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United States42573 Posts
On August 01 2013 22:59 Klondikebar wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 22:43 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:38 Plansix wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I don't want to sleep with someone who is married, but they don't disclose that either. In the grand scheme of things, I can’t really feel bad for people who get surprised by something after they have a one night stand. There is a reason we do not encourage people to have those. Sure, its not nice, but that person decided to sleep with someone with limited information on who they are. "I didn't tell them but they're having a one night stand so it's okay". This is known as two wrongs making a right. I don't really hold to that. Also their wrong by not asking enough questions before sex is not equivalent to your wrong of obtaining consent through omission of relevant information. Are you actually disputing whether obtaining consent through omission of relevant information is bad or are you saying that people who have one night stands deserve it or? I'd dispute the "obtaining consent through omission of relevant information." How is trans status relevant to a hookup? In what way is hooking up with a trans woman any different than hooking up with a cis woman? Other than "it makes me feel icky after the fact" what demonstrable difference is there? During typical hookups no one discloses completely irrelevant information about themselves. I don't submit a credit report to my hookups. I'd have to let them know if I had an STD because that could actually affect them. But simply being trans doesn't affect the partner in any way shape or form when it comes to a hookup. Also, caring about something that not only doesn't affect you but you can't even identify is patently stupid. In the scenario where you're hooking up with a trans woman who you find attractive and would not know that she was trans unless she told you, you don't get to pretend you care about trans status.
You might think what they're predicating their decision to consent on is stupid. That's fine. But that doesn't give you the right to dismiss their decision to consent. It's still theirs. Whether or not their criteria are dumb does not impact their right to have their own criteria regarding sexual consent.
On August 01 2013 23:07 Smat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 22:43 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:38 Plansix wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I don't want to sleep with someone who is married, but they don't disclose that either. In the grand scheme of things, I can’t really feel bad for people who get surprised by something after they have a one night stand. There is a reason we do not encourage people to have those. Sure, its not nice, but that person decided to sleep with someone with limited information on who they are. "I didn't tell them but they're having a one night stand so it's okay". This is known as two wrongs making a right. I don't really hold to that. Also their wrong by not asking enough questions before sex is not equivalent to your wrong of obtaining consent through omission of relevant information. Are you actually disputing whether obtaining consent through omission of relevant information is bad or are you saying that people who have one night stands deserve it or? How are you suppose to know what exactly would not be acceptable to your one night stand partnee. There seems to be this idea that most men care. What if the trans woman told some peope a few times and they didnt care (this happens a lot) shouldnt she assume from her.experience that most people wouldnt care? If half your partners think its a deal breaker and half dont why do you have to assume that everyone thinks its a deal breaker?
If half your partners think it's a deal breaker and half don't then I think it's reasonable to assume that half of people will think it's a dealbreaker and because you don't want a 50% chance of obtaining consent through deception you tell all of them. It doesn't have to be everyone, you're just trying not to obtain consent by deception through reasonable disclosure.
On August 01 2013 23:09 shinosai wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 22:47 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:42 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:32 Darkwhite wrote:On August 01 2013 22:18 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:15 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:05 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:03 Darkwhite wrote:On August 01 2013 21:55 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 21:29 KwarK wrote:
[quote]
I read it and I disagreed with it. If transgenders were a significant portion of the population then it'd be reasonable to interpret not asking directly as not caring but they are not. It is not a reasonable interpretation to make, it is much more likely they are simply assuming a trans woman is a cis woman because the vast, vast majority are. In this context the trans woman has far more information than her partner, she knows she's an outlier where the question could realistically be relevant. In that situation it is reasonable to place the onus for bringing it up on her. I'm going to have to disagree with you via analogy, reconstructing your argument through reductio ad absurdum. If biracials were a significant portion of the population then it'd be reasonable to interpret not asking directly as not caring but they are not. It is not a reasonable interpretation to make, it is much more likely that they are simply assuming a biracial woman is a single race woman because the vast, vast majority are. In this context the biracial woman has far more information than her partner, she knows she's an outlier where the question could realistically be relevant. In that situation it is reasonable to place the onus for bringing it up on her.If we reconstruct the argument in this way, we can see that your real argument is not at all about how prevalent transsexualism is. Rather, there is a sort of hidden view here that there is something wrong with trans women, and therefore they ought to disclose. Without the hidden premise 'there is something wrong with trans women, and they need to disclose it' this argument makes no sense. It is not nearly as innocent as it appears. You are not reconstructing the argument. You are making a false analogy, where you substitute something a lot of people care strongly about - i.e. transsexuality - with something very few people care about, namely mixed race. If it were true that equally many people would feel cheated, if they post hoc discovered that their partner was of mixed rather than pure heritage, as if they discovered they were transsexuals, the analogy would be accurate - I strongly doubt if this is true, unless you are from a Neo-Nazi suburb. They did used to care about it - therefore, not a false analogy, at least not on that front. People used to have their marriages annulled for deception