California Proposition 8

[Sihouette]

I find it odd, Siho, that you don't think that things/people can be better, that you have a defeatist attitude about the condition of the world

Just a reminder. Keep the analysis to issues of homosexuality. I could enjoy pulling the wings off of flies but it is irrelevant to the issue of homosexuality becoming a snowballing cultural phenomenon like with the vignette on San Francisco.

Youth bend to mimicry, coercion and peer pressure . This apparently is OK with you when you plea to have homosexuality acheive the stamp of mainstream. That's my argument in a nutshell. Gays know this and are OK with it. Get it?

The word is recruitment.

And the majority of CA voters decided that adopting gayness into mainstream culture (formed as impressionable youth grow up and become adults and older adults die off) is not the direction they wanted to go.

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

Just a reminder. Keep the analysis to issues of homosexuality. I could enjoy pulling the wings off of flies but it is irrelevant to the issue of homosexuality becoming a snowballing cultural phenomenon like with the vignette on San Francisco.Youth bend to mimicry, coercion and peer pressure . This apparently is OK with you when you plea to have homosexuality acheive the stamp of mainstream. That's my argument in a nutshell. Gays know this and are OK with it. Get it?The word is ecruitment.And the majority of CA voters decided that adopting gayness into mainstream culture (formed as impressionable youth grow up and become adults and older adults die off) is not the direction they wanted to go.

Basically, you are running away from a discussion of your theory? No basis but fear, no proof but opinion, just another homophobic poser with pretensions to a college degree in biology.

A "snowballing cultural phenomena"? Oh yeah, like we're all gonna be gay just to spite you. You mentioned "deeper psychological therapy", well, maybe you're just projecting like Chippo said?

 

[Segep]

The word is recruitment.

If by recruitment you mean that teaching people and especially the younger generation that we are human beings, too, than you're damned right. And I'm the best recruiter I know. I live a normal life in a normal house and I drive a normal car to a normal job. My coworkers and my community accept us for who we are because they've seen us around and realize we're not a threat. For the most part they all treat us as equal members of the community and seem to give our family the same consideration as any other. If that's recruitment, I'm proud to sign up as many as I can.

J... I could enjoy pulling the wings off of flies....

....


uh...





....nah, that's just too easy.

 

[Sihouette]

You see, the temptation to ignore what I'm saying and instead ad hominem me is nearly irresistable from the losing side... Thanks for illustrating that Segep.

Basically, you are running away from a discussion of your theory? No basis but fear, no proof but opinion, just another homophobic poser with pretensions to a college degree in biology.~ Mare

It appears the gist of your stance is: "Anyone who objects to GLBT marriage being legalized is a homophobe". Correct?

I could have a PhD in human behavioral psychology, have done exhaustive studies on what Gay By The Bay admits: that homosexuality can become cultural...like the biblical Sodom... and still none of it would matter. None of it. Any person anywhere who presents lucid, sane and thoughtful rebuttal to the idea of gay marriage is, by your definition, a "homophobe".

So you are coming from a position of irrational hate yourself. You hate (and therefore ad hominem/attack/denigrate/belittle) anyone who differs in opinion with you. Truthfully, you have a lot to lose if you concede that I even have a smidgen of a point. That's why I can paint you out so easily as irrational. I present more and more logic and studies/links and sources about human behavior...stuff that anthropology 101 requires of its most basic hurdles to pass...and you shoot it down. You DO understand then that the very argument you're trying to make about me "ad-libbing" to the areas of human behavioral psychology, you are guilty of yourself? In effect, you are trying to argue now that anthropology itself is a erroneous field of study.

You do realize how silly that makes you look?


Talk about too easy..!

Let's just say that having removed your penis makes you susceptable to any and all forms of irrational rebuttal to preserve your "truth" (backed by numerous misguided sychophants, including your therapists apparently). If you don't, if you allow the tiniest bit of sanity and learned opposition into that inventory of "I was absolutely correct in removing my penis", then the foundation of your very reality will crumble. And hence the reason I know I can get you to position yourself in the most absurd corners in debating the issue.

