Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you:
No adverts like this in the forums anymore.
Times and dates in your local timezone.
Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance.
Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely.
Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net.
If you are already a member then feel free to login now.
and yet when all the savings are made, the ones deciding where the savings should be made are the bureaucrats and so they will protect themselves/jobs while the front line suffers.
I don't think the NHS results are all that bowel-clenchingly inadequate.
For example, there has been a steady improvement in survival rates from cancer, to the point that we are starting to pass other European nations.
The NHS costs less per capita than the French system, in fact it is cheaper than most western European systems, while providing broadly similar results.
Albatross wrote:Really? When you have prominent politicians talking about 'death panels'? Come off it - the standard of debate is shocking, particularly on one side...
Its really not hysterical, a minority of people are being hysterical, but the whole thing just isn't, and I disagree with you. And our parliament is hardly exemplary is it? I merely think its another case of you running down the Americans as if we are somehow far better at discourse than they are, but we shall agree to disagree there.
Regards the "bad debate" clearly I'm not primarily speaking of people fleecing the NHS like that is my number one point, did you read the whole thing? I pointed out that I was hardly the man to ask with regards to sensible general NHS reform, I merely said that it obviously NEEDS to occur, and then I listed some things that seem absurd about the NHS.
The rest of what you said, Is what I said. I.e The NHS needs squaring away.
Im not foolish enough to think that paying for boob jobs and tattoo removal and gender reassignment is what's causing the system to bleed staggering amounts of money, I just pointed out some clearly ridiculous gak that annoys me.
The mainstay was simply that system needs sorting, It needs looking at, and it needs reforming, and they should get on and do it and not worry about party politics.
Oh yeah, and I dont think IVF should be covered by the NHS. That should save us some dough as well.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/06/08 17:41:49
We are arming Syrian rebels who support ISIS, who is fighting Iran, who is fighting Iraq who we also support against ISIS, while fighting Kurds who we support while they are fighting Syrian rebels.
mattyrm wrote:Im not foolish enough to think that paying for boob jobs and tattoo removal and gender reassignment is what's causing the system to bleed staggering amounts of money, I just pointed out some clearly ridiculous gak that annoys me.
And yet these are the only sorts of examples of what you consider to be excessive spending you ever seem to cite, and when people try to shift the debate towards the areas that take up a far bigger chunk of the NHS budget you either ignore them or dismiss them as having a 'fingers in your ears attitude'.
When you combine with this your tendency to point the finger at patients you deem to be undeserving, take a blinkered attitude to corporate excess, and make side points advocating that people who don't agree with you shouldn't be allowed to vote, it shouldn't come as a surprise when you get perceived to be in the same camp as those wilfully ignorant and/or lying tea party types who toxify debate by squawking about fictional death panels and such.
Kilkrazy wrote:I don't think the NHS results are all that bowel-clenchingly inadequate.
I said 'bowel-clenchingly adequate'.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
mattyrm wrote:
Bad debate?
Its really not hysterical, a minority of people are being hysterical, but the whole thing just isn't, and I disagree with you. And our parliament is hardly exemplary is it? I merely think its another case of you running down the Americans as if we are somehow far better at discourse than they are, but we shall agree to disagree there.
'Agreeing to disagree' is what people do when they run out of argument. You can't expect to make such a sweeping statement implying that I am constantly 'running down the Americans', and then 'agree to disagree'. I am not 'running down' the 'Americans'. Unless by that you mean 'pointing out the absurdity of the public debate on this issue in the USA', in which case I am. During the 1920s, there arose the prevailing opinion amongst the political and business classes of the USA that the best, in fact, only real way to govern large bodies of humans in a democratic society, without resorting to physical coercion, was to propagandise the populace. This was due in no small part to the success of the British Ministry of Information during WWI of mobilising huge numbers of volunteers for military service, both at home and in the United States. This became known by the slightly less sinister term 'Public Relations', but the effect is the same - shaping public opinion via means of appeal to emotion, in order to create an atmosphere of sympathy (or revulsion) for certain ideologies.
