When are you old enough to decide to go trans? A gentle critique of the left's position
Within you are two demons, and they both have something to say about trans issues, bodily autonomy, fertility, and so on.
Some topics I’ll discuss:
Questions of life and death at the center of the trans debate
On the legal system arbitrating between autonomy of parents and the autonomy of their children
Military draft vs. bodily autonomy
The right to choose vs. the right to life
Sex-ed and a child’s right to privacy
On paying $200,000 for a transition you do not want for your child
Approaches toward reconciliation
My post is a response to this post about the struggle of a dad trying to figure out how to stop the mother of his child from getting puberty blockers at 16. It’s a heart-wrenching post and it has relevance to my own life and decisions.
Questions of life and death at the center of the trans debate
The question of life and death is at the bottom of the trans debate for both sides. Trans people are at much higher risk of suicide. At the same time, gender-affirming treatment can leave them infertile and incapable of creating new life. Whichever way you slice it, it’s a question about life and death.
Untangling the cause and effect is also a point of contention. Trans supporters believe suicide is a result of them being rejected. If the question was a merely a matter of infertility, a child choosing to dedicate themselves to monastic life would receive the same pushback. Many dads worry that their children are being manipulated into becoming trans. They would take offense at the comparison to monks. Finally, at what age is someone old enough to make such a choice? Is a 16 year old capable of choosing their own gender? What if they’re 12?
On the legal system arbitrating between autonomy of parents and the autonomy of their children
The trans issue is frustrating for parents with kids because it pits the autonomy of a child against their parents. What if the parents disagree? On one hand, children are their own autonomous agents. If getting your child to listen to you requires you to spank them until they get bruised, does this make it right? What if you’re trying to stop them running into oncoming traffic? Most people would say my scenario is unrealistic. There are many ways to deal with a situation like that without resorting to violence. Is it possible that a child deciding to transition is being seriously manipulated?
At what point is a child old enough to consent to choices that may leave them infertile? If they can make such a choice, does this suggest that they are of sound mind to make equally permanent decisions? For most purposes, the age of majority marks the line between childhood and adulthood. At 18 you can legally make your own choices. In many places the age of consent starts at around age 13 or so. In the US, the youngest seems to be 16.
If a 16yo is old enough to decide whether or not to undergo a surgery that would leave them infertile, are they also old enough to consent to unprotected sex that can leave them pregnant? In California where such a case went to trial, the answer is no. There, the age of consent is 18. Can we separate the right for someone to choose to get pregnant and the right to never get pregnant? Both can be permanent choices that cannot be undone. On which grounds is a person old enough to make one permanent choice but unable to make another? If you want to enlist without parental consent to die for your country, you must be at least 18.
Before I go further, my point is not to jump through legalistic and logical hoops in order to justify one argument or another. Laws exist to serve us, and not the other way around. Legality should not count as a moral justification.
To smoke or drink, you need to be at least 21. So you need to be 18 to consent to die for your country, but 21 to consent to smoke. Though it’s difficult to quit smoking, people can get back from that. There’s no coming back from being dead.
However, let me quickly make the strongest case I can for the apparent contradiction. Personally, I think if you’re old enough to consent to sex, you’re old enough to consent to mind-altering substances. However, if we get too many 21 year olds crashing cars from drunk driving, then as a practical matter, raising the minimum age does make sense. Anything that alters your mental state has the ability to affect your decision-making. It can be argued that mind-altering substances effectively put you in a less mature mental state.
Military draft vs. bodily autonomy
As for military service, the government is perfectly happy to send you off to war. If you believe that governments partially exist to perpetuate their own existence, then it will make sense. In any case, 18 is where you become an adult in nearly all respects. Still, it’s a bit odd that a person can be considered an adult but still have age restrictions placed on them.
War brings up another questions of consent. Shouldn’t soldiers get the final say when it comes to war? Why should anyone have the right to send you to war without your enthusiastic consent? What about your right to bodily autonomy?