But of course to you, you are the sanest and most rational person in this debate, even if you are sitting at your PC having hired (more "rational" "learned" than me, naturally!) people to amputate part of your body because you had issues with being male: based on negative experiences that deeper therapy could've addressed.

My depression started when I began puberty around 11 years of age, by 15 I was suicidal and I dealt with suicidal ideation, fantisizing about my own death, and struggling with a sense of hopelessness that was worse than the depression on a daily basis. I could not look into a mirror without feeling a sense of rage and hatred that was so strong that it made me want to take a knife and cut myself to get out of me...

..PLUSSES: fewer birthday and Christmas presents to buy (no brothers), I get to be who I feel like I am every day, no depression, no hopelessness, less body hair (ugh!), JOY, happiness, satisfaction, peace of mind, pretty clothes, perfume, fun shoes, no insane, endless, my-dick-is-bigger-than-yours male competition, social life, no suicidal ideation, much more capacity to interact with the world, no self-hatred, loving myself, being happy with who I see in the mirror every day, the camaraderie of women, less interaction with men, no more struggles to behave like a man so that men wouldn't beat the sh1t out of me for being queer,
Page 20~ Mare

It is grossly evident that you have been teased about the size of your penis, been on the short end of normal male competition and foisting of aggressive male lifestyles. Has it occured to you that many many men feel the same way and opted instead to withstand those pressures and get help to love their maleness without these qualities? What town did you grow up in? Maybe relocation first? Noone is arguing you had many many negative experiences with being male that warped you.. But they happened after you were born. And therefore were affective disorders. Cutting your penis off was not the correct, nor sane way to address those issues. Sorry to be the first (apparently) to point this out to you in a gentle, but frank manner.

I've mentioned Southpark before and last night's episode reminded me of your stance Mare. Mr/Mrs. Garrison (the transexual gay-hating teacher of Southpark School) went back home to confront his father for not having molested him as a child. The father was appalled and shocked when Mr. Garrison insisted that he molest him, "to prove you love me!". The whole town backed up Mr. Garrison, even though they fully and frankly admitted that for a father to molest his son was wrong. But the interest of "not upsetting" Mr. Garrison's wishes to be molested by his dad, the townspeople overlooked the wrongness and instead opted to promote placation.

The dad stopped out front of his house, looked at the sky and yelled "Am I the only sane person on Earth?" He never did molest Mr. Garrison but hired another guy to do it posing as him in the darkness...just to keep the peace and fool the twisted Mr. Garrison into thinking he was "loved"..

Utter madness...and this is what I love most about Southpark: it merely reflects the utter madness that our culture has adopted, blindly.

And this is what you want us to do also Mare: adopt your self-amputation blindly, without question...to placate you and your ilk...in spite of all we know to be sane.

 

[Segep]

It is grossly evident that you have been teased about the size of your penis

haha, yeah clearly. Your profound perceptions and clever insights into others' characters and motivations never fail to astound me.

I've mentioned Southpark before and last night's episode reminded me of your stance Mare. Mr/Mrs. Garrison (the transexual gay-hating teacher of Southpark School) went back home to confront his father for not having molested him as a child. The father was appalled and shocked when Mr. Garrison insisted that he molest him, "to prove you love me!". The whole town backed up Mr. Garrison, even though they fully and frankly admitted that for a father to molest his son was wrong. But the interest of "not upsetting" Mr. Garrison's wishes to be molested by his dad, the townspeople overlooked the wrongness and instead opted to promote placation.

The dad stopped out front of his house, looked at the sky and yelled "Am I the only sane person on Earth?" He never did molest Mr. Garrison but hired another guy to do it posing as him in the darkness...just to keep the peace and fool the twisted Mr. Garrison into thinking he was "loved"..

Utter madness...and this is what I love most about Southpark: it merely reflects the utter madness that our culture has adopted, blindly.

And this is what you want us to do also Mare: adopt your self-amputation blindly, without question...to placate you and your ilk...in spite of all we know to be sane.