because they did not disclose their racial status and were assumed white. edit: You would have to be *extremely* ignorant to think that this was never something that a lot of people cared strongly about. And back then not disclosing that information, no matter how unfair, arbitrary or unreasonable that "deal breaker" might be, would be taking advantage of the said person. As Snusmumriken said, two wrongs don't make a right. So as long as we're clear then, the argument seems to be: As long as the majority of the population finds something to be distasteful and it would cause them to not sleep with you, you *must* disclose your status of this distasteful thing. It does not matter if it is being a natural blonde, being biracial, liking peanutbutter, or transsexualism - the important thing is that we must not cause inconvenience to the majority of the population. Am I getting this right? Because to me this sounds completely absurd. The argument is very, very simple: If you have good reason to believe that your partner might change his mind, given information you can choose whether or not to disclose, then you have an obligation to tell your partner and let him make the call. It has nothing to do with inconveniencing the majority. Similarly, if I were to become part of a transsexual dating site, where the default assumptions would be that everybody is transsexual, I would consider myself obligated to let my partners know that I am not a transsexual myself, because they have a right to make an informed decision. On a regular dating site, where transsexuality is not the norm, the obligation would lie with the transsexuals. Except that without the 'majority' premise, the entire argument falls apart. The only reason I'm supposed to disclose to everyone I sleep with is because of the belief that the 'majority' is transphobic. Without this belief I would have no reason to believe the person is transphobic without additional evidence. You're basically asking me to assume that everyone is transphobic, ergo, the majority premise matters. Basically, if the majority of the population has a hangup about something, then it's my obligation to inform all potential partners, because that is evidence that the person might change their mind. I'm just going to have to disagree ethically with this. People are responsible for their own hangups. If you dislike promiscuous people - and I don't care if *everyone* hates promiscuous people, and promiscuous people are super rare so they might assume that you're not promiscuous - I still think it's up to you to take steps to make sure your partner isn't promiscuous. Lies by omission are nonsense - especially if the only reason it's a "lie by omission" is predicated on how prevalent transphobia is. Take some personal responsibility. It doesn't have to be everyone, nor a majority. If you think there's a 20% chance you're obtaining consent through deception and an 80% chance they don't care about it you should still tell them because a 20% chance of deceiving someone into sex is too high. Consent is important. The reason it's a lie of omission is because of their assumption you are cis whereas you are are aware that you are not. This is nothing to do with transphobia, this is to do with numbers. There are far, far more cis people than trans. The assumption that a given person is cis rather than trans is a reasonable assumption to make. I'm not sure why you think that assumption is in any way transphobic, it's not, it's just statistics. The prevalence of transphobia matters here (the argument is predicated upon it) because, within the context of the argument, the ethical criteria for disclosure is whether or not the person is transphobic. The only evidence we have to assume that the person is transphobic is 'it seems like most people are transphobic.' Therefore, the argument is predicated upon the prevalence of transphobia. To me, if the ethics of disclosure is merely based on population and is inconsistent otherwise, then there is no real imperative as the ethic is weak. You frame it as statistics, but this is a bit disingenuous. You make it sound like it's simply "most people are cis, few people are trans, therefore trans people must inform cis people". But this obfuscates the point. Trans people wouldn't have to inform cis people that they are trans *unless* the cis people are transphobic. Therefore, the argument hinges upon the prevalence of transphobia. I think that if the ethics of disclosure is ever predicated upon something as arbitrary as the beliefs of a population at a particular time, then the ethical imperative is rather weak and unconvincing. If not informing someone that I'm trans is okay in the future because transphobia dies off, then I'm going to be rather skeptical that I have an ethic to disclose in the present.
The ethics of disclosure are constant. If you believe that consent is predicated upon a lack of a fact that you are withholding then the consent has been obtained through deception and there is a moral imperative to disclose the fact. Failure to do so is simply dismissing their right to freely consent to sex and is pretty damn immoral. It doesn't matter what the fact is, it doesn't matter that they care because they're transphobic, two wrongs don't make a right. If less people are transphobic in the future then it will be less likely that consent is predicated upon the lack of disclosing this particular fact. The argument will no longer be relevant to trans people. But the argument will not cease to be valid. Not informing someone of something upon which their consent to sex hinges will always be wrong, it may not apply to trans people in the future but that doesn't change the validity of the argument.
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United Kingdom36161 Posts
On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman.
Not sure what society you live in my friend.
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On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend.
Yeah, I am pretty sure I am just going to blame the violent ass hole and heap all the blame on him. No need to drag the rest of the world into this.
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The ethics of disclosure are constant. If you believe that consent is predicated upon a lack of a fact that you are withholding then the consent has been obtained through deception and there is a moral imperative to disclose the fact. Failure to do so is simply dismissing their right to freely consent to sex and is pretty damn immoral. It doesn't matter what the fact is, it doesn't matter that they care because they're transphobic, two wrongs don't make a right. If less people are transphobic in the future then it will be less likely that consent is predicated upon the lack of disclosing this particular fact. The argument will no longer be relevant to trans people. But the argument will not cease to be valid. Not informing someone of something upon which their consent to sex hinges will always be wrong, it may not apply to trans people in the future but that doesn't change the validity of the argument.
