SCOTUS Decision: Ban on "Talk" Conversion Therapy is Unconstitutional

[Analytics]

19 hours ago, smac97 said:

"Assigned at birth."

"Sex is a spectrum."

"Sex is a social construct."

"A woman is anyone who 'identifies' as one."

"Trans women are women."

And so on.  These are factually and linguistically incoherent claims, but anyone who disagrees with them at all is denounced as a "bigot."

I have long taken you seriously as a person.  I think you are quite smart and articulate and well-educated and well-informed on a variety of issues.  Taking you seriously is a rather easy thing to do.

The difficulty comes when you stray into areas in which, in my view, ideological capture has caused you to say things that just aren't so.  I'm not speaking of differences of opinion or taste or belief.  I am, instead, speaking of things that are empirically and obviously true, and which you nevertheless deny.

In any event, I do appreciate you sharing your perspective here.

I honestly don’t know what you think I’m saying that "are empirically and obviously true, and which [I] nevertheless deny.” I’m squarely on the side of empirical reality.

Let’s level set. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) is a private, nonprofit, non-governmental scientific institution chartered by Congress to provide independent, objective advice to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine. It is not an advocacy organization. Its consensus reports are prepared by expert committees and undergo independent peer review. Two years ago, they published a “consensus study report” that touches on some things we’ve been discussing. The Statement of Task of this report begins with:

"An ad hoc committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will review the latest published research and medical guidelines addressing the current status of sex-specific medical diagnosis, evaluation, and treatment for individuals who are transgender or who are undergoing gender affirming procedures. Based on the available evidence, the committee’s report will strive to:
1. Describe the current clinical conceptions of sex and gender accepted by the medical community, including:
a. How sex and gender are medically defined ..." 

 

They offer the following definitions:

Sex : The biological components, including anatomical and physiological traits, largely related to sexual reproduction. Not all components align for all people. (Alternatively Biological sex)

Gender:    A multidimensional construct that links language with social and cultural expectations about status, characteristics, and behavior that are supposedly associated with sex traits.    

Male:  A term identifying individuals who are typically capable of producing sperm for fertilizing ova. Males typically have XY chromosomes. Not everyone who is male has all the traits (e.g., chromosomes, hormone prevalence, external and internal anatomy) that are typically defined as male.    (Alternatively Male sex, Man, Boy)

Female:    A term identifying individuals who typically have ovaries and produce eggs. Females typically have XX chromosomes. Not everyone who is female has all the traits (e.g., chromosomes, hormone prevalence, external and internal anatomy) that are typically defined as female. (Alternatively Female sex, Woman, Girl)

Sex recorded at birth: The sex recorded on the original birth certificate (based on appearance of external genitals observed at birth by physical exam).    (Alternatively Sex assigned at birth, Sex designated at birth, Birth sex, Assigned female at birth, Assigned male at birth)

Sex of rearing: The sex assigned to a child at birth, most often based on the appearance of the child’s external genital anatomy. Traditionally, sex of rearing is assigned as “male” or “female,” although in some geographic regions, there is the option of “X.” Assigned sex of rearing becomes the sex recorded on birth certificates and medical records. When a child is born with atypical genitalia, there may be a delay in assigning sex of rearing until the child’s condition or diagnosis is better understood. Through a shared decision-making process between a multidisciplinary care team and the child’s parents/guardians/caregivers, the goal is to select a sex of rearing that has the greatest likelihood of matching gender identity in adulthood.(Alternatively Sex assignment at birth, Gender of rearing, Assigned sex of rearing, Assigned gender of rearing)

Gender marker:    Designation of “male” (M) “female” (F) or other (X) on a document, including on the original birth certificate. Depending on the document, this marker may represent an individual’s sex recorded at birth or gender identity and a designation of “X,” where present on records, may be defined in different ways.     (Alternatively Sex marker)

Gender identity:    Used by individuals to label themselves and their internal sense of themselves. One’s gender identity can be the same as or different from one’s sex recorded at birth.     (Alternatively Affirmed gender, Gender)

Gender expression:    One’s mannerisms and appearance—including through behavior, clothing, body characteristics, or voice—that are, in a given culture, associated with masculinity or femininity.    

Gender attribution:    The process through which others assign a gender to a person, with or without knowledge of that person’s sex recorded at birth or gender identity.

Do you take issue with these definitions, or do you think this ad hoc committee of the National Academy largely succeeded in conveying how these terms are medically defined?

[smac97]

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

I honestly don’t know what you think I’m saying that "are empirically and obviously true, and which [I] nevertheless deny.” I’m squarely on the side of empirical reality.

Perhaps I have been mistaken.  I had understood that you subscribed to most or all of the fundamental tenets of trans ideology.  Here's the list I presented previously:

Quote

Here is a descriptive list of claims that function as load-bearing principles in much of contemporary “trans” advocacy — especially the institutional/activist version that treats dissent as bigotry or “denial of existence.” Not every trans person holds all of them. The point is which ones are treated as non-negotiable in that framework.

Core identity claims

1. Gender identity is real, innate, and authoritative. A person’s stated identity is the primary fact about whether they are a man, woman, both, or neither.
2. Identity is sex (or replaces sex for social/legal purposes). “Trans women are women” / “trans men are men” is treated as a literal truth, not a courtesy or a political slogan.
3. Self-identification is sufficient. No medical diagnosis, surgery, hormones, or even consistent presentation is required for the identity to be valid.
4. Denial of the identity is a denial of the person. Disagreeing with the identity claim is framed as saying the person “doesn’t exist,” not as disputing a proposition.

Sex, biology, and language

5. Sex is a spectrum, a social construct, or at least not a strict binary relevant to policy. Chromosomes, gametes, and reproductive anatomy are treated as crude, incomplete, or bigoted ways to classify people.
6. “Assigned sex at birth” is the preferred description of sex, implying a bureaucratic label rather than an observed reproductive category.
7. Preferred pronouns and names are morally mandatory. Using sex-based pronouns is “misgendering”; using a prior name is “deadnaming.” Both are treated as harms comparable to slurs.
8. There is no polite way to state the sex distinction. “Biological male/female,” “natal sex,” and similar terms are often classified as hate speech or dogwhistles.

Medical and youth claims

9. Gender dysphoria is validated by affirmation, not primarily explored as a possible misattribution of other distress. “Watchful waiting” or exploratory therapy is frequently labeled conversion therapy.
10. Medical transition (blockers, hormones, surgery) is healthcare, and withholding it is violence. Access is framed as lifesaving; gatekeeping is framed as cruelty.
11. Minors can have a stable, knowable transgender identity that justifies social and often medical transition. Parental or clinical caution is cast as abuse or bigotry.
12. Desistance, detransition, and comorbidity (autism, trauma, same-sex attraction, social contagion) are minimized, treated as rare, or blamed on stigma rather than on the affirmation model.

Social and institutional claims

13. Single-sex spaces, sports, prisons, and shelters must follow identity, not sex. Exclusion of males who identify as women is discrimination.
14. Any line among “trans women” is itself bigotry. Distinguishing social-only from medically transitioned, or pre-op from post-op, is “transmedicalism” or “dividing the community.”
15. Lived experience outranks data when studies, crime patterns, or fairness in sport cut against the identity rule.
16. Questions are a form of harm. Asking for definitions (“what is a woman?”), evidence, or tradeoffs is treated as bad-faith or as endangering trans people.
17. Opposition is explained as animus. The admissible motives are hatred, disgust, or religion; safety, fairness, child protection, and definitional accuracy are discounted.

Political enforcement

18. Allies must affirm publicly. Neutrality (“I don’t care what adults do privately”) is often not enough; failure to repeat the slogans is coded as hostility.
19. Conflicts with women’s rights and gay rights are denied or inverted. Sex-based rights are reframed as bigotry; same-sex attraction is pressured toward “attraction to gender identity.”
20. The category must expand, not contract. Nonbinary, genderfluid, xenogender, and similar identities are folded into the same moral protection as transsexualism; limiting the category is betrayal.

My perception of you is that you have affirmed, or would affirm if asked, most or all of the foregoing claims.

For example, you have frequently characterized biological men as "women."  You have expressed shock that anyone might disagree with this claim, and that such disagreement is "bigotry."  In my view, the notion that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one is a per se departure from "empirical reality."

I think the same must be said for your rejection of the sexual binary.  It is a per se departure from "empirical reality."

And your perspective on "assigned at birth" (though your recent comments have clouded my understanding of your perspective on this one).

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Let’s level set. The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) is a private, nonprofit, non-governmental scientific institution chartered by Congress to provide independent, objective advice to the nation on science, engineering, and medicine. It is not an advocacy organization. Its consensus reports are prepared by expert committees and undergo independent peer review. Two years ago, they published a “consensus study report” that touches on some things we’ve been discussing. The Statement of Task of this report begins with:

"An ad hoc committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will review the latest published research and medical guidelines addressing the current status of sex-specific medical diagnosis, evaluation, and treatment for individuals who are transgender or who are undergoing gender affirming procedures. Based on the available evidence, the committee’s report will strive to:
1. Describe the current clinical conceptions of sex and gender accepted by the medical community, including:
a. How sex and gender are medically defined ..." 