I love it that you get your information from South Park and base your argument on that information. Does that mean if Alex Trebek says his name backwards he really will be sent back to the dimension he comes from?

 

[Sihouette]

And it's easy to paint you out a fool when you wilfully ignore the thrust of what is being said...and once again resort to ad-hominems to "get your point across"...

Like shooting fish in a barrel. Here, let me beat you to the punch. Now I'm a "fish-killer" too....lol...

Read it again. Other people are...

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

Just a reminder. Keep the analysis to issues of homosexuality.

Hello? You remind me to keep to the subject and then you post about transsexuals? Make up your mind, Siho.

It appears the gist of your stance is: "Anyone who objects to GLBT marriage being legalized is a homophobe". Correct?

No, it depends on why they object and how they express their objections. It could be a person who lies about their educational background, supports their position with veterinarian articles, decades old research, popular magazines, and with articles culled from the web which the poster does not even read--because if she had she would have discovered that two of her articles said her position was WRONG. If that person posts fear-based arguments with no historical support, cannot learn the difference between homosexual and transsexual in more than 500 posts, then THAT person is a homophobe. Clear?

I could have a PhD in human behavioral psychology, have done exhaustive studies on what Gay By The Bay admits: that homosexuality can become cultural...like the biblical Sodom... and still none of it would matter. None of it. Any person anywhere who presents lucid, sane and thoughtful rebuttal to the idea of gay marriage is, by your definition, a "homophobe".

You could have majored in biology,but you didn't. Maybe on this thread you could focus on what is ACTUALLY happening instead of making up scary stories based on pop-psych and magazines.

So you are coming from a position of irrational hate yourself. You hate (and therefore ad hominem/attack/denigrate/belittle) anyone who differs in opinion with you. Truthfully, you have a lot to lose if you concede that I even have a smidgen of a point. That's why I can paint you out so easily as irrational. I present more and more logic and studies/links and sources about human behavior...stuff that anthropology 101 requires of its most basic hurdles to pass...and you shoot it down. You DO understand then that the very argument you're trying to make about me "ad-libbing" to the areas of human behavioral psychology, you are guilty of yourself? In effect, you are trying to argue now that anthropology itself is a erroneous field of study.

It would be fun to run this paragraph past your sister and see what she thinks of it.

I've said nothing to invalidate anthropology or behavioral psychology, I have posted science around those two fields which you have not looked at, have you?

Let's just say that having removed your penis makes you susceptable to any and all forms of irrational rebuttal to preserve your "truth" (backed by numerous misguided sychophants, including your therapists apparently). If you don't, if you allow the tiniest bit of sanity and learned opposition into that inventory of "I was absolutely correct in removing my penis", then the foundation of your very reality will crumble. And hence the reason I know I can get you to position yourself in the most absurd corners in debating the issue.

Here's another paragraph to run past your sister. What is amazing is that you think the stuff you post is new and profound, that you have insights denied to all but the most ignorant and homophobic amongst us. Why would you think that YOU are the first person to say these things? Why would you think that therapists and counselors who have been dealing with transsexuals for decades wouldn't have thought of these things? Shoot, if a little teasing was all that caused my problem I could have solved it much more easily than changing gender--trust me on that one.

I guess my next question to you that you will not be able to answer is why the endocrinologist found that my hormone levels were not right, and that's why puberty took more than 15 years to complete? Oh yeah, why do I have estrogen receptors in my brain? Teasing causes estrogen receptors to develop in the brain? Yes, you certainly are the voice of sanity on THIS thread and the scientific community, the AMA, the APA, and all the rest of us should heed your opinions.

But of course to you, you are the sanest and most rational person in this debate, even if you are sitting at your PC having hired (more "rational" "learned" than me, naturally!) people to amputate part of your body because you had issues with being male: based on negative experiences that deeper therapy could've addressed.

