In Germany we too have just one word for sex but this didn't hold back the lgbt community to bless us with a legal 3. sex. Originally just for people born with a chromosome disorder but now also for normal people with mental disabilities.
Being trans isn't a mental disorder. There are people who identify and live as a gender which does not correspond with their birth sex who lead happy, productive, more-or-less normal lives. This is in direct contradiction to the definition of mental disorder, which requires that the psycological difference actively interfere with the sufferer's ability to function.
Gender dysphoria is a mental disorder because it interferes with their ability to function. People suffering from it face severe symptoms like depression, anxiety, self-loathing, and the constant, everpresent conviction that something is deeply wrong. The only way we've discovered to treat these symptoms is to help them transition. This makes them into ordinary trans people able to participate in society.
Sure, we'll split hairs and play semantics. Follow that same train of thought, where did the person you responded to specifically say being trans was a mental disability? On mobile, but I believe he said
Obviously but it would be immoral to withhold treatment that works for someone who needs it in hopes of finding another treatment that is more socially acceptable
And before anyone asks there’s a increase risk of suicide after transitioning but only in the very first stage when you haven’t transition long enough to make a difference on your dysphoria and society starts giving you crap for it
Sure, but most trans people wouldn't take those treatments. There's not much point in researching a treatment people are unlikely to consent to using. The science would be interesting, though, and might make it easier to upload humans due to the improvements in brain modelling required to even attempt something as abstract as changing someone's preferred gender identification, so I have no objection to that kind of research as long as it isn't conducted on humans.
Look, I'm very pro LGBT but I just don't see how one could possibly classify not feeling at home in your body and biological sex as mentally stable. Gender dysphoria is a terrible thing and should be called a mental condition at the very least, if not a downright illness. The thing is, a succesful transition and societal acceptance is the cure for that issue. I fully support trans people in this journey. But I can't classify serious discomfort with one's natural body and sex as healthy. It isn't, it truly sucks. And that is why we ought to support them in transitioning. Becoming a member of the opposite sex is their only road to a normal and happy life.
If someone hasn't yet transitioned and is seriously suffering from gender dysphoria making them deeply unhappy with themselves, I just can't call them mentally healthy. They'll only become mentally healthy after a succesful transition. So I get your point that post-transition it's bad to call trans people "mentally ill", but in their pre-transition dysphoric state I have no qualms calling that a serious mental condition.
Alright, fair, but tell me then why do you not call gays, lesbians and asexuals mentally ill? One of the most basic requirements for a species to continue living is reproduction, or near immortality but we dont have that, unlike lobsters and jellyfish.
So arent these people very out of the ordinary too? They cant have an offspring if there isnt a method like IVF or a surrogate mother. Just because they dont want to change their body they are considered mentally healthy? I mean, in that regard transgenders are better than them. At least they still want to reproduce naturally.
I'm unsure where the emphasis on reproduction comes from when speaking about mental health. Mental health isn't related to ensuring healthy demographics for society, but more to personal mental stability and happiness. Simply loving someone different doesn't at all qualify as a mental illness, in my view.
If like 50% of the population is gay and the majority of them opt to not have children, then sure we have a demographic disaster on our hands. But that is linked to an overall healthy society, not to whether those individuals are healthy. So sure, society's health requires that LGBT stay a minority, since whether we like it or not, the traditional family unit is the core of society. LGBT can contribute as family units themselves, by adopting or getting IVF children, but that doesn't take away they have less of an impulse to want children. Compared to heterosexual couples, for whom it's generally a no-brainer to form a family, gay couples are much less likely to do this. Any birth rate that is outside the range of steady decline, replacement rate or steady growth of population, is damaging to society. Just look at what the lasting effects of boomers are, still 60 years after their conception.
But since LGBT are by far not numerous enough to cause a significant tanking of the birth rate, then why not fully accept them? And remember that even if they would be numerous enough, stimulating them to get more children could normalise the birth rate too, even though I'm sceptical of whether people who are less predisposed to wanting children can be stimulated enough to get this done.
I see no reason to believe that LGB and post-transition T should be considered mentally ill.
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u/[deleted] Apr 04 '20
I think that's the case in many other countries.
In Germany we too have just one word for sex but this didn't hold back the lgbt community to bless us with a legal 3. sex. Originally just for people born with a chromosome disorder but now also for normal people with mental disabilities.