I think we might be arguing different things here. I agree that I have an ethic to disclose if I have good reason to believe that the person has a problem with it. However, I do not agree that I *always* have an ethic to disclose merely because a particular percentage of people "appear" to be transphobic.
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United States42573 Posts
On August 01 2013 23:19 Plansix wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. There is no evidence to back that up and I find that to be unlikely. The type of person who is going to become violent when they find out the woman they were flirting with was at one time male, is not going to change due to more honest from people who are transgender. At the end of the day, once they find out, they feel they have been tricked into being attracted man and want to take out that frustration and embarrassment through violence. You cannot blame the transgender person for being honest and then being confronted by violence because the other party is an ass hole.
I disagree. I do not wish to defend the terrible crimes done to trans people but suggesting that their anger is completely unrelated to their perception of being deceived into sex is nonsense. A transphobic person who finds out they have had sex with someone who disgusts them, and that the person who disgusts them failed to disclose, will feel more violated. The desire not to legitimise transphobic violence should not lead us to deny the causes of it. These are people who feel like they have been raped, early disclosure prevents it escalating to that.
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On August 01 2013 22:59 Klondikebar wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 22:43 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:38 Plansix wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I don't want to sleep with someone who is married, but they don't disclose that either. In the grand scheme of things, I can’t really feel bad for people who get surprised by something after they have a one night stand. There is a reason we do not encourage people to have those. Sure, its not nice, but that person decided to sleep with someone with limited information on who they are. "I didn't tell them but they're having a one night stand so it's okay". This is known as two wrongs making a right. I don't really hold to that. Also their wrong by not asking enough questions before sex is not equivalent to your wrong of obtaining consent through omission of relevant information. Are you actually disputing whether obtaining consent through omission of relevant information is bad or are you saying that people who have one night stands deserve it or? I'd dispute the "obtaining consent through omission of relevant information." How is trans status relevant to a hookup? In what way is hooking up with a trans woman any different than hooking up with a cis woman? Other than "it makes me feel icky after the fact" what demonstrable difference is there? During typical hookups no one discloses completely irrelevant information about themselves. I don't submit a credit report to my hookups. I'd have to let them know if I had an STD because that could actually affect them. But simply being trans doesn't affect the partner in any way shape or form when it comes to a hookup. Also, caring about something that not only doesn't affect you but you can't even identify is patently stupid. In the scenario where you're hooking up with a trans woman who you find attractive and would not know that she was trans unless she told you, you don't get to pretend you care about trans status.
Umm...frankly, I think that if you have good reason to believe that someone wouldn't have sex with you if they knew [something] about you, then you owe it to them to let them know. I'm not sure if I'd say failing to tell them makes you immoral, or something like that, but it is somewhat inconsiderate, at the very least. I mean, we can talk about how people have irrational deal-breakers all we want, but the truth is that if you have good reason to believe that someone has a particular sexual preference, and if you have some trait that they aren't aware of that would be relevant to that person viz. sexual intercourse, then it doesn't really matter how obtuse/irrational/judgmental they're being in holding such a belief, because knowingly deceiving someone to get them to have sex with you is just not a good thing at all.
Now, I'm sorta on the fence about whether trans people should tell their partners about their trans status in the case of one night stands. On the one hand, I think honesty is important, and I think that, in choosing to omit information about their transsexuality, transgender individuals might actually be reinforcing the notion that trans status is something to be ashamed of. See, it's very easy for some ignorant, or uneducated person to conclude that transgenderism is bad because even transgender people seem to hide it. Obviously, that's a ridiculous line of reasoning, but it definitely makes it easier for people to hold the belief that there's something shameful about being transgender. While it's true that transgender people who wear their history on their sleeve will be less likely to attract partners for one night stands, it's also true that the people they do attract will be much more likely to be respectful of them in general, and perhaps, in time, a more positive conception of trans individuals will permeate society.
On the other hand, telling people about one's trans status can be really traumatic for both parties (in very different ways) and can lead to violence or depression, among other things. For someone like me, the decision as to whether I would disclose trans status is very easy: I would always do so. I'm a white, heterosexual, cisgendered male, but there are certain things in my history (regarding mental health and so on) that I always disclose to potential partners. I feel that I'd be lying about who I am if I didn't do so, because those things in my history aren't just part of my past; they're a huge part of who I am today. That said, not everyone is me, so I can't really comment much on how transgender people might feel when they consider the notion of disclosing their trans status to other people; maybe it makes them feel very insecure/hopeless about ever finding someone who likes them for them. And that's a fair concern, IMO. At the end of the day, I'd probably say that, ideally, one should always be honest about such things, but that, since trans people face very real issues associated with disclosing their identity/stigma/self-worth/hopelessness/suicide etc., I'm not going to condemn people who don't do so in a really strong way. I hope that someday they'll be able to disclose their identity, but until then, I think that their sense of personal worth is a strong enough reason to be hesitant to do so.