Gosh, Siho, I wish that you COULD prove that my condition was caused by trivial things, then no one would ever have to go through what I did--I'd love it. If I could make it so that no one ever had to suffer from this condition again I'd do it in an instant, I'd end breast cancer, prostate cancer, and a host of other medical problems as well. But it doesn't work that way except in the world of Simple Siho.

It is grossly evident that you have been teased about the size of your penis, been on the short end of normal male competition and foisting of aggressive male lifestyles. Has it occured to you that many many men feel the same way and opted instead to withstand those pressures and get help to love their maleness without these qualities? What town did you grow up in? Maybe relocation first? Noone is arguing you had many many negative experiences with being male that warped you.. But they happened after you were born. And therefore were affective disorders. Cutting your penis off was not the correct, nor sane way to address those issues. Sorry to be the first (apparently) to point this out to you in a gentle, but frank manner.

"...gentle, but frank..."? I don't mean to be anything but frank and gentle with you either, but you have been practicing what amounts to verbal rape on me with your lie about your biology background and your pop-psychology based on vet science and feedlot dynamics. Only an extraordinarily ignorant person would diagnose this kind of thing with neither knowledge of the subject nor experience with the person involved. Seems like common egotistical homophobia.

Could we run this one past your sister too?

I've mentioned Southpark before and last night's episode reminded me of your stance Mare. Mr/Mrs. Garrison (the transexual gay-hating teacher of Southpark School) went back home to confront his father for not having molested him as a child. The father was appalled and shocked when Mr. Garrison insisted that he molest him, "to prove you love me!". The whole town backed up Mr. Garrison, even though they fully and frankly admitted that for a father to molest his son was wrong. But the interest of "not upsetting" Mr. Garrison's wishes to be molested by his dad, the townspeople overlooked the wrongness and instead opted to promote placation.

The dad stopped out front of his house, looked at the sky and yelled "Am I the only sane person on Earth?" He never did molest Mr. Garrison but hired another guy to do it posing as him in the darkness...just to keep the peace and fool the twisted Mr. Garrison into thinking he was "loved"..

So now you are adding South Park to your list of sources, good! For my part I'd like to add some journal articles from the American Psychological Association website. Please take note that these citations are all from THIS century.

American Psychological Association. (2002). Ethical principles of psychologists and code of conduct. American Psychologist, 57, 1060-1073.

Bockting, W. O., & Fung, L. C. T. (2005). Genital reconstruction and gender identity disorders. In D. Sarwer, T. Pruzinsky, T. Cash, J. Persing, R. Goldwyn, & L. Whitaker (Eds.), Psychological aspects of reconstructive and cosmetic plastic surgery: Clinical, empirical, and ethical perspectives (pp. 207-229). Philadelphia: Lippincott, Williams, & Wilkins.

Clements-Nolle, K. (2006). Attempted suicide among transgender persons: The influence of gender-based discrimination and victimization. Journal of Homosexuality, 51(3), 53-69

De Cuypere G,TSjoen, G., Beerten, R., Selvaggi, G., De Sutter, P., Hoebeke, P., Monstrey, S., Vansteenwegen A., & Rubens, R. (2005). Sexual and physical health after sex reassignment surgery. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 34(6), 679-690.

Grossman, A. H., D'Augelli, A. R., & Slater, N. P. (2006). Male-to-female transgender youth: Gender expression milestones, gender atypicality, victimization, and parents' responses. Journal of GLBT Family Studies, 2(1), 71-92.

Lev, A. I. (2004). Transgender emergence: Therapeutic guidelines for working with gender-variant people and their families. Binghampton, NY: Haworth Press.

Lurie, S.(2005). Identifying training needs of health-care providers related to treatment and care of transgendered patients: A qualitative needs assessment conducted in New England. International Journal of Transgenderism, 3(2/3), 93-112.

Newfield, E., Hart, S., Dibble, S., & Kohler, L. (2006). Female-to-male transgender quality of life. Quality of Life Research, 15(9), 1447-1457.

Spade, D. (2003). Resisting medicine, re/modeling gender. Berkeley Women’s Law Journal, 18(15), 15-37.

