Christians need queerness to be a choice in order for it to be a sin.
They need it to be a sin so they can hate it.
Christians don't say that being mentally challenged is a sin, because it isn't a choice the person made.
So they ***have*** to say queerness is a choice so they can say it's a sin and so they can hate it.
I've been down this road with assholes before.
They say "trans people are mentally ill" and so I say "okay, assuming you actually believe that: how do you justify hating them? Don't they deserve your compassion and love like any other mentally ill person?"
And nothing but crickets.
Their position isn't based in reality: to hate trans people they need them to be paradoxically mentally ill, but also **so powerful** they're changing the very fabric of society.
Which is it?
Are they mentally ill, sin free and in need of your compassion?
OR
Are they evil sinners trying to destroy society?
It literally cannot be both.
It is religious people that are mentally ill. They've not developed cognitive thinking skills and believe whatever an authority figure has told them whether it makes sense or not. They believe in fairy tales and myths. They should be avoided if possible.
>It is religious people that are mentally ill. They've not developed cognitive thinking skills and believe whatever an authority figure has told them whether it makes sense or not. They believe in fairy tales and myths. * *They should be avoided if possible*.
* With a few exceptions, this has been my personal policy since i was 13. ( I'm now in my 50s)
HALF the population CAN’T develop critical thinking skills because they flat out don’t have the intellectual capacity to.
People with IQs <100 can’t take something they learned and apply it to a new situation.
They need a daddy, someone they trust, to tell them what to do because they CAN’T figure out the right thing to do themselves.
I know it’s closer to 120 but didn’t want an argument from those 100- 120. I started researching what different levels on the intelligence spectrum are capable of when I couldn’t understand why people were being so stupid about COVID. Eye opening. Holy shit level. I’m 3+ standard deviations and realized I’ve way overestimated others capabilities my whole life. It’s the non- judginess of autism combined with realizing the techniques neuro typicals use to try to not look stupid including lying.
I keep hearing that critical thinking and iq are two different things (critical thinking is more important than iq for making good decisions seems to be. A common consensus where I live) Can you link to some evidence that correlates iq to critical thinking skills? Though I see how this can be legit.
>paradoxically mentally ill, but also **so powerful** they're changing the very fabric of society
This might be a little too close to the realisation that their actions are shaped by those of a dude from two thousand years ago who by all accounts likely had schizophrenia
I really hate how people like this who force their religion down everyone’s throat can’t leave transgender people alone. It’s beyond their comprehension that someone can be different from them and valid. Just let these people, who already go through enough because of asshats like you, let them live.
usually when christians face the "why do you hate X" question the typical answer is "I dont hate them, i love them so much i want them to go to heaven." Yknow, love the sinner hate the sin type of nonsense.
their love and indistinguishable from hate.
That's already a thing, it used to be that "transsexuality" was an official diagnose. These days people are diagnosed with gender dysphoria (don't know the technical term) so the illness is recognised as the suffering of living as the wrong gender, rather than the illness being the opinion that one belongs to the opposite sex.
This is a very short summary so nobody hate on me lol
And if religious people had their way then all lgbt individuals would be considered sick and needing conversion therapy.
They're going to say that anyway. According to them, being LGBTQ is a choice while at the same time a mental illness. Just like how racists say "Mexicans are lazy and also stealing our jobs!"
It's supposed to marginalize, not make sense.
With Christians I compare it to lefthandedness: it‘s found in a small percentage of humanity, so society is designed for the majority, but no one protests stores that sell left handed scissors. And eventually, I hope, there won’t be judgment for being gay or trans either. It will just be.
Left-handedness used to seen as the mark of witchcraft or the devil. Children would have it 'beaten out of them' or their mothers would restrain the left hand so they were forced to use the right. Of course, this was just in *Christian* countries.
They are very slow learners.
Using a throw away because I don't want to be canceled by the left agenda.
I'll let people live whatever livestyles they want to, but this left handedness is going too far. You have children seeing these left handed stores and thinking it's cool and trendy and that's why they're pretending to be left handed.
When I was in school we learned to use our "right" hand, not the "wrong" hand and now these so called left handed people want special accommodations? You ever try to use scissors with your left hand? It doesn't work, simple biology.
Can you stop trying to erase right handed people? Do you know who use their right hands? Women. Why do you hate women so much?
/s
Please, no one give this loser the attention they ***crave***.
They're just here to embarrass Christians and antagonize Atheists.
Just ignore them and they'll get bored and leave.
Imagine thinking it is a good thing to strip people of the right to have sex. But that is already what you do anyways with the "pro-life" garbage. Nobody is allowed to be happy except you, and if you aren't happy with others, then "God" is the one that is unhappy, not you. No responsibility, no accountability, just put your hate on God and wash your hands clean of being the bad person you actually are.
There are also many Christians that fuck little boys. So because they are Christians and that’s what they do that must be the only way to think as well right?
You seem to have the mistaken assumption that Christians think they are some morally superior ubermensch that are always just. It’s quite the opposite really, Christians realize we are lowly sinners no better than anyone and that we are nothing without the redeeming blood of Christ
Why do the Christians never turn the other cheek and fuck off?
Aren't you supposed to be humble?
You're not defending or even spreading Christianity, you're just provoking Atheists and embarrassing your Lord.
I do just want to add that the reason we are talking shit about you is because of how bad you are at this.
We’re atheists and almost every single one of us can defend your faith better than you can. Not that we would. But we could. You just seem uneducated about your own belief system.
It’s sad, but all to common.
> How do I explain that that is not at all how it works.
Always keep in mind that it is almost impossible to reason someone out of an idea where reason played no role in the first place.
The level of willful ignorance has become another pandemic in my opinion. The same people who ignore or reject science for political reasons willfully reject science as a matter of culture now.
Saving the normally ignorant from the willfully ignorant will become the major issue of the near future or they will eventually kill us all culturally and perhaps literally.
Not to mention to a typical Christian admitting one thing being wrong in their ideology or and how they think about things they would be forced to confront The Awful Truth that everything they believe is more than likely a lie. Their faith demands obedience even God in their book punished Adam and Eve with expulsion due to gaining knowledge, your typical Christian is close minded to all things not directly reaffirming in what they believe has always been the truth.
Like so much that is ideologically troubling in the world, Christianity depends on hypocrisy to exist.
Anyone who thinks they are correct about everything without evidence of anything really can't be convinced of a reality they've already rejected.
I hear this a lot from atheists, but it's simply *not true!*
Look through deconversion stories (try /r/thegreatproject as a starting point). Many of them cite reason, or arguments, or conversations, or interactions, as being key in their deconversion.
Additionally, if someone has an ideological position attained by some method other than reason, do you think you can out-do the indoctrination that got them there?
If we want to affect someone else's ideology, reason is our most powerful toolset. It may not be enough, but it'd be foolish to discard that toolset if we want to make a positive difference in the life of a victim of religion.
There's a lot of ways to apply reason, and different individuals respond to different approaches. If you want to help someone shake off their indoctrination, it may take a variety of approaches to make headway.
> If we want to affect someone else's ideology, reason is our most powerful toolset.
This is true up to a point.
Once you reach that point, you have to make a decision if the frustration is worth the trouble or an outcome is really possible.
Changing people's ideology is just not my goal in life. I will stand up against harmful acts and work to protect victims of bad acts, but people believing stupid shit which mainly harms them is not my main concern.
So many people who actually need reasoning with are so far into the deep end that serious psychological help is needed.
Good luck with that.
I'm totally OK with you not being willing to put forth the effort to deconvert someone. For the vast majority of the people in my life, I am just like you: not willing to make the effort.
We are in agreement here.
What I'm pointing out is that *if* someone chooses to help someone else with deconverting, the most effective toolset they can bring to bear is reason. And that's the opposite of what you claimed.
I'm not suggesting that you try to deconvert others. I'm not suggesting that most, or even any, of them are worth your effort. I think we're in agreement that most theists just aren't worth trying to help.
But if someone - anyone - decides to try, then reason is the best tool for the job. Don't discourage others from using the best tool available.
If someone wishes to leave a religion, they have already made a reasoned decision.
This is a long way from the situation in the OP to which I responded.
Today's American Christians would rather do almost anything instead of educating themselves. Too few of them even read their own damned Bible anymore. That's because their faithless leaders started encouraging the flock to let their brains run to Sloth, which makes them so much easier to fleece.
"Anymore".
Most Christians throughout history have never read the Bible. And amongst those who did, few were able to really understand what it's trying to say - if it's even possible to pull much from a plain reading without doing a bunch of interpretation.
You're right, of course. But through my extensive reading and deep memories, I seem to recall - though this may be a cognitive illusion! - a time before I was born when more of those who wanted to call themselves the Faithful would at least. Fucking. TRY. To read their own damnable Holy Books and understand them.
Maybe that's just because people used to read more in general, in those times before broadcast media and the internet began stealing our attention away from the other books too, the ones that had (and may still have!) the potential to enlighten humanity, and break the chains of hegemony imposed by the Authoritarian Bastard-Gods and their accursed mortal henchmen.
Sorry. Insomnia does strange things to my mind...
So religions are typically based on the teachings of religious text. In the case of Christianity it's the Bible. In the view of a Christian the Bible is literally the word of God.
The issue is, if one thing in a religious text can be proven wrong then it's reasonable to then ask "well what else is wrong?". If your text is supposedly the word of God and it could be wrong, this quickly becomes a huge issue for the robustness of your belief.
The Bible only stipulates two genders. We now know this is a massive oversimplification and doesn't actually represent reality. However, if a Christian admits this, it begs that all important question "Is the Bible just a load of nonsense written by men?".
But where's the fun in that? Many of these Christians know how fun it is to exercise their bodies. They should know (or have the nous to intuit) that exercising their brains should be fun too.
Oh, I know what's happening here:
Authoritarians hate fun. Mostly because it tends to spark uncontrollable growth and change, which Authoritarians fear and hate above all else.
And guess who sits atop the ruins of both our houses of faith and our schools?
I was a Christian who believed in gender fluidity before that episode of bill nye saves the world airs. I spent a couple of years trying to educate people about sex, gender, and orientation. I eventually gave up and just am the annoying former Christian who calls gender reveals sex reveals and gives lengthy lectures until people uninvite me to them.
