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Culture War Roundup for the week of June 16, 2025

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Trans people are already used to travelling for surgeries not because of legal issues but because there’s so few skilled surgeons out there. For instance the best MtF sexual reassignment surgeons are all in Thailand, and you generally book a hotel for a full month there in case of complications.

Trans people are already used to travelling for surgeries

A bit hard to pull off for a 14 year old girl, without the approval of the parents.

I don’t think many 14 year olds can afford a $15k+ surgery without their parents anyway.

Are mastectomies really that expensive? Aren't there a good deal of insurance companies that cover it?

In any case, my argument is one I've made before: many parents are Milgram Experiment-ed into it. If they want to travel to California to lob their daughter's breasts off, it's their choice, but if the practice is locally illegal, they'll probably figure out they don't have to listen to the psychopath in the labcoat.

It costs double in the US compared to most other countries, but it’s still a complicated and expensive surgery that requires a decent amount of post-op care, and I wouldn’t trust a random Tennessee plastic surgeon with it.

The number of top surgeries on underage patients is in the hundreds per year for the whole US anyway, might as well have the minimum age be 18 and avoid the moral panic altogether.

The number of top surgeries on underage patients is in the hundreds per year for the whole US anyway, might as well have the minimum age be 18 and avoid the moral panic altogether.

My opinion on blockers and hormones isn't particularly high either, but yeah, never understood why we can't settle on 18+ for all this stuff.

Isn't the reason that if you wait until puberty is nearly complete, it becomes much harder to pass in the future?

Doesn't that mean you're that much more screwed if you end up changing your mind later?

Obviously, but I think the TRA would argue that this is exceptionally unusual and outweighed by the QoL improvements of early transition.

I strenuously disagree, but I do think that's the actual crux.