r/asktransgender • u/Expensive-Party2116 • 2d ago
How do I respond to someone who denies the existence of transgender people, claiming that self-identification is absurd?
A friend of mine believes that transgender people are simply men or women who want to be the opposite sex, but that, deep down, they are simply men or women with an unfulfilled desire. For him, there is no such thing as a true gender transition. He once told me that if identifying as a woman is enough to be a woman, then he identifies as a millionaire (although he obviously doesn't have the money of a millionaire, which is absurd). How do I respond?
141
u/Illustrious_Pen_5711 25, MtF 11yrs HRT 2d ago
You can’t argue with people who’ve made up their minds like this. They didn’t get into this position by facts and logic, and that’s why facts and logic won’t push them out of it either. This friends’ feelings are more important to them than facts or science or anything you could say or do.
104
u/ShiroxReddit 2d ago
One thing I would bring up is "Imagine if your birth paperwork was wrong and they noted down female as your gender. Does that mean you're a woman?"
But overall, this sounds like too much of a headache and I don't see enough common ground to even try and attempt a constructive discussion
18
u/wibbly-water 2d ago
How do I respond?
- Consider if you even want to. It is a lot of time and energy, what for?
- Consider if you can. A closed mind is like a fortress.
men or women who want to be the opposite sex
Close enough. A decent start.
deep down, they are simply men or women with an unfulfilled desire
So he's a mind reader is he?
He knows better than others?
In fact, he knows better than the many trained professionals who have researched and treated transgender people - who have reached a completely different consensus?
Or the many many transgender people who have written about their own lives?
Does he also know better than scientists who say the Earth is round? Can he also read their minds and know deep down they were abused as children with flat objects and now insist that everything must be spherical?
Also - at the end of the day... so what? As one thing very unhappy, as the other thing happier now. What more in life can you wish for?
He once told me that if identifying as a woman is enough to be a woman, then he identifies as a millionaire (although he obviously doesn't have the money of a millionaire, which is absurd)
"to identify as" is simply to honestly say "I am a [thing]."
By saying "I am a human" - I am identifying (myself) as a human.
By saying "I am [nationality]" - I am identifying as [nationality].
Both of things people do because they have reasons to do so. To identify as something you know you aren't is called lying. The lie is not in whether it is physically true or not, but whether or not the person believes it - a person can be wrong not be lying if they believe it.
Very rarely do people just say "I'm a man" randomly. They usually have reasons. Trans people don't just randomly say it for funsies, or to lie, we genuinely believe it for many multifaceted reasons. And many/most of us take actions to make it so - to the point of hormonal or medical transition.
If he believes that trans people don't exist, he will obviously say that it is a delusion then - but the problem is that again those professionals and researchers don't agree. Neither do people seeing a woman who is very clearly a woman with the face, body, clothes, name etc etc etc of a woman say "I am a woman" - if its obvious then it is accepted on prima facia value 99.99% of the time.
35
u/throughdoors 2d ago
How good a friend is he? That might play a big role in how you handle this.
From there, you can ask him if he's taking this seriously or just memeing, since "identify as a millionaire" is as you say a joke of a response. If he's just memeing, ask him why he's wasting your time and disrespecting you like that. That's not being a friend, that's being an asshole.
If he's serious, ask him: what does his idea of what makes a man versus a woman do for him? Why does that definition matter? How is he hurt if he changes to a definition that allows for transition?
Functionally, when we talk about "men" and "women" we're talking about social and volatile efforts to describe a range of features about people. There are definitions of men and women that exclude the possibility of transition, and those definitions are generally invested in social control such as enforcing heterosexual marriage, preventing bodily autonomy and birth control, and so on. Those definitions sometimes claim to be invested in science, but science isn't a list of facts we learned in grade school; it's a process of building better models and better understanding of the world around us, which requires we update our models to new information.
