Poll: Would you date a transgendered person?

[Da_Vane]

But I'm not intolerant of MtF or FtM. If you had been paying attention, you'd see that actually MtF is the one I'd consider dating, although I wasn't sure I could get around the appearance of their genitals.

So, let me get this perfectly clear. You would be willing to date a Male to Female transsexual, and support them, but in your head, you would still consider them a man?!

You do realise the very contradictory nature of that statement, right?

What they are saying is that, from the post op photos they have seen, the newly reconstructed genitals, do not look natural, and that is what she might not be able to get past.

Previously, Miss Kendarik had asserted that she would always consider transsexuals as belonging to their birth sex, and that Gender Dysphoria is just a mental illness which she would be playing along with.

In terms of vaginoplasty, there is a great deal of variance depending upon where the surgery is performed. You get what you pay for, and some of the best surgeons are actually in Thailand. However, surgery is very expensive, and with the worsening economy, most people have to suffer with what are basically hack jobs.

Then again, that's capitalism for you - if you do not have the capital, you get a hack job, whether it is a vaginoplasty or heart surgery.

 

[airrazor7]

In hindsight and at your prompting, yeah I think I was a bit assumptious of you.

I now have to ask what did you actually mean by "Pretty sad results on the poll, if not unexpected" with 50% of the poll results being "I am male and I would NOT date an MTF"?

No, you never said anything about a person's right to personal choice and I apologize if my post appeared to put words in your mouth (so to speak, or put words in your text/post?) since that was not my intention. However, the first part of your post can only lead a reader to think you a meant a few things by that, and

For all you knew at the time you wrote this, I was upset by what I viewed as limited options for answer, the gender lines upon which they were skewed or my own specific demographic being excluded.

doesn't quite fit unless you typed something along the lines of "Pretty sad options on the poll..." which you also did not type.

So, what was the actual meaning behind that first line in your post?

Also, I noticed your avatar pic is of Poison. Are you a Street Fighter fan? If so and if you have Street Fighter 4, we should play online sometime.

 

[artanis_neravar]

But I'm not intolerant of MtF or FtM. If you had been paying attention, you'd see that actually MtF is the one I'd consider dating, although I wasn't sure I could get around the appearance of their genitals.

So, let me get this perfectly clear. You would be willing to date a Male to Female transsexual, and support them, but in your head, you would still consider them a man?!

You do realise the very contradictory nature of that statement, right?

What they are saying is that, from the post op photos they have seen, the newly reconstructed genitals, do not look natural, and that is what she might not be able to get past.

Previously, Miss Kendarik had asserted that she would always consider transsexuals as belonging to their birth sex, and that Gender Dysphoria is just a mental illness which she would be playing along with.

In terms of vaginoplasty, there is a great deal of variance depending upon where the surgery is performed. You get what you pay for, and some of the best surgeons are actually in Thailand. However, surgery is very expensive, and with the worsening economy, most people have to suffer with what are basically hack jobs.

Then again, that's capitalism for you - if you do not have the capital, you get a hack job, whether it is a vaginoplasty or heart surgery.

Oh, I'm not trying to argue with you, I'm just clarifying what I saw from another post of hers (at least I think it was her)

 

[Use_Imagination_here]

I don't know. I mean mentally I'm 90% sure it wouldn't bother me, but sexually I just don't know.

This threads getting pretty emotionally charged. I for one suggest that with issues as complex as these you should argue your opinion with yourself as much as you argue with others (preferably in that order). Questions like "is a woman a man if she goes through sex change surgery" force you to ask much bigger questions that most people don't think enough about, so please do that before you start yelling at eachother.

 

[Da_Vane]

OK... Same question to you as everyone else.

Define what it means to male or female.

Given a pair of animals in a species that reproduces through sexual means, the female is the one that gives birth to the young (or eggs) and the male is the one that doesn't.

OK, so maybe that definition is a bit reliant on function - children are still male or female after all, even though they haven't reached the age where they can reproduce. In that case, we can look for indicators of sex in a person's physical features (such as their genitals) an also their chromosomes.

why is president Obama not considered white?

