Letter: Candidates don’t even know what transgender means?!

Larissa Sneider, Evanston Resident
Posted 8/23/18

Letter to the editor from Larissa Sneider

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Letter: Candidates don’t even know what transgender means?!

Posted

Editor:

Upon reading “GOP candidates face off in Evanston,” in the Uinta County Herald, Aug. 17, I was very puzzled by one portion. One of the published debate topics read, “Regarding the rights of LGBTQ and a SOGI bill that would allow transgender males to use women’s restrooms, there were different attitudes.”

I contacted the author to see if this was paraphrased or quoted. She said she quoted the published debate points. I had to shake my head at adults debating incorrect information. Didn’t any of the candidates know that a transgender male is a human assigned the female gender marker at birth who has a male brain?

This person is trying not to have to use the women’s restroom as they see themselves as male and have taken steps to correct their bodies to reflect that.

Seem complicated? You should be that person. (To learn the steps taken by this individual, Google “WPATH” to see the standards of care.)

A little terminology may help. A transgender male was labeled female at birth but seeks to be male in all aspects. A transgender female was labeled male at birth and seeks to be female in all aspects. At birth, we seem compelled to label our children male or female. Actually, there is no true male or true female. We all have traits of both but tend to lean one way or the other.

The new scanning technologies (CAT, MRI and PET) have shown that male and female brains have subtle differences. Not all babies with male genitalia have male brains and not all babies with female genitalia have female brains. These are the ones who seek to change and are labeled transgender.

There is also the well-hidden secret of inter-sexed babies. These children have some combination of both genitalia at birth. Parents and doctors panic when they can’t answer the age-old question, “Is it a boy or a girl?” For the last 80 or more years the answer is to mutilate the child’s genitalia to conform to one or to the other, not leaving that child the option to choose at puberty when the male or female aspects reveal. The doctor’s educated guess and subsequent actions often condemn that child to a life of confusion and pain.

Whether these conditions were caused by events or lack of events happening during gestation, the result happened. Exposure during pregnancy to a host of chemicals, medications and traumas may be responsible — there is no way to know. Research has been limited because of religious and other superstitions finding their way into law or custom. The best research has been coming out of Australia and New Zealand.

To all politicians: It is very easy to denigrate, shame, condemn and use name calling when you don’t wish to understand; but would rather use yours and others’ ignorance to divide the  electorate? The human way to approach any subject is to learn and understand rather than make judgment based on ignorance and superstition. Educate yourself and you will be an asset to your constituents.

Larissa Sneider

Evanston