#how can you argue that gender affirming surgery is not also life saving?

[laisai]

My dad refused to let me even try ballet as a child because he said it would "deform" my body. So one (1) person thinks it's an issue for cis people 😂

But yeah my friend who did ballet most of her life told me about all the irreversible changes her and her peers had because they started ballet so young, and how that was actually necessary for them to even be kind of "good" at it, not even for professional reasons, just good enough to be in roles for like, their shows. She also ultimately could not make the cut to be a pro ballet dancer, despite dancing before kindergarten, going to boarding ballet dance camps every summer, and dancing year-round during school.

Apparently one of the girls my friend knew had her toe joints grow crooked. Lots of the ballet dancers had bow-legs. Many lost some of the nails on their feet. Also they had tons of eating disorders that were kind of just handwaved away because, well, that's what you do for ballet, especially if your body is not naturally the ideal ballet dancer shape (this goes for the guys too apparently).

An aunt of mine had a roommate who was a pro ballet dancer and every day she would have one meal: a blended concoction of onions and other strong tasting food. She'd drink it all and have zero appetite for eating anything the rest of the day. That is also apparently not too bizarre for a ballet dancer.

So yeah children are already well able to ruin their bodies with decisions they make and people kind of just go along with it. Tbh just using puberty blockers to delay puberty sounds super benign in comparison. Even surgery is like... honestly, by your teens I think you know enough. Every kid is different but definitely by late teens it's old enough to make these decisions. Kids make irreversible decisions all the time. It's not the irreversibility that's really the issue here.

“transition poses some ethical questions. Such as, from what age should you be allowed to irreversibly change your body.“

This of course completely ignores the fact that puberty makes irreversible changes to your body. But let us just rephrase the question: “from what age do you gain bodily autonomy?” Now it gets very easy to answer: From the moment you’re fucking born.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Eliza Mondegreen

Published: Dec 3, 2023

A recent New York Times op-ed entitled “There is no way to live a life without regret” meditates on youth gender transition, regret and how we know who we are (I’ll save you a few thousand words: we don’t). 

As far as op-eds go, it’s poorly argued and far too long. But as an example of its genre —a genre we could call ‘Desperately Throwing Spaghetti at the Wall’ — it’s unbeatable. 

“[L]iberals and progressives who fret about the rapidly changing gender landscape,” according to author Lydia Polgreen, are too worked up about the possibility that children and adolescents may later regret the decision to transition. Rather than address their actual concerns, however, Polgreen gives readers a rambling tour of misdirections: gender is like race, somehow, and also like an arranged marriage. Further, life is full of “transitions” that are like “little deaths,” all leading up to the biggest “transition” of all: the big sleep. 

Some teenagers get nose jobs and boob jobs, so why should gender transition surgery be viewed as any different? “Cosmetic procedures can produce regret, sometimes famously so,” the author writes. Never mind that few of youth gender transitions’ critics champion cosmetic surgery for teens. The point is, “gender-affirming” care has not been billed to regulators, consumers, and the public as cosmetic, but held up as life-saving procedures, covered under many public and private health insurance plans, and carried out in the name of medicine as a treatment for distress. The stakes matter. 

But what is a life without regret? This is a talking point that started circulating relatively recently, in response to mounting evidence of regret and detransition, and concerns that social influence may be driving the explosion in gender-distressed youth — the way just about everybody acknowledges that social influence drives the recent surge in TikTok tics or multiple personalities. So what if it’s a social contagion? “What is gender if not contagious?” Polgreen asks. 

Because few young people who embarked on transition as children have spoken up, the author first dismisses their experiences as rare and overhyped (“a handful of such people have appeared over and over again in news stories across the world”) before writing them off altogether a few paragraphs later (“when the media fixates on the hypothetical regret of children who do transition…”). 

Besides, maybe deciding to transition as a child is like quitting the swim team: “so what are we saying, really, when we worry that a child will regret this particular decision, the decision to transition? And how is it different, really, from the decision I made to quit competitive swimming?” 

Of course, a child who quits competitive swimming merely forecloses a competitive swimming career. One needn’t give up the ocean or the pool whereas children who undergo puberty suppression, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries foreclose more than one possible future. Fertility, sexual pleasure, the possibility of growing up and becoming comfortable in one’s own intact body, to name a few.

We have no idea what childish decisions like these will mean 50 years down the road. And again: Polgreen has pulled the conversation off-course to avoid the inconvenient topic of medical responsibility. The decision to quit swimming is not a medical decision, cosigned by medical authorities. Youth gender transition is. 

The author goes on to make a number of bizarre analogies in this 4,500-word slog. But she never touches the real arguments that she pretends to counter: that children are not just small adults, that the medical system needs to be accountable for the power it exercises, and that children who struggle with gender distress need real support, not empty meditations on identity, autonomy, and the ubiquity of regret.

Polgreen misdirects and obfuscates in a half-dozen creative ways, then reifies her misdirections. She misses the point — on purpose — and then wonders why so many people care so much about this issue.

==

We're into the "...and that's a good thing" phase. Where the thing that they were denying was happening at all actually is, but it's a good thing. Teaching (using) CRT, cancel culture, ROGD, juvenile surgeries, and now detransition and regret.

This is just more gaslighting. Before it was, "nobody's doing that, you're being crazy for worrying about something that's not happening." Now it's, "well, that's completely normal, you're being crazy for worrying about something that happens all the time."

Pay attention to who was endorsing, facilitating and cheering this on. Eventually they will be trying to convince you that they never did.