The USA is large. It has a huge population of wealthy (in global terms) people, who enjoy considerable freedom (on paper, like the rest of us). As a result, the USA is one of the most heavily propagandised countries on earth. Don't get me wrong, we're not massively far behind, but when you get Wal-Mart placing TV screens at their check-outs which play messages by the Department of Homeland Security warning people to be vigilant and to report any suspicious activity by their fellow shoppers, you have to wonder where it will all end.
Regards the "bad debate" clearly I'm not primarily speaking of people fleecing the NHS like that is my number one point, did you read the whole thing?
Yes, but to be fair, you do go on about people 'fleecing' the NHS and welfare a lot. Stuff like 'Romanian transsexuals being flown over to the UK for gender-reassignment' and other such delightful (but fictional) anecdotes. What I'm asking is what any of this has to do with NHS reform? And what does inequality in access to IVF treatment have to do with cuts? No-one is suggesting it should be cut altogether except you, because you think it's frivolous.
I disagree. I also disagree that breast augmentation should be denied to NHS patients, within reason. In a terrible (tit-related) accident? Fine, you get your tits back. Have one on me. In fact, have two. Breast Cancer? Same again. Feelings of worthlessness and depression because you're only an A-cup? Cry me a river. Or rather, tell it to your NHS counselor. Either way, you ain't getting a boob-job on the government quid. I feel similarly about 'gender reassignment'. These people need care and counseling, not body mutilation. Just my opinion.
Saying that, as long as they don't expect the tax-payer to pay a penny towards surgery, it's their body, they can do what they like. NHS counseling yes, surgery no.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2011/06/09 14:13:54
lindsay40k wrote:When you combine with this your tendency to point the finger at patients you deem to be undeserving, take a blinkered attitude to corporate excess, and make side points advocating that people who don't agree with you shouldn't be allowed to vote, it shouldn't come as a surprise when you get perceived to be in the same camp as those wilfully ignorant and/or lying tea party types who toxify debate by squawking about fictional death panels and such.
Who are, presumably, no worse than the wilfully ignorant and/or lying progressives who toxify debate by suggesting that any reduction in social welfare is for the intent and purpose of killing off the elderly.
Or the willfully ignorant (I won't say lying in this case, because I don't believe that people are necessarily that evil) people who think, despite the mass of history against them, that a single payer system will lead to more and better provision and distribution of health care (or anything).
Kilkrazy wrote:I don't think the NHS results are all that bowel-clenchingly inadequate.
I said 'bowel-clenchingly adequate'.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
mattyrm wrote:
Bad debate?
Its really not hysterical, a minority of people are being hysterical, but the whole thing just isn't, and I disagree with you. And our parliament is hardly exemplary is it? I merely think its another case of you running down the Americans as if we are somehow far better at discourse than they are, but we shall agree to disagree there.
'Agreeing to disagree' is what people do when they run out of argument. You can't expect to make such a sweeping statement implying that I am constantly 'running down the Americans', and then 'agree to disagree'. I am not 'running down' the 'Americans'. Unless by that you mean 'pointing out the absurdity of the public debate on this issue in the USA', in which case I am. During the 1920s, their arose the prevailing opinion amongst the political and business classes of the USA that the best, in fact, only real way to govern large bodies of humans in a democratic society, without resorting to physical coercion, was to propagandise the populace. This was due in no small part to the success of the British Ministry of Information during WWI of mobilising huge numbers of volunteers for military service, both at home and in the United States. This became known by the slightly less sinister term 'Public Relations', but the effect is the same - shaping public opinion via means of appeal to emotion, in order to create an atmosphere of sympathy (or revulsion) for certain ideologies.
The USA is large. It has a huge population of wealthy (in global terms) people, who enjoy considerable freedom (on paper, like the rest of us). As a result, the USA is one of the most heavily propagandised countries on earth. Don't get me wrong, we're not massively far behind, but when you get Wal-Mart placing TV screens at their check-outs which play messages by the Department of Homeland Security warning people to be vigilant and to report any suspicious activity by their fellow shoppers, you have to wonder where it will all end.