Because he lives in a white-majority country so his dark skin gives him "black" minority status. Had he been brought up in Nigeria, people would probably have referred to him as notably light-skinned.

Now, see, here is where the logic breaks down.

Your definition of male and female are more or less the most fundamental ones.

But the extension to it is indicative of all the associated problems.

Since you admit there are people classified as male or female despite not meeting the functional basis that underlies this, you run into the question of which secondary features qualify you as one sex or the other.

Children are a good example of this, because it's actually incredibly difficult to determine a child's sex without doing something generally considered invasive.

They have no secondary sexual characteristics to speak of, so unless you're seeing them naked you have very little to go on.

If your definition is based on the act of reproduction alone...

You end up with 3 groups. Reproductively male. Reproductively female, and 'other'.

If it's based on other criteria, what is the basis for making one feature more meaningful than another?

Why is an invisible feature that you cannot trivially check for such as genetics, more significant than all the secondary and tertiary sexual characteristics put together?

If a person has breasts, a feminine figure, and dresses and acts in a manner we've deemed consistent with being female, you're using rather twisted reasoning if you're going to argue they're actually male instead.

Similarly, a surgically constructed vagina is not identical to a natural one, but it is still closer to being a vagina than it is to being a penis.

Arguing it's actually a penis is another one of those weird twists of logic that depends on a definition of what a penis or vagina is that makes little sense.

That's my problem with this altogether. People either don't have an answer at all, or forward something which just has no internal consistency to it, or is based on totally arbitrary criteria.

(And if the criteria are arbitrary, I might as well say that person is actually a toaster for all the rational validity the statement has...)

Pinning the definition of someone's identity on something which is for all intents and purposes invisible, and intangible seems incredibly bizarre to me.

Making it dependent on a feature that some people lack in it's entirety is fair enough insofar as that feature is the only reason the concept has any meaning to begin with...
But if you do that you have to be willing to accept the logical consequences of such a definition. Which people really don't seem willing to do.

Instead we seem to end up with definitions that say "If you have these qualities you are X", and then someone comes along and says "I have most of those qualities", only to be told that the only qualities that actually matter are the ones they don't have.
But if that were the case, why does the definition even include these other qualities they do have to begin with?
Furthermore, how can it then be argued that they are in fact something else, when they lack most of the qualities that define a person as such?

It seems to me to be a case that nobody actually knows what the definition should be, but if you ask them to think about it, the only answer you get is "Not you."

I think you'll find that is because most of what people are using isn't reason - it is rationalization. They already have their answers: They are just trying to prove that their answers are correct.

Identity is based on what makes us the same and what make us different, and basically, this all comes down to gender identity being defined as what makes us different. A woman is quite literally defined as "not a man" - you can go all the way back to Fruedian theories of Penis Envy, and the counter-arguments by Feminist writers which support the principle, but put women as opposed to men as the source of envy, citing abilities such as child-birth in texts like The Feminine Mystique.

When it comes down to transgender identity, however, both male and female identities are quite firmly taking the stance that transgender identities are "not us" and barring entry, leaving an identity that is out in the cold. For those that seek to become a unique gender identity, this is perfectly fine, but this is not fine for those fighting to be accepted as one gender or another within the traditional binary gender system.

We still exist in a heteronormative society, so the idea that someone is not of the opposite gender is still pretty important to us. However, we don't actually think about what they are. This is the major disjunct here - the idea that people perceive MtF transsexuals more strongly as not women than the fact that they perceive them as women because of their own selfish concerns is a major issue.

But then, maybe it's because the people concerned with this - who are apparently mostly men who are thinking with their penises anyway, are too busy looking for something to screw, and haven't stopped to ask whether MtF transsexuals are men. Heterosexual men don't care about men, they just want to screw women.

Personally, you'd have thought the idea of having sex with someone without having to worry about getting them pregnant would have been ideal for a lot of men. In fact, I am surprised that nobody has brought up the issue of hysterectomies yet - if a woman has an hysterectomy, are they no longer a woman? Because that's essentially what a MtF transsexual is - a woman with an hysterectomy.