[definitelynotnia]

sorry i have to rant or i will cry i hate when im so angry that the anger comes out as tears

tw: random guy being a general asshole abt lgbtq and trans ppl so if you dont wanna deal with that today, cz ik there's already enough hate literally everywhere online, then please save yourself from this burden and move along, i hope u have a nice day bcz if i cant then someone should

i just spent my whole afternoon arguing with this guy- it was such a waste of my time i haven't slept properly last night and i wanted to take a nap but my nap time is GONE i hate this i told him im done with this conversation and that i dont give a shit about him enough to want to educate him on things and have him change his opinion i TOLD HIM IM DONE i told him that he can keep his opinion shoved up his ass and as long as he doesn't bully people i dont give a shit i was READY TO GO TAKE MY NAP but nooo this bitch is like "just say you've run out of valid points" like BITCH NO.

i can't have valid points to counter you with because all the points ur giving me are utter bullshit like how the fuck am i supposed to reply to "ppl assigned male at birth wearing skirts and make up is worse than war" like WHAT???? DO YOU HEAR YOURSELF??? ARE YOU INSANE? what the fuck am i supposed to respond to that with? except that trans people aren't hurting anyone and war is, and he's like "at least war can be contained, these people are spoiling the mentality of the youth" like YOU ARE THE SPOILED YOUTH not the other way around, im like listen if you were really pressed about children and how trans inclusivity impacts children then you would have at least read more about that but if your first point is only "they're doing surgery on children" then clearly you have not even done as much as a simple google search so we both know that you just heard that in some random reel and went with it and you dont give two shits about the supposed 'children being made to undergo surgery', which they're not, and all you actually care about is looking cool and edgy by hating on the lgbtq community because thats whats in trend right now in india. he's like these people are too privileged why cant they just shut up and enjoy life they are rich like first of all rich people can have problems too??? also being able to afford therapy and gender affirming care does not equal to rich thats like saying if someone in ur family has any chronic illness ur automatically rich like ??? also poor people are trans too? and im so sick of these ppl thinking being trans is just an american thing or a first world problem like brother no? you are literally living in india trans people are mentioned in the FUCKING SCRIPTURES are u KIDDING ME? being trans is not a new sudden occurence its been there for longer than you have. like literally after 2 hours of conversation the only points he could think of to hate on lgbtq for no reason is

they are rich and privileged so they shouldnt have problems

if they have a problem with their gender they should keep it to themself and not fight it (??????)

they are running from their problems (they are literally solving the problem thats the part which everyone is mad abt its when trans people try to solve the problem by being okay with expressing themselves freely and to counter i said that even alcoholics are running from their problems ive never seen any of u andrew tate cocksuckers ever make a "joke" bullying alcoholics he's like thats different like literally all his "points" are him just saying whatever and then if u try to explain it with logic he'll be like no but thats ok bcz i said so and this is wrong bcz i said so like fuck you dude)

they shouldnt have rallies and stuff because there's more important things like war that the government should focus on (he was the one who said "war is a beacon of peace there cannot be peace without war" when i had first mentioned that its ironic that out of all the bad things happening in the world rn LIKE war the biggest thing he's worried about is a "man" wearing a skirt but ok sure now all of a sudden war is a big boo boo and we should all be focusing on that, so basically when he wants to hate on ppl war is irrelevant but when a marginalised group wants to fight for their rights that time war is the most important point and no one elses suffering is valid bcz there is war)

it is spoiling today's youth (im not even gonna talk about this because i do not see how people living their lives and just existing is considered "spoiled" and "corrupt" but people regularly hating on, bullying and degrading a whole ass community just because they are uneducated swines lacking critical thinking skills and a spine that saw some 'famous' youtuber or influencer or wtv or maybe a reel with 'dark humor' dissing on lgbtq and pronouns and 'blue haired girls' and now they thing they're oh so cool and edgy and dIfFeReNt and "not like those woke snowflakes" just cz they degrade and bully a whole community of people every chance they get)

im so done im SO DONE with this bullshit its EVERYWHERE its a trend now to be hateful and mean and an asshole to anyone who isnt "normal" according to heteronormative standards. i understand not having an opinion, to some extent ok i get it you're young you don't need to be involved in this yet but no, they want to have an opinion but they will do no research they physically shudder at the thought of reading a book and god forbid they actually google up a trustworthy article to confirm some of the bullshit they believe they will do none of this but they will scream and shout about how lgbtq is the problem and magically that is the only "social issue" they care about and they care soo vehemently apparently that they have to post about it and make dArK jOkEs about it and use slurs and degrade them every chance they get because THEY are harmful yes sure you who are actively spreading hate are the angelic saviours of society and a community of people JUST EXISTING are the ones that are harmful, right.

[3000s]

ig i just dont understand ur post bc like if a “cis” woman wants to transition to look more masculine and has dysphoria about being a woman and wants to become more like a traditional man isnt that just being a trans dude? and like if cis women start transitioning while still calling themselves women wouldnt they be misgendering themselves? also wouldnt us calling them women after transitioning just give more excuses to transphobes to misgender trans men?

the thing about that is like, if they dont identify as trans men then they're not trans men! the reason these labels exist isnt to categorize people based on how we see their experience, its for people to have the language to describe themselves!

i think a lot of yall get stuck on the idea of dysphoria being something that makes someone transgender, but thats not something i believe, so thats a large part of why an argument based in transmedicalism would fall flat on this subject... people have the right to self-identify, just like how there are trans people who dont medically transition, there are also cis people who do, and you cant force them to identify as transgender if thats not how they feel!

its def important that ppl within our community learn that as trans ppl we arent the only ppl who can have a complicated relationship with gender. i've mentioned it a couple times before, but there are a lot of factors at play with regard to someones gender + presentation + dysphoria + decision to medically transition! race, sexuality, and things of that nature can play a part in the way someone experiences these things... for ref, this post puts it well; even a cishet person of color can have a more complex relationship with gender than a white lgbt person, and some further explanation on that in a post here as well! like, for example, historically (yes, even within lgbt spaces and relationships) black women have been and continue to be treated as though they are more masculine than white women because of their race, and although that isnt exactly what you asked, thats why i say that peoples experiences in a gendered society vary, that can cause someone to have a different relationship with gender, something you or i may not be able to relate to

and really anyone can feel alienated from belonging to their assigned gender with those factors at play to influence it, and that doesnt always cause them to feel like they belong to another gender either. there are many lesbians who feel that their only ties to womanhood are through their sexuality and love of other women, its not uncommon for them to use pronouns other than she/her, or to go on testosterone, or to get top surgery, but at the end of the day they can still tell you explicitly that they do not identify as trans men, and it wouldnt make sense for someone to assign them that label.

you didnt mention it here, but to get it outta the way: the last thing i've seen argued is that women are using up & taking spots in line for life-saving resources that transmeds believe trans men should be entitled to... honestly i think its kind of batshit how the ppl saying this don't realize how stupid they sound by advocating for the medicalization of transness, having to jump through all these hoops for these treatments, then somehow placing the blame on other people looking for treatment. like, if you were a cancer patient needing chemo you wouldn't go around blaming other cancer patients as the reason you arent getting treatment, right? it makes no sense, and we should be talking about the issues with the way access to hrt and affirming surgeries are set up rather than prying into the personal lives of others to see who "really" needs it the most, yknow

anyway this got long as hell, my bad, dm me if u have anymore questions or w/e

[thrown-away-opinions]

All of the gender-affirming care is ostensibly about making sure a child will be able to live a fulfilling adulthood where they can pursue the romantic partners, and relationships, and so on, in a way that will make them the most happy.

