LGBTQI Thread - An Ode to Lesbians

[Galactus]

It's a matter between us and our doctors

But doesen't that become a public matter (in principle, if not in every case) the moment you start to deal with public funding of it? (in whatever capacity) If only to ensure that the most effective treatment is being given.

Yes, your personal medical history is private informtion for a reason, but more broad questions about medical care (what procedures should be funded, to what extent, under which circumstances, etc.) is definitely the public's business.

[Galactus]

I don't have a birth certificate or passport.

I'm genuinely curious, how did you acheive that? Is your birth certificate maculated at some point, or where you just born off the grid, so to speak?

[Robin Of House Hill]

But doesen't that become a public matter (in principle, if not in every case) the moment you start to deal with public funding of it? (in whatever capacity) If only to ensure that the most effective treatment is being given.

Yes, your personal medical history is private informtion for a reason, but more broad questions about medical care (what procedures should be funded, to what extent, under which circumstances, etc.) is definitely the public's business.

Is it a public matter, whether to treat cancer or heart disease?

[Galactus]

Is it a public matter, whether to treat cancer or heart disease?

Yes.

EDIT: Or rather, how to treat it, how to fund said treatment, what requirements are needed for a professional to perform said treatment, etc.

[Robin Of House Hill]

Yes.

EDIT: Or rather, how to treat it, how to fund said treatment, what requirements are needed for a professional to perform said treatment, etc.

Currently, in the US, transgender related medical services are not included in national healthcare (ACA, VA, Medicare) and most private insurers classify it as a pre-existing condition and refuse to cover it.

As is the case with medical treatment needed by a minority, the emphasis of the discussion is likely to be, "why should we pay for it".

[Galactus]

Currently, in the US, transgender related medical services are not included in national healthcare (ACA, VA, Medicare) and most private insurers classify it as a pre-existing condition and refuse to cover it.

As is the case with medical treatment needed by a minority, the emphasis of the discussion is likely to be, "why should we pay for it".

Yes, and whether or not it should be covered is a public/political issue. (I assume you're in favour of having these kinds of procedures covered by the abovementioned programmes, I sure am)

What these programmes cover, and how they do it, are public issues that is up for political control/oversight/lobbying whatever you want to call it.

[Robin Of House Hill]

Was there ever any public discussion about whether treatment for sickle cell anemia or tay-sachs should be covered? Why should this be any different?

And yes, I am in favor of both HRT and SRS being covered. It is currently the only issue I'm actively trying to promote, because I don't see others doing much about it.

[Michael Seswatha Jordan]

Well to all of you who have responded, thank you. I just wanted to know how you felt about it and karraden gave the scientific side.

I appreciate it and reading this thread, I better understand your outlooks. You know, it hard to walk up to someone and say, " what made u gay?" One it be real uncomfortable and two I might get decked. Thanks to all.

Eta: and if I did offend anyone I am truly sorry.

[Galactus]

Was there ever any public discussion about whether treatment for sickle cell anemia or tay-sachs should be covered? Why should this be any different?

And yes, I am in favor of both HRT and SRS being covered. It is currently the only issue I'm actively trying to promote, because I don't see others doing much about it.

Okay, so on the one hand you're actively lobbying for a position (a position I agree with, btw.) and on the other hand you're claiming (or at least insinuating) that it is not a public issue?

How do you square these two things?

[brook]

Galactus I think what karaddin was saying is that if an individual trans person has had surgery is NOT a matter for public discussion, that is between them and their doctor and there is no public need to know.

Who covers the cost of surgery and treatment IS a discussion the public have an interest in BUT,

imo that only needs to be at the level of 'do we provide healthcare for our citizens or not?'

I see no great value in a public discussion about which necessary and lifesaving medical treatments are covered by a public health service and I'm not sure why this one should be treated any differently (I'm aware that it is, but it shouldn't be and agree with Robin that the situation must change)

[Robin Of House Hill]

Okay, so on the one hand you're actively lobbying for a position (a position I agree with, btw.) and on the other hand you're claiming (or at least insinuating) that it is not a public issue?

How do you square these two things?

Very good question. I've been concentrating on government healthcare (ACA, VA, Medicare), rather than private insurance plans. Last year, I began research the voting records of various members of Congress to see how they voted on healthcare and LGBT issues. My hope was that if I found sufficient cause to think the legislative process was viable, I'd get a petition up on change.org and start some type of lobbying effort.

