Transgender - Part 2

[Gethelred]

Please be aware that the tolerance of anti-trans language on BF is at an all-time low. Jokes and insults that are trans-related, as well as anti-trans and bigoted rhetoric will be met with infractions, threadbans etc as required. It's a sensitive (and important) topic, so behave like well-mannered adults when discussing it, PARTICULARLY when disagreeing. This equally applies across the whole site.

 

[Gethelred]

Trans people have higher rates of major depressive episode, anxiety disorder, autism spectrum, multiple personalities than the general population. To help those individuals you need to be looking at the whole mental health picture. It could be that their gender dysphoria is not the underlying cause of their issues but part of a more general dissociative disorder. If so, changing gender is not going to alleviate their problems.

But it has become prevalent by educators, psychologists and social workers to accept people identifying as transgender at face value and even to take pride in it. When the system is rigged like this there's a lack of informed choice. They might be encouraged to identify as trans as a way of dealing with mental health issues that are not driven by gender identity.

I trust the educators, psychologists and social workers to make the decision concerning trans people's mental state a good deal more than I trust you to make it at range with a broad brush, which is what you're doing here.

Also, a doctor or specialist can certainly be wrong, but does that give you carte blanche to question the advice they give you? If a doctor after as many tests, second opinions and you've jumped through all the hoops a trans person has to undertake before they transition diagnoses you with cancer, are you truly telling me you'd wander off to get a second opinion?

At a certain point, you need to trust what the specialists tell you. Otherwise, you just don't trust doctors, and the thread for that's thataway:

Society/Culture - The distrust of education

This is an almost ever present conversational topic on the SRP, so it probably should have a thread to discuss it isolated from everything else. Certain groups and politicians like referring to 'Inner city elites', 'Latte sipping', 'Acacdemic/theoretical understanding'; in short, they evince a...

www.bigfooty.com

 

[Frank Bunn]

I trust the educators, psychologists and social workers to make the decision concerning trans people's mental state a good deal more than I trust you to make it at range with a broad brush, which is what you're doing here.

Also, a doctor or specialist can certainly be wrong, but does that give you carte blanche to question the advice they give you? If a doctor after as many tests, second opinions and you've jumped through all the hoops a trans person has to undertake before they transition diagnoses you with cancer, are you truly telling me you'd wander off to get a second opinion?

At a certain point, you need to trust what the specialists tell you. Otherwise, you just don't trust doctors, and the thread for that's thataway:

Society/Culture - The distrust of education

This is an almost ever present conversational topic on the SRP, so it probably should have a thread to discuss it isolated from everything else. Certain groups and politicians like referring to 'Inner city elites', 'Latte sipping', 'Acacdemic/theoretical understanding'; in short, they evince a...

www.bigfooty.com

I've seen it at first hand. I went with my son to see a counsellor. I was probably better qualified than her. It was absolutely assumed by her that all his issues were due to gender dysphoria. She wouldn't allow any other basis of discussion to take place, and this was one visit out of many where she would have been slightly challenged.

Psychology is very much a soft science, so the views of 'specialists' come and go with different prevailing ideologies. There was a time when homosexuality was treated as a mental illness, and women were diagnosed with 'hysteria'.

 

[Gethelred]

I've seen it at first hand. I went with my son to see a counsellor. I was probably better qualified than her. It was absolutely assumed by her that all his issues were due to gender dysphoria. She wouldn't allow any other basis of discussion to take place, and this was one visit out of many where she would have been slightly challenged.

Psychology is very much a soft science, so the views of 'specialists' come and go with different prevailing ideologies. There was a time when homosexuality was treated as a mental illness, and women were diagnosed with 'hysteria'.

Oh look, you're doing the thing again in which you don't trust a different sort of science than you do because you think you know better.

You know, people can dismiss your expertise with the precise same joie de vivre as you seem to dismiss theirs. Either treat all apples like apples, or people will tell your orange is rotten.

 

[faible]

I trust the educators, psychologists and social workers to make the decision concerning trans people's mental state a good deal more than I trust you to make it at range with a broad brush, which is what you're doing here.

Yeah but they’re all woke leftists indoctrinated at university trying to force everyone to be trans. Can’t be trusted.

