I was going to post this under "Suicide" but thought that perhaps we should have a broader conversation. This article is about a NYFD campaign to reduce LGBT teen suicide. It's part of the "It Gets Better" campaign. http://m.nydailynews.com/new-york/fdny-releases-better-video-lgbt-youth-article-1.2392827?utm_content=buffer7e353&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_
I don't expect that everyone has the same views about LGBT people, but I think you might have questions and I think it might be worth having a conversation.
So, what questions do you have about sexual orientation, gender identity, and our partnered /sexual lives? I'll find out answers if no one in our class knows them. Kaitlin Jenner & transgendered, intersex, etc. Ask your serious questions and I'll try to explain. Remember that "normal" is very subjective and just because someone is different than you doesn't mean that person is wrong. The same caution applies to the term "natural."
Be aware, too, that LGBT folks have been marginalized everywhere, including at end-of-life. As future medical professionals and caring citizens, you should try to understand people even if they aren't like you, and especially those who have less power & status in society. Finally, you should assume for this type of discussion that not everyone in the conversation is heterosexual and cisgendered (yep, look it up - first person to define it gets a gold star!). If you need to personify "the other," you can use me.
Gold star here I come.....
ReplyDeleteCisgender means "denoting or relating to a person whose self-identity conforms with the gender that corresponds to their biological sex; not transgender" says google. Time.com says it is a word that applies to the vast majority of people for describing someone who is not transgender. An example of this is when a doctor announces in the delivery room "It's a girl" and she grows up identifying herself as a woman then the person is cisgender. I believe this must mean that a person is cisgender when his/her gender assigned to them at birth, his/her body, and his/her personal identity for himself/herself match up.
I am trying to accept the Caitlin Jenner situation and many other people's situation as a transgender. I can't help but wonder, my beliefs teach me that God made us in his own image and likeness and it is hard for me to understand why people would want to change the way God created them? I am not quite sure what the Bible says about transgenders, if it says anything at all? But, how I feel is that if someone is so unhappy in their body and genuinely believe that they are meant to be a different gender, then no one can really stop them. I am trying to be more open-minded and to accept anyone as they are, but I have never been in the situation or had a feeling like that so it is hard to relate to where these people are coming from. I think it is very important to accept everyone as they are, no matter what the situation. You may not have to agree with them, but it is still important to accept them and love them for who they are.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with everything that you stated. It may be hard for us to understand what people are going through, but that does not mean we have the right to judge. We should accept everyone for who they are and love them just as we love everyone else in our lives. We put this label on those that seem "so different" from us and it's very wrong. We are all different in our own unique ways. God didn't create us to be clones of one another, He made us each individually to be our own unique person.
DeleteI think it takes this type of situation to hit home for people to fully understand and respect a person's discussion to change their sex. I have a family member of my immediate family who is a transgender. I grew up not knowing that she was related to me but my mom finally told me at the age of sixteen that her sister, who I always thought was a close family friend, was a transgender. I was always fascinated when Oprah would have episodes on transgendered people. Just think... when an embryo is in a woman's uterus, it has a short period at the five week mark to either create a boy or a girl. Sometimes our soul doesn't match up with our body and I can't imagine living in a body that feels so wrong and uncomfortable. I'm glad that people are becoming more aware of this situation and Caitlyn Jenner has brought awareness to our society.
ReplyDeleteI recently learned about the term "Heteroromantic Bisexual", it's someone who is sexually attracted to both male and females but is only sexual with the opposite sex. So from what i've gathered it is someone who is interested in both but only acts upon their interest of the opposite sex. I can't find the article where I first learned this term but this is how the woman described herself, she said she used to label herself as bisexual but she wasn't sure if that was something she should label herself as since she had never dated a girl. She was only ever just attracted to them. But in my search to find the article I stumbled upon this discussion board where there are quite a few talking about many different labels.
