First off, I’d like to apologize for being dilatory. In another life I am currently engaged web design studies and, while this was a great idea being stuck at home during a pandemic, is shaping up to be a bit harder than I thought.
Not that I’m failing, of course, but I find myself having to study even harder than I used to back when I was, well, younger.
Perhaps this is just a function of age as my brain isn’t as quick as it used to be.
I digress…
So over in Scotland there’s a bill coming up called the Gender Recognition Act which is basically a continuation of the GRA of 2004, only this time the government wants to go ahead and just let anyone who says they’re trans just go ahead and self-identify as a trans person.
What could possibly go wrong with this idea, I wonder?
Mostly this bill enshrines into law a dangerous idea that anyone who thinks they’re trans can just go ahead and say they’re trans without a diagnosis of gender dysphoria.
I want to repeat that: transgender people should no longer be required to get a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria in order to be legally recognized in their gender, a report from Parliament’s Women and Equalities Committee concluded.
I am assuming the Women and Equalities Committee is largely, if not entirely, men because I don’t believe a single woman (actual adult human female) was consulted.
Again, I want to make this very clear in case nobody has been paying attention: when you allow anyone to identify as a part of your grouping you get Chomo McDogfucker, alias John “Claire” Goodier - a trans identified male who was recently found in possession of a thumb drive containing graphic images of him actually fucking a dog.
With his penis, because women totally have penises.
What is even more disturbing is how this bill is basically going to take medical intervention out of the equation altogether.
Caroline Nokes (oh look, there was a woman on the WEC!), chair of the Women and Equalities Committee, said: “The GRA is crying out for modernization, and the Government has spectacularly missed its opportunity.
“This is an area of reform which has attracted strong opinions and debate, but there are areas – such as the removal of a time period for living in an acquired gender – which many can agree on. The Government’s failure to implement even these changes – made clear in its consultation – suggest its lack of willingness to engage.
And now for the best part:
“Being trans is not an illness. It is imperative that the Government de-medicalize the process of gender recognition by removing the outdated requirement for a gender dysphoria diagnosis.”
That’s odd because the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) categorizes this is a mental illness because, after all, it’s in the DSM-V!
The DSM-5 defines gender dysphoria in adolescents and adults as a marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and their assigned gender, lasting at least 6 months, as manifested by at least two of the following:
A marked incongruence between one’s experienced/expressed gender and primary and/or secondary sex characteristics (or in young adolescents, the anticipated secondary sex characteristics)
A strong desire to be rid of one’s primary and/or secondary sex characteristics because of a marked incongruence with one’s experienced/expressed gender (or in young adolescents, a desire to prevent the development of the anticipated secondary sex characteristics)
A strong desire for the primary and/or secondary sex characteristics of the other gender
A strong desire to be of the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender)
A strong desire to be treated as the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender)
A strong conviction that one has the typical feelings and reactions of the other gender (or some alternative gender different from one’s assigned gender)
In order to meet criteria for the diagnosis, the condition must also be associated with clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.
So what we have here is a bunch of parliamentarians who couldn’t all be psychiatrists (doubtful there’s any among them) who are contradicting what doctors, actual doctors who do actual doctor stuff for actual money, have identified as a full-on mental illness.
And now I will tap the sign again.
You would think that the transgender community would be up in arms about anyone, including John Goodier, infiltrating their ranks. You would think that the transgender community would take a cue from the gay rights movement when pedophiles tried to infiltrate theirs and were quickly run out and you would think that the time has come (and passed) for the transgender community to put foot to ass and clean house to rid their community of the dregs that have infested it.
Sadly, no.
England has already scrapped this plan after they saw the damage self-ID can do. I know that Scotland wants desperately to extricate itself from the rest of the UK, England in particular, but I wonder if they have to be so different from England that they’ll just do the opposite of whatever England is for or against.