/s

 

[Carringbush2010]

There's a lot of people with <something> that doesn't fit neatly in to the 'majority' so it's not just about transgender people making up ~ 1% of the population, but about a society that works for everyone no matter what box you don't quite fit in to; disability, sexuality, gender, mental health.

Hammer, nail, head.

*That takes compromise, from where I sit, there are some activists / advocates for transgender who (read advocates for minority groups) don't believe, whether deliberately or just naively that society (read the majority) are more than accepting and accommodating of those 'who don't fit neatly into a box' then have ever been in history, >ever<.Definitely in liberal democracies.

It's never talked about, certainly not in msm, can't say I've seen concession on here itt or even on these boards.

Then there's the other side of that coin, some, likely minuscule in number of those in the majority, who either deliberately or naively believe the majority is being unfairly treated and minority groups are 'getting all the attention and favours' from 'us the majority'.

*^ I believe this is caused in part by the 'too much favouritism of minority groups' that some wrongly believe.

The bolded can and IS being achieved, not there yet, but let's not pretend society by and large haven't worked to compromise for minority groups.

 

[ElectricG]

Oh look, you're doing the thing again in which you don't trust a different sort of science than you do because you think you know better.

You know, people can dismiss your expertise with the precise same joie de vivre as you seem to dismiss theirs. Either treat all apples like apples, or people will tell your orange is rotten.

I don't think it's right to be taking what is really a social/cultural issue and trying to "the science is settled" it. There is a reason we go to the public vote to decide to decide who runs the country rather than just checking in with political scientists to get their consensus. The trans "issue" exists very much within the realm of values and belief even if there is an area of medical science that focuses on it.

 

[Gethelred]

I don't think it's right to be taking what is really a social/cultural issue and trying to "the science is settled" it.

Frank Bunn tried to use their own qualifications - in gender specific councelling? In psychology/psychiatry? - to trump a psychiatrist. This is a long, old academic argument concerning the 'right' kinds of academia, the 'correct' kinds of science.

That's what is being pointed out here. Either all fields of study are their own thing and you rely on the scientific method to produce results - in short, to know what you don't know by virtue of knowing what you do - or you don't. If you attack their qualifications and findings based on their science being a 'soft science', you tarnish your own qualifications which rely on precisely the same methods to produce results.

There is a reason we go to the public vote to decide to decide who runs the country rather than just checking in with political scientists to get their consensus. The trans "issue" exists very much within the realm of values and belief even if there is an area of medical science that focuses on it.

Only because people have turned it into one, in order to drum up fear against an other when race isn't available.

 

[ElectricG]

Frank Bunn tried to use their own qualifications - in gender specific councelling? In psychology/psychiatry? - to trump a psychiatrist. This is a long, old academic argument concerning the 'right' kinds of academia, the 'correct' kinds of science.

That's what is being pointed out here. Either all fields of study are their own thing and you rely on the scientific method to produce results, or you don't. If you attack their qualifications and findings based on their science being a 'soft science', you tarnish your own qualifications which rely on precisely the same methods to produce results.

Only because people have turned it into one, in order to drum up fear against an other when race isn't available.

If I missed some of the context re: your argument with the other poster then that's my bad.

Regarding your comments in defense of the 'soft' sciences, how far are you willing to go with this? If we take the following scenarios:

1. A chemical scientist performs a calculation for how much CO2 will be emitted by a novel solar installation in comparison with conventional systems; and
2. An academic writes a paper on how the Voice to Parliament would have provided better outcomes for indigenous people, and successfully has it published in the Australian Journal of Political Science

Where [2] is an area which the layperson (rightfully) has total freedom to form their own opinion, [1] is an undertaking that could be measurably be botched by an unqualified person. For the hard science they are just dealing so much more in data and 'knowns'.

My point is that to just take an overview of a bunch of academic papers and which way they seem to be pointing at a given time and think that settles a social issue is to ignore a large human element. I don't mean to denigrate the humanities, just to say that we shouldn't apply their findings where they don't belong.

 

[Gethelred]

If I missed some of the context re: your argument with the other poster then that's my bad.

