Serious Question: Why are so Many People Afraid/Unaccepting of Transgender People?

This thread has been quite revealing.

Serious questions:
Should people be expected to accept (not just tolerate) any and all voluntary human behavior?

If not, where should that line be drawn?

a reply to: OpenMindedRealist

Forget expectation, we are talking about force here. Change society, enact laws, etc.

originally posted by: OpenMindedRealist
This thread has been quite revealing.

Serious questions:
Should people be expected to accept (not just tolerate) any and all voluntary human behavior?

If not, where should that line be drawn?

Yes, and tolerance is not good enough, you are wrong if you do not fully accept and actually "celebrate" the movement and never disagree with any part of the "promotion" of the movement regardless of consequences, or else....

I have major concerns with "anatomical males" using Womens showers, locker rooms, and bathrooms. I have brought up the point that any man can then say he is "transgender" even if he is not in order to access womens facilities for nefarious purposes.

It is a valid concern. There are very bad and sick people in our society and there are many, many women who do not want "anatomical men" in their locker rooms, showers, and bathrooms.

Recently, there has been a drive to sue anyone who prevents transgender "anatomical males" from accessing these Womens facilities. There are also "negative consequences" for Women who voice their concerns.

When Unisex options are provided, that idea is rejected and litigation ensues.

I think it is quite a fair concern. How do you keep the predators and perverts from claiming "transgender" status and accessing women's facilities without the ability to even challenge it because challenging will be considered unfairly "profiling" or harassment?

Again, me personally could care less who uses the Male facilities but allowing unchallengeable ease of access to womens facilities is a concern.

Does anyone else see this as a valid concern?

originally posted by: ketsuko

The little darlins' don't graduate with any understanding of math, science, or even a third grade level reading ability, but bless their hearts, we make sure they know all the possible sexual positions known to man, how to put on condoms, all the different sexual orientations and whether or not they might be gender fluid!

I bet you the vast majority of people have more use for a condom than a protractor !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Issues of sex, relationships etc have far far more relevance to the vast majority of people every week all through their lives than does mathematics, quantum mechanics or DNA base pairs.

The concept of 'tolerance' has become extremely muddied in our day and age.

So, you're transgendered, good for you. Could you please leave the rest of us alone now?

I've been shunned by my family, and guess what? I go on with my life. Yeah, it's that simple. I don't demand that they see things my way through coercion, or legislation. I live my life without their input.
I was born left-handed in what is very much a right-handed world. I didn't have much of a choice in that. Yet, somehow, though most everyone I meet is right-handed, and the world is essentially set up with them in mind, I have somehow manage to get by without bemoaning the fact that when I have to rearrange a computer at work, so the mouse is on the comfortable side, people look at me strangely. I don't whine that left handed scissors are as difficult to find in an average office, or left-handed power tools in the average workshop, as the Holy Grail; I deal with it.
You may think to yourself that this is a trifle, well, that is exactly how I view your "struggle".
Left-handedness is just one way in which I don't fit in with society, but it's as good an example as any.
When someone watches me write something, and says "Oh wow. You're a lefty? That's so weird.", does that make them a bigot, or fearful towards lefties? It doesn't, but in THAT moment, I'm as much of a circus freak to them, as you are to those you proclaim 'bigots'.
Seriously, stop telling everyone how normal you are, because they don't believe you, and probably never will. That doesn't mean they're afraid or hateful, it means they don't see things the way you do.
You'll never be happy until YOU can move on with your life, and not give a rat's ass what others think.
In short, get over yourself, already. Everyone else has.

a reply to: honested3

First, I don't hate you and I'm not afraid of you and I accept that you feel what you feel and I respect your free will to do as you will as long as you aren't hurting anyone else... but I honestly don't understand how you can "feel like a woman." I am a woman and I still have absolutely no concept of what it means to "feel like a woman." I can only tell you what it feels like to have lived the life of a woman.

I've given this a lot of thought since "the Bruce interview." It makes no sense to me. I know how it feels to bleed once a month for 25+ years... I know the pain of menstrual cramps... I know the inconvenience of having a period. I also know what it feels like to be pregnant and to be in labor and to deliver a baby -- once without benefit of pain killers (though not by choice!). I also know the pain of endometriosis, an ectopic pregnancy that ruptured, uterine fibroid tumors, and a hysterectomy... I can only assume that you don't. All of those things are exclusive to being a woman, but they don't make me "feel like a woman."