They offer the following definitions:

Sex : The biological components, including anatomical and physiological traits, largely related to sexual reproduction. Not all components align for all people. (Alternatively Biological sex)

Gender:    A multidimensional construct that links language with social and cultural expectations about status, characteristics, and behavior that are supposedly associated with sex traits.

I agree with both of these, except that I think "gender" has sometimes been popularly used as a coterminous synonym for "sex."  I think that should be addressed in the definition as a sort of caveat or clarification.

It seems like many "trans" advocates equivocate between "sex" and "gender," treating them as synonyms in some circumstances, and as differentiated from each other in others.

Are you on board with this definition of "gender?"  That it is a "construct" and not a synonym for "sex?"

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Male:  A term identifying individuals who are typically capable of producing sperm for fertilizing ova. Males typically have XY chromosomes. Not everyone who is male has all the traits (e.g., chromosomes, hormone prevalence, external and internal anatomy) that are typically defined as male.    (Alternatively Male sex, Man, Boy)

Female:    A term identifying individuals who typically have ovaries and produce eggs. Females typically have XX chromosomes. Not everyone who is female has all the traits (e.g., chromosomes, hormone prevalence, external and internal anatomy) that are typically defined as female. (Alternatively Female sex, Woman, Girl)

I agree with both of these.  Do you?

My sense is that much of "trans" advocacy is built on re-defining these terms and their synonyms ("male" and "man," "female" and "woman") to include something along the lines of "and also anyone who identifies as a woman."  At least two dictionaries, Cambridge and Merriam-Webster, have incorporated this re-definition into their entries.

Here, though, there is no "gender identity" component to "female" (as there is according to Merriam-Webster).  Do you endorse that omission? 

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Sex recorded at birth: The sex recorded on the original birth certificate (based on appearance of external genitals observed at birth by physical exam).    (Alternatively Sex assigned at birth, Sex designated at birth, Birth sex, Assigned female at birth, Assigned male at birth)

I think this is much better than "assigned at birth," as those phrases have sometimes been used - deliberately, I think - to make biological sex seem like something that is arbitrarily chosen by the doctor, rather than observed.

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Sex of rearing: The sex assigned to a child at birth, most often based on the appearance of the child’s external genital anatomy. Traditionally, sex of rearing is assigned as “male” or “female,” although in some geographic regions, there is the option of “X.” Assigned sex of rearing becomes the sex recorded on birth certificates and medical records. When a child is born with atypical genitalia, there may be a delay in assigning sex of rearing until the child’s condition or diagnosis is better understood. Through a shared decision-making process between a multidisciplinary care team and the child’s parents/guardians/caregivers, the goal is to select a sex of rearing that has the greatest likelihood of matching gender identity in adulthood.(Alternatively Sex assignment at birth, Gender of rearing, Assigned sex of rearing, Assigned gender of rearing)

The definition acknowledges, but neither ratifies nor rejects, "the option of 'X.'"

Generally, this sounds right.  Psychologist John Money famously recommended raising a biologically male infant named Bruce (or "David") Reimer as a girl after a botched circumcision destroyed his penis in 1965.  Johns Hopkins University. Money believed that gender identity was entirely learned and shaped by social conditioning rather than biology ("nurture over nature"). He advised the parents to surgically alter the child into a girl, rename "her" Brenda, and raise "her" without revealing "her" biological sex.

Though rare, some parents have elected to raise their son as a girl/daughter, or vice versa.

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Gender marker:    Designation of “male” (M) “female” (F) or other (X) on a document, including on the original birth certificate. Depending on the document, this marker may represent an individual’s sex recorded at birth or gender identity and a designation of “X,” where present on records, may be defined in different ways.     (Alternatively Sex marker)

"{T}his marker may represent an individual’s sex recorded at birth or gender identity and a designation of 'X.'"

No endorsement or rejection of using "M" or "F" or "X" as a designation of "gender identity" (and not sex).

I assume these folks are simply reporting how this term is being used, without commenting on its incoherence.

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Gender identity:    Used by individuals to label themselves and their internal sense of themselves. One’s gender identity can be the same as or different from one’s sex recorded at birth.     (Alternatively Affirmed gender, Gender)

Gender expression:    One’s mannerisms and appearance—including through behavior, clothing, body characteristics, or voice—that are, in a given culture, associated with masculinity or femininity.    

Gender attribution:    The process through which others assign a gender to a person, with or without knowledge of that person’s sex recorded at birth or gender identity.

These seem good.

11 minutes ago, Analytics said:

Do you take issue with these definitions, or do you think this ad hoc committee of the National Academy largely succeeded in conveying how these terms are medically defined?

That link is Chapter 2 of the same 2024 SSA report, “Clinical Conceptions of Sex and Gender,” around the glossary table (pp. 43–45). It is a word list for disability files, not a proof that a man is a woman, or ratification of that concept by the committee.

“Not all components align” is the DSD / hormone-treatment hedge. It is true that a CAIS XY person or a post-surgical male will not show every typical male trait. It is not true that sex therefore becomes a menu. Misalignment of some traits is how you describe a disorder or a medical intervention. It is not how you get a third sex or a female male.

The committee operationalizes sex as “sex recorded at birth.” That is a paperwork term. It lets the rest of the chapter talk about identity without saying “male” or “female.” Once sex is a line on a form, “updating” the form looks like updating the fact. The fact is still the reproductive anatomy the form was trying to record.

If those definitions were along the lines of “trans women are women,” I think the table would define woman as anyone who identifies as one. It does not. It defines sex as reproductive biology and then, separately, an identity that can diverge from that biology. Divergence is only intelligible if the two things are not the same.

I think the committee's comment here is worthwhile:

Quote

The committee uses the term “variations in sex traits” (VSTs) for this report to describe individuals with variations in development of the reproductive system (sex determination and sex development). The term “differences of sex development” (DSD) is commonly used in medical records and in the medical literature. However, some patients and clinicians consider the term DSD to be inaccurate and distasteful. “Intersex” is another commonly used term, but some individuals take issue with the notion that their reproductive anatomy falls between the binary and question this terminology. “Variations in sex traits,” therefore, is intended to encompass all variations in reproductive tract development while being attentive to patient lived experience. However, the committee acknowledges that stakeholders have different and varied opinions on appropriate terminology and, like other terminology in this report, terminology is likely to evolve over time.

I take some small exception to the committee's definition of "Transgender and gender diverse" as being "Umbrella term for people whose gender identity differs from what is typically associated with their sex recorded at birth."  I think the better definition would have been: "Umbrella term for people whose gender identity differs from what is typically associated with their biological sex."

Thanks,

-Smac

[webbles]

6 hours ago, Analytics said:

I think what’s really happening is that since these edge cases were so extremely rare, most people lived their whole lives never having to confront the issue. Now there are a few social influencers trying to get famous by publishing outrageous content, and an entire industry engineered to feed addictive rage in their viewership. That is indisputably going on.

The outstanding question is whether the societal order is really breaking down. I’ve been asking for is some evidence that it is, and evidence that laws like that of Kansas will do more good than harm. It’s obvious to me that creating laws that REQUIRE “people who look like men” to use the women’s restroom undermines the very thing it is trying to prevent--uncomfortable confrontations in bathrooms with people who look like they don’t belong there.

Rather than being given statistics about the societal order breaking down or even personal anecdotes, I’m just repeatedly told "Lily Tino is a man going into DisneyWorld bathrooms” over and over again. 

I can understand how somebody might feel that the societal order is breaking down if they are obsessed with videos featuring Lily Tino, Lia Thomas, and drag queens. I never heard of Lily Tino until Smac brought it up here. The reason those videos are shocking is because they are outrageous outliers that are so far afield from what we all see in our normal lives. The shock value is evidence that the societal code is doing fine, not that we are doomed.

Maybe that is the biggest difference between Smac and me. Smac thinks the anecdotes of outrageous behavior he curates are impressive evidence. That is why he posts his lists over and over and over. In contrast, I’m a statistician and am not persuaded by anecdotes. Show me statistically significant evidence. Is there any? 

Or even give me some personal anecdotes. How often do you or the people around you bump into “people who look like men” in women restrooms?

I agree that it is indisputably going on but I also think it is happening on both sides.  It seemed to have started on the transgender side and now has kind of blown up.  One side will do something that triggers the other side and back and forth.  The Kansas law that you've been talking about is the just the most recent in the ping-pong situation.  Maybe some day we'll be able to get some middle ground, but right now, both sides really don't want to give up any ground.

I've never heard of Lily Tino either.  And I don't really follow the drag queens thing (I think it is overblown way too much).  But every now and then, a news article crosses my screen that discusses transgenderism (most recently because of the supreme court cases).  I like to dive deep into what is happening and will try to read a wide variety of things.  I do see that people are bothered by 'male looking people' in bathrooms and are bothered that they can't seem to do anything about it.  I don't think anyone has ever done statistics on it, which is sad.  But it is also probably going to be similar to women's assault statistics, where most things are just never reported.  I've been told that women are socialized to not create a scene so if someone invades their space, I would expect most to just get out and go on with their lives.  That makes it really hard to quantify it.  Should we take the few lawsuits that have occurred to mean that is the only times it happened?  Or to mean that there's a lot more going on and women are just being silent about it?

This societal change is only a little more than 10 years old.  I don't think you need to be obsessed with videos featuring those people to feel the order is breaking down.  I don't, yet I still feel like things are changing.  I can see it when just reading supreme court arguments.