ReplyDeletehttp://emptyclosets.com/forum/chit-chat/73122-am-i-heteroromantic-bisexual.html
One of them mentioned that labeling yourself or redefining yourself isn't that important unless you're trying to get one gender or another to better understand your sexual interest or ward away a particular party. So in other words if you were a bisexual female but you wanted guys to stop hitting on you then you probably should give yourself a label that is ideally one people understand.
Personally, I really don't care one way or the other. Someone else's sexual interest doesn't affect my life in any way so other people's business doesn't bother me. I just think we're trying to hard to be politically correct. To the point we are actually confusing some people. I know some people I went to school with who struggled knowing who they are mainly because of how open their families were about sexual orientation for one. I remember one friend of mine telling me she wasn't sure if she was gay or not because her parents always told her if she was it was okay with them. So she walked around wondering for years even though she never experienced any type attraction towards any females which I could tell made her extremely nervous. I know she really just wanted an answer to a question that really didn't need to be asked in the first place. If you're gay you're gay if not then you're not, does it really matter either way? Until she met a lesbian for the first time she told me she thought she liked her. But again, wasn't sure. So I always wondered if this would have been such an issue for her if she had never been questioned as a child, because everyone I know who is gay always says they knew they were "different" when they were just little kids but kept their feelings suppressed because they didn't know why they felt that way when no one else they knew was like that. Or they grew up with religious parents who spoke of homosexuals burning in hell so they worried if they acted upon their feelings they would burn or lose their family. But instead they lost God and want nothing to do with religion now.
Are all these new crazy labels really beneficial to us or are we really just trying TOO hard and confusing people who wouldn't otherwise be confused?
Karen, I completely agree with what other people do with their lives does not affect me in any way. I think that the country we live in is so used to everything having to be "normal" that no one can every accept anything that is out of the norm. i think that society is just trying to make things more difficult, and just need to allow people to express themselves in the way they want, because when it comes down to it none of their lives affect ours, so why should we try and effect their lives.
DeleteWhen i think about transgender situations, i think of the way the brain works. When i hear about this topic i always think back to an episode off of Law and Order, they did an episode of a boy in middle school who wanted to become a girl. A woman in the episode, who also was transgender, said to the people "you have no idea what it is like being someone yorue not, we wake up every morning and we are trapped inside a body that doesn't reflect who we are." I know the people who truly are transgender are stuck inside a male or female body, when their mind tells them that they really are something different. In my opinion, the transgender does not bother me, because i think of it in a way that they are just expressing themselves and everyone has a right to do so.
ReplyDeleteI believe that people are people. People are attracted to whoever they are attracted to, feel that they are the people they are, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if people are transgendered, bi, gay, straight, pan, A-sexual. Heck, these days 90% of the women I come across have made out with their best friend at least once or twice. I know many men who have done the same thing. They say don't know it unless you try it... well, you don't need to know about that part of my life. However, what I find most offensive is people who are offended. With all the politically correct aspects of everything, it seems if you aren't attracted to a trans person, you're somewhat considered transphobic. For instance, say you are a gay couple, your boyfriend says he now wants to be a woman, you aren't attracted to women because you're gay and you break up with them. I believe that is nonsense. You're attracted to who you're attracted to. If many of these people who want to spout off and say you're transphobic because you're not attracted to that person, then I pose a question. Would you go up to a lesbian and ask them to be attracted to a male? They would say no, right? Would you not go ahead and using that logic say they're heterophobic? For the record, I think every man in his lifetime sees another dude and says "yeah, I'd go gay for him"...for me it's John Barrowman, the guy who plays Captain Jack off of Doctor Who.... look 'em up. Yeah, you'd go gay for him if you're a guy, and if you're a lesbian, you'd go straight for him. - Christian Shodahl
ReplyDeleteI see what you are getting at even with the out there examples. I agree that people who are offended are the ones with the problem. People can be attracted to whomever they want and if you don't share that belief then that fine, but there is no need to make a big ordeal out of it. If you don't agree there is no reason to degrade someone because they believe something different. That's like saying if someone doesn't like dogs and I bully, degrade, and harass them because I love dogs. It's their choice to not like dogs and even though I love dogs, I need to respect their decision because I don't want someone doing the same thing to be because i disagree with something they don't. So people who have different sexual orientation, gender identity, and partnered /sexual lives shouldn't have to live in fear because they believe something different. It is their live and people need to learn to be more open and accepting of other people's choices. If people were more accepting, then maybe the suicide rate of LGTB may have a decrease because they wouldn't be living in fear of who they truly are.