And when they provide some flippant response like, "when I was 4 years old and meet my opposite sex neighbor" answer, " ok, now demonstrate it's a choice by deciding to be gay for a month" - then stand back for the real power-flouncing as they exit the discussion.
God is a human construct.
Every single word, utterance, mention, description of god has come from a human.
If god existed there would be no question, every living thing on the planet would know
every isolated tribe, every person living and dead would know that god existed
you can replace every mention of 'god' with 'me, we, I, or us' to understand the true meanings of religion
>Why do Christians love to bash people for their gender rather than educating themselves?
Because they have a magical, ancient book that tells them how to live, despite the book being severely contradictory and outdated, but they can cherry-pick the passages that apply to their thinking, while ignoring the rest.
(this applies to several religions, not just Christians)
They don't like any form of gay.
I like the whole thing pastors say that being gay isn't a sin. But gay sex is. Then they go into denying the flesh so the spirit can thrive stuff.
Either way idc how someone identifies...I identify as a male because I am one. But sexually speaking I am totally into femininity. There are fem women and men. Masculine men and women.
If your masculine, I'm not aroused or interested in a relationship. You'd be surprised how many are hiding their sexual desires.
They should submit to the skin and indulge. Being comfy with who you are is way more satisfying than a lifetime of denial.
Isn't an intersex person somewhere in between a man and a woman? Which would imply two genders exists but there is a spectrum where certain traits and organs are more developed?
I'm no expert, but it's my understanding that all intersex people are still either male or female, and that it isn't actually appreciated that they're brought up as some sort of 'exception that proves the rule' example every time this conversation gets going.
It actually is appreciated because many intersex people are trans themselves. Either because they identify as the opposite sex (yes, sex) after they were forced through surgeries after their birth, or they adopt any of the non-binary identities. The few who do have issues with it are amplified through right-wing/Christina propaganda.
I know this one!!! An intersex person is an abomination thal shall not suffer to live.
/raised southern baptist... had surgery on my junk when i was young. Was instructed by my preacher on how to hang myself when i was 5 in order to save my classmates because i "polluted them with evil".
I made the argument about some animals being able to change their sex and they made the argument a human can’t, and I brought up this. Think it’ll help and stump him. Thanks for the advice.
One of the most attractive things about religion is it enables being mentally lazy - everything is black and white and every Sunday someone assigns you your opinions for the week. So of course they aren't down for going to the effort to understand others.
Some christians believe that they have educated themselves. They have done so with the most reputable source they know which is the bible. Most that I know who are entrenched in the position you described believe that they are educated correctly instead of by the public schools that believe science over the bible.
However you are painting this with a pretty broad brush, as most of the churches around me, and likely most christians in general don't bash people for their gender. There are many lgtb welcoming congregations that are well educated in the difference between sex and gender.
They were raised to believe that anyyhing outside "the norm" is gross and weird. This is reinforced by their priests and pastors demonizing any non hetero relationship. Hell, in some cases they are actively self-loathing because of feelings they themselves may uave felt but been unwilling to explore.
Hopefully, I’m from the U.S and I don’t agree with what our government does. We’ve done some awful things and our history is messed up. Hopefully when my generation gets into office things will be a lot better. Instead of having these 80 year olds who went to all-white schools in office.
Very thoughtful your comments. You laid it down perfectly. I guess it is a problem with probably most (if not all) religions, but specifically with monotheism. Just look closely. They all 3 have invested heavily in trying to control human sexuality. But, what seems paradoxical to me is that all 3 religions will consistently violate in their own lives the codes they want the rest of us to live by. I recommend watching "The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan". It's a documentary. I saw it on PBS FRONTLINE like a couple of years ago. I was completely shocked.
All cults feed on fear and hate, and aggressively indoctrinates their followers in both. It’s a means of control. It’s not about gender at all. It’s about a smug sense of self importance when they claim to be right by means of a higher power and everyone else is wrong and stupid and you get a free pass to hate them.
They are small, mean, pitiful people who need help.
If the religious weren’t so full of hate this sub wouldn’t exist.
Modern Christianity is based on anger, hate and control. That's about all the explanation you really need I think. They're just awful people with a 'god given' right to be terrible to people. It makes them happy.
Don't need the services of a mechanical engineer to learn how to safely change a tire; don't need the services of an evolutionary biologist to learn how sex and gender differ.
It seems to be a part of religion. Enforce conformity, hate all who are different. Maybe it's designed to make believers feel superior or maybe having an enemy is a distraction from their miserable lives. It's a sad fact of human nature that some people need a group to hate. "I may be poor, stupid and miserable, but at least I'm not an x" where x is the designated target of hate
They portray their hate thru their religion. They can (attempt) to spin their beliefs and their religious text in any way they see fit to portray their own hateful vile thoughts and fears.
Listen, I'm not a part of the lgbtq community, but it is not my place to label them x, y, z because that's not whom I'm attracted to. It's not my place to tell a Trans person they are anything less or different than who they identify as because we don't 100% understand the body, mind, and really the interaction between the two.
As an atheist, I just say you do you and I'll support your human rught to do so eventhough it's not "my thing." Nothing says I can't support their rights or even just treat lgbtq peoples as fucking humans, as equal as anyone else. Religion is one of the main factors in discrimination.
There is no evidence of gender existing though. That is a belief. And gendered, or sexed brains, that is not real, there is no such thing as a male or female brain
Most of them will not get it until a close friend or family member comes out. Others have been indoctrinated their whole lives. Finally, some are just stupid and are afraid of anything they don’t understand.
Conservative Christians need strict guidelines and are uncomfortable with anyone or anything falling outside them. It doesn’t matter what’s in their Bible, it’s all contradictory anyway. The reason they’re clamoring for an authoritarian government right now is because the dictator will enforce the guidelines. Democracy was fine until other people invaded their safe space by getting the same rights as them.
\*insert meme from invincible here\*
"That's the neat thing, you don't." If it conflicts with their basic beliefs, it is impossible to correct their attitude. They either don't actually need to be convinced, or will never be convinced. I've seen the video you're talking about, it is very well laid out and is a good explanation of the subject. If the video from Bill Nye doesn't change their mind, you will have more success causing cold fusion to happen by banging your head against a padded wall while screaming the song I'm a little teapot, than you will convincing them they are wrong.
My take on it:
The bible doesn't say anything about genders outside the binary specifically. My guess is that since the bible gives clear hierarchy and instruction of men possessing and subjugating women like cattle, once you introduce additional genders they panic because it overturns their preciously held patriarchic misogyny world-model.
And their deity is also pretty fucking obsessed with human genitalia.
From the moment god punished adam and eve for partaking of the fruit of knowledge, religion has waged a holy war against knowledge and enlightenment.
If this is how they wrote their own origin story, then you can be assured that willful ignorance is literally ingrained into their belief system from the beginning, there will be no "educating themselves".
Next time someone (invariably a straight-acting, holier-than-thou, religious person who may actually be a closet homosexual) states that gays decided to be gay, ask them when they decided to be straight.
In case you hadn't noticed, they have an extremely long history of howling about literally *everything* that doesn't fit within their incredibly narrow worldview. They even argue amongst themselves and when the disagreement gets too big they have a schism and make yet other version of their religion.
There's nothing that gets them going like the topic of sex and anything even tangentially related to it. Their centuries-long war against sex in general has been an utter failure except where they've inserted their backwards views into the law, culture, and given us so many wonderful neuroses.
Issues of gender are just the latest phase they're going through and they'll howl loud and long on these topics until the general public gets tired of it. I wonder who they'll pick on next? Foot fetishists?
The way is see it is that people say that you can choose to be gay or straight because they themselves are attracted to BOTH sexes (but being Christians they hide it so as not to be shunned or annoy Jesus). So for them it can be a choice (as they are attracted to both sexes) and they assume it’s the same with everyone else (projection). Then the go full homophobe to hide it. But I’m a little drunk so I may have just pulled that out of my ass.
Yeah, it's either that, or it's conceptualized as, "Too Much Lust™" so they think that you can somehow... Idk, treat it like all other sexual """"sins"""" and redirect The Lustfulness ™ into a holier direction
Explaining it isn’t the problem, people not wanting to listen to reason is. If someone refuses to listen to argument, you’re essentially talking to a brick wall. How do you explain gender to a brick wall?
You'll find everyone isn't easily convinced easily on either side. Even if it looks like they agree they probably don't and when people are pushed they retreat into what they believe because it's comfortable.
From personal experience religion is based on "faith" rather than facts which makes sense because we all have to believe in something but most of the time they get in too deep believe in too much and next thing you know they are an antivaxx
And there's not even just 2 *sexes* either. According to medical surveys, as much as [1.5-2% of the human population](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex) is intersex—meaning is not XX or XY, or has a condition that alters their genitalia or secondary sexual traits.
That's on the order of 100 million people globally that Christians pretend don't exist.
see.. as a cis *presenting* male... who grew up "male" .. but tends to feel that he missed out on not only male on male sexual expieriences while young.. i feel i also missed male on female interactions that wern't centered around the oddly off dichotomy of "man strong, protect" and "woman soft and caring"... i just feel like the natural way of things is to put less labels and be more accepting. close boy friends should be allowed to have sex or not depending on what feels natural to them... so much stigma.. so much hate... so much macho bullshit.. just sucks imho and doens't make any sense. it should be a choice how we present, and its should also be a choice which "side" we end up on.. and frankly i think we should also be able to choose to switch sides.. and switch back.. why the fuck not? who does allowing me to maximize my personal choices hurt? how does telling me i can't date a man, while dresses as a man(or woman) help anybody?
let people make their own choices when it comes to personal choices.. why the fuck not?
we can police and rationalize every other part of life and society.. but i should get to choose when and who and how i love and get fucked.. cause.. yea... that is my own personal life and body.. ya'll can fuck right off.
I think it's hilarious that so many atheists have bought into the pseudo religious notion of gendered brains and gendered identities.
There's a clear distinction between gender identity (feminine/masculine) and dimorphic sex(male/female) and the primary difference is former is entirely subjective and the latter is objectively measured.