And it can't just be about clothes or makeup or perfume or other girly things. I enjoy getting all gussied up occasionally, but for the most part it's a just a big pain in the butt! My clothing of choice is jeans and a T-shirt. It's practical, it's comfortable, and it's affordable. And usually mens jeans, because my legs are so long and I can't find women's jeans long enough very often. But it doesn't make me "feel like a man." I was even a tomboy growing up -- I didn't have much choice! My little sister was the only other girl in the neighborhood, so I played "boys" games with the boys. But I never felt like a boy/man. How would I even know what it feels like to be a man? I have no frame of reference whatsoever.

So a serious question for you (or two or three): What does it feel like to feel like a woman? How is it even possible for you to feel like a woman? What is your frame of reference?

Perhaps more important, in a societal context as opposed to you as an individual, I do not understand this demand to qualify and quantify everyone -- especially in terms of gender... except as one more way to divide-and-conquer. I thought the feminist movement was all about breaking down such superficial identity politics! We're all people with the same basic wants and needs. We all need air to breathe and food and drink to sustain us... we all want and need a little love and affection and friendship to nurture ourselves... we all get hurt and get sick and need some tender loving care... I give everyone the respect they deserve as a fellow human. I don't judge a book by it's cover -- or a person by the color of their skin or the genitalia under their clothing -- and I taught my kids the same. If we don't like you, it won't have anything to do with biological gender nor the gender you identify with. What more can we possibly do? What more do you expect of us or anyone?

a reply to: yorkshirelad
Some might consider that an indictment on the human race.

What you say may be true, given that many people seem to think only about what they see around them. Instincts will steer our minds, if we allow.

There is also the matter of the reverse bullying of people who do not render their open approval.

We don't like bullying, but how is it not bullying to call anyone and everyone who does not instantly tender to you the exact right amount of approval you were looking for a "bigot" or "hater?"

If you want true equality, then you have to be treated exactly like everyone else and treat everyone else the same. That means you aren't special because you have a differing status of some sort. Sometimes, it is up to you to accommodate the larger society and not the other way around because let's be honest - if we tried to design society to fully accommodate everyone who would prefer that we did something differently to suit them, then society would not exist. Everything would clash and there would only be chaos.

Or to be more specific - I'm sure that people with dwarfism would prefer that we built and designed all of society to accommodate people of their height, but so would people with gigantism. However, since the two are extreme outliers on either end of the spectrum of human height, society builds and designs to accommodate the majority with reasonable accommodation for the extreme outliers.

Reasonable accommodation is what outliers have the right to expect, and I think this current drive to break down gender and sex is simply a way to try to force all of society to accommodate itself to the outliers rather than the outliers accepting that maybe in some things they ought to accommodate themselves to the larger society.

And I think if we all think about it, there are ways in which we would like all of society to bend itself to our whims, but should we make it do that?

a reply to: Boadicea

I'm not a transgender, but I could try to imagine what it may be like. Imagine waking up one day with the same personality, the same "you" that you have always been, but all of a sudden you have a different body. Now you have broad shoulders, a 5:00 shadow and... a penis between your legs. Everyone starts treating you exactly as if you are a guy. But you feel the same as you always did on the inside. Do you think it might freak you out a little bit, or do you think you wouldn't notice the difference? And would you still get "gussied up" in a dress and high heels?

a reply to: Boadicea

So you're not the only one!

My husband and I talked about it, and we both have no idea what it feels like to be a man or woman. We are simply ourselves. Does he "feel" like a man? Do I "feel" like a woman? We neither one have any idea. We've just been who and what we are, and it never really crossed our minds that we should feel any particular way to qualify as having one gender or another.

originally posted by: kaylaluv
a reply to: Boadicea

I'm not a transgender, but I could try to imagine what it may be like. Imagine waking up one day with the same personality, the same "you" that you have always been, but all of a sudden you have a different body. Now you have broad shoulders, a 5:00 shadow and... a penis between your legs. Everyone starts treating you exactly as if you are a guy. But you feel the same as you always did on the inside. Do you think it might freak you out a little bit, or do you think you wouldn't notice the difference? And would you still get "gussied up" in a dress and high heels?

But why would you suddenly wake up that way?