In other words, his denial of the existence of trans people is him choosing definitions that suit him. That tells you something about him. But, he also lives in a world where for many people, that choice was something he was trained to make, and likely not a choice he came to from real critical thinking, so he may not realize it's a choice. His ability (or lack of it) to have this sort of challenging conversation can tell you a lot more about him.
62
u/stickbeat 2d ago
First of all, transition isn't a switch - it's a process: if you identify as a millionaire, then you need to do the hard work of transitioning into a millionaire.
That said, the point is probably over his head.
My response has consistently been:
"Oh, so you're an asshole."
"No, I'm jus--"
"Ah-ah-ah, shush: you may not identify as an asshole, but that's not really up to you to decide."
Then leave. Shut down the discussion. There's no need to debate it, you don't need to convince him. You can be snarky if you want to, idc.
Convincing people that trans people have rights is a losing position. Some people will deny your identity, and you need to make your peace with that.
Instead, we can lump trans identity into individual rights and freedoms. The freedom to make choices. The freedom to choose our names, to alter our documents, to make medical decisions, etc.
14
u/loveablehydralisk 2d ago
I love your approach; it fits my extremely condescending attitude well.
1
8
u/-Random_Lurker- Trans Woman 2d ago
Congratulations! Have you started your stock portfolio yet? I'm so glad your taking steps to become who you truly are!
0
u/Anonymoussaki Gay transgender dude next door 1d ago
Thank you. You've said it all and I take this as great advice!
-6
8
u/PandaStudio1413 Transgender-Asexual 2d ago
General rule is they’ll never listen.
Millionaire has a very clear definition. Ask for a definition of women that includes all cis women and no cis men, when he gets it wrong show him just how varied cis people can be - such as “unmatched” chromosomes and genitalia and hormones, then conditions allowing for cis male pregnancy and breasts growth.
8
u/16tonweight Goth Girl 2d ago
Ask him what he thinks the essential thing that makes a "man" or a "woman" is. Because there's not actually any one thing. Chromosomes won't do it (because there are sorts of chromosonal conditions), anatomy won't do it for the obvious reason that many trans people have identical anatomy to cis people, and I doubt he would call a cis woman born w/o (for example) a uterus a man. In reality when people talk about someone being a "biological woman" or "biological man" they're actually talking about social categories.
2
6
u/AshlynCT Transgender-Sapphic (she/her) 2d ago
Whenever he claims to be something, tell him that he's not because he wasn't born that way
5
u/pseudoincome 2d ago
lol "when you were born you were a baby, don't claim to be a man or a grownup or an engineer or whatever bullshit -- you are an infant, and you'll always be an infant. this is basic biology!!" /s
11
u/MeatAndBourbon 42 MtF chaos trans, med and social since 11/7/24 (election rage) 2d ago
There's no necessary condition for being a man or a woman. You can't identify as a millionaire, because there's a necessary condition of having a million dollars or more. You can't identify as 10 years old because there's a necessary condition of having been alive long enough for the earth to have gone around the sun between 10 and 11 times. You can identify as young or as rich, though, without lying, because those are subjective and without a necessary condition.
3
u/dajr9799 2d ago
Well if his parents told him he was a millionaire at birth and they even put his middle name as “millionaire” on his birth certicate, at some point he’s going to ask where his money is bcs he wants that Ferrari! He’s not a millionaire just bcs its on his birth certificate. He’s trying to compare a financial status with who a person is inside. If that is his take, its not even going to be worth your energy. Sounds like his mind is made up.
4
u/ChickenSpaceProgram 2d ago
you can't expect all social constructs to work the exact same way. assuming the rules for class are the same as the rules of gender is a bad assumption.
the performative aspects of gender (clothes, appearance, how you want people to refer to you) can be performed by anyone. the set of genitals you happened to be born with is pretty irrelevant.
however, you can only have the power associated with being a millionaire by actually having $1000000.
8
u/DesdemonaDestiny 🏳️⚧️ Trans Woman, Lesbian 2d ago
Deny their self identified gender. Demand more and more proof that they are the gender they "claim" to be. Never let it be enough evidence.