Witten, T. M., & Eyler, A. E. (2007). Transgender aging and the care of the elderly transgendered patient. In R. Ettner, S. Monstrey, & A. E. Eyler (Eds.), Principles of Transgender Medicine and Surgery (pp.343-372). New York: Haworth Press.

American Psychological Association. (2008, August). Resolution on transgender, gender identity, and gender expression non-discrimination. Retrieved [date] from http://www.apa.org/pi/lgbc/policy/transgender.html.

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

And it's easy to paint you out a fool when you wilfully ignore the thrust of what is being said...

Like shooting fish in a barrel. Here, let me beat you to the punch. Now I'm a "fish-killer" too.

Why don't you take a moment out from the fun of shooting fish in a barrel and answer my questions about your thesis? In my post #570 I asked a number of reasonable questions in a polite manner--why not answer them?

 

[Pidgey]

Kinda' difficult for me to imagine this thread going on this long without the principals just getting plain sick of the bother--it's like "East is East, West is West, and never the twain shall meet."

In the GLBT spectrum, there's everything from innocently-but-irrevocably-born-that-way to true acquired deviant behavior with malignant intent towards others who aren't cut from the same cloth. Surely, some researcher somewhere has even applied statistical mathematics to the distribution. The real problem with people is that they don't come stock with identifcation stickers to tell you what the ingredients are so it's often just plain easiest to paint an entire sector with a broad brush: "Do Not Touch"

Where economics are concerned and especially in a dangerously diminishing economy, that's probably just good business sense in the minds of the majority. They're almost automatically going to give some new proposition a light reading and instinctively come to the conclusion, "whoever and whatever these SOBs are... they probably want my money!" because, as we all know, all new laws to be voted in are always about getting money one way or another.

Of course, there aren't many mothers out there who fantasize about telling their peer group someday that, "gosh, girls, I just got the most wonderful news--I'll never have to suffer being a grandmother because my son's/daughter's just come out of the closet!!! (profligate squeals of delight and tears of joy!)"

Not a common scene, methinks, nor welcome as such. No, I expect most people's inner thoughts when hard times come (and they're definitely on the way) are going to be something more like, "sounds like a personal problem to me, and the best place for you to take care of it's going to be way-the-h*ll-and-gone out of my sight."

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

Kinda' difficult for me to imagine this thread going on this long without the principals just getting plain sick of the bother--it's like "East is East, West is West, and never the twain shall meet."

In the GLBT spectrum, there's everything from innocently-but-irrevocably-born-that-way to true acquired deviant behavior with malignant intent towards others who aren't cut from the same cloth. Surely, some researcher somewhere has even applied statistical mathematics to the distribution. The real problem with people is that they don't come stock with identifcation stickers to tell you what the ingredients are so it's often just plain easiest to paint an entire sector with a broad brush: "Do Not Touch"

Where economics are concerned and especially in a dangerously diminishing economy, that's probably just good business sense in the minds of the majority. They're almost automatically going to give some new proposition a light reading and instinctively come to the conclusion, "whoever and whatever these SOBs are... they probably want my money!" because, as we all know, all new laws to be voted in are always about getting money one way or another.

Of course, there aren't many mothers out there who fantasize about telling their peer group someday that, "gosh, girls, I just got the most wonderful news--I'll never have to suffer being a grandmother because my son's/daughter's just come out of the closet!!! (profligate squeals of delight and tears of joy!)"

Not a common scene, methinks, nor welcome as such. No, I expect most people's inner thoughts when hard times come (and they're definitely on the way) are going to be something more like, "sounds like a personal problem to me, and the best place for you to take care of it's going to be way-the-h*ll-and-gone out of my sight."

Reducing all laws to a mere money issue is perhaps a bit simplistic. And I have no idea what the grandmother story was supposed to mean. ???

 

[Pidgey]

People are going to vote with their emotions, Mare. Most moms don't react too well to the suggestion that their kids are going to turn out unlikely to produce heirs and so they'd probably tend to vote in such a way as to cut off their kids' options proactively.

