Soooo, not taking sides on this one because it’s very divisive buuuut……
The conservatives are worried that therapists are run amok and are out there convincing normal kids that are on a path of self discovery that they should flip genders. I mean I’m a guy and there were definitely points in my life where I wondered what it’s like to be a girl beyond just the simple question. There’s some validity to this because the therapy community has made messes before (see “recovered memories”)
As an example of this, at a recent pride event I was at, I saw a 10 year old wearing the asexual flag. They’re far too young to try and define what they are, they we’ll change as life goes on…… but more than that, should a 10 year old have a sexuality?? Are they actually asexual or just 10 and not yet finished puberty?
I don’t have the answers, but it’s a valid question.
That being said, the reality is that there are VERY few children who actually transition that early in life and they seem to be fairly clear cases, so the risks seem WAY overblown and the blowback on that great mongering is a huge safety risk to the trans community and frankly the lgbtq community as a whole. So while they do have a somewhat valid but minor concern, they’re treating it like every elementary school teacher is trying to find the “trans” in everyone. It gets much worse than that in the “don’t say gay” bills.
Then there’s the sports problem and quite frankly I agree with the conservatives on that one. Trans folk should compete with the men’s/open leagues and not the women’s leagues.
Testosterone is too powerful to allow trans (in either direction) to obliterate the women’s leagues.
ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 months ago
I’m going to go out on a limb here and bet that you don’t call out parents saying that their little boy is a “lady’s man” or their little girl is going to be “fighting off the boys”.
Society is perfectly happy to stick orientation on children, but somehow, people only care when it’s the kids themselves saying that they don’t agree with the default assumption that their heterosexual.
Even if your wrong, and the kid in question doesn’t turn out to be ace, the best thing you can do as a parent is let them find themselves and support them whilst they do it. Maybe they go through some labels before they arrive at certainty, but who cares? The end result is they know who they are more than a lot of other kids do, especially if those kids aren’t straight, but have had straight identity forced on them since birth.
Then you haven’t done enough research, and are responding to an active misinformation campaign and wedge tactic. Which is exactly the reason it’s used that way by the people you’re agreeing with…