[smac97]

23 minutes ago, webbles said:

I agree that it is indisputably going on but I also think it is happening on both sides.  It seemed to have started on the transgender side and now has kind of blown up. 

I concur.  I was generally both unaware about and largely indifferent to trans folks until quite a few of them went out of their way to court publicity.

Dylan Mulvaney and his Female Minstrelsy and Sexist Caricature schtick has perhaps been the most visible.  But then came Lia Thomas.  And Lily Tino.  And then came the Drag Queen Story Hours.  And drag shows for children.  And then, I think the worst part: medical interventions on children.  Tavistock Clinic.  WPATH corruption.  HHS corruption.  Schools "transing" kids (sometimes without parental awareness or consent).  And on and on.

Some of this has come to light because people noticed, but I think the bulk of public attention has arisen because notoriety has been actively sought.

23 minutes ago, webbles said:

One side will do something that triggers the other side and back and forth.  The Kansas law that you've been talking about is the just the most recent in the ping-pong situation.  Maybe some day we'll be able to get some middle ground, but right now, both sides really don't want to give up any ground.

I'm not sure there's much middle ground to be had.  There are too many absolutist demands on the trans side.  Too many reflexive attacks on Chesterton's Fence.

23 minutes ago, webbles said:

I've never heard of Lily Tino either.  And I don't really follow the drag queens thing (I think it is overblown way too much). 

I think DQSH and drag shows for children are pretty bad.  As for "overblown," I dunno.  I think Andrew Sullivan nailed it last year:

Quote

"I didn’t and don’t believe that being a man or a woman has nothing to do with biology. My sexual orientation is based on a biological distinction between men and women: I’m attracted to the former and not to the latter. And now I was supposed to believe the difference didn’t exist?"

He called this development "madness," writing, "But abolishing the sex binary for the entire society? That’s a whole other thing entirely. And madness, I believe. What if I redefined what it is to be heterosexual and imposed it on straight people?"

"They demanded the entire society change in a fundamental way so that the sex binary no longer counted," he said, noting how dissent with this principle was "equated with bigotry."

The other major problem with this new version of the gay rights movement, he said, was the preoccupation with children’s sexual orientations.

Sullivan continued, "But this illiberalism made a fateful, strategic mistake. In the gay rights movement, there had always been an unspoken golden rule: Leave children out of it. We knew very well that any overreach there could provoke the most ancient blood libel against us: that we groom and abuse kids… So what did the gender revolutionaries go and do? They focused almost entirely on children and minors."

He detailed how gender ideology proponents taught kids that "being a boy or a girl was something they could choose and change at will," allowed biological males to compete in female sports, and, in some places, allowed kids to socially transition at school "without their parents’ knowledge or permission."

"{A}n unspoken golden rule: Leave children out of it."

Seems like we've needed to make it a spoken golden rule.

23 minutes ago, webbles said:

But every now and then, a news article crosses my screen that discusses transgenderism (most recently because of the supreme court cases).  I like to dive deep into what is happening and will try to read a wide variety of things.  I do see that people are bothered by 'male looking people' in bathrooms and are bothered that they can't seem to do anything about it.

I think many women and girls fell this way.

I also think there is a not-very-subtle pressure for women and girls to be silent, step aside, let men into women's spaces, and act as if the Emperor's New Clothes are beautiful.

23 minutes ago, webbles said:

I don't think anyone has ever done statistics on it, which is sad.  But it is also probably going to be similar to women's assault statistics, where most things are just never reported. 

I too would like to see statistics done.  

23 minutes ago, webbles said:

I've been told that women are socialized to not create a scene so if someone invades their space, I would expect most to just get out and go on with their lives.  That makes it really hard to quantify it.  Should we take the few lawsuits that have occurred to mean that is the only times it happened?  Or to mean that there's a lot more going on and women are just being silent about it?

This societal change is only a little more than 10 years old.  I don't think you need to be obsessed with videos featuring those people to feel the order is breaking down.  I don't, yet I still feel like things are changing.  I can see it when just reading supreme court arguments.

The Skrmetti decision really does seem to take the wind out of Roger's "Hey, this trans thing is being blown up to be a lot more than it really is" sails.

Hugely controversial medical interventions on children are a very important topic, and not because Republicans think so.  Look at Europe's 180-turn on such treatments.  The Tavistok Clinic.  The Cass Report.  Republicans don't guide any of this.

Men in women's prisons has been a controversy for quite a while, both in the U.S. and the U.K. and elsewhere.

I think schools interfering with the rights of parents or deliberately withholding information on their child is a very consequential issue.

There are also less consequential, but still important and associated, topics, such as men in women's bathrooms, changing rooms and sports.

In the end, I think Sullivan was right.  The unspoken Golden Rule, to "leave kids out of it," has long been breached and disregarded.  It was the "let's put all sorts of emphasis on trans ideology and children" move (particularly the sexualized/grooming stuff and the questionable medical procedures) that I think has alienated many who otherwise would be more supportive of, or at least indifferent to, trans issues.

Thanks,

-Smac

[Analytics]

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

Perhaps I have been mistaken.  I had understood that you subscribed to most or all of the fundamental tenets of trans ideology.  Here's the list I presented previously:

My perception of you is that you have affirmed, or would affirm if asked, most or all of the foregoing claims.

Asking Grok to summarize “the fundamental tenets of trans ideology” is like asking Walter Martin to summarize the fundamental tenets of Mormonism. That comparison isn’t perfect, though, because I don’t think there even is a uniform list of trans ideological doctrines that you must subscribe to in order to be considered an ally.

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

For example, you have frequently characterized biological men as "women." 

When I have used the word “woman” that way, I was using it as a gender category rather than as a synonym for adult human biological female. If somebody has a female gender identity and female gender expression, the polite thing to do is socially categorize them as a woman.

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

In my view, the notion that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one is a per se departure from "empirical reality."

In my view, when you do this you are fervently refusing to understand their words, their conceptual framework, and the nuances of their point. “Gender identity” and “gender expression” are well-defined terms that represent real-world things, too. On my mission, on a few occasions people I was talking to were adamant that I wasn’t an “elder”. In their view, calling a 19-year old kid an “elder” was a radical “departure from empirical reality,” and they were willing to die on that hill.

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

I think the same must be said for your rejection of the sexual binary.  It is a per se departure from "empirical reality."

I disagree with you on this one. George Box said all models are wrong, but some are useful. The sexual binary is a model. In many contexts it is an extremely useful one, but when dealing with the biology of real-world people, it is less universally useful than many people imagine, and certainly isn’t the ultimate truth of what it means to be a human being. Empirical reality is that sex is "the biological components, including anatomical and physiological traits, largely related to sexual reproduction. Not all components align for all people."

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

And your perspective on "assigned at birth" (though your recent comments have clouded my understanding of your perspective on this one).

"Sex assigned at birth" means “sex recorded at birth.” It is in fact a term used by doctors in medical records when dealing with these issues, and was well-defined by the Academies. 

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

I agree with both of these.  Do you?

I don’t think it is my job to gate-keep the definition of words and to agree or disagree with definitions. I generally use the definitions the Academy provided, and try to understand what people are trying to communicate with the words they use. 

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

My sense is that much of "trans" advocacy is built on re-defining these terms and their synonyms ("male" and "man," "female" and "woman") to include something along the lines of "and also anyone who identifies as a woman."  At least two dictionaries, Cambridge and Merriam-Webster, have incorporated this re-definition into their entries.

My sense is that much of trans advocacy is built less on redefining biological sex than on the idea that how we relate to other people matters. In ordinary social contexts, the polite and humane thing to do is generally to treat people in a way that aligns with their gender identity and presentation. That does not require pretending biological sex is unreal or different than what it really is. It means recognizing that social categories used in social situations don’t necessarily need to line up with the underlying biology you’d talk about with your doctor in medical situations.

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

Here, though, there is no "gender identity" component to "female" (as there is according to Merriam-Webster).  Do you endorse that omission?

I'm not in a position to endorse anything on this. I’m a finance expert, not a doctor. I will note that the purpose of this glossary is to understand medical records, not describe the polite way to engage with others in all social interactions.

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

I assume these folks are simply reporting how this term is being used, without commenting on its incoherence.

Just because you think something is incoherent doesn't mean it really is. I’d give the benefit of the doubt to doctors and assume they speak coherently about medical and biological issues. If you think they are using the language incoherently, maybe you are the one with an ideology that is a little off.

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

“Not all components align” is the DSD / hormone-treatment hedge. It is true that a CAIS XY person or a post-surgical male will not show every typical male trait. It is not true that sex therefore becomes a menu. Misalignment of some traits is how you describe a disorder or a medical intervention. It is not how you get a third sex or a female male.

“Not all components align” is biological reality when we’re talking about real-world human beings. When scientists say “sex is a spectrum,” they do not mean that male and female are meaningless categories. They mean that the biological traits associated with sex: chromosomes, hormones, gonads, genital anatomy, secondary sex characteristics, and gene expression, do not always line up perfectly and often vary continuously in degree. From this coherent, reality-based point of view, sex is bimodal rather than perfectly binary in every biological feature: most people cluster strongly around typical male or female patterns, while some fall between or outside those typical combinations. This can be an insightful way of understanding human biology. 