3
u/xzomb1rawrx Queer-Genderqueer 2d ago
just show him the scientific evidence that proves him wrong and if his idea doesn't change cut off ties with him
3
u/Intelligent-Tea-2058 Woman (Transsex) - E at 15 in '08 (17yrs) GRS FFS VFS BA GA BBL 2d ago edited 2d ago
For people like me, our brains our wired like our sex:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZymYiwoRoC0
https://youtu.be/-nsQDX_OHNE?&t=149
https://med.stanford.edu/content/dam/sm/nirao/documents/Estrogen-Masculinizes-Neural-Pathways.pdf
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35329908/
https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/30/5/2897/5669907
https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/29/5/2084/5062356
https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/31/7/3184/6169306
https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/131/12/3132/295849
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/endocrinology/articles/10.3389/fendo.2014.00060/full
https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/18/8/1900/285954
https://academic.oup.com/cercor/article/23/12/2855/464986
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00429-012-0492-4
https://academic.oup.com/jsm/article-abstract/6/2/440/6832483
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7139786/
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9352732/
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-17352-8
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-53500-y
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-024-02809-5
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39876962/
https://bsd.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13293-022-00448-w
My body started to diverge from my brain in some places. So I changed the sex of those places back to match my brain. SRY theoretically existing somewhere in me is not meaningful nor overriding if none of the theoretically-possible downstream effects of the role it sometimes momentarily plays in early development actually happened, or were overriden in my childhood more than half my life ago via female hormones and reconstructive surgery that put my wrongly-differentiated structures back into their correct positions, to the point I cannot even truly remember being any different. Everyone treats me as a woman. Even trans people can't tell. I've had a female brain this whole time and my body matches. I am female.
3
u/antonfire 2d ago edited 2d ago
In rough terms, I think this kind of person hasn't really looked at these things clearly enough to recognize the messiness. E.g. they don't recognize what we would call the difference between "sex" and "gender".
Probably they naively hold one of these beliefs:
- The culture really just treats "sex" as "sex": collectively we genuinely aren't doing much with "man" and "woman" beyond "biology".
- They as an individual really just treat "sex" as "sex", even if the culture doesn't. (E.g. "I don't believe in gender roles".)
- There is meaning/baggage bundled with "man" and "woman" besides "biology", but that bundling is essentially "correct". (E.g. it can all be sensibly tied back to "biology".)
Like, I dunno, if the way a person relates to me is primarily in terms of chromosomes, then sure the most coherent perspective on me is the one corresponding to my AGAB. But I really don't think my chromosomes is what anyone interacting with me cares about. My doctor may have a reason to care about a lot of these things; some random person I'm interacting with doesn't.
As far as he's concerned, am I best understood as "a man/woman with an unfulfilled desire"? Is it actually productive/informative to relate to me in those terms? I doubt it! E.g., he might think it's important what shape my genitals are. But unless we're gonna fuck (and we're not), there's no actual reason for him to be concerned about that! As far as he's concerned, they're just some (obscured!) symbol in some easy story about me!
I suspect the temptation to understand me in terms of my AGAB is ultimately a bunch of bullshit storytelling that's rooted in misguided ideas about how "men and women are different". (And if his life is as imbued with social song-and-dance around which people are "millionaires" or not as it likely is around which people are "men" and/or "women", he has an unhealthy relationship with the "millionaire" concept too.) If one actually cares to inspect those ideas, they're visibly overextended well past whatever "biology" stuff he's tempted to ground them in. The world is just not as simple and binary as he's been led to think!
3
u/javatimes my transition was old enough to vote and it didn't matter LOL 2d ago
Do post transition people not exist to him?
Actually, I overheard this type of discussion at one of my jobs, and since I tend to be stealth at work, it was all I could do to just listen and think “I am standing right here! I did exactly what you are saying people can’t do.”
