No, not should have been; FEEL how they should have been.
I'm not implying that at all. I am saying that certain people feel that their physical gender does not match the gender that represents there true identity. Their body is not the physical gender they FEEL it should have been. The way they FEEL about it is what makes it a problem. If they didn't care one way or the other, it wouldn't matter, and wouldn't be an issue.Wow. You're implying a lot, there. You're implying there's a way things "should have been" that they are not. But how do you know what "should have been"?
No, natural laws don't have intention, or care about anything, but people do. People have feelings, wants, emotional needs; you are perfectly aware of this, so why say something so idiotic?But who "intended" that things "should have been" anything? Are we not mere products, according to your worldview, of accidental forces that didn't "want" anything to happen at all. Heck, natural laws are not even capable of "wanting" anything, or "intending" that anything "should" happen. They just make stuff go as it does. Thus, there's no way things "should have" been...there's only what is, what exists, what's here, right?
No, let's just stick to what body-dysphoric people think and feel about their situation.Or shall we anthropomorphize? Shall we say there's a "Mother Nature," who thinks that body-dysphoric people "should" be other than they are?
No, I am not saying that. I am saying there are, it seems, some people who cannot live a satisfactory life as a person of the gender that matches their physical body. Some of them may well be suffering from mental illness, and need to be treated accordingly, but not all, and I'm sure the professionals who deal with and treat these people are far better placed than you or I to decide what is an appropriate course of action.The problem is this: not whether body-dysphoric people deserve compassion, understanding and help, but rather what compassion, understanding and help actually look like. You say that telling them they're fine, and encouraging their delusion is "acceptance" and compassion.
My money is also on the person who respects reality, biology, and scientific facts, such as a qualified medical practitioner, rather than, say, some unqualified bloke who thinks the answer to everything is in the Bible.So we can both be thinking compassionately, but coming up with opposite expressions of compassion. One of us will turn out to be right, and the other will turn out to be wrong. But my money's on the person who respects reality, biology, and scientific facts.
So is someone who falls in love, wants to get married and start a family delusional? What do those feelings and emotional desires refer to that is real in a way that an emotional desire to live your life as someone of another gender isn't. One is normal and the other isn't, you might say, but why are feelings and emotions to be disregarded solely because they aren't normal? They are no less compelling, and will not result in less anguish if unfulfilled.IC wrote:That they exist is real. What they refer to is not. That's what a "delusion" means.Harbal wrote:Feelings and emotions are not delusions, they are very real to those experiencing them.
Belief in God is just a feeling. It does not refer to anything that can be seen or touched, and your delusion is even worse for the rest of us, because you insist that we should all change our whole approach to life based on it. According to your own reckoning, you need to be treated for mental illness.
And God made me with too much intelligence to be able to accept the logical possibility of his existence, so why don't you encourage me to accept myself as God made me?IC wrote:It doesn't actually tell us what's "driving them" to it. What it does tell us, though, is that whatever we're doing, it's not working. And right now, what we're providing is that euphemistically-named "gender-affirming care," which really means encouraging them to ignore their biology, be restentful of their lot in life, and refuse to accept themselves as God made them. Not a very loving thing to do, ultimately.Harbal wrote:That suggests it is the condition that drives them to it, and not the treatment that is responsible.
When you produce your medical qualifications, I might take your view seriously, but not before.What I'm pointing out is that body dysphoric people, both before and after transition, are the most self-loathing, suicidal kinds of people on the planet. And that, it seems to me, argues they need mental health care, not an indulgent and ultimately uncaring society to drive them deeper into their mental illness.
And I thought I was being ironic when I said you needed treating for mental illness.IC wrote:I would no doubt struggle. ButI hope I would thank God for what He had made me, accept the challenge of it, and become a better person through overcoming my confusion and learning to live gratefully for the things I have been given.Harbal wrote:If you woke up tomorrow and found your body had turned female, how cheerfully would you go about your day?
I neither like nor dislike the idea of "transitioners", but I do dislike the idea of people suffering needlessly. I don't feel any need to defend that feeling just because you object to it.Objective? You say there is no such thing. So if it's merely subjective, you're just saying, "Harbal likes the idea of transitioners,
I think I could give you a reason for my having any of my moral opinions, and the fact that you would refuse to accept it as valid would merely be your choice, but not necessarily everyone -or even anyone- else's choice. And your stated grounds for your moral assertions would no doubt undermine your credibility in my estimation, of course.IC wrote:Not with any reasons. Your own viewpoint would undermine your credibility in the condemnation.Harbal wrote:I could condemn or approve of your position, just as you could with mine.
I think everybody's moral judgement is subjective, including yours, and my only means of assessment is by comparison with my own moral judgement.When somebody comes along and says morally-judgmental things that their own reasoning says are purely "subjective" anyway, no more than their personal feeling-of-the-moment, should you listen to them? It's hard to see why you would.