To put it into context for all you guys out there. It's like have a vasectomy. The FtM surgery isn't really advanced enough to compensate for a penis, because that really will need a penis transplant, but in theory, what you are getting is a guy with a vasectomy. Are you really arguing that having a vasectomy means you are no longer a guy?

The poll isn't scientific enough, because it would be curious to find out the exact age demographic of the people who are polling. Because I wouldn't be surprised if the people are mostly young people who haven't got a damn clue about the world, and their virility is very much part of their gender identity.

That is why they are putting such stock in their ability to have sex and have children. They probably aren't old enough to actually got to the point to make real decisions about these things, let alone deal with the issues should they not be able to actually have children. Remember these arguments should that happen. Ask yourself - if you are firing blanks, are you less of a man? Because that's the fear, isn't it? Not being up it - not being man enough. That's what your principles are based on.

It doesn't have to be that way - but society makes it that way. Society guides conventions and how people behave, how people think and react. Society defines how we perceive things, and thus the meanings we give to them. It's called provocation. You see people based on how society has taught you to see them - but you still have some control over that. You can choose to let society influence you, or you can actually just be open and honest.

Society seeks to divide, to constrain, and oppress. Collective ignorance to blind the masses and prevent individuality and freedom to promote compliance. It is there to undermine your intelligence, to sap your will, and to crush your spirit. To sow disrespect and mistrust, so people turn against people, and never know the truth - to know that they still have the power to change things. To change themselves, their lives, and to help change others that want it, for the better. Society wants you broken, dispirited, undermined, going from one identity crisis to another, without ever understanding why. It encourages people to break the spirits of others for their own gain, by making them believe they are doing the right thing. In the end, everyone will just end up broken.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Snip

You can't compare genetics to the floor plan of a building. They are two completely different things, it's like trying to compare and apple to the theory of relativity. The most important aspects of all life are Genes, without genes, there are no offspring, and therefore, no life.


I'm sorry, but I have to disagree. Genes are, for all intents and purposes akin to a computer program, or set of plans, or something of that nature.

Life can theoretically exist without genes as we know it, but that's not the point. Genes don't define what something is. The instructions they contain have to be expressed properly.

In fact, ignoring life as such, comparing genes to a building plan is very relevant, because functionally that's a lot closer to what they are than anything else.

Genes are instructions on how to build a living thing!

Of course you wouldn't have children without them, because you wouldn't have any instructions available for how to create a new living thing.

If you change the instructions, you change what is created. But this process is far from perfect, and arguing that the genes prove what something is, despite obvious evidence to the contrary makes little sense.

Stating that a logical inference of what genes are on a functional level is not a valid comparison is like saying you can't compare a truck to a train.
You quite obviously can, if you know what the two have in common.
Implying it's an invalid comparison merely suggests you don't know much of anything about genetics.

The relative importance or non-importance of genes to the existence of life is a red herring when the comparison is based on a functional consideration of what a gene does.


A more proper comparison would be; I take a piece of coal and put it under extreme pressure, and suddenly it's a diamond. it looks different, it has a different worth, but guess what? It's still a lump of carbon.


Sorry to be so pedantic about meaning here, but this isn't a meaningful analogy.

Is diamond still carbon? Obviously. But it's not coal. Or graphite. Or carbon Monoxide.

You've turned coal into a diamond. The argument I was refuting is someone claiming that this diamond is not actually a diamond, because it used to be a lump of coal.

Aside from anything else, you've essentially reversed the logic involved.

A diamond is a diamond, regardless of what it used to be, or whether or not it can be claimed to be anything else.

As an analogy to the situation I was trying to describe however, it is completely meaningless, and doesn't address the issue in any way.


Now if you actually read anything else I wrote on here, you would notice that I pointed out transgender is just a qualifier people use, it defines them for better or for worse, it is part of their history and who they are.