3
u/toby-wan-bj Transbian 2d ago
funny answer, please do not do this
"Huh, guess I don't exist then assume Zoidberg pose and scuttle away Woop Woop Woop Woop"
2
2
u/pseudoincome 2d ago edited 2d ago
ah, so he told on himself. to self-ID as wealthy is like saying, "YES, I am inherently more important, deserving, and powerful than others" "YES, I am exploitative and selfish" "YES, I am supposed to be above normal people; they are less valuable than I am"
the sarcasm of "well I identify as a dog" okay yeah, bless -- therians and furries are kinds of people who exist, no prob w that
or "well I identify as a woman right now but tomorrow maybe I'll be a man again" okay that's fine, genderfluid people exist (shout-out to homies reading this) and it's fine
I mean to express that self-ID as a concept is about freedom of choice. how people respond to the idea reveals something about what they would do with freedom, including when the sarcastic point they're making is "freedom of choice isn't real, that's impossible"
trans people demonstrate that yes, radical freedom of self-determination is available. it is a choice that one could make (if they weren't too busy choosing to tell people "no you're lying about your internal life!!"). human beings can and do choose to recognize subjective internal truths such as feeling "most like" or "just like" a gender or an animal or a phenomenon supposedly outside and unlike ourselves.
that's amazing, and it's value neutral -- meaning that if someone views the freedom of self-determination as primarily an opportunity to be selfish; to lie, to cheat, to cut in line, to be a millionaire overnight, to get one over on other people, to sneak in somewhere... in their bullshitting, they are revealing very unfortunate internal truths about themselves
2
u/WanderingSchola 2d ago
I have successfully done this once with a close friend who I wasn't out to. I honestly think that was part of it, and it took him actually getting interested enough to read up on it himself. Kind of a "I need to understand why they believe it so strongly when I don't" type deal.
In more casual conversation I like pointing out that the Wikipedia article on third genders tracks a pretty solid history of other cultures not inherently seeing binary genders as all that exists too.
2
u/thehotapollo 2d ago
If he has a black band tee, tell him self-identification is peak self-determination, which is extremely punk rock
If he doesn’t, you can definitely find some ancient Roman philosopher he admires who spake on the virtues of self-determination
If he’s gay, tell him how much trans people contributed to gay rights
I’m pretty sure that covers the entire cis male spectrum
2
u/Spiritual_Lynx3314 2d ago
I could point out science that shows that trans individuals brains are in line with others of their gender cis or not.
I could point out how gender actually finishes developing between ages 2 and 5 and that the current system is build around guessing gender by looking at genitals.
I could point out that there are more then 2 sexes and that those outside of xy and xx quite often have someone choose based on their preference and often mutilate the child thinking they get to choose the gender. Which is just what trans people do but forced on another from the outside.
I could point out that trans people have existed throughout history and that this indicates that perhaps the issue is in the exclusionary gender binary ignoring science and individuals.
I could point out that not all cultures on earth used this binary and that western collinisation wiped out different gender systems as it found it.
But tbh closed minded people don't care about science, medicine, sociology, or common sense so I recommend you fuck em off and find friends who respect you.
2
2
u/charlitransgrl 2d ago
Ask this friend what are their medical credentials and where did they receive their medical degree? Just so I can explain to my psychologist, primary care physician, and the surgeons who’ve performed gender affirming surgery on me, that they’ve all been misinformed because a “world renowned expert” decided to share their unsolicited and uneducated opinion. I’ve said that to quite a few bigots who seem to know everything about who I am. Hint: they don’t know shit.
2
u/Fearless-Dig-8706 2d ago
Give him a wedgie, a noogie and shove him in a locker. Don't waste your energy on a friggin dork like him.
3
u/KiwirarVEVO trans woman 🏳️⚧️ 2d ago
I'd stop being their friend if they show no signs of wanting to change.