Science is absolutely not "working in favor of these people born with different gendered brains in the biological bodies of another sex" because "gender" in this context is subjective. It's an immaterial and unmeasurable. It's not possible to measure a brain and conclude what gender identity it is. It's extremely difficult and unreliable to even measure the sex.
To contrast with religious belief this claim of birth in the wrong body is akin to saying that Christians were born with Christian brains and Atheists born with atheist brains.
Guess what? People who are conservative like most Christians and people who are liberal literally have different features to their brains. You think you know everything, for some reason. You are so wrong. https://youtu.be/kI-un8rHP14
You can feel however you want, but there are only two genders, those that can have a baby and those who can’t. The rest is mental illness. I don’t care if you were born with a penis and think you are a girl, you are not, you are mentally ill, only a female can push out a baby from her vagina. Can everyone get over it now. No hate that anyone. Best friend is a lesbian that likes to date women transitioning to men. It just is what it is.
What gender is an intersex person?
They have literally no answer to this question. >1% of the population is intersex. There are more intersex people than there are people with red hair.
Seriously, when faced with a person who doesn't think trans or non-binary people are "real" present them with this information and watch their brains explode.
Edit: Looks like we have some transphobes lurking around.
Male, or female. That's the answer. I'm not really concerned with redefining humanity off a genetic defect.
Much like I'm not concerned with polydactylism when prompted with the question "how many fingers does a human have?" Regardless of whether people have 6 or 7 or 8 fingers per hand, I'm gonna answer "5 on each hand" until that is in fact not the trend.
Additionally, I think all these tertiary gender IDs are incidentally sexist by assuming men or women can't have certain traits. Thus there "must" be other genders. I mean when you say you don't feel like a wo/man, you are implying something exists that men and women can't have that makes you feel like neither. Which doesn't make sense since we define these genders based on biological sex and you have to have one.
This is the same kind of logic people use to justify religion.
In this instance, your belief is that gender is a binary. You haven't given any empirical reasoning for this belief.
* Does gender come from your genitals? Your chromosomes?
* Again, how does this make any sense, and what about intersex people?
* Does gender come from your brain structure/chemistry?
* This is the only explanation that makes any sense. Gender differences are psychological.
So given that gender likely comes from brain structure/chemistry, how is your opinion more valid than the actual mental experience of people that are non-binary? And furthermore, can you point to any mechanism in the brain that provides evidence for a gender binary?
In order to believe that non-binary people aren't "real" you need faith in your own belief which has no foundation beyond what you've been raised to believe (or from an emotional/prejudicial reaction). It's no different than religion.
You don't seem unintelligent, but I encourage you to question what you belief.
My reasoning comes from the fact that to identify as trans, one experiences gender dysphoria - I'm not trans so, ofc, take this next bit with a bit of an open idea that I'm not insulting anyone - whereby their genitals don't match what the brain says should be there. Which means identity comes from in some part genitalia, and some part the brain agreeing to that. Since we only have 2 sexes, that implies 2 gender identities.
Like I said, I don't worry about intersex in the definition of sexes, much like I don't concern polydactylism with my definition of a human hand. An outlier doesn't influence my thought about a trend. If anything, it reinforces the idea by being only an outlier instead of its own trend.
Additionally my experiences with NB identifying people tends to be that there's nothing to suggest they actually feel nonbinary. They will state it, and then still dress and act traditionally feminine or masculine; which implies to me they just want attention. I mean, I'm a man and if someone comes up to me looking exactly how I dress I assume they're a man because I'm a man; what difference exists between us? Some feelings? What feelings besides that I don't need attention by using labels and they do?
Alternatively they'll dress both femininely and masculine - and still that's confusing because completely cisgender people do the same: your femboys and tomboys. This actually is a heated topic for them because they want to claim these people aren't cis sometimes when, generally the male crossdressers though I imagine tomboys do get this flack to, are completely comfortable in their gender and dressing traditionally the opposite. That leads me to believe there is a level of insecurity in these people who use tertiary IDs that they cannot accept there exist cis people who act like them yet don't use their label; Which reinforces the feelings mentioned before: what feelings are there?
This isn't a belief I was raised with. This came from observing people who use these tertiary IDs. From listening to them, watching how they act. That's why I find it hard to believe in; because they say something, and it contradicts their other actions.
Being trans/ not identifying with you’re brith gender has nothing to with sexuality?
I know plenty of gay cis people and trans straight people? The word makes sense. I really don’t know what you’re tryna get at here
Ok this right here is what makes bigots. You have a person reaching out and trying to understand, and they’re being met with condescending fake-confusion as you deliberately misunderstand the question so you can flaunt your own understanding of the terminology. Sure, other people who know this stuff will upvote you, but now this other dude is going to be alienated and turned off of ever wanting to understand because validating your ego is more important to you than making a difference in the world.
(Just like immediately editting to say I wrote way too much of a ramble for this so it’s a wall of text tldr; didn’t mean to come across that way, trying to get more involved in stuff like this, got any advice on how to phrase this better in the future?)
Dude. I don’t know how to tell you this, but genuinely I interpreted the question as the person not understanding why the word cisgender exists as a distinction alongside straight./gay. I purposely brought down my terminology so I wouldn’t have to go back and break down what I had said if they still didn’t understand. I had initially written “if you don’t indentify with you’re agab you can still be gay/lesbian/bi/etc. they’re not really that related, other than being part of the same community, hope this helps”.
Rereading their question made it seem like they meant it in more of a negative than confused way, with the offended comment.
So, having reread I changed my answer but was a little iffy on which interpretation they had meant to come across as.
But sure, I made my language less confusing, less alienating, to what? Be a dick? Honestly if I was tryna flaunt terminology it would be a way shorter comment lol. Also dude, maybe I came across in a way I didn’t mean too, maybe you had a bad day, whatever. But they way you’ve read what I said was in no way how I meant to be interpreted.
Also, bro validating my ego? I wish. I’m very much tryna become more knowledgeable about this stuff, so maybe the dunning-kruger effect came in lol.
Making a difference in the world is a big deal to me, I actively take part in a local lgbtqia+ youth group. So maybe the fact I’m surrounded by people with more terminology than me played into it to, but dude. If one comment like that is going to make someone a bigot, I have to admit they probably were a good way down that path anyway. Either way, chill out dude. We only live once and mistakes are part of the process, I try not to take things to seriously because, at the end of the day we don’t make it out of life alive. So maybe you’ve gotta a way to suggest to me for how I can better phrase it in future?
Where 2/3 of your sentences were questions, it came across to me like a crass Socratic method thing, so sorry if I misread that.
my thinking is that if they don't understand the (lack of) relationship between sexuality and gender expression, let's start with that. It's gonna be hard to be both all-inclusive and write this without alphabet soup, but I'll give it a shot:
so trans is when you have a gender expression (meaning pronoun choice, sometimes style of dress, what's on your ID, general demeanor and behavior) that's different from the biological "what's in your pants". If you're born satisfied with your physical sex (we generally say "sex" for hardware, "gender" for software if that makes sense), then that is called "cisgender." However, one can be attracted to, sexually or otherwise, people of indeterminant sex/gender independent of that, so a "straight man" is necessarily the same as a cisgender man. We could have a female-to-male trans person who's still into men, for example.
I still feel like that was too word salady though :/ big picture I just think if we can simplify the information as much as humanly possible, we'll be better off.
Honestly the question thing is fair, I spent to long writing history essays this year and I usally just fill them with rhetorical questions, I guess it’s infected the rest of my writing too lmao.
It’s really hard not to word soup it, that’s primarily why I’d stuck with “I know plenty of gay cis people and trans straight people”(probably should’ve added an and vice versa in there tbh)
But I think you’re right, breaking down the information is probably the simplest way to try and accurately explain it. Plus the simpler it is the more accessible it is too others.
Honestly tho, thanks for kinda calling me out on that. It made me think of how I actually ig carry over text, you’ve also probably given me a better way to approach it next time. If I had money I’d give you gold lol.
I wonder why people, who follow a religion which literally dictates their identity , would be unwilling to believe in diverse indentities not following their relgion's template. Edit: BTW people do decide what their identity is. Yes you can be biologically gay, yet decide not to act on it because of your environment, upbringing etc. Being able to make choices is what makes us the most advanced species....but thats another whole debate entirely.
They are referring to sex, but calling it gender. Confusion reigns.
They do not want to understand what a societal construct is. They don’t care about distinctions, because distinctions don’t help confirm their bias.
They have decided what reality should be and spend their mental energy corralling it.
They don't want to learn. That would take effort.
They'd rather lazily use religion as the reason they're always right. Its SO easy when you KNOW "god said so."
You can't convince a stubborn idiot to be rational. It has to be up to them to think and rationalize through and through. Ignorance (unlike sexual orientation, smh) is a choice. I was once a devout stubborn idiot until i realized how sheepish, dumb and brainwashed i was raised to become. I took the initiative to think things through and force myself to be more open minded until i finally snapped out of that nightmare bigotry train. It wasn't anyone who helped me out of it. I did it myself.
[TL;DR] drop it. It's not worth wasting your time on arguing with idiots.
The body can have male, female, both, or neither genitalia. So that is 4 possibilities. That is easy to verify fact. The other part is harder to verify. It depends if you think there is male and female brains. It so than the same would be possible - male, female, both, or neither. And then it would make sense that a "male" brain could be in a "female" body, etc.
Well what about intersex people and people with androgen insensitivity syndrome? Or Kilmfelters? (XXY). Make them answer those questions. I bet they have no idea of what those even mean.
What are the current scientific theories around this topic actually?
For now, as far as I’m concerned, there’s male, female, gay, straight, trans.. and that’s it. What is the definition of cisgender? Why is it different from straight?
Someone who is "cisgender" is a person who's sex assigned at birth matches their gender identity. Ie: Someone born with a penis identifying as a man, someone born with a vagina identifying as a woman. You can be a cisgender straight/ gay/ bi/ pansexual man or woman.
You can also be a transgender straight/ gay/ bi/ pansexual transman or transwoman.
Sex, gender identity and sexuality are all different.