No, I have not read the entirety of this thread, nor am I sure I could really effectively separate out who said what effectively given so much information.
Whether transgender is a qualifier or not though, the nature of people's arguments mostly has very little about if someone is transgender or not, but whether this qualifies them as being a 'real' man or woman or not.



Are they physically any less of the gender they have changed to?


You can't physically be a gender. That's a meaningless statement. Now I know someone implied that in effect gender and sex are interchangable terms, but if that were truly the case, they would be entirely redundant.

Clearly you meant are they physically any less of the sex they changed to, but I'll let that pass considering the way the terms are generally used.


That is debatable, it really depends on whether you define a physical female as someone with a vagina, someone with a womb, or someone with ovaries and the ability to become pregnant?


There are other possible definitions... Choosing just one single trait seems rather problematic at best.
But... Let's go with that for now.


Any of these physical definitions a transgender would not be considered female,


Debatable, depending on what you're referring to when you talk about 'transgender'. 'transgender' is an overly broad, and thus mostly meaningless label. A crossdresser is 'transgender', but so is someone who has had surgery and taken hormones.

You listed 3 definitions though. Of these, definitions 2 and 3 are (currently) not medically possible to create. (But they are in theory, based extrapolating current research).

Definition number 1, "Someone with a vagina." is very possible. But depends on what constitutes a vagina. (or in other words, how close is 'close enough' for purposes of saying whether someone has a vagina or not.)


but with these definitions neither would someone who had a hysterectomy, so obviously that definition doesn't apply.



Is a female anyone who fits the cultural norm, or ideas of a female?


By the technical definition of gender, this statement is 100% correct. Obviously, though, it is not if you go with the more common idea of assuming sex & gender are interchangeable concepts.


If that were true than any man who stays at home with the kids, or shows their emotional side would be female, so that definition doesn't fit.


That's not an entirely valid statement though. Since a lot of gender is behavioural, then you can't simply pick any arbitrary behaviour in isolation and say it makes the person a specific gender.

Is the man who stays at home with the kids, but wears masculine clothes, loves boxing and motor sports, and messing around with the engine in his car, of the male, or female gender?
What if he likes knitting? Or flower arranging?

Clearly this person shows contradictory gender traits. How can you possibly assign them a single, distinct gender based on taking any single such trait in isolation?
Any such answer would be a logical contradiction.
At best you would have to take everything as a whole and make an informed judgement as to which category is more appropriate overall.
Anything less would create nonsensical answers.



Is it someone with XX chromosomes, well that fits every female and excludes every male


No it doesn't. Not unless you redefine our existing systems for deciding which is which after the fact.

Historically, people with Complete Androgen Insensitivity syndrome were simply considered to be women who for some reason were infertile.

With the advent of genetics, we've since learned that these people have an XY chromosome. There are similar conditions affecting people that have XX chromosomes, as well as those with XXY and various other variations generally referred to as intersex conditions, none of which can easily be classified as one or the other.

Furthermore, Genetics is a very recent discovery, and the concept of male and female cannot possibly have been defined on this basis, since genetics are an entirely 'hidden' attribute, that cannot actually be determined about another person in any practical circumstance.

It isn't even common practice to test newborns genetically before assigning them their gender, which is what most people think of as being 'the sex you were born as'...



, so it is the only definition that works. Therefore the only definition that we can go by is genetic.


But the thing is, this definition doesn't work at all. Especially because the answers it gives are for all practical intents and purposes contradictory, and hold no real relationship with anything except at the most abstract of levels.

If you want to start a family, is it relevant that your wife has XX chromosomes? Or that she has a fully functioning womb and ovaries?

If you are a woman, and want to have sexual intercourse with a man, is it of any practical difference if they have a Y chromosome or not? Or is in fact the only actual issue on any practical level whether they have a penis, and if it functions properly?

Using genetics as an argument is very abstract, and rather out of touch with just about any practical concern you might have relating to another person.

That was the whole point of my building analogy. To show the absurdity of focusing on something abstract even though the practical immediate situation and it's consequences completely contradicts what this abstract idea would imply.