As a thought experiment, imagine in a few years Elder Uchtdorf as prophet. Imagine at the same time a faithful member of the Church who deeply, deeply, feels their spirit is a woman and that somehow, their body looks, biologically, like a male. This person isn’t an activist or public agitator. Just a committed Latter-day Saint who feels like a woman trapped in a males body. They finds themself talking to the first presidency about it, and after a blessing and a prayer they receive a revelation: this person’s spirit really is a female spirt.

In principle, this could happen, right? Mormons believe in spirits, and that spirits really do have genders. And they also believe genetic defects generally don’t reflect the essence of the body’s spirit. So what if the prophet had a revelation that a specific biological man had a female spirit? Would you object to this person claiming that on the inside, they really are a woman? Would you insist they be treated like a man, despite the prophet’s revelation that their spirit is female?

[Analytics]

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Asking Grok to summarize “the fundamental tenets of trans ideology” is like asking Walter Martin to summarize the fundamental tenets of Mormonism. That comparison isn’t perfect, though, because I don’t think there even is a uniform list of trans ideological doctrines that you must subscribe to in order to be considered an ally.

Hi @smac97,

After I posted this, I realized it wouldn’t be clear what I was referring to, so I decided to flesh out my point. On a personal level, it irritates me that you went to a source with an obvious political bias on this topic (Grok), asked it to create a straw man version of “trans ideology”, and then use this to bait the people you are talking to and then criticizing them for not embracing the straw man.

For my part, I asked ChatGPT to critique what Grok said on this matter, and replace its straw man with a steel man. Here is what GPT says:

First, I would not call these the “fundamental tenets of trans ideology.” There is no catechism, governing body, or agreed philosophical system called trans ideology. More importantly, allyship is primarily a position about how transgender people should be treated, not a requirement that one accept a particular metaphysics of sex.

If I were trying to steelman the minimum position, I would reduce it to something like this:

A minimal trans-ally position

1. Transgender people are describing a real human experience. Some people experience a persistent gender identity that does not correspond to the sex category in which they were born and raised. One need not settle whether this identity is innate, developmental, neurological, psychological, social, or some combination in order to take their experience seriously.

2. Transgender people deserve the same dignity, liberty, and legal protection as everyone else. They should not be harassed, assaulted, fired, denied housing, or otherwise mistreated simply because they are transgender.

3. In ordinary social interactions, people should generally accommodate another person's gender identity. If someone lives and presents socially as a woman, there is usually no reason not to call her a woman, use the name she asks to be called, and use female pronouns. That is ordinary interpersonal courtesy. It does not require believing that chromosomes, reproductive anatomy, or biological history have somehow changed.

4. Sex and gender identity are distinguishable concepts. Biological sex is real. Gender identity and gender expression are also real phenomena. Which one matters depends upon what we are talking about. At a cocktail party, gender identity may be overwhelmingly relevant and chromosomes completely irrelevant. In some medical contexts, biological sex may be critically important.

5. Public-policy questions should be decided individually rather than by slogans. Bathrooms, competitive sports, prisons, shelters, medical records, identification documents, and treatment of minors do not necessarily present the same problem. Being a trans ally does not require believing that gender identity must prevail over sex in every conceivable context. It requires taking the interests of transgender people seriously along with whatever competing interests actually exist.

6. Medical questions are empirical questions. It is entirely consistent with trans allyship to ask about benefits, risks, diagnostic uncertainty, desistance, detransition, comorbidities, age, informed consent, and the quality of evidence supporting particular treatments. Compassion does not require knowing the answer before the research is done.

That strikes me as a defensible minimum. Someone could go substantially further—believing, for example, that self-identification should control virtually every legal sex classification—without that stronger proposition becoming a prerequisite for treating transgender people decently.

And this is where I think Grok's earlier answer went badly off the rails.

Its 20-item list isn't a steelman of trans allyship. It is a hostile reconstruction of the most maximalist things one can associate with trans activism, sprinkled with assertions about activist motives and behavior, and then presented as though those constitute the movement's “fundamental tenets.”

Look at what gets smuggled into the supposed creed. A trans ally allegedly must believe that sex is socially constructed; that chromosomes and reproductive anatomy are crude or bigoted classifications; that disagreement denies people's existence; that withholding medical treatment is “violence”; that lived experience outranks data; that asking questions is harmful; that opponents are motivated by animus; that conflicts with women's or gay rights must be denied; and even that xenogender identities must receive exactly the same conceptual treatment as classical transsexualism.

Those aren't minimum propositions necessary for trans allyship. Several aren't propositions about transgender identity at all. They are accusations about how certain activists allegedly argue.

That distinction matters.

For example, compare:

Steelman: “It is generally courteous to socially recognize a trans woman as a woman.”

with:

Strawman: “A person's subjective identity literally overrides biological sex, and anyone who disagrees is denying that person's existence.”

Those are not equivalent claims.

Or compare:

Steelman: “Sex-associated biological traits do not always align perfectly, and scientists can therefore meaningfully discuss variation in sex characteristics.”

with:

Strawman: “Sex is a social construct and chromosomes, gametes, and reproductive anatomy are bigoted ways to classify people.”

Again, not remotely the same proposition.

And compare:

Steelman: “Gender-affirming medical treatment can benefit some patients and should be evaluated using the ordinary standards of evidence-based medicine.”

with:

Strawman: “Medical transition is lifesaving, withholding it is violence, and clinical caution is cruelty.”

A person can believe the first and emphatically reject the second.

This is why I think Grok deserved considerably more skepticism than it received here. The giveaway isn't merely that individual statements are debatable. It is the construction of the list itself. Nearly every disputed question is phrased in the version least charitable to the trans side. Moderate propositions are replaced with absolutist ones; empirical controversies become alleged articles of faith; and the worst rhetoric one can find among activists is treated as constitutive of the entire worldview.

If I asked an AI for “the fundamental tenets of conservative Christianity” and it returned twenty propositions about controlling women, suppressing gay people, rejecting science, imposing religion through government, and treating dissenters as sinners, nobody would mistake that for neutral analysis merely because examples could be found of Christians saying each of those things.

The same standard should apply here.

One can disagree profoundly with particular trans activists, reject self-ID as a universal legal rule, believe biological sex remains important, demand better evidence for pediatric medicine, and recognize genuine conflicts involving sports or privacy—and still hold the rather modest proposition at the center of trans allyship:

Transgender people are real people describing a real experience, and in both our personal interactions and our laws we should try to treat them with dignity, courtesy, and fairness while dealing honestly with biological reality and legitimate competing interests.

That is a considerably stronger steelman than Grok's partisan caricature—and, I think, a much more useful starting point for an actual discussion.

[smac97]

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Asking Grok to summarize “the fundamental tenets of trans ideology” is like asking Walter Martin to summarize the fundamental tenets of Mormonism.

I felt the list was fairly accurate.  And most of the items on the list were readily available from "trans advocacy" groups.

From this post:

Quote

Here's an interesting thought experiment:

Would CB and SU be willing to have their proposal published, perhaps as a "Letter to the Editor" or other form, in a recognized "trans advocacy" organization media outlet, such as GLAAD, HRC or GLSEN?  

And would they be willing to publish this proposal under their IRL names? 

And would GLAAD and these other groups be willing to publish such a proposal?

Anyway, here are some quotes of advocacy groups referencing the above presuppositions:

Quote

1–2. Identity is real/authoritative; “trans women are women” is literal

Human Rights Campaign (official account):
“Let’s clarify this again for those who don’t get it — trans women are women, trans men are men and non-binary people are non-binary.”

HRC president Alphonso David, Senate QFR:
“Transgender women are women and transgender men are men.”
“A woman is an adult who knows herself to be female.”

GLAAD open letter (Women’s History Month / TDOV):
“We acknowledge with clarity and strength that transgender women are women and that transgender girls are girls.”
The same letter treats opposing feminists as promoting “damaging and violent ideas about trans people.”

National Women’s Law Center testimony:
“this statement erases the fact that trans women and girls are women and girls.”
“With our full conviction, we at NWLC know unequivocally that trans women and girls, and intersex women and girls, ARE women and girls who deserve to participate fully in women’s sports.  ”

3. Self-ID / no medical requirement

GLAAD Transgender FAQ:
“But not all transgender people can or will take those steps, and it’s important to know that being transgender is not dependent upon medical procedures.”
“Gender identity is a person’s internal, personal sense of being a man or a woman (or boy or girl.)”
“Always use the term used by the person.”

HRC definitions:
“One’s innermost concept of self as male, female, a blend of both or neither… One’s gender identity can be the same or different from their sex assigned at birth.”
Transition “might” be social only (name, pronouns, dress) or medical.

WPATH SOC8:
“this version of the SOC recognizes and validates various expressions of gender that may not necessitate psychological, hormonal, or surgical treatments.”
“access to transition-related health care should be based on… informed consent… not on what words TGD people… use to describe their identities.”

4. Denial of identity = denial of the person / violence

HRC reporting guide:
“Contrasting transgender people with ‘real’ or ‘biological’ men and women is a false comparison. Transgender people’s gender identities are real…”
Misgendering victims “disrespect[s] their identities, causing pain… and reinforcing the stigma at the center of anti-trans violence.”

