Homosexuality vs Gender Dysphoria
Originally published on Facebook on JUNE 6, 2018
Re-published on Minds without revisions
As a sexually reproducing species, it should not be surprising that sexuality has always been the major issue for human societies, especially given that reproduction is not the only function of sexuality. It is also important for social bonding and social control.
The most debated and controversial issues are obviously marginal forms of behavior, mostly homosexuality. Over the past few years, Gender Dysphoria or “Transsexuality” has become extremely politicized. To properly respond to the claims by trans-activists, I will provide a facts-based analysis, so you can evaluate their claims.
Homosexuality
Homosexuality has always existed, in all societies and throughout history. We know that because it is represented and mentioned in numerous historical and religious documents - generally in rather negative terms, but occasionally as a normal part of society, e.g. in texts from ancient Greece. The Bible mentions and condemns it, which tells us that there definitely were homosexuals in the Middle East thousands of years ago.
One debate concerns the origin of homosexuality - is it learned behavior or is a person homosexual from birth? Those who oppose homosexuality as “immoral” claim that it cannot be natural, as homosexuals do not reproduce (well, in theory, in practice, they often do...) and hence cannot transmit a “homosexuality gene”.
Except that there is no need for a "homosexuality" gene, as it appears to be a part of the general genetic code controlling the sexuality of mammals, as most mammal species have been observed to practice homosexual behavior. It is more like a strategy that seems to enhance the survival chances of the species.
Homosexuality is not random. Studies have show that a person is most likely to be homosexual when the mother had already one or more previous children and when she experiences stress during the pregnancy. In nature, stress is interpreted as “lack of resources”, hence it is best for the species if the population pressure decreases.
http://healthpsych.psy.vanderbilt.edu/2008/PrenatalStress.htm
Homosexuals will reduce the population pressure and the competition between male members of society, while also contributing to the upbringing and education of their siblings' children, as they tend to be particularly skilled in "domestic" tasks such as cooking, fashion, arts, acting, education etc., domains often chosen by homosexuals, which cannot be a coincidence. Sexual preference affects the brain in many ways. Overall, their contributions seem beneficial to the species, which would explain their persistence in human society.
There is overwhelming evidence that the majority of homosexuals are born that way, i.e. no external influence "made" them homosexual. A significant number of homosexuals live in societies that prosecute homosexuals and may even kill them, as in many Islamic and African countries. If homosexuality was not natural, it is extremely unlikely that men would choose it voluntarily in such an environment with strong social and legal deterrent. In Europe, too, there used to be a strong social stigma and in many countries, it was even illegal until quite recently.
That said, it is also documented that severe abuse can alter a person's sexual preference. Boys who were raped by homosexual men seem to find it difficult to develop normal sexual relationships with women as adults. Girls who were raped as children might be so turned off by men that they become lesbians. In Afghanistan, men are so deprived of any contact with women that they developed the culture of “Bacha Bazi”, the sexual exploitation of very young boys, which they refuse to recognize as being homosexual pedophilia.
“Bacha Bazi: The Tragedy of Afghanistan’s Dancing Boys”
https://thediplomat.com/2014/08/bacha-bazi-the-tragedy-of-afghanistans-dancing-boys/
Sexual preferences exist on a sliding scale - men and women may be bisexual, entirely heterosexual or entirely homosexual. Bisexuality is much more frequent among women than among men. Studies have shown that almost all women are sexually aroused by heterosexual, lesbian and bisexual sex acts, even if they declared that they are strictly heterosexual, while heterosexual men are generally not stimulated by gay sex scenes and even find them repulsive. Strict lesbians react more like men and are not turned on by sex scenes involving men. As with so many other issues, we find that men and women are not at all symmetric in their behavior and preferences. Here are the details:
Sexual arousal and masculinity-femininity of women https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26501187
In principle, nothing should prevent a homosexual person from living a happy and fulfilling life. They are not unhappy about being homosexual per se, although they might be unhappy about the treatment they get from society. The brilliant Alan Turing, the father of modern computers who broke the Enigma encryption system, which contributed substantially to the allied victory over Nazi Germany, was driven to commit suicide after he was condemned to a humiliating hormone treatment because of a homosexual relationship, which was still illegal in the UK, in the 1950s. Homosexuality is not a mental health issue, although it was treated as such, as homosexuals can function normally in every way and do not display any other signs of mental health issues when allowed to live in peace.