Regarding your comments in defense of the 'soft' sciences, how far are you willing to go with this? If we take the following scenarios:

1. A chemical scientist performs a calculation for how much CO2 will be emitted by a novel solar installation in comparison with conventional systems; and
2. An academic writes a paper on how the Voice to Parliament would have provided better outcomes for indigenous people, and successfully has it published in the Australian Journal of Political Science

Where [2] is an area which the layperson (rightfully) has total freedom to form their own opinion, [1] is an undertaking that could be measurably be botched by an unqualified person. For the hard science they are just dealing so much more in data and 'knowns'.

I have a few things to say here, the first of which is that this demonstrates a misunderstanding of things like historiography and academia. Anyone can write about the past, but not everything rises to the level of academic scrutiny... which is the whole ****ing point of the process of peer review, EG.

A paper on sociology - considered by many to be among the softest sciences - might have the same level of academic rigor as any chemistry of physics paper, and there can be mistakes in the scientific process in any of them. Data is equivalent to data.

Next, a layperson - someone at an enthusiastic amateur level - is not the equivalent of a PHD candidate. They haven't worked at it; they haven't struggled at it in the same way. To have achieved even an undergraduate level of understanding - in short, to have gone to university and majored in something - is to sit above an amateur level of understanding; to go on to doing your PHD, you need to have achieved a masters degree as well, which requires a research paper and presentation at full levels of academic rigor, which is also subject to peer review.

A lay person is not going to have the same dedication to their discipline, nor are they going to work as hard to ensure that what they say is backed up and supported by prior work. That is not to say that laypeople's work isn't worthwhile, but every single person other than one qualified is a layperson.

Thirdly, pop history is frequently as damaging as pop science is. Take - for example - the line attributed to Louis XVI:

I am the state

... in an awful lot of pop history readings. It serves as a brilliant demonstration of what authoritarianism is, and gives readers/consumers a pocket understanding of the excesses of the French monarchy and its reach and power.

... buuuut...

He never said it. The quote is, in full:

I may die, but the state remains.

This is a meaningful distinction because as opposed to being a demonstration of an authoritarian ruler exhibiting their total power over their state, this is a sublimation of the role of ruler to the eternity of their state; it's nearly completely in opposition to the pop history version.

... all of which is to say that a softer science done wrong can be just as incorrect, and just as damaging. Acknowledge it when you don't know enough, and leave it to those who do. Cobbler, mind your shoes.

My point is that to just take an overview of a bunch of academic papers and which way they seem to be pointing at a given time and think that settles a social issue is to ignore a large human element. I don't mean to denigrate the humanities, just to say that we shouldn't apply their findings where they don't belong.

You're conflating two things: gender theory as a component of feminism (sociology, feminist studies, etc) and gender identity/dysphoria (psychology). They're different things; one is the psychological affect being nonbinary/transgender identity face in dealing with the world (psychology) and the other is studying them from a sociological standpoint; how society treats them, the history of it, theorising about intersectionality and how they fit into feminism and gender studies (sociology).

The science around the psychology of it has long been settled. It's only due to the conflation of it with the sociological side of it (and the politicization of it) that this is an argument you can make.

 

[ElectricG]

Next, a layperson - someone at an enthusiastic amateur level - is not the equivalent of a PHD candidate. They haven't worked at it; they haven't struggled at it in the same way. To have achieved even an undergraduate level of understanding - in short, to have gone to university and majored in something - is to sit above an amateur level of understanding; to go on to doing your PHD, you need to have achieved a masters degree as well, which requires a research paper and presentation at full levels of academic rigor, which is also subject to peer review.

I'm not sure how much this really relates to our argument, but what you say here isn't my experience at all. I know people with masters degrees who do not even have a slender grasp on the fundamentals on what they have allegedly studied. I can't remember what your field is Geth but from memory it's something like education. Based on what I know of your character I have no doubt that you dived head first into your studies and worked your arse off from beginning to end. I also have no doubt that you would have noticed those around you who are never at lectures, collude with other students just to get through the quiz, leave assignments to the last minute and then hand up something half-arsed and AI assisted just to get that P.

As for peer review. Well, I know you will take this as being anti-academic, but my god some shite gets published in respectable journals. And yes, I have read a lot of them as part of my study and work.

