At the end of the day for you to believe there is a systemic problem of children with nilly having premature gender reassignment treatments you also need to believe in a substantial set of parents who in bad faith use their kids for political brownie points which seems like a right wing fairy tale story kinda like when religious conservatives made "God's not Dead" with a male believe story of an evil atheist failing kids for believing in god. It's the perfect anecdote to make people hate atheists just like this notion of a neferious group of parents and medical professionals wanting create an army of transgender kids for political brownie points. The rhetoric is also similar to rhetoric regarding late term abortions. To be so adamantly against it one most think there is a cadre of young women just dying to murder babies right before their birth when late term abortions happen very rarely and only in grace circumstances.
I'm not saying there is or isn't some kind of widespread problem here, but if you meet enough parents, you realize just how low of a bar that is to clear. And no, you don't even need "political brownie points" for a motivator.... any number of motivations can come into play.
I've meet plenty of parents. Don't know many that are willing to turn their lives upside down because guess what when you have a trans kid, you are going to be viewed differently by the local community for some brownie points or "virtue singling". Humans are complex. They aren't binary evil vs good or insane vs sane. You probably can count the amount of parents willing to force transgenderism on their kids for virtue signaling or brownie points outside a handful and that handful is not worth the 10000 hours worth of discussion on this message board.
I want someone to explain the logical reasoning behind the hate and fight against late term abortions and the hate and fight against transgender treatments for minors when both are typically options available to the public but are only utilized in extreme circumstances but require a belief that there is a cadre of young women or a cadre of virtue signaling parents lining up in glee to do these practices that they are so against.
Bill Maher had a bit on this recently that raised an important point imo. If the rise in LBGBTQ is organic, why does it appear regionally? And for that matter, why does it skew by race and sex? There's something to be said for the concept of mass psychological phenomenon. Part of this is no doubt social contagion. To deny that or dismiss it is irresponsible and a disservice to everyone. The right has their own psychosis and moral panic about this to reckon with, but the left being unable to grapple with this honestly does them no favors.
Well at least you're slightly braver than @SuraGotMadHops in admitting what you truly think (as hateful and stupid as it may be)
Oh trust me, I've seen more than enough of your thoughts on the matter to be very confident in my conclusion.
Well then you are an idiot. And no, I do not trust you. You think of yourself as way smarter than you actually are.
Dude I can't tolerate right wing framing. This is abject right wing framing, the concept of people turning gay for political points or to be socially accepted. Bill Maher is an out of touch human who's trying to grift towards target advance of 45-70 year old neo-liberals to conservatives. Every other week he has a ATW style woke rant. He isn't a serious person and he is not someone with intellectual curiosity that I would deem having something worth while to say. Come out trans in a upper middle class diverse suburb and try to come out trans in Orange Texas. Regional differences of LGBTQ individuals coming out is a result of the regional differences in those people feeling comfortable expressing their sexuality openly.
Given what I know about you on this topic I'd be surprised, if not disappointed, if you felt any other way.
Also don't be that guy who posts about being right because you are getting b****ed at by both sides. Being in the "middle" of a topic isn't the definition of "right".
Lol you and @AroundTheWorld are truly a match made for each other on this topic. If only we could lock yall in your own forum together.
We are debating about enabling serious and life altering treatments for adolescents on a minority for which we do not have lengthy/timely data or sample size for each treatment. We really don't, and the "guinea pig" analogy is not the best basis for why the is data improving. And there happens to be an undisclosed/uncounted minority of that minority that regret the initial decision made as minors from which they later blame experts/care specialists for not giving them the entire picture. These specialists later reply (if you assume entirely pure intentions) that the data wasn't conclusive and they were working with the best they had. There is an appeal for simplicity. We want to believe in the case where a natal boy 100% knew she was gender dysphoric since the age of 5, self diagnosed and supported by parents. She passed the battery of tests and exams with flying colors so by 12 was a perfect candidate for hormonal treatment to enable a better chance that her external image jives more than her internal image. This is pure idealism with what we already know. Many of these specialists, who even signed declarations against state bans, openly admit they don't know when gender fluidity ends or if it ever does. There's obviously the "sure fire cases" with 2 or 3 standard deviations outside the bell curve, but those within the biggest hump are way trickier and complex to diagnose. Then you ask if growing up with permanent non-reversable complications like bone density loss, spinal problems, or potentially "dysphoric" physical traits (masculine voice for detrans women) is worth it for the gender fluid or non-binary cases that they later conclude after reaching adulthood. The accounts of bottom surgery is far grislier, and I'd like to hear persuasive arguments from those who support it for adolescents. Humor me. The appeal for simplicity is also why you didn't read or even skim the NYT or Reuters articles and attempted to bottom line the discussion with "at the end of the day". Add another checkmark for tricks to win this debate in the abstract.