Then, Katie Couric made the mistake of asking Laverne Cox and Carmen Carrera about their surgery and genitals. Immediately, a loud chorus of, "we are not defined by our genitals", went up, over and over again. I realized that any chance my effort had, was now gone. While the complaint about not being defined by anatomy, is absolutely correct, it had been heard by the public. Even some of the mainstream media ran with it. The general public cannot handle two seemingly opposite ideas and support both. With one group saying, in essence, "being a woman doesn't require surgery", and the other saying surgery was a medical necessity, which side do you think the general public would listen to? If the public doesn't support things, Congress won't either.

I changed my approach. With the legislative path, gone, I started researching two things. Is there enough data in medical literature to unequivocally support that SRS is a medical necessity, and Is there enough case law to support a court challenge based on the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. That's the research I'm doing. It isn't a public issue. It's a medical and legal issue That's how I square things away.

[Weeping Sore]

There's a chilling potential pitfall in positioning surgery as a necessary "cure" for gender dysphoria. If as k puts forth above, trans identity arises from a morphological difference in the brain, enterprising conservative politicians could take the position that of course society should pay for surgery for trans citizens- brain surgery that is. After all, the brain is part of the body, so why is one body part more inviolate than another? Embedded in "medical necessity" is the idea that something is wrong and needs fixing.

Even though the "born this way/not a choice" argument has been politically expedient, I believe in the not-so-distant future it should be discarded.

Does a Catholic have to claim they were born a Catholic and cannot change to excercise their freedom of religion? Does a Muslim? Even if the so-called "God gene" is discovered, freedom of religion will not be threatened.

Orientation and gender identity should be seen as an inviolable individual right, enshrined as a universal spiritual prerogative, not as an unfortunate biological necessity to be tolerated.

[TerraPrime]

Yup. I've been banging on that drum for over a decade now. The "born this way" argument is both false and indefensible. Sadly, it was needed at the time to counter the "you chose to sin" argument from the right.

[Disturber of Peace]

There's a chilling potential pitfall in positioning surgery as a necessary "cure" for gender dysphoria. If as k puts forth above, trans identity arises from a morphological difference in the brain, enterprising conservative politicians could take the position that of course society should pay for surgery for trans citizens- brain surgery that is. After all, the brain is part of the body, so why is one body part more inviolate than another? Embedded in "medical necessity" is the idea that something is wrong and needs fixing.

Even though the "born this way/not a choice" argument has been politically expedient, I believe in the not-so-distant future it should be discarded.

Does a Catholic have to claim they were born a Catholic and cannot change to excercise their freedom of religion? Does a Muslim? Even if the so-called "God gene" is discovered, freedom of religion will not be threatened.

Orientation and gender identity should be seen as an inviolate individual right, enshrined as a universal spiritual prerogative, not as an unfortunate biological necessity to be tolerated.

Well said.

[Disturber of Peace]

Yup. I've been banging on that drum for over a decade now. The "born this way" argument is both false and indefensible. Sadly, it was needed at the time to counter the "you chose to sin" argument from the right.

Exactly how i view it and i did say as much.

[protar]

Pardon my ignorance but am I missing something with the "born this way" argument? I always thought it was well...right, but I don't pretend to be an expert. I do of course agree with Weeping Sore that said argument shouldn't be necessary in order to make orientation and gender and inviolable individual right.

[emberling]

The general public cannot handle two seemingly opposite ideas and support both.

Fox News proves otherwise every day. People who accept welfare are worthless parasites; corporations are people; corporations who accept government money are heroic job creators. And so forth.

But beyond that, maybe I'm being hopelessly naive here but I'd like to think that the public could understand all these things without need for dissonance, because there is no goddamn dissonance. You know it and I know it; why would we assume that the general public can't learn the same? You keep framing these two narratives as opposites as if that's something we just have to accept, just because the ways each issue is currently framed in the media seems to be at cross purposes. But why not change the framing?

Both of these issues have the same core: people are different. Being different is normal. Not everyone who has a heart condition gets the same treatment, because one person with a heart condition is not the same as every other person with a heart condition. Not everyone who has a missing limb or a missing eye is the same. Not every mother uses the same method of childbirth. Those mothers who need caesarean sections aren't springing for an extravagant extra procedure; they simply have different needs because the situation is different. This is not controversial; in fact, it's so blindingly obvious that it need not be stated or even consciously considered.

But since we don't consciously consider it, somehow people fail to apply this to unfamiliar events. Caesarean section is medically necessary in some cases of childbirth. Genital surgery is medically necessary in some cases of gender dysphoria. The relevant medical experts support both of these facts. As the first is covered, so should be the second.

