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Small-Scale Question Sunday for February 8, 2026

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Agreed. Sometimes I say things and I think, "wow, they're going to crack an egg over my head, aren't they?" and of course it's always a catch-22 -- denying gender dysphoria is often treated like repression rather than honesty.

My biggest concern with the trans movement is the possibility of sweeping up people who just don't fit in society for one reason or another and giving them a pathway that says they aren't 'defective', they have a real condition shared by dozens of us and now they're explained

When I was a young child I had a period of time where I legitimately believed there was a chance I was some sort of space alien Superman'd onto the planet. I just felt like I didn't fit. What's interesting to me is that this kind of narrative has almost entirely been captured by the gender and sexual minorities debate: when Pixar recently made a movie literally about a child who believes he might be a space alien, the critical response was that this was because he was gay, or transgender, or autistic. Even the concept of "being weird" has become a kind of regularized set of categories! It feels almost high modernist: like we are supposed to have such a profoundly complete understanding of the human phenotype that every oddity can be precisely categorized and explained.

I often get along with transgender people better than some might expect of me based on my worldview, but I'd argue that I'd get along with them just as well had they never transitioned. I like people who don't fit. They're interesting, and sometimes more real.