GLAAD letter: opposition is “anti-transgender rhetoric,” “bigoted governmental policies,” and “assaults (legislative, physical, social, and verbal).”

Vox, summarizing the political fight in the terms advocates use: bathroom bans “reject[] the existence of trans people” and “advance[] a rejection of the idea that trans women are women.”

5–6. Sex as incomplete / “assigned at birth”

GLAAD:
“Transgender is a term used to describe people whose gender identity differs from the sex they were assigned at birth.”

HRC FAQ:
“both the existence of intersex people and the ability to medically transition show that sex is also mutable and not defined by rigid categories.”

HRC David QFR: genitals “are not defining of maleness or femaleness”; HHS findings that male/female biological differences “matter” are “not true for all males or all females.”

Stonewall staff evidence (Kirrin Medcalf), as reported:
“Bodies are not inherently male or female. They are just their bodies.”
“Biological sex is made up of a multitude of characteristics that change over a person’s life-cycle.”

7. Pronouns/names mandatory; misgendering and deadnaming as harm

HRC:
“Transgender and non-binary people… should always be identified and referred to with their correct pronouns.”
“Misgendering… may lead them to feel distressed, unseen, or unwelcome.”
“be sure to always use them—and to correct others if they use the wrong pronoun.”
Neopronouns (“fae/faer,” “ey/em”) included.

HRC reporting guide: do not publish a prior name “without their explicit consent, which is sometimes called deadnaming.”

GLAAD ally tips:
“Don’t ask a transgender person what their ‘real name’ is.”
“If you happen to know the name someone was given at birth but no longer uses, don’t share it without the person’s explicit permission.”

The Trevor Project: using a young person’s pronouns is “a real life-saving difference” and “a public health issue.”

8. Sex-based language as illegitimate

HRC: contrasting trans people with “‘real’ or ‘biological’ men and women is a false comparison.”

GLAAD “hate and disinformation” guide treats “Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria” as an “intentionally misleading anti-trans trope” and groups “groomer,” bathroom-predator, and healthcare-as-experimental narratives as coordinated dehumanization.

Wikipedia’s own framing of “adult human female,” reflecting activist/academic usage: the phrase is “described by scholars as a dog whistle for transphobic beliefs.”

The orgs rarely say “hate speech” in a statute sense; they say false comparison, trope, stigma, violence, erasure. That is the enforcement mechanism.

9–10. Affirmation vs exploration; care is healthcare / withholding is violence

Stonewall:
“Conversion therapy is any intervention that seeks to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity.”
“Gender-affirming therapy and gender transition healthcare are not conversion therapy.”
Affirming therapy “starts from the premise that… the patient has autonomy to explore and know their own gender identity… and to request and seek treatment in line with their own stated needs.”

HRC on the 2025 HHS review:
“gender exploratory therapy” is “a focus-tested and innocuous-sounding name for the debunked, destructive, and dangerous practice of anti-LGBTQ+ conversion therapy.”
West Virginia bill: “restricting life-saving gender affirming care”; “these lawmakers are denying transgender and non-binary youth care that saves lives.”

HRC facts page: “healthcare for transgender and non-binary people, known as gender-affirming care, is best-practice, medically necessary health care.” “Why do some people say it’s life-saving?” — then cites Trevor Project / suicide-risk studies.

Human Rights Watch headline: “Trans Youth’s Access to Lifesaving Care Under Threat.”

WMA: condemns “conversion” or “reparative” procedures / SOGICE as having “no evidence-based background” and being “a serious threat to the health and human rights” of those subjected to them.

11. Minors can have a stable identity justifying social/medical transition

HRC: “Every credible medical organization… calls for age-appropriate gender-affirming care for transgender and non-binary people.” Ban = “dangerous, discriminatory.”

WPATH SOC8: separate adolescent chapter; puberty suppression and hormones “when indicated”; no absolute age floors for surgery in the published version (maturity assessment instead); parental consent “recommended but may be dispensed with if assessed as harmful or not feasible.”

Stonewall after Cass (as reported): hormones and blockers should still be prescribed to children and young people in a “timely manner” if a practitioner supports it.

12. Desistance / detransition / contagion minimized or recoded as stigma

GLAAD: ROGD is an “intentionally misleading anti-trans trope used… to fearmonger.” “Transition-related health care for transgender people, including youth, is supported by every major U.S. medical association.”

HRC: exploratory approaches that might “change… gender identities” are conversion therapy; Kennedy/HHS review is “outright lies and misinformation.”

WPATH SOC8:WPATH SOC8 “acknowledges” social influence and the rise in natal-female adolescents but “stopp[ed] short of endorsing ‘rapid-onset gender dysphoria.’”

You will not find these orgs leading with desistance rates, Cass-style evidence reviews, or social-contagion hypotheses as first-line explanations.

13. Spaces and sport follow identity

GLAAD restroom fact sheet: bills forcing “transgender men to use women’s bathrooms, and trans women to use the men’s room” rest on “intentional falsehoods”; trans people should use facilities “that align with who they are.” Cites ACLU: trans people must be able to “use facilities and participate in activities that match who they are.”

NWLC: excluding trans athletes “erases” that they are women and girls; Title IX requires full participation. Inclusive restrooms do not increase safety risk; exclusion endangers both trans and cis women.

GLSEN (via NCTE-style school advocacy): trans students “barred from sports teams that reflect their gender identity” and “forced to use facilities corresponding to their legal sex” as evidence of a hostile climate.

14. No internal line (social-only vs medical)

GLAAD: identity “is not dependent upon medical procedures.”

WPATH SOC8: validates identities that need no medical treatment; access should not depend on the words used.

HRC explicitly includes non-binary and neopronouns in the same pronoun/respect rules.

15–16. Lived experience / questions as harm

GLAAD media program: when media “talks about transgender issues – it is imperative that they get it right” (i.e., the org’s frame).

GLAAD disinformation guide: named research frames (ROGD, “experimental” care, “groomer”) are “false narratives… used to dehumanize trans people.”

HRC to Rowling: “Any questions…?” after restating the slogan.

The phrase “what is a woman?” is treated in adjacent commentary as a “rhetorical strategy in anti-trans discourse.”

17. Opposition as animus

GLAAD letter: dissenters are “self-identified feminists” promoting “damaging and violent ideas”; legislation is “bigoted.”

HRC: sports/care limits are “disinformation,” “extreme elements of their base,” “discriminatory.”

18. Public affirmation; neutrality is not enough

HRC ally FAQ: use the pronouns, “correct others,” learn “gender identity-inclusive language,” oppose “discriminatory bills.”

GLAAD allies page: listen, ask, apologize, never ask the “real name,” don’t share old photos.

19. Conflict with women’s/gay rights denied or inverted

GLAAD: “honoring the diversity of women’s experiences is a strength, not a detriment to the feminist cause”; equal access to “recreation and public accommodations.”

NWLC: exclusion of trans women from women’s sport is sex discrimination under Title IX, not a sex-based protection.

Stonewall conversion-therapy line treats gender identity and sexual orientation as the same kind of trait to be protected from “change.”

20. Category expands (nonbinary, etc.)

HRC slogan includes “non-binary people are non-binary.” Definitions: “a blend of both or neither”; neopronouns listed as valid.

GLAAD FAQ: identity “does not fit neatly into those two choices”; use whatever term the person uses, including non-binary.

WPATH SOC8 title and text: “Transgender and Gender Diverse People.”

These advocacy groups lay out the ideological presuppositions, and self-identified "allies" go around enforcing them by, inter alia, vilifying people who do not agree with those presuppositions (hasty and unsubstantiated leaps into "Bigot!" accusations are a good example of this).

That said, I am quite willing to listen to what you have to say.  Which items in the list of "tenets" of trans ideology I previously provided do you feel are inaccurately characterized as such?

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

That comparison isn’t perfect, though, because I don’t think there even is a uniform list of trans ideological doctrines that you must subscribe to in order to be considered an ally.

I agree that there is not any particular "uniform list of trans ideological doctrines."  The movement is, after all, pretty amorphous.

That said, I think most or all of the items in the list I provided would be recognized by most people as widely accepted tenets/axioms amongst trans advocacy groups, trans persons, "allies," and so on.

But again, I am quite willing to listen to what you have to say.  Which items in the list of "tenets" of trans ideology I previously provided do you feel are not widely accepted by these folks?

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

For example, you have frequently characterized biological men as "women." 

When I have used the word “woman” that way, I was using it as a gender category rather than as a synonym for adult human biological female.

You are redefining, in an manner, "woman" by including men within it.  Ideologically-driven, ad hoc redefinition of basic terms is, in my view, a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

In my view, the notion that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one is a per se departure from "empirical reality."

In my view, when you do this you are fervently refusing to understand their words, their conceptual framework, and the nuances of their point.

When I do this I am declining to acquiesce to the radical redefinition of "woman" to include men in its meaning.

If I fervently believe that I am the son of Elon Musk, I am factually incorrect about that.  I may try to twist and turn to redefine terms or otherwise present some sort of "conceptual framework" and "nuances" to justify my belief, but doing so is a departure form "empirical reality."  I am not the son of Elon Musk, and no amount of subjective feeling or equivocation or redefinition or nuance can change that.

