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#41 |
Penultimate Amazing
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#42 |
Fiend God
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#43 |
Fiend God
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#44 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jan 2006
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__________________
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts ~ Bertrand Russell I am proud to say that Henry Kissinger is not my friend. |
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#45 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jan 2006
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__________________
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts ~ Bertrand Russell I am proud to say that Henry Kissinger is not my friend. |
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#46 |
Fiend God
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#47 |
Philosopher
Join Date: Sep 2008
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__________________
The weakness of all Utopias is this, ... They first assume that no man will want more than his share, and then are very ingenious in explaining whether his share will be delivered by motorcar or balloon. -G.K. CHESTERTON |
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#48 |
Penultimate Amazing
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#49 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Aug 2007
Posts: 31,613
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Fake op eds have the same implications for media credibility as fake news reports. I don't mind putting them under the same heading.
ETA: And I wouldn't say they aren't news. Certainly when the New York Times publishes an opinion, they're saying, "this opinion is newsworthy." "You should consider these ideas." Etc. In a sense, fake op eds are even worse. They're not giving you bad facts. They're giving you bad ideas and bad conclusions. |
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#50 |
Illuminator
Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 4,431
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__________________
Caption from and old New Yorker cartoon - Why am I shouting? Because I'm wrong!" |
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#51 |
Graduate Poster
Join Date: Apr 2018
Location: Boston, USA
Posts: 1,043
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I can't really tell what the motive of this op-ed is. Is it meant to be a public commentary on the wider issue of medical gatekeeping for GRS and trans people, or just a human interest story specifically about this very conflicted person.
If it's supposed to be the former, it seems a bit sketchy to me. I don't think this author's story typifies the dilemma that trans people face when making these decisions by a long shot. I wouldn't go so far as calling it fake news, but I do find it a bit muddled and strange for the NYT. |
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Gobble gobble |
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#52 |
Fiend God
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#53 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jun 2003
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__________________
"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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#54 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Aug 2007
Posts: 31,613
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Recently I've been reading through the Wikipedia articles related to nuclear weapon design. The metaphor on my mind is critical mass of fissionable material. In normal concentrations, gingers don't produce enough soulons to generate a soul. But put enough of them together, perhaps with a gadget to generate an initiating soulon pulse, and you might get something.
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#55 |
![]() Join Date: Jun 2004
Location: Monkey
Posts: 47,344
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Just why exactly were you reading up on nuke design? Planning to give a few as presents to the Ukraine? I think they'd appreciate it very much around now!
I've been reading up on food taboos. Things I've learned: bear meat isn't kosher, eating cat meat was legal in Germany until 1996, and Sunni Islam is okay with eating whale meat but only if the whale died from natural causes. Wikipedia is awesome. |
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You added nothing to that conversation, Barbara. |
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#56 |
Fiend God
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#57 |
Fiend God
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#58 |
Fiend God
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#59 |
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You added nothing to that conversation, Barbara. |
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#60 |
Show me the monkey!
Join Date: Jul 2005
Posts: 21,461
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__________________
Bigfoot believers and Bigfoot skeptics are both plumb crazy. Each spends more than one minute per year thinking about Bigfoot. |
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#61 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 41,858
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If you want a nuclear analogy, I'd consider them more like boron in a nuclear reactor. They suck up soulons, and thus interfere with the positive feedback that normal souls have with each other. Too many of them in one place and the people around them might as well be soulless too.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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#62 |
Neo-Post-Retro-Revivalist
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: The Emerald City
Posts: 15,108
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A dozen or so years ago, I would have considered the possibility to be laughable, but given everything I've learned about the various disinformation campaigns, and about the various anti-minority crusaders out there (racist, sexist, anti-LGBTQ, etc.), combined with what I've been learning about the burgeoning TERF movement in the last year (and their leaders/organizations like Cathy Brennan and Get the L Out), as well as activities by religious right organizations like the Pacific Justice Institute, I can more readily believe that this is yet another disinfo tactic. Not that I'm saying it definitively is a disinformation troll or agent provocateur, after all it could just be a mentally ill individual who has had the bad fortunate to be unduly influenced by anti-trans rhetoric, but it does have a lot of the hallmarks, and fits the conspiracy theories far too neatly. |
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"All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others." -- Douglas Adams "The absence of evidence might indeed not be evidence of absence, but it's a pretty good start." -- PhantomWolf "Let's see the buggers figure that one out." - John Lennon |
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#63 |
Penultimate Amazing
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#64 |
Fiend God
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#65 |
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You added nothing to that conversation, Barbara. |
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#66 |
Not a doctor.