And yet every single thing they're doing and insisting is life-saving care will actively destroy any possibility of a healthy sex life or relationship. Right off the bat, the dating pool is cut down drastically. This also goes for the pool of potential friends. Having children will likely be impossible. May as well cut out financial stability since they'll be paying for therapy and treatments and surgery their entire shortened lives to cope with the effects of puberty blockers destroying their bodies. The cherry on top being that they won't even be able to enjoy whatever sex they can get.

If you're an adult and that's what you want.. well, that's your choice. I can't stop you. Children, however, are in damned near every way incapable of fully grasping the long-term consequences of a decision that so many self-styled authority figures and experts and seemingly wizened adults are telling them is a life or death certainty and that it is worth destroying EVERYTHING in their lives all for the sake of some anxiety-driven mood instability that's being deflected onto gender identity, of all things.

(With how often these things go hand in hand with deep-rooted, untreated mental illness, I'd argue that many adults probably aren't fit to make this decision for themselves either, but that's a whole other can of worms.)

Speaking mostly for myself, when it comes to not wanting kids to transition, it's not about hating abnormality or wanting the queers to suffer and be miserable, or lashing out at people who are perceived as being a political opponent. Throw those ideas out entirely. Please. Just, for fuck's sake, ignore politics for 5 minutes. Understand that even just starting a kid on puberty blockers does life long damage and leads to conditions and diseases that will cripple them for life and leave them desperately dependent on the health care system to fix something that was foisted on them by mentally ill adults who abused ill-gotten authority and divisive politics to mutilate other people's children because it makes them feel like heroes, while they turn a blind eye and pretend not to notice what's happening to those kids after those treatments.

Even if you fully support transitioning as treatment, and I really don't think you should, no one should support transitioning for children or teens. It's monstrously evil.

[endobiologist]

What Being Trans Is Like; A Guide For Allies

Hello, let me introduce myself. My name is Atom Yorke. I am a 16-year-old transgender and pansexual man, and you should probably get some popcorn ready because I've got a lot to say.

I'll split this up into categories so you can go page by page.

DEFINITION Now to begin this, if you're not sure what transgender means, transgender people are people whose brain does not match their body in gender. For example, I am a man. However I was born in a body most would call "female". I am a transgender man. This may be a radically new concept for some of you, but the truth is that we've been around since the dawn of humanity. Our history has been heavily modified and erased. In fact, any history that's not white, christian, heterosexual & cisgender has been shoved down to the darkest confines of information, where people have to look to find it. The truth is even ancient cultures have records of trans people, of nonbinary people, and of other LGBTQ concepts. This was one of the things they most heavily tried to erase during the ruthless colonization of Christianity.

You may be surprised to learn that yes, you yourself have met a trans person! Chances are you've met a lot of them, actually.

The reason why we're never seen is because until a little ways back, we would be imprisoned, killed or worse just for being out.   Now that we finally have a voice, we're speaking loud. But still, some trans people do not wish to be that way, and they will stay quiet their whole lives and blend in with the rest of society. Because of many people living in hiding, surveys are skewed and we have no real way to quantify just how many transgender people there are in the world. But there are a lot. And we matter, just like you.

MISCONCEPTIONS First off, there are a LOT, and I mean A LOT of misconceptions about transgender people. And it's not an accident. The lack of information and the stereotypes that have been given have been due to not only ignorance, but intentional covering up of the truth of who we are, and blatant propaganda against us. Many people think trans people are "out to get them" like they're some kind of "cross-dressing predators looking to peep in on the other gender". I can assure you, we are nothing of the sort. This falsehood would be laughable, if it didn't hurt so many people. Nearly 60% of trans people in America are outright TERRIFIED to go to the bathroom, (or go anywhere, really) due to them being harassed, assaulted, and worse inside. We are the ones being attacked in bathrooms, not you. We are the ones being attacked out in the streets, not you. We are not predators, we are quite literally the prey for the real predators. And this has to change. And the way it changes is through spread of information, and actual facts.

A trans woman is a woman. She is not a "man in a dress". A trans man is a man. He is not a "woman in disguise". A trans person is a person. They are not "confused".

There have been multiple scientific studies done on transgender people's brains, and they have revealed, every time, that your brain will match your gender, even if your genitalia does not. The reason for this is due to how you develop in the womb. In utero, the brains form one way, and the genitalia develops another way. Most of the time they match, creating what is known as a cisgender person, aka a person who is not trans.   Occasionally, the brain will develop in one gender and the sexual organs will develop in a different way due to an influx of different hormones during pregnancy, causing a trans person to be born.

To restate that; A trans person's brain matches their gender, not their genitalia. It has been scientifically proven. To argue that trans people "do not exist", are "confused", are "pretending" or anything else of the sort is foolish, and a rejection of science and reason altogether.

TERMINOLOGY Also, before you say "Well, if they existed forever, where are all these new terms coming from and why are we only now seeing trans people?" The reason being is you have seen trans people. You haven't seen these words because they are helpful labels we have only created recently for concepts that are ancient. The reason for all this new influx in trans activity is due to the internet and the spread of its information, which causes so many people to feel much safer and begin to come out. Now, let's take a look at the vocabulary of trans people, so you have an easier time understanding the lingo!

LGBTQ - Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer. Refers to the community. FTM - Female to Male. A trans man. MTF - Male to Female. A trans woman. T - Testosterone E - Estrogen HRT - Hormone Replacement Therapy. The medical procedure of hormone replacement to look more like your actual gender. Binder - A form of undergarment that is like a very tight sports bra that binds the chest of trans men & sometimes nonbinary people so they can appear flat-chested. Packer - A fake penis (or sometimes a rolled up sock, etc.) used to make trans men look like they have a bulge. Tucking - A technique trans women use to make them look like they have no bulge. Top surgery - Surgery on your chest to correct it to your gender. Bottom surgery - Surgery on your genitalia to correct them to your gender. Coming out of the closet - Telling the world and everyone openly that you are LGBTQ, or in this case transgender. Stealth - A term referring to trans people who go completely "undercover", and keep the fact that they're trans hidden so they can just enjoy a normal life. Gender dysphoria - A feeling of heartwrenching, guttwisting wrongness in a trans person's soul when someone calls them by the gender they are not, or sometimes when reminded of their body. Gender euphoria - A feeling of either complete contentedness, or giddy joyful excitement when their gender is affirmed.