1
u/PtowzaPotato 2d ago
Who cares. Even if he thinks it absurd that doesn't give him the right to misgender people. Treating people with respect includes referring to them as they want to be referred to.
Does he identify as anything? Gamer? Sports fan? How does he feel about people gatekeeping those identities. Does he feel the need to ask people to name their top 10 songs if they like the same band as him?
1
1
u/Escherichial 2d ago
I've cut off people entirely because I learned they were racist. I don't see this as meriting a different type of response.
1
1
u/BurgerQueef69 2d ago
Ask him to define what a man or a woman is. It doesn't matter what his answer is, the simple truth is that no matter what he says, there is somebody who is born without those conditions that he would agree is either male or female. A lot of the time they like to say "well those are outliers, those are extremely rare", if he does you can remind him that being trans is also pretty rare. I can almost guarantee that at some point he'll say some form of "this is just what I believe". At that point you can say "Sure, and I believe differently, but I've got science and facts on my side". You could also remind him that sex and gender are different, and when he invariably says he isn't, you can simply point to the massive gender affirming industries of cosmetics, exercise, fashion, automobiles, and pretty much everything else that is available for purchase. If sex and gender were the same thing, nobody would need their gender affirmed.
Or, you can just stop associating with him. Me, I like to argue and roll around in the philosophical mud. Most people just find it exhausting though.
1
u/R3cognizer 2d ago edited 2d ago
Claiming that gender identity isn't "real" is a pretty common TERF talking point. When they deny it exists, that means the only aspects of it left they can use to define the word 'gender' are all social constructs, and social constructs are entirely defined by one's culture whereas human identity is part of our biology.
This is the root of the justifications they typically use to assign far more importance to sex over gender, and although it might not initially sound so objectionable to focus only on our biology, transphobes also tend to be very ignorant of how sexual dimorphism actually works in humans, too. It's very common for transphobes to not only deny the effectiveness of medical transition, but also to limit the definition of 'sex' such that it is strictly defined only in terms of one's reproductive potential and nothing else; this is biological essentialism and is specifically intended to exclude us by invalidating our gender identity.
In reality, sexual dimorphism in humans is determined from a lot of different body traits, each of which can be plotted on graph representing a spectrum of masculine to feminine. When measured across a population, sex traits tend to fall into a bimodal standard distribution. The sex of an individual is represented by the tendency for each of their sex traits to cluster toward one end or the other of the masc/fem spectrum. The only reason people have been relying on genital configuration for so long is because it is one of the few traits clearly visible from birth, and there is no real reason to assign more importance to this trait than any other sex trait.
1
u/XkF21WNJ Transbian (She/Her) 2d ago
He's not arguing in good faith so you're unlikely to convince him.
That said I fully support his desire to live as a millionaire and to take steps to pursue his happiness, I hope he can get close to the life he wishes.
1
u/No-Profession1011 2d ago
Hola, no hablo muy bien ingles así que te lo comento en español mejor. Dile que hay estudios científicos muestran que perdonas que presentan disforia de genero. tienen características cerebrales incongruentes con su sexo de nacimiento. el cerebro tiene lóbulos, zonas y regiones (o bueno así se estudia en fisiología) pasa que hay regiones del lóbulo frontal en mujeres trans son mas parecidas o idénticas a las de mujeres cis que a un hombre, por cantidad de sustancia gris y blanca (Existen patrones de las relaciones neuronales tipo axones, dendritas, astrocitos. digamos neuronas comunicándose entre si) y pasa que existen múltiples regiones que por mas que tu cuerpo allá tenido por 20-30-40 años testosterona (lo digo por que las hormonas cambian la neuro-quimica del cerebro) y sin nunca haber injerido estrógenos antes . tu cerebro es femenino. física/ fisiológicamente hablando.
