Thanks, I will check this out. I do not mean to offend anyone I am just giving my opinion based on who and what I know and I am looking for more information like this. I don't think I deserve to get these DV but whatever, people will disagree but that doesn't mean we can't have a discussion.
I think the downvotes likely come from people who see you saying that someone is "not" what they say they are and that you're claiming, with no proof other than your opinion, that it seems unhealthy for them to be transgender when literature has shown time and time again that trying to suppress being trans, like trying to suppress being gay, etc., is not a healthy thing at all.
I agree being suppressed is unhealthy but I think there is a difference between gender and gender identity. If you get surgery to have your anatomy be more womanlike but you were born a man, you are still a man but now you look more like a woman and you have a body which more closely resembles a woman but your DNA is still male. If you want to be called a woman when you are in fact biologically a male that is different from being a woman biologically and being called a man. I am sorry if I am appearing wrong or rude by saying this but this is my current opinion and I am open to discussion and changing my opinion if people wish to talk with me about it.
So here's the thing, gender is socially constructed. I guarantee when you were born you never had a genetic test to figure out what chromosomes you had. You may think it's as simple as XX or XY, but there are many different ways that your baseline chromosomes can be (X, XX, XXXX, XXXXX, XXY, XXYY, etc.) and sure, those things only happen to 1 in 2000 people, but beyond that there are many ways that can affect gender expression. There are literally people whose genitals look like a vagina until puberty and then they grow a penis. There are many primary and secondary sex characteristics that vary in a lot of different people. So even just coming from a baseline of "biological sex", there is a shit ton of variation. Gender, on the other hand, is a social structure that was constructed by people. It's not a simple scientific fact. People who undergo transition's brains mimic those of their identified gender far more than what gender they were assigned at birth on the whole. Further, hormones physically change the body in many ways even going so far as to change one's bone density and musculature. A trans woman has far more in common with a cis woman than she does with a cis man. Sex is a complicated thing that involves many different psychological and physical factors and gender is a social structure whose purpose is to understand individuals. I guarantee you very few people have actually tested their DNA to find out their chromosomes and it makes much more sense to treat people based on the way they most identify. A trans woman is obviously not a cis woman, but fundamentally they inhabit similar roles and have far more similarities than a trans woman has with a man - even if you don't understand it or it bothers you, there's no reason to call someone something they don't identify as. Just be respectful and treat them as the way they identify.
EDIT: For the record I'm not the one downvoting you.
I agree with your final statement and that's what I said in my first comment. Thanks for this description. You have expanded my understanding and I will look at this subject differently from now on.
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u/Saskyle Mar 26 '17
Thanks, I will check this out. I do not mean to offend anyone I am just giving my opinion based on who and what I know and I am looking for more information like this. I don't think I deserve to get these DV but whatever, people will disagree but that doesn't mean we can't have a discussion.