politics
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
view the rest of the comments
I'm not trolling. I legitimately don't understand how people can justify this kind of "treatment" for kids. There is a reason we don't allow the other things I mentioned. It's because the judgement and experience of a minor is inadequate. We are protecting young people from making mistakes and hurting themselves or others. They will have the rest of their adult life to determine how they want to live and/or medically alter their biochemistry.
Here I'll make it simple for you.
If you block trans teens from receiving gender affirming care, some of them will commit suicide.
Also 99% of gender affirming care is hormone treatments alone.
"They will kill themselves if you dont do x" isn't an argument. If anything it's a problem statement.
If you let them destroy their young, still forming bodies many of them will regret it and commit suicide later when they realize they have irrecoverably destroyed their natural sexual function. They are children with a limited capacity to understand the totality of how this will impact the rest of their life. If doctors and schools communicate openly and honestly with parents (which they don't) the situation can be handled in ways befitting a minor.
You'll keep getting down voted because you simply don't know what you are talking about. Or are arguing in bad faith. Suicide is a problem and with trans kids the best ways of reducing that are accepting and supportive parents and gender affirming treatments. The accepting and supporting part is relatively easy the medical aspects, not as much, and if there were easier options you better believe they would be getting used (in fact most places support patients social transitions steps along side medical steps they may be pursuing). The nice overlap here is that for trans youth starting medical steps at the beginning of puberty also comes with the benefit of reducing later in life procedures to undo the permanent (there's that word again) changes caused by puberty and the particular set of hormones that comes with that.
As for people understanding themselves and how things will impact their life, you once again swing and miss. While no one knows what will happen and how they may change over time our sense of self does tend to be fairly crystalized in our teen years. The rates of de/retransitioning are really low, and research with those that do shows that it's only a small portion of those people that have regret (many don't regret it, they just see things as changing for them). Surgery is a different animal in many ways BUT, rates of regret with gender affirming surgery is actually LOWER than rates of regret for other surgeries (think knee surgery back surgery etc.). It is so low that it is an area being studied in hope of reducing regret for other kinds of surgeries.
Lastly as for doctors and schools communicating, I don't know why schools should have any say in what medical or social steps a person takes, they don't need to be involved at all. Period. (Let me amend that school do have a role in supporting their students, not telling them who they are and how to be themselves). And parents are absolutely involved in any medical steps, it's already illegal to do most medical procedures with a minor with out adult consent (there are some exceptions to this). Unless it's some kind of clinic operating outside the usual standards of care, medical transition steps involve mental health evaluations and medical monitoring as well as follow up appointments and monitoring. All parties involved go through medical informing appointment to discuss expected impacts/changes, I clouding those that are permanent and those that are reversible, risks and side effects, and in many places discuss what fertility preservation options are available (this can vary widely depending on state and insurance). It's an involved process that often takes a long time with many people and experts involved along the way.
Actually, the rate of transition regret is remarkably low, including among those who began transitioning early in life. The most common reason for regret is social stigma.
If you think trans care should be banned because people might regret it, then you need to ban pretty much any permanent medical intervention.
"They will kill themselves if you dont do x" isn't an argument. If anything it's a problem statement.
What is your point?
Just in case you or someone else is genuinely not aware: Transgender care for anyone before puberty is entirely social - let them wear their preferred clothing and use their preferred name and pronouns. This is not permanent. Transgender care for those who have reached puberty but are still minors involves the same social things, plus puberty blockers - puberty blockers delay puberty while you take them. If someone took them for 6 months, then stopped, their puberty would start back up as normal. This gives kids more time to grow up without having permanent changes that they would have to work hard to reverse, like a trans man having to deal with getting rid of breasts later in life. This is exactly the opposite of letting minors make permanent changes to their biochemistry. Given the suicide rates, this is also the opposite of "hurting themselves". The treatments you seem worried about are not available to minors. The medical standards of care for those age ranges straight-up do not include them, and it would be really weird (and likely considered unethical) if a doctor ignored the standards of care and did them anyways. The care standards give younger people time to see what it feels like to live as another gender, while leaving every option open for them later as they grow up.
Actual transgender care for youths also reduces suicide risks substantially, which is a lot more permanent than temporarily delaying puberty for a while and wearing a dress. Though, given how extremely low detransitioning rates are, it is likely to end up being permanent, the options available to young people aren't difficult to reverse.
All this is why you got the downvotes - you are arguing against something that does not happen, using dramatic language, in favor of something that leads to a lot of self-harm in children (literally over 90% of trans youths have attempted self-harm at least once, per a 2017 University of Cambridge study).
You have been lied to.
No I haven't. Sorry but kids don't get to do whatever they want precisely because they might kill themselves or engage in self harm. That's a symptom of something else. I suspect it's lack if a structured home life, unmonitored internet access, pornography and the hypersexualized culture at large among other things.
Minors (especially teenagers) will do anything for attention and being 'trans' is often a means to that end. Even worse it's often presented as a solution for problems it can't solve. Parents can fall into this trap too.
Yeah there's nothing permanent about stunting a childs adolescence while everyone around them naturally grows into their bodies and actually learns what it's like to be a man and a woman instead of weirdly speculating on the sidelines. We're robbing kids of normal childhoods by not just allowing but often encouraging them to obsess over this stuff.
Kids should have hobbies, read books, be responsible for chores at home and be raised by parents not the state. Adults can do what they want but they need to leave kids out of it.
Self-harm and suicide statistics are cited repeatedly as perhaps THE primary argument for the child trans stuff as if it is that cut and dry. It's not. I can guarantee these situations are way more complex than anyone wants to admit. Something like 1 out of every 2 or 3 adults are on antidepressants in the west. It's not because they are transgender it's because we have a nihilistic culture that offers no meaning to life outside of consumption and worship of self.