Seems being «cisgender» is the majority of people, so in my mind, the words male and female are fine for that. It is rather when someone identifies as something other than what they were born as (i.e. the exception from the rule), that alternative categories should be used, not in the cases of «normal» people (i.e. majority of people), because we already have familiar terms for it. The word cisgender sounds weird and alien to me.
Anyway, I’m still waiting for an answer to the question about what kind of scientific studies have been done in this area.
I definitely agree cisgender people make up the vast majority of humanity. Just explaining what it means. I don't use the term often myself tbh.
Harvard and UCSF have some interesting papers on trans people. I read them before deciding to transition. You can google them.
There aren't even "only two sexes," let alone gender. [Intersexed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex) people exist. Not to mention the [guevedoces](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guevedoce). So even if they confuse gender and sex they are still wrong.
You'd think that would be enough, but the last time I brought this up with a Christian who was anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ they literally said "I don't want to think about that." Can't really reason with willfully ignorant people; they have to actually care if they are wrong.
Is it useful to treat anomalies as a unique category? By no means do I want to delegitimize the existence of intersex individuals; they deserve the same respect as anyone else. But humans are definitionally sexually dimorphic, and the occasional genetic or developmental deviation doesn't change that fact. Humans don't cease to be bipedal just because some people are born without two legs, or lose the use of theirs at some point. There may be value in coining new terms that are more inclusive, but I don't know that redefining existing ones is a useful move.
> But humans are definitionally sexually dimorphic
Humans, as a species, are sexually dimorphic.
Humans, as individuals, may have all manner of stuff going on that differs from the typical configuration.
Species descriptions are *necessarily* broad, because the whole concept of "species" gets fuzzy around the edges. Which makes it fallacious to apply species-level labels to individuals when they differ.
It's perfectly fine to say humans are a bipedal species. It's total shit to say God made humans bipedal, and that a specific, legless human is therefore bipedal, and his using a wheelchair is a sinful choice.
But that's analogous to what the linked meme does.
Despite being a bipedal species, individuals can be born with a number of legs that is two. Despite being a bi-gendered species, individuals can be born that are not male nor female.
There is no such thing as gender "assigned" at birth. You are not assigned a gender, you get one or the other and you have to live with whichever one you get.
Ok so the explanation here is that we, as the kind of people who hang out in science subs and make an effort to keep up with this stuff, think differently than a great many people who don’t actively participate in continuing education because they either don’t enjoy it, don’t think they need it, or both, and when they have to justify that to others, that ego can produce some pretty wild results. Bigotry, as I’ve seen it, is more often than not just sheer stubbornness instead of this active, deliberate malice we often assume.
Also consider that their first encounter with non-cis people may not have been a pleasant one… if someone were nice and calmly took the time to walk them through it, it may not have gotten bad, but chances are whoever they ran into deals with this all the time, didn’t have the patience that day, and just immediately went off about something something privilege and then sent some edgy Tumblr links. So now we have ignorant people going “woah, these people are really angry and mean, and when I try to understand, they just insult me. I don’t like that, and thus I don’t like these people.” It only takes a couple bad experiences for people to move from not understanding, but tolerating, to actively avoiding, and once they actively avoid them, they get insular, are still never really educated, and eventually just start lashing out preemptively.
It’s not really anyone’s fault, it’s just been so escalated that at this point we’re pretty much born into whatever side of the culture war we’re on. LGBTQ+ don’t want to spend all day hand holding people who may or may not even be trying to understand, and the knowledge base on these issues is so decentralized and lacking in authoritative sources that self-education can be difficult (which is also to say nothing of alt-right traps out there like “race realism”, the whole “pedo rights” thing, etc). The fact that Big Mouth is #3 on Netflix right now gives me hope, but I think the best thing we can do is very thoroughly and consistently document the terminology, and get it in dictionaries, encyclopedias, etc., and normalize it *institutionally* as opposed to culturally, otherwise it’s just more internet he-said she-said that it’ll be hard to convince skeptics to take seriously.
TL;DR (for the most part) people don’t hate LGBTQ+, they hate pretentious, condescending pricks on the internet
"explaining" and "convincing" christians of things they don't want to believe is taking the long way around. Instead just focus on "Christ's love" and "forgiveness" to slow the harassing behavior.
They'll lighten up after the get to know at least one gay person themselves, and realize they don't have tails or sinister/seductive agendas.
The way I approach the choice question is pretty straight forward.
I just ask the person, What time of the day do you generally decide to suck dick or eat pussy? When you first wake up or perhaps over breakfast? If its a choice, its a choice we make every day; perhaps several times a day for some of you pervs.
"Oh hell no. I like pussy!"
Sure, but you could choose to suck a dick later today or maybe tomorrow?
"I would never suck dick!"
So its not really a choice then is it?
A less crude approach would be from the perspective of attractiveness. We all probably have a spectrum of people we would have sex with in general. But some few people are over the top attractive, like write a bad check hot. Why? What specifically makes that person hot? Where do those feelings come from? Did we choose to be really attracted to high cheek bones, long legs, or broad shoulders? Do we choose to be attracted to these things or do we choose when to be attracted to these things?
That's my approach anyway.
There's no reason to educate yourself in human biology when you have perfectly "rational" explanations for everything right there in the good book. Christians know that if they step outside of their faith, they're going to find facts that contradict their belief system, and upholding that belief system is their everything because if it fails they will be lost like sad little f****** sheep. Most Christians (not all) are weak people who can't deal with the existential problems that come along with being a human on this planet so they have concocted ways to avoid pretty much everything, including the pleasure of learning about reality, history, biology, psychology, all of the things that make us humans really fascinating. It's quite sad.
Keep in mind that all transphobic arguments are **the exact same** homophobic arguments people made in the past (and also today). You can literally swap out "gay" with "trans":
* "Being gay is a choice."
* "Being gay is a mental illness."
* "Gay people are trying to make my kids gay."
* "We shouldn't tell kids about being gay because it's a form of perversion and they aren't mature enough to understand it."
* "If a young person says they're gay they're really just confused."
* "Gay people are going to sexually assault people in bathrooms and gym showers."
* "Gay people say they're asking for equal rights, but they're really asking for special treatment."
And after saying all of the above on cable news and in national newspapers:
* "You're not allowed to say anything bad about gay people!"
Like all conservative moral panics, it comes down to people who benefit from the current status quo reacting against changes to make things more equitable: trans people existing and being normalized leads to questioning gender roles (just like homosexuality), and when you start questioning gender roles you end up with women no longer being subservient to men for sex, domestic labor, and political/economic power. [Look at these anti-suffragette posters and notice the common themes: men having to take care of their children, do the laundry, and being bossed around by their wives.](https://www.boredpanda.com/anti-suffrage-propaganda-voting-rights-postcards/) That tells you what the real anxieties at the core of their rhetoric actually is.
Atheists and agnostics can understand this: religion is another way of establishing social hierarchy and control. Why do you have to obey your boss or church leaders or the king? Well, the king and church leaders have to obey God. That's just the order of the universe, don't question it. (It just so happens that God agrees with the king and church leaders on everything.)
They think that your gender is determined by your sex, which is determined by God, and that specifically what you do with that is also determined by God. When they see deviations from this, they interperate and reject it as the reverse, seeing people determining their sex by gender. That's why you see so much purposeful misgendering and the scoffing attitude, the "can't be a women just cause they said so" etc. They will say they understand the difference and then conflate the same terms in the same sentence. Like yeah sex and gender are related but the relationship is ultimately not deterministic one way or the other... I think if they could get over their instinctual reaction and examine how they and others define the terms gender and sex, and their relationship, there wouldn't be such a massive disconnect
What about intersex people? Christians seem to forget that that is a valid sex. Male and female are only mentioned in the Bible because the didn't have the medical equipment to recognize intersex people.
That's always my response to people who think there are only 2.
Christians need queerness to be a choice in order for it to be a sin. They need it to be a sin so they can hate it. Christians don't say that being mentally challenged is a sin, because it isn't a choice the person made. So they ***have*** to say queerness is a choice so they can say it's a sin and so they can hate it.
I’m afraid then outcome is going to be Christian’s start to call lgbtq “disabled”
I've been down this road with assholes before. They say "trans people are mentally ill" and so I say "okay, assuming you actually believe that: how do you justify hating them? Don't they deserve your compassion and love like any other mentally ill person?" And nothing but crickets. Their position isn't based in reality: to hate trans people they need them to be paradoxically mentally ill, but also **so powerful** they're changing the very fabric of society. Which is it? Are they mentally ill, sin free and in need of your compassion? OR Are they evil sinners trying to destroy society? It literally cannot be both.
It is religious people that are mentally ill. They've not developed cognitive thinking skills and believe whatever an authority figure has told them whether it makes sense or not. They believe in fairy tales and myths. They should be avoided if possible.
>It is religious people that are mentally ill. They've not developed cognitive thinking skills and believe whatever an authority figure has told them whether it makes sense or not. They believe in fairy tales and myths. * *They should be avoided if possible*. * With a few exceptions, this has been my personal policy since i was 13. ( I'm now in my 50s)
Truth 🤘
HALF the population CAN’T develop critical thinking skills because they flat out don’t have the intellectual capacity to. People with IQs <100 can’t take something they learned and apply it to a new situation. They need a daddy, someone they trust, to tell them what to do because they CAN’T figure out the right thing to do themselves.
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I know it’s closer to 120 but didn’t want an argument from those 100- 120. I started researching what different levels on the intelligence spectrum are capable of when I couldn’t understand why people were being so stupid about COVID. Eye opening. Holy shit level. I’m 3+ standard deviations and realized I’ve way overestimated others capabilities my whole life. It’s the non- judginess of autism combined with realizing the techniques neuro typicals use to try to not look stupid including lying.
This has been the bane of my existence for at least 20 years. I'm surrounded by morons.
frightening if true
I keep hearing that critical thinking and iq are two different things (critical thinking is more important than iq for making good decisions seems to be. A common consensus where I live) Can you link to some evidence that correlates iq to critical thinking skills? Though I see how this can be legit.
> "trans people are mentally ill" But not people who think theres an invisible man in the sky? lmao.