HOW IT FEELS; A WATERED DOWN VERSION Now that we got all that out of the way, I wrote a short summary of what it feels like to be trans, from my perspective.

Imagine you're in the womb. It's a clean slate, nothing but peace. Then from the moment you're born, you're immediately categorized by your sexual organs and colour-coded. "It's a girl!" They say. They wrap you in a pink blanket. Your whole life you're told to be a girl, and so that's what you are. It was the first thing someone decided that you are. But the whole time you live in this fake life you feel... empty. Every time you use the girl's bathroom, there's a gnawing part of you that says you shouldn't be there. When kids around you are playing on a bouncy slide, playing a game of boys vs. girls, you always feel like you belong on the other side, for some nagging reason. Your grandmother keeps buying you skirts, bras, dresses, because you ask for them. You think that's what it takes for you to feel normal. You never wear them. "Maybe I'm not girly enough." So you try to be even more of what you are not. And every time, you feel this pit, this twisting gnawing void that aches and only aches more as you grow older. You don't know what it is. It gets worse every time someone says the word "She". "Girl." "Have a nice day, ladies." You tear through your room, looking for anything that doesn't look like the dresses your grandmother buys you. You cry and cry like you've never cried before, and you don't know why you're crying. What is it that's wrong with me? And after a while you decide you want your hair cut. Maybe that's what it is. Then you think, "Maybe it's because I eat a lot. Girls are supposed to be self-conscious of their weight, right?" So you blame your weight. Until you realize that's not the issue at all. Because one day you wake up. It hits you. And you put the pieces together. I'm not what they forced me to be all my life. There was a reason I was always uncomfortable. I'm not a girl... That was an option? That was even an option? I'm not forced to stay in this cell? There's actually NOT something wrong with me?

All I felt was profound relief at first, but soon enough the relief turned to paralyzing fear. This was the beginning, and also the end of my life, and I was only thirteen. But some people don't find out until they're adults, sometimes even until they're in their old age. It doesn't make anyone any less who they are. But man, does it uproot your whole life to fix things. If you realize at a young age it's easier because then you don't have as much paperwork to deal with, but you still no matter what have to deal with it, and people make it as hard as they possibly can for you, because of petty ignorance. I've had multiple cases of people straight-up refusing to give me my legal documents back (such as my insurance card which I need for my literally life-saving medication) because of ignorance or malicious transphobia. I had to actually argue with people to put my insurance card through, something that was common sense, that I had all the legal documentation for, that could be typed in at the push of a button, and costs nothing for them. But they had "never came across this situation before" so they argued with me for a good while about doing it until they finally gave in.

I've had cases of family members, family friends turning on me and calling me "tranny", a "confused girl", I've been told that there was "no masculinity in my eyes" when they looked at me. I was yelled at, screamed at in front of family and friends that I would never be a man. I've been insulted in front of people, I've been ridiculed and humiliated. But I will stand tall. You know why? Because it is A MILLION times better dealing with all this than dealing with not being who I truly am. I'm myself, and if anyone's got a problem with that, they can take it up with me.

The sad truth is, if you're trans, you unfortunately are going to experience horrible, horrible things like this. It's an inescapable reality. But that does not mean it's without hope. Every person can be educated, even if it may not seem so at first. Don't give up hope, because there is so much more beauty than you're seeing right now, and wouldn't you like to get to see it?

If you're an ally, you're here to make sure this feeling they have happens less. So, here is how to treat a trans person, written from the perspective of a trans person.

HOW TO HELP TRANSGENDER PEOPLE (from the perspective of a trans person)

1. Treat them with basic human respect. Aka refer to them how they want to be referred, you know, by their ACTUAL name and pronouns, not the ones you're clinging to desperately. You may think "What's the big deal?" about being misgendered, because as a cis person you've never been forced to live in a body that's not your own. You have ZERO frame of reference for how a trans person feels, or experiences their life, and so the very least you could do, even if you may not understand, is treat them with basic human decency. It literally costs you nothing to just be a civil human being.

2. Ask questions! (to a point. Don't be creepy or disrespectful.) If you are concerned you are not treating a trans person completely right due to not knowing, or you have something you're curious about, or you just don't understand us at all--ask! Please ask! We love it when you consider our needs, it makes us feel more appreciated. And asking questions opens important communication pathways, that lead to higher understanding, empathy, and acceptance of each other, which can only lead to higher growth for everyone involved. However, if you start getting really nosy about it by asking us weird questions when you barely know us like "Have you had the surgery yet? What do your genitalia look like?" Or the much dreaded "What's your original name?" Then you know you've gone too far. I mean, come on, you wouldn't ask a regular person that question, so why would you ask us?!

3. Speak up for them when they have no voice. This is probably by far the most huge thing you can do for a transgender person. A minor example; If they're in a very uncomfortable situation, like say for example they are getting misgendered by the cashier over and over at the grocery store and you can see they're too nervous to correct them, or even if they have corrected them themselves multiple times but the person will not give them that basic respect, the best thing you can do in that moment is step in and correct them for them.  I've had someone do it for me, and it makes me feel euphoric that someone actually stood up for me. Just back us up when we need back up, cause we very rarely have that support. A lot of trans people have no support whatsoever. Any support you can show a transgender person will help them exponentially more than you know. Some allies will post LGBTQ positive things on their social media pages, meanwhile some others take this to extremes by becoming huge supporters of LGBTQ communities, and standing up and giving a voice everywhere for them through words, art, many different forms of media, pride parades & riots.

4. Physical Support If you are very close to a trans person yourself, such as one of your children, your spouse, etc. or even if you just want to go above and beyond by supporting trans people everywhere, giving a roof over their heads, a warm meal, and some kind words would change people's lives. Consider donating to a charity (a charity you research before donating into, a lot of them are fake and will collect the money) that goes towards help for transgender people, or LGBTQ people in general! We really need it, especially in the days of He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named as our president.