Again, you have frequently characterized biological men as "women."  In my view, the notion that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one is a per se departure from "empirical reality," and no amount of subjective feeling or equivocation or redefinition or nuance, or accusations of "bigotry" can change that.

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

“Gender identity” and “gender expression” are well-defined terms that represent real-world things, too.

Sure.  But to the extent they express the idea that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one, such expressions are a departure from "empirical reality."

Uncle Teddy in Arsenic & Old Lace is a long-recognized character, but nobody expects the audience to think he actually is Teddy Roosevelt.

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

On my mission, on a few occasions people I was talking to were adamant that I wasn’t an “elder”. In their view, calling a 19-year old kid an “elder” was a radical “departure from empirical reality,” and they were willing to die on that hill.

"Elder" has a variety of definitions, some pertaining to chronological age and others to ecclesiastical titles:

Quote

1. a person who is older or higher in rank than oneself.
2. an aged person.
3. an influential member of a tribe or community, often a chief or ruler; a superior.
4. a presbyter.
5. (in certain Protestant churches) a lay member who is a governing officer, often assisting the pastor in services.
6. Mormon Church. a member of the Melchizedek priesthood.

Thus, there is no radical, ad hoc redefinition here.  But there sure is one when you affirm that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one.  That claim is a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

I think the same must be said for your rejection of the sexual binary.  It is a per se departure from "empirical reality."

I disagree with you on this one. George Box said all models are wrong, but some are useful. The sexual binary is a model. In many contexts it is an extremely useful one, but when dealing with the biology of real-world people, it is less universally useful than many people imagine, and certainly isn’t the ultimate truth of what it means to be a human being. Empirical reality is that sex is "the biological components, including anatomical and physiological traits, largely related to sexual reproduction. Not all components align for all people."

I take the Box point seriously, but I think it is being asked to do work it cannot do.

“All models are wrong, but some are useful” is a warning about statistical approximations of complex systems. It is not a license to treat every real classification as optional, which is what you appear to be attempting.

Sex is not a subjective, convenient story we tell about bodies. In anisogamous species, including humans, there are two gamete types: small (sperm) and large (ova). That is the empirical binary. Organisms are organized around one or the other pathway. “Not all components align for all people” is true of developmental variation, injury, and medical intervention. It does not create a third gamete, a third reproductive class, or a spectrum of sexes. It describes incomplete, atypical, or medically altered expression within the binary.

Your denial of the sexual binary, then, is ideological, not rational, and is therefore a per se departure from "empirical reality."

The National Academies language you quote works against you, as it still anchors sex in “biological components… largely related to sexual reproduction.” That is the binary. The hedge about alignment is a recognition of disorders of sex development and of trait mismatch, not a finding that sex is non-binary. A person with CAIS is not a third sex; they are an XY individual whose body cannot use androgens. The classification remains male in the reproductive sense even when the phenotype is atypical.

So when I say rejection of the sexual binary is a departure from "empirical reality," I mean this: the binary is not a rough average we can set aside when it is socially inconvenient or ideologically mandated. It is the reproductive architecture of the species. Models can be refined. They do not get to deny the existence of the two gamete classes that define the system.

If the claim is only that some traits vary and some people need careful clinical description, we agree. If the claim is that sex itself is therefore not binary, that is the step I cannot take. Usefulness and truth are not opposites here. The binary is both.

And because I think it is clear that we disagree, I find your denial/rejection of the sexual binary to be a per se departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

"Sex assigned at birth" means “sex recorded at birth.” It is in fact a term used by doctors in medical records when dealing with these issues, and was well-defined by the Academies. 

Right.  I acknowledge that.  I also note, however, that "assigned at birth" has sometimes been misappropriated by some ideologues to characterize biological sex as something chosen, not observed, and is therefore subjective and/or arbitrary. 

When these idealogues do this, they use “assigned at birth” to recast sex as a label someone applied, not a trait someone observed.

A midwife recording “male” or “female” is almost always naming the reproductive class already present. The "assigned at birth" is used to suggest that the midwife's act - an administrative/clerical annotation - is the origin of sex, such that a later "gender identity" incongruent with biological sex can be framed as the real fact and the natal record as merely a guess that can be corrected.

In other words the phrase The work the wording does: move sex from biology to paperwork, then treat disagreement with the new paperwork as denying the person rather than disputing a classification.

Such misappropriated usage is, in my view, a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

I agree with both of these.  Do you?

I don’t think it is my job to gate-keep the definition of words and to agree or disagree with definitions.

But it is your job to endorse a position that necessarily involves a radical redefinition?  If so, you are being selective in what you will and will not do in terms of lexical usage.  That selectivity is arbitrary and ad hoc and borne of ideological obligation, and is a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

I generally use the definitions the Academy provided, and try to understand what people are trying to communicate with the words they use. 

You have affirmed, many many times, that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one.

You have repeatedly used and ratified a radical, ad hoc, ideologically-driven redefinition of "woman," which I think constitutes a departure of "empirical reality,."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

My sense is that much of trans advocacy is built less on redefining biological sex than on the idea that how we relate to other people matters.

I quite disagree.  I think redefinition and equivocation are two of the most potent and frequently-used tools in the "trans advocacy" toolbox.  

"Assigned at birth."

"Sex is a spectrum."

"Sex is a social construct."

"A woman is anyone who 'identifies' as one."

"Trans women are women."

And so on.  These are factually and linguistically incoherent claims, but anyone who disagrees with them at all is denounced as a "bigot."

AFAICS, you have endorsed these terms in ways that are necessarily redefinitional, ad hoc, ideological, equivocating, and obfuscatory, and I find such usage to be a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

In ordinary social contexts, the polite and humane thing to do is generally to treat people in a way that aligns with their gender identity and presentation.

And that sure is a strange phenomenon.

• Can "Stefoknee Wolscht," a biological male in his 50s, call himself a perpetual six-year-old girl? 
• Can a 5'9" white guy "identify" as a six-foot-tall Chinese woman? 
• Can Eva Tiamat Medusa "identify" as a dragon? 
• Can Naia Ōkami "identify" as a wolf?  

The answer to all of these questions is "Subjectively and in their own worldview, yes; otherwise, no.  To suggest otherwise would be to depart from 'empirical reality.'"

Meanwhile, 

• Is Mr. Wolscht actually a perpetual six-year-old girl?  No.
• Is the 5'9" white guy who "identifies" as a six-foot-tall Chinese woman actually a six-foot-tall Chinese woman?  No.  
• Is Eva Tiamat Medusa actually a dragon?  No.
• Is Naia Okami actually a wolf?  No.

Does society in general go along with the incongruent-with-reality "identities" of these people?  No.

Nevertheless, there are substantial numbers of people in society who somehow manage to affirm and ratify that notion that although a person cannot become something they are not despite "identifying" as it (a dragon, a wolf, etc.), a man can "become" a sex he is not - a "woman" - by "identifying" as one.

I have yet to see a coherent explanation for why claims to an "identity" of a dragon or a wolf are not treated as congruent with reality, but claims by a man to an "identity" of a woman is treated as congruent with reality.

At this point, the standard rejoinders I see are "Gender/sex and species/age are different" (never explained, just asserted), or equivocation ("gender identity" is separate from "sex," while elsewhere conflating them (such that "woman" can refer to sex or "gender identity" or both)) or "Bigot!"

Wolscht and Medusa and Okami are all claiming "identities" which are incongruent with reality and biological fact.  You have repeatedly endorsed claims that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one, which is also incongruent with reality and biological fact.  You attempt to overcome or mitigate that incongruency by resorting to ideological and ad hoc equivocatons and redefinitions.  I find that to be a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

That does not require pretending biological sex is unreal or different than what it really is.

I find the foregoing to be incompatible with your numerous ratifications elsewhere that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one.  I think that claim requires its adherents to treat biological sex as "unreal" and "different that what it really is" (that is, malleable, subjective, changeable, on a spectrum and not a binary, etc.).  I find that treatment to be unreasoned and factually inaccurate and arbitrary and ad hoc, and therefore a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

It means recognizing that social categories used in social situations don’t necessarily need to line up with the underlying biology you’d talk about with your doctor in medical situations.

Okay.

Uncle Teddy from Arsenic & Old Lace was not born to Martha Stewart Bulloch Theodore Roosevelt Sr. on October 27, 1858.  Uncle Teddy is not really Teddy Roosevelt, and nobody in society believes that he is.  Family members and others humor his delusion, but that's about it.

But somehow, some segments of our society have found it workable in their minds to go along with an incongruent-with-reality claim that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one.  No other "identity" claim (wolf, dragon, whatever) is treated as it is legitimate and real, but this "gender identity" thing is.  I find that notion to be incompatible with "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

Here, though, there is no "gender identity" component to "female" (as there is according to Merriam-Webster).  Do you endorse that omission?

I'm not in a position to endorse anything on this. I’m a finance expert, not a doctor.

And Ketanji Brown-Jackson could not define "woman" because she's not a doctor either.

In truth, she dodged the question because she did not want to answer it.  Evasion and equivocation are, sadly, hallmarks of those who want to defend, or not run afoul of, trans ideology.

The ideas being presented here, such as there being a "gender identity" component to "female" (such that a male who "identifies" as a woman is female) is ideological and ad hoc and incompatible with "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

Quote

I assume these folks are simply reporting how this term is being used, without commenting on its incoherence.

