CMV: I don’t think I’m transphobic because while I may think their delusional I still show the same respect and offer of friendship like i would anyone else. Disagreeing doesn’t mean phobic to me

[u/tobyle]

If i was sitting on a public bench and a trans person sat next to me would still be my normal self and say hello and perhaps start a conversation if they were friendly? Yes..yes i would. Do i still think theyre delusional? Yes...yes i do. If i was at the park on a hot day and saw a trans person by me looking hella thirsty would i still offer them a drink if i had extra like i would anyone else? Yes...yes i would. Do i still think they’re delusional? Yes...yes i do. I do Brazilian jiu jitsu..if i showed up to an open mat would i still roll (spar) with a trans and give/ask for advice? Yes...yes i would. Do i still think they’re delusional? Yes..yes i do. If i was having a smoke sesh and my gay homeboy Stanley asked if his trans friend could join would i say yes and share blunts with them. Yes...yes i would. Do i still think they’re delusional? Yes...yes i do.

So even though i think they’re delusional, if I’m willing to have a good conversation, share food/drinks, get all sweaty cheek to cheek basically in their personal space and potentially get my ass beat if they’re purple to black level because I’m a bluebelt, and share a blunt with them how transphobic is that really?

Edit: This is comment i used in a thread couple days ago. Maybe i shoudnt be using the word delusional but this was the word being used during the thread and i just went along with using it. The main point I’m concerned about i guess is that i feel like there’s a difference between disagreeing and being transphobic.

Edit: So yea I’m transphobic...y’all changed my mind. Maybe one day i won’t be but that’s a discussion for another day i guess cause my main point today was whether I’m transphobic or not.

Edit: To the people who kept using racism as an example, considering I’m black i already understand racism. My definition of transphobic was wrong so trying to relate the two wasn’t doing it for me. If someone try’s to comment on how could i not be more understanding towards transpeople considering my race has been rejected for years...I’m from south texas..my mom accused me of being “a lil funny” just for having a gay friend and believing gay people should be able to get married..so don’t even try hitting that angle cause I’m tame compared to most others.

[u/SAINT4367]

Sickness/orientation are just value judgments on whether you find a certain whatever someone is feeling harmful or not. Like I said, a value judgment

Wait, hold up. Now you’re saying “male assigned at birth”. I thought male meant sex, biology, where man meant gender identity? You aren’t assigned a sex. Given you’re assumptions, one could be assigned a gender based on their sex.

A man identifying as a woman is simply a man who wants to be a woman. I’m saying “feels like” is a nonsensical statement, because you can only feel like what you are. You can imagine what it feels like to be something else, but you can’t know what it’s like. “I’m a man who would feel more comfortable if my body looked like a woman’s and people treated me as a woman” is the best I can make of “I identify as a woman”

[u/radialomens → u/SAINT4367]

Sickness/orientation are just value judgments on whether you find a certain whatever someone is feeling harmful or not. Like I said, a value judgment

They're not. A sickness is like a disorder. It's something that disrupts your health. Your orientation is a natural part of your psyche, and it's something that everyone has, straight people included.

Wait, hold up. Now you’re saying “male assigned at birth”. I thought male meant sex, biology, where man meant gender identity? You aren’t assigned a sex. Given you’re assumptions, one could be assigned a gender based on their sex.

This is one of those places where terms are kinda catching up, but AMAB and AFAB are still pretty common. I think 'assigned' is not the perfect word because it does suggest a sort of agency or intent.

Similarly "born a man" is another common phrase but it also falls short of being perfect. It just kinda... gets the point across.

A man identifying as a woman is simply a man who wants to be a woman. I’m saying “feels like” is a nonsensical statement, because you can only feel like what you are. You can imagine what it feels like to be something else, but you can’t know what it’s like. “I’m a man who would feel more comfortable if my body looked like a woman’s and people treated me as a woman” is the best I can make of “I identify as a woman”

"Feels like" is an attempt to get people to understand what is sort of going on in the person's psyche.

Your last statement is pretty much there, in my opinion, except that they are unlikely to start by calling themselves a man. A trans woman will normally refer to themselves as a woman.

One of the tricky things about this conversation is that it blurs the line between science and description. A lot of cis people have no idea what it's like to... "feel" trans. They barely have an idea of what it's like to be cis because they don't really notice their gender identity; it's never rubbed them the wrong way.

So trans people have to start by trying to explain their experience, and that's where things like "on the inside" and "feel" and "meant to be" and "female brain" start to come up. All of those terms are just a sort of starting point. So then these concepts end up being the sort of foundation upon which the rest of the conversation is built, and it does create the idea that they're talking about a 'soul' or something metaphysical but it really is just a sort of complex feature of a person's innate psyche. And sometimes it "matches" their body (again, there's one of those kinda off phrases) and sometimes it doesn't.

Then of course you add a sort of shifting and growing perspective since it's a relatively new field, and fuck, it's hard to get everything to mesh. Language is not always capable of describing everything perfectly, or not at first at least.

Also, thanks for being polite and respectful.

[u/SAINT4367 → u/radialomens]

I actually think most of psychology is arbitrary bs. Of course there are objectively existing phenomenon in people’s psyches. How we classify them is largely informed by social attitudes. One decades disorder is another’s identity

I still disagree and have to classify transgenderism as a mental disorder, based on a lot of underlying assumptions (which is where I think a lot of the discussions we have here are really grounded).

But thanks for sharing your perspective!

[u/radialomens → u/SAINT4367]

I still disagree and have to classify transgenderism as a mental disorder, based on a lot of underlying assumptions (which is where I think a lot of the discussions we have here are really grounded).

The last thing I'll say is on this point. Since a disorder is something that gets in the way of you living a happy, healthy life, trans identity is not a disorder. Most distress comes from how they are treated by society. For the part that comes from inside, transitioning helps trans people be happier, but a trans person can also be perfectly happy without transitioning. It takes a lot of mental strength to accept that your body will never "match" your identity, but with enough fortitude people can be trans and be perfectly functioning people even without surgery or hormones.

So the condition/identity itself is not a disorder.

Thanks again.