Does this make them any less of a person? no, it doesn't. It does however make the genetically male, and physically and socially transgender. Transgender people should be allowed to use the bathrooms, locker rooms, and changing rooms or what ever sex they have decided to become, and it is their choice, and they should be referred to by what ever pronoun they want to be referred by.

However, none of that changes the fact that they are still genetically the gender they were born as.

OK, misuse of the word gender aside, it's technically true they are probably genetically male.
But insisting on this as the over-riding definition is missing the forest for the trees.

Genes are for all intents and purposes intangible. Their effects are invisible except insofar as the living thing that results has certain traits.
If those traits match the genes, fine. But if they do not, arguing that the correct interpretation is that which the genes define, rather than that which you are in fact, directly confronted with...

In any event, singling out a single trait as the definitive answer of what someone is, is not really reflective rational thought.

I can't say X is a car because it has wheels...
Or it has wings, so it must be an airplane. (When in actual fact it's a bird.)

No trait taken in isolation can really define anything meaningful. Especially not when the trait in question is effectively invisible and has no direct practical effects in and of itself, but only through how that trait influences the development of other traits.

Furthermore, when you've got the definitions of two different things. (in this case male & female), and then run into something which is, based on those definitions a logical contradiction, you cannot arbitrarily force such a contradiction into an existing category.

Clearly you would need to create a new set of definitions, or a new set of categories to deal with this.
Either way, those new definitions have to have some innate validity to them, otherwise it just degenerates into 'my definition is better than yours'.

The alternative of course, is to acknowledge the imprecision, and accept that not everything fits neatly into one group or another.
You would then conclude, that, while neither category is an entirely accurate definition of the situation, one is closer to being accurate than the other.

How do you do this? Not by trying to reduce the definitions down to as little information as possible and declaring everything else irrelevant. Instead, you take all the factors into consideration, and take whatever's closest.

Or, to put it in a much simpler context, taking things at face value is much, much simpler than trying to deduce someone's genetics, or second-guessing all kinds of things about everyone you meet.

Yes, a transsexual is infertile. But that could apply to just about anyone else too, for any number of reasons.

Yes, with the transgender community as a whole there's all kinds of possibilities of meeting people that would cause anyone serious confusion.

But someone who is contradictory, is contradictory. Instead of trying to work out which of two groups they fit in (when quite clearly they don't really fit into either)... Well, anyway...

Genetics is not an answer with any practical meaning in day-to-day life. Critical to the survival of the sepcies? Sure. Fundamental to how life works? Absolutely.
Meaningful as an actual thing to concern yourself with for living, breathing person? Not in the slightest.
(Unless you are a doctor treating genetic defects. If you have a genetic defect, it's not your genes that you'll care about, but the practical day-to-day consequences of that defect. A genetic defect with no visible or practical effects might as well not exist.)

 

[artanis_neravar]

Quote Fail, sorry

 

[artanis_neravar]

snip

I'm tired, so I'm going to keep this short. You can change the floorplan of a building, you can not change your genes (at least not yet) all I have said (and I am sorry if I have been contradictory or confusing on what my point is) is that if you have XY chromosomes than you are genetically male, and if you have XX chromosomes than you are genetically female.

I am curious about your opinions of this analogy;
If a woman has surgery and makes herself a male, then if I have facial reconstruction surgery to make myself resemble Harrison Ford, change my last name to Ford, and start saying I'm his son, does that make me his son?

 

[jboking]

well, one, people call me angry...vicious cycle really

The only one who can make you angry is yourself.

two, i don't care what 'medical experts' say, if you were born one gender, you are stuck as that gender no matter what you do yo your self. I can darken my skin, but that doesn't make me a black guy does it?

Ah. So instead of listening to people who would actually know something on the issue, you choose to shove your head in the sand and fill your mouth with grit while attempting to yell, "NANANANANA I can't hear you!" While simultaneously making ridiculously false analogies. cool. cool. You are free to have your opinion, it's just a shame you base it on personal bias instead of researched information. Kind of a waste really.

three, if the person has both, thats a separate gender in my opinion...a gender that comes around via mutation but hey, they cant help it. I wont date them, and would be pissed they led me other wise.....but meh, we can be friends.

