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[Otakumegane]

Quick google search turned up nothing so I figured I'd ask GAF.

Due to my single-sided deafness, I sometimes read articles about deaf culture and how certain deaf peoples disagree of being "cured" of their deafness through implants and whatnot. Some of them apparently also believe that it would be better for their children not to receive treatment for their deaf children at an age where the child really doesn't have an understanding on the matter.

This got me thinking, we believe that causes of gender dysphoria (don't really know a better term for this so if this offends people tell me a better option to put here) usually arise due to prenatal complications regarding certain hormone receptions (again, couldn't find exact science because I don't know what I'm searching for). The "solution" in this sort of scenario would be to induce hormone therapy before birth so that a born male would identify itself as a male instead of possibly being born identifying as female.

So then here lies the issue with this. Firstly, do trans people believe that if given the choice, they would prefer being comfortable with the assigned sex of their body? What are their viewpoints on "cisgendering" a baby that might have been born transgender?

We are a long way from this sort of treatment anyway due to a lack of information and what's more a lack of the infrastructure and political advancements needed to really tackle more intrusive prenatal care in general in the U.S. but it may not be far off int he future where we can really identify the causes before birth and have the technology to do something about it.

I mean this has parent's rights and the law all entwined into one complicated mess if the tech is there, but I believe that to society, absolutely it is preferential to eliminate the potentiality for gender dysphoria prenatally than multi-year hormone therapies later in life to transition in both terms of cost and time. Is there any discussion in the trans community on this issue?

 

[shnurgleton]

Hoo boy

 

[KmA]

Just gonna give my unsolicited cisgender opinion here...

I personally wouldn't want a cure for homosexuality as a gay man. The issues surrounding being gay and trans are social issues that's where the stigma comes from. It's society that needs to fix itself not us.

 

[emag]

Can we wait until we such therapies are more than just a pipedream or at least until we have a better understanding of the biological factors involved before we have this conversation?

 

[StarCreator]

This is a rough question and I'm not sure if my opinion really means much, but from what I've seen, transgender people go through hell - not just socially, but with HRT and extensive surgeries, none of which really makes the person feel whole. If there was a surefire way of preventing that kind of suffering in the first place, it's worth consideration.

 

[Otakumegane]

Just gonna give my unsolicited cisgender opinion here...

I personally wouldn't want a cure for homosexuality as a gay man. The issues surrounding being gay and trans are social issues that's where the stigma comes from. It's society that needs to fix itself not us.

In regards to this comparison (which completely slipped my mind), being gay doesn't require the sort of medical treatment that being transgender does.

Which i why I bring up the deaf case as an example which relates to the deaf community refusing treatments on their same deaf kids which "could" be treated on this issue but they have no choice in the matter.

I mean for me personally if the tech was there I would have loved to not be born deaf (partially) regardless of my choice or not at that time.

 

[Westbahnhof]

Just gonna give my unsolicited cisgender opinion here...

I personally wouldn't want a cure for homosexuality as a gay man. The issues surrounding being gay and trans are social issues that's where the stigma comes from. It's society that needs to fix itself not us.

Hm. I don't know if that's a good comparison, as transgender people often want/require medication, which can cause financial problems, and so on.
I'm just saying that the hardships do not simply stem from discrimination.

Now, I still think stuff like this shouldn't be touched, but ultimately, it's up to the parents, the mother.

It's super complicated.
I've heard deaf people tell me they'd choose to be born deaf again if they could redo things.
Of course, this is not always the case, but I'm just thinking, if happy, supported deaf people would not want to be changed, it's probably even more the case for people who are simply transgender.

But then again, many deaf people would probably change.
Idk.

Btw, what would you do if you could make a change in your past, OP?

 

[Poor GRIMES]

Bumping for visibility and I want to see TransGAF in here relaying their knowledge.

 

[Kinsei]

I'd be for it. Being trans is a living hell.

 

[NoblesseOblige]

Everybody is uncomfortable with their body in some way. And while a person's sex not aligning to their gender is more considerable than most I think maybe a lot of that has to do with societal interpretations of gender coupled with the harsh prejudice against transgender people.