5. Don't out them if they're not ready! This goes for all LGBTQ people, but please, if someone is closeted due to safety reasons or even just because they're not ready, do not under any circumstance out them for who they are. This could potentially throw them into massive danger, or it could just throw a massive wrench into their lives in some way. Please ask first.

6. Give positive, gender-affirming actions toward them! I absolutely LOVE IT when people do this. I have a friend who not only does bro-fistbumps with me, the two-pat hug thing, highfives me, but also always uses gender-affirming language such as calling me "man", "dude", "bro", etc. and it just always makes me feel so good to be around him! It creates a pleasant, safe space for us to be ourselves when you treat us for who we are, and it honestly makes us more happy than you know. So next time you see a really fabulous trans woman, tell her she looks lovely and classy today! When you see a trans man on top of his game, mention that he's handsome. And mention the things you know they feel insecure about in a positive way! It gives us majour gender euphoria. I know I've always been so ashamed of my round baby face due to it being the main reason I don't pass, but my friends on a call once had started all ooh-ing and ah-ing about how nice my cheekbones and jawline were and all that day I was ecstatic! A simple compliment that you might not even remember giving could change someone's life. And that goes for all people, not just trans people.

Now, you might have heard a lot of negative things that happened to me because of my being transgender, but I'm here to tell you there is so much hope. Cut forward to 2019. I've been out and proud for three years, and by God, I am so, SO SO much happier than I was. I am proud to say I was lucky, I have an amazing support system in my mom, dad, siblings & grandmother that have helped me so much through this. I'm about to start T soon, and I am so unbelievably excited. The person who had yelled at me in front of family members? They are now supportive, and make an effort around me. The person who called me a tranny? They apologized profusely and learnt from that experience.

So to fellow trans people out there--Things do get better. And they get better soon. You just have to hold out for a little while longer.

And for the allies who want to do better by trans and LGBTQ people everywhere, thank you. Thank you for showing your support, and thank you for your willingness to learn about those different from you. That shows extreme emotional maturity. On behalf of all LGBTQ people, thank you.

- Atom T. L. Yorke

Atom T. L. Yorke is a visual artist, cosplayer, writer, musician, and comedian that has also dedicated his life to helping LGBTQ people in need, especially the transgender community.

[thepoliticalpatient]

The cost of trans healthcare

This blog believes trans rights are human rights (this blog believes that should go without saying).

I’m not actually sure whether insurance currently covers medical costs related to transitioning. I do know that I’ve gotten into a lot of internet arguments about whether it should. People typically argue that trans people don’t have anything wrong with their bodies that is dangerous to them, so insurers shouldn’t have to pay for it.

Well, the idea that being trans isn’t dangerous is demonstrably false. Trans folk are over 8x more likely than the general population to attempt suicide in the US, attempting at a rate of 41% compared with 4.6% of the general population. Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) has been shown to be effective in reducing their depression and anxiety: one study showed rates of anxiety going from 61% pre-HRT to 33% post-HRT, and depression went from 31% to 8%. Trans people are also far more likely than the general population to become victims of violence, so it’s dangerous to be “visibly” trans, which HRT is important to ameliorating.

So I took it upon myself to do some calculations about what the actual costs are here.

0.6% of the US population is trans. I want to calculate the annual cost of covering transitions, so for ease of calculation, let’s say we’re going to fund transition for each trans person on their 18th birthday. About 4 million people turn 18 every year in the US. That’s about 24k trans kids coming of age. But 14% of transwomen and 21% of transmen say they’re not interested in having gender affirmation surgery. Transwomen are about 3 times more common than transmen, so that comes out to almost 4,000 people opting out, bringing us down to about 20k surgeries to fund.

Reassignment surgery for transwomen can cost $7-24k with the average being about $17k. The procedure is more expensive for transmen, about $50k. Again taking into account the proportion of transmen to transwomen, this comes to an average of about $25k for a sex reassignment. HRT is about an additional $2k. We’ll still include the $2k cost of HRT for the 4,000 people who opted out of surgery, since a large majority of trans folk do want HRT. The calculation comes out to about $548M in annual costs.

Is that a lot? Well, there are about 274M people under 65 in the US. 10.5% of them are uninsured, so there are about 245M people paying into the insurance pool. To cover $548M in annual costs, then, the annual price per person is an estimated $2.24.

Estimating how many lives this actually saves is harder, largely because pre-op trans people are often misgendered after death, but I’ll try. Since the suicide attempt rate is 41% among trans people, some 10k of those 24k kids we’re funding would have attempted suicide at some point. But we saw that receiving treatment reduces anxiety by about 50% and depression by about 75%. Let’s guess then that the effect of receiving treatment is maybe a 60% drop in suicide attempts (I couldn’t find actual data on this). Our $2.24 a year just prevented 6,000 attempts, then. About 1 in 25 suicide attempts results in a death in the general population - though attempts in the LGBT community tend to be more “serious,” more frequently resulting in severe injury or death - but this is hard to quantify, so let’s stick with 1 in 25 for the next calculation. That means that 240 people who would have died were saved by our $2.24 a year, meaning that we’d each be paying just under 1 cent per life saved.

Are you willing to pay 1 cent to save a life?

I just want to make a note here: It makes me pretty uncomfortable to try to speak in an authoritative way about issues pertaining to groups I’m not a part of. I’m not trans. If you are, and I’ve said something wrong here, please jump in and correct me!

