Gender dysphoria doesn't exist

submitted by SexualityCritical from self.GCdebatesQT

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[–]peakingatthemomentTranssexual (natal male), HSTS 13 insightful - 1 fun13 insightful - 0 fun14 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

I feel like it doesn’t make sense to say it isn’t real. Just because something may only exist in a society or has a societal part mean it isn’t real. If you applied the same standard you are trying to apply to gender dysphoria, you’d throw out all sorts of mental illnesses. Very few can be easily located in the brain I don’t think. As u/loveSloane said, it’s a mental condition that exists. How can it exist and not be real?

[–]SexualityCritical[S] 2 insightful - 6 fun2 insightful - 5 fun3 insightful - 6 fun -  (1 child)

What sort of mental illnesses can't be located in the brain? I mean, you could name some. But, I believe they're either found within a person's neurology, or, they're not mental illnesses at all. I don't believe something should be called an 'illness' unless there exists some sort of medical basis to it.

As stated, while doctors and general physicians might sometimes refer to gender dysphoria diagnoses as 'medical,' there is never the claim from them that a diagnosis involves looking at, A, neurology, or, B, discovering some type of gene, or genetic arrangement, which testifies to the existence of dysphoria. So, in a sense, it's never claimed to be a scientific process. Gender dysphoria doesn't exist, is my claim, in the identical sense to how virginity doesn't exist. I've already explained this part.

[–]peakingatthemomentTranssexual (natal male), HSTS 8 insightful - 1 fun8 insightful - 0 fun9 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Nearly all of them! If we could fine something wrong in the body it likely wouldn’t be considered a mental disorder. Anorexia nervosa for instance can’t necessarily be found in the brain, but lots of people still struggle with it. It’s understood by how people behave who have it. Sometimes, we will be able to locate things in the brain that are more likely to be present in someone with a certain disorder, but it’s always a mix of social and other things. Gender dysphoria or gender identity disorder (which is what I was diagnosed with) isn’t unique in this way. And we’re finding things in the brain for that too. It doesn’t mean that we were necessarily born like this, because brains are very plastic and can change a lot, but it is another indicator that it is a real thing. I feel like the only way your position makes sense is if you just say mental illnesses aren’t real to you.

https://www.eneuro.org/content/6/6/ENEURO.0183-19.2019