 

[kiguel182]

The way you describe it seems like you are changing the gender of the baby to match it’s genitais. From a cis perspective I think it’s a little morally wrong since it’s a pretty big change.

I’ve always put it as the hormones decide the gender and not the genitals. Wouldn’t that mean a baby that would be a trans woman is now a man? Seems radical.

I’m ignorant about how the science behind this stuff so sorry if I’m saying something dumb and wrong.

 

[Fuchsdh]

If you could cure dysphoria prenatally safely? I don't see why there'd be a problem.

I think the distinction you can make between gender dysphoria and something like homosexuality is that, if you magically could handwave away all the prejudice out there, a gay man or woman's only inherent disadvantage outside of bigotry is a smaller potential dating pool. There's huge health risks to trans therapies, and in extreme cases even if you're letting a kid from a young age identify as another gender... they're physically not going to be. Solving that before it was ever a problem would be a huge benefit to many people's lives.

Honestly I can't see much of a good argument for making sure your kid is deaf, but at that point you're getting into some pretty messy moral arguments about parental rights.

 

[Skellig Gra]

Considering the tragic suicide rate for trans people I think its something that should be explored.

 

[Platy]

The "solution" in this sort of scenario would be to induce hormone therapy before birth so that a born male would identify itself as a male instead of possibly being born identifying as female.

That is the problem.

You are changing the brain, not the body.

 

[Inuhanyou]

i think stem cell research should only be used on humans to cure deficiencies like abnormal diseases and DNA degeneration. Don't change the natural sex of children and dont touch their mental capacitors. That's dangerous and "factory mass produce" level.

 

[Mushroomer25]

Can we wait until we such therapies are more than just a pipedream or at least until we have a better understanding of the biological factors involved before we have this conversation?

Yeah, there's not much merit in just discussing a hypothetical 'miracle cure', because the answers are never quite that easy.

Referencing back to the deaf conversation, a lot of the resistance from the deaf community to 'assimilate' comes from the current solutions to provide hearing being rather sub-par. The experience isn't 1:1 with somebody who was naturally born to have hearing, so the decision is much harder than 'do you want to hear?'.

It's absolutely inevitable that any sort of prenatal hormonal treatment would have similar complications, especially since our present understanding of the root cause of dysphoria is nowhere near what it would need to be for most parents to even consider this option for their child.

 

[kirblar]

Dysphoria is caused by a mismatch between the brain and the body. We change the body because we cannot change the brain.

Hypothetically, therapy to try and alter the brain makeup so that the mismatch doesn't exist seems absolutely fine- but it seems like this is something that would only ever be a hypothetical given the amount of risk already involved in a standard pregnancy.

 

[badcrumble]

Nobody wants their kids to experience dysphoria, sure. But locating dysphoria in hormones and not in gender-socializing is never a solution that'll work. Plenty of trans women first go into the military/bodybuilding/whatever in order to try to butch themselves up and 'fix' themselves before coming to terms with themselves and transitioning, for example. Any kind of 'there are two kinds of people' social framework is bound to fail.

 

[Zaru]

Due to my single-sided deafness, I sometimes read articles about deaf culture and how certain deaf peoples disagree of being "cured" of their deafness through implants and whatnot. Some of them apparently also believe that it would be better for their children not to receive treatment for their deaf children at an age where the child really doesn't have an understanding on the matter.

Is this anything more than people trying to idealize their own unfortunate position as a coping mechanism? I mean you've got groups of women advocating for the existence of genital mutilation. Coping is one hell of a drug, but not something that rational decisions should be based on.

 

[PSqueak]

I don't think you can actually "cisgender" a person.

The spectrum of gender identity is much more complex than that, and the whole concept of gender identity goes beyond biology, i find hard to believe it's something that could be affixed prenatally.

Furthermore, Gender identity is a form of self expression, how would you be able to set a baby to "cisgender" before the baby is even born and thus haven't been able to descover their identity?

 

[Platy]

Fixing a children's brain is like taking out the entire auditory system as a way to cure deafness. You don't have a problem in your auditory system because there is no more auditory system !

 

[The Faceless Master]

sounds amazing. what about gene editing for race bending? i'd like my kids to be able to pass as white males too, would make their lives so much easier.