Homosexual relationships among consensual adults cannot be seen as immoral. Given the prevalence of homosexuals among artists and intellectuals, it should come as no surprise that societies that murder their homosexuals rank very low in the production of intellectual and cultural goods.
Gender Dysphoria or “Transsexuality”
Gender dysphoria is a totally different issue. Although political activists added “Transgender” to the LGB (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual) movement, it is not a matter of sexual preference or of biology.
Gender Dysphoria is experienced by a person who is unhappy about his or her physical body and appearance, specifically the sex they were born with. It is comparable to the mental issues of a person who is unhappy about being very small or very tall, overweight or anorexic or suffering from some physical handicap.
There are people who suffer from “unwanted limb” syndrome - they feel that one of their arms or legs should not really be there. No doctor would indulge their psychological issue by cutting off the incriminated limb. But they do butcher genitals and breasts because a person has psychological issues with his or her gender and give them opposite sex hormones? And they even do so to teenagers. Is there any medical justification for this?
Transgender individuals suffer from an extremely high suicide rate - depending on various other factors, the rate of attempted suicide reaches 30% to 83%. This has been quoted as justification for both, specific laws to protect transgenders as well as hormonal and surgical changes, supposedly to make a person’s desired and physical gender match
Except that there is no evidence that such changes are helpful - even in the most tolerant, accepting environment, suicide rates stay extremely high and “gender reassignment procedures” don’t lead to the desired improvements either.
Some basic facts on Transgenderism
Note that some of the following are decried by promoters of Transgenderism as “activists against Transgenderism”, i.e. as ideological opponents. That doesn’t mean they should not be heard. See what they have to say and if they sound reasonable. They should only be dismissed if their objections are prima facie and not based on rational arguments.
This is an introduction into the origin and ideology of the “transgender” movement by a pediatrician:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxprkaJQNzU
This is a pediatrician endocrinologist who actually knew the original authors of the movement, the 3 musketeers, including Alfred Kinsey and John Money, who introduced the term “gender” as “psychological construct”:
“Transgender Surgery Isn't the Solution“
http://online.wsj.com/articles/paul-mchugh-transgender-surgery-isnt-the-solution-1402615120
“ Study shows rising rates of suicidal acts in transgender adults”
Regret of “gender reassignment” procedures is very high:
Even the standard bearer for the transgender movement, Bruce / Caitlyn Jenner expressed regret: https://www.ibtimes.com/caitlyn-jenner-regrets-transitioning-woman-wants-become-bruce-again-report-2367939
There are other clear indications that being transgender is a psychological and social issue that will never improve by medical treatment. An epidemiologist from Brown University observed that transgenderism spread like an infectious disease among adolescents, i.e. adolescents claim to be transgender, because it seems to be “cool” and it allows those who identify as such to claim victim status:
“Rapid-onset gender dysphoria in adolescents”
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0202330&type=printable
This study was immediately attacked by the transgender movement, which is entirely politicized and wants to control the public discourse:
The entire discourse about gender not being “binary” is of course complete nonsense. As a matter of biology, 2 genders are required - a male and a female - for reproduction to function properly. Everything else is a matter of psychology.
Yes, a child can be born with multiple sex organs, but typically, one or both will not be functional. If you are interested, here is an extensive article about this issue. It explains how sexual organs are formed, what can cause aberrations, how they are treated and the medical risks involved, e.g. the much higher risk of tumors for individuals with multiple or malformed sexual organs:
https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/encyclopedia/content.aspx?ContentTypeID=90&ContentID=P03079
A hermaphrodite with 2 fully functional sexual organs is born in 1 of about 400’000 births. A hermaphrodite is not a 3rd gender, but an individual that happens to be capable of fulfilling both gender roles, at least in theory.
Yes, chromosomal defects that include XXY, XXYY, XXXY and XXXX combinations exist. ALL of them lead to serious health issues. Not one of them represents a different gender:
“48,XXYY, 48,XXXY and 49,XXXXY syndromes: not just variants of Klinefelter syndrome” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3314712/
The “transgender” movement is unrelated to any of those genetic and health issues. It does not concern hermaphrodites or chromosomal defects. It concerns individuals who would prefer to be of the opposite gender - or who would like to be able to switch between genders - even if they had one perfectly well-formed set of sex organs.
Modern medical technology allows doctors to butcher a person’s sex organs and make them look like something different. Hormonal treatment will alter a person’s appearance to the point where they can look like the opposite sex, but all of that does not alter the person’s birth sex. Those alterations might be very convincing and might work for recreational sex, but they will never work for reproduction.