Regards the "bad debate" clearly I'm not primarily speaking of people fleecing the NHS like that is my number one point, did you read the whole thing?
Yes, but to be fair, you do go on about people 'fleecing' the NHS and welfare a lot. Stuff like 'Romanian transsexuals being flown over to the UK for gender-reassignment' and other such delightful (but fictional) anecdotes. What I'm asking is what any of this has to do with NHS reform? And what does inequality in access to IVF treatment have to do with cuts? No-one is suggesting it should be cut altogether except you, because you think it's frivolous.
I disagree. I also disagree that breast augmentation should be denied to NHS patients, within reason. In a terrible (tit-related) accident? Fine, you get your tits back. Have one on me. In fact, have two. Breast Cancer? Same again. Feelings of worthlessness and depression because you're only an A-cup? Cry me a river. Or rather, tell it to your NHS counselor. Either way, you ain't getting a boob-job on the government quid. I feel similarly about 'gender reassignment'. These people need care and counseling, not body mutilation. Just my opinion.
Saying that, as long as they don't expect the tax-payer to pay a penny towards surgery, it's their body, they can do what they like. NHS counseling yes, surgery no.
No agreeing to disagree is what I do when I find the point in question to be OT and I don't see the point in discussing it further. Do you really want to argue about you saying that the Americans were being hysterical and I wasnt?
If you do want to, I can just say that I was right and you were wrong because you jumped in with both feet. On March 23, 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) became law in the US, providing for major changes in health insurance. There was a lengthy process to get to that point, and an enormous document was floating around regarding the issue when I was in the States, basically, how is the debate and then the passing of a law "shrieking and hysterical"? As I said to you, a minority of idiots are being hysterical, the rest are involved in discourse. As a result of that, a law was passed, the healthcare rules changed, and your statement was wrong, and mine wasn't.
You do a better job refuting me with the rest of your statement of course, as I do indeed say some silly stuff, but I say that in the pub when were taking the piss and having a laugh! I obviously don't think that droves of Somalians are filling our hospitals getting their cocks lopped off on the tax payer! Im just saying that stupid gak like that does sometimes happen!
You said I made it up!? No man! Remember Nadia from BB? "She" was a Madeiran national called Carlos!
Anyways, were way OT. My initial point was simply that I dont think IVF should be available on the NHS.
My second point was simply that we need to tighten the purse strings and let the government try and sort the fething NHS out, what's wrong with that?
If you want to disagree with me on either of those two points, have at it! I fully understand Lindsays POV despite disagreeing with it, in that im a somewhat callous and brash individual, and basically I think that most of the non essential ops shouldn't be taking place. But thats just my opinion, what ISNT just my opinion, is that the NHS is fethed up.
We are arming Syrian rebels who support ISIS, who is fighting Iran, who is fighting Iraq who we also support against ISIS, while fighting Kurds who we support while they are fighting Syrian rebels.
Whilst I'm quoting @Albatross below, this reply is aimed at everybody who's been making these asinine remarks about people with gender dysphoria.
Albatross wrote:I feel similarly about 'gender reassignment'. These people need care and counseling, not body mutilation. Just my opinion.
You're welcome to your opinion, but that's not to say it's got any founding in the overwhelming medical consensus about transsexualism.
Why should people born with malformed genitalia only be eligible for corrective surgery if you don't think the malformation makes them passable for someone of the opposite sex?
Why have the NHS in all likelihood have to spend a far greater sum on a longer need for more regular counselling, and probably having to treat the depression arising from these problems going untreated? And, since saving public money is our goal here, we've also got the jobcentre having to pick up the bill should this depression make the patient unable to work.
