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Transgender people will no longer serve in the US military
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Transgender people will no longer serve in the US militaryPosted:

uwu
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Donald Trump has announced today that he will ban transgender people from serving in the military in any capacity; it's not clear as to how the ban will be carried out since there are currently an estimated 2,500-7,000 transgender soldiers in the US military. This decision confused many since just last month, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis gave the military a six month extension on their review if allowing transgender people into the military would affect force readiness. Seems like this was more of a White House decision rather than a decision by the Department of Defense since Jim Mattis is on vacation and when asked about the ban, the Department of Defense (in a few words) just said: "Ask the White House."

This announcement has been criticized heavily as "petty", "cruel" and "downright discriminatory". It has been pointed out that Donald Trump, during his 2016 campaign, was an active "supporter" of the LGBTQ community and mentioned multiple times that he would protect the community against "foreign attackers", probably not mentioning that he would take away some of their rights in the process.

2016 campaign trail tweet: [ Register or Signin to view external links. ]
Tweets from today's announcement:
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It seems quite ridiculous that they would spend millions more on the F-35 fighter jets, which have been proven are inferior to the fighter jets which the F-35 is supposed to be replacing, than help the trans men and women who take part in the US military and are proud to be serving. The total expenditures for the F-35 program were estimated, reported by Bloomberg Businessweek, at $1 billion; in 2014, the airframe of the F-35 cost $100 million and the Air Force "expected prices to fall".

Source:
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The following 9 users thanked uwu for this useful post:

9nty (08-01-2017), Halo (07-30-2017), Jass (07-29-2017), nolanberollin (07-28-2017), TaigaAisaka (07-26-2017), ProfessorNobody (07-26-2017), BJP (07-26-2017), nasa (07-26-2017), -Busolini- (07-26-2017)
#2. Posted:
nasa
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When Tricare is spending hundreds of thousands on transgender reassignment hormones and surgery but refusing to spend money on simple knee procedures that cost less than 5k to get mobility back to soldiers than you have an issue. Also a lot of non-transgender service men/women don't trust their lives with transgender.
#3. Posted:
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Rabbi_NASA wrote When Tricare is spending hundreds of thousands on transgender reassignment hormones and surgery but refusing to spend money on simple knee procedures that cost less than 5k to get mobility back to soldiers than you have an issue. Also a lot of non-transgender service men/women don't trust their lives with transgender.


I will agree with you on that one. I believe that's due to the universal necessity that now exists in the world to be "politically correct"; if they're willing to pay for reassignment hormones and surgery as openly as they do, then they should be willing to spend money on the simple knee procedures you specified.
#4. Posted:
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Completely agree with the decision. After going through hormone changes/ medical procedures that hard on the body then you should not be able to join. You should be treated the same as a person who has had a mental illness in the past or attempted to self harm: which is an extensive period (1-4 years+) free from any mental issues and a maximum of one recorded self harm incident.

More work should be spent on improving the military and not making sure people have safe spaces and feel included.


EDIT:
Researchers found that transgender adults were 14 times more likely to think about suicide and 22 times more likely to attempt suicide than rates in the general population.
The analysis of the studies showed that on average, 55 percent of respondents thought about suicide and 29 percent had attempted suicide in their lifetimes. The numbers changed to 51 percent thought about suicide and 11 percent had attempted suicide in the past year.


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#5. Posted:
ProfessorNobody
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BJP wrote Completely agree with the decision. After going through hormone changes/ medical procedures that hard on the body then you should not be able to join. You should be treated the same as a person who has had a mental illness in the past or attempted to self harm: which is an extensive period (1-4 years+) free from any mental issues and a maximum of one recorded self harm incident.


So you don't really agree with the decision.
If someone who transitioned four years before joining the military was rejected then they wouldn't be being treated the same as someone with a previous mental illness.

Researchers found that transgender adults were 14 times more likely to think about suicide and 22 times more likely to attempt suicide than rates in the general population.
The analysis of the studies showed that on average, 55 percent of respondents thought about suicide and 29 percent had attempted suicide in their lifetimes. The numbers changed to 51 percent thought about suicide and 11 percent had attempted suicide in the past year.


I don't understand why this matters. Surely they should judge these people on an individual basis?
If a transgender person who has gone through the reassignment is fit enough to pass the training and mentally healthy enough to be cleared by a therapist then what is the problem?
The only problem then is that they aren't the same as everyone else which isn't judging them based on their merit, it's judging them based on the overall idea that their group is more mentally unstable and less physically capable which may very well be true on both counts but the group doesn't matter when we have the ability to judge individuals.


