Anybody trying to read this: I am still editing it. It's not finished
I had a long twitter conversation with some folks about trans issues.
This has been bouncing around a lot in my head. First, having my ex and my eldest child be trans makes it very personal, but also the format of this discussion being on twitter was confusing and alienating. Twitter is not a great place to discuss issues that take more than a few interchanges. Blogs are more sophisticated. So I wanted to add some more information.
Safety issues
One issue had to do with the safety of restrooms.
Some people participating and reading seemed to be unaware that transgender people are being attacked. I tweeted a link to wikipedia where someone is keeping a list of trans people who have been attacked for being trans. wikipedia list of trans people being attacked Plus there was a huffington post article Huffington Post article about trans people being attacked Clearly trans people are being attacked.
Then there was the issue of women being attacked, specifically, at Target. Here's some information about that. women attacked at Target . I pointed out that none of the attackers were alleged to be trans.
My ex told me that he goes to some event called Transgender Day of Remembrance about trans people who have been killed for being trans. This is obviously one of those high drama events about tragic loss of people.
On the other hand, in retrospect, I do have to concede that the number of cis women who are attacked for being women dwarfs the number of trans people who are being attacked for being trans.
Detransitioning
There was an assertion that most trans people regret their decision, and specifically that Caitlin Jenner regretted her decision. With respect to Caitlin, she has most emphatically denied that she regrets transitioning. Caitlyn Jenner denies sex change regret
I have certainly heard trans people denying that most regret it
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brynn-tannehill/myths-about-transition-regrets_b_6160626.html
Pretending
This person I was talking to had the impression that "trans" people are "pretending" to be the other gender. This word is wrong. I would accept words like "obsessed" or "delusional," but not "pretending." "Pretending" implies that people know that what they are doing is fake. That is not the case with trans people. That is the case with many cross dressers. Many cross dressers know they are pretending to be of the other gender. Trans people believe they are of the other gender and are in the wrong body.
Biblical interpretation
I'm not sure why I care about this. I'm not a fundamentalist. I don't believe that the Bible is literally true. I did grow up in Christian churches, though, so I do care what the Bible says. A lot of fundamentalists don't seem to recognize that most Christians are *not* fundamentalists. They seem to think that fundamentalism is the only way.
The following instances of scripture were cited to me.
Deut 22:5 Gal 3:28 Deut 23:1 Mat 6:25 Ro 1:24-32
Let's just look at these passages in more detail.
Deut 22:5
5 A woman must not wear men’s clothing, nor a man wear women’s clothing, for the Lord your God detests anyone who does this.
Of course, a transwoman does not think she is a man, so her desire to wear women's clothing, in her mind, would not violate this provision.
But, even putting that aside, this passage is part of the Torah, the firs five books of the Bible. For Jews, this part of the Bible is particularly important, and is to be paid the utmost attention to.
Most Christians, however, while enjoying reading the Torah, typically do not obey many of its provisions. During this interchange of tweets, I gave the example of eating pork, which most Christians do, even though the Torah prohibits it. Some Christians even take the position that the New Testament supercedes the Torah, despite Jesus having said that he would not take on jot or tittle from the law.
Still, I have to be a bit skeptical of a person who may eat pork, swear oaths on the Bible, &c citing the Torah to me, when they don't observe other provisions of it.
It's also ironic to me, because conservatives were asserting, when Hillary Clinton was running against Rudy Giuliani for NY State Senate, that he was more conservative than she and that she was a dangerous liberal. Then we saw photos of him dancing on stage in a chorus line in drag. I always wondered what all those conservative Republicans thought, when they were asserting that he was more conservative.
Gal 3:28
28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
I find it mysterious that this passage would be cited as prohibiting people from doing gender reassignment. This seems to be a statement of acceptance, not a statement of prohibition. If anything, I would cite this as an argument for why it would be ok, and not make a difference if one was to transition, since everyone is one anyway.
Mat 6:25
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?
This statement seems to be about trusting God and not worrying about whether will have food, drink, or clothing. I fail to see how this could be interpreted as relating to the appropriateness of transitioning.
Ro 1:24-32
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
I see this passage as relating to gay people -- not that I agree with it -- but it does not seem to be dealing with trans people. I don't think my ex or my son is having sex with anyone, actually. Caitlin has said she is asexual.