Just because you think something is incoherent doesn't mean it really is.

A dictionary definition which folds "male" into the definition of "female" is facially incoherent and a departure from "empirical reality."

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

“Not all components align” is biological reality when we’re talking about real-world human beings. 

I quite agree.  People with DSDs exist.

But we all know that all the talk about "trans" stuff is not about people with DSDs, but rather about people who are unequivocally male but "identify" as a woman, or vice versa.  

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

When scientists say “sex is a spectrum,” they do not mean that male and female are meaningless categories. They mean that the biological traits associated with sex: chromosomes, hormones, gonads, genital anatomy, secondary sex characteristics, and gene expression, do not always line up perfectly and often vary continuously in degree. From this coherent, reality-based point of view, sex is bimodal rather than perfectly binary in every biological feature: most people cluster strongly around typical male or female patterns, while some fall between or outside those typical combinations. This can be an insightful way of understanding human biology. 

I can accept most of the first half of this paragraph. Chromosomes, hormones, gonads, genitals, and secondary traits do not line up the same way in every body. Some of those traits vary in degree. A few people sit far from the typical male or female cluster. That is real, and it is why medicine needs more than a cartoon.

The mistake is treating that variation as if it were the definition of sex.

“Spectrum” and “bimodal” describe how traits are distributed. Sex names which reproductive class an organism is organized toward: small gametes (male) or large gametes (female). There is no third gamete and no sliding scale between sperm and ova. The two clusters exist because there are two developmental programs. Variation around the clusters does not turn the programs into a continuum or "spectrum" of sexes.

A tall woman is not “more male.” A man with low testosterone is not “partly female.” A person with a DSD is not a third sex; they have a developmental difference within one of the two pathways, or a mix of traits that still does not create a new reproductive class. “Not every feature is perfectly binary” is true. “Therefore sex is not binary” does not follow.

So I can use the trait language when we are talking about labs, anatomy, or medical care. I will not use it to retire male and female as the only two sexes. The insightful part is that bodies vary. The overreach and departure from "empirical reality" is concluding that the categories themselves are only a rough sketch. 

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

As a thought experiment, imagine in a few years Elder Uchtdorf as prophet. Imagine at the same time a faithful member of the Church who deeply, deeply, feels their spirit is a woman and that somehow, their body looks, biologically, like a male. This person isn’t an activist or public agitator. Just a committed Latter-day Saint who feels like a woman trapped in a males body. They finds themself talking to the first presidency about it, and after a blessing and a prayer they receive a revelation: this person’s spirit really is a female spirt.

Latter-day Saint beliefs are, in the main, not empirically testable.  

I am quite willing to believe in things that are real, part of "reality," but not empirically so.  I cannot prove that my wife loves me, but I believe that love to be as real as anything in my life can be.

5 hours ago, Analytics said:

In principle, this could happen, right? Mormons believe in spirits, and that spirits really do have genders. And they also believe genetic defects generally don’t reflect the essence of the body’s spirit. So what if the prophet had a revelation that a specific biological man had a female spirit? Would you object to this person claiming that on the inside, they really are a woman? Would you insist they be treated like a man, despite the prophet’s revelation that their spirit is female?

I can take the thought experiment in good faith, though it takes some real work.  In the most de minimis sense, could the First Presidency receive a revelation that George Patton really had experienced 8 prior incarnations prior to his Patton one (e.g., a soldier with Alexander the Great, a soldier fighting Parthians for Rome, a viking, etc.)?  "In principle, this could happen, right?"  I suppose so, (AoF 1:9 - “We believe all that God has revealed, all that He does now reveal, and we believe that He will yet reveal many great and important things pertaining to the Kingdom of God.”), but I find it so implausible and farfetched that I have difficulty taking it seriously.  So it is with your theoretical.  Nevertheless, let's give it a go.

I do not doubt that a faithful member can suffer that distress, or that a prophet can receive revelation about a person’s soul (though frankly, I doubt there has ever been a situation remotely like the theoretical one you describe).  But I still think the hypothetical smuggles in a conclusion the Church has not taught.

The Family Proclamation says gender is an essential characteristic of premortal, mortal, and eternal identity. The Church has since said that in that sentence gender means biological sex at birth. Counseling materials add that our bodies are patterned after the likeness of our spirits. That is the opposite of “the spirit is one sex and the body is the other, and we just failed to notice.” Feelings of incongruence are acknowledged, but they are not treated as evidence that the spirit is female in a male body. The Church takes no official position on the cause of those feelings. It does take a position on what sex is for ordinances, classes, and covenants: the body.

So “in principle, a prophet could reveal a female spirit in a male body” is not a small step from present doctrine. It would be a new claim that spirit-sex and body-sex can come apart in an otherwise typical male. Genetic defects and DSDs are real. They are not the same thing as an intact male body plus an inner conviction. Treating every case of dysphoria as a “defective body hiding a female spirit” is the theory being tested, not a premise we already share.

Even if I grant the scene—Elder Uchtdorf, a blessing, a statement that this person’s spirit is female—I would still separate three questions:

1. Did God speak comfort to that person? I am not the judge of their prayer.
2. Is that person a woman in the sense the word has in biology, marriage, and the mortal church? No. The body is male. Priesthood, temple, bathrooms, sports, and “daughter of God” in the embodied sense follow the body. Current handbook practice already does.
3. How should I treat them? With the same duty I owe anyone in pain: kindness, no mockery, no demand that they perform a political script. Kindness is not the same as agreeing that they are a woman.

If a future prophet actually received and published such a revelation, members would have to weigh it the way we weigh any claimed addition to the order of the Church: with the First Presidency and Twelve, in harmony with what is already revealed, not as a private interview that rewrites the categories for everyone else. I would not pretend a press release from a message board is that process.

So my answer to your last two questions is: I would not deny their inner life or their standing before God. I would still say they are a man, and I would still insist that the sex-based parts of church and civic life follow the body. The hypothetical asks me to treat a revelation about a spirit as if it changed the sex of the body. That is the step I cannot take on the doctrine we actually have.

Thanks,

-Smac

Edited 1 hour ago by smac97

[smac97]

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Hi @smac97,

After I posted this, I realized it wouldn’t be clear what I was referring to, so I decided to flesh out my point. On a personal level, it irritates me that you went to a source with an obvious political bias on this topic (Grok), asked it to create a straw man version of “trans ideology”, and then use this to bait the people you are talking to and then criticizing them for not embracing the straw man.

I have previously asked, and now ask again: 

I am quite willing to listen to what you have to say.  Which items in the list of "tenets" of trans ideology I previously provided do you feel are inaccurately characterized as such?

Which items in the list of "tenets" of trans ideology I previously provided do you feel are not widely accepted by these folks?

As for LLMs and political bias, seems like your preferred on - ChatGPT - has its own issues:

AI chatbots face major backlash over left-wing bias: ‘Can no longer be considered neutral and cannot be trusted’

In any event, I think all Grok did was compile most of tenets I would have (I have addressed many of this in threads on this board).

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

For my part, I asked ChatGPT to critique what Grok said on this matter, and replace its straw man with a steel man. Here is what GPT says:

First, I would not call these the “fundamental tenets of trans ideology.” There is no catechism, governing body, or agreed philosophical system called trans ideology. More importantly, allyship is primarily a position about how transgender people should be treated, not a requirement that one accept a particular metaphysics of sex.

Good luck departing from those tenets - and publicly saying so - while staying in the good graces of trans advocates, both the groups and the self-appointed online and social media guys.

That there is no governing body to definitively establish "tenets" of trans ideology is one thing; to say that no generally-accepted tenets exist at all is, I think, incorrect.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

If I were trying to steelman the minimum position, I would reduce it to something like this:

A minimal trans-ally position

1. Transgender people are describing a real human experience. Some people experience a persistent gender identity that does not correspond to the sex category in which they were born and raised. One need not settle whether this identity is innate, developmental, neurological, psychological, social, or some combination in order to take their experience seriously.

2. Transgender people deserve the same dignity, liberty, and legal protection as everyone else. They should not be harassed, assaulted, fired, denied housing, or otherwise mistreated simply because they are transgender.

3. In ordinary social interactions, people should generally accommodate another person's gender identity. If someone lives and presents socially as a woman, there is usually no reason not to call her a woman, use the name she asks to be called, and use female pronouns. That is ordinary interpersonal courtesy. It does not require believing that chromosomes, reproductive anatomy, or biological history have somehow changed.

4. Sex and gender identity are distinguishable concepts. Biological sex is real. Gender identity and gender expression are also real phenomena. Which one matters depends upon what we are talking about. At a cocktail party, gender identity may be overwhelmingly relevant and chromosomes completely irrelevant. In some medical contexts, biological sex may be critically important.

5. Public-policy questions should be decided individually rather than by slogans. Bathrooms, competitive sports, prisons, shelters, medical records, identification documents, and treatment of minors do not necessarily present the same problem. Being a trans ally does not require believing that gender identity must prevail over sex in every conceivable context. It requires taking the interests of transgender people seriously along with whatever competing interests actually exist.

6. Medical questions are empirical questions. It is entirely consistent with trans allyship to ask about benefits, risks, diagnostic uncertainty, desistance, detransition, comorbidities, age, informed consent, and the quality of evidence supporting particular treatments. Compassion does not require knowing the answer before the research is done.

