America's First Nonbinary Person

[love]

Jamie Shupe has gone back to being trans.

I really feel for this guy... what a mixed up, upsetting life.

Wow, how sad! Now going by Lisa and had a life threating blood clot from estrogen.

[glowsilver]

That's very sad, it reminds me of Maritza/Mark Cummings and her husband who have both detransitioned and re-transitioned multiple times. It can be so difficult to get out of

[Marge Bouvier Simpson]

Great article. 

https://www.dailysignal.com/2019/03/10/i...all-a-sham

Wow, this broke my heart. I am an autistic woman who was sterilized by a surgeon who I had barely spent 15 mins with in an appointment. Granted this was due to my reproductive health issues, but it turns out these "chop happy" doctors aren't doing what's best for women with my diseases either. Just handing out hysterectomies left and right to patients who do not know what they are getting themselves into. While my procedure was not for any gender affirming reasons, I did  "identify" as "non-binary" at the time, after years of fighting against accusations from "friends" and transgender activists that because I was androgynous and autistic, I was not a woman, but some other gender OR a transgender "man". I was even influenced to start dating women, even though I was not sexually attracted to women in any way. I look back at this time in my life and wonder just how close I had gotten to making the mistake of choosing to pursue "gender affirmation". I am devastated at the repercussions and health consequences of my hysterectomy, only to find out that it had no chance of curing my diseases anyways- it only complicated things further. Not a single doctor warned me. It frightens me to no end that I could have easily slipped into this horrific epidemic of young women being castrated and mangled beyond recognition by "gender affirming care".

Thanks for sharing your story, Doppiosfrog. I'm so sorry doctors rushed you, ignored your needs and neglected to do their jobs properly. 

It's interesting you've experienced how people can be pressured or manipulated to believe they are trans, while the common narrative is that gender identity is "innate" and can never be chosen. Although I suppose that may be true as far as a preference for androgyny, masculiity or femininity. 

I'm so glad you never made it as far as medical transition. I hope you are happy and strong today as an androgynous, autistic woman.

Thanks for your perspective; I believe many of our kids are in similar positions, as far as being gender nonconformig and/or autistic. It's heartbreaking they've been led to believe they were "born wrong" and need to transition. 

Thanks also for joining the board. Your account has been activated.

[Guest]

It is a really good article and offers a certain optimism that even people whose "transition" seems to be persistent may yet come to their own realization that it is false and wrong for them.. 

I have to also add it is a huge bummer that the piece appears in an ultra-right wing media outlet next to articles cheering Trump, absolving Brett Kavanaugh of sexual abuse and applauding a florist who refused service to a same-sex wedding. I deeply wish that the gender-critical perspective had a more separate existence from right-wing politics that I and many others in this community absolutely do not share.

I do believe ordinary people of all philosophical and political stripes are being seriously punked by corporate media . . . many of the other divisive topics you've listed have a great deal more nuance to them than news reporting from either the "right" or the "left"-leading outlets provide . . . most news outlets are financially incentivised to get people outraged and convinced that those who disagree with them or either brainwashed or moral monsters . . . I would submit to you that if you decided to do some deep research into any of the topics you listed, with the aim of truly understanding (in certain circles, the term is "steelmanning") the reasons for the other side's perspective, you would find that you hold more in common value-wise than not.

There's a practical reason for getting away from the habit of knee-jerk dismissing those who may occupy the more conservative end of the political spectrum as "right-wing." I would encourage you to perhaps investigate some of the work by organizations and thinkers who are trying to depolarize us . . . and I don't think we parents can afford to slap away a conservative's offer of help; to do so is almost like subjecting ourselves to the same ideological purity test that the gender ideologues use to threaten anyone who won't submit to their diktats.

Sigh . . . I know I'm probably not explaining this very well . . .

May I point you to some resources that might help you see how you might be unfairly caricaturing someone who disagrees with your opinion on - say - Kavanaugh?

Meghan Daum's interview with Sarah Hepola on the "Unspeakable" podcast (her expertise on the phenomenon of "Blackout" adds much-needed nuance to various high-profile sexual assault stories):
https://www.theunspeakablepodcast.com/po...tuntil-now

Are you familiar with the group called Braver Angels? Perhaps sample a bit of the work they do to bring conservatives and liberals together on a more human level:
https://www.youtube.com/c/BraverAngels/about  

Consider yourself a feminist?  Maybe listen to some feminists who are looking harder at the left-right divide, and pointing out how it weakens us in the face of the trans threat: https://unherd.com/2021/11/the-sexual-re...-feminism/

Point I guess I'm trying to make is, I don't think the old right-left culture war stuff is serving us very well at all . . . and we need to break out of it and lose our old assumptions and sacred cows . . . I've had to take a long, hard look at some of the attitudes and unexamined beliefs behind how I approached my marriage and parenting and the broader worldview that went along with them . . . I think each of us have a responsibility to re-examine how we categorize people whose opinions differ from our own . . .

I want to be your friend.  Lol that's just my nueroatypical way of saying that I really loved your comment and took some comfort from it.