essentialists, because they believe that there is no difference between male and female brains and that masculinity and femininity are forced upon people.
I apologise; I should have been more precise—that was not the sense of biological essentialism I meant, but the idea that man- and womanhood are absolutely determined by one’s biology, i.e. sex. (Perhaps ‘biological determinism’ would be a better term?) To be more precise:
TERFs:
Women are humans with XX chromosomes.
Transmedicalists:
Women are humans with XX chromosomes XOR dysphoria.
(Or any other definition of female sex.)
Tucutes say that gender is socially constructed. How is that not conflating gender presentation with gender?
Do they? (Who are these “tucutes”, to be clear?)
Whether or not gender is socially-constructed, who does saying it is conflate gender presentation with gender? Gender being a social construct doesn’t necessitate that [female] and [feminine presentation] are the same thing.
When you ask a nondysphoric “trans” person why they feel they’re a boy, they always give examples of how they aren’t comfortable with girly clothing, and how they don’t do girly things. Those are all fake things that society made up.
They are…but I’ve seen dysphoric, trans people give examples like that, too. (And people argue that such examples invalidate their gender, too.) Yes, these are absolutely Fake Things Society Made Up, but let’s not be too hasty in judging people for giving them. In a society that pressures people to conform to gendered expectations, it can be comforting for someone struggling to identify or come to terms with their gender to identify ways they do conform.
Ultimately: we can recognise that that line of reasoning is wrong without invalidating the gender of anyone who’s fallen victim to it—dysphoric and non-dysphoric trans people alike.
This is what happens when people put GNC people and transgender people under the same category. When looking at research on trans people, or websites for trans people, it’s all “transgender and gender nonconforming individuals,” as if they have anything to do with one another.
I don’t know how you expect me to respond to those examples—or even what’s supposed to be wrong with the last, besides “theybies”—and I certainly don’t see the relevance to “tucutes…spitting up the same things cis transphobes and terfs are saying”.
“Tucutes” aren’t putting GNC and trans people in the same category. Non-dysphoric, trans people are no more “just gender-non-conforming, cis people” than dysphoric, trans people are—as TERFs et al claim. Those “examples” notwithstanding, this is a perfect example of an argument against non-dysphoric, trans people that’s just a recycled argument against all trans people.
One might argue that the crucial difference is that you, unlike TERFs, are right, but you’ve not established how any of this relates to non-dysphoric, trans people as a whole, or to the question of whether or not dysphoria is necessary to be trans.
I notice you say that dysphoria is a symptom of being trans, not the other way around. I agree. People are transgender or not, and dysphoria is how transgenderism presents.
Dysphoria is not the entirety of what it means to be trans. Fundamentally, being a gender other than your assigned gender/sex is how it presents.
This causes distress, which is treated with transition. That makes it a medical condition. Saying that is transphobic how, exactly?
Gender dysphoria is a medical condition; being trans is not.
I notice on a post you say “ Dysphoria is a consequence of being trans [in a transphobic society]. A potential consequence.” This is saying that dysphoria is caused by society, which is false. It’s an innate, biological disconnect. Getting rid of transphobia won’t get rid of dysphoria. What other consequences of transgenderism could their be?
That disconnect, itself, is not gender dysphoria; it is what causes dysphoria. That “disconnect” is one way of conceptualising being trans, or which dysphoria is a symptom.
I did not mean to say that it is caused by society—I said it’s caused by being trans—but being in a transphobic society does influence it, how is it experienced, and how it is understood.
I don’t understand your question—what consequences need there be?