—

References: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/08/16/transgender-individuals-face-high-rates–suicide-attempts/31626633/ https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=15&ved=0CEcQFjAEOAo&url=http%3A%2F%2Fportal.uned.es%2Fpls%2Fportal%2Furl%2FITEM%2FE2B94D3A1D86F2EDE040660A33701E9A&ei=eTpPU7K9HrLlyAGg84CYBQ&usg=AFQjCNFm5rngu75GhBIxhFpLK_v0Dj-xEQ&sig2=8aE8SozZSMQfJ7nOeJmCng&bvm=bv.64764171,d.aWc&cad=rja http://www.businessinsider.com/sex-transition-plastic-surgery-statistics-2017-5 https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/01/health/transgender-population.html http://civicyouth.org/you-ask-we-answer-16-8-million-new-youth-eligible-to-vote-in-2012/ http://www.surgeryencyclopedia.com/Pa-St/Sex-Reassignment-Surgery.html http://www.tgender.net/taw/tsins.html https://tgmentalhealth.com/2010/03/31/the-prevalence-of-transgenderism/ https://www.census.gov/search-results.html?q=health+insurance&search.x=0&search.y=0&search=submit&page=1&stateGeo=none&searchtype=web http://lostallhope.com/suicide-statistics http://www.thetrevorproject.org/pages/facts-about-suicide https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST045216

[lavendeerlesbian]

Ten stages to genocide which you haven't explained at all and you haven't linked me to any sources still. Which trans laws are you referring to? The ones that trample over women's rights to single sex spaces and sports? The ones that make it hate speech to even talk about sex-based oppression and eliminates women's free speech? The ones that make it illegal to even organize any kind of single sex gathering which harms lesbians and gay men on top of women? The laws that argue for genital "corrective" surgeries for children that intersex people have been fighting against for years? The ones that are allowing sex offender males into women's prisons so they can rape and assault female inmates and staff? The ones that are pushing for identity changes being allowed, even in the cases of men on sex offender registries which helps them avoid putting themselves on said registries and helps them to offend again? The ones touted as "trans healthcare" which has nothing to do with regular healthcare for trans people and has everything to do with affirming surgeries and hormones which goes against the Hippocratic Oath? The laws that fight for those procedures to be covered by health insurances which takes resources away from real disabled people that need actual life-saving medicines and surgeries? Those trans laws?

Saying "science evolves, sex is a spectrum because I say so" does nothing to convince me or anyone else on the planet. But yeah let's just ignore that sex-based oppression exists and erase thousands of years of oppression against the female sex! That is definitely how reality works. Intersex conditions also are literally medical conditions, there is no imaginary medicalizing going on.

So like just for the sake of clarity here, are you agreeing that the sex work industry is harmful and should be abolished? Also, even if you claim it's just because transwomen are in sex work (which is a lot less common in the US as opposed to say Brazil by the way), what about all the cases of convicted sex offender transwomen who are placed in female prisons, rape and assault female inmates and staff, serve their sentence, and as soon as they are released identify as men again? Are those women just acceptable casualties for you? Also I literally provided you with sites that log trans crimes and has news articles with individual names and faces attached... Which adds up to hundreds of examples (at least 300) of transwomen who aren't in sex work and who are commiting violent and sex crimes against mostly women and children. Which makes your whole point here moot.

Storme was a butch lesbian and did not identify as a man. She is part of LGB history which is not part of the T. And y'all are twisting the narrative, Fred Sargeant became a cop because he saw how awful cops were and wanted to help change the system. But I have to give you props for not mentioning Malcom as a transwoman who threw the first brick at Stonewall, which is what most of you TRAs lie about. Anyways, Fred Sargeant is protecting gay rights and if you consider his sign "transphobic", then that means the trans narrative is inherently homophobic. Crying transphobia at homosexual people for being homosexual is homophobic.

Okay so animals have neutral sexes and no gender identity which you agree with which is why we used sex based pronouns. And for some reason you cannot also apply that to humans (who are also animals by the way) because you care more about gender identity. You can't treat sex as a neutral thing that only describes what type of body you have. You have to make it about stereotypes or feelings. That is sexist. And also upholds gender and does nothing to abolish it, by the way.

Lol nah you said it in bad faith because you cannot wrap your head around actual rejecting of gender and come to the most convoluted and confusing conclusion which is anyone can claim they are anything instead of just recognizing reality.

How do terfs know that gender is purely a social construct, push the belief to get rid of it, and not see the irony of enforcing pronouns and other gendered terms?

They are legit a part of gender and gender expression. A butch lesbian can preferrably go by Sir and still call himself a woman as much as he can wear a tux and cut his hair short.

Like, I know it's probably because there's a focus on being anti transgender before anything, and when one of the common methods to show acceptance is asking for pronouns, they want to push against it. It's so contradictory though.

"They're based on sex!" Tell that to LGBTQ history and culture that was around before either of us were born. Might as well tell me that women can't wear pants while still claiming to be against gender roles.

[searchingforproofsthatimwrong]

searchingforproofsthatimwrong:

chocolate-and-discourse:

searchingforproofsthatimwrong:

chocolate-and-discourse:

rogers-discourse:

searchingforproofsthatimwrong:

rogers-discourse:

searchingforproofsthatimwrong:

Just saw a post saying : "Trans is just "I am not this gender""

And TRA are wondering why we get mad when we get called cis.

If trans is " i am not this gender" then cis is "i am this gender" There is no place for "gender is bullshit and should be abolished"

Telling Radfem they are cis is the same as telling atheist that they have a religion and it is "believing in the absence of god".

No. Atheists do not have a religion and Radfem are certainly not "cis".

Cis just means you aren’t trans calm the fuck down.

Yes I know, that's the definition I just used ?

The problem here is the definition for trans.

Okay but then why take offense to being cisgender.

@searchingforproofsthatimwrong you know you’re allowed to say you personally opt out of gender right? You can declare yourself genderless without having to be cis or trans, like that’s allowed. You don’t need to hate on people who find those terms useful though.

Like, it’s one thing if you’re like “they assigned me a woman and I am a woman”, that’s not opting out of gender, that’s just like. Default. If you were like “they assigned me to be a woman and gender is fucking stupid, I’m a person without gender bc it’s stupid” you don’t have to be cis or trans. You can opt out of gender and it’s labeling without taking it away from the people who find it useful.

Again, being a woman is not something I can opt out of.

We have fundamentaly different views on "gender" it makes discussion like this really hard. I know I sound to you like I don't understand anything and am being "mean" to people without reason but ...

Listen : I am not saying "gender is stupid so I don't have one", I'm saying "gender is harmful and nobody has one", because it's not something you have, not in that way.

"People find it useful"

I know they do. You mean it as "it helps them describe themself" or something like that, am I right? Well I meant it as "gender is a tool of the patriarchy and it is very useful in upholding it". See? Completly different thing.

When I'm talking about gender I am not talking about me, I am talking about a societal problem, I cannot solve it by "opting out of it". This is not how it works.

Then what stops the (frankly arbitrary) division of sex from just becoming gender 2.0? I feel like you’re having this conversation is relatively good faith, so I’m ready to hash this out with you if you’re willing to. To my understanding, you can’t opt out of being a woman not because of your knowledge of your self, but because of assigned sex, right? But why is that? Like, why is that boundary so immutable to you?