Your gender is defined by your brain. If you were to get rid of all your physical male characteristic, chance are you would most likely still identify as male. Or let say your brain get transplanted into a robot. Do you still identify as a man ? I think the answer is yes, in my case, I would still identify as female, because being one is an extremely important part of my life and my identity
This is where I always get lost, honestly. Let me preface this by saying that I have no problems at all with trans individuals, and I think that their gender dysphoria is a legitimate phenomenon. My lack of understanding is honest, and not the result of a lack of study. Okay, with that said: no, I don't think that I'd still identify as male if I had my memories of being in a (sexually) male body erased andif my brain was transplanted into a robot. Why? Because I don't identify as being a male right now. I don't even know what identifying as a male means. I don't know of a coherent definition of gender that doesn't appeal to physical sexual characteristics. I mean, when I think of the senses in which I'm a man, I think about the fact that I have (very little) facial hair, that I have functional testicles, that I have a penis, that I have a fairly high level of testosterone compared to females, that I don't have breasts, and that many anatomy is, on the whole, somewhat similar to that of the average biologically designated "male" category of human beings.
I really don't know what it means to "identify" as a male, per se, because I don't identify as a male; I have a sexually male body with hormone levels on par with the average male. As far as my brain goes, I don't really have any particular association of "maleness" beyond my physical characteristics. I don't really believe in gender roles all that much, so I'm not really sure what that leaves for my brain to hang onto outside of sexual organs. Now, don't get me wrong: I don't have any sort of sexual dysphoria or dysphoria in general. I feel very connected to my body and at peace with it. But when I think of the "male gender" and the notion that, apparently, I belong to this gender (since I consider myself to be a man, whatever that means) I don't really understand what qualities this refers to. What are the properties of the male gender? What does it mean to identify as male (or female)? Is it as simple as just being comfortable with a particular body? Is it something to do with gender roles? If not these, then what? Again, it's not that I don't have a gender, or something, but that I literally don't understand what gender actually is when we cut away all the societal roles and sexual organs. Obviously, a lot of people believe strongly that it is something mental/associated with the brain, but can someone list a few characteristics of what gender identity feels like in one's mind?
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On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend.
The one where all the media exposure trans people get is about them being jokes and freaks. Theres more depictions of trans serial killers than there are healthy and mentally stable trans view points. I am not implying things arent getting better.
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On August 01 2013 23:14 Smat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:02 Snusmumriken wrote:On August 01 2013 22:58 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 17:18 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 16:59 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 16:49 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 16:03 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 04:58 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 04:39 fugs wrote:
Being trans and mentally disabled makes reading these arguments very uncomfortable. Believe it or not, telling a trans person that they're infertile/not real/mentally challenged/disgusting/ugly is a really mean thing to do. You don't walk up to some cancer patient and point out their infertility do you? Why do so many people think it's okay to tell trans people, to their face, things you'd never tell any other individual?
Whether you believe it's 'right' or 'wrong' for me to use the bathroom I feel comfortable in, or to wear the clothes I think are cute, date the people I am attracted to is not going to stop me. Your discomfort is a product of your own design and I'm not responsible for it.
As for all the understanding people posting, thank you, I wish others were more like you. No offence, but how is you not feeling comfortable using a bathroom dedicated for a sex you don't identify with any different from people not being comfortable with you using a bathroom they might not identify you with? I think you're being just as insensitive towards their feelings as they are towards yours. Why is that a vast majority should accommodate you and not the other way around? This argument is so shit. Do you know why the majority of people have to accommodate a minority? Because we write it into our laws that the majority should not have tyranny over the minority. That's why we forced white Southern woman to share bathrooms with black southern woman, because those white southern women needed to sit down and learn some compassion and empathy. While racism is acquired, implying that feeling uncomfortable in the said situation is, too, is just an unfounded assumption. We can flip the issue and say that transsexuals need to learn some compassion and empathy because they, likewise, seem to have no regard for other people's feelings (you can see that clearly from transsexuals here saying that they have absolutely no obligation to disclose that part of their identity to people they get intimate with because, apparently, it's none of their business). Should a slave have regard for the moral feelings held by his master about letting blacks roam free across the country side when he takes into account his own freedom? Yes extreme, I know. Its an analogy. Feeling justified about being wrongfully enslaved does not give the slave a moral justification for doing anything he wants to the master, but it does give him the necessary perspective judge slavery. Trans people are people and they abide by the same rules of courtesy as everyone else in society until those values conflict with their very essence and quality of life, then there is a problem. Like I said, racism is acquired. Your analogy hinges on the assumption that feeling uncomfortable in the said situation is also acquired. What if it's as innate as the transsexual's identity? Its not innate as evidenced by the thousands of heterosexually identifying men in relationships wwith trans woman, not counting the fetishists. lol, what a ridiculous way of reasoning. First of all, some level of racism is likely inherent in our species, and more importantly just because thousands of people in a group containing billions do something or feel something that doesnt mean it applies to the rest. Its as ridiculous as arguing since some people want to be transgender then everyone wants to be transgender. "Heterosexual male" is not a homogenous category. At all. Racism is not inherent and can be conditioned out of society. So can the popular culture of.disgust and fear surrounding transgender people. Why should i assume that every guy is a transphobe when many are not. I dont know the number of.partners, who knows what actual number is. I do know that nearly every attractive trans woman i know has a partner and gets as much attention as an attractice cis woman, the incidence of the guys staying.into them drops if they find out but not as much as you may think. In their limited experience most people dont care so why shouls they assume that everyone would care therefore they should HAVE to tell before hand.