 

[HellforLeather]

Due to my single-sided deafness, I sometimes read articles about deaf culture and how certain deaf peoples disagree of being "cured" of their deafness through implants and whatnot. Some of them apparently also believe that it would be better for their children not to receive treatment for their deaf children at an age where the child really doesn't have an understanding on the matter.

Im more baffled by this part. Why wouldnt you want your deafness cured? Let alone deprive your child of some kind of cure?

 

[mollipen]

I think a concrete answer on a fix is hard because we don't know the exacts of what makes someone transgender. Like, is it a switch that can be flipped one way or another with ease? Is it a mental defect? Is it a point in development at which things go wrong? Or is it a deeper screw-up in utero that causes the problem? Basically, the question comes down to this: if someone is born male but identifies as female for example, were they supposed to have been male but not everything got set right, or were they supposed to have been female but certain parts of their development (such as the sex of their body) didn't follow the plans?

At the end of the day, though, I think it's better to not have people be transgender. If we had a realistic fix that would have the child develop normally in the way they were meant to, why wouldn't we want that for them? Being trans ranges from mildly hell to ungodly hell, and if people don't need to be subjected to that, we should help help them not be. I think it's hard for a trans person to say they wish they were the opposite of how they identify, but that, at the same time, they'd also wish they hand't had to deal with that disconnect in the first place.

And I think being trans and being gay are two totally different things, so the concern over what it means for one if you're curing the other doesn't bother me.

 

[Otakumegane]

I don't think you can actually "cisgender" a person.

The spectrum of gender identity is much more complex than that, and the whole concept of gender identity goes beyond biology, i find hard to believe it's something that could be affixed prenatally.

Furthermore, Gender identity is a form of self expression, how would you be able to set a baby to "cisgender" before the baby is even born and thus haven't been able to descover their identity?

From what I understand, we can pretty accurately predict the potential for a child being born cisgender by reading how sensitive they are to estrogen and testosterone. Another hormone/horomons? controls this sensitivity and an issue in that specific process can develop into the person being trans later in life.

The hormone therapy hypothetically would try to match the composition of the hormones sensitivity to their sex so they don't develop dysphoria later on.


Now I'm not saying we SHOULD do this, but we need to have this discussion early on so we understand what we CAN do in the future and discuss from then on out, as we have to carefully weigh the moral and medical costs of doing this vs transitioning.

 

[RedHill]

Just gonna give my unsolicited cisgender opinion here...

I personally wouldn't want a cure for homosexuality as a gay man. The issues surrounding being gay and trans are social issues that's where the stigma comes from. It's society that needs to fix itself not us.

Being gay is only considered a deflection from normal because of toxic religion standards. Same as gender. If we didn't have toxic gender and sexuality constructs, none of this stigma towards any sort of LGBT person would exist. Being straight and cis isn't the standard of "normal" if you remove toxic behavior.

 

[PSqueak]

From what I understand, we can pretty accurately predict the potential for a child being born cisgender by reading how sensitive they are to estrogen and testosterone. Another hormone controls this sensitivity and an issue in that specific process can develop into the person being trans later in life.

The hormone therapy hypothetically would try to match the composition of the hormones sensitivity to their sex so they don't develop dysphoria later on.

That sounds more like predicting potential for dysphoria, which can be a factor for a person identifying themselves as a different gender but is not 100% necessary.

Im sure a lot of people, specially actual trans members, can explain it better than i do, but as far as i understand the expression of gender identity is beyond just the biological components.

 

[Otakumegane]

Im more baffled by this part. Why wouldnt you want your deafness cured? Let alone deprive your child of some kind of cure?

Hell if I know but it is a VERY real thing.

 

[Ri'Orius]

Fixing a children's brain is like taking out the entire auditory system as a way to cure deafness. You don't have a problem in your auditory system because there is no more auditory system !

Look, I love a good hyperbole as much as the next guy, but uh, this may be overdoing it a touch.

Yeah, when we're talking about a teenager, fixing the brain rather than the body sounds horrible. But this is about prenatal. A time when the baby's brain is already being subjected to various hormones to shape it. If those hormones are out of whack and will create dysphoria, I see no inherent problem with correcting that issue.

