Trumps Bars Transgender From Military

[Lonewolf_50]

and the evidence is overwhelming that it does not.

George, I note that you make an unsupported assertion. What you say may be true, or not true, but you simply saying it doesn't make it true. While Manning is a data point against, the service member whose commentary got this thread started looks to be a point for. If you are going to complain about bloviating nonsense, I suggest you not engage in the same.

Meet the standards, be a good troop, I'll bet the notional five pound note that the chain of command will have your back.

[George K Lee]

I should perhaps amend that to "there isn't a whole lot of evidence that it does".

[siddar]

The suicide rate among transsexuals is threw the roof. Do you really want to trust them in high risk situation? Then there is the fact that it renders protections for women in the military pointless. If you're going to allow men to shower and bathe with them as long as they feel their a woman.

Their simply more trouble then there worth in military service.

[ORAC]

That sets a benchmark for bad grammar, spelling, facts and logic in such a small number of words.....

[Captain Dart]

The military does take dyslexics?

[Pontius Navigator]

Yse dadky thy does

[BEagle]

Oh highly amusing, PN...

Why don't you take the p*ss out of the disabled whilst you're at it...

[siddar]

Oh sorry thought this was serious discussion. Not a troll job by pro trans rights people. I leave that type of discussion to sites where I have more posts and know what the moderators will tolerate . Enjoy your pro-dickchopper arguments
here.

[Al-bert]

Originally Posted by BEagle

Oh highly amusing, PN...

Why don't you take the p*ss out of the disabled whilst you're at it...

I think PN's just talking Yorkshire BE

[pasta]

Originally Posted by siddar

The suicide rate among transsexuals is threw the roof.

Maybe that has something with the discrimination they still face in many walks of life...

[West Coast]

Or that they suffer depression at greater rates.

[KenV]

Originally Posted by George K Lee

The question is whether one's sexual orientation &c renders one incapable of military duties, and the evidence is overwhelming that it does not.

Hmmmm. This is NOT simply a "question of sexual orientation." Gender dysphoria is an actual mental/emotional illness with serious consequences, among them severe depression that leads to an 800% higher suicide rate. There are many many physical, mental, and emotional conditions much less severe than gender dysphoria that disqualify people for military service. Check this LINK. There are literally several pages of disqualifying conditions.

Now on the subject of bloviating, are all the people with these conditions having their civil rights denied because they cannot serve in the military? REALLY??!!

[KenV]

Originally Posted by pasta

Maybe that has something with the discrimination they still face in many walks of life...

Hmmmm. Blacks, gays, women, lesbians, etc, etc were discriminated against "in many walks of life" for generations. And their suicide rate was 800% higher than the rest of the population until fairly recently as that discrimination was removed.

O wait. No it wasn't.

Look up Red Herring.

[pasta]

Originally Posted by KenV

Hmmmm. Blacks, gays, women, lesbians, etc, etc were discriminated against "in many walks of life" for generations. And their suicide rate was 800% higher than the rest of the population until fairly recently as that discrimination was removed.

O wait. No it wasn't.

Look up Red Herring.

I don't know about you guys, but we definitely had an issue with higher suicide rates as a result of government-sponsored discrimination. Alan Turing, who contributed quite a lot to the war effort, lost his security clearance and had to submit to chemical castration as a "treatment" for his homosexuality, and ended up committing suicide. If we'd treated him in the way we would now, he'd have been able to contribute a lot more to our country, and there's every reason to believe he'd have lived a lot longer too.

[KenV]

Originally Posted by pasta

I don't know about you guys, but we definitely had an issue with higher suicide rates as a result of government-sponsored discrimination. Alan Turing, who contributed quite a lot to the war effort, lost his security clearance and had to submit to chemical castration as a "treatment" for his homosexuality, and ended up committing suicide. If we'd treated him in the way we would now, he'd have been able to contribute a lot more to our country, and there's every reason to believe he'd have lived a lot longer too.

Two comments:

1. A single example does not a "rate" make.

2. Was the suicide rate among gays, blacks and women EVER even remotely 800% higher that the general population's suicide rate?

That being said, what happened to Turing is an abomination, and that anecdote used in this context is another example of a red herring.