Racism is definately innate in some sense, I urge you to read up on the neuroscience and psychology of the topic. The fact that it can be conditioned out of us by culture doesnt take away from that biological fact.
Regarding the rest, either it is true that a lot of people care or its not. If its not true, then obviously it wouldnt be a valid inference to make. Duh. Having said that, it doesnt actually matter if its true or not here, the argument at hand is working under the assumption that the transgender person believes it to matter. If you believe a certain fact is a dealbreaker and youre then withholding that fact because you want to have sex anyways youre being immoral. Whatever that fact is. Its that simple.
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On August 01 2013 23:27 Smat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend. The one where all the media exposure trans people get is about them being jokes and freaks. Theres more depictions of trans serial killers than there are healthy and mentally stable trans view points.
That's not equivalent to "society is basically saying it's ok to treat them as subhuman."
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United Kingdom36161 Posts
On August 01 2013 23:27 Smat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend. The one where all the media exposure trans people get is about them being jokes and freaks. Theres more depictions of trans serial killers than there are healthy and mentally stable trans view points.
I'm sorry, this overblown rhetoric just weakens your arguments, not strengthens them. Certainly in British media I don't see any regular depiction of trans people as 'freaks'.
In our society, if *anyone* gets the shit beaten out of them, then they will be arrested and hopefully prosecuted, and the large majority of people would obviously agree with this course of action.
The fact that the media doesn't portray trans folk favourably does not equate to society saying it's ok to treat them as subhuman. That's just nonsense and you should stop it.
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United States42573 Posts
On August 01 2013 23:24 shinosai wrote:Show nested quote +The ethics of disclosure are constant. If you believe that consent is predicated upon a lack of a fact that you are withholding then the consent has been obtained through deception and there is a moral imperative to disclose the fact. Failure to do so is simply dismissing their right to freely consent to sex and is pretty damn immoral. It doesn't matter what the fact is, it doesn't matter that they care because they're transphobic, two wrongs don't make a right. If less people are transphobic in the future then it will be less likely that consent is predicated upon the lack of disclosing this particular fact. The argument will no longer be relevant to trans people. But the argument will not cease to be valid. Not informing someone of something upon which their consent to sex hinges will always be wrong, it may not apply to trans people in the future but that doesn't change the validity of the argument. I think we might be arguing different things here. I agree that I have an ethic to disclose if I have good reason to believe that the person has a problem with it. However, I do not agree that I *always* have an ethic to disclose merely because a particular percentage of people "appear" to be transphobic.
If 30% of the population are transphobic then you have good reason to believe that any given stranger might be transphobic. If the proportion of the population who were transphobic went down then trans people could make the argument that they assumed their partner was not transphobic because the vast majority of people are not. At that point non disclosure would be fine. Likewise if the proportion of trans people in society rose above the proportion of transphobic people then the onus would switch to the transphobic people to ask, the assumption that a partner is cis would no longer be valid.
As it is though, the trans people know their partners are making assumptions that are wrong.
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On August 01 2013 23:28 Snusmumriken wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:14 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:02 Snusmumriken wrote:On August 01 2013 22:58 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 17:18 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 16:59 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 16:49 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 16:03 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 04:58 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 04:39 fugs wrote:
Being trans and mentally disabled makes reading these arguments very uncomfortable. Believe it or not, telling a trans person that they're infertile/not real/mentally challenged/disgusting/ugly is a really mean thing to do. You don't walk up to some cancer patient and point out their infertility do you? Why do so many people think it's okay to tell trans people, to their face, things you'd never tell any other individual?
Whether you believe it's 'right' or 'wrong' for me to use the bathroom I feel comfortable in, or to wear the clothes I think are cute, date the people I am attracted to is not going to stop me. Your discomfort is a product of your own design and I'm not responsible for it.
