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[Reelyanoob]

I think I finally understand the source of the TV ads mentioned a while ago labelling all schoolyard boys as "Potential Abusers"

"No", the counselor chirped in confidently, "Tag is a game in which people try to touch someone who doesn't want to be touched." This attitude of thinking you can touch someone who doesn't want to be touched can be the gateway to rape, child molestation, domestic violence, and assault."

This is taught at universities despite the fact there are no peer review studies (or studies of any kind) to back it up. Another source labels the problem as tag's "chasing behavior" teaching domestic violence behavior later on.

[G-Flex]

I wasn't a very socially or physically active kid, but I certainly don't remember any non-consensual games of Tag going on at my school.

Might as well make the same argument about literally any contact sport... or really any competitive physical sport at all.

[lordcooper]

Why is this thread always about either transexuals or rape?

Nearly any time I poke my head in, people are talking about one of those topics.

[G-Flex]

Gender-related issues are very much at the forefront of progressive talk these days, I guess, and/or they're just what some people are particularly interested in in this thread.

If you have another topic, though, go ahead. We did talk very briefly about censorship, if that helps!

[Heron TSG]

The rape thing just popped up again, it's not like we've been talking about it for weeks on end.

As for tag being rape... that's silly. My cross country team plays tag sometimes, and there's nothing rapey about it.

[Vector]

Pff.  If Tag is like rape, it's consensual rape.  I.e., a rape fantasy, not actual rape.

Tag isn't about touching someone who doesn't want to be touched, after all.  It's about touching someone who's consented to run around trying not to be touched.

[Truean]

Out of curiosity, how long have you felt this way about your body, and in what way do you feel that way? Do you feel like there's a situation going on as was described earlier, where you intuitively feel like the parts your brain has mapped out for you simply don't correspond to what's attached, or is it something else? I don't really expect an answer here; I'm aware that may be a little more personal than you want to talk about.

[blush....] It's like having a third ear in the middle of your stomach: you know it shouldn't be there, are horrified that it is, about cry when you hear something through it and feel like a freak because of it. I never want to use it for anything, ever. The thought of doing so terrifies me and has made me cry and literally curl up in the fetal position when with my boyfriend.... Thankfully he was understanding and had saintly patience to put up with my neurotic BS.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Given that, imagine how I felt when my sister tired to get me to pay child support to one of her friends by saying it was my kid. Naturally I "failed" the paternity blood test. Her goal was to get me to publically admit being "gay" on the record for blackmail or "extortion" under http://codes.ohio.gov/orc/2905.11, which is a third degree felony. I handed the police the case on a silver platter, but they were actually worried and said "Son, do you want it a matter of public record that you're gay?" They actually were trying to protect me...[sigh] What's worse they might have been right....

I have no idea how to respond to the "mapping" thing, but my body tells me I should have breasts and my chest feels empty without them. This also greatly saddens me if I ever let myself think about it for any length of time. I wonder if this is what you mean. Then of course there are areas that I wouldn't know how to describe....

That sounds like you're talking about multiple genders, not multiple sexes. Academically, the distinction here is that sex is biological and gender is more the associated behaviors and social roles.

Yup

In summation, it would greatly help me if society would chill out and accept me, but even then, I would still need surgery.

I really wish we lived in some kind of hypothetical future-world where sexual reassignment were, well, better. Compared to the ideal (the ideal being that the end result is exactly what someone born as that sex would be like), the current state of affairs is woefully lacking, but I don't honestly know how that could improve in the near future, given that it's slightly difficult to, you know, give people new body parts. The best we can do now, really, is reposition, contort, cut up, and convolute ones that we already have into new configurations that sort of approximate what the real thing is supposed to be like. But hey, it's progress, and if it helps people to stop having to go through that kind of inner turmoil every day, and significantly improves their quality of life for that reason, then I'm all for it.

Yup basically ditto. Thank you for that .... All the same I'd happily take it. Anything is better than this....

[Reelyanoob]

Your post just made me think of a documentary I saw about "wannabe amputees". One guy in the USA took his left leg off with a shotgun, because he always hated that particular leg, felt like it didn't belong, not sure why. He states he's much happier now. Maybe related to brain=>body mapping?? The doco kind of freaked me out.

EDIT: I can actually deal with the transgender concept much easier than these people at war with their own limbs. Just read about a guy who hated BOTH his legs and took them off with a frozen C02 bath. :/

[G-Flex]

I have no idea how to respond to the "mapping" thing, but my body tells me I should have breasts and my chest feels empty without them.