[ORAC]

Gender dysphoria is an actual mental/emotional illness

True, but that is not the same same as Gender Identity - and signifies the depression caused by the stigmatisation described above.

Gender Dysphoria: DSM-5 Reflects Shift In Perspective On Gender Identity | HuffPost

"......This shift reflects recognition that the disagreement between birth gender and identity may not necessarily be pathological if it does not cause the individual distress, said Robin Rosenberg, a clinical psychologist and co-author of the psychology textbook “Abnormal Psychology” (Worth Publishers, 2009). For instance, many transgender people — those who identify with a gender different than the one they were assigned at birth — are not distressed by their cross-gender identification and should not be diagnosed with gender dysphoria, Rosenberg said.

Transgender people and their allies have pointed out that distress in gender dysphoria is not an inherent part of being transgender. This sets it apart from many other disorders in the DSM, because if someone is depressed, for example, he or she is, almost by definition, distressed as part of depression. In contrast, the distress that accompanies gender dysphoria arises as a result of a culture that stigmatizes people who do not conform to gender norms, Rosenberg said.

In this regard, the change resembles the elimination of homosexuality from the manual 40 years ago........."

[KenV]

Hmmmmm. One the one hand "many transgender people....are not distressed by their cross-gender identification and should not be diagnosed with gender dysphoria."

But on the other hand, "distress in gender dysphoria is not an inherent part of being transgender....The distress that accompanies gender dysphoria arises as a result of a culture that stigmatizes people who do not conform to gender norms.."

So, some transgender people experience "distress" and some do not. But all the distress is due to external "stigmatizing" factors. And only those who experience distress can rightly be described as having "gender dysphoria." I must question these notions on at least three grounds:

1. It seems extremely improbable that some transgender people within a given culture are stigmatized while many others are not. The "stigma" is almost certainly the same within a culture, so "stigma" cannot be the cause of transgenderism allegedly morphing into gender dysphoria.

2. Other groups "stigmatized" by their cultures (blacks, gays, lesbians, women, etc etc) do not exhibit the very high suicide rate of transgenders. If "stigma" is the cause of the "distress" that leads to suicide, then those other groups being stigmatized should also have high suicide rates. And that is not the case.

3. There are cultures that have accepted transgenders and some that have recognized three genders for generations. The suicide rate of transgenders among them is essentially the same as in other cultures. So even with the stigma removed, the "distress" that results in suicide remains.

[ORAC]

The amendment to the DSM has undergone rigorous and intensive debate amongst the experts in the field. Your professional qualifications to disparage and refute their findings would be of interest. Please provide.....

[West Coast]

Then look at it another way, why should the US military fund the personal needs for cosmetic surgery? You tiptoed past that by pointing out how small the outlay would be compared to the size of the DoD budget and that the US taxpayer pays a greater amount for the Pfizer riser.

Whataboutery is a stylistic type of argument that has its place, but somewhere along the lines, your argument has to stand on its own merit. Your argument pointing out that the Government spends millions on Viagra only tells me that we're wasting money there as well.

[KenV]

Originally Posted by ORAC

The amendment to the DSM has undergone rigorous and intensive debate amongst the experts in the field. Your professional qualifications to disparage and refute their findings would be of interest. Please provide.....

My argument is not with the DSM. May argument is with Wynn Parry, the author of this Huffpost piece, who is providing his interpretation of the DSM. I concede that his credentials might be better than mine in this field. On the other hand, Mr. Parry clearly has an agenda. To put his agenda into perspective, this is (allegedly) an article on the new terminology for transgenderism in the DSM (from "Gender Identity Disorder" to "Gender Dysphoria") yet deals out lots of opinion and precious little fact. To buttress his opinion, Mr. Parry provides a link to "Surprising Facts of Gay Conversion Therapy" which is totally irrelevant. In other words, yet another Red Herring.

Nevertheless, I find it fascinating that one's sexual orientation is (allegedly) defined at birth (or earlier) and is thereafter "fixed and immutable," and thus therapies to "treat" homosexuality are doomed to certain failure. Yet gender is totally "fluid" and can be "treated" with hormone therapy and even grossly invasive surgery. Even on pre-pubescent children!! Fascinating! I'm confident that in the future we will look upon such therapies with the same abhorrence we look today upon the "therapy" Alan Turing endured.