As for the other: as one person's disease is not the same as another's, as one childbirth is not the same as another's, as one person's Vegas vacation is not the same as another's, as one car accident is not the same as another's -- one person's experience of gender is not the same as another's, one person's need for privacy is not the same as another's, one person's identity is not the same as another's. There are more things on heaven and earth, Joe Public, than are dreamt of in your restrictive binary. Is it so hard to understand, so terrifying, that the world is a complex place full of diversity? That one thing that seems so clear-cut, one white obelisk piercing the sky, appears totally different when seen by other eyes on another day, from a different angle by moonlight?

There is no conflict between acceptance of diverse shapes of women and acceptance of medical necessity of surgery. They are, in fact, the same thing: acceptance of the individuality of each person's relationship to their own gender.

[TerraPrime]

Pardon my ignorance but am I missing something with the "born this way" argument? I always thought it was well...right, but I don't pretend to be an expert. I do of course agree with Weeping Sore that said argument shouldn't be necessary in order to make orientation and gender and inviolable individual right.

There are 2 levels to the inquiry here.

One on level, it is a scientific inquiry to the origin of human sexuality. That is not the problematic part, as, obviously, something as complex and fascinating as human sexuality is well worth the effort to figure out. In this pursuit, data have been accumulating to a larger picture indicating that it is, unsurprisingly, a complex and fascinating story. We now know that the chromosomal composition alone does not dictate sexual orientation, given the identical twins studies performed in the 80s and early 90s, because genetically identical twins only share the same sexual orientation roughly 50% of the time for male twins (they also looked at female twins but I forgot the precise numbers, except that it's lower than 50%). There are also studies showing that in utero conditions can play a role, although they are not by themselves determinative (if they were, then fraternal twins would have the same rate of concordant sexuality as identical twins, and they don't). The latest studies are pointing to possible involvement of epigenetic control, as well, though that story is still very early and evolving.

In many ways, these studies are not entirely surprising - there are genetic and biological factors that determine sexual attraction, something that is rooted in part in our biological components.

On the other level, this inquiry is used as way to deflect the accusation that LBGT people want special treatment. The reasoning goes that we should not be discriminated against by virtue of a trait that we cannot choose to not have, much like skin color. But it was a flawed reasoning from the beginning, because we seem to conveniently forget that people ARE and WERE discriminated precisely for their skin colors and ethnic origins. It is still happening today, not just to African Americans, but to Mexican Americans, and other ethnic minorities. In adopting the "we are born this way" argument, we are also conceding that something that is a choice, in the meaningful sense of the word, is okay to discriminate against. This is also false, given the sanctity we give to religious freedom and to the freedom of speech.

So I just never could get behind this argument. I get that it is easy and it is a direct opposite of the "you choose to sin" condemnation from the other side, and that's why it gained traction both within the LBGT community and with our allies.

[emberling]

There's a chilling potential pitfall in positioning surgery as a necessary "cure" for gender dysphoria. If as k puts forth above, trans identity arises from a morphological difference in the brain, enterprising conservative politicians could take the position that of course society should pay for surgery for trans citizens- brain surgery that is. After all, the brain is part of the body, so why is one body part more inviolate than another? Embedded in "medical necessity" is the idea that something is wrong and needs fixing.

That's an intriguing can of worms -- looks like it would cause a serious debate about mind/body dualism. The religious right would be all for it because they are already committed dualists and wouldn't see it as a violation of the soul. I generally think of the general public as holding a simultaneous, vaguely contradictory belief in dualism and in the emergent physicality of the self (i.e, that poking around in someone's brain and changing things would be a fundamental violation of the self). No idea which of those would win out.

The good news is that such brain surgery is far beyond modern technology, and nobody seems to be interested in developing anything of the sort. We have plenty of time to normalize and destigmatize body-transition before a brain-based "cure" is possible. How well do you think a surgical "gay cure" would float in 2014? Better than we'd like, to be sure -- but it wouldn't end gay rights.

Long-term though, in a utopia where being LGBT is seen by all as a benign difference like having red hair, I'd like to see such things available. It should be my choice and no one else's whether to change my body or change my brain. I expect the vast majority would choose the former, because it is hard to discard a dream after wanting it one's entire life. But it would be nice to have the choice. It would be nice for cisgender people to be able to choose to transition, both mind and body to prevent dysphoria. It would be nice if someone could choose to be able to appreciate human sexuality in all its forms, or choose to be unburdened by any.

[protar]

@TerraPrime - Ok I understand now. I was sort of conflating the "born this way" argument with the more general "not a choice" argument. Thanks for the science, it's very insightful. I don't think that the "not a choice" argument necessarily comes with the implication that stuff that isn't a choice can be discriminated against however. From my personal experience it's simply a statement of fact. I didn't choose to be bisexual. By stating that I certainly wouldn't mean to imply that it's ok to discriminate against say, one's religion.