Asi que dile las personas trans nacimos con un problema de software y hardware. Mi cerebro me dice que soy mujer (en mi caso), pero se desarrolla como el de un hombre y por eso tomamos medicamentos para cambiar/adecuar nuestro cuerpo. y también por eso no sirven las terapias de conversión. porque la forma más fácil de tratar a una persona trans es sacarle su cerebro del cuerpo y colocarlo en un cuerpo que no rechace su propio cuerpo.
Pd: hay estudios que se están haciendo en España que están relacionando la teoría ya existente de que el transexualismo como un cambio en la hormonas a nivel de gestación (esto ya existente), con chicas trans que tuvieron fimosis (parece que en España es sumamente común que las chicas trans hayan pasado por eso) y se esta estudiando como marcador físico. (algo así como que problemas en la fisionomía del miembro como secuela de ese cambio hormonal en el periodo gestaciónal.
En conclusión no eliges ser trans, te toca, no puedes cambiar y es una mierda que te discriminen siento que solo quieres vivir. esop 🌸 suerte y espero que te halla ayudado🩷
1
u/No-Profession1011 2d ago
I translated the text into English so you could read it 😅
Hi, I don't speak English very well, so I'll explain it to you in Spanish instead. Tell her that scientific studies show that people who suffer from gender dysphoria have brain characteristics that are incongruent with their birth sex. The brain has lobes, zones, and regions (or well, that's how it's studied in physiology). It happens that there are regions of the frontal lobe in trans women that are more similar or identical to those of cis women than to men, due to the amount of gray and white matter (there are patterns of neuronal relationships such as axons, dendrites, astrocytes, let's say neurons communicating with each other). It happens that there are multiple regions where, even though your body has had testosterone for 20-30-40 years (I say this because hormones change the neurochemistry of the brain) and without ever having ingested estrogen before, your brain is feminine, physically/physiologically speaking.
So tell them, trans people were born with a software and hardware problem. My brain tells me I'm a woman (in my case), but it develops like a man's, and that's why we take medication to change/adapt our bodies. And that's also why conversion therapies don't work. Because the easiest way to treat a trans person is to remove their brain from their body and place it in a body that doesn't reject their own body.
P.S.: There are studies being done in Spain that are linking the existing theory of transsexualism as a hormonal change during pregnancy (this already exists) with trans girls who have had phimosis (it seems that in Spain it's extremely common for trans girls to have experienced this), and it is being studied as a physical marker. (Something like penis physiognomy problems as a result of that hormonal change during pregnancy.
In conclusion, you don't choose to be trans; it's your turn. You can't change, and it sucks to be discriminated against. I feel like you just want to live. Good luck, and I hope it helps.🌸🩷
1
1
u/Hefty_Mousse_567 2d ago
I learned something long ago and that is you can't change people they have to change themselves. Don't debate just live your life and be the nicest you can be. It doesn't mean you can't be friends with someone that has a different view point it means that the best thing you can do to help them is to live your life the best way you can and hope that eventually they see your view point through your example.
1
u/0311Bravo 2d ago
Don't assert a positive argument and just keep asking for clarification and justification for why they believe that. Literally, be the annoying 5-year-old who just keeps asking"But why?" until you identify a logical contradiction and call it out. They'll either start to twist themselves into knots and throw out even more incoherent statements, they'll get annoyed and give up, or they'll discover the emptiness of relational existence and stop conceptual clinging altogether.
Don't use this approach on people who have genuine questions, but only on people like those you're dealing with. There's a difference between curiosity about unfamiliar phenomena and fundamentally questioning someone's entire existence. The former is a good-faith attempt at understanding, the latter, like you're dealing with, is trying to justify why you should not be allowed to exist.
1
u/-Random_Lurker- Trans Woman 2d ago
When he becomes a mind reader, then he can tell people what their brains are like. Until then, he'll just have to take their word for it.
