Science Supports Trans People - Here is why

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119251778#Comment_119251778

Try actually reading the research before making such a comment. You obviously haven't.

There is compelling evidence for a biological basis for transgenderism.

The One Doctor

I note that there are very few females stupid enough to convert to male. It's mostly idiot males wanting to fondle their own boobies.

Tempting though that is from a male perspective, deliberately stopping children from going through puberty is a crime against humanity.

I have no problems with people wanting to be trans. Let them decide when they are adults. It's inhuman to put children in that position.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119251823#Comment_119251823

Its funny how people always back away when asked the personal question could you choose to change your gender. I think its the critical question that cuts through the bullshit.

i know what the answer is for me - there is literally nothing that could ever pressure me to change my gender identity. SIMPLE.

Mic 1972

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119251777#Comment_119251777

no problem with that.

in fact, gender theory is a way to cancel homosexuality

Ash.J.Williams

any research done on the mental status of people “trapped” in the body of the opposite gender who take no action vs those who get surgery ?

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119253969#Comment_119253969

What's missing from the title is how non-specific it is; as it refers to all "trans people", as a collective.

The evidence in the OP may well be right. It might not be, but it may be. But it only concerns male-to-female trans- and vice versa.

So even if the evidence was right in the OP, it says nothing about non-binary gender identities - and whether they objectively exist.

Objectively being the key word here. If a person is born, we can conduct tests to independently identify whether that person is biologically male or female.

What objective test exists to identify any trans- identity? Now this test cannot rely on the subjective interpretation of the person, by definition. So, what is the objective test?

There doesn't seem to be any, at all.

It also says nothing about the objective means through which we can identify a gender as a legitimate gender as opposed to non-legitimate / subjective. Or does anything go? In which case, that's not scientific at all.

So far from concluding that "science supports trans- people", there is an awful, awful lot more missing from the OP's argument than he's letting on.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119254012#Comment_119254012

Self identifying as a gender due to your own lived experience is a perfectly legitimate position to take. I cannot imagine anyone lying about their gender identity for alteria motives as sustaining a false narrative would be a massive personal burden - for what gain. The projection of peverse abusive motoiive which is the foundational belief of many conservatives simply doesn't stack up - if you want to abuse others sexually its perfectly possible to do so without lying about your gender - rape and sexual abuse are some of the most common crimes so why do you imagine that people will assume a different gender so they can achieve something that is already commonplace for those who do not.

It just doesn't make any sense.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119254651#Comment_119254651

Self identifying as a gender due to your own lived experience is a perfectly legitimate position to take.

That bold part means subjective experience.

What objective evidence / test exists to prove the existence of a trans- person's identity?

For instance: if their body was exhumed in 1,000 years from now by archaeologists, how would we objectively know what gender they were?

Or can we only know their biological sex?

In the case of biological male or female, we have those tests.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119254680#Comment_119254680

Its your requirement - not an objective requirement. It seems to matter a lot to you - I say get over it.

However there is a growing body of evidence of a physical - bio-chemical basis of trans self identification - so I would say that most people could provide objective evidence if your criteria were valid.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119254862#Comment_119254862

It seems to matter a lot to you - I say get over it.

Where is the objective test that a trans- person's identity exists?

Biological sex, we've sorted out.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119254888#Comment_119254888

Repeating yourself isn't helping - I reject your test as been useful.

rom

My sister in law wanted to be a horse when she grew up when she was young. Were her family wrong not to affirm her identity as a horse? She is now happily married with a child and has not seemed to have suffered from it. She still does love horses. I think her parents were right to wait until she was an adult for her to make her own decisions.

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119254888#Comment_119254888

I was thinking about your opinion while chewing the cud (I might identify as a cow)...karyotyping has proven that a lot of those who are biologically female have well...some male traits? I think the technology is in its infancy

TomTomTim

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119255373#Comment_119255373

Depends I suppose. Did she identify as a thoroughbred? If so, you're family may have stripped her of a potential Grand National victory, wins at Cheltenham, and all the money that may have came with that.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119263281#Comment_119263281

That's not the same thing.

"Male traits" are not objective.

Moreover, many gay men are effeminate and so would fall under your term of "female traits". But that doesn't make the gay men trans-. Many straight women have "male traits", too, but are neither gay nor trans-. This works in all manner of ways.

Feminine traits and masculine traits cannot, therefore, be the measure with which to identify a person as trans-.

So purely identifying "male traits" as a means to objectively confirm the existence of any gender is deeply flawed.

So the point seems to stand. That we do not have an objective test for the existence of the gender that someone self-identifies as.