"Comes around via mutation." Fun fact: Men are mutated Women.

four, the LGBT threads are so abundant, im starting to get annoyed by them. We get it, you are not straight....stop. rubbing. it. in. my. face. damn. it. I respect your life style choice, now respect my choice of not being of that life style and not being a big fan of it. You exist. GOT IT!.

Who makes you go into these threads? Who makes you read them? Who is forcing you to observe their sexuality. Honestly, it's like overhearing someone talking about their sex life and then rushing up to them and telling them to shut up. I know you don't particularly like the topic, but that doesn't mean that everyone should simply stop talking about it. Example: I didn't care for the brony threads when they were prevalent here, as I'm not a fan of MLP. I didn't run into every brony thread and ***** about the brony threads, I just found (or made) other threads. Why not do that?

Side note: I went to the off-topic forum for you. There are far more non-sexuality based threads than there are sexuality threads. Just saying, man.

welp, time to fill up the sand bags for the shit storm im sure i just caused.

Eh, it's not the worst response I've ever seen.

 

[MartianWarMachine]

I am curious about your opinions of this analogy;
If a woman has surgery and makes herself a male, then if I have facial reconstruction surgery to make myself resemble Harrison Ford, change my last name to Ford, and start saying I'm his son, does that make me his son?

I told you before, only if he adopts you! x3

 

[drisky]

I ain't making cis a part of my vocabulary and I don't know a single person worth knowing who would. Their lingo is kinda dumb. I'm not using that shit.

Cis is only ever needed to be used when comparing the opposite, it is far more sensitive than saying the opposite of "Transgender" is "Normal" or "Real". It is the same as saying heterosexual and homosexual. It is not common use because transgender people aren't as common as homosexual or bisexual. My question to you is why do you care, if people who use cis aren't "worth knowing", why is it worth your time to keep coming back here to complain?

On a related note I'm not making "ain't" a part of my vocabulary and I don't know a single person worth knowing who would.

 

[artanis_neravar]

I am curious about your opinions of this analogy;
If a woman has surgery and makes herself a male, then if I have facial reconstruction surgery to make myself resemble Harrison Ford, change my last name to Ford, and start saying I'm his son, does that make me his son?

I told you before, only if he adopts you! x3

Yeah, but everyone else ignored me and I wanted to know if it was because they didn't have an answer, didn't think it needed one, or just didn't see it.

 

[artanis_neravar]

I ain't making cis a part of my vocabulary and I don't know a single person worth knowing who would. Their lingo is kinda dumb. I'm not using that shit.

Cis is only ever needed to be used when comparing the opposite, it is far more sensitive than saying the opposite of "Transgender" is "Normal" or "Real". It is the same as saying heterosexual and homosexual. It is not common use because transgender people aren't as common as homosexual or bisexual. My question to you is why do you care, if people who use cis aren't "worth knowing", why is it worth your time to keep coming back here to complain?

On a related note I'm not making "ain't" a part of my vocabulary and I don't know a single person worth knowing who would.

What if I always assumed there was no opposite of transgender, other than not-transgender. I had someone tell me they were transgender my response was "cool, I'm not"

 

[CrystalShadow]

I'm tired, so I'm going to keep this short. You can change the floorplan of a building, you can not change your genes (at least not yet) all I have said (and I am sorry if I have been contradictory or confusing on what my point is) is that if you have XY chromosomes than you are genetically male, and if you have XX chromosomes than you are genetically female.

Notice how you're now insterting a qualifier in your statement? 'genetically' male, or female. Yes, if you include that qualifier obviously the statement is valid. But it's not very meaningful, and it's open to abuse precisely because it lack any practical meaning.

That aside, you can change genes. A lot of research on this matter has been done. You just can't do it safely or reliably enough to use it on living humans.

And yes, you can change the plans to a building. But changing the plans and changing the building are unrelated acts.
Changing the plans doesn't magically cause the building to change to match.
My point was that if you change the building, but don't change the plans, it would be incredibly silly to argue that the plans are correct, but the building is wrong. (Which is how arguments about your genetic sex are almost always used.)


