How would you react to finding out you were making out with a transsexual?

[Yonadav]

During my time with the Orthodox Jewish community, the community's understanding of trans rights and acceptance of trans people grew exponentially

If you can't see how it is harmful to claim that post-op trans-women who have had sex with men without revealing their past are date-rapists, then you shouldn't be 'educating' people about trans-rights or what it means to be trans.

If you can't understand how it negates a person core identity and erodes their belief that they have a right to exist like any other person or to do the most basic of things, then you're probably doing more harm than good by trying to be a representative of transsexuals.

And yes I do recognise that I am doing the same to you by denying that you are transsexual.

Sucks doesn't it.

I don't try to be representative of transsexuals. I simply am a transsexual with mountains of experience in trans issues. I was a major operative in persuading a city to add a gender identity clause to its EEOC enforcement, making trans people a protected class in that city. It was one of the earliest cities to do so. I've been a major operator in getting religious communities to be more accepting of trans people. I've spent decades on the front lines. 

And you're just a pot smoker with strong vapid opinions about things that you don't know anything about.

I've said everything that I have to say, and you're too entrenched in what you perceive to be the liberal side of a partisan issue where you think that trans people have rights and the people that they are intimate with don't. There's no talking to someone who thinks like that. So I'm done talking to you about it.

[I_am_not_mafia]

I honestly don’t now how that’s not transgenderism. If he wasn’t transgender, that vagina would be a real problem.

I didn't say that it wasn't transgenderism. I said that he's not transsexual. Transgenderism is an umbrella term that includes being transsexual. Transsexual is an outdated term because of the word 'sexual' suggesting to people it's a matter of sexuality rather than biological sex. But it was and still is very specific about what it refers to. Fundamental to it is the concept of gender dysphoria to the point where children will often end up trying to mutilate their genitals to correct the mistake they are born with. That is not consistent with the idea of choosing to revert back again.

It's just not possible that Yonadav is this kind of transsexual where living in your acquired gender is fundamental to who you are as a person at its very core. Because if his gender identity is male and he is now living with a female body then why transition in the first place? But if he claims his gender identity was female then why is he using a male pronoun and has started living as a man again.

Sure Yonadav could have been confused about his gender identity which could have been in the middle of the spectrum. And I feel sorry for him if he was. That's a difficult place to be. That may be transgendered but it's not transsexual which he is claiming to represent and educate cisgendered people about while coming out with incredibly harmful comments.

---

And you're just a pot smoker with strong vapid opinions about things that you don't know anything about.

What does pot have to do with it?

You don't know what I know about this. Just because I am not revealing my own personal experiences doesn't mean to say that I am what you think I am. A transsexual would recognise that.

[Yonadav]

Just for the record:

I'm not confused about my gender identity. I know exactly what I am, and for me it makes complete sense. Other people are confused about my gender identity. I like what I am. I like myself and what I am just fine. For me, being a female to male transsexual who was born male makes complete sense. I like it. I'm very comfortable with it. It took me decades to discover that this is who I am. I self identify as a woman who lives as a man. I really like myself this way.

[The Grand Nudger]

-and I'm a total lesbian!  

aaaaanyway.......it's clear that this entire notion swirls around taboo and stigma and insecurity.  For whatever reason, being trans is so taboo and stigmatized that it seems "different" than being a republican, for example..even though the functional explanation of why this would be molestation or rape or a breach of moral duty is equally applicable to hidden republicanism on it;s own terms.

I don't think that there's any cogent description of rape or molestation or even moral duty that can lay that charge against a person when some other individual, with their own hands and of their own accord, starts groping. No one is grabbing someone else's hand and rubbing it all over their crotch in this hypothetical or in the OPs story.

"I don't like penis! He tricked me! No gay no gay he's the gay!" - Well...you certainly seem to have liked him......

[Divinity]

I'd be too busy making out with them to really think much about it to be honest. I mean if I'm already attracted to them to the point where I'd make out with them, then I really don't give a fuck. Helps to be bi-curious, I guess.

[Yonadav]

Mathilda reminds me some white people who consider themselves to be very accepting of black people, until a black person disagrees with them about something. And then the super accepting white person becomes a flaming racist toward the black person who disagrees with them.

At the end of the day, transsexuals have never given me much push back in discussions about the ethics of intimate relationships with others. Our discussions aren't the flame wars that Mathilda wants to engage in, because we are sincerely interested in the rights of those with whom we are intimate.

[The Grand Nudger]

Would you like to complain about libtards next..or...?

It's not really surprising that you don't get alot of pushback from trans folks on this issue, their perceptions and expectations and notions of moral duty would be just as informed by taboo, stigma, and insecurity as anyone else's in this regard. The cultural milieu informing all of us, trans and cis, just wasn't set up to address the issue and, when confronted with it, handles it poorly.

[I_am_not_mafia]

Just for the record:

I'm not confused about my gender identity. I know exactly what I am, and for me it makes complete sense. Other people are confused about my gender identity. I like what I am. I like myself and what I am just fine. For me, being a female to male transsexual who was born male makes complete sense. I like it. I'm very comfortable with it. It took me decades to discover that this is who I am. I self identify as a woman who lives as a man. I really like myself this way.

In that case you're not transsexual. You aren't fully male or female. I can say this because humans are a mix of both nature and nurture. Parts of the brain are plastic and shaped by environmental influences, other parts aren't. This is why transsexuality cannot be cured except by transitioning. And fuck knows the medical community have tried for many decades. This is also why being transsexual is so damaging to the individual. Because whatever the person does, the nurture they receive is fundamentally opposed to their nature.

So your gender identity may be female, but if you aren't living as a woman then your brain is not being shaped by environmental influences consistent with your gender identity. This is one reason why it takes so long to transition. It's not just a matter of shaping the body, but learning how to talk, walk, interact with other people and be seen as your acquired gender. And this point is critical to this conversation. Because if you have to explain to people that you are trans before you can have sex, or be denied access to bathrooms or locker rooms, or access to women's refuges or festivals, then it's stopping you becoming the person that you need to be. A transsexual would know this, maybe not explicitly but at least recognise it by transitioning. This was the whole fucking point of the thread after all if you think about it.

So while I am genuinely happy that you have found a way to live with yourself that works for you, maybe you should just admit that you are intersex, not transsexual. Trans- means to cross over, inter- means to be inbetween. So you should consider calling yourself intersex. Because by staying in the half way position you're not fucking transsexual.

Mathilda reminds me some white people who consider themselves to be very accepting of black people, until a black person disagrees with them about something. And then the super accepting white person becomes a flaming racist toward the black person who disagrees with them.

At the end of the day, transsexuals have never given me much push back in discussions about the ethics of intimate relationships with others. Our discussions aren't the flame wars that Mathilda wants to engage in, because we are sincerely interested in the rights of those with whom we are intimate.

Fucking leave it out with the strawman arguments about pot smoking and about my motivations in this regard. It just shows that you cannot argue against the points that I am raising and that you are losing the argument.

Maybe the transsexuals would have given you push-back if you had just accused them of being date rapists.

The fact that you are so wrong about me tells me that I am correct.

[Divinity]

Accusing someone of being a pot smoker is a lot like accusing someone of having a cool car.

[I_am_not_mafia]

Accusing someone of being a pot smoker is a lot like accusing someone of having a cool car.

I only started using it to help with my MS and it's a fundamental part of my strategy for coping with the disease and not becoming disabled or losing neural functionality. But I now wish that I had discovered pot much earlier. It has only had a positive influence on my life. And I am someone that is very reluctant to take any medication unless I absolutely have to. I haven't even been on anti-depressants for example.