This 'we could save money by telling transsexual people whose conditions I don't understand to naff off to the private sector' approach only proposes false savings that make a bigger bill for other departments. It's an argument that's most frequently presented by those who put their head in the sand and refuse to listen when anybody tries to calmly and rationally discuss the wider NHS budget being bled dry by outsourcing building, treatment, production, transport and cleaning to for-profit companies. And furthermore, in practice it's bigotry against transfolk and the poor, because what it means is advocating that only well-off transsexuals should be allowed to stop existing and start living.
At best, it's an example of entrenched ignorance. At worst, it's using borderline hatespeech to draw attention away from the real problems faced.
The NHS will not save money by knee-jerk withdrawals of treatment at the behest of people with almost zero understanding of the condition being treated or the long-term cost implications of withdrawing that treatment. If y'all continue to argue for such things, it'll be difficult to draw any conclusion other than that you either want the NHS to overspend and regard ruining transfolk's lives as a price worth paying, or else you want to ruin transfolk's lives and regard NHS overspending as a price worth paying.
Oh, and for the record, y'all have practically already got your wishes. My best friend's been denied prescriptions from her Gender Identity Clinic because their funding's been cut to the bone. (Even if this changed, she'd never be able to afford the private sector hair removal and suchlike that necessarily precedes gender affirmation surgery.) And even better news for you - her GP's so ignorant and unsympathetic towards transfolk, when her depression becomes unmanageable it's myself and her partner who have to stay up until the early hours convincing her not to commit suicide when she should be being offered counselling!
We're SO glad that taxpayers are not having to pay a penny more to fix her, and that money's not being diverted from the sports cars fund for the shareholders and execs of the construction firm making a 200% profit (no typo) on building the new local hospital.
Of course, this mindset of hers makes her very unattractive to potential employers. But then that means it's the DWP paying out, not the DH, and I'm sure we can tell ourselves ad infinitum that the issues are not related.
Patient: 'I feel like a man/woman inside, gimme a free sex change and hundreds of hours of after care via specialist clinics.'
Politically correct doctor: 'Oh you poor person, have lots of funding and medical support on the NHS. Equality, comes first. We can always short change another someone who lost their leg to an IED to make money for it, easy.'
Realist doctor: 'You dying, you sick, you injured? No? Get over it then. If you really want it we can advise you, but you pay for it yourself. Why should we make you a different gender, people in all walks of life have to make do with the cards dealt them, this isn't a medical problem really.'
n'oublie jamais - It appears I now have to highlight this again.
It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion. By the juice of the brew my thoughts aquire speed, my mind becomes strained, the strain becomes a warning. It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion.
Im well aware of the facts on the issue, Im certain you are sincere if you want a sex change!
But its this simple to me. If I couldn't see and I wanted laser surgery for my eyes, id save up for it. My pride demands it from me. If I was going bald, had bad teeth, wanted a bigger dick, or better skin (all of which can be treated) I would save up, work hard, and get it done.
If you want to get your cock off, pay for it your fething self.
Not ignorant.
And opinion I am entitled to, made in the light of cold logic. I am offended that I save for everything I want to get but you can be an immigrant and get made into a woman because you really want it.
Spend less money going to the gay bars in Manchester for a few years and bobs your uncle, gender reassignment from your own bloody wallet.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/06/09 12:41:57
We are arming Syrian rebels who support ISIS, who is fighting Iran, who is fighting Iraq who we also support against ISIS, while fighting Kurds who we support while they are fighting Syrian rebels.
lindsay40k wrote:When you combine with this your tendency to point the finger at patients you deem to be undeserving, take a blinkered attitude to corporate excess, and make side points advocating that people who don't agree with you shouldn't be allowed to vote, it shouldn't come as a surprise when you get perceived to be in the same camp as those wilfully ignorant and/or lying tea party types who toxify debate by squawking about fictional death panels and such.
Who are, presumably, no worse than the wilfully ignorant and/or lying progressives who toxify debate by suggesting that any reduction in social welfare is for the intent and purpose of killing off the elderly.
Or the willfully ignorant (I won't say lying in this case, because I don't believe that people are necessarily that evil) people who think, despite the mass of history against them, that a single payer system will lead to more and better provision and distribution of health care (or anything).