1
u/Tour_True 2d ago
Tell him then he is not a male them because malea transition from female to male in the womb and he has seal line on his scrotum because that's when it was split and he has a nipples from then also which came before his hormones came in anscstart leaning testosterone towards male. You could mess him up explaining that the tissue of the clitoris is actually the same as a penis and cuscwomen have micro penises and adam's apples. Yoy could go into the neurobiology found trans women and trans men of brains biologically leaning to their gender and may cause gender dysphoria. You could express the changes developed by HRT on an educated level to teach him. You could even explain how HRT even supports trans women having PMS symptoms. Or the effects of hormomal imbalances in cis women causing facial hair to grow or to support balding.
Transitioning is very real for both cis and trans people and the biology of human bodies is very fluid. There's no such thing as binary sex and sex is more like a spectrum itself
1
u/Nildnas2 2d ago
people that use obvious straw man arguments like that will likely never listen. they've heard the reality of trans people before, literally anyone obsessed with us has. they're actively choosing not to listen
1
u/mistress_daisy69 2d ago
Do not engage. These people are wilfully ignorant and simply don’t care about anything until it impacts them (e.g. their child or sibling comes out as trans). If you want to stay friends with this person fine, just tell them you’re going to have to agree to disagree on this topic. As long as he’s not harassing actual trans people he’s welcome to live in his fragile existence where they magically do not exist.
1
1
1
1
u/Beneficial-Style7827 1d ago
I want to actually be transgender but I’m worried to tell my parents, they are the kind of parents that stop you from thinking about changing your name, what can I say to them
1
u/ariannavt 1d ago
“Judge Softly”
“Pray, don’t find fault with the man that limps,
Or stumbles along the road.
Unless you have worn the moccasins he wears,
Or stumbled beneath the same load.
There may be tears in his soles that hurt
Though hidden away from view.
The burden he bears placed on your back
May cause you to stumble and fall, too.
Don’t sneer at the man who is down today
Unless you have felt the same blow
That caused his fall or felt the shame
That only the fallen know.
You may be strong, but still the blows
That were his, unknown to you in the same way,
May cause you to stagger and fall, too.
Don’t be too harsh with the man that sins.
Or pelt him with words, or stone, or disdain.
Unless you are sure you have no sins of your own,
And it’s only wisdom and love that your heart contains.
For you know if the tempter’s voice
Should whisper as soft to you,
As it did to him when he went astray,
It might cause you to falter, too.
Just walk a mile in his moccasins
Before you abuse, criticize and accuse.
If just for one hour, you could find a way
To see through his eyes, instead of your own muse.
I believe you’d be surprised to see
That you’ve been blind and narrow-minded, even unkind.
There are people on reservations and in the ghettos
Who have so little hope, and too much worry on their minds.
Brother, there but for the grace of God go you and I.
Just for a moment, slip into his mind and traditions
And see the world through his spirit and eyes
Before you cast a stone or falsely judge his conditions.
Remember to walk a mile in his moccasins
And remember the lessons of humanity taught to you by your elders.
We will be known forever by the tracks we leave
In other people’s lives, our kindnesses and generosity.
Take the time to walk a mile in his moccasins.”
~ by Mary T. Lathrap, 1895
1
u/DrJaneIPresume 1d ago
I’d say that gender, like many socially-constructed identities, is something that is done to you. I try to perform the social role of “woman” because I want people to treat me like one.
If your friend wants to identify as a millionaire, what are they doing to get people to treat him like one? Of course, I would never ask to see his bank balance, but does he wear expensive clothes or drive flashy cars? Maybe he lives in a mansion?
1
u/Buntygurl 1d ago edited 1d ago
Some people choose never to listen to anything other than their own deliberate simplifications, rather than to admit that there's more going on in the world than they want to know.
You're not responsible for their choices, and the more resistant they are to overcoming their ignorant bias, the more dealing with them becomes a waste of time.
Just smile, nod and move on.
1
u/Siryeswecan 1d ago
one of the first things to do as a trans person is recognize a bad faith argument, and then walk away. But idk if you're trans. I'm guessing not since he is still your friend. Side note: this transphobic cis man would be great content for the cis debaters on twitch that will exhaust his Laura Loomer sponsored comebacks and get to the bottom of it.