I am curious about your opinions of this analogy;
If a woman has surgery and makes herself a male, then if I have facial reconstruction surgery to make myself resemble Harrison Ford, change my last name to Ford, and start saying I'm his son, does that make me his son?[/quote]

No. It would not. It would make you a person with the last name Ford, that bears a physical resemblance to Harrison Ford.

The problem is you're mixing up definitions again by posing this question.

It's a bit like asking, "If I have an identical twin, are we the same person?".
Genetically speaking, you would be, but obviously, based on the actual definition of what makes two people different, independent beings, it should be obvious that two people can't both be the same person.

OK, though. I'll try not to get overly distracted.

What is the definition of being someone's son? (Aside from implying you are male, that is.)

Does it have anything to do with what you look like? Or what your last name is? Or even your genetics?

In actual fact, it isn't really based on any of these things.

I have a step-brother. OK, so yes, there's a qualifier here. But the point is, this is my brother, and we are in no way genetically related at all.
So why is he my brother?

Because his mother married my father.

Similarly, if you wanted to be Harrison Ford's son, you could do so by having him legally adopt you.

Point is, will changing your name and having surgery make you someone's son?
No, because no part of any definition of being someone's son involves any requirements of sharing the same last name, or having any physical resemblance to them.

Now, yes, there are those that might say if you're not genetically related to someone then you aren't their son.

But in practice, the definition of being someone's son, is either that they are biologically related to you. (I'm not sure if this definition holds up for things such as cloning, but that's theoretical for now anyway. There's also problems surrounding such things as a surrogate mother, or a sperm donor...)
Or, that they were or are legally responsible for you.

It's a little more complicated than that, but no part of any definition of being someone's son even theoretically involves having the same name, and similar appearance as a prerequisite.

At least some definitions of male & female depend on your physical traits, or even your behaviour. (Whether those definitions are correct is another matter, but they do exist.)

You can argue about which definitions for anything are actually correct, but you do have to consider whether any hypothetical case you're making even bears any resemblance to the definitions involved.

There's a pretty big gulf between saying This table is actually a chair, and saying this is a table built by Bob. (When in fact it was built by Fred.) - The first is within the realms of possibility. The second is not.
Of course, This chair was built by Bob (using a table built by Fred) is a perfectly valid statement...

Anyway, I see I've gone on about this for far longer than I should have already. Hopefully you can see what I'm getting at.
You basically have to ask yourself how something is defined as being what it is, before you can meaningfully say if, (and how), you can change it. You chose an example where the changes being made held no relation to the definition of what you were trying to change.

 

[drisky]

I ain't making cis a part of my vocabulary and I don't know a single person worth knowing who would. Their lingo is kinda dumb. I'm not using that shit.

Cis is only ever needed to be used when comparing the opposite, it is far more sensitive than saying the opposite of "Transgender" is "Normal" or "Real". It is the same as saying heterosexual and homosexual. It is not common use because transgender people aren't as common as homosexual or bisexual. My question to you is why do you care, if people who use cis aren't "worth knowing", why is it worth your time to keep coming back here to complain?

On a related note I'm not making "ain't" a part of my vocabulary and I don't know a single person worth knowing who would.

What if I always assumed there was no opposite of transgender, other than not-transgender. I had someone tell me they were transgender my response was "cool, I'm not"

I'm fine with that. Cisgendered is commonly only used when transgender is the actual topic, especially on a scientific or medical journal. In that sense its more professional to use cisgender. Still I don't expect it to be a common use term. Hell spell check will not even recognize it.

 

[Batou667]

Now, see, here is where the logic breaks down.

The damn forum ate my post. Karma? Anyway, Take 2.

I concede that sex is difficult to define, without using some very precise medical terminology (although I think most people have quite a secure "gut feeling" of what male and female usually mean).

I also acknowledge that very occasionally people are born who are hermaphrodites, or who have other hormonal or chromosomal imbalances or abnormalities.