You're conflating two things: gender theory as a component of feminism (sociology, feminist studies, etc) and gender identity/dysphoria (psychology). They're different things; one is the psychological affect being nonbinary/transgender identity face in dealing with the world (psychology) and the other is studying them from a sociological standpoint; how society treats them, the history of it, theorising about intersectionality and how they fit into feminism and gender studies (sociology).

The science around the psychology of it has long been settled. It's only due to the conflation of it with the sociological side of it (and the politicization of it) that this is an argument you can make.

But "here is the science, and therefore that's what we as a society should do" is your side of the trans argument isn't it? That sounds more like you're conflating the two.

 

[Gethelred]

I'm not sure how much this really relates to our argument, but what you say here isn't my experience at all. I know people with masters degrees who do not even have a slender grasp on the fundamentals on what they have allegedly studied. I can't remember what your field is Geth but from memory it's something like education. Based on what I know of your character I have no doubt that you dived head first into your studies and worked your arse off from beginning to end.

Pbbbft!

I was and am a terrible student! I've always struggled at uni, largely because the hands-off style of education there ****s with my head. I only really worked out how to study in university environs in around year 3 of my undergrad, and only really could say I 'got' it earlier this year; last year, I should say.

I like learning, but studying sucks. The kind of academic rigor I'm talking about is ****ing awful; it requires you to be pedantic rather than enthusiastic, obscurantist, long-winded and arcane rather than clean spoken or to the point.

There's joy to be found, but god it was like pulling teeth to get there.

I also have no doubt that you would have noticed those around you who are never at lectures, collude with other students just to get through the quiz, leave assignments to the last minute and then hand up something half-arsed and AI assisted just to get that P.

I'm explaining my complaint with regards to the posts made in my exchange with Frank Bunn, and pointing out why and where the scientific method applies and matters in nonscientific disciplines and the supposedly soft sciences.

To undermine those fields as 'soft sciences' is to undermine the scientific process itself.

As for peer review. Well, I know you will take this as being anti-academic, but my god some shite gets published in respectable journals. And yes, I have read a lot of them as part of my study and work.

Of course, largely because capitalism.

Just so, so much of academic work these days is completed to fulfil the requirements of the course and obtain the degree. Universities in Australia function as profit mills; you're gonna see academic standards decline when you turn universities into profit centres.

The other side of it is, is it your point of view that the studies/work published in peer review goes completely unquestioned?

But "here is the science, and therefore that's what we as a society should do" is your side of the trans argument isn't it? That sounds more like you're conflating the two.

You're going to have to say this again, because that went straight past me.

 

[ElectricG]

You're going to have to say this again, because that went straight past me.

I'd expand on it but tbh I'm just picking a fight we've already had before.

 

[Frank Bunn]

Frank Bunn tried to use their own qualifications - in gender specific councelling? In psychology/psychiatry? - to trump a psychiatrist. This is a long, old academic argument concerning the 'right' kinds of academia, the 'correct' kinds of science.

That's what is being pointed out here. Either all fields of study are their own thing and you rely on the scientific method to produce results - in short, to know what you don't know by virtue of knowing what you do - or you don't. If you attack their qualifications and findings based on their science being a 'soft science', you tarnish your own qualifications which rely on precisely the same methods to produce results.

That's false. The counsellor my son saw was a social worker with a diploma. No science happened in their sessions. I didn't try to trump her with my qualifications but my degree gave me some perspective on the subjective trends of psychology over the years.

The counsellor effectively trumped me by virtue of her status. Despite my over 20 years as a parent she thought she knew best from a few chats with my son, and wouldn't allow any other basis of discussion to take place apart from that gender dysphoria was the basis of his problems.

As for soft science, there's a good reason why most psychology and sociology grads get a bachelor of arts. Those subjects lack empirical rigour and rely on subjective interpretations which are heavily influenced by the pervasive norms of the time.

 

[Gethelred]

ElectricG, see?

That's false. The counsellor my son saw was a social worker with a diploma. No science happened in their sessions. I didn't try to trump her with my qualifications but my degree gave me some perspective on the subjective trends of psychology over the years.