 

[Platy]

Being gay is only considered a deflection from normal because of toxic religion standards. Same as gender. If we didn't have toxic gender and sexuality constructs, none of this stigma towards any sort of LGBT person would exist. Being straight and cis isn't the standard of "normal" if you remove toxic behavior.

 

[emag]

Im more baffled by this part. Why wouldnt you want your deafness cured? Let alone deprive your child of some kind of cure?

Because:

1) You're proud of who you are, and deafness is a part of that identity
2) You don't want the social and cultural destruction that goes along with eugenics

 

[Laiza]

This is 100% pointless.

If society wouldn't stigmatize it and if we treated dysphoria as a genuine medical condition that can be covered by insurance there would be no reason to bother in the first place. Furthermore, doing so would decrease the amount of diversity in the world, something I would consider a major no-no, especially considering this is not a condition that is either untreatable or seriously debilitating.

On top of that, this doesn't address ambiguous scenarios like non-binary identifying individuals (see: myself).

Personally, I think the world would be a much better place if humanity were more diverse as a whole - if we were all forced to mingle instead of self-segregating to the degree we do today, there would be a whole lot less of that mindless hate that prompts this kind of thought process in the first place.

 

[Otakumegane]

Because:

1) You're happy with who you are, and deafness is a part of that identity
2) You don't want the social and cultural destruction that goes along with eugenics

Deaf parents refusing are refusing cochlear implants for their deaf children AFTER they are born.

 

[tamaster92]

id rather see it the other way where its possible to see gender at birth and correct for that.

Messing with the brain sounds bad to me

(am trans girl and if id of been physically born female then my life would of been 100000000000000% better regardless of any sexism in the world)

 

[Fenderputty]

Just gonna give my unsolicited cisgender opinion here...

I personally wouldn't want a cure for homosexuality as a gay man. The issues surrounding being gay and trans are social issues that's where the stigma comes from. It's society that needs to fix itself not us.

At face value, this seems different because being trans is being born in a body you don't identify with. Why would you not be comfortable with your sexuality if not for societal reason?

 

[Steel]

I'd be for it. Being trans is a living hell.

To an extent I'd agree. I have serious doubts on the actual science behind this therapy, though.

 

[LCGeek]

id rather see it the other way where its possible to see gender at birth and correct for that.

Messing with the brain sounds bad to me

(am trans girl and if id of been physically born female then my life would of been 100000000000000% better regardless of any sexism in the world)

Why don't we let intersex and tg people be instead of trying to correct anything. The only thing that needs correcting is society itself, but hey lets fix others instead of ourselves.

I don't disagree with the notion, but we have no practical solutions except one most of the species won't participate in due to ignorance, fear or belief systems.

Messing with the process you want is equally as dangerous as the mind.

 

[Red Arremer]

The problem I see is that this would not address the problem at its core, which is that society does not accept transgender people.
While transition is difficult, expensive and even risky (which is more something we should invest research into), putting the choice of gender/sex into the hands of the parents enables many moral problems.

First of all, there's varying degrees of transgender identity. Some people don't want to undergo full transition, for instance.

Then there's slippery slopes like "fixing" things such as race or sexuality presenting themselves as being real possibilities given the current societal situation.

The biggest hurdle, frankly, is not cisgendering transgender people prenatally, it's fixing society's view of them and other minorities, as well as the still existing gender stereotyping. We can bring up this discussion once bigotry towards trans people has been eradicated.

 

[Zoe]

id rather see it the other way where its possible to see gender at birth and correct for that.

Messing with the brain sounds bad to me

(am trans girl and if id of been physically born female then my life would of been 100000000000000% better regardless of any sexism in the world)

Physically altering the body and maintaining those changes for life is significantly more invasive though than theoretically altering brain chemistry with hormones.

 

[Otakumegane]

id rather see it the other way where its possible to see gender at birth and correct for that.

Messing with the brain sounds bad to me

(am trans girl and if id of been physically born female then my life would of been 100000000000000% better regardless of any sexism in the world)

This is an interesting thought but I'm not sure if this is possible due to the nature of XY and XX chromosomes (which is decided at fertilization) and their involvement in fetal growth.