I find this part interesting, and somewhat confusing, as nobody is born with developed breasts and I'm really not sure why your body would feel that way. I mean, developed breasts aren't really a major neurological thing, just redepositing of fat and shaping of tissue that's already there. I'm not saying I don't believe you, just that it sounds like a rather odd phenomenon, almost like your body telling you that your legs should be longer or something rather than having a part it doesn't. Again, I believe you, but I'm very curious how that works, and that's obviously something neither of us can answer and is probably too complex on a psychological and neurological level in a way that those fields don't understand yet.

Yup basically ditto. Thank you for that .... All the same I'd happily take it. Anything is better than this....

On a personal note: I used to be less accepting of sexual reassignment, because I thought it just amounted to people wanting to change their physical sex, as if it were the same as someone feeling like they should be a different species or have a different skin color or number of limbs or something else arbitrary like that (there was a very stupid and heavy-handed South Park episode to that effect a long time ago). However, the more I learned about it, the more it seemed like something else entirely: That the people who felt they needed it didn't do so out of simple desire, but because there was a serious issue going on, probably regarding sexual development, that resulted in their bodies simply not feeling right no matter what. It's no surprise that this can happen, either. After all, we start out pretty much the same at one point in the womb and diverge from there, so it shouldn't be a great shock that sometimes, that process can go off-kilter or become inconsistent in some way or another.

Your post just made me think of a documentary I saw about "wannabe amputees". One guy in the USA took his left leg off with a shotgun, because he always hated that particular leg, felt like it didn't belong, not sure why. He states he's much happier now. Maybe related to brain=>body mapping?? The doco kind of freaked me out.

Yeah, on Wikipedia you can look up "Body Integrity Identity Disorder", which is the name for that sort of thing. It's a rather controversial issue in terms of whether or not you allow surgeons to remove body parts for that reason, probably because it's an ill-understood condition.

I believe Supernumerary Phantom Limbs were mentioned in this thread, too, which is basically the opposite thing: Feeling the presence of a body part, such as an extra arm, that isn't actually there and never was.

[Rose]

I have no idea why I haven't subscribed to this thread before.

well now I have.

[Kay12]

I haven't heard of cases of people voluntarily removing perfectly functional body parts, but I'm not questioning the phenomenon's reality. It reminds me of a human arm transplants, as supposedly the transplanted arms will feel strange and unfamiliar, even threatening, which is why some people wish to undo the transplant. Could these two be related?

[Vector]

I think I finally understand the source of the TV ads mentioned a while ago labelling all schoolyard boys as "Potential Abusers"

"No", the counselor chirped in confidently, "Tag is a game in which people try to touch someone who doesn't want to be touched." This attitude of thinking you can touch someone who doesn't want to be touched can be the gateway to rape, child molestation, domestic violence, and assault."

This is taught at universities despite the fact there are no peer review studies (or studies of any kind) to back it up. Another source labels the problem as tag's "chasing behavior" teaching domestic violence behavior later on.

I have to say, though, that having now read the OP, that is pretty fucking offensive itself in its framing and attitudes.

[G-Flex]

I haven't heard of cases of people voluntarily removing perfectly functional body parts, but I'm not questioning the phenomenon's reality. It reminds me of a human arm transplants, as supposedly the transplanted arms will feel strange and unfamiliar, even threatening, which is why some people wish to undo the transplant. Could these two be related?

In the sense that you feel something's not right about your body, I guess. A new arm won't have exactly the same dimensions as your old one, or exactly the same nerves, as well as a bunch of other minor differences. Perhaps that's jarring enough that something might never, ever feel right about it to you? I wish I could find more information on it.

I have to say, though, that having now read the OP, that is pretty fucking offensive itself in its framing and attitudes.

Yeah. Reading it now, the story sounds very apocryphal, on the level of a chain e-mail. I'm skeptical that even happened.

[Gamerlord]

-snip-

I think Vector would get pissed at me for what I posted.

[Vector]

If you look upthread, even before I read the article I agreed with him.

On the other hand, I think the framing of Tag as a boy's game, derided only by silly young feminists out to destroy the male population, is just slightly offensive.  I don't care if he's right or not.  In this case, it's about the way it was said and the easy derision with which he treated this counselor for things like her age, gender, and educational history.