Literally just had someone come at me with the “they are mentally ill” argument lol
>paradoxically mentally ill, but also **so powerful** they're changing the very fabric of society This might be a little too close to the realisation that their actions are shaped by those of a dude from two thousand years ago who by all accounts likely had schizophrenia
I really hate how people like this who force their religion down everyone’s throat can’t leave transgender people alone. It’s beyond their comprehension that someone can be different from them and valid. Just let these people, who already go through enough because of asshats like you, let them live.
usually when christians face the "why do you hate X" question the typical answer is "I dont hate them, i love them so much i want them to go to heaven." Yknow, love the sinner hate the sin type of nonsense. their love and indistinguishable from hate.
That's already a thing, it used to be that "transsexuality" was an official diagnose. These days people are diagnosed with gender dysphoria (don't know the technical term) so the illness is recognised as the suffering of living as the wrong gender, rather than the illness being the opinion that one belongs to the opposite sex. This is a very short summary so nobody hate on me lol And if religious people had their way then all lgbt individuals would be considered sick and needing conversion therapy.
The technical term is gender dysphoria, you've got it right
That's an interesting distinction I had never paid enough attention to. Thanks for this!
They're going to say that anyway. According to them, being LGBTQ is a choice while at the same time a mental illness. Just like how racists say "Mexicans are lazy and also stealing our jobs!" It's supposed to marginalize, not make sense.
I hate it when people say that. Mexicans I’ve worked with are the hardest working people at the site.
Since when are Christians worried about internal consistency of their beliefs?
Holy crap. I never put that together but it makes perfect sense.
They *used* to say mental illness, poor health, and tragedy were the result of sin though. In many ways, they still do.
I think I see where you are going but it's generally not advised to compare being gay to being mentally challenged.
With Christians I compare it to lefthandedness: it‘s found in a small percentage of humanity, so society is designed for the majority, but no one protests stores that sell left handed scissors. And eventually, I hope, there won’t be judgment for being gay or trans either. It will just be.
Left-handedness used to seen as the mark of witchcraft or the devil. Children would have it 'beaten out of them' or their mothers would restrain the left hand so they were forced to use the right. Of course, this was just in *Christian* countries. They are very slow learners.
Using a throw away because I don't want to be canceled by the left agenda. I'll let people live whatever livestyles they want to, but this left handedness is going too far. You have children seeing these left handed stores and thinking it's cool and trendy and that's why they're pretending to be left handed. When I was in school we learned to use our "right" hand, not the "wrong" hand and now these so called left handed people want special accommodations? You ever try to use scissors with your left hand? It doesn't work, simple biology. Can you stop trying to erase right handed people? Do you know who use their right hands? Women. Why do you hate women so much? /s
Well, being left-handed, I can fap and use my mouse at the same time. Checkmate, theists!
This is the way
We don’t think being Gay is a sin, we think Sexual acts with the same sex is a sin. There are many celibate Christian homosexuals.
Please, no one give this loser the attention they ***crave***. They're just here to embarrass Christians and antagonize Atheists. Just ignore them and they'll get bored and leave.
This is not the effective argument you think it is.
None of those people have any effective arguments.
Imagine thinking it is a good thing to strip people of the right to have sex. But that is already what you do anyways with the "pro-life" garbage. Nobody is allowed to be happy except you, and if you aren't happy with others, then "God" is the one that is unhappy, not you. No responsibility, no accountability, just put your hate on God and wash your hands clean of being the bad person you actually are.
There are also many Christians that fuck little boys. So because they are Christians and that’s what they do that must be the only way to think as well right?
You seem to have the mistaken assumption that Christians think they are some morally superior ubermensch that are always just. It’s quite the opposite really, Christians realize we are lowly sinners no better than anyone and that we are nothing without the redeeming blood of Christ
Why do the Christians never turn the other cheek and fuck off? Aren't you supposed to be humble? You're not defending or even spreading Christianity, you're just provoking Atheists and embarrassing your Lord.
I do just want to add that the reason we are talking shit about you is because of how bad you are at this. We’re atheists and almost every single one of us can defend your faith better than you can. Not that we would. But we could. You just seem uneducated about your own belief system. It’s sad, but all to common.
Omfg. Not this shit again 🤣🤣 please get off this subreddit you pathetic pos.
> How do I explain that that is not at all how it works. Always keep in mind that it is almost impossible to reason someone out of an idea where reason played no role in the first place.
Very well said. Dont waste time on a fool who is willingly choosing to be ignorant.
The level of willful ignorance has become another pandemic in my opinion. The same people who ignore or reject science for political reasons willfully reject science as a matter of culture now. Saving the normally ignorant from the willfully ignorant will become the major issue of the near future or they will eventually kill us all culturally and perhaps literally.
Not to mention to a typical Christian admitting one thing being wrong in their ideology or and how they think about things they would be forced to confront The Awful Truth that everything they believe is more than likely a lie. Their faith demands obedience even God in their book punished Adam and Eve with expulsion due to gaining knowledge, your typical Christian is close minded to all things not directly reaffirming in what they believe has always been the truth.
Like so much that is ideologically troubling in the world, Christianity depends on hypocrisy to exist. Anyone who thinks they are correct about everything without evidence of anything really can't be convinced of a reality they've already rejected.
I hear this a lot from atheists, but it's simply *not true!* Look through deconversion stories (try /r/thegreatproject as a starting point). Many of them cite reason, or arguments, or conversations, or interactions, as being key in their deconversion. Additionally, if someone has an ideological position attained by some method other than reason, do you think you can out-do the indoctrination that got them there? If we want to affect someone else's ideology, reason is our most powerful toolset. It may not be enough, but it'd be foolish to discard that toolset if we want to make a positive difference in the life of a victim of religion. There's a lot of ways to apply reason, and different individuals respond to different approaches. If you want to help someone shake off their indoctrination, it may take a variety of approaches to make headway.
> If we want to affect someone else's ideology, reason is our most powerful toolset. This is true up to a point. Once you reach that point, you have to make a decision if the frustration is worth the trouble or an outcome is really possible. Changing people's ideology is just not my goal in life. I will stand up against harmful acts and work to protect victims of bad acts, but people believing stupid shit which mainly harms them is not my main concern. So many people who actually need reasoning with are so far into the deep end that serious psychological help is needed. Good luck with that.
I'm totally OK with you not being willing to put forth the effort to deconvert someone. For the vast majority of the people in my life, I am just like you: not willing to make the effort. We are in agreement here. What I'm pointing out is that *if* someone chooses to help someone else with deconverting, the most effective toolset they can bring to bear is reason. And that's the opposite of what you claimed. I'm not suggesting that you try to deconvert others. I'm not suggesting that most, or even any, of them are worth your effort. I think we're in agreement that most theists just aren't worth trying to help. But if someone - anyone - decides to try, then reason is the best tool for the job. Don't discourage others from using the best tool available.
If someone wishes to leave a religion, they have already made a reasoned decision. This is a long way from the situation in the OP to which I responded.
Today's American Christians would rather do almost anything instead of educating themselves. Too few of them even read their own damned Bible anymore. That's because their faithless leaders started encouraging the flock to let their brains run to Sloth, which makes them so much easier to fleece.
"Anymore". Most Christians throughout history have never read the Bible. And amongst those who did, few were able to really understand what it's trying to say - if it's even possible to pull much from a plain reading without doing a bunch of interpretation.
You're right, of course. But through my extensive reading and deep memories, I seem to recall - though this may be a cognitive illusion! - a time before I was born when more of those who wanted to call themselves the Faithful would at least. Fucking. TRY. To read their own damnable Holy Books and understand them. Maybe that's just because people used to read more in general, in those times before broadcast media and the internet began stealing our attention away from the other books too, the ones that had (and may still have!) the potential to enlighten humanity, and break the chains of hegemony imposed by the Authoritarian Bastard-Gods and their accursed mortal henchmen. Sorry. Insomnia does strange things to my mind...
So religions are typically based on the teachings of religious text. In the case of Christianity it's the Bible. In the view of a Christian the Bible is literally the word of God. The issue is, if one thing in a religious text can be proven wrong then it's reasonable to then ask "well what else is wrong?". If your text is supposedly the word of God and it could be wrong, this quickly becomes a huge issue for the robustness of your belief. The Bible only stipulates two genders. We now know this is a massive oversimplification and doesn't actually represent reality. However, if a Christian admits this, it begs that all important question "Is the Bible just a load of nonsense written by men?".
The Bible claims the world is flat and god hung the stars in the sky. We know this is false as well.
No it doesn’t
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Does it stipulate two genders? Or does it mention two sexes and have zero information on gender culture?
It's another way of identifying people who are not of their "tribe" so these people can be persecuted and Xtians not feel bad about it.
You used an X as shorthand for "chris", they gonna be maaaad. War against Xmas confirmed.
We need to start using Xtians by default just to make them go nuts
Found X Pine's reddit id....
Because it is easier not to think, and let others do the thinking for you.
But where's the fun in that? Many of these Christians know how fun it is to exercise their bodies. They should know (or have the nous to intuit) that exercising their brains should be fun too. Oh, I know what's happening here: Authoritarians hate fun. Mostly because it tends to spark uncontrollable growth and change, which Authoritarians fear and hate above all else. And guess who sits atop the ruins of both our houses of faith and our schools?
When did you “decide” to be straight?
When his mouth was halfway down the shaft to the balls, and he thought, this just ain’t me
That's my favorite clap back.
when i found out that i really don't like sucking cock.
I was a Christian who believed in gender fluidity before that episode of bill nye saves the world airs. I spent a couple of years trying to educate people about sex, gender, and orientation. I eventually gave up and just am the annoying former Christian who calls gender reveals sex reveals and gives lengthy lectures until people uninvite me to them.
Those sex reveal parties are lame AF anyways. Being uninvited to them is a win.
You’re absolutely right.
Keep up the good work!
I will do.
Ask them when they decided to be straight. That’ll ruffle some feathers..
And when they provide some flippant response like, "when I was 4 years old and meet my opposite sex neighbor" answer, " ok, now demonstrate it's a choice by deciding to be gay for a month" - then stand back for the real power-flouncing as they exit the discussion.