That strikes me as a defensible minimum.

Okay.  Still hope to see you identify the "tenets" in my list which, in your view, are not fairly characterized and/or are not widely accepted by advocates of "trans" issues/ideology.

Your list overlaps with mine only at the edges. Most of it is a different position: liberal courtesy plus “don’t be cruel,” not the set of largely asserted and controverted axioms that I listed and which I see played out all the time (and I documented numerous examples of trans advocacy groups using them).

The overlap: Item 1 (the experience is real) and item 2 (ordinary civil protection) are compatible with almost any serious view, including mine.

Item 4 (sex and identity are distinguishable) rejects “identity is sex.”

Item 5 (policy case by case) rejects “identity wins in every space.”

Item 6 (medicine is empirical) is a rejection of my list’s “affirmation is non-negotiable / questions are harm” tenets.

So relative to my list of tenets, this "steelman" keeps the humanitarian floor and drops the metaphysical and institutional big ticket claims.

Again, I have documented numerous instances of trans advocacy organizations asserting and/or presupposing the tenets in my list.

As for reasonableness, 2, 4, 5, and 6 in your list are reasonable as a minimum if “ally” only means “don’t abuse people and don’t pretend biology vanished.”  Frankly, I don't think most folks in the "trans" community would accept this minimal commitment, particularly if coupled with a rejection of the tenets in my list.

Item 1 is reasonable if “take the experience seriously” means the distress and the self-report exist, not that the self-report is the last word on sex.  Again, good luck getting that milquetoast item endorsed by other "trans" allies and such.

Item 3 is the hinge. “Usually call her a woman” is courtesy. In practice that courtesy is how “trans women are women” gets treated as the default in every room until someone names a sexed rule. The item tries to wall that off (“does not require believing biology changed”). I think this works as etiquette, but it becomes your tenet #2 the moment "courtesy" is demanded in sports, prisons, medicine, or law.

1 can slide into your tenet #4 if “take it seriously” means “do not contradict the identity claim.” As written, it does not have to.

5 is the honest item—and the one activist frameworks usually will not accept. A person who means 5 is not an “ally” in the HRC/GLAAD sense. They are a liberal who will lose the room the first time they say “not in women’s sports” or "Hey, deep down we all know that 'trans women' are not really women" or "sex is a binary, and is not something that can be changed so that person in one category can 'transition' into the other" or "In the end, I think we need to put *some* parameters on what does and does not count as a 'trans woman.'"

In sum, your list is a steelman of a moderate position that I think comes nowhere near being acceptable by most "trans advocacy" organizations and self-appointed "allies."  It overlaps with my list of tenets a bit, but also contradicts quite a few.

I am quite willing to publicly say whether I think my list is a decent summary of fairly widespread tenets of trans advocacy.  I am curious if you will reject any of those tenets.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Someone could go substantially further—believing, for example, that self-identification should control virtually every legal sex classification—without that stronger proposition becoming a prerequisite for treating transgender people decently.

And this is where I think Grok's earlier answer went badly off the rails.

Its 20-item list isn't a steelman of trans allyship. It is a hostile reconstruction of the most maximalist things one can associate with trans activism, sprinkled with assertions about activist motives and behavior, and then presented as though those constitute the movement's “fundamental tenets.”

I don't think my list is "maximalist."  I think it reflects widely-held tenets, as evidenced by the post in which I documented examples of most of those tenets from "trans advocacy" sources.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

Look at what gets smuggled into the supposed creed.

I never called or characterized the list as a "creed" (this, in your view, is ChatGPT exhibiting apolitical views)?

And what's with this "smuggling" stuff.  I posted the list for the world to see and invited feedback on it.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

A trans ally allegedly must believe that sex is socially constructed; that chromosomes and reproductive anatomy are crude or bigoted classifications; that disagreement denies people's existence; that withholding medical treatment is “violence”; that lived experience outranks data; that asking questions is harmful; that opponents are motivated by animus; that conflicts with women's or gay rights must be denied; and even that xenogender identities must receive exactly the same conceptual treatment as classical transsexualism.

Those aren't minimum propositions necessary for trans allyship.

I didn't say they were "minimum propositions," but rather that they are widely-held propositions, both by trans advocacy organizations and individual "allies."

I mean, good luck getting away with going to, say, a "Trans Pride" rally or some such and saying any of the following:

Re: Tenet 1 (Gender identity is real, innate, and authoritative. A person’s stated identity is the primary fact about whether they are a man, woman, both, or neither): 

• "I am a 'trans' ally.  However, I think we need to set aside the notion that a person's 'stated identity' is determinative of whether that person is a man or a woman or neither.  Biological sex determines that."

Re: Tenet 2 (Identity is sex (or replaces sex for social/legal purposes)).  “Trans women are women” / “trans men are men” is treated as a literal truth, not a courtesy or a political slogan.

• “I am a 'trans' ally.  However, deep down we all know that 'trans women' are not really women, but are instead men who have taken cosmetic, medical and sartorial measures to deliberately appear and 'identify' as women.  "Trans women are women" only in an entirely figurative/suggestive sense, that's all."

Re: Tenet 3 (Self-identification is sufficient). No medical diagnosis, surgery, hormones, or even consistent presentation is required for the identity to be valid.

• "I am a 'trans' ally.  However, there must, in the end, be some sort of barebones criteria to qualify as 'a woman.'  Subjective identity is unworkable because it's untestable and unfalsifiable.  Those two former NBA players have effectively destroyed the idea that being a "trans woman" can be based solely by self-identification.'"

I  compliment @california boy and @SeekingUnderstanding for being willing to come to this board and present/endorse a "Steps A-C" proposal which differentiates "trans women" who meet specified criteria (such that they can use women's bathrooms) and those who do not (and so are to be excluded from women's bathrooms).  This is a really small venue though.  I would be more impressed and surprised if CB presented his proposal in writing and widely disseminated it.

See also public declarations denying that "sex is a 'spectrum' and a 'social construct.'"  

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

This is why I think Grok deserved considerably more skepticism than it received here.

I'm okay with that.  I posted the list, and then documented numerous examples of these "tenets" being presented by trans advocacy groups.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

The giveaway isn't merely that individual statements are debatable. It is the construction of the list itself. Nearly every disputed question is phrased in the version least charitable to the trans side. Moderate propositions are replaced with absolutist ones; empirical controversies become alleged articles of faith; and the worst rhetoric one can find among activists is treated as constitutive of the entire worldview.

Candidly, I think "moderate propositions" are there, but they are not nearly as widely-held and endorsed as the list I provided.  

In other words, the "absolutist" and other extreme tenets seem to be largely assumed and axiomatic in the trans community.

2 hours ago, Analytics said:

One can disagree profoundly with particular trans activists, reject self-ID as a universal legal rule, believe biological sex remains important, demand better evidence for pediatric medicine, and recognize genuine conflicts involving sports or privacy—and still hold the rather modest proposition at the center of trans allyship:

Transgender people are real people describing a real experience, and in both our personal interactions and our laws we should try to treat them with dignity, courtesy, and fairness while dealing honestly with biological reality and legitimate competing interests.

That is a considerably stronger steelman than Grok's partisan caricature—and, I think, a much more useful starting point for an actual discussion.

Frankly, I am astonished.  By your metric I am a trans ally.

"Transgender people are real people describing a real experience,"

I affirm this, with some clarification (along the lines of "but that experience, however strongly felt, cannot override biological reality.  A man cannot 'become' a woman by 'identifying as one, nor can anyone migrate from one category in the sexual binary to the other").

"and in both our personal interactions and our laws we should try to treat them with dignity, courtesy, and fairness while dealing honestly with biological reality and legitimate competing interests."

I affirm this, with some clarification ("Such 'honest dealing' must include a kind, but still candid and direct, rejection of incongruent-with-reality notions such as 'Trans Women are Women' (they are not women, and acting or pretending to act as if they are is furtherance of falsehood and delusion), 'a "woman" is anyone who identifies as one' (this is a circular and nonsensical definition, as 'woman' means, and has always meant, 'adult human female,' which necessarily excludes men - including 'trans women' - from that definition"), '"sex" is a spectrum' or '"sex" is a social construct' ("sex" is a biological reality, not a subjective identity, not a spectrum, not a social construct)).

Thanks,

-Smac

[Calm]

2 hours ago, smac97 said:

I felt the list was fairly accurate. 

Subjective

Edited 1 hour ago by Calm

[Analytics]

2 hours ago, smac97 said:

"Elder" has a variety of definitions, some pertaining to chronological age and others to ecclesiastical titles:

Thus, there is no radical, ad hoc redefinition here.  But there sure is one when you affirm that a man can "become" a woman by "identifying" as one.  That claim is a departure from "empirical reality."

Let me get this straight. When you say an 18-year-old kid is an “Elder,” it is my job as the listener to figure out which definition you are using and understand what you mean. But if somebody else says, “I am a woman because that is my gender identity,” that’s totally different: you have no corresponding responsibility to understand what they mean. Instead, you can impose your definition onto their words and then criticize them for the nonsense that results.

Do I have that right?

Because if you aren’t willing even to acknowledge a responsibility to understand another person's conceptual framework before criticizing what they are saying, I’m not sure there is much point in continuing the conversation.