Move over homosexuality. Transgender is the next big thing in the media. Over the last few years, we have all seen more and more and more articles in the news and in television shows about transgender issues, transgender people, and even run of the mill crossdressers. It must be exciting or entertaining for people. Now that homosexuality is so well accepted, it’s become boring. Or perhaps there are those that want such exposure to make us feel like transsexuals are normal, just like has happened with homosexuals. In a way this is good. People do need to know more about these issues and learn to have compassion and understanding. On the other hand, it’s clearly propaganda to get the mainstream culture to accept gender surgeries and alternative styles of living as something good and not distorted (or even as something heroic).
However, I am encouraged. There are a lot of people digging deeper into transgender ideology and behavior and seeing the inconsistencies and problems. Perhaps the broader culture may yet come to understand some of the problems with the arguments for transsexualism and sex reassignment surgery. For example this article – Bruce Jenner, Media, & Madmen.
There are so many inconsistencies in transgender thought that I keep bringing up, but I have yet to see a transgender person answer and explain on my blog or anywhere online. If someone has a good link explaining these contradictions, I’d love to read more.
On the one hand they argue that gender is fluid and not binary, and that it should be okay for boys to like playing with dolls and girls to like playing with guns or playing sports. On the other hand, they say they always knew they were really a girl because they liked playing with dolls and liked dresses when they were a kid. And they see such a clear binary that they cannot imagine living without changing their body to fit the binary If gender is not binary and actually fluid, why can’t they function as a man who is different from the average temperament of other men without changing their body?
They argue that clothes are just clothes and shouldn’t be limited from person to person. But very few are wearing dresses just because they like the feel. They are desperately trying to feel and live as females. So clearly the clothes aren’t just clothes.
On the one hand, they say they have to be who they really are, but on the other hand isn’t part of who they really are the body they were born with? They say that their soul is female, and therefore they should alter their bodies to fit what is in their souls. They think their bodies don’t matter and don’t give them identity, but rather their souls. Yet they live in internal contradiction because their bodies matter so much to them that they are desperate for surgery to rectify their bodies.
If your body is not what makes you male or female, and your personality and preferences are not what make you male or female, then what do you even mean when you say you have a female soul? Doesn’t the word “female” at that point no longer have any meaning?
I know this might sound crazy, but it seems to me that the only people who can argue for any kind of reality to transgenderism are the people who hold a very traditional view of binary sex. That men and women have different bodies, and different temperaments. Only on such a view could one try to argue that their body and mind have been mismatched. I do have a traditional view of binary sex/gender, and I still don’t think transgender people should get gender surgeries and rather should get counseling. But I do think the traditional view is the only place to start if you want to make arguments for transgenderism. So it’s baffling to me that transsexual websites and blogs keep advocating an end to a binary view of sex/gender. They are arguing against themselves in the process.
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