 

[PSqueak]

id rather see it the other way where its possible to see gender at birth and correct for that.

Messing with the brain sounds bad to me

(am trans girl and if id of been physically born female then my life would of been 100000000000000% better regardless of any sexism in the world)

I have seen people throw the idea of putting children on puberty blockers until they figure out their identity as to ease a transition if required.

But i seriously don't have the knowledge to know the effects such [irresponsibly sounding] idea would have on a child.

 

[Servbot24]

I don't know enough about the science of it, but my gut reaction is that it sounds like a form of torture. I would never want to be 'therapied' into a different gender or sexual orientation. Imo the therapy should be to enable kids to be who they really are.

 

[Steel]

Physically altering the body and maintaining those changes for life is significantly more invasive though than theoretically altering brain chemistry with hormones.

Well, if we get to the point where gene therapy is possible changing gender in womb would be the easiest time to do it. Of course then you run into all sorts of other problems, not the least of which is having to identify whether or not a fetus is trans super early on(I'd go so far as to say identifying that with any certainty before a baby is fully formed is impossible).

 

[Fenderputty]

Sexuality and race are different because everyone should be comfortable with how their born. Society is the culprit for any discomfort here.

Being trans seems like the discomfort is coming from a natural perspective. In an ideal society, nobody would give a shit, but the trans person may still have that discomfort. Making a transition seems like it can actually subject the trans person to more societal pressures, currently. They're bravely challenging society to feel comfort at a base level making that change.


Edit: basically, I don't see any reason why this shouldn't be a case by case basis and left up to personall preference

 

[cryptosporidium]

This is a rough question and I'm not sure if my opinion really means much, but from what I've seen, transgender people go through hell - not just socially, but with HRT and extensive surgeries, none of which really makes the person feel whole. If there was a surefire way of preventing that kind of suffering in the first place, it's worth consideration.

Im of the same opinion. Poor mental health during childhood and teen years from a severe inability to find oneself should be allowed to be avoided under the Parents discretion. My one aquantince whose trans is doing better now as an adult but still went through a lot up to this point i imagine.

 

[Otakumegane]

Sexuality and race are different because everyone should be comfortable with how their born. Society is the culprit for any discomfort here.


Edit: basically, I don't see any reason why this shouldn't be a case by case basis and left up to personall preference

Because the child doesn't necessarily can't communicate what is wants and then the debate is whether the parents have control over or not legally?

Also I'd like the input of more transgaf folks but don't see much of their input here.

 

[Misha]

I can't really imagine this but I wouldn't want to be a cisguy. The scenario just doesn't work in my brain for me

At face value, this seems different because being trans is being born in a body you don't identify with. Why would you not be comfortable with your sexuality if not for societal reason?

That's an oversimplification of the problem, besides the genitals, most of the discomfort is caused by hormones later in life (teens and on). Its a societal issue that we refuse to let people recognize and provides ways to make this better. Its improving of course but its no where there. Also the very narrow gender ideals really hurt things and those are also societal

 

[aliengmr]

Hypothetically it would essentially being doing the transition early rather than later. So yeah, in those terms it makes total sense.

Although, realistically it's probably more complicated than that.

 

[cryptosporidium]

Because the child doesn't necessarily can't communicate what is wants and then the debate is whether the parents have control over or not legally?

Also I'd like the input of more transgaf folks but don't see much of their input here.

I believe in Canada children are legally considered the property of the parent until 16. Legality shouldnt be an issue same as for the reasons for allowing abortion. It is up to the discretion of the mother first and the father second

 

[UncleSporky]

Im more baffled by this part. Why wouldnt you want your deafness cured? Let alone deprive your child of some kind of cure?

Because from what I understand, a culture has built up in the deaf community, one invisible to most people who don't have experience with it and thus wouldn't have any basis to participate in deaf community discussions. They have their own way of experiencing the world, their own private frustrations, observations and amusements that non-deaf people might not have context for. In a sense their own memes.

Parents want their children to be like them, to be on the same level as them, communicate as deeply because they're immersed in the same experience. They want to be able to introduce them to other deaf parents they've befriended and their deaf kids as playmates. And of course they don't want them undermining their authority or care as parents due to having a hearing advantage either.