it may not fully reflect the conditions of today because it doesn’t take into account the negative effects of coverage like the nytimes.
i wonder if the nyt is even correct about more children identifying being out as trans? and - given their bigotry - if they even bother to separate “children who feel safe enough to identify as trans” from “children who are trans” out kids from the total number of trans youth. it seems there can be a big difference between the two.
( i’m sure the number of out gay and lesbian people has changed a lot over recent history too, but not the numbers of gay and lesbian people )
The number of children who are out about being trans has increased, but the curve is very similar to the growth in children who are left handed after it stopped being punished at schools.
As for identifying as trans, I am starting to realise how much language matters. I identify as a woman, not trans. Trans is just the unchangeable circumstances of my life. Trans identifying x is TER hate speech.
Don’t worry, I know you are not a TER, I’m just pointing out how words can be twisted against us to deny who we are.
I was on an LGBT history panel years ago. One of the very early gay rights leaders said that back in the day there was only about 100 out gay people in the entire country. Yet no one is surprised about the number of gay people.
I remember when they used to say that the incidence of being trans was 1 in 10,000 for trans women and 1 in 100,000 thousand for trans men. The numbers never made sense in the community as how would any of us ever have met other trans people? A trans friend with a very respected career in science sat down and looked at the number of surgeries alone in the US over the years and blew that number out of the water by orders of magnitude. And of course- having surgery isn’t the metric for the size of the community. But it was incontrovertible evidence.
Some people aren’t just wrong and perhaps surprised about the number of trans people. But want to argue that we shouldn’t exist. They paint better information as documenting a problem; rather than documenting a people.
The reported incidence of LGB people has doubled in the last 10 years; yet there’s no huge alarm being raised about the number of other queer people. The new information is useful to understand and support communities.
Why plan for the needs of those you want to eliminate?
that makes sense. i see how that phrasing is harmful, and how it undermines people who have a sex different than the one that was assigned to them. it makes it sound like a choice, when it isn’t.
it’s always been my sense that when people started coming out, it made it safer for other people to come out. it didn’t change who people were, intrinsically
that’s why i guess i have some surprise when some place implies there are more kids who are out about being trans now.
it made me wonder if that’s true or if it’s really about the same as it ever has been, and just more people are noticing.
but engaging with the nyt’s bigoted framing wasn’t a particularly good idea on my part. they’re pushing a narrative about fear of trans people, and they’re not asking any honest questions
