> those things on your chest,… cannot be escaped. But now there’s another route,… Girls can get their breasts cut off.
Trans-man aren’t “Girls who want to be men to avoid the pains of modern femininity”. It’s an unfortunate limit of human empathy that we try to relate our experiences with those in pain, and often this causes us to project our own difficulties onto others, when they are actually feeling something else. I get it Janice, you and JK Rowling had difficulty coming to terms with your own changing body and your own experiences of womanhood. That doesn’t mean all afab trans people are just transitioning to avoid the same pains you went through. Gender-Dyspohoria is something else entirely.
> Mermaids might not insert the scalpel but it sets girls on course to the clinic.
Nobody is coming to ‘trans the kids’. More people are identifying as trans because there is more awareness and understanding of gender dysphoria and trans peopel in general. Nobody I have ever talked with has wanted to ’cause more people to be trans’. They want those who experience gender dysphoria or desire to be another gender, to have the knowledge and confidence to improve their lives. They want to address the situations that already exist in society, not turn a bunch of ‘normal’ people trans.
> Breast ironing, performed in some African countries to make a girl look too young to be married off, is classed as child abuse in Britain and a criminal act. Yet breast binding, which gives a similar androgynous, prepubescent silhouette, is not.
Because they are two fucking different things! God woman, just because two things result in a similar silhouette doesn’t make them identical. Binding *can* cause the damage you describe, but thats why you have to be careful to limit use. You have to take breaks through the day, and don’t sleep in it. You know what else that’s like, contact lenses. Contact lenses will cause permenant and nasty damage if you keep them in constantly, but nobody is suggesting we ban them, or that opticians are an evil group going around blinding kids are they.
> For many girls binding is a passing craze,… But worn for long periods binders wreck your breasts, so you hate them even more;… Then LGBT groups promote a road to freedom, not by removing your binder, but your breasts.
See above about “they’re transing the kids” panic. LGBT groups generally advocate for therapy and counsiling to help understand who you are and what you want, and trialling different perts of social and presentational gender transition before jumping to anything permenant. I have never heard anyone suggest jumping to immediate HRT (which is not the same as puberty blockers) or surgery.
> In fact you don’t need “dodgy Google searches” to witness this horror. Just search #topsurgery on Instagram and find thousands of short-haired waifs displaying livid lateral scars, their nipples cut off to be sewn or tattooed on later.
“It’s gross and scary and therefore bad”. Literally the same shit arguments as anti-abortion groups trying to make people object to abortion based on disgust by showing images. Have you ever seen a lung transplant? Because let me tell you, that is nasty and disgusting to watch, but it’s very necessary and good that it happens.
> They send greetings cards to congratulate friends on “getting a weight off your chest” or contribute to crowd-funders “to put my tits in the bin by Christmas”.
In shocking news, people with gender dysphoria feel good about fixing sources of said dysphoria. And people who see their friends happy congratulate them. Wow, how terrifying!
> Where are the voices in sex education saying entering womanhood can feel like walking through fire, that bodily discomfort is a logical response both to the strange rhythms of biology and daunting expectations?
Still there. It’s still fucking there Janice! Nobody is saying “Either you’re 100% comfortable during puberty, or you’re trans”. Puberty can be a difficult change for everyone, but gender dysphoria is one thing that can cause it to be seriously fucking miserable. And so we try to educate people so that if they think they might be suffering from it, they can receive help.
I don’t know why I expected better from the author of “Children sacrificed to appease trans lobby.”. The Times should be ashamed to still take work from her.
2 comments
Archived, no paywall:
https://archive.ph/20220930222723/https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/time-to-change-the-world-not-girls-bodies-m03n269xf
Who ordered a maincourse of transphobia?
> those things on your chest,… cannot be escaped. But now there’s another route,… Girls can get their breasts cut off.
Trans-man aren’t “Girls who want to be men to avoid the pains of modern femininity”. It’s an unfortunate limit of human empathy that we try to relate our experiences with those in pain, and often this causes us to project our own difficulties onto others, when they are actually feeling something else. I get it Janice, you and JK Rowling had difficulty coming to terms with your own changing body and your own experiences of womanhood. That doesn’t mean all afab trans people are just transitioning to avoid the same pains you went through. Gender-Dyspohoria is something else entirely.
> Mermaids might not insert the scalpel but it sets girls on course to the clinic.
Nobody is coming to ‘trans the kids’. More people are identifying as trans because there is more awareness and understanding of gender dysphoria and trans peopel in general. Nobody I have ever talked with has wanted to ’cause more people to be trans’. They want those who experience gender dysphoria or desire to be another gender, to have the knowledge and confidence to improve their lives. They want to address the situations that already exist in society, not turn a bunch of ‘normal’ people trans.
> Breast ironing, performed in some African countries to make a girl look too young to be married off, is classed as child abuse in Britain and a criminal act. Yet breast binding, which gives a similar androgynous, prepubescent silhouette, is not.
Because they are two fucking different things! God woman, just because two things result in a similar silhouette doesn’t make them identical. Binding *can* cause the damage you describe, but thats why you have to be careful to limit use. You have to take breaks through the day, and don’t sleep in it. You know what else that’s like, contact lenses. Contact lenses will cause permenant and nasty damage if you keep them in constantly, but nobody is suggesting we ban them, or that opticians are an evil group going around blinding kids are they.
> For many girls binding is a passing craze,… But worn for long periods binders wreck your breasts, so you hate them even more;… Then LGBT groups promote a road to freedom, not by removing your binder, but your breasts.
See above about “they’re transing the kids” panic. LGBT groups generally advocate for therapy and counsiling to help understand who you are and what you want, and trialling different perts of social and presentational gender transition before jumping to anything permenant. I have never heard anyone suggest jumping to immediate HRT (which is not the same as puberty blockers) or surgery.
> In fact you don’t need “dodgy Google searches” to witness this horror. Just search #topsurgery on Instagram and find thousands of short-haired waifs displaying livid lateral scars, their nipples cut off to be sewn or tattooed on later.
“It’s gross and scary and therefore bad”. Literally the same shit arguments as anti-abortion groups trying to make people object to abortion based on disgust by showing images. Have you ever seen a lung transplant? Because let me tell you, that is nasty and disgusting to watch, but it’s very necessary and good that it happens.
> They send greetings cards to congratulate friends on “getting a weight off your chest” or contribute to crowd-funders “to put my tits in the bin by Christmas”.
In shocking news, people with gender dysphoria feel good about fixing sources of said dysphoria. And people who see their friends happy congratulate them. Wow, how terrifying!
> Where are the voices in sex education saying entering womanhood can feel like walking through fire, that bodily discomfort is a logical response both to the strange rhythms of biology and daunting expectations?
Still there. It’s still fucking there Janice! Nobody is saying “Either you’re 100% comfortable during puberty, or you’re trans”. Puberty can be a difficult change for everyone, but gender dysphoria is one thing that can cause it to be seriously fucking miserable. And so we try to educate people so that if they think they might be suffering from it, they can receive help.
I don’t know why I expected better from the author of “Children sacrificed to appease trans lobby.”. The Times should be ashamed to still take work from her.