The counsellor effectively trumped me by virtue of her status. Despite my over 20 years as a parent she thought she knew best from a few chats with my son, and wouldn't allow any other basis of discussion to take place apart from that gender dysphoria was the basis of his problems.

As for soft science, there's a good reason why most psychology and sociology grads get a bachelor of arts. Those subjects lack empirical rigour and rely on subjective interpretations which are heavily influenced by the pervasive norms of the time.

This feels like you've buried the lede a bit to me, FB. This is a different description than provided earlier.

 

[raskolnikov]

So now we have actual statistics from the ABS: transgender and gender-diverse people make 0.9% of Australians 16 and over. It'd be nice if people stopped getting worked up about such a small percentage of the population existing, and just let them be.

No no no. We must persecute people different from ourselves.

 

[Johnny Bananas]

No no no. We must persecute peope different from ourselves.

I think being left handed is a perversion of human nature and against the way God intended for us to be. We shouldn't pander to the whims of this minority of sickos who are probably mentally ill. Of course some woke leftie soyboy will tell me I'm being a bigot. Can't say anything anymore without being silenced by the woke leftie mob!

 

[Gethelred]

I think being left handed is a perversion of human nature and against the way God intended for us to be.

They even have the LBW rule written in their favour.

 

[smelly cat]

Why is it silly? If they're there to treat women and they refuse to treat a woman, how is it not discrimination? I find it hard to believe that every doctor and nurse in the building specialises in obstetrics only, and even then they are all trained in basic medical knowledge.

Well if the hospital is there to treat biological females then it would be the least qualified hospital to manage a trans female. So if obtaining genuine medical aid was the goal, why would a trans female want to go to a women's hospital anyway?

So yeah it would be silly.
Furthermore, it is one of the scenarios where the interests of one person come up against those of someone else. And someone has to give way since we are talking about the allocation of limited resources.

In this case, we are weighing up the right of a biological female to receive treatment and use resources that she can't obtain anywhere else.

Should she have to wait for treatment so that a transwoman can be assessed? The trans woman can present to any other hospital like any other female, where they can receive optimum treatment.

On the other hand, some women's hospitals are starting to provide certain departments for transitioning women, like surgery, psych support or transitional hormone therapy. If the health problem pertains to these issues then it makes complete sense for a transwoman to present. Though in such a department, they would not treat a biological female (who wants to stay female) for reasons similar to those mentioned above.

Not all discrimination is pejorative. no one is being denied treatment. It is about ensuring treatment is provided by those with the most expertise, and enabling appropriate allocation of resources.

 

[Johnny Bananas]

Well if the hospital is there to treat biological females then it would be the least qualified hospital to manage a trans female.

Do you think the people who become nurses or doctors specialising in female health are learning about female biology only, right from the first day of medical school? Do you think they have no expertise at all in medical conditions that can afflict people who weren't born with a female body?

So if obtaining genuine medical aid was the goal, why would a trans female want to go to a women's hospital anyway?

Because they want to.

Furthermore, it is one of the scenarios where the interests of one person come up against those of someone else.

How are they against the interests of someone else?

And someone has to give way since we are talking about the allocation of limited resources.

In this case, we are weighing up the right of a biological female to receive treatment and use resources that she can't obtain anywhere else.

Hospitals can treat multiple patients at once. We are not a poor country and we are able to build and staff hospitals adequately if governments provide the funding.

Should she have to wait for treatment so that a transwoman can be assessed?

It depends on what the hospital staff think is more urgent. Generally patients are seen based on how critical it is that they get immediate care.

The trans woman can present to any other hospital like any other female, where they can receive optimum treatment.

I'm sure if the hospital is overcrowded, they can tell people, trans or cis, to go to another hospital for care. Outright refusing to treat people even when a hospital is not overcrowded is discriminatory.

On the other hand, some women's hospitals are starting to provide certain departments for transitioning women, like surgery, psych support or transitional hormone therapy. If the health problem pertains to these issues then it makes complete sense for a transwoman to present. Though in such a department, they would not treat a biological female (who wants to stay female) for reasons similar to those mentioned above.

Again, you keep acting like medical staff only ever learn about one type of body and are completely inexperienced in treating patients with different bodies. That's not how it works. And there are many conditions that affect all people, regardless of their genitalia.