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Do you think trans people are a different phylum? Do you think trans people are claiming to be a different phylum, or able to transition between phylums?
Like, if we're just talking general biology, hermaphroditism is hardly a controversial idea. Biology obviously supports the idea that individuals can change sexes. (And in case you're particularly bad at reading: no, I'm not claiming humans can do that yet; we're obviously still a few years away from an artificial uterus - which, hey, it's amusing that no one in this debate is willing to bite the bullet and discuss whether that'd be sufficient to qualify)
I mean, you have the category of "was/will be fertile at some point", and the category of "never fertile at any point."
You then want me to take someone who was born XX but never developed a uterus, and put them in the... first category? That's a "woman" even though they don't have a uterus, will never produce gametes, and so on? But a trans woman, who also never developed a uterus, also has a vagina, also has breasts... that person is "male". And this is a totally consistent, natural, intuitive way to split people up?
No, but a phylum is one biological classification. Sex is another.
A human whose heart has stopped working does not change phylums.
A human whose sexual organs have stopped functioning does not change sexes.
A human embryo that does not yet have a heart is in the phylum chordata.
A human child who does not yet have the capacity to bear a child is still female.
An imagined bionic human who no longer has a heart would still be in the phylum chordata.
A post-menopausal woman who no longer has a functioning uterus is still female.
The idea that someone can change classification is a Trans idea. It is not universal. I am specifically countering your objections that a woman with a hysterectomy or a post-menopausal woman is a different gender. They are not because sex/gender does not change. They have the qualities of their sex at some point in their lifecycle.
You are making a mistake that you think everyone thinks like you. You believe that you have changed sex/gender, and therefore whatever definition someone has for sex/gender allows for change.
In humans, there are four potential sexual categories (though only three in reality.)
Body produces large gametes in reality, or would have produced large gametes if health was obtained.
Body produces small gametes in reality, or would have produced small gametes if health was obtained.
Body produces neither small gametes or big gametes, and there is no obvious direction where health would go, even if Miracle Healer Jesus touched them. (Happens, though much rarer than the intersex statistics show, even a person with CAIS and XY chromosomes can become pregnant.)
(This category has never happened in a human) Body produces both small gametes and big gametes at the same time or at different times in the lifecycle.
What's funny is that there is a tradition of intersex people naturally transitioning and this being accepted in Christianity (below is a repost of a previous AAQC):
So there is some discussion where someone who can perform the male role in sex can be a priest, even if they haven't always been able to perform the male role in intercourse.
However, that's a natural development of an intersex person's body. It's interesting that they talk about "nature itself breaking out." I don't think orthodox Christians will ever encourage someone to artificially change their sex, or believe that artificial changes are sufficient to actually change sex. If gender is in the soul, than it is the form of the body - the blueprint for what a body does on its own power.
I am perhaps more open than some of your interlocutors, at the least my philosophical and biological assumptions are very different. I still think you're a man, one that has become very sick. Restoring you to health would not involve you growing large gametes naturally and bearing children, it would involve you creating sperm and a mechanism to impregnate a woman. That is what is written into your body, the form of your body which you struggle against.
I know you believe that one day we will have control over these things, and there will be no difference. I believe that your sex is written into every cell of your body and is impossible to change, wherever medicine goes in the next century. Maybe through very artificial and mechanical methods will you approximate what my body does as easily as breathing, but that would not be the same as changing the powers of your body, you would be relying on a power outside you. The Abolition of Man and all that.
I know you wish it was one specific thing that defines sex, and then it would be something you could obtain for yourself (even theoretically, in some distant future) and then you have it. But sex isn't a thing a person possesses. It is one of the things a human person is.
The bit that confuses me here is this weird counterfactual: if someone "would have" developed large gametes, they're a woman. But, I mean, there's a counterfactual world where I got dealt XX chromosomes instead - in that world I "would have" been female. There are plenty of people who "would have" lived if we'd eradicated Polio sooner - are we counting them as "alive" because of that?
What other natural category has this weird counterfactuality about it? The group of people who X, and "would have" X if not for Y? Surely "People who are blind, and would have gone blind if not for medical treatment" doesn't make any sense. People who are born blind and people who get blinded by an accident are both "blind", right? Even though one of those groups has a sighted soul, and the other apparently has a blind soul?
We use this way of classification all the time, you are swapping disease with biological classification willy-nilly and that is what is confusing you.
