I think thought leaders know this which is why, for example, the woke cult doesn’t allow any disagreement with any piece of the transgender narrative.
It’s all or nothing because they’re afraid that allowing any disagreement will cause people’s binary thinking to switch to the other side.
sigh please don't use terms of abuse such as "woke cult" on HN.
And yes, people are being incredibly defensive because there are a number of misinformation campaigns circulating trying to get trans healthcare banned for everyone. The war on drugs, for testosterone and estrogen.
They are a cult. It’s a group of people who fervently worship an ideology filled with hatred, falsehoods, manipulation and deception. They even have original sin, and excommunication.
All under the guise of protecting oppressed people.
However if they actually cared about the causes they claim, then they would try to make their ideas as easy to digest for the average sane person as possible. But it’s not actually about helping people, it’s about moral superiority and pushing people away who aren’t “pure” enough.
But for starters how about the idea that a trans-man doesn’t just identify as a man, but is a man. In other words, embracing delusion and denying biology.
Or how about girls feeling uncomfortable in their own bathrooms and locker rooms because a biological male is allowed in their safe space?
Or how about the stuff that’s just plain silly. Like this recent Men’s Health article where a straight man is told that his preference for a real vagina is actually a vulva fetish and that he’s actually bisexual since “technically” a woman and a trans-man can both have vulvas.
https://www.menshealth.com/sex-women/a41018711/sexplain-it-v...
I could honestly go on and on and on.
I suggest this binary positioning is a very American phenomenon; the cultural reasons for which I'm unable to suggest a reason for.
I really don't think so. Binary thinking is something I've personally noticed and thought about for a while, and I think it stems from the human brain just trying to simplify things. In most scenarios, it is far easier (and time efficient) to only consider the 2 extreme options rather than the entire spectrum of possible options, even if those two extremes are far worse than the alternatives.
Plus, I've seen Europeans do the same thing all the time [0]. Remember, polarization (which is really just an extension of tribalism imo) isn't an American condition, it's a human condition.
[0] I've lived in both the US and Europe
No I didn't type that. Your reading it that way is..... binary?
It is possible to observe behaviour without knowing what causes it.
"I suggest drinking heavily is a very British phenomenon; the cultural reasons for which I'm unable to suggest a reason for either."
Of course, it took decades to get people to acknowledge that the harms of some drugs were far less than the harm caused by policing them, and that the harms had been wildly exaggerated for political reasons, so it's not really surprising that people will jump to deny any harm in case it gets banned again.