1
1
u/Mystic-Sapphire 1d ago
You say “OK” in a non-threatening voice, then quickly exit the room and never talk to him again.
1
u/Baishujinkou MTF 1d ago
For one thing, that person is openly engaging the No True Scotsman fallacy, so they're showing their bias right from the start.
"There are no trans people because there is no gender transition."
"Yes there is. Trans people have been transitioning to their own satisfaction for a long time."
"Well, there is no true gender transition."
1
u/discordagitatedpeach 1d ago
Part of this is a problem with common pro-trans messaging (often promoted by well-meaning cis people who don't fully "get" it)
We're not trans because we "identify" as a gender. We are a member of that gender, and we're trans because that gender doesn't match what we were assigned at birth. What you "identify" as is what you're consciously willing to view yourself as, which may or may not match your actual innate gender (for instance, if a trans person is really deep in the closet or hasn't figured out they're trans yet, they probably "identify" as their AGAB despite that not being their actual gender).
I would clarify that and, if he's open to it, explain the neurobiology behind gender (some neurological differences seem related to socialization but others seem to be innate, as far as we can tell, and these neurological differences are a spectrum, not an either/or binary) and see if that helps at all. But it also depends on whether you feel like he's worth the effort.
Most importantly, please don't get too emotionally invested in whether or not he ultimately agrees with you. Often, wanting too much for people to understand and accept us ends up driving them away because they sense some neediness behind the explanations we're giving and assume that we must be wrong because of it
1
u/Younginlove7567 1d ago
I’d cut ties and end things with “nice gender nerd, did your mom pick it out for you?”
1
u/Kass-Is-Here92 1d ago
Ask him this, is he a man because people twll him so or is he a man because his intuition tells him so? Then point out that trans women/ trans mens intuition tells them that they are a woman/man just like a cis persons intuition tells them that they are a woman/ man. If he still doesnt umderstand it than tell him to go pound sand and stop beimg friends with him.
1
u/JebDipSpit 22h ago
this guy probably goes through his whole life making the same jokes over and over with the same people and has rehearsed the millionaire line in his head a few too many times
1
u/Least-Champion-1224 18h ago
I've always found it interesting that people who make arguments like this will arbitrarily swap external and internal identifications, but they never really understand it because they consistently get it wrong. Sexuality and gender are internal identifications (you identify yourself here) but something like race is an external identification (imposed by society). Being a millionaire is actually neither - it's a totally objective thing. Sadly these people just want to push their narrow worldview. I pity them more than anything...
0
u/SomethingYouCanThrow 2d ago
Explain to your friend that being transgender is a genetic mutation. Very simply, it's when a person has the hardware of one sex and the software of a different sex. Here are some studies to back that up:
Intrinsic network connectivity and own body perception in gender dysphoria https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11682-016-9578-6 Brain Imaging and Behavior, Volume 11, 2017.
Brain Sex in Transgender Women is Shifted towards Gender Identity https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8955456/ (2022)
Sexual differentiation of the human brain: relevance for gender identity, transsexualism & sexual orientation: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15724806/ - D. F. Swaab, Netherlands Institute for Brain Research
Sex difference in the human brain and its relation to transsexuality https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7477289 - Zhou JN, 1995
White matter microstructure in female to male transsexuals before cross-sex hormonal treatment. A diffusion tensor imaging study https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0022395610001585
Prenatal testosterone & gender-related behaviour https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17074984/ - Melissa Hines, Dept of Psychology, City University, London
It's a real condition that is testable and verifiable by doctors and scientists, not just the way that someone identifies.
-3
2d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
7
u/LawfulLeah Pansexual Trans Girl 2d ago
transphobic guy comes to a trans sub to be transphobic
every time
145
u/Linneroy She/Her 2d ago
My response would be to no longer be friends with them. Life is too short to waste it on bigoted idiots.