As for all the understanding people posting, thank you, I wish others were more like you. No offence, but how is you not feeling comfortable using a bathroom dedicated for a sex you don't identify with any different from people not being comfortable with you using a bathroom they might not identify you with? I think you're being just as insensitive towards their feelings as they are towards yours. Why is that a vast majority should accommodate you and not the other way around? This argument is so shit. Do you know why the majority of people have to accommodate a minority? Because we write it into our laws that the majority should not have tyranny over the minority. That's why we forced white Southern woman to share bathrooms with black southern woman, because those white southern women needed to sit down and learn some compassion and empathy. While racism is acquired, implying that feeling uncomfortable in the said situation is, too, is just an unfounded assumption. We can flip the issue and say that transsexuals need to learn some compassion and empathy because they, likewise, seem to have no regard for other people's feelings (you can see that clearly from transsexuals here saying that they have absolutely no obligation to disclose that part of their identity to people they get intimate with because, apparently, it's none of their business). Should a slave have regard for the moral feelings held by his master about letting blacks roam free across the country side when he takes into account his own freedom? Yes extreme, I know. Its an analogy. Feeling justified about being wrongfully enslaved does not give the slave a moral justification for doing anything he wants to the master, but it does give him the necessary perspective judge slavery. Trans people are people and they abide by the same rules of courtesy as everyone else in society until those values conflict with their very essence and quality of life, then there is a problem. Like I said, racism is acquired. Your analogy hinges on the assumption that feeling uncomfortable in the said situation is also acquired. What if it's as innate as the transsexual's identity? Its not innate as evidenced by the thousands of heterosexually identifying men in relationships wwith trans woman, not counting the fetishists. lol, what a ridiculous way of reasoning. First of all, some level of racism is likely inherent in our species, and more importantly just because thousands of people in a group containing billions do something or feel something that doesnt mean it applies to the rest. Its as ridiculous as arguing since some people want to be transgender then everyone wants to be transgender. "Heterosexual male" is not a homogenous category. At all. Racism is not inherent and can be conditioned out of society. So can the popular culture of.disgust and fear surrounding transgender people. Why should i assume that every guy is a transphobe when many are not. I dont know the number of.partners, who knows what actual number is. I do know that nearly every attractive trans woman i know has a partner and gets as much attention as an attractice cis woman, the incidence of the guys staying.into them drops if they find out but not as much as you may think. In their limited experience most people dont care so why shouls they assume that everyone would care therefore they should HAVE to tell before hand. Racism is definately innate in some sense, I urge you to read up on the neuroscience and psychology of the topic. The fact that it can be conditioned out of us by culture doesnt take away from that biological fact. Regarding the rest, either it is true that a lot of people care or its not. If its not true, then obviously it wouldnt be a valid inference to make. Duh. Having said that, it doesnt actually matter however if its true or not here, the argument at hand is working under the assumption that the transgender person believes it to be so.
And my arguement was based on the fact that in reality a significant percentage of people dont care in the experience of a many trans people.
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United States42573 Posts
On August 01 2013 23:30 marvellosity wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:27 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend. The one where all the media exposure trans people get is about them being jokes and freaks. Theres more depictions of trans serial killers than there are healthy and mentally stable trans view points. I'm sorry, this overblown rhetoric just weakens your arguments, not strengthens them. Certainly in British media I don't see any regular depiction of trans people as 'freaks'. In our society, if *anyone* gets the shit beaten out of them, then they will be arrested and hopefully prosecuted, and the large majority of people would obviously agree with this course of action. The fact that the media doesn't portray trans folk favourably does not equate to society saying it's ok to treat them as subhuman. That's just nonsense and you should stop it.
There was a shitty episode of the otherwise good The IT Crowd in which a trans woman formed a relationship with a man without disclosing it and when she did eventually disclose he reacted violently. It portrayed the man as somewhat sympathetic, in retrospect that was pretty horrible.
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On August 01 2013 23:20 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 22:59 Klondikebar wrote:On August 01 2013 22:43 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:38 Plansix wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I don't want to sleep with someone who is married, but they don't disclose that either. In the grand scheme of things, I can’t really feel bad for people who get surprised by something after they have a one night stand. There is a reason we do not encourage people to have those. Sure, its not nice, but that person decided to sleep with someone with limited information on who they are. "I didn't tell them but they're having a one night stand so it's okay". This is known as two wrongs making a right. I don't really hold to that. Also their wrong by not asking enough questions before sex is not equivalent to your wrong of obtaining consent through omission of relevant information. Are you actually disputing whether obtaining consent through omission of relevant information is bad or are you saying that people who have one night stands deserve it or? I'd dispute the "obtaining consent through omission of relevant information." How is trans status relevant to a hookup? In what way is hooking up with a trans woman any different than hooking up with a cis woman? Other than "it makes me feel icky after the fact" what demonstrable difference is there? During typical hookups no one discloses completely irrelevant information about themselves. I don't submit a credit report to my hookups. I'd have to let them know if I had an STD because that could actually affect them. But simply being trans doesn't affect the partner in any way shape or form when it comes to a hookup. Also, caring about something that not only doesn't affect you but you can't even identify is patently stupid. In the scenario where you're hooking up with a trans woman who you find attractive and would not know that she was trans unless she told you, you don't get to pretend you care about trans status. You might think what they're predicating their decision to consent on is stupid. That's fine. But that doesn't give you the right to dismiss their decision to consent. It's still theirs. Whether or not their criteria are dumb does not impact their right to have their own criteria regarding sexual consent. Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:07 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 22:43 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:38 Plansix wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I don't want to sleep with someone who is married, but they don't disclose that either. In the grand scheme of things, I can’t really feel bad for people who get surprised by something after they have a one night stand. There is a reason we do not encourage people to have those. Sure, its not nice, but that person decided to sleep with someone with limited information on who they are. "I didn't tell them but they're having a one night stand so it's okay". This is known as two wrongs making a right. I don't really hold to that. Also their wrong by not asking enough questions before sex is not equivalent to your wrong of obtaining consent through omission of relevant information. Are you actually disputing whether obtaining consent through omission of relevant information is bad or are you saying that people who have one night stands deserve it or? How are you suppose to know what exactly would not be acceptable to your one night stand partnee. There seems to be this idea that most men care. What if the trans woman told some peope a few times and they didnt care (this happens a lot) shouldnt she assume from her.experience that most people wouldnt care? If half your partners think its a deal breaker and half dont why do you have to assume that everyone thinks its a deal breaker? If half your partners think it's a deal breaker and half don't then I think it's reasonable to assume that half of people will think it's a dealbreaker and because you don't want a 50% chance of obtaining consent through deception you tell all of them. It doesn't have to be everyone, you're just trying not to obtain consent by deception through reasonable disclosure. Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:09 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:47 KwarK wrote:On August 01 2013 22:42 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:32 Darkwhite wrote:On August 01 2013 22:18 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:15 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:05 shinosai wrote:On August 01 2013 22:03 Darkwhite wrote:On August 01 2013 21:55 shinosai wrote:
[quote]
I'm going to have to disagree with you via analogy, reconstructing your argument through reductio ad absurdum.