In the Soviet Union, Stalin issued an order requiring deserters to be shot on the spot. You might be surprised that that US law isn’t that different:
Any person found guilty of desertion or attempt to desert shall be punished, if the offense is committed in time of war, by death or such other punishment as a court-martial may direct, but if the desertion or attempt to desert occurs at any other time, by such punishment, other than death, as a court-martial may direct.
The last time someone in the US was sentenced to death for desertion was 1945. Usually, other punishments like imprisonment are used. Punishment does here serves a practical purpose. War is hell and you don’t want your soldiers deserting when you need them most.
Are you legally allowed to opt out of war entirely? Not really. In the US, almost all men from 18-25 are required to register for the draft. If you don’t, “You may be prosecuted and face a fine of up to $250,000 and jail time of up to five years” (source).
The right to choose vs. the right to life
Many women believe that a woman should have a right to choose whether to complete a pregnancy or terminate it. Many women support the right to choose, but never intend to use such a right. Morally, I believe abortion is wrong, but I don’t know if abortion should be made illegal, and this is partially based on my suspicion that women (who either didn’t want a child or changed their minds) may go to extreme lengths to terminate their pregnancy regardless of what the laws might be. I’m just not sure.
On the other hand, I believe that if you’re having sex with someone, there must be at least some desire to produce children whether you’re consciously aware of it or not. It’s important for us to not forget the consequences of sex. If a guy gets a girl pregnant and abandons her, we naturally look at that as an abandonment of responsibility. If both parents abandon their responsibility, we sometimes believe that they were too young or not mentally ready.
In any case, someone should take care of a newborn child since it can’t take care of itself or make its own decisions. At some point, children cross into adulthood. People have put that transition point at different ages. I’ve walked past a couple quinceañeras in the US. I know it’s a celebration that Mexicans have when a girl becomes 15 because it marks her transition into adulthood. To me, they still look like girls and not women. Before that age, the girl is taught skills and prepared for marriage.
Evolutionarily, our drawn-out childhoods separate us from other animals (among other characteristics). Historically, the age of consent and even adulthood has been lower than 18, but some places now put the age of majority at age 21. On one hand, these increasingly drawn-out childhoods may be a sign of progress. They could also be a sign that modern society does a poor job of preparing young people for adult life. In the US, you can be under your parent’s health insurance until age 26.
Sex-ed and a child’s right to privacy
What about teaching kids sex education? If kids are being taught about birth control, then we must also presume that these same kids have a right to privacy. How else is it possible for kids to be having sex? If they’re not having sex, then maybe they don’t need to know about it. Then again, if it’s possible for them to learn about sex from other students, etc, then it may be better (as a parent) to be the one to tell them first.
How much privacy should kids have? If a child tells his teacher that he’s gay, should the teacher tell the parents? If the kid is gay, does it even matter unless the kid is kissing other boys? Should kids be allowed to kiss each other?
Is it possible that giving children privacy is the real moral failure to focus on? Most people would oppose leaving a child unattended in a car for almost any reason. We would consider it to be negligent parenting. What about leaving a child alone in another room? That depends on whether there’s something in there they can hurt themselves with. On first pass, it looks like harm is the primary concern with neglect.
COPPA aims to put parents in control of their children’s data until they’re 13. This is a little weird. Again, the age isn’t 18, which suggests that children have the ability to make reasonable choices about their data at 13. This brings up further questions about what kind of data, and for what purpose. For example, Apple’s Child Safety features don’t allow parents to see the messages that children send. However, it tries to protect children by scanning messages for nudity and hiding the image until a child consents to seeing it.
They’re trying to balance children privacy while preventing this same privacy from being a vehicle for them being abused and exploited. This feature doesn’t prevent children from sending nudes to each other, and merely warns them.
