A person telling you, “I don’t feel like man”, is something you can observe. A person telling you, " I don’t feel like either gender" is something you can observe. A person telling you, “I feel like a woman” today but next week telling you “I feel like a man” is something that can be observed.
Happiness and sadness are easy to comprehend because all humans experience it. Their biological mechanisms have also been studied and partially understood by science. “Gender feelings”, not so much. Let put it this way: How can a biological male, who was never a female, know the feeling he feels is that of a woman?
How can a biological male, who was never a female, know the feeling he feels is that of a woman?
How can a biological male who was never a different individual biological male, know the feeling that he feels is that of another man? He can’t! He’s never been another man, only the individual that he is. So he can never know that the way he feels “as a man” is anything at all like how another man might feel “as a man.” However, since as a social species we have empathy we can make reasonable assumptions about how other people feel, in part based on what they say they feel, and no less so because they have different bits between their legs than if they have a different color of hair.
None of us can unambiguously know what it is like to be another person. This is an obvious truism. The way you’re trying to use it to draw this arbitrary line between what people can know about their own feelings, but only as determined by what kind of genitalia they were born with… it’s gross. And whether intended or not, bigoted. People of any and all genders can have empathy for anyone else of any and all genders. We can also know how we feel internally when society around us sees us as we feel we are, versus how we feel internally when society around us sees as as what we feel we are not. The former is good and affirming. The latter is painful and dejecting.
Their biological mechanisms have also been studied and partially understood by science. “Gender feelings”, not so much
Btw, there has been scientific research on transgender issues. Famously, there was a great trove of it that was burned by the Nazis in Germany. You know those infamous book burnings? Yeah, that was transgender scientific research. Fortunately, there has been a lot of other valid scientific studies done since then, too. All of it confirming the things people in this thread have been trying to tell you, even when you call it “fickle” or insist that your society isn’t empathetic enough to ever accept (which I categorically reject.)
I dunno, I feel the need to lightly push back…
A person telling you, “I don’t feel like man”, is something you can observe. A person telling you, " I don’t feel like either gender" is something you can observe. A person telling you, “I feel like a woman” today but next week telling you “I feel like a man” is something that can be observed.
What is “feeling like a man”? What is “feeling like a woman”? What is the biological mechanism that determine these feelings?
I can observe a person who has near death experience telling me they met god. Should I take it as face value?
I don’t think my society is willing to accept such fickleness, even if we are willing to accept transgender.
What is feeling happy or sad? This is absurd.
Happiness and sadness are easy to comprehend because all humans experience it. Their biological mechanisms have also been studied and partially understood by science. “Gender feelings”, not so much. Let put it this way: How can a biological male, who was never a female, know the feeling he feels is that of a woman?
How can a biological male who was never a different individual biological male, know the feeling that he feels is that of another man? He can’t! He’s never been another man, only the individual that he is. So he can never know that the way he feels “as a man” is anything at all like how another man might feel “as a man.” However, since as a social species we have empathy we can make reasonable assumptions about how other people feel, in part based on what they say they feel, and no less so because they have different bits between their legs than if they have a different color of hair.
None of us can unambiguously know what it is like to be another person. This is an obvious truism. The way you’re trying to use it to draw this arbitrary line between what people can know about their own feelings, but only as determined by what kind of genitalia they were born with… it’s gross. And whether intended or not, bigoted. People of any and all genders can have empathy for anyone else of any and all genders. We can also know how we feel internally when society around us sees us as we feel we are, versus how we feel internally when society around us sees as as what we feel we are not. The former is good and affirming. The latter is painful and dejecting.
Btw, there has been scientific research on transgender issues. Famously, there was a great trove of it that was burned by the Nazis in Germany. You know those infamous book burnings? Yeah, that was transgender scientific research. Fortunately, there has been a lot of other valid scientific studies done since then, too. All of it confirming the things people in this thread have been trying to tell you, even when you call it “fickle” or insist that your society isn’t empathetic enough to ever accept (which I categorically reject.)