For biological sex, we have all the tests. But for gender, there is no objective test.

UID0

"Male traits" and "female traits" are traits that are stereotypically present in males and females respectively. Some come from a more biological basis (e.g. skeletal differences cause men and women to walk differently) and some are more from a "nurture" background (the reaction of others to a behaviour causes a positive/negative reinforcement of the behaviour).

Some of these stereotypes vary over time and some vary between different societies.

The majority of people do not conform completely to these stereotypes in every manner.

The question can then be asked if any of the traits are definitively male or female, and what variance from the gender norm is required to identify as the opposite gender.

If some people deem themselves to be gender non-conforming (or don't even question it - they just are who they are), but not trans, and others deem themselves to be trans, then how is that decision made. Science can't test for something where the same result (level of non-conformance to gender stereotype) gives a different diagnosis (trans/gender non-conforming). If that comes from the individual, then there are other aspects at play, which may be due to greater rigidity in gender roles in the mind of the trans person or a greater level of person affirmation in the non-conforming individual (they have been brought up to believe that they can be who they want to be - their gender doesn't define them). It's an interesting area that requires further study, and unfortunately these two groups tend to be grouped together in research and non-conforming individuals who are happy and unquestioning in who they are are ignored.

silverharp

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119263788#Comment_119263788

I cant really give a better answer than my sig

Liberty_Bear

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119263788#Comment_119263788

I refer to male traits as in physical attributes which people discuss around this topic. The notion that men are physically more defined than women in the long run due to natural differences. Karyotyping has exposed a lot of the population in some countries as neither being definitvely female or male (I cant find the report, saw it on twitter) but there is this from Nature that provides a fascinating insight into how biologists themselves theorise that even biological determinism is the root of all of this. The notion that our gender is fixed from birth.

https://www.nature.com/articles/518288a

When genetics is taken into consideration, the boundary between the sexes becomes even blurrier. Scientists have identified many of the genes involved in the main forms of DSD, and have uncovered variations in these genes that have subtle effects on a person's anatomical or physiological sex. What's more, new technologies in DNA sequencing and cell biology are revealing that almost everyone is, to varying degrees, a patchwork of genetically distinct cells, some with a sex that might not match that of the rest of their body. Some studies even suggest that the sex of each cell drives its behaviour, through a complicated network of molecular interactions. “I think there's much greater diversity within male or female, and there is certainly an area of overlap where some people can't easily define themselves within the binary structure,” says John Achermann, who studies sex development and endocrinology at University College London's Institute of Child Health.

What I think is happening here is that as biology evolves and learns more and more about the intricate genetic structures that make us up, the more that we are learning that the notion of there being two fixed genders is faltering .Western Society baulks at these ideas. 80 years ago Social Darwisnism preached black people were reprobates, then women, then the homosexuals - society swings around this fulcrum every generation that there is somehow some minority that does not fit in with the rigid notions. In 20 years time something else will be along to ruffle our feathers.

@eskimohunt - above you wrote

Feminine traits and masculine traits cannot, therefore, be the measure with which to identify a person as trans-.

Yet these traits (higher muscle definition, taller etc. all traits) are said to be attributable to physical development in men before they transition to women and compete in womens sports. I see no issue with holding off on trans women in sport for the moment till this is studied more and the competitve advantages looked at however the evidence by and large is pointing to gender (and biological sex) existing across a spectrum , a huge strata...

EmmetSpiceland

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119251754#Comment_119251754

And it’s funny that when it doesn’t agree with them they dismiss it saying that any study can be bought and paid for.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119268416#Comment_119268416

They are actually misrepresenting the science they are referencing - the actual base science papers do not support the positions they claim they do. They are lying by omitting important parts of the research they are using. this is called "cherry picking". You will not find actual scientific evidence which supports critics of trans people.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119268416#Comment_119268416

Probably because funding bias is a recognised problem in regards to research, and drug trials. Although it's funny that you would dismiss that (considering what you previously found funny ).

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119267981#Comment_119267981

The entire premise of your thread title is misleading.

a) most trans- people do not get surgery

b) the OP excludes any reference to non-binary people, too, which are a large community of trans-. 40% of the US trans- community are non-binary, for example.

c) even if the conclusion in your OP was true, it wouldn't support the conclusion that "science supports trans- people". At best, it would support the clinical idea that surgery helps some trans- people some of the time.

d) psychology is a social science, not a hard science; so we have to take the data from the extremely small sample size in the OP with at least some degree of scepticism. I'm not saying the conclusions are wrong but, from an objective scientific standpoint, you cannot draw absolute, firm conclusions from it. Social matters complicate the question in ways that do not impact the hard sciences.