On paying $200,000 for a transition you do not want for your child
In this story, Ted got a $209,820 charge on his insurance statement for a puberty-blocking implant for his 16 year old child that he did not consent to. Both Ted and his ex-wife are smart and successful. He worked at Apple and she worked at BlackRock. He had a court order that would have presumably prevented something like this. Personally, my blood boils when I read stories like this. I feel for the guy because I have a daughter of my own. However, I want to understand the opposing side. It’s not easy, but his ex-wife is no idiot.
To defend her, if you’re 16 year old boy and you can be convinced that you’re a girl, then maybe you’re not that masculine to begin with. Now, what makes this a challenging case is that we’re talking about 16yo not an 18yo. Just two years make or break the story here. If it was about an 18 year old boy who wanted to transition, it would still be painful but the dad would be more accepting that it isn’t his choice to make.
Another thing that makes the situation difficult is that there’s room for manipulation here, and in Ted’s case I strongly suspect that’s what happening. A parent has all sorts of strings they can pull to incentivize or punish their child to make them do what they want. Without this ability, the parental role is effectively moot, but this power can also be abused. Nobody is arguing that parents should be able to have full legal custody over their kids indefinitely. Nobody believes that a person becomes a full adult simply by the fact that they turn 18. Finally, we all understand that children should ideally be getting increasing levels of autonomy as they get older. In other words, you don’t hand your 3yo a knife, but you can teach your 17yo how to cut vegetables no problem.
At what point should a conservative accept their child as being trans?
From the outside, it’s hard for me to know what mistake Ted made. If he cheated on his wife, maybe this isn’t something his wife wanted to reveal. Maybe she wants to leave him because she found someone better. Maybe he didn’t spend enough time raising his kids. Maybe he was difficult to live with and didn’t pay enough attention to her. Maybe she’s a truly awful and spiteful woman and it was a mistake to marry her. Maybe he should be more accepting of trans people.
One pretty out there idea is that kids really are transitioning because of estrogens from plastics and from the overconsumption of sugar, or some such environmental factor. If this were the case, it would suggest that transitioning is the right thing to do if the circumstances that lead to it cannot be mitigated. Otherwise, you’re asking your child to undergo a great deal of suffering.
Another perspective is that he was being too controlling. I say this with a heavy heart. It’s not crazy to question your kids to make sure that they really do want to make the choice they’re about to make. However, there’s a point at which it’s too much just like with this bird:
Approaches toward reconciliation
The video shows a male bird trying to impress a female bird, but doing it too aggressively. Women don’t respond well to aggression like this whether is a romantic matter or even to prove a point:
As a man, I think it is important to lead, but to me it sounds like he was pressuring. He had all the right intentions, and I agree with his conclusion, but he was still pressuring. I say this after being in a situation where I had a major issue with the foods that my ex was feeding our daughter, among other problems. It’s heartbreaking to see and it’s hard not to do something. It’s especially hard not to display any anger or resentment while making your point. It’s especially hard to be defeated and punished for doing what you believe is right.
I relate to Ted’s story because even though the facts of our situations are different, the story has the same characters and the emotions of the disagreements are also the same. I’m fearful of committing to my ex via marriage for fear that I might suffer the same fate as Ted. My ex’s childhood wasn’t easy and it’s hard to know just how much of her experiences have shaped her to becoming the person she is. I also fear having multiple children with her and then watching her do something impulsive that would leave me to pick up the pieces. My relationship with her hasn’t been easy, but I’m slowly learning to forgive and love again.
I think of love as holding an egg. You don’t have to hold with the perfect pressure, but there’s a middle ground where it’s not too tight that it crushes the egg and not so loose that the egg slips out onto the floor. Men and women should find ways to reconcile for the benefit of themselves and their children, but that doesn’t mean you can force someone to make certain choices even if you’re right. I believe the court system is wrong for allowing a minor to undergo treatment that might leave them infertile. However, I don’t want to let Ted off the hook either. He shouldn’t have been menacing towards his wife. I’m sure he knows this. Loosening his grip is only gonna break the egg if he lets go completely. There’s a middle way and it would require both of them to hash out their differences while recognizing each other’s autonomy.