Trans man concerned for kids thrown under for asking legitimate questions.

[Oscar_Kipling]

The issue is that there's no such thing as a "gender identity". It's a confusing concept, it's wrong, and it lies at the foundation of that multiple thousand per cent increase in trans-identifying individuals (particularly among girls). If a girl doesn't like "girl things" or is uncomfortable with her body, it's no longer the case that she's a girl with different interests than most or uncomfortable with her body as the vast majority of girls are. Now it's a sign that she might be trans -- a boy, or non-binary, or in possession of some other identity along the supposed spectrum of gender identities (read: expression).

It's a concept that purports to give meaning to confusion. And because it's supposedly identity, it's unassailable. I'd say that's precarious, but also unnecessary. There's no need to induce the thought, "but what if I'm really..." in a young person. For those who are already there, competent help is required. For everyone else, "but are you really sure? How can you know if you've never tried?" isn't the hallmark of a healthy education.

I think that it is one thing to say that gender identity is a dubious idea, and something else entirely to blame this dubious idea for destroying lives. I think that it has been just as dangerous to susceptible people to to engender equally dubious rigid gender roles and stereotypes as was much more prevalent in the recent and distant past. Admittedly the influences of so called traditional gender roles pretty rarely ended in surgery though we have certainly seen many examples of people modifying their bodies through surgery and chemistry or classic reproductive biology to better fit the masculine or feminine "ideal" with much more frequency than modern gender identity has....to be fair its conceivable that more young women could get mastectomies than breast "enhancements" in the future, but no one can claim that is currently the case. I'm not saying that any culture/group/society has ever nailed a healthy sense of gender that has no possibility of attracting vulnerable folks down a possibly dangerous path, I'm saying that what we are seeing now is a part of humans recoiling against one dubious, unhealthy, restrictive sense of what it means to be a person and attempting to build another which is also full of pitfalls. Nothing wrong with criticizing the new paradigm, but...and I'm not saying that you specifically are doing this, the idea that dubious ideas around gender is just now becoming a dangerous problem to vulnerable people  or young girls in particular is patently dubious itself, because like when were vulnerable & confused young girls with underlying mental health issues ever safe from weird gender ideas that lead them to doing regrettable things to their bodies?

It could be that they are, and certainly, this has been the case. It could also be that "trans" is socially the thing to do, and we see a multiple thousands per cent increase among girls because girls are the sex more pliable by the social thing -- self-harm and suicide being the well-known examples, despite also being self-destructive. ROGD, as Littman would put it, and as everyone hates.

This brings us back to the notion of "gender identity", which is a concept that sows confusion.

I don't know who Littman is , but I believe it was Sister Mary Clarence of Aquinas Cathedral who said "Ball of confusion
Oh yeah, that's what the world is today, well well". Again I say when has the current "the thing to do" when it comes to identity roles and such been so friggin' great? I feel like you feel like this is a particularly precarious set of ideas, like especially so when compared to previous paradigms, and I say I do not think so. Its certainly not perfect, but we only got here because we already had messed up ideas that people rejected because they saw the damage caused or saw that more fundamental issues were exacerbated by these messed up gender ideas. I have no problem with pointing out the issues, we probably share more concerns than not, but from where I stand it seems like there is a huge lack of perspective and context going on here.

This is a bizarre comparison. Was there a time during the 20th - 21st centuries when sexual abuse was taught as good, and to not accept so was to risk job loss, a mob, ostracisation, etc.?

Heavens to Betsy! I was merely comparing the pervasiveness of the issue as it were. I'm just saying that picking your pet issue as the issue that we'll name the entire generation after is a little or alot over the top considering all of the traumatic pervasive junk this generation faces. Also not to beat a dead horse, the "risks" for not fitting into the gender roles identity concepts that are the current "thing to do" have always been deleterious to those that didn't fit in...its not right, but it is common as rain. I'm not saying you should shut up about it or anything, but if the consequences are the same for 2 orthogonally opposed ideologies then maybe the way we approach the questions and ideas and questioning the questions and ideas is fundamentally unhinged.

That, broader society has.

Yes, agreement. I think this means that if we want to actually help vulnerable people to become more robust in the face of dubious ideas or dubious interpretations of veracious ideas then we can spend a little more focus and resources on actually getting at what underlies this vulnerability in the first place. I suspect you might believe that ultimately its rooted in super-nature, but I think it rests in nature-nature and if we worked at it we could do alot better.

[Athanasius]

Oscar, if you don't know who Littman is, do you have any personal insight or connection into this "pet issue" of mine, or are you just theorising on a forum? I have my own experience, in addition to dozens (upon dozens, upon dozens) of others I've spoken with. Is this real for you, or is it at a distance?

[Oscar_Kipling]

Oscar, if you don't know who Littman is, do you have any personal insight or connection into this "pet issue" of mine, or are you just theorising on a forum? I have my own experience, in addition to dozens (upon dozens, upon dozens) of others I've spoken with. Is this real for you, or is it at a distance?

 Yes, I have personal connection, not sure that I have any special insight and yes it's real for me, however not being trans myself there is a certain gulf that will always exist for me. Is that good enough to continue?

[Athanasius]

Oscar, if you don't know who Littman is, do you have any personal insight or connection into this "pet issue" of mine, or are you just theorising on a forum? I have my own experience, in addition to dozens (upon dozens, upon dozens) of others I've spoken with. Is this real for you, or is it at a distance?

 Yes, I have personal connection, not sure that I have any special insight and yes it's real for me, however not being trans myself there is a certain gulf that will always exist for me. Is that good enough to continue?

Yep, so long as we aren't theorising in a vacuum. I'll reply in full later. In the meantime, Littman is worth becoming familiar with.

[Oscar_Kipling]

Oscar, if you don't know who Littman is, do you have any personal insight or connection into this "pet issue" of mine, or are you just theorising on a forum? I have my own experience, in addition to dozens (upon dozens, upon dozens) of others I've spoken with. Is this real for you, or is it at a distance?

 Yes, I have personal connection, not sure that I have any special insight and yes it's real for me, however not being trans myself there is a certain gulf that will always exist for me. Is that good enough to continue?

Yep, so long as we aren't theorising in a vacuum. I'll reply in full later. In the meantime, Littman is worth becoming familiar with.

Okay, I've familiarized myself with Littman's original & corrected ROGD papers, her methodology defense paper and her detransitioner survey paper. Additionally I have familiarized myself with various academic  critiques, responses and reviews of Littmans work. I can confidently say that I am now the leading Littman/ROGD scholar of my entire household.