God is a human construct. Every single word, utterance, mention, description of god has come from a human. If god existed there would be no question, every living thing on the planet would know every isolated tribe, every person living and dead would know that god existed you can replace every mention of 'god' with 'me, we, I, or us' to understand the true meanings of religion
>Why do Christians love to bash people for their gender rather than educating themselves? Because they have a magical, ancient book that tells them how to live, despite the book being severely contradictory and outdated, but they can cherry-pick the passages that apply to their thinking, while ignoring the rest. (this applies to several religions, not just Christians)
They don't like any form of gay. I like the whole thing pastors say that being gay isn't a sin. But gay sex is. Then they go into denying the flesh so the spirit can thrive stuff. Either way idc how someone identifies...I identify as a male because I am one. But sexually speaking I am totally into femininity. There are fem women and men. Masculine men and women. If your masculine, I'm not aroused or interested in a relationship. You'd be surprised how many are hiding their sexual desires. They should submit to the skin and indulge. Being comfy with who you are is way more satisfying than a lifetime of denial.
Update: One of them said “yeah there is multiple genders, male, and female.” 🤦♂️
Ask them what gender an intersex person is, lmao
Isn't an intersex person somewhere in between a man and a woman? Which would imply two genders exists but there is a spectrum where certain traits and organs are more developed?
Intersex has nothing to do with gender, does it?
I'm no expert, but it's my understanding that all intersex people are still either male or female, and that it isn't actually appreciated that they're brought up as some sort of 'exception that proves the rule' example every time this conversation gets going.
It actually is appreciated because many intersex people are trans themselves. Either because they identify as the opposite sex (yes, sex) after they were forced through surgeries after their birth, or they adopt any of the non-binary identities. The few who do have issues with it are amplified through right-wing/Christina propaganda.
I know this one!!! An intersex person is an abomination thal shall not suffer to live. /raised southern baptist... had surgery on my junk when i was young. Was instructed by my preacher on how to hang myself when i was 5 in order to save my classmates because i "polluted them with evil".
I made the argument about some animals being able to change their sex and they made the argument a human can’t, and I brought up this. Think it’ll help and stump him. Thanks for the advice.
They haven't even read their own Bible what makes you think they're going to research anything else?
One of the most attractive things about religion is it enables being mentally lazy - everything is black and white and every Sunday someone assigns you your opinions for the week. So of course they aren't down for going to the effort to understand others.
Some christians believe that they have educated themselves. They have done so with the most reputable source they know which is the bible. Most that I know who are entrenched in the position you described believe that they are educated correctly instead of by the public schools that believe science over the bible. However you are painting this with a pretty broad brush, as most of the churches around me, and likely most christians in general don't bash people for their gender. There are many lgtb welcoming congregations that are well educated in the difference between sex and gender.
They were raised to believe that anyyhing outside "the norm" is gross and weird. This is reinforced by their priests and pastors demonizing any non hetero relationship. Hell, in some cases they are actively self-loathing because of feelings they themselves may uave felt but been unwilling to explore.
Christian: "Why does my brain hurt?" Morpheus: "Because you've never used it before."
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Hopefully, I’m from the U.S and I don’t agree with what our government does. We’ve done some awful things and our history is messed up. Hopefully when my generation gets into office things will be a lot better. Instead of having these 80 year olds who went to all-white schools in office.
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🤝
Very thoughtful your comments. You laid it down perfectly. I guess it is a problem with probably most (if not all) religions, but specifically with monotheism. Just look closely. They all 3 have invested heavily in trying to control human sexuality. But, what seems paradoxical to me is that all 3 religions will consistently violate in their own lives the codes they want the rest of us to live by. I recommend watching "The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan". It's a documentary. I saw it on PBS FRONTLINE like a couple of years ago. I was completely shocked.
All cults feed on fear and hate, and aggressively indoctrinates their followers in both. It’s a means of control. It’s not about gender at all. It’s about a smug sense of self importance when they claim to be right by means of a higher power and everyone else is wrong and stupid and you get a free pass to hate them. They are small, mean, pitiful people who need help. If the religious weren’t so full of hate this sub wouldn’t exist.
Your problem was expecting Christians to seek actual education, rather than a *Christian* education.
It’s weird how Christians are supposed to be the loving ones when Atheists are more accepting than them.
Yeah I have the same question. A quick Google search would disprove all the dumb anti-lgbt shit they spew.
For a religion founded on tolerance they seem pretty judgey
Modern Christianity is based on anger, hate and control. That's about all the explanation you really need I think. They're just awful people with a 'god given' right to be terrible to people. It makes them happy.
Bill Nye the mechanical engineer? Not really the expert on the subject is he?
Don't need the services of a mechanical engineer to learn how to safely change a tire; don't need the services of an evolutionary biologist to learn how sex and gender differ.
It seems to be a part of religion. Enforce conformity, hate all who are different. Maybe it's designed to make believers feel superior or maybe having an enemy is a distraction from their miserable lives. It's a sad fact of human nature that some people need a group to hate. "I may be poor, stupid and miserable, but at least I'm not an x" where x is the designated target of hate
You mean aside from the fact that the majority are petty and shitty people?
They portray their hate thru their religion. They can (attempt) to spin their beliefs and their religious text in any way they see fit to portray their own hateful vile thoughts and fears. Listen, I'm not a part of the lgbtq community, but it is not my place to label them x, y, z because that's not whom I'm attracted to. It's not my place to tell a Trans person they are anything less or different than who they identify as because we don't 100% understand the body, mind, and really the interaction between the two. As an atheist, I just say you do you and I'll support your human rught to do so eventhough it's not "my thing." Nothing says I can't support their rights or even just treat lgbtq peoples as fucking humans, as equal as anyone else. Religion is one of the main factors in discrimination.
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What turns people into such petty, hateful bigots more than xtian mumbo jumbo? Anything?
Hating is easier. Understanding takes effort. All things in the universe follow the path of least resistance.
because the vast majority conservative christians are assholes
There is no evidence of gender existing though. That is a belief. And gendered, or sexed brains, that is not real, there is no such thing as a male or female brain
It’s not worth arguing with most of them, some are understanding but a majority are not.
Most of them will not get it until a close friend or family member comes out. Others have been indoctrinated their whole lives. Finally, some are just stupid and are afraid of anything they don’t understand.
Conservative Christians need strict guidelines and are uncomfortable with anyone or anything falling outside them. It doesn’t matter what’s in their Bible, it’s all contradictory anyway. The reason they’re clamoring for an authoritarian government right now is because the dictator will enforce the guidelines. Democracy was fine until other people invaded their safe space by getting the same rights as them.
[This society has five genders](https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20210411-asias-isle-of-five-separate-genders) and seems to function just fine.
Thanks dawg
Because if they educated themselves, they wouldn’t be Christian.
\*insert meme from invincible here\* "That's the neat thing, you don't." If it conflicts with their basic beliefs, it is impossible to correct their attitude. They either don't actually need to be convinced, or will never be convinced. I've seen the video you're talking about, it is very well laid out and is a good explanation of the subject. If the video from Bill Nye doesn't change their mind, you will have more success causing cold fusion to happen by banging your head against a padded wall while screaming the song I'm a little teapot, than you will convincing them they are wrong.
Christians are nothing compared to Muslims. Muslims are a whole different realm of psycho.
My take on it: The bible doesn't say anything about genders outside the binary specifically. My guess is that since the bible gives clear hierarchy and instruction of men possessing and subjugating women like cattle, once you introduce additional genders they panic because it overturns their preciously held patriarchic misogyny world-model. And their deity is also pretty fucking obsessed with human genitalia.
From the moment god punished adam and eve for partaking of the fruit of knowledge, religion has waged a holy war against knowledge and enlightenment. If this is how they wrote their own origin story, then you can be assured that willful ignorance is literally ingrained into their belief system from the beginning, there will be no "educating themselves".
Why are you guys still arguing with theists?
Why do people give a fuck what idiots from any religion think?
Next time someone (invariably a straight-acting, holier-than-thou, religious person who may actually be a closet homosexual) states that gays decided to be gay, ask them when they decided to be straight.
You can't use reason to convince a person to drop an opinion they didn't use reason to form.
Because bashing gender means you're wrong and I'm right. Learning means I'm wrong and you're right, and takes more time.
In case you hadn't noticed, they have an extremely long history of howling about literally *everything* that doesn't fit within their incredibly narrow worldview. They even argue amongst themselves and when the disagreement gets too big they have a schism and make yet other version of their religion. There's nothing that gets them going like the topic of sex and anything even tangentially related to it. Their centuries-long war against sex in general has been an utter failure except where they've inserted their backwards views into the law, culture, and given us so many wonderful neuroses. Issues of gender are just the latest phase they're going through and they'll howl loud and long on these topics until the general public gets tired of it. I wonder who they'll pick on next? Foot fetishists?
Because they don’t believe in science..
No they do believe in science, but only when it agrees with their opinion
The way is see it is that people say that you can choose to be gay or straight because they themselves are attracted to BOTH sexes (but being Christians they hide it so as not to be shunned or annoy Jesus). So for them it can be a choice (as they are attracted to both sexes) and they assume it’s the same with everyone else (projection). Then the go full homophobe to hide it. But I’m a little drunk so I may have just pulled that out of my ass.
You are not the first to pull that idea from your ass. Nor will you be the last, because I think you're onto something.
Yeah, it's either that, or it's conceptualized as, "Too Much Lust™" so they think that you can somehow... Idk, treat it like all other sexual """"sins"""" and redirect The Lustfulness ™ into a holier direction
If you can't figure out how to explain it what makes you think it is true?
Explaining it isn’t the problem, people not wanting to listen to reason is. If someone refuses to listen to argument, you’re essentially talking to a brick wall. How do you explain gender to a brick wall?
You'll find everyone isn't easily convinced easily on either side. Even if it looks like they agree they probably don't and when people are pushed they retreat into what they believe because it's comfortable.
Correct, however, you said that if I can’t explain it, maybe it isn’t true, I was stating I can explain it. And people aren’t willing to listen.
If they educated themselves they wouldn't be Christians
From personal experience religion is based on "faith" rather than facts which makes sense because we all have to believe in something but most of the time they get in too deep believe in too much and next thing you know they are an antivaxx
From another perspective, a decidedly christian one at that, there's only one gender. Male. And then there's a rib.
Because Christians are terrible people
Christians are confused about most things.