If biracials were a significant portion of the population then it'd be reasonable to interpret not asking directly as not caring but they are not. It is not a reasonable interpretation to make, it is much more likely that they are simply assuming a biracial woman is a single race woman because the vast, vast majority are. In this context the biracial woman has far more information than her partner, she knows she's an outlier where the question could realistically be relevant. In that situation it is reasonable to place the onus for bringing it up on her.
If we reconstruct the argument in this way, we can see that your real argument is not at all about how prevalent transsexualism is. Rather, there is a sort of hidden view here that there is something wrong with trans women, and therefore they ought to disclose. Without the hidden premise 'there is something wrong with trans women, and they need to disclose it' this argument makes no sense. It is not nearly as innocent as it appears.
You are not reconstructing the argument. You are making a false analogy, where you substitute something a lot of people care strongly about - i.e. transsexuality - with something very few people care about, namely mixed race. If it were true that equally many people would feel cheated, if they post hoc discovered that their partner was of mixed rather than pure heritage, as if they discovered they were transsexuals, the analogy would be accurate - I strongly doubt if this is true, unless you are from a Neo-Nazi suburb. They did used to care about it - therefore, not a false analogy, at least not on that front. People used to have their marriages annulled for deception because they did not disclose their racial status and were assumed white. edit: You would have to be *extremely* ignorant to think that this was never something that a lot of people cared strongly about. And back then not disclosing that information, no matter how unfair, arbitrary or unreasonable that "deal breaker" might be, would be taking advantage of the said person. As Snusmumriken said, two wrongs don't make a right. So as long as we're clear then, the argument seems to be: As long as the majority of the population finds something to be distasteful and it would cause them to not sleep with you, you *must* disclose your status of this distasteful thing. It does not matter if it is being a natural blonde, being biracial, liking peanutbutter, or transsexualism - the important thing is that we must not cause inconvenience to the majority of the population. Am I getting this right? Because to me this sounds completely absurd. The argument is very, very simple: If you have good reason to believe that your partner might change his mind, given information you can choose whether or not to disclose, then you have an obligation to tell your partner and let him make the call. It has nothing to do with inconveniencing the majority. Similarly, if I were to become part of a transsexual dating site, where the default assumptions would be that everybody is transsexual, I would consider myself obligated to let my partners know that I am not a transsexual myself, because they have a right to make an informed decision. On a regular dating site, where transsexuality is not the norm, the obligation would lie with the transsexuals. Except that without the 'majority' premise, the entire argument falls apart. The only reason I'm supposed to disclose to everyone I sleep with is because of the belief that the 'majority' is transphobic. Without this belief I would have no reason to believe the person is transphobic without additional evidence. You're basically asking me to assume that everyone is transphobic, ergo, the majority premise matters. Basically, if the majority of the population has a hangup about something, then it's my obligation to inform all potential partners, because that is evidence that the person might change their mind. I'm just going to have to disagree ethically with this. People are responsible for their own hangups. If you dislike promiscuous people - and I don't care if *everyone* hates promiscuous people, and promiscuous people are super rare so they might assume that you're not promiscuous - I still think it's up to you to take steps to make sure your partner isn't promiscuous. Lies by omission are nonsense - especially if the only reason it's a "lie by omission" is predicated on how prevalent transphobia is. Take some personal responsibility. It doesn't have to be everyone, nor a majority. If you think there's a 20% chance you're obtaining consent through deception and an 80% chance they don't care about it you should still tell them because a 20% chance of deceiving someone into sex is too high. Consent is important. The reason it's a lie of omission is because of their assumption you are cis whereas you are are aware that you are not. This is nothing to do with transphobia, this is to do with numbers. There are far, far more cis people than trans. The assumption that a given person is cis rather than trans is a reasonable assumption to make. I'm not sure why you think that assumption is in any way transphobic, it's not, it's just statistics. The prevalence of transphobia matters here (the argument is predicated upon it) because, within the context of the argument, the ethical criteria for disclosure is whether or not the person is transphobic. The only evidence we have to assume that the person is transphobic is 'it seems like most people are transphobic.' Therefore, the argument is predicated upon the prevalence of transphobia. To me, if the ethics of disclosure is merely based on population and is inconsistent otherwise, then there is no real imperative as the ethic is weak. You frame it as statistics, but this is a bit disingenuous. You make it sound like it's simply "most people are cis, few people are trans, therefore trans people must inform cis people". But this obfuscates the point. Trans people wouldn't have to inform cis people that they are trans *unless* the cis people are transphobic. Therefore, the argument hinges upon the prevalence of transphobia. I think that if the ethics of disclosure is ever predicated upon something as arbitrary as the beliefs of a population at a particular time, then the ethical imperative is rather weak and unconvincing. If not informing someone that I'm trans is okay in the future because transphobia dies off, then I'm going to be rather skeptical that I have an ethic to disclose in the present. The ethics of disclosure are constant. If you believe that consent is predicated upon a lack of a fact that you are withholding then the consent has been obtained through deception and there is a moral imperative to disclose the fact. Failure to do so is simply dismissing their right to freely consent to sex and is pretty damn immoral. It doesn't matter what the fact is, it doesn't matter that they care because they're transphobic, two wrongs don't make a right. If less people are transphobic in the future then it will be less likely that consent is predicated upon the lack of disclosing this particular fact. The argument will no longer be relevant to trans people. But the argument will not cease to be valid. Not informing someone of something upon which their consent to sex hinges will always be wrong, it may not apply to trans people in the future but that doesn't change the validity of the argument.
