People using cases of detransition to invalidate trans people

This is one of those topics complicated topics. There are cases where some people do regret transitioning. Most though do not regret transitioning. Some people like to look at the small group that do regret it and then throw that in the face of transgender people who are planning to transition or have already transitioned.

I think that the transgender community sometimes pushes the idea that transitioning will fix everything. I remember reading articles telling transgender people that the only way that they will ever feel better about themselves is to transition. I bring this up because I think that this can push people that are not truly ready into making the decision to transition. I've even read some articles that say that if a person does not transition then they are not "really transgender". This is problematic because it does not even take a person's circumstances into account.

I think that people see the detransitiong stories, and see how pushy some people can be about transitioning and these kinds of stories come out and are shared. I also think that some see the stories of people detransitiong due to monetary concerns and that will use that to create these articles as well.

There is also the fact that most of the time the informed consent process is not fully explained. I have seen it in some cases described as just signing a letter and then getting hormones. So, some people tend to get pretty reactionary when this topic is brought up. This is what I think causes a lot of people to fall into the mentality that in order to transition you have to be diagnosed with gender identity disorder or gender dysphoria. I use both those terms because some places still use gender identity disorder as a diagnosis.

Really, at the end of the day, I think that there is a lot of fear and misinformation out there about transgender people. That fear and misinformation impacts all transgender people in many different ways, and this is one of them. Since trans people are a "new" topic to many, they tend to react with fear, and with fear comes the regulations. We've seen a lot of them in the United states this year. From bathrooms to medical care and treatment in correctional facilities, there have been a lot of reactionary policies and procedures put into place.

My hope is that we are heading to a place where we as transgender people will not be feared, looked down upon, or treated like we are mentally ill just because we are transgender. The reality is that I think that we are going the opposite direction right now. While there have been positive strides, like the gender identity disorder being renamed gender dysphoria and more representation of transgender people in popular culture, there has also been the negative side. That negative side has been with increased publicity there has been increased scrutiny. I think that this is the reason that more of these articles are being created and shared.

That all being said, a lot of people tend to hold these "trans people are scary" mindsets until something challenges that. I have a few coworkers that were terrified that we had a transgender client at the time. These coworkers did not know about me. I started to have conversations with them, and once I knew that they would not be freaked out, I came out to them. They were shocked. This challenged their view, because they realized that they had been working with a "scary transgender person" for a while. They realized I was just like them, and not something to be feared.

We all can play a part in helping people to realize that we are not scary, different or in need of a mental diagnosis to explain who we are. That being said though, never put yourself in a dangerous situation.

I cannot speak much on the issue of transgender children, as I don't know too much about that. I just hope that in these cases parents, children and the doctors are working to make the kid as comfortable as they can be.

 

I should have clarified in my post, I use transgender as the umbrella term. This is a bit of a habit of mine, I was taught that transsexual people are under the transgender umbrella. Also my region tends to shy away from the usage of the word transsexual. Preferred termernology tends to differ depending on location, and that is something I often forget. Where I abbreviated everything as trans, that was my autocorrect. I typed everything on my cell phone at 2am Ohio time, so I'm surprised that there were not any more typos in it.

I agree that those that regret often do not follow the appropriate medical routes to do so. It sucks, because a lot of the time the people that transition in this manner do so because they do not have any place in their area that handles transgender or transsexual health care. So, it really is a lose lose situation. A person may feel the need to take drastic measures due to not having access to care, and that is really sad.