The badly named “gender reassignment” procedure mostly has the effect of destroying the victim’s ability to have children.
No one deserves to be treated badly because of any physical or psychological issues, so it is understandable that transgender individuals try to raise awareness about their existence. But that’s where it ends - there can never be any kind of legal action to:
- impose forced speech (gender pronouns, as in Canada and various US States)
- restrictions on free speech such as Twitter banning users for saying that “women don’t have a penis”, which is a factual statements
- any attempt at limiting scientific research because the conclusions of such research does not please some political group
- impose a major cost on schools and other public places to accommodate a tiny minority who are not physically handicapped
- to impose biological men in spaces normally reserved to women just because they claim to be women; this is offensive and potentially dangerous to actual women
- to allow transgender men to compete as women in sports and cultural events specifically reserved for women
The latter point is particularly absurd: a biological man will have a huge advantage over women even after hormonal and surgical procedures:
“Transgender MMA Fighter Breaks Female Opponent’s Skull” https://www.bjjee.com/articles/transgender-mma-fighter-breaks-female-opponents-skull-are-we-getting-too-politically-correct-with-reality/
“WATCH: Two Transgenders Blow Out Girls In State Meet” https://www.dailywire.com/news/31605/watch-two-transgenders-blow-out-girls-state-meet-hank-berrien?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_content=062316-news&utm_campaign=benshapiro
“Transgender wrestler wins second straight Texas girls’ high school title”
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/feb/25/mack-beggs-transgender-wrestler-wins-texas-girls-h/
“Aiming for Miss Universe — and Universal Transgender Rights” https://www.nytimes.com/2018/07/13/world/europe/spain-transgender-ponce-miss-universe.html
The irony that a student is fired from a “Free Speech” journal for re-tweeting an article that questions the transgender ideology is proof that it is high time to fight back:
“Student editor who retweeted article pointing out that that 'women don't have penises' is fired from university journal“
Interestingly, even the New York Times just published a very critical article about the Gender Dysphoria movement: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/24/opinion/sunday/vaginoplasty-transgender-medicine.html
And here is a comment on the article well worth reading as well: http://www.breakpoint.org/2018/12/breakpoint-this-is-what-i-want/
Best analogy
Regarding fanatics who cheer on people with gender dysphoria, the thought just crossed my mind that since gender dysphoria is like any other forms of body dysphoria, one should ask them if they support radical medical transformations for all of them, rather than try to convince them to accept who they are.
Michael Jackson spent a fortune on plastic surgery and medical treatments over decades as he was trying to look more like a white person - changing his hair, performing operations on his nose, lips, cheek bones, whitening his skin etc.
The transformation of Michael Jackson
He kept denying that he was doing it, claimed that his skin was naturally whitening because of an illness and that the nose operation was done to improve his singing voice, but medical experts think that his claims are highly questionable. Here is an article that debates this issue:
https://abcnews.go.com/2020/MichaelJackson/story?id=7982236&page=1
So would the transgender fanatics edge Michael Jackson on and tell him "Yes, great, it's good that you embrace who you want to be, this is so much better than your natural self" or would they rather tell him "Michael, you don't have to change - you look great. You can be happy and proud of your achievements as a black man. Everyone will like you just the same"?
Note that it is not relevant whether Michael Jackson really did try to be white or not, he is just an easily recognizable and plausible example.
Another famous example is Rachel Dolezal, the white woman who wanted to be black and publicly claimed to be black when the lie was absolutely obvious. Her parents adopted several black children and apparently neglected their biological children, giving more love to the adopted ones. As a consequence, she felt that as white woman, she was not lovable, so she developed race dysphoria.
Those who promote transgenderism are like co-dependent alcoholics. They are not helping, they are aggravating the condition of those who suffer from various forms of body dysphoria.
Conclusion
The attempt to associate homosexuality and transgenderism is a complete fraud - they are totally different issues. If someone says that they can be “whatever gender they want to be”, I will consider them as potentially dangerous and in need of urgent psychiatric help.
Doctors who agree to hormonal and surgical sex-change operations for adolescents should be prosecuted for malpractice.
Adults are obviously free to do whatever they want with their own bodies - at their own cost. Such procedures should never be covered by government grants or health insurances.
Attempts to impose specific transgender laws should be rejected. Existing laws are entirely sufficient for the protection of all individuals, transgender or not.