Friday 27 May 2016

Common sense and body dysphoria

I have been investigating all the aspects of the current trend for transgenderism, something which till recently was considered one of a family of many similar mental illnesses exhibiting the delusion you believe you are something you are not. These had been treated in the usual ways using therapy and exceptionally surgery, but despite offering sex change surgery it was still the result of trying to settle the mind of the sufferer, using in my view excessive force by excising healthy functioning organs and administering toxic hormone treatment which causes sterility.

Now although body dysmorhpia itself has not changed the transgender aspect has been removed from the spectrum, claiming men really can be women and vice versa. One study even claims this is because the sufferers (as they really suffer) have different brains. I don't think anyone really accepts this much as a brain is a brain and doesn't vary enough from men to women in ways we can yet detect. I will post the links at the end. Before this ground breaking decision there was a long and potentially unlimited list of alternative beliefs about ones identity. Transgender was clearly the commonest and others are very unusual but equally real to the individuals concerned. This can include identity (Jesus and Napoleon were favourites), fatness (anorexia), amputeeism (your limb is not yours and you want it removed, some surgeons actually will), species, race, and anything else you can think of.

I challenged one of these activists recently. I said I am a genius, and they said you're a liar, you're not a genius. I said using their logic if I decide I am a genius then you must accept it, it is no different from deciding I am a woman. Apparently subjective identifying only works for them on some areas so far and not others. Which of course using their logic is discriminating against other types of identity delusions. Of course I don't lie as I had a test in 1971 which put my IQ at genius level, otherwise I'd lose all my credibility in a single statement. But the side issue it raised very usefully was these people only accept delusions when they fit their own political agendas, and not any others equally genuine to the individual.

Of course gender is a political phenomenon. You have 99% of people XX female and XY male. If they are burned in a fire the DNA will always tell you that, whatever operations the person had had to make the surface appear something else. There are no sliding scales, and the in between are XXY, XYY is super-male with no obvious symptoms besides aggression, and a few other intersex disorders irrelevant to transgenderism as they have no obvious gender at all. A man or woman is free in a free society to dress and name themselves however they want, and nowadays few will not get a job as such, especially as it would be illegal not to let them go to work dressed as the opposite sex. But insisting a man who may or may not have had cosmetic surgery to create the rough (and it is very rough) impression they have a woman's body is a woman is a pernicious lie and one even the least discriminating people are beginning to wake up to.

Using psychology, something I am qualified in so beyond the level of a mere blog, your identity has various aspects. If for example you apply for a job or take an exam you do not normally decide the results yourself, but hand it over to others. The same applies to what sex you are. Some of the hulking body builders with a wig and a dress who call themselves Susan or Jackie and appear on television presenting themselves as women will not swing the credibility of a single person, they are just too polite to say so in public. A few, like Paris Lees, happen to have the sort of features which can fool you from a reasonable distance, but penetrate far enough (literally) and the reality will be apparent.

Using the logical argument, does a twin brother know what their twin feels like? Or a parent? Or a male friend? Not really, we only know for certain how we feel. If we are blind we feel a body but we don't know what it looks like, and what men or women look like, so purely take our information from others. A blind man would probably be less likely to be transgender as he isn't able to see a difference in the first place to feel like the other person. But besides the physical awareness, when we are not looking at our bodies to remind ourselves we see everything in front of us instead, our bodies usually disappear. Look in front of you and it's vanished. A child who grows up on a small island or isolated community who was never told wouldn't even realise it had a gender. It is a taught area, with your sex being biological. Transgender activists want to tell you the biology has also changed along with the disturbed mind, as if belief can change every strand of your DNA to XX. And sprout breasts and a clitoris etc naturally in response.

Yes, that is what they want us to accept. However, feminists, for possibly the first time ever (artistic license), have provided a useful input (sorry feminists). They quite rightly point out unless you've always been female, had a female body both outside and in, been treated as a woman, had periods and maybe children, you can't come in half way through the party, zip up your winkle, lop off your bollocks and join the sisterhood as if you were there at day one. And returning to my initial point, if you can't feel how a friend or family member, or pet, feels, how can you know what a woman feels like to be if you're not a man? Not feeling comfortable as a man (the main official symptom) means like every other complex, you are not comfortable as yourself, and as a result, wish you were someone else. Superman, Jesus, a horse, or even a woman. Currently the Superman, Jesus and horse beliefs are still mental illnesses (unless they've wiped them as well since I checked), but strangely not women, even though all are equally provably wrong.

All forms of dysphoria are ultimately dissatisfaction with who you are, for a combination of biological and environmental reasons. In the past these were generally successfully treated with therapy, and as anorexia kills sufferers if a doctor agrees with a patient they are fat and they need to diet, they won't be lopping off their tits, but helping them to die, which in law is manslaughter. I would given the power ban sex change surgery as grievous bodily harm as well, as they are removing healthy organs causing lifelong potential problems and massive scarring. That aside, colluding with a deluded patient is normally considered malpractice, so persuading one to accept who they are is the universal therapeutic goal, and any other is dangerous and encouraging the patient to believe their delusion and ingrain it for life. Adding dangerous disfiguring surgery on top is to me a serious crime, but either way it is impossible for a man to know what it feels like to be a woman and vice versa, and singling that delusion out as OK from the long list of others is both irresponsible and will lead to further legalised errors in society, including the soon to come mixed changing rooms. Many men of course will be counting the days till they have free rein to enter female changing rooms and may even be the end of the porn industry as they will be able to see it in reality for nothing, but nothing comes without consequences and we know exactly the ones which have flowed from this already. Most people have common sense when they ask themselves and read with their heart, but often won't dare to share it with others as not many have such thick skins to cope with the venom shot at them from the establishment zombies. But you can push the line too far and this is where they have crossed it and will be pushed back. Sooner or later for all the reasons above and more it is inevitable.