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: Texas
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#67 |
Penultimate Amazing
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#68 |
Fiend God
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#69 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jan 2006
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__________________
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts ~ Bertrand Russell I am proud to say that Henry Kissinger is not my friend. |
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#70 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 41,858
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Back to the OP for a moment: I get the feeling that this person's new vagina won't make anyone else happy either.
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__________________
"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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#71 |
Graduate Poster
Join Date: Sep 2012
Posts: 1,155
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Not every trans is the same trans, it's why I hate labels.
people have different reasons to do what they do. Seems to me the OP has bigger issues. |
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#72 |
Master Poster
Join Date: Nov 2012
Posts: 2,043
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RE: The thread title. This reminds me of the classic Aladdin, where the evil magician walks down the street yelling "New lamps for old." In both cases the ignorant woman removes a functional rub activated gene shooting model and swaps it for an alternate cosmetic version that lacks most of the important functions, and doesn't necessarily look any better.
Typical woman. |
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#73 |
Philosophile
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Osaka, Japan
Posts: 24,377
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__________________
"The thief and the murderer follow nature just as much as the philanthropist. Cosmic evolution may teach us how the good and the evil tendencies of man may have come about; but, in itself, it is incompetent to furnish any better reason why what we call good is preferable to what we call evil than we had before." "Evolution and Ethics" T.H. Huxley (1893) |
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#74 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jan 2006
Posts: 10,584
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__________________
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts ~ Bertrand Russell I am proud to say that Henry Kissinger is not my friend. |
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#75 |
Philosophile
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Osaka, Japan
Posts: 24,377
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__________________
"The thief and the murderer follow nature just as much as the philanthropist. Cosmic evolution may teach us how the good and the evil tendencies of man may have come about; but, in itself, it is incompetent to furnish any better reason why what we call good is preferable to what we call evil than we had before." "Evolution and Ethics" T.H. Huxley (1893) |
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#76 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 41,858
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__________________
"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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#77 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Aug 2007
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#78 |
Penultimate Amazing
Join Date: Aug 2007
Posts: 31,613
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Here's her bio:
https://www.andrealongchu.com/full-bio/ And her CV: https://static1.squarespace.com/stat...CV+7-26-18.pdf And here's her GFM: https://www.gofundme.com/buy-me-a-new-body Where she links to other portions of her body of work, including her Twitter feed. Apparently she's written several articles for a wide range of publications. I'm sure that with an evidence trail like that, you truth-seekers will be able to expose this fraud in no time. Tell me one thing, though: Is the NYT in on the hoax, or were they fooled too? |
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#79 |
Graduate Poster
Join Date: Feb 2014
Posts: 1,845
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I don't think they ARE a fake person or controlled opposition or whatever. I just think it reads that way.
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#80 |
Master Poster
Join Date: Jul 2013
Posts: 2,967
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I think that people have to accept that this is her lived experience. She is under no obligation to be positive about her life, body or experiences just to validate others.
Having been close at one time to someone who was transitioning I do recognise anxieties that my friend had. 1) That she mourned the girlhood she never had. She did have an interest in what it was like to grow up a girl. She wanted to vicariously share the experience. At times her need could be uncomfortable for me. 2) Hormone therapy does affect the emotions. Interestingly about 50% of M to F TG people express sexual attraction to women pre transitioning; half of those will change their sexual preference post hormone therapy. 3) Surgery is not great. Vaginas need daily maintenance, this is a constant reminder that one is TG. One does not transition to being a woman, one is in a constant state of transitioning. Surgery for F to M is even worse. The phrase that her vagina is an open sore in the op-ed I read as being metaphorical rather than literal. The open sore being her continual need to maintain her femininity by artificial means. It is an open psychic sore. We know people are capable of being irrational, but those irrational feelings are real to them, we should recognise their validity. For TG people there are a series of summits, coming out and living as a woman, getting hormone therapy, getting surgery, more surgery; each is the greatest challenge, then once is completed there is another challenge, it is only natural that there is a come down. The reality is a proportion of people subsequently regret decisions they made around transitioning, particularly as it relates to fertility. There are many life affirming narratives of transitioning, but it is not inappropriate for someone to say that for some it can also be a trial. |
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