Just to clarify, I don't agree or disagree with this decision yet.
I'm just looking for a good reason why they shouldn't be allowed to serve if they are physically and mentally capable enough to.

They can take away the ability for them to have the surgery done using the military budget, that makes complete sense to me and I don't actually know why they allowed that to happen in the first place.
That's like a teenager wanting to transition having the surgery done using the education budget.

But this outright ban doesn't make sense to me yet, perhaps some people can enlighten me.
#6. Posted:
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Adding arbitrary and ridiculous restrictions on who can join the military while we're in the middle of seven different wars and marching towards a third full-scale war is the mark of an empire that totally 100% without a doubt last forever.

That was sarcasm.
#7. Posted:
TaigaAisaka
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Kaniel wrote

Researchers found that transgender adults were 14 times more likely to think about suicide and 22 times more likely to attempt suicide than rates in the general population.
The analysis of the studies showed that on average, 55 percent of respondents thought about suicide and 29 percent had attempted suicide in their lifetimes. The numbers changed to 51 percent thought about suicide and 11 percent had attempted suicide in the past year.


I don't understand why this matters. Surely they should judge these people on an individual basis?
If a transgender person who has gone through the reassignment is fit enough to pass the training and mentally healthy enough to be cleared by a therapist then what is the problem?
The only problem then is that they aren't the same as everyone else which isn't judging them based on their merit, it's judging them based on the overall idea that their group is more mentally unstable and less physically capable which may very well be true on both counts but the group doesn't matter when we have the ability to judge individuals.

They can take away the ability for them to have the surgery done using the military budget, that makes complete sense to me and I don't actually know why they allowed that to happen in the first place.

That's like a teenager wanting to transition having the surgery done using the education budget.


I think the suicide numbers were just thrown in there for the overall article. Yeah, I can see why the suicide thoughts, attempts and actual deaths would be higher, seeing how they're arguably ridiculed more. Going to the topic of why it matters if they finish their training, I'm going to just assume that it's a matter of getting there in the first place. I don't remember the story off the top of my head, but it was either boxing or MMA, where a man transitioned into a female and was put against female opponents, where a lot of people were in an uproar because it was a man, who trained as a man, increased their muscle mass as a man, then had cosmetic surgery and changed their gender to be a female; all that training as a man, is now allowed to fight women. I think that type of idea kind of goes back here, where either as a "joke" or people actually have this thought process: join the military, and switch genders as you please to try and make your life easier. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the women in training aren't worked as hard as the men. If men have to run something like 12 miles, women are running 8 or 10? So someone could want to be lazy and one day "oh I'm this gender" to make their time there easier. It's immature, yeah, but we all know there would be some asshole that does that. Sure that could be argued with anything "I have Asthma, I threw up on the way here" or any number of excuses, but I think playing a gender role is a little more out there than trying to fake an example I gave.

Then you could even throw in the argument t that some people are just so full of themselves that they'll try to demand you call them what they want to be called. Would that shit fly with a drill sergeant? Nah, but it's still wasting time getting in someone's face reminding them they're a soldier and their gender means as little as the sidewalk I walk on.

Overall, the decision seems to have been made on the medical costs, based off of Trumps tweets. People join the military, think they won't be deployed, slack off or put barely passing effort, just so they can use funds for their own cosmetic surgery. People will abuse that type of stuff, hell, people will abuse anything they can get something out of that would otherwise destroy their life financially. What I wrote above was just me assuming what it could have been. It literally could be just to save some money, instead of some hate mob in the military against them.
#8. Posted:
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TaigaAisaka wrote I think that type of idea kind of goes back here, where either as a "joke" or people actually have this thought process: join the military, and switch genders as you please to try and make your life easier. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the women in training aren't worked as hard as the men.


Ah, yes. The common practice of making a permanent life-alterting decision, that you know people will shit talk you for your entire life, just so you can have it easy for the 10 weeks that basic training lasts.
#9. Posted:
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Tywin wrote
TaigaAisaka wrote I think that type of idea kind of goes back here, where either as a "joke" or people actually have this thought process: join the military, and switch genders as you please to try and make your life easier. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the women in training aren't worked as hard as the men.


Ah, yes. The common practice of making a permanent life-alterting decision, that you know people will shit talk you for your entire life, just so you can have it easy for the 10 weeks that basic training lasts.