Your criteria for consent are your own. If being trans is a deal breaker or that's something you want to know, you have to ask that. You're right, it's not really rational to assume that every woman is possibly trans because they're such a small part of the population. But it's not the woman's job to assume that's your deal breaker. If it's not on your mind enough to ask, then it's probably not a deal breaker.
And I'm not saying people aren't allowed to have random, dumbass criteria. I'm saying that you shouldn't expect your partner to assume criteria that don't affect you in the slightest. If you never had sex with people who owned Volkswagons, I wouldn't volunteer that I own a Jetta. Not because I'm lying by omission, but because I why on earth would I think it mattered?
Sure sure, transphobia is a lot more common than volksphobia so we might just assume every man is transphobic and that it's a common enough deal breaker that trans women should volunteer the information. But do you not see a problem with just assuming that everyone is an asshole? If a trans woman is just supposed to assume everyone who is sexually attracted to her is transphobic...how is that healthy? How is that normal? And how is that not just as oppressive as calling by their original sex?
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On August 01 2013 23:30 marvellosity wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:27 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend. The one where all the media exposure trans people get is about them being jokes and freaks. Theres more depictions of trans serial killers than there are healthy and mentally stable trans view points. I'm sorry, this overblown rhetoric just weakens your arguments, not strengthens them. Certainly in British media I don't see any regular depiction of trans people as 'freaks'. In our society, if *anyone* gets the shit beaten out of them, then they will be arrested and hopefully prosecuted, and the large majority of people would obviously agree with this course of action. The fact that the media doesn't portray trans folk favourably does not equate to society saying it's ok to treat them as subhuman. That's just nonsense and you should stop it.
It was hyperbolic for sure. The point is society sucks. Threads like this are great though.
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On August 01 2013 23:27 Smat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:21 marvellosity wrote:On August 01 2013 23:18 Smat wrote:On August 01 2013 23:13 maybenexttime wrote:On August 01 2013 22:31 KwarK wrote:
And it really, really sucks that violent homophobes do horrible things to trans people but tricking them into what they would view as gay sex is not going to help the situation. I strongly believe that if thinking it's okay not to disclose such information was not as prevalent (since it seems to be, for various reasons), then there would be much less violence in that regard. The reason why I'm saying that is because those people are not aggressive because they have anger management problems, but because (assuming sex did happen or was about to happen), they indeed were tricked into sex they did not consent to. Your a fool if you think even something as significant as a plurality of trans people dont disclose before sex. Men beat the shit out.of and kill transgender people because society is basically saying its ok to treat them as subhuman. Not sure what society you live in my friend. The one where all the media exposure trans people get is about them being jokes and freaks. Theres more depictions of trans serial killers than there are healthy and mentally stable trans view points.
To be fair, there are plenty of shows that depict them as sane, normal people as well. In general, serial killers are depicted as mental unstable for whatever reason and there are a number of ways the media depicts that mental instability. Clearly there are examples of terrible writing and depictions of trans, but every group gets that treatment by the media.
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United Kingdom36161 Posts
I'd gently suggest that hyperbole is not a winning strategy.
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On August 01 2013 23:35 marvellosity wrote:
I'd gently suggest that hyperbole is not a winning strategy.
It worked for Charlie Sheen.
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On August 01 2013 23:35 marvellosity wrote:
I'd gently suggest that hyperbole is not a winning strategy.
Society tells people its ok to react violently when they put a move on a trans woman. Do you disagree?
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United Kingdom36161 Posts
On August 01 2013 23:36 Klondikebar wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2013 23:35 marvellosity wrote:
I'd gently suggest that hyperbole is not a winning strategy. It worked for Charlie Sheen.
IT WORKED FOR EVERYONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
no wait :D
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