And if you are transgender, you have always been that way, so as far as you are concerned, this is you. Part of life is learning to accept who you are not fight against it.

a reply to: ketsuko

The point is, to try to understand how someone can feel like they are in the wrong body. You and the other poster are saying that it shouldn't feel any different to be a man or a woman in your head. But it does feel different. You would see that if you all of a sudden didn't have the body that you thought you had. You would see how the body didn't match the you inside. You would see how it would feel "wrong". You would probably try hard to figure out how to get your body back, rather than just shrug and say "oh well, I'll just live with it."

a reply to: ProfessorChaos

Tell this to the transgender that can't get hired, or the transgender who gets beat up, or the transgender who has been told by their parents that they are "evil" while they completely cut them off from the rest of the family. It's a little bit different than being left-handed.

originally posted by: kaylaluv
a reply to: Boadicea

I'm not a transgender, but I could try to imagine what it may be like. Imagine waking up one day with the same personality, the same "you" that you have always been, but all of a sudden you have a different body. Now you have broad shoulders, a 5:00 shadow and... a penis between your legs....

I'm really not trying to be flippant, but I guess I'd just look at it as trading protruding bosoms for broad shoulders... shaving my face instead of my legs and pits... and wearing boxers instead of panties... On the plus side, I could give up underwires!

While I appreciate your analogy, this isn't about suddenly waking up different; then one would have a different frame of reference. But the OP (and I believe most transgenders) have felt this way for as long as they can remember.

Everyone starts treating you exactly as if you are a guy. But you feel the same as you always did on the inside. Do you think it might freak you out a little bit, or do you think you wouldn't notice the difference?

I'm sure it would be an eye opening experience. But it would still be more about external influences rather than internal influences.

And would you still get "gussied up" in a dress and high heels?

Maybe sometimes. Just the dress part -- not the high heels. One, I'm tall enough already! Two, I can barely walk and chew bubble gum at the same time... high heels are a physical hazard for me. I do like dresses. They just aren't practical usually. But if I was suddenly a guy, I think I'd probably also have a little fun wearing tuxes and such too!

a reply to: ketsuko

Thank you! Whew!!! I've never seen anyone else bring it up (here or elsewhere), and my husband and I were beginning to think we were missing something... We just are who we are.

a reply to: Boadicea

Yes, it's easy to be flippant when it is just a hypothetical situation. Might be a bit different if it was real, and if you were told you had to live with this body for the next 40-50 years of your life. At least I know it would seriously bum me out.

originally posted by: kaylaluv
a reply to: ketsuko

The point is, to try to understand how someone can feel like they are in the wrong body.

I am trying... I just have no frame of reference so I don't understand how it's even possible to "always" feel like you are really the opposite sex.

You and the other poster are saying that it shouldn't feel any different to be a man or a woman in your head.

No "shoulds" here. It is what it is. I don't understand it... but I understand that it is.

Oh wow! I think this whole thing has been stretched to far. But mostly I think people have been stretched to far, and for the most part it has nothing to do with the transgender people. The truth is most are not going to see it your way in pretty much every facet of your life, and on a individual level that is true of all of us.

That and you know the planets are aligning we are going through a central flux with the core of the galaxy, the crazy beams from planet nibiru are just getting warmed up and redirected through phobos and deimos, and people issues have been stretched and prodded in all aspects of life, there nerves are on edge from all directions and things are generally going in all kinds of directions, but mostly in the general direction of last nerve and crazy direction. The world is in flux and things are a shifting both for good and bad.

This may not be the best of times OP to administer to the plight of transgender people. I am quite sure they will have there time. But it may not be now. I think we just need to agree that an apple will never see things from the perspective of an orange and it is futile to compare them even in contrast. Life and let live for another time when there is less turbulence in the air of posterity. People do seem to take posterity super serious ya know.

originally posted by: kaylaluv
a reply to: Boadicea

Yes, it's easy to be flippant when it is just a hypothetical situation. Might be a bit different if it was real, and if you were told you had to live with this body for the next 40-50 years of your life. At least I know it would seriously bum me out.

I really wasn't trying to be flippant. I am trying to understand.

On the other hand, it can also seem quite flippant to say "I feel like a woman" when you've never had to be a woman.... or spend 40+ years (and counting) suffering from actually being a woman. I've suffered endometriosis, several miscarriages -- including an ectopic pregnancy that ruptured and almost killed me, severe complications in pregnancy that kept me bed-ridden at best and hospitalized at worst, fibroid tumors that hurt like hell and literally knocked me unconscious a few times before being removed...

What the OP is feeling I cannot relate to. Neither can the OP relate to what I have been through as a woman. Hence my question: how does the OP (or anyone) know what it feels like to be the opposite gender?

I am not afraid of them at all, I find them very interesting, oh wait, is that Micro Aggression?,

mommy