Limerance

It’s not about invalidation. It’s about the case of lost and mentally unwell people finding out about transgender, then find a welcoming community, that accepts them. They get presented a simple explanation on why they don’t feel like themselves and a path through that. If other people (like the parents) shed doubt on this, they can be called transphobic and face social consequences. So if someone grabs onto this, they get treatment in the form of hormone pills pretty much immediately under informed consent.

Differential diagnosis for mental health issues is never easy. One mental health issue can easily cause others. The major difference is that gender and being trans can become a big part of one’s identity. You don’t get that to that extent with other disorders.

Especially the overlap with autism is interesting and not obviouS. https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-psychiatry/article/crossing-boundaries-unraveling-the-link-between-gender-dysphoria-and-autism/DB33E9208EF32A46C4AE83D9B673F498

Preliminary findings indicate that individuals with ASD may experience higher rates of gender dysphoria compared to the general population. Factors such as social communication difficulties, rigid thinking patterns, and heightened sensitivity to social norms appear to influence the experience of gender identity. Qualitative data reveal that many individuals navigate significant challenges in accessing appropriate support and validation, often feeling marginalized within both the autistic and gender-diverse communities.

I invite you to seek out interviews with detransitioners and people who used to work in gender affirming care, if you want to learn about Trans issues from someone besides activists.

That said trans people are real and some benefit from transitioning. The very charged political climate around this health care issue, creates problems for trans and non trans folk alike.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.2147/AHMT.S135432

Evidence from the 10 available

prospective follow-up studies from childhood to adolescence

(reviewed in the study by Ristori and Steensma28) indicates

that for ~80% of children who meet the criteria for GDC,

the GD recedes with puberty

Puberty blockers are a strong change in your life and a severe intrusion into the natural development of a body. Instead of going through puberty like most other kids, the child will be behind in their physical development by years. That can lead to social and psychological problems of course.

There’s generally not much quality research into the long term effects, as you can read repeatedly in [the Wikipedia article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puberty_blocker#Research).

As for transitioning not resolving the psychological issues, those choosing to detransition are the best proof. https://segm.org/first_large_study_of_detransitioners

The participants’ decision to detransition was most often tied to the realization that their gender dysphoria was related to other issues (70%), health concerns (62%), and the fact that transition did not alleviate their dysphoria (50%). Interestingly, over 4 in 10 (43%) participants endorsed a change in political views as a reason for detransition.

Most participants reported significant difficulties finding the help that they needed during their detransition process from medical, mental health, or LGBT communities. Only 13% of the respondents received help from LGBT organizations when detransitioning, compared to 51% when transitioning. A number of participants reported negative reactions from LGBT and medical communities, and 51% of the sample expressed that they did not feel supported during their detransition.

Most detransitioners reported ongoing needs related to managing comorbid mental health conditions (65%), finding alternatives to medical transition (65%), and coping with regret (60%). Half of the sample reported the need for medical information on stopping or changing hormone regimens. A great majority of participants also expressed the need to hear about others’ detransition experiences (87%) and getting in contact with other detransitioners (76%). The study highlights the urgency of providing appropriate medical, psychological, legal, and social support to detransitioners.

I haven’t bothered to look for data concerning the long term mental health of those who transition. I only have lots of anecdotes from conversations with trans folk over the years. That’s of course not representative.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36151828/

Our findings coincide with existing research, which indicates TG individuals do experience a higher prevalence of mental health disorders than that of the general population or cisgender individuals

Watch the video.

Probably your client‘s fault.

The popular front of course!

Most children and teenagers with gender dysphoria grow out of it on their own. Giving children and teens easy access to strong drugs that will affect their whole future life, is something that should be questioned. Children know little, struggle to find their identity, are easily influenced, and often make stupid decisions. Societal roles help children orient and find their way around the world. How can we expect a child to understand something as complex as gender fully to make an informed decision?

Gender dysphoria rarely comes alone, usually it’s comorbid with a bunch of other psychological issues. Then transition is often presented as the one treatment that will fix everything. It often fails to do that.

Trans issues are mental health issues. They have been politicized by making it about identity and attaching it to the political struggle of gay and bi people. No other mental health issue has that kind of political clout and rigid ideology attached to it. The political activism has glued itself to radical ideas.

Scientific research into trans issues has become difficult to conduct, because if you have the „wrong“ results, you might not have a career and be labeled transphobic. In the end it’s trans people themselves who suffer the most from this.

Helping people live a healthy and fulfilling life should be the goal. If someone transitioning is the only thing that helps someone, then by all means go for it.

Something you haven’t mentioned is talking about the way medical treatment is practiced, access to gender affirming care, etc.

As you notice from your votes at -9, this is a radioactive topic.

Only if you support free access to medical transition, and promotion of self chosen identities, you might escape accusations of transphobia. Even asking for the scientific foundations this rests on, can get you in trouble quickly.

Mentioning what detransitioners say is risky as well. They are worth listening to.

There are real issues surrounding this topic, but they are hard to address because of the stark political divide. Trans issues are used as a political shibboleth and not as a psychological-medical issue.

Mine is even animated.

iCloud, Spotify family, Bitwarden password manager

North Korea did it.

That would close a major gap on the Linux desktop for me.

It’s just not as nice.

An actually good alternative to Adobe software is the excellent Affinity suite.

https://kaleidoscope.app/ on macOS is a super nice tool for diffs as well.

Bombing civilians? I haven’t heard that claim before. Do you have a source for that?

A civil war, mass riots, general strike, etc. only happens when people are really suffering. For the most part Americans are still doing pretty okay.

American society is also atomized. Mass political movements are rare and often fizzle out like occupy wallstreet or BLM. There’s widespread dissatisfaction with politics in general. So far nobody has found a way or even wanted to tap that besides MAGA

You’re overlooking that MAGA is an actually revolutionary movement in many ways. MAGA has already managed to storm a government building. The revolution is already happening with Trump at the helm. It’s not going the way you want.

What decade do you live in? The biggest media companies today are on the internet. X, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Netflix.

Now list all non Jewish people in similar positions please.

Your quote is inaccurate according to your own link.

That’s impossible at the moment. The USA dominates the software industry. No modern economy can run without relying on American software. Replacing that would be hard, maybe impossible.

For whom? Even those making nuclear weapons, have a high chance of dying in the war, have their possessions destroyed, their investments ruined.