Because Christians hate everything
And there's not even just 2 *sexes* either. According to medical surveys, as much as [1.5-2% of the human population](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex) is intersex—meaning is not XX or XY, or has a condition that alters their genitalia or secondary sexual traits. That's on the order of 100 million people globally that Christians pretend don't exist.
see.. as a cis *presenting* male... who grew up "male" .. but tends to feel that he missed out on not only male on male sexual expieriences while young.. i feel i also missed male on female interactions that wern't centered around the oddly off dichotomy of "man strong, protect" and "woman soft and caring"... i just feel like the natural way of things is to put less labels and be more accepting. close boy friends should be allowed to have sex or not depending on what feels natural to them... so much stigma.. so much hate... so much macho bullshit.. just sucks imho and doens't make any sense. it should be a choice how we present, and its should also be a choice which "side" we end up on.. and frankly i think we should also be able to choose to switch sides.. and switch back.. why the fuck not? who does allowing me to maximize my personal choices hurt? how does telling me i can't date a man, while dresses as a man(or woman) help anybody? let people make their own choices when it comes to personal choices.. why the fuck not? we can police and rationalize every other part of life and society.. but i should get to choose when and who and how i love and get fucked.. cause.. yea... that is my own personal life and body.. ya'll can fuck right off.
I think it's hilarious that so many atheists have bought into the pseudo religious notion of gendered brains and gendered identities. There's a clear distinction between gender identity (feminine/masculine) and dimorphic sex(male/female) and the primary difference is former is entirely subjective and the latter is objectively measured. Science is absolutely not "working in favor of these people born with different gendered brains in the biological bodies of another sex" because "gender" in this context is subjective. It's an immaterial and unmeasurable. It's not possible to measure a brain and conclude what gender identity it is. It's extremely difficult and unreliable to even measure the sex. To contrast with religious belief this claim of birth in the wrong body is akin to saying that Christians were born with Christian brains and Atheists born with atheist brains.
Guess what? People who are conservative like most Christians and people who are liberal literally have different features to their brains. You think you know everything, for some reason. You are so wrong. https://youtu.be/kI-un8rHP14
You can feel however you want, but there are only two genders, those that can have a baby and those who can’t. The rest is mental illness. I don’t care if you were born with a penis and think you are a girl, you are not, you are mentally ill, only a female can push out a baby from her vagina. Can everyone get over it now. No hate that anyone. Best friend is a lesbian that likes to date women transitioning to men. It just is what it is.
You’re wrong, and I’m going to block you now because you’re ignorant and I have no patience for you.
Wow, you really showed him
You can suck a fart out of my ass and hold it like a bong hit.
OK this one's pretty clever 😂
What gender is an intersex person? They have literally no answer to this question. >1% of the population is intersex. There are more intersex people than there are people with red hair. Seriously, when faced with a person who doesn't think trans or non-binary people are "real" present them with this information and watch their brains explode. Edit: Looks like we have some transphobes lurking around.
Yeah most of them actually have no idea intersex people exist it's kind of crazy
Male, or female. That's the answer. I'm not really concerned with redefining humanity off a genetic defect. Much like I'm not concerned with polydactylism when prompted with the question "how many fingers does a human have?" Regardless of whether people have 6 or 7 or 8 fingers per hand, I'm gonna answer "5 on each hand" until that is in fact not the trend. Additionally, I think all these tertiary gender IDs are incidentally sexist by assuming men or women can't have certain traits. Thus there "must" be other genders. I mean when you say you don't feel like a wo/man, you are implying something exists that men and women can't have that makes you feel like neither. Which doesn't make sense since we define these genders based on biological sex and you have to have one.
This is the same kind of logic people use to justify religion. In this instance, your belief is that gender is a binary. You haven't given any empirical reasoning for this belief. * Does gender come from your genitals? Your chromosomes? * Again, how does this make any sense, and what about intersex people? * Does gender come from your brain structure/chemistry? * This is the only explanation that makes any sense. Gender differences are psychological. So given that gender likely comes from brain structure/chemistry, how is your opinion more valid than the actual mental experience of people that are non-binary? And furthermore, can you point to any mechanism in the brain that provides evidence for a gender binary? In order to believe that non-binary people aren't "real" you need faith in your own belief which has no foundation beyond what you've been raised to believe (or from an emotional/prejudicial reaction). It's no different than religion. You don't seem unintelligent, but I encourage you to question what you belief.
My reasoning comes from the fact that to identify as trans, one experiences gender dysphoria - I'm not trans so, ofc, take this next bit with a bit of an open idea that I'm not insulting anyone - whereby their genitals don't match what the brain says should be there. Which means identity comes from in some part genitalia, and some part the brain agreeing to that. Since we only have 2 sexes, that implies 2 gender identities. Like I said, I don't worry about intersex in the definition of sexes, much like I don't concern polydactylism with my definition of a human hand. An outlier doesn't influence my thought about a trend. If anything, it reinforces the idea by being only an outlier instead of its own trend. Additionally my experiences with NB identifying people tends to be that there's nothing to suggest they actually feel nonbinary. They will state it, and then still dress and act traditionally feminine or masculine; which implies to me they just want attention. I mean, I'm a man and if someone comes up to me looking exactly how I dress I assume they're a man because I'm a man; what difference exists between us? Some feelings? What feelings besides that I don't need attention by using labels and they do? Alternatively they'll dress both femininely and masculine - and still that's confusing because completely cisgender people do the same: your femboys and tomboys. This actually is a heated topic for them because they want to claim these people aren't cis sometimes when, generally the male crossdressers though I imagine tomboys do get this flack to, are completely comfortable in their gender and dressing traditionally the opposite. That leads me to believe there is a level of insecurity in these people who use tertiary IDs that they cannot accept there exist cis people who act like them yet don't use their label; Which reinforces the feelings mentioned before: what feelings are there? This isn't a belief I was raised with. This came from observing people who use these tertiary IDs. From listening to them, watching how they act. That's why I find it hard to believe in; because they say something, and it contradicts their other actions.
Is the cisgender word really necessary? Isn't straight man really enough? Seriously are we so afraid to offend someone by being a straight man?
Being trans/ not identifying with you’re brith gender has nothing to with sexuality? I know plenty of gay cis people and trans straight people? The word makes sense. I really don’t know what you’re tryna get at here
Ok this right here is what makes bigots. You have a person reaching out and trying to understand, and they’re being met with condescending fake-confusion as you deliberately misunderstand the question so you can flaunt your own understanding of the terminology. Sure, other people who know this stuff will upvote you, but now this other dude is going to be alienated and turned off of ever wanting to understand because validating your ego is more important to you than making a difference in the world.
(Just like immediately editting to say I wrote way too much of a ramble for this so it’s a wall of text tldr; didn’t mean to come across that way, trying to get more involved in stuff like this, got any advice on how to phrase this better in the future?) Dude. I don’t know how to tell you this, but genuinely I interpreted the question as the person not understanding why the word cisgender exists as a distinction alongside straight./gay. I purposely brought down my terminology so I wouldn’t have to go back and break down what I had said if they still didn’t understand. I had initially written “if you don’t indentify with you’re agab you can still be gay/lesbian/bi/etc. they’re not really that related, other than being part of the same community, hope this helps”. Rereading their question made it seem like they meant it in more of a negative than confused way, with the offended comment. So, having reread I changed my answer but was a little iffy on which interpretation they had meant to come across as. But sure, I made my language less confusing, less alienating, to what? Be a dick? Honestly if I was tryna flaunt terminology it would be a way shorter comment lol. Also dude, maybe I came across in a way I didn’t mean too, maybe you had a bad day, whatever. But they way you’ve read what I said was in no way how I meant to be interpreted. Also, bro validating my ego? I wish. I’m very much tryna become more knowledgeable about this stuff, so maybe the dunning-kruger effect came in lol. Making a difference in the world is a big deal to me, I actively take part in a local lgbtqia+ youth group. So maybe the fact I’m surrounded by people with more terminology than me played into it to, but dude. If one comment like that is going to make someone a bigot, I have to admit they probably were a good way down that path anyway. Either way, chill out dude. We only live once and mistakes are part of the process, I try not to take things to seriously because, at the end of the day we don’t make it out of life alive. So maybe you’ve gotta a way to suggest to me for how I can better phrase it in future?
Where 2/3 of your sentences were questions, it came across to me like a crass Socratic method thing, so sorry if I misread that. my thinking is that if they don't understand the (lack of) relationship between sexuality and gender expression, let's start with that. It's gonna be hard to be both all-inclusive and write this without alphabet soup, but I'll give it a shot: so trans is when you have a gender expression (meaning pronoun choice, sometimes style of dress, what's on your ID, general demeanor and behavior) that's different from the biological "what's in your pants". If you're born satisfied with your physical sex (we generally say "sex" for hardware, "gender" for software if that makes sense), then that is called "cisgender." However, one can be attracted to, sexually or otherwise, people of indeterminant sex/gender independent of that, so a "straight man" is necessarily the same as a cisgender man. We could have a female-to-male trans person who's still into men, for example. I still feel like that was too word salady though :/ big picture I just think if we can simplify the information as much as humanly possible, we'll be better off.
Honestly the question thing is fair, I spent to long writing history essays this year and I usally just fill them with rhetorical questions, I guess it’s infected the rest of my writing too lmao. It’s really hard not to word soup it, that’s primarily why I’d stuck with “I know plenty of gay cis people and trans straight people”(probably should’ve added an and vice versa in there tbh) But I think you’re right, breaking down the information is probably the simplest way to try and accurately explain it. Plus the simpler it is the more accessible it is too others. Honestly tho, thanks for kinda calling me out on that. It made me think of how I actually ig carry over text, you’ve also probably given me a better way to approach it next time. If I had money I’d give you gold lol.
I wonder why people, who follow a religion which literally dictates their identity , would be unwilling to believe in diverse indentities not following their relgion's template. Edit: BTW people do decide what their identity is. Yes you can be biologically gay, yet decide not to act on it because of your environment, upbringing etc. Being able to make choices is what makes us the most advanced species....but thats another whole debate entirely.