DeleteMy belief is that it is not my duty or right to judge others. A persons sexual orientation is their business, and it does not change who they are as a person, they just may not have the same views as someone else. LGTB tend to be looked down on in society because they are viewed as "different" or not normal, but honestly who is normal? When did it become the job of society to judge individuals? People are often judged by the clothes they wear, the money they have, and now people are being judged their personal choices on who they fall in love with. Someone's private and personal life should stay just that, private and personal. No matter a person's sexual orientation, does that really change anything about them? Have you ever met someone and not even though that they could be GLTB, but later found out that they were? Did that really change your opinion about that person? I have friends with different sexual orientations, but it's not something i focus on in our friendship. I may ask them questions every now and again, but in the end we are friends because of the things we have in common, not because we agree with everything each other believes. In the end everyone is different, and if we were all the same we would grow so sick of each other because there would be interesting about people anymore. God did not create humans so we could judge each other on personal opinions, that is and will forever be His job.
ReplyDeleteI agree that people are judging others even though it is not the job of a society. No one in technically normal because we are not all robots. If we were all robots, then there would be no diversity and people would probably get tired of others. The diversity in society is what brings it to life, its what makes it more interesting to be in. If we judges less and accepted more, then I believe that the world would be a better and happier place to live in
DeleteMy belief is that it is not my duty or right to judge others. A persons sexual orientation is their business, and it does not change who they are as a person, they just may not have the same views as someone else. LGTB tend to be looked down on in society because they are viewed as "different" or not normal, but honestly who is normal? When did it become the job of society to judge individuals? People are often judged by the clothes they wear, the money they have, and now people are being judged their personal choices on who they fall in love with. Someone's private and personal life should stay just that, private and personal. No matter a person's sexual orientation, does that really change anything about them? Have you ever met someone and not even though that they could be GLTB, but later found out that they were? Did that really change your opinion about that person? I have friends with different sexual orientations, but it's not something i focus on in our friendship. I may ask them questions every now and again, but in the end we are friends because of the things we have in common, not because we agree with everything each other believes. In the end everyone is different, and if we were all the same we would grow so sick of each other because there would be interesting about people anymore. God did not create humans so we could judge each other on personal opinions, that is and will forever be His job.
ReplyDeleteI believe that if a person knows that they are stuck in the wrong body and they are trying to be themselves,they start to have a conflict in their mind.They want to be true to themselves, but at the same time they want to be normal and fit into society. I believe that a person should express who they are on the inside. Society judges people based on if they fit into the social norm, but if every one is the exact same, then where is the expression of individuality? There are people who believe that things should only be one way, but that is not how the world works. There will always be someone or something that goes against a certain belief. What we as a society need to do is to teach the future generations that they can believe what they want, but they should be accepting of other people's choices and beliefs.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't sure which section to post this under, but here is a current event concerning this topic:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/07/us/mormons-gay-marriage.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur
ReplyDeleteAlthough I am very unfamiliar with the struggles that come with those that are transgender, I believe that we all should be treated the same no matter what. If someone is struggling with their identity and they feel like they have been living a lie, who says we have the right to judge? As a Catholic, I believe that we are all made in God’s own image and likeness. I find it hard to think that God would create His children with a questionable identity, but it is not society’s place to judge.