 

[Pidgey]

And in the face of a full-blown economic depression, the likelihood is all too possible that there will be folks who are literally going to starve to death. That said, you'll see people begin to significantly retract from charitable thoughts and actions so their sense of community's going to retract as well. They're likely to get just plain hostile. Being "different" has never been easy at a time like that except where the difference serves the public good.

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

People are going to vote with their emotions, Mare. Most moms don't react too well to the suggestion that their kids are going to turn out unlikely to produce heirs and so they'd probably tend to vote in such a way as to cut off their kids' options proactively.

Voting keeps people from being gay? What? How does a person's vote have any impact on how many people are gay? Even in countries where gay people are killed they still have gay people, all cultures throughout history have had gay people--persecution has had no effect on this fact. I fail to see the connection here.

 

[Mare Tranquillity]

And in the face of a full-blown economic depression, the likelihood is all too possible that there will be folks who are literally going to starve to death. That said, you'll see people begin to significantly retract from charitable thoughts and actions so their sense of community's going to retract as well. They're likely to get just plain hostile. Being "different" has never been easy at a time like that except where the difference serves the public good.

Does that make it right? Should we all begin hiding now? I realize that what you are saying is correct, people look for scapegoats--look at Nazi Germany--but somehow that doesn't convince me to begin being obsequious to the Sihos of the world in an attempt to save my life at the expense of others. If I am silent I can pass in society and I'll be as safe as anyone, but what does that say about me if I'm will to throw others off the back of sled to save myself? Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther, Dorothy Day, Mother Theresa, and a long, long list of other admirable people didn't take the coward's way out, why should I?

"The ultimate goal is not survival, but doing the right thing."
Angela Bey

 

[Pidgey]

Voting keeps people from being gay? What? How does a person's vote have any impact on how many people are gay? Even in countries where gay people are killed they still have gay people, all cultures throughout history have had gay people--persecution has had no effect on this fact. I fail to see the connection here.

Sorry, I was returning to the thread's title and just finding another way to phrase the debate. On the one hand, you're almost battling for your right to exist unprejudged, just as anyone else with a simple birth defect. The other side of the argument seems to be that since the "birth defect" (for lack of a better term) in question has a certain behavioral component, severe restrictions need to be applied.

You two, the two principals in this debate, aren't really convincing each other (from what little I've read) one way or the other, and for most of the rest of us, it's just too tedious to want to follow for very long. I suppose that all I'm really trying to do is point out various reasons for the impasse.

Medically, I'm aware that there are individuals born with the various "configurations" that cause these circumstances, and that judging them harshly isn't "right". And beyond that simple medical fact, I don't know what to tell you besides what criteria others are likely to use in their own minds for what decisions they're going to make. When you embark on a mission to educate others, it's often a very good exercise to attempt to argue from their point of view.

I think the biggest difficulty (this might be a mistake) in this one is both sides trying to paint a multifaceted issue with too broad of a brush. Let's just say for the sake of argument that:

1) there really ARE evil b*stards out there who have a real issue with needing to sexually dominate other guys and predate other individuals they deem are ripe for the picking; and,

2) there really ARE non-evil individuals with gender identity issues due to bonafide medical realities.

In an arbitration scenario, opposing sides would each have to cede a point and then have to figure out how to proceed. I think it'd be interesting to run that exercise.

Does that make it right? Should we all begin hiding now? I realize that what you are saying is correct, people look for scapegoats--look at Nazi Germany--but somehow that doesn't convince me to begin being obsequious to the Sihos of the world in an attempt to save my life at the expense of others. If I am silent I can pass in society and I'll be as safe as anyone, but what does that say about me if I'm will to throw others off the back of sled to save myself? Jesus, Gandhi, Martin Luther, Dorothy Day, Mother Theresa, and a long, long list of other admirable people didn't take the coward's way out, why should I?

"The ultimate goal is not survival, but doing the right thing."
Angela Bey

It's highly likely that in the very near future "The ultimate goal will be to survive, even if it means doing the wrong thing."