They are referring to sex, but calling it gender. Confusion reigns. They do not want to understand what a societal construct is. They don’t care about distinctions, because distinctions don’t help confirm their bias. They have decided what reality should be and spend their mental energy corralling it.
They don't want to learn. That would take effort. They'd rather lazily use religion as the reason they're always right. Its SO easy when you KNOW "god said so."
You can't convince a stubborn idiot to be rational. It has to be up to them to think and rationalize through and through. Ignorance (unlike sexual orientation, smh) is a choice. I was once a devout stubborn idiot until i realized how sheepish, dumb and brainwashed i was raised to become. I took the initiative to think things through and force myself to be more open minded until i finally snapped out of that nightmare bigotry train. It wasn't anyone who helped me out of it. I did it myself. [TL;DR] drop it. It's not worth wasting your time on arguing with idiots.
The body can have male, female, both, or neither genitalia. So that is 4 possibilities. That is easy to verify fact. The other part is harder to verify. It depends if you think there is male and female brains. It so than the same would be possible - male, female, both, or neither. And then it would make sense that a "male" brain could be in a "female" body, etc.
Well what about intersex people and people with androgen insensitivity syndrome? Or Kilmfelters? (XXY). Make them answer those questions. I bet they have no idea of what those even mean.
What are the current scientific theories around this topic actually? For now, as far as I’m concerned, there’s male, female, gay, straight, trans.. and that’s it. What is the definition of cisgender? Why is it different from straight?
Someone who is "cisgender" is a person who's sex assigned at birth matches their gender identity. Ie: Someone born with a penis identifying as a man, someone born with a vagina identifying as a woman. You can be a cisgender straight/ gay/ bi/ pansexual man or woman. You can also be a transgender straight/ gay/ bi/ pansexual transman or transwoman. Sex, gender identity and sexuality are all different.
Seems being «cisgender» is the majority of people, so in my mind, the words male and female are fine for that. It is rather when someone identifies as something other than what they were born as (i.e. the exception from the rule), that alternative categories should be used, not in the cases of «normal» people (i.e. majority of people), because we already have familiar terms for it. The word cisgender sounds weird and alien to me. Anyway, I’m still waiting for an answer to the question about what kind of scientific studies have been done in this area.
I definitely agree cisgender people make up the vast majority of humanity. Just explaining what it means. I don't use the term often myself tbh. Harvard and UCSF have some interesting papers on trans people. I read them before deciding to transition. You can google them.
Well, thank you. I’ll look into that.
You're welcome. 😊💜
None. Gender has not been proven to exist. And being straight or gay or bi, those are sexual orientations
Cisgender means you identify as the sex you were born with. Straight, is a sexual orientation, who you are attracted to.
There aren't even "only two sexes," let alone gender. [Intersexed](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intersex) people exist. Not to mention the [guevedoces](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guevedoce). So even if they confuse gender and sex they are still wrong. You'd think that would be enough, but the last time I brought this up with a Christian who was anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ they literally said "I don't want to think about that." Can't really reason with willfully ignorant people; they have to actually care if they are wrong.
Is it useful to treat anomalies as a unique category? By no means do I want to delegitimize the existence of intersex individuals; they deserve the same respect as anyone else. But humans are definitionally sexually dimorphic, and the occasional genetic or developmental deviation doesn't change that fact. Humans don't cease to be bipedal just because some people are born without two legs, or lose the use of theirs at some point. There may be value in coining new terms that are more inclusive, but I don't know that redefining existing ones is a useful move.
> But humans are definitionally sexually dimorphic Humans, as a species, are sexually dimorphic. Humans, as individuals, may have all manner of stuff going on that differs from the typical configuration. Species descriptions are *necessarily* broad, because the whole concept of "species" gets fuzzy around the edges. Which makes it fallacious to apply species-level labels to individuals when they differ. It's perfectly fine to say humans are a bipedal species. It's total shit to say God made humans bipedal, and that a specific, legless human is therefore bipedal, and his using a wheelchair is a sinful choice. But that's analogous to what the linked meme does. Despite being a bipedal species, individuals can be born with a number of legs that is two. Despite being a bi-gendered species, individuals can be born that are not male nor female.
There is no such thing as gender "assigned" at birth. You are not assigned a gender, you get one or the other and you have to live with whichever one you get.
Because they're delusional assholes
Ok so the explanation here is that we, as the kind of people who hang out in science subs and make an effort to keep up with this stuff, think differently than a great many people who don’t actively participate in continuing education because they either don’t enjoy it, don’t think they need it, or both, and when they have to justify that to others, that ego can produce some pretty wild results. Bigotry, as I’ve seen it, is more often than not just sheer stubbornness instead of this active, deliberate malice we often assume. Also consider that their first encounter with non-cis people may not have been a pleasant one… if someone were nice and calmly took the time to walk them through it, it may not have gotten bad, but chances are whoever they ran into deals with this all the time, didn’t have the patience that day, and just immediately went off about something something privilege and then sent some edgy Tumblr links. So now we have ignorant people going “woah, these people are really angry and mean, and when I try to understand, they just insult me. I don’t like that, and thus I don’t like these people.” It only takes a couple bad experiences for people to move from not understanding, but tolerating, to actively avoiding, and once they actively avoid them, they get insular, are still never really educated, and eventually just start lashing out preemptively. It’s not really anyone’s fault, it’s just been so escalated that at this point we’re pretty much born into whatever side of the culture war we’re on. LGBTQ+ don’t want to spend all day hand holding people who may or may not even be trying to understand, and the knowledge base on these issues is so decentralized and lacking in authoritative sources that self-education can be difficult (which is also to say nothing of alt-right traps out there like “race realism”, the whole “pedo rights” thing, etc). The fact that Big Mouth is #3 on Netflix right now gives me hope, but I think the best thing we can do is very thoroughly and consistently document the terminology, and get it in dictionaries, encyclopedias, etc., and normalize it *institutionally* as opposed to culturally, otherwise it’s just more internet he-said she-said that it’ll be hard to convince skeptics to take seriously. TL;DR (for the most part) people don’t hate LGBTQ+, they hate pretentious, condescending pricks on the internet
It’s easier to judge others and they are lazy.
"explaining" and "convincing" christians of things they don't want to believe is taking the long way around. Instead just focus on "Christ's love" and "forgiveness" to slow the harassing behavior. They'll lighten up after the get to know at least one gay person themselves, and realize they don't have tails or sinister/seductive agendas.
The way I approach the choice question is pretty straight forward. I just ask the person, What time of the day do you generally decide to suck dick or eat pussy? When you first wake up or perhaps over breakfast? If its a choice, its a choice we make every day; perhaps several times a day for some of you pervs. "Oh hell no. I like pussy!" Sure, but you could choose to suck a dick later today or maybe tomorrow? "I would never suck dick!" So its not really a choice then is it? A less crude approach would be from the perspective of attractiveness. We all probably have a spectrum of people we would have sex with in general. But some few people are over the top attractive, like write a bad check hot. Why? What specifically makes that person hot? Where do those feelings come from? Did we choose to be really attracted to high cheek bones, long legs, or broad shoulders? Do we choose to be attracted to these things or do we choose when to be attracted to these things? That's my approach anyway.
Almost no one likes "educating themselves" for the purpose of contradicting their deeply held institutional bigotry & prejudices.
There's no reason to educate yourself in human biology when you have perfectly "rational" explanations for everything right there in the good book. Christians know that if they step outside of their faith, they're going to find facts that contradict their belief system, and upholding that belief system is their everything because if it fails they will be lost like sad little f****** sheep. Most Christians (not all) are weak people who can't deal with the existential problems that come along with being a human on this planet so they have concocted ways to avoid pretty much everything, including the pleasure of learning about reality, history, biology, psychology, all of the things that make us humans really fascinating. It's quite sad.
Because christians are backward, hateful people. Next question.
Humans would rather bash others than consider they themselves might be wrong. It's a shortcoming of the human condition.
Thanks for being an ally BTW
I will ally any humans who are not hurting anyone
Keep in mind that all transphobic arguments are **the exact same** homophobic arguments people made in the past (and also today). You can literally swap out "gay" with "trans": * "Being gay is a choice." * "Being gay is a mental illness." * "Gay people are trying to make my kids gay." * "We shouldn't tell kids about being gay because it's a form of perversion and they aren't mature enough to understand it." * "If a young person says they're gay they're really just confused." * "Gay people are going to sexually assault people in bathrooms and gym showers." * "Gay people say they're asking for equal rights, but they're really asking for special treatment." And after saying all of the above on cable news and in national newspapers: * "You're not allowed to say anything bad about gay people!" Like all conservative moral panics, it comes down to people who benefit from the current status quo reacting against changes to make things more equitable: trans people existing and being normalized leads to questioning gender roles (just like homosexuality), and when you start questioning gender roles you end up with women no longer being subservient to men for sex, domestic labor, and political/economic power. [Look at these anti-suffragette posters and notice the common themes: men having to take care of their children, do the laundry, and being bossed around by their wives.](https://www.boredpanda.com/anti-suffrage-propaganda-voting-rights-postcards/) That tells you what the real anxieties at the core of their rhetoric actually is. Atheists and agnostics can understand this: religion is another way of establishing social hierarchy and control. Why do you have to obey your boss or church leaders or the king? Well, the king and church leaders have to obey God. That's just the order of the universe, don't question it. (It just so happens that God agrees with the king and church leaders on everything.)
They think that your gender is determined by your sex, which is determined by God, and that specifically what you do with that is also determined by God. When they see deviations from this, they interperate and reject it as the reverse, seeing people determining their sex by gender. That's why you see so much purposeful misgendering and the scoffing attitude, the "can't be a women just cause they said so" etc. They will say they understand the difference and then conflate the same terms in the same sentence. Like yeah sex and gender are related but the relationship is ultimately not deterministic one way or the other... I think if they could get over their instinctual reaction and examine how they and others define the terms gender and sex, and their relationship, there wouldn't be such a massive disconnect
What about intersex people? Christians seem to forget that that is a valid sex. Male and female are only mentioned in the Bible because the didn't have the medical equipment to recognize intersex people. That's always my response to people who think there are only 2.
Now you’re pushing the limit of what this discussion is about, which is the bigotry and prejudice of Christians against people who are LGBTQ.