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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   38184 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of June 5, 2023

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If technology is that sufficiently advanced we could presume there'd be a 'cure' for this population to allow them to be happy with their natal bodies.

Some trans people would argue that such a “cure” would fundamentally change who they are as a person, as opposed to say, plopping the same brain in a new body of the opposite sex. It would be akin to having a pill to cure homosexuality when you could instead just accept people for who they are.

I’m somewhat ambivalent about it because going from one sex hormone to the other also changes who you are as a person (I’ve experienced this as someone who went on HRT), and there’s reports of dysphoric biological female teenagers going on testosterone blockers and that significantly reducing their dysphoria to the point they no longer need to transition.

But, given the two options, I would probably go with the perfect transition, because it’s a lot more interesting.

fundamentally change who they are

In terms of fundamental change, happy as I am, seems a lesser / smaller change than the alternative.

I would think a pill to cure homosexuals would be popular. Though I can imagine there would be opposition. There's opposition by some in the deaf community to cochlear implants.

I’m much more averse to altering my brain than altering my body. To me a perfect sex change would be plopping my existing brain into a body of the opposite sex, while a dysphoria cure would involve fundamentally altering my existing brain structure.

Me with a different set of genitals is still me; me after a treatment that changes my self-perception and my sexuality… seems like a much bigger change.

To me the gender swap is the cochlear implants, whereas the curing gender dysphoria is like making you OK with being deaf and having you live in an idyllic deaf community. Sure, some of those people are very happy, and it’s better than being miserable because you don’t know what everyone around you is saying, but I would much prefer to be able to actually hear.

Hormones literally alter your brain structure, almost certainly more than altering whatever is causing dysphoria would. I can understand someone who has been trans for a while and has built up an identity around it, but once we have a pill that just removes the dysphoria that should be the last generation of trans people.

Some trans people would argue that such a “cure” would fundamentally change who they are as a person

So would cochlear implants. It hasn't posed a significant moral problem for us I think.

It is only a problem if you buy into the idea that an illness or deficiency has the same value as the natural functioning of the body. But that is putting the cart before the horse.

Given that transpeople are claiming that their dysphoria makes them suffer so significantly that care is mandated and most of their gains have been based on a mostly pragmatic desire to avoid this suffering they have less room here than many - e.g. homosexuals - to complain.

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