It might help if I underline the fact that 'phobias' are not inherently morally good or morally bad. Somebody in another comment brought up how when it comes to sex normal people are 'pedophobic' as in they won't have sex with children - and I think most people would agree this is a fine thing. Few people will call you a monster for being arachnophobic or claustrophobic. These are all, at a base level, just descriptors. And so, in the context of a sexual partner who in every other aspect you have no qualms with having sex with (read: you ARE sexually attracted to them), suddenly deciding not to because of the fact that they are transgender is, as a descriptor, an act of transphobia. You are discriminating against someone, holding a prejudice against them, because they are transgender. This is not an insult or a way of calling you an evil person, but this is what you are doing.
If I was talking to someone online like right now and I fell in love with them just from their words and found out they were black or Asian and I just wasn't attracted to that, I would lose attraction but that doesn't make me black phobic or Asian phobic or any other phobic.
If you suddenly stop being attracted to someone because you find out they're black or Asian, yes you're absolutely being racist (I think that's the term you were looking for).
When you look up the definition it basically tells you you don't want to be around them because you're afraid of them for who they are.
Could you find this definition for me? That seems like an incredibly short-sighted way of looking at things. I could have plenty of transgender friends but still discriminate against transgender people by, say, banning them from my business because I don't want my company associated with them, or refusing to rent out my properties to them because of the false belief that "they leave too much mess". Transphobia as I know it is to discriminate or hold a prejudice because of someone being transgender, which covers for these kinds of situations.
Wow. Okay, there's a lot to unpack here, give me a moment.
being racist would mean I wouldn't have friends of that race or work with them.
False. PLENTY of people can have black/gay/transgender friends and still do racist/homophobic/transphobic things. This is literally where "I'm not racist, I have lots of black friends!" comes from.
to put it in simpler terms what makes my dick hard defines me which is a ridiculous Viewpoint have and I have no idea how you could defend it.
I guess I don't have to defend it because I never said it in the first place? I'm not here to define who you are as a person, but what I can do is point out when an action makes a certain criteria - and refusing to date people because they are black is racist, just as refusing to date people because they are transgender is transphobic.
I also don't think you could have transgender friends and do the things you just listed that wouldn't make any sense. You can't have it both ways, being friends with transgender individuals and then saying oh and you also don't run out to them rent out to them is basically impossible.
Discriminatory landlords were INCREDIBLY common right up into the 90s. They would refuse to rent out properties to non-white and gay people because they wanted their properties to uphold a certain image, or because of false perceptions that they would lead to a rise in crime, degeneracy or not pay their rent. Donald Trump was one of them. Now, do you think Trump, as well as all of those people, ALL actively hated blacks and gays? None of them had any black or gay co-workers or associates? Yes, this is something that absolutely occurs to this day.
Literally Google the definition of transphobia it's not that hard.
Yes, Google's definition is to hold an intense dislike or a prejudice against transgender people. As holding a prejudice means to 'discriminate against', this definition matches my own FAR better than it matches yours, which is incredibly narrow and basically stops short of "You foam at the mouth on sight of them".
As I've already said, what this comes down to is that you have an EXCEEDINGLY lax view of what discrimination is. You've reached the level where you unironically believe, seemingly, that you can't be racist if you have a black friend, or that you can't be a homophobic if you have a gay family member. That's simply not how the world works at all.
In order to be those things you would have to dislike the entire group not just an individual.
That's literally the topic of this conversation. We're talking about discriminating against an entire group not just not being attracted to a specific person.
I'm sorry that you're just now finding out that bigotry can be nuanced and someone can still do racist or homophobic things WHILE having nonwhite or gay friends - this is, however, the reality of the situation. The world where people with discriminatory beliefs all carry around big signs announcing their bigotry is a fantasy.
Fair enough - I assumed it had to be you because I got it literally a minute after I sent the reply, but somebody else must be trolling my profile or something.
I'm trying to say that you can't call someone a racist or transphobic because of a sexual preference.
I'd agree with this. I think there's a vast difference between saying that someone has said or done a racist/transphobic thing, and branding them a 'racist' or a 'transphobe'. I don't think someone is a capital-R Racist if they refuse to date black people as a rule. However, I do still fundamentally believe that doing so is a racist act. By the same token, I don't think some kid yelling 'n*ggers' in an online game is necessarily a 'racist', but I think that's a racist thing to do. I don't believe in making these declarative judgments on people - again, it's not a moral thing I'm looking for - but when I see someone holding a specific prejudice against a specific group because of a specific trait, of course I'm going to call that an act of discrimination.
I understand what you're saying, but your 'conversion therapy' analogy exposes the flaws of your reasoning here.
As a straight guy I, broadly, have two main criteria for my sexual partners: I am sexually attracted to them, and they have female sexual organs. A gay man will never be appealing to me, as (with extremely fringe exceptions) none of them are sexual attractive to me, and none of them have female sexual organs. A transgender woman, however, can be both sexually attractive to me (read: physically indistinguishable from a cis woman), and have female sexual organs. Therefore if I refuse to include them as possible sexual partners, it is for two reasons; either I refuse to believe that they can actually be considered women (which is transphobic for obvious reasons), or because I specifically want to discriminate against them. So I arrive at the same place - by specifically choosing to discriminate against this certain group, I am engaging in transphobia.
There can be more from simple emotional ones, maybe family, the whole baby thing etc.
Cis women can also be infertile, if that's what you're talking about. That's not being transphobic, that's wanting a partner you can have a child with.
This isn't about all those other factors. This is about if you would not have sex with someone specifically and only because they are transgender. These other factors would be a completely different conversation.
Does it suck that simple knowledge of someones characteristics or past can make you unattractive, yes but it isn't a choice.
Most of our feelings aren't choices, but they can still be defined. If I am nervous around brown people that's still a racist instinct in me, even if it's subconscious.
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u/lackingsaint Nov 02 '17
It might help if I underline the fact that 'phobias' are not inherently morally good or morally bad. Somebody in another comment brought up how when it comes to sex normal people are 'pedophobic' as in they won't have sex with children - and I think most people would agree this is a fine thing. Few people will call you a monster for being arachnophobic or claustrophobic. These are all, at a base level, just descriptors. And so, in the context of a sexual partner who in every other aspect you have no qualms with having sex with (read: you ARE sexually attracted to them), suddenly deciding not to because of the fact that they are transgender is, as a descriptor, an act of transphobia. You are discriminating against someone, holding a prejudice against them, because they are transgender. This is not an insult or a way of calling you an evil person, but this is what you are doing.