I was meaning more towards the people who would claim they are - even if they're not - or simply say they will end up transitioning at [x] date. That's where I was touching base with, people claiming they are trans or will become trans, but still trying to abuse the role of changing gender at will, before they even had surgery. There's people out there who actually think they could get away with stuff if they tried that. Hell, there was some image floating around a while back about how people could try to avoid the draft if WW3 or whatever pops up, by simply saying they'll change their gender. I wasn't meaning someone would actually go through the transition, join the military and then try to pull that lame ass "prank" just to make a few months easier in psychical labour. That's why I mentioned "switch genders as they please." That would be someone who is trying to joke about wanting that lifestyle. Don't think an actual trans would be able to switch genders as they please, eventually their body is just going to reject everything that they do be that the surgery or the medication.
#10. Posted:
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Kaniel wrote
BJP wrote Completely agree with the decision. After going through hormone changes/ medical procedures that hard on the body then you should not be able to join. You should be treated the same as a person who has had a mental illness in the past or attempted to self harm: which is an extensive period (1-4 years+) free from any mental issues and a maximum of one recorded self harm incident.


So you don't really agree with the decision.
If someone who transitioned four years before joining the military was rejected then they wouldn't be being treated the same as some one with a previous mental illness.

Researchers found that transgender adults were 14 times more likely to think about suicide and 22 times more likely to attempt suicide than rates in the general population.
The analysis of the studies showed that on average, 55 percent of respondents thought about suicide and 29 percent had attempted suicide in their lifetimes. The numbers changed to 51 percent thought about suicide and 11 percent had attempted suicide in the past year.


I don't understand why this matters. Surely they should judge these people on an individual basis?
If a transgender person who has gone through the reassignment is fit enough to pass the training and mentally healthy enough to be cleared by a therapist then what is the problem?
The only problem then is that they aren't the same as everyone else which isn't judging them based on their merit, it's judging them based on the overall idea that their group is more mentally unstable and less physically capable which may very well be true on both counts but the group doesn't matter when we have the ability to judge individuals.


Just to clarify, I don't agree or disagree with this decision yet.
I'm just looking for a good reason why they shouldn't be allowed to serve if they are physically and mentally capable enough to.

They can take away the ability for them to have the surgery done using the military budget, that makes complete sense to me and I don't actually know why they allowed that to happen in the first place.
That's like a teenager wanting to transition having the surgery done using the education budget.

But this outright ban doesn't make sense to me yet, perhaps some people can enlighten me.


Here is my reasoning behind a "outright ban"

2 limiting factors I see straight away for transgender people are:

Mental illness been so high risk that you would be always unsure if the person is okay - 40%+ is a scarily high figure. Sure, most could pass basic training but the chances of falling ill mentally due to the transition and on top of that been in that line of work would make it even more of a risk.
According to the RAND Center for Military Health Policy Research 20% of the vets who served in either Iraq or Afghanistan suffer from either major depression or post-traumatic stress disorder.

So the epidemic of vets with mental illness will become even worse.

Daily hygiene regimes that are hard the on body enough (without then adding onto the daily workload of war). - Male to female transgender people require daily dilation of the wound that they now call their vagina. This dilation which requires specific tools is around a 4 hour process which ontop of a busy work day for any normal job would be hard let alone on a tour in a country at war. If this is not done the it will close up and more than likely become infected meaning even more time where that individual is unavailable.

In a study (male to female)
-22% had regular episodes of vaginal irritation
-8% frequently experienced dysuria
-Thirty-four out of the 50 patients answered the additional questions about the use of vaginal products and presence of bad smelling discharge
-23.5% had frequent episodes of bad-smelling vaginal discharge.
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These people are wounded (literally) and shouldn't be in the military when they so limited.

The military is not for everyone - Diabetes, Depression, ADHD, Epilepsy are all limiting factors because most of whom are non-deploy-able reducing their effectiveness significantly (unless you go through rigorous testing)

Where I think a "case-by-case" basis could work is if your a "Trap" then I think its a different ballgame altogether since you are like the majority of other people but cross dress and have different sexual preferences. Once you go through the surgery then I think you should lose the privilege to serve. You can still call yourself a woman and do stereotypical ladylike things but once you go through the procedure then the cons outweigh the pros of employing that person into the military.

EDIT - Forgot to add also, people generally are not used to trans people. I cant even begin to imagine the issues with possible fraternisation, bullying, privacy.

You want the best of the best to be in the military not people who need meds everyday for the rest their lives.

EDIT 2 - Here is another interesting opinion on the matter. [ Register or Signin to view external links. ]

BJP


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