For these reasons, this thread comes across as a campaign rather than an attempt to seriously engage with science as it regards all matters of trans-, and not just the specific corner of trans- that you want us to hone in on.

The one thing science says for absolutely certain is that biological sex is not, nor ever can be, interchangeable. Oh yeah, and men cannot give birth.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119251334#Comment_119251334

It is usually by the age of 5–6 years that children would attain gender constancy, so that they understand that gender does not change along with physical appearances and that their gender will remain unchanged in their whole life."

This does not state that their gender identity is "set" when they are 5-6, it states that they have a more proper conceptual understanding of what gender even is at that age. That is a completely different statement.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119269960#Comment_119269960

You can spin it that way, but the upshot of that statement is that children know they are differently gendered at that point and it means they know they are trans even if they cannot clearly articulate that fact

.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119270172#Comment_119270172

Its not spinning, that's literally what it says - That is the age that they understand the concept of what gender actually is. That they know they are "differently gendered" at that point absolutely does not follow on from that statement.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119271585#Comment_119271585

Moreover, there's a world of difference between a) having an conceptual idea of a phenomenon and b) having the self-awareness to contemplate that concept, such as self-identity, in any meaningful sense.

Children that young are reactive, unlike self-aware adults who understand the implications of what it means to change gender.

Gentlemanne

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119232396#Comment_119232396

your bias is showing

Huh?? Take a look in the mirror would you? It didn't take a crystal ball to realise yourself and the other anti-trans posters would laser in on this thread to attempt to debunk this.

And I didn't win a medal to predict those posts would be the same predjudice and bias ye have about transgender people.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119271695#Comment_119271695

Children at that age are well aware of their gender identities and will choose to wear whatever cloths of the sex they feels at that very early age. They may have a lot of developmental understanding to grow through before they can make an informed decision about their eventual gender identity - but they have started a process of self awareness and questioning of their assigned gender roles. Their eventual destination is very uncertain at this early age - but the last thing they need is rejection and suppression of their legitimate questions about what gender they may be.

I have personally seen this process taking place in the family of close friends - and it started in earnest around 8 years old.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119272669#Comment_119272669

Huh?? Take a look in the mirror would you? It didn't take a crystal ball to realise yourself and the other anti-trans posters would laser in on this thread to attempt to debunk this.

I haven't claimed not to have a bias. I am certainly biased. Although, I'm not anti-Trans as you would love to frame me as. I support certain aspects of the Trans debate, and I'm against others. Whereas this belief that someone needs to support the overall trans topic completely, or be termed anti-trans? Meh.

Of course, the people who are critical of the Trans situations are going to seek to counter a claim that science supported Trans people.. because science doesn't support them. Not to the degree that you and others want to promote as happening.

When you can provide me with scientific evidence (not social sciences or psychology) that shows verifiable results that a man can become a woman, and vice versa, to the point of being able to have children.. as their desired biological sexes.. then, I'll happily drop that bias. You'll have to work a bit harder for me to drop my bias in regards to non-binary or self-Id.. because there is no science today to prove gender, apart from the direct connections to their natural biological sex (from birth). Not suggestions. Not theories. Facts. Verifiable, and repeatable means to show that it can be done across a wide selection of people. Although, I'll still have reservations due to the importance of experience of that desired gender in developing from child to adult, and how that reflects on a teens/adults identity. I'm rather sceptical at the idea that someone can declare themselves another gender, without any knowledge of what it's like to be that gender. But sure... you get me some proper scientific research to prove that. I'll step away from my bias.

But you won't.. because there is no such research, using scientific methods, to prove it.

And I didn't win a medal to predict those posts would be the same predjudice and bias ye have about transgender people.

And yet, you didn't counter them. You just decided to make vague reference to a prejudice, which is some weak attempt to discredit.

Pointing out a bias existing doesn't seek to discredit, unless it relates to something where people are supposed to be impartial... which is not the case on boards. You decided that my saying your bias is showing, is some form of insult or whatever, and reacted.

Shoog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119273125#Comment_119273125

Why do you imagine that anyone should accept you arbitary definition of what a sex change means to a trans person (ie your requirement that they could have children - by this definition many biologically born women are not infact women at all) ? You do not get to define what a trans person is or needs to achieve personal acceptance. You do not get to define what gender means to a person either.

As to your other arbitary criteria that you want some one to experience been of the other sex before making the personal decision to transition - well thats a requirement of every single reputable support service - and the minimum requirement is to live as that other sex for a minimum of a year.