I think that society at large has far too hard of an emphasis on both gender and sex as concepts, and until we as a society put less emphasis on either of them, I’m not going to fault anyone for finding comfort and self identity within an imperfect system. I also don’t personally think gender should be abolished, just that it should become generally unimportant, so I feel like that’s where we diverge on the solution to gender and sex based oppression, though correct me if I’m wrong here.

On why I feel it helps people, yeah as self expression, but beyond that to self-actualization. Many people find comfort and joy and identity in the spaces that some refer to as gender identity. You see gender as oppression, but I argue that’s not a trait inherent to gender, but the emphasis and rigidity that we place on sex-linked-gender as a society, particularly in western countries (at least from my POV, I admit my perspective is limited).

I agree that mismatching definitions of gender do widen the divide and toxify the discourse; so does treating each other with highly hostile disrespect. Frankly this is the MOST respectful reply I’ve gotten, and I’ll admit I was a little snarky to start so thank you for that. If you’re up for continuing elaborating, I’d be happy to continue this discussion further if you are?

Then what stops the (frankly arbitrary) division of sex from just becoming gender 2.0?

(I’m going to ignore calling biological sex arbitrary because i really don’t feel like discussing that right now but : You’re wrong)

I think you’re having it backwards here? Gender is division of sex 2.0. Sex is biological and gender is everything our society associates with this sex. Since we’re in a patriarchal society, gender is harmful to women.

you can’t opt out of being a woman not because of your knowledge of your self, but because of assigned sex, right? But why is that? Like, why is that boundary so immutable to you?

Yep you got it right, I can’t opt out of a biological reality. Me being a woman is written in every cell in my body, it IS immutable. Sex-change surgery etc... are misnommers : they do not change biology, they’re just cosmetic surgery.

I think that society at large has far too hard of an emphasis on both gender and sex as concepts

We agree on that at least

I’m not going to fault anyone for finding comfort and self identity within an imperfect system

This is a misrepresentation. I know it’s very tempting to say “live and let live” and “let everyone do what they want”, it’s easy and give you the impression of being an open-minded, good person, but radfems are not opposing people “finding comfort”. They’re opposing transactivism because it actively hurt women. When “women” is a category protected by law, with quotas and specific spaces reserved for women etc..., how we define “women” is not actually a purely philosophical question. It has real life consequences for real life women.

I mean, you probably do not have a problem seeing how white people pretending they’re black is bad for black people right? It’s the same thing here.

I also don’t personally think gender should be abolished, just that it should become generally unimportant

I honest to god do not see the difference here. If we go by my definition of gender ( what society forces on you because of your sex) then it becoming unimportant is the same as being abolished, since it is not forced anymore.

On why I feel it helps people, yeah as self expression, but beyond that to self-actualization. Many people find comfort and joy and identity in the spaces that some refer to as gender identity.

Women’s protection is more important than men’s feelings. Or you know, anyone’s feelings.

particularly in western countries

You’re just flat out wrong on this one. Western countries are the least rigid on gender roles. Saoudi Arabia gave women the right to drive 2 years ago!! I think it’s fair to say the gender roles of men and women are not remotly the same there.  I know we’re on tumblr and being white is a sin here but please.

I’ll admit I was a little snarky to start so thank you for that

You’re welcome :)

I don’t think that you can dismiss out of hand the variation of different sex characteristics and combinations out of hand like that, especially when I assume you’re talking about an ideal system that reduces identity in this category to sex- because it directly ties back into your next point.

Being a woman by your definition is immutable because of which traits exactly? Chromosomes? Because where does that leave people with atypical chromosomes? The reproductive system you possess? Then again, people born without, or who have had them removed? Hormones? Again, intersex people, people who are not intersex but have varying hormone levels, people on HRT? Then what about genitals? Yet again we come back to intersex people and trans people, particularly trans people who have gone through gender-affirming surgeries. Some combination of all of these? Because in the end, none of these are fully binary, fully immutable, and no percentage of the population is negligible. Is it socialization? Well in a system that renders sex and gender binarism and societal roles irrelevant, the point’s kind of moot, and no ones anything realy.

I also object to gender affirming procedures being referred to as strictly “cosmetic”- in many cases these are life saving interventions.

The case of women being a definable category is something that I don’t really think is as reductionist as you’re insisting. Yes protections for women are important. But “unconventional” women are still women. And that circles back around to your point above, about how do you define women and why is that an unchanging, immutable trait of someone.

In this system you’re envisioning as I understand it, where do intersex people come in? People who transition? Because even if gender as you define it is abolished, people will still transition, people will still take hormones and people will still need gender affirming surgeries..... just now without the vocabulary to explain their experiences. Where do people like that fall in? These are questions that need answers, I think, if we’re to even remotely consider a reality where sex is both binary and immutable.

Tying back into women’s protection being more important than men’s feelings, I agree. People’s safety is always more important than someone else’s feelings. But pushing someone to the edge of a society, refusing to allow them the space to be their true and actualized self, puts them at significant physical and mental risk. I also fail to see how in any form, trans activism harms women. In fact, I frankly think that our end goals aren’t as far apart from each other as either of our sides tend to think. You want women to live their lives free of oppression, to be themselves fully and freely. Trans-positive activists want the same thing; where we diverge is the matter on if gender as a tool of self-expression is viable, and if sex is binary and immutable. I argue that it can be, and that it isn’t. More and more in fact, studies show that sex is a little hazier than we think, but I’m not an expert on that- I just have several people very close to me that are intersex, and the topic comes up a lot.

I also super concede the point about western gender roles; I did admit my biases, and I believe coming up in a cult-like evangelical environment left me feeling like the West was a bit more strict than it was. My point still stands though that I believe the issue isn’t gender identity itself, but the rigidity that sex-linked gender roles impose upon gender expression and identity.

Please stop dragging intersex people into this. Have they not repetedly told TRA that they didn’t want to be used as a “gotcha” by transactivists? Intersex conditions are not a third sex. Atypical chromosomes are not a third sex, they are always male or female depending on wether or not they have the Y chromosomes. 

So yes, chromosomes, among other thing .

I want to add that if we define spider as “ an eight-legged predatory arachnid” showing me a sick or mutilated spider with only 7 legs will not make me change the definition or say this is not a spider, so I really do not know what you are trying to do with bringing “ people on HRT “ or “trans people with surgery” up. 