But I think that these two facts constitute a very flimsy precedent for declaring sex to be a spectrum rather than a binary state, and furthermore to take this as positive encouragement to switch from one physical sex to the other as a matter of personal choice. To my mind it just fundamentally does not work this way.

*shrug*

 

[CrystalShadow]

Now, see, here is where the logic breaks down.

The damn forum ate my post. Karma? Anyway, Take 2.

I concede that sex is difficult to define, without using some very precise medical terminology (although I think most people have quite a secure "gut feeling" of what male and female usually mean).

I also acknowledge that very occasionally people are born who are hermaphrodites, or who have other hormonal or chromosomal imbalances or abnormalities.

But I think that these two facts constitute a very flimsy precedent for declaring sex to be a spectrum rather than a binary state, and furthermore to take this as positive encouragement to switch from one physical sex to the other as a matter of personal choice. To my mind it just fundamentally does not work this way.

*shrug*

Ah, but declaring sex to be a binary state, where the definition is effectively a logical contradiction is quite useless.

My primary point is to get a clear, objective definition that is not in fact circular, and doesn't pretend fringe cases such as intersex conditions (however rare they may be), don't even exist.

Because if we let subjective opinions and 'gut feelings' determine this kind of question, what you end up with is a huge mess.

Case in point, to a transsexual their actual view on the matter usually isn't that they're changing their sex, but that they always were that sex to begin with, physical traits be damned.

If you take that perspective, a person's sex is incredibly nebulous and non-physical in nature.

Any such definition would create similar issues. If you can't take what you see at face value, then what can you actually base a decision on?

If something isn't what it appears to be, then what actually defines what it is in the first place?
(Yes, I know not everything is what it appears to be, but there usually still is some obvious reason why not, and some obvious reason for saying what it actually is.)

Anyway, I would argue that declaring sex to be a binary state in spite of evidence to the contrary is a rather flimsy argument overall.

Declaring sex to be immutable also seems completely nonsensical to me. I can't come up with any way that makes any sense.
Not without invoking the equivalent of 'magic', or 'the soul', or other equally unprovable and untestable statements.

Just like everyone else I have a strong predisposition to 'knowing' what sex someone is intuitively. (And to assuming it's a binary thing).
The difference is, I know with considerable certainty that this intuitive sense of a person's sex is based on very superficial traits.
There's nothing mystical about it. If a person has certain physical and behavioural traits, the mind will tend to interpret this as implying they are of a given sex that matches those traits.

But none of those qualities actually reflect any real 'truth' about another person. The judgement is superficial, so by extension so is the most obvious definition.

"What you see is what you get." is mostly true as far as I'm concerned. If you don't like what you see, fair enough.
But that's quite different from liking it until you find out some detail that doesn't really mean anything.

You quite clearly thought one thing before.
If it were a trick that would be something you could work out for yourself.
If the only way you can know about it is me telling you, then I seriously have to question your belief system.

 

[twohundredpercent]

My question to you is why do you care, if people who use cis aren't "worth knowing", why is it worth your time to keep coming back here to complain?

Pfff I only complained like twice.

 

[Android2137]

No. I'd be too confused to be an effective date.

 

[Guardian of Nekops]

From what I've heard, the science really isn't there yet. Shifting the nerve endings to where they ought to be so the person feels the way they want to feel, lubrication issues and associated tearing, etc... we just can't do an effective gender switch yet, which is unfortunate.

Whether the proceedures, as they are, are good enough to satisfy those people who need them probably varies from case to case, but I think it's clear that we have a long way to go. While I don't expect we'll be able to make transgender people fertile any time soon, we should at least be able to manage the mechanics of sex (that being a large part of the point, after all). Then again, we didn't learn how to do heart surgery well by waiting until we had it all figured out, so...

If all that was required was a bottle of lube and if she could still experience sexual pleasure, even if it took a bit more work or creativity on my part? Sure I'd date a MtF. Medical bills are another issue entirely, though it doesn't automatically represent more luggage than other people bring into a relationship.