It could be just me, but I see gender identity everywhere. I caught a hint of this trend a few years back but I didn't think it would grow so big and popular. Plus, the person espousing it wasn't especially smart or nice, so it was easy to dismiss at the time. Then, a lot of people who I consider both smart and nice, started picking it up as a legitimate lifestyle choice. Really, that's what it is, a choice much like deciding your fashion style.
I'm not much for following trendy things, especially when they feel like nonsense to me. At times I feel as if I'm back in high school, not fitting in, not cool, only liking my art stuff, being nice to everyone, and looking around me wondering why people are constantly mean to one another while they simultaneously care what everyone else thinks of them. That's what this hyper focus on gender identity feels like to me.
A giant part of me doesn't care at all. People can do whatever lame (or cool) stuff they want and I don't have to like it or participate. I can even like a person when I disagree with them. I recognize it's not a common trait, as disagreement usually means that people will stop being friends. Perhaps it depends on what the disagreement is. If someone disagrees with a core value, it's much harder to bridge that gap, but bridges are worth the effort. It certainly feels better than being angry or burning bridges which may feel good at the time, but long term, really are much more destructive than constructive, literally. What I've seen is that a great many people who adopt gender identity ideology really do adopt it as a core value system.
The politics and social contagion of gender identity create so much anger and discord. Unless of course you embrace gender identity as a lifestyle choice, then you'll be embraced into that world with hugs and love fest. It's almost like church, except there's nothing within it that works toward personal em-betterment aside from improving one's appearances within the narrow confines of that lifestyle choice.
This is a lifestyle choice that can quickly and easily lead to medical choices that impact a person for the rest of their lives. That person need not be an adult, and so often isn't one. If it wasn't for this aspect of gender identity, I would never say another word on the subject.
As a parent, I make a lot of decisions in regards to how I raise my children. When presented with a series of choices, I, along with my partner, pick one that feels like it will work best for our family. In that process, the choices we discard, range in ways we've decided won't work. It could be that we find that particular solution wrong, or it could be that we find that while it's not wrong, it's not right for our situation. The ways in which parents discipline their children is like this. If the parent/s have decided that spanking is wrong, then it narrows the other options as they discard that one. The other options become the focus as they decide upon appropriate ways to parent their children that match their value system.
Gender identity that leads to medical intervention is very much like making choices for how we want to parent. If I've decided that medical intervention based on gender identity is wrong, it narrows the choices to other options. This is my focus right now. I encourage every parent dealing with this to think of a huge range of options on how you might make decisions with and for a child with gender identity issues, especially those children that identify as transgender. If you've decided, like me, that medical options are not appropriate, then let's work to see what other, better, options there are.
I'm not much for following trendy things, especially when they feel like nonsense to me. At times I feel as if I'm back in high school, not fitting in, not cool, only liking my art stuff, being nice to everyone, and looking around me wondering why people are constantly mean to one another while they simultaneously care what everyone else thinks of them. That's what this hyper focus on gender identity feels like to me.
A giant part of me doesn't care at all. People can do whatever lame (or cool) stuff they want and I don't have to like it or participate. I can even like a person when I disagree with them. I recognize it's not a common trait, as disagreement usually means that people will stop being friends. Perhaps it depends on what the disagreement is. If someone disagrees with a core value, it's much harder to bridge that gap, but bridges are worth the effort. It certainly feels better than being angry or burning bridges which may feel good at the time, but long term, really are much more destructive than constructive, literally. What I've seen is that a great many people who adopt gender identity ideology really do adopt it as a core value system.
The politics and social contagion of gender identity create so much anger and discord. Unless of course you embrace gender identity as a lifestyle choice, then you'll be embraced into that world with hugs and love fest. It's almost like church, except there's nothing within it that works toward personal em-betterment aside from improving one's appearances within the narrow confines of that lifestyle choice.
This is a lifestyle choice that can quickly and easily lead to medical choices that impact a person for the rest of their lives. That person need not be an adult, and so often isn't one. If it wasn't for this aspect of gender identity, I would never say another word on the subject.
As a parent, I make a lot of decisions in regards to how I raise my children. When presented with a series of choices, I, along with my partner, pick one that feels like it will work best for our family. In that process, the choices we discard, range in ways we've decided won't work. It could be that we find that particular solution wrong, or it could be that we find that while it's not wrong, it's not right for our situation. The ways in which parents discipline their children is like this. If the parent/s have decided that spanking is wrong, then it narrows the other options as they discard that one. The other options become the focus as they decide upon appropriate ways to parent their children that match their value system.
Gender identity that leads to medical intervention is very much like making choices for how we want to parent. If I've decided that medical intervention based on gender identity is wrong, it narrows the choices to other options. This is my focus right now. I encourage every parent dealing with this to think of a huge range of options on how you might make decisions with and for a child with gender identity issues, especially those children that identify as transgender. If you've decided, like me, that medical options are not appropriate, then let's work to see what other, better, options there are.
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