Well in a system that renders sex and gender binarism and societal roles irrelevant

Sex will never be irrelevant. It is very relevant indeed for procreation and, also, sexualities. Even in a perfect society, I would still be able to be pregnant while men would not. It is important. It is a distinction that exist and will always exist. 

I also object to gender affirming procedures being referred to as strictly “cosmetic”- in many cases these are life saving intervention

They can be both. Cosmetic =/= unimportant. I was just saying those surgery did not change the sex of the person, a transwoman with surgery still cannot become pregnant. It just changes the apparence of the sex of the person.

But “unconventional” women are still women

Not if they’re male. That’s the one thing women cannot be. 

Correct me if I’m wrong but your point in the first paragraph is basically that sex is meaningless and we cannot define women right? How do you propose we protect them if we cannot define who we are protecting? 

Also, this whole “sex is a spectrum ” thing is so annoying . Even if you were entirely right and sex WAS a spectrum and intersex WERE a completly different sex, it would still not mean that everybody can say they’re a woman. You know what is 100% a spectrum and a societal construct and something with very fuzzy definition ? RACE. Try to argue that it means anybody can call themselves the race they want to be and see how stupid it is. 

In this system you’re envisioning as I understand it, where do intersex people come in? People who transition? Because even if gender as you define it is abolished, people will still transition, people will still take hormones and people will still need gender affirming surgeries

Those people can still be transgender, even now, I just want them to stop calling themselves women if they’re not females. Really. That’s all. A man can cut his dick, have boob surgery, take hormones, the whole thing, and still be a man. None of this change the fact that he is a man.UNCONVENTIONAL MEN ARE STILL MEN. He is a transgender. The vocabulary to explain his experience exists. Do you really thing that “woman” is needed to explain their experience ? I mean you already said the word was meaningless, didn’t you ?

pushing someone to the edge of a society, refusing to allow them the space to be their true and actualized self, puts them at significant physical and mental risk.

Again, I do not want transexual to be pushed at the edge of society. I just want them out of female only spaces. Not being able to compete in women sport for exemple do not put transexual “at significant physical and mental risk”. 

On the other hand, allowing male in female only spaces do put women “at significant physical and mental risk”, males in women prison DO put women at risk, males in rape shelter DO put women in mental risk, male in women sport DO put them at physical risk. 

The solution can be to make transgender spaces only, and frankly I am all for that. 

I also fail to see how in any form, trans activism harms women.

That’s the crux of the matter isn’t it?

 Well I fail to see how it helps women. Like really you gotta find me an exemple of transactivism helping women. 

On the other hand we got :

 transactivism trying to stop a bill banning FGM, 

Transactivism making it harder for womento talk about theit biology (menstruator, people with cervixes etc...) 

Transactivism silencing feminism (did you really think JK Rowling was a danger for transpeople lives? ) 

I’ve already talked about sports and rape shelter and prisons but still, this is hurting women 

Transactivism upholding gender roles (I know you don’t agree but when people are saying i’m a woman because I like pink, this is not going toward the abolishment of gender roles you want) 

Transactivism saying things like “genital preferences”and “coton ceiling” which is homophobic and harmful to lesbians 

there is more but it’s also like 3am so ... 

“Being a woman by your definition is immutable because of which traits exactly? Chromosomes? Because where does that leave people with atypical chromosomes?

[chocolate-and-discourse]

I don’t think that you can dismiss out of hand the variation of different sex characteristics and combinations out of hand like that, especially when I assume you’re talking about an ideal system that reduces identity in this category to sex- because it directly ties back into your next point.

Being a woman by your definition is immutable because of which traits exactly? Chromosomes? Because where does that leave people with atypical chromosomes? The reproductive system you possess? Then again, people born without, or who have had them removed? Hormones? Again, intersex people, people who are not intersex but have varying hormone levels, people on HRT? Then what about genitals? Yet again we come back to intersex people and trans people, particularly trans people who have gone through gender-affirming surgeries. Some combination of all of these? Because in the end, none of these are fully binary, fully immutable, and no percentage of the population is negligible. Is it socialization? Well in a system that renders sex and gender binarism and societal roles irrelevant, the point’s kind of moot, and no ones anything realy.

I also object to gender affirming procedures being referred to as strictly “cosmetic”- in many cases these are life saving interventions.

The case of women being a definable category is something that I don’t really think is as reductionist as you’re insisting. Yes protections for women are important. But “unconventional” women are still women. And that circles back around to your point above, about how do you define women and why is that an unchanging, immutable trait of someone.

In this system you’re envisioning as I understand it, where do intersex people come in? People who transition? Because even if gender as you define it is abolished, people will still transition, people will still take hormones and people will still need gender affirming surgeries..... just now without the vocabulary to explain their experiences. Where do people like that fall in? These are questions that need answers, I think, if we’re to even remotely consider a reality where sex is both binary and immutable.

Tying back into women’s protection being more important than men’s feelings, I agree. People’s safety is always more important than someone else’s feelings. But pushing someone to the edge of a society, refusing to allow them the space to be their true and actualized self, puts them at significant physical and mental risk. I also fail to see how in any form, trans activism harms women. In fact, I frankly think that our end goals aren’t as far apart from each other as either of our sides tend to think. You want women to live their lives free of oppression, to be themselves fully and freely. Trans-positive activists want the same thing; where we diverge is the matter on if gender as a tool of self-expression is viable, and if sex is binary and immutable. I argue that it can be, and that it isn’t. More and more in fact, studies show that sex is a little hazier than we think, but I’m not an expert on that- I just have several people very close to me that are intersex, and the topic comes up a lot.

I also super concede the point about western gender roles; I did admit my biases, and I believe coming up in a cult-like evangelical environment left me feeling like the West was a bit more strict than it was. My point still stands though that I believe the issue isn’t gender identity itself, but the rigidity that sex-linked gender roles impose upon gender expression and identity.

Just saw a post saying : "Trans is just "I am not this gender""

And TRA are wondering why we get mad when we get called cis.

If trans is " i am not this gender" then cis is "i am this gender" There is no place for "gender is bullshit and should be abolished"

Telling Radfem they are cis is the same as telling atheist that they have a religion and it is "believing in the absence of god".

No. Atheists do not have a religion and Radfem are certainly not "cis".