In any case, I don't think that a Christian need worry about whether these passages are prohibiting people from changing gender -- not that the person who cited them to me was willing to consider that her interpretation might have been wrong.
In any case, I don't think that a Christian need worry about whether these passages are prohibiting people from changing gender -- not that the person who cited them to me was willing to consider that her interpretation might have been wrong.
First, some screen shots of the discussion. It's hard to capture the sequence in a 3 way twitter conversation, because people are writing responses sometimes not seeing that other responses have already occurred. If you open a tweet, you can see what conversation it is part of, but sometimes several tweets share the same history.
This has been bouncing around a lot in my head. First, having my ex and my eldest child be trans makes it very personal, but also the format of this discussion being on twitter was confusing and alienating. Twitter is not a great place to discuss issues that take more than a few interchanges. Blogs are more sophisticated.
Safety issues
One issue had to do with the safety of restrooms.
Some people participating and reading seemed to be unaware that transgender people are being attacked. I tweeted a link to wikipedia where someone is keeping a list of trans people who have been attacked for being trans. https://t.co/17SSil5ouA Plus there was a huffington post article https://t.co/4tfLYvBTPq Clearly trans people are being attacked.
Then there was the issue of women being attacked, specifically, at Target. Here's some information about that. https://t.co/FOeuRSF0MK . I pointed out that none of the attackers were alleged to be trans.
My ex told me that he goes to some event called Transgender Day of Remembrance about trans people who have been killed for being trans. This is obviously one of those high drama events about tragic loss of people.
On the other hand, in retrospect, I do have to concede that the number of cis women who are attacked for being women dwarfs the number of trans people who are being attacked for being trans.
Detransitioning
There was an assertion that most trans people regret their decision, and specifically that Caitlin Jenner regretted her decision. With respect to Caitlin, she has most emphatically denied that she regrets transitioning. https://t.co/dwfyLZOQIy
I have certainly heard trans people denying that most regret it
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brynn-tannehill/myths-about-transition-regrets_b_6160626.html
Biblical interpretation
I'm not sure why I care about this. I'm not a fundamentalist. I don't believe that the Bible is literally true. I did grow up in Christian churches, though, so I do care what the Bible says. A lot of fundamentalists don't seem to recognize that most Christians are *not* fundamentalists. They seem to think that fundamentalism is the only way.
The following instances of scripture were cited to me.
Deut 22:5 Gal 3:28 Deut 23:1 Mat 6:25 Ro 1:24-32
Let's just look at these passages in more detail.
Deut 22:5
5 A woman must not wear men’s clothing, nor a man wear women’s clothing, for the Lord your God detests anyone who does this.
Of course, a transwoman does not think she is a man, so her desire to wear women's clothing, in her mind, would not violate this provision.
But, even putting that aside, this passage is part of the Torah, the firs five books of the Bible. For Jews, this part of the Bible is particularly important, and is to be paid the utmost attention to.
Most Christians, however, while enjoying reading the Torah, typically do not obey many of its provisions. During this interchange of tweets, I gave the example of eating pork, which most Christians do, even though the Torah prohibits it. Some Christians even take the position that the New Testament supercedes the Torah, despite Jesus having said that he would not take on jot or tittle from the law.
Still, I have to be a bit skeptical of a person who may eat pork, swear oaths on the Bible, &c citing the Torah to me.
Gal 3:28
28 There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
I find it mysterious that this passage would be cited as prohibiting people from doing gender reassignment. This seems to be a statement of acceptance, not a statement of prohibition. If anything, I would cite this as an argument for why it would be ok, and not make a difference if one was to transition, since everyone is one anyway.
Mat 6:25
25 “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?
This statement seems to be about trusting God and not worrying about whether will have food, drink, or clothing. I fail to see how this could be interpreted as relating to the appropriateness of transitioning.
Ro 1:24-32
24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
I see this passage as relating to gay people -- not that I agree with it -- but it does not seem to be dealing with trans people. I don't think my ex or my son is having sex with anyone, actually. Caitlin has said she is asexual.
In any case, I don't think that a Christian need worry about whether these passages are prohibiting people from changing gender -- not that the person who cited them to me was willing to consider that her interpretation might have been wrong.
In any case, I don't think that a Christian need worry about whether these passages are prohibiting people from changing gender -- not that the person who cited them to me was willing to consider that her interpretation might have been wrong.
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