Paglia on Transgender

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_The CCC
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Re: Paglia on Transgender

Post by _The CCC »



Don't confuse subs with the facts. :lol:
_beastie
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Re: Paglia on Transgender

Post by _beastie »

Maksutov wrote:

Paglia is more provocateur of 'orthodox' feminists than feminist, in my opinion. But I'm sure she'd disagree. I've found some of her work interesting and a valuable contrarian voice but she veers quickly into the absurd.


She's not the only feminist hostile to transgenders. It's a real problem. I think it's tragic.
We hate to seem like we don’t trust every nut with a story, but there’s evidence we can point to, and dance while shouting taunting phrases.

Penn & Teller

http://www.mormonmesoamerica.com
_subgenius
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Re: Paglia on Transgender

Post by _subgenius »


Yay, wiki

Pay attention idiot, CCC made the statement that gender want sex, and then proceeded to cut/paste a definition to prove his point. ...ignoring that his "proof" included the quoted text.
Ergo he looked foolish until you, as usual, upstaged him with your OTP white suburban idiocy.
Seek freedom and become captive of your desires...seek discipline and find your liberty
I can tell if a person is judgmental just by looking at them
what is chaos to the fly is normal to the spider - morticia addams
If you're not upsetting idiots, you might be an idiot. - Ted Nugent
_subgenius
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Re: Paglia on Transgender

Post by _subgenius »

The CCC wrote:


Don't confuse subs with the facts. :lol:

Check your own post idiot old man, then you'll recognize confused
Seek freedom and become captive of your desires...seek discipline and find your liberty
I can tell if a person is judgmental just by looking at them
what is chaos to the fly is normal to the spider - morticia addams
If you're not upsetting idiots, you might be an idiot. - Ted Nugent
_beastie
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Re: Paglia on Transgender

Post by _beastie »

I decided that since transgender rights are an important issue today, for both my family and larger society, that whenever the topic arises, I would share one of the most informative pieces I’ve ever seen on the topic. This is taken from a reddit debate on the topic, posted by “Chel of the sea”. The original can be found here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/c ... f_wanting/

I take no credit for compiling this information. I hope that Chel of the sea would welcome sharing it. (I do not know Chel nor do I participate in reddit. Another family member researching the topic shared it with me.) I did add some bolding.

Chel of the Sea from reddit wrote:Historically, we were indeed considered mentally ill. The DSM (used in the US) recently declassified us as a 'disorder', but the ICD (used in much of the rest of the world) continues to classify us as a paraphilic disorder (essentially, a fetish). It's worth pointing out, however, that the ICD didn't declassify homosexuality as a disorder until the 90s (in fact, they did so in the current version of the ICD), two decades after the DSM declassified it. It also classifies the vast majority of the population as sex disordered, since things like enjoying kinky sex are disordered by the ICD's standards. The current draft of the upcoming new ICD edition also declassifies us as mentally ill, following the DSM's example.

But I would say we are not disordered, for three primary reasons: one, we show some basis in fact for our identification; two, unlike true delusional or somatoform disorders (which seem the most obvious comparison), psychiatric medication does not affect our feelings; and three, unlike true delusional/somatoform disorders, allowing us to pursue our feelings is far from destructive and in fact has exceptionally well-demonstrated positive results.

As best we can tell, gender identity is at least partially determined by brain structure formed very early in fetal development.

A few (http://www.journalofpsychiatricresearch ... 5/abstract) studies show (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21195418) patterns typical (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7477289) of our identified gender and not of our birth sex.

Moreover, transgenderism correlates strongly with endocrine conditions - if we look at people born with externally female bodies, those with PCOS (which raises testosterone) are much more likely (https://books.google.com/books?id=RUfMr ... sm&f=false) to ultimately identify as men; those with CAIS (which makes their bodies incapable of responding to testosterone) almost never do, to the point that single cases (http://link.springer.com/article/10.100 ... 010-9624-1) merit publication in their own right. On top of that, digit ratio (a marker of prenatal testosterone exposure) displays markedly low T exposure on average in trans women and high T exposure in trans men.

There's even some experimental evidence that, when cis (=not trans) people are categorized contrary to their birth sex, they experience the same distress that trans people do. Under the assumption that gender is malleable to social expectations, David Reimer (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Reimer) was raised as a girl after a botched circumcision. He found himself uncomfortable with the female role, displayed symptoms typical of what would be expected of a trans man (that's FTM, to be clear), and ultimately transitioned to living as a man as soon as he became aware of his status in his early teens. And on the flip side, an author named Norah Vincent (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norah_Vincent) spent a year living as a man for the purposes of writing a book. By the end of that time, she was so depressed she checked herself into a mental institution because she was worried she might harm herself.

Additionally, trans feelings simply don't respond to psychiatric medication designed to 'cure' them. No professional organization in the world - even those that do classify us as a mental illness for (I feel) mostly historical/political reasons - recommends just giving us SSRIs or the like and sending us away. Traditional therapies simply do not work.

Compare this with Body Dysmorphic Disorder, a disorder that could be seen as an analog to trans people. BDD sufferers fixate on a small (e.g., a mole) or nonexistent part of their bodies, which they believe makes them hideous and unlovable. Some seek out treatment to remove the offending part. But BDD, unlike trans people, responds well (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1785390/) to both therapy and SSRIs (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3589080/) and does not respond to their desired interventions.