Blindness is a disease, not a biological classification. A blind person still belongs to the human species, which is a sighted-species. A blind person still belongs to a sighted-species. Their blindness is not a sign they are a member of a different species, it is evidence they have a health problem.
A woman is a human who, if her body is not producing large gametes, has a health problem that requires explanation. A male body does not require a disease to explain why it's not producing large gametes.
Your counterfactual world where you have XX chromosomes requires you to not exist. It requires a completely different person to have been conceived and born.
The counterfactual worlds that I am using are all, "if the same organism was healthy." It is something that happens every day, some organism in a disease state becomes healthier.
Okay, so if a person has Magic XX Genetic Defect Syndrome, and is born with XX chromosomes, a vagina, etc. but no large gametes, they're... third gender? To be clear: there is no world where this person produces large gametes, since as you said, changing their genetics results in a completely different person.
Honestly, if they have a functioning vagina from birth (not a weird amalgamation of penile tissue and intestines sewn into a gaping hole that needs to be prevented from healing over) then I am comfortable calling them a woman. It's clear what direction their body would go. If it would take modern medicine to determine that their reproductive system doesn't work, they belong to the sex they appear.
We're talking about a magic person, so it's hard to specify what I mean by "direction." But I imagine that such a person either has ovaries or could receive an ovary transplant in a way a man could not. Their body would naturally make the hormones to stimulate the follicles and bring forth an egg. This egg could be fertilized by a motile gamete that had a straight path through the vagina. This conceptus would find a home in a uterus.
If you only have to bring one thing to health to make the female reproduction system work, then it's obviously the female reproduction system. A male reproductive system isn't a defective female reproductive system and vice versa.
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Pre-transition I was miserable, and now I'm happy. Surely that means healthier? Is there some health risk associated with transition that you're particularly concerned about?
If my genetics gave me depression, would you be opposed to me taking anti-depressants?
Are you equally opposed to cis people getting cosmetic surgery?
Your body is not healthier. You have lost some biological functioning that you had before.
Yes, there are soooo many health risks to cross-sex hormones. A FtM balds because of their testosterone. Do they take Finistrade? Finistrade is risky to women, do the same risks apply to this person?
But I don't even have to get on the weeds on this, the increased risk to cancers, blood clots, heart attacks, etc. The mechanism of transition itself purposely damages the reproductive system. It is by itself unhealthy.
Now, it may be the case that cross-sex hormones are an effective treatment for gender dysphoria, maybe the only effective treatment after a certain threshold (I much prefer treatment that would make someone's hormones more like their natal sex if they are being treated before the age of 16, and have seen evidence that this works better.)
I am not against treating trans people with cross sex hormones.
But there is a difference between getting a hormone treatment to treat your mental illness and trying to make everyone else in society believe your mental illness.
I am 100% against cosmetic surgery except where it restores functionality, like nose jobs to breathe better and skin repair for burn victims.
Well, you're consistent at least. I do think a realistic assessment of health ought to look at happiness a fair bit more, though. I was never going to reproduce for a variety of reasons, so I think it's totally reasonable to trade that off for happiness. I think people have plenty of hobbies that make them happy, despite being dangerous: they drive cars, they drink alcohol, they eat badly.
On a spiritual level... I'm not much for formal churches and whatnot, but as best as I can tell, my soul, my connection to the divine, wanted me to do this. I trust it, because when I was even younger, it held me back and said no, you're not ready to do this yet, and looking back I think it was right.
Plenty of people are spiritual, and plenty of people think it's a mental illness. I'm spiritual myself, but I still expect the people in the latter category to try and show some respect for people of faith.
Yes, happiness is a component of health. It's just not a component of the health of a reproductive system, which is what is under discussion here.
I respect Truth, and I'm sorry but this conversation has mostly cemented my belief that many trans people have a very tenuous grasp on reality and equivocate between concepts in order to justify themselves to themselves.
(I am a very spiritual person myself. I worship the Way, the Truth, and the Life.)
I'm aware of your spirituality - but I'm equally aware of mine. I believe that Jesus supports my decision, and that if he were here today he would "cure" me by making me indistinguishable from a cis woman. I'm no stranger to this being called a mental illness, either because someone doesn't agree that "Jesus" exists or because someone doesn't agree that "gender" exists. It seems like a fair equivalence myself - I'm asking you to have faith in some internal truth of mine that I can't prove to your satisfaction.
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