And finally, trans people show absolutely enormous improvement when allowed to pursue our identifications unimpaired. Here are a few studies, although far from all that exist on the subject:

• Heylans et al., 2014:(http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 3/abstract) "A difference in SCL-90 [a test of distress, anxiety, and hostility] overall psychoneurotic distress was observed at the different points of assessments (P = 0.003), with the most prominent decrease occurring after the initiation of hormone therapy (P < 0.001)...Furthermore, the SCL-90 scores resembled those of a general population after hormone therapy was initiated."

• Dhejne, et al. (http://journals.plos.org/plosone/articl ... ne.0016885) is much-cited by those who like to say that we have elevated mortality post-transition, and it does in fact say this...for the cohort who transitioned before 1989, in a far more hostile world and with less effective treatments. However, there was not a significant elevation of suicide or of other mortality in the post-1989 cohort.


• Colizzi et al., 2013:(http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 5/abstract) "At enrollment, transsexuals reported elevated CAR ['cortisol awakening response', a physiological measure of stress]; their values were out of normal. They expressed higher perceived stress and more attachment insecurity, with respect to normative sample data. When treated with hormone therapy [at followup, 1 year after beginning HRT], transsexuals reported significantly lower CAR (P < 0.001), falling within the normal range for cortisol levels. Treated transsexuals showed also lower perceived stress (P < 0.001), with levels similar to normative samples."

• Gomez-Gil et al., 2012: (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21937168) "SADS, HAD-A, and HAD-Depression (HAD-D) mean scores [these are tests of depression and anxiety] were significantly higher among patients who had not begun cross-sex hormonal treatment compared with patients in hormonal treatment (F=4.362, p=.038; F=14.589, p=.001; F=9.523, p=.002 respectively). Similarly, current symptoms of anxiety and depression were present in a significantly higher percentage of untreated patients than in treated patients (61% vs. 33% and 31% vs. 8% respectively)."


• Here (http://www.gires.org.uk/assets/Medpro-A ... _study.pdf) is a broad survey conducted in the UK. Unlike the previous links, it's not peer-reviewed, but the large sample size provides some corroboration of the above results. In particular, we have: (Page 15): "Stage of transition had a substantial impact upon life satisfaction within the sample. 70% of the participants stated that they were more satisfied with their lives since transition, compared to 2% who were less satisfied (N=671)" (Page 50): " Most participants who had transitioned felt that their mental health was better after doing so (74%), compared to only 5% who felt it was worse (N=353)." (Page 55): "For participants who had transitioned, this had led to changes in their self-harming. 63% felt that they harmed themselves more before they transitioned, with only 3% harming themselves more after transition (N=206)." (Page 59): "Suicidal ideation and actual attempts reduced after transition, with 63% thinking about or attempting suicide more before they transitioned and only 3% thinking about or attempting suicide more post-transition. 7% found that this increased during transition, which has implications for the support provided to those undergoing these processes (N=316)."

• de Vries, et al., 2014 (http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/c ... 8.abstract) studied 55 trans teens from the onset of treatment in their early teenage years through a follow-up an average of 7 years later. They found no negative outcomes, no regrets, and in fact their group was slightly mentally healthier than controls.


• Lawrence, 2003 (http://link.springer.com/article/10.102 ... 4086814364) surveyed post-op trans folk: "Participants reported overwhelmingly that they were happy with their SRS results and that SRS had greatly improved the quality of their lives. None reported outright regret and only a few expressed even occasional regret."

This is not the case for (for instance) BDD sufferers - see the links above. If the offending part is removed or modified (e.g., dermatological treatments to get rid of a mole), they simply re-fixate on a new part. Trans people, in general, do not.
________________________________________
Setting aside the abstract, for a moment, I am a trans woman. I am:
• Stable: I have never been suicidal or anything more than moderately depressed. I have good control over my emotions (although less now than I once did - adjusting to the return of all the emotional turmoil of puberty takes work!). I can bear my emotional burdens, and I help many others to carry theirs too. I teach students who, in some cases, just go off the plane from countries where people like me are hanged - and I have the strength and stability to look them in the eye and not hide who and what I am.
• Happy: I smile when I look in the mirror. I see a face that, for the first time in my life, feels like a face that is really mine and not a mask I'm looking through. I sing happily as I go through my day. I do my very best to be cheerful and warm to everyone I know.
• Productive: I am financially self-sufficient and earned a Master's degree during my transition; a degree I never would have gotten otherwise. I pay my taxes, tip my waiters, and have enough to fill my belly and help a friend in need.

So let me turn this around - in what sense am I mentally ill? I made a choice for my own well-being after 18 months of careful deliberation. That decision, so far, has brought me nothing but joy for its own sake (you can read my story here https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comm ... ke/ck591nt). The worst parts are my worries about others and the occasional crappy treatment. I am not distressed, I am not impaired, I pose no threat to others, and I ask nothing but the courtesies already extended to half the human race. So where, exactly, is the illness?


My own comments:
I find it unfortunate and yet predictable that as public support for gay rights and aversion to prejudice against gay people grows, the far right is now using the transgender issue as their whipping post, whipping up frenzy amongst their adherents who are usually misinformed, or not informed at all, and don’t actually know any transgendered people. It’s the same old song, just slightly different lyrics. It’s repulsive to me to see this used as a political tool when live – sometimes literally – hang in the balance.

Unfortunately, there is a subset of feminism that is also hostile to transgender women. They are as misguided, misinformed, and sometimes as malicious as the right.
We hate to seem like we don’t trust every nut with a story, but there’s evidence we can point to, and dance while shouting taunting phrases.

Penn & Teller

http://www.mormonmesoamerica.com
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