I wouldn't say that those who advocate social welfare reductions have an objective of killing off the elderly, though the architects of such reforms (in the UK, at least) do seem to be fairly ambivalent about the issue. I'm not sure which the worst of either desiring the deaths of the elderly, or not even caring about it one way or the other.
But aaanyway... you're asserting that history debunks the idea of a single-payer system.
The dark bars are public sector spending, the light bars are private sector spending.
The US system might do a fairly good job of shifting treatment costs for minor conditions onto the shoulders of the patients who can afford it, but when it comes to having to spend even more money mending people who were denied cheaper preventative treatments, it shoots straight ahead.
Anyway, who's advocating a single-payer system whereby the government signs the cheque for treatment after a load of private sector construction, transport, pharmaceutical, tech and medical companies buy sports cars for their shareholders and execs and treat a patient or two at some point in the proceedings? There's a big saving begging to be made, right there.
I think one of the greatest problems with the NHS and our society, is that having had a couple of generations grown up with the NHS, there is now an overwhelming sense of entitlement and selfishness that pervades the system. These days, people try to squeeze the most they can out of the system rather than stop and think about whether they should be doing it. I have every sympathy for gender-reassignment patients, just as I do for a whole other bunch of conditions. But if it were me personally and if I stopped and thought that the operation I wanted could make the difference as to whether a baby got life saving treatment or not, then that might cause me to re-evaluate my priorities a little. Its not always about whether a person can get something done on the NHS but rather if they should - there isn't a bottomless pit of money after all.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2011/06/09 12:46:13
lindsay40k wrote:I wouldn't say that those who advocate social welfare reductions have an objective of killing off the elderly, though the architects of such reforms (in the UK, at least) do seem to be fairly ambivalent about the issue. I'm not sure which the worst of either desiring the deaths of the elderly, or not even caring about it one way or the other.
And I wouldn't say that people advocating a single healthcare system have the intent to pull resources from the elderly in order to kill them off and entrench support with younger voters.
But your previous point was decrying the evils of one side of the debate without acknowledging the far more pernicious and vile advocates on the other side of the aisle.
lindsay40k wrote:But aaanyway... you're asserting that history debunks the idea of a single-payer system.
No, history debunks the idea that socialism works. So does economics. But if you ignore the laws of economics, you can achieve some short term advantages.
lindsay40k wrote:The US system might do a fairly good job of shifting treatment costs for minor conditions onto the shoulders of the patients who can afford it, but when it comes to having to spend even more money mending people who were denied cheaper preventative treatments, it shoots straight ahead.
This paragraph is so full of misunderstanding that I'm not sure how to address it. The US doesn't "shift" costs onto the "shoulders of the patients who can afford it." It requires people who require treatment to pay for it. It is the socialized systems that shift costs from the consumers of health care onto the backs of taxpayers at no benefit to the taxpayer.
The idea that a consumer isn't responsible for the services they acquire involves a fundamental disconnect from reality.
lindsay40k wrote:Anyway, who's advocating a single-payer system whereby the government signs the cheque for treatment after a load of private sector construction, transport, pharmaceutical, tech and medical companies buy sports cars for their shareholders and execs and treat a patient or two at some point in the proceedings? There's a big saving begging to be made, right there.
Well, you are. And the far left in the United States is. Politics doesn't happen in a vacuum, it involves political favors and lots and lots of money exchanging hands. To believe that politicians have the best interests of the populace at heart is willful ignorance.
If you cannot make your point without being deliberately rude or using inflammatory language, then it'd be better if you didn't post. I'm sure you're all big and ugly jaded enough to manage to cope with the horror of someone, somewhere, not agreeing with you or holding a different view. It's a terrifying idea, we know, but struggle on.
There's always alcohol.
The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all
We love our superheroes because they refuse to give up on us. We can analyze them out of existence, kill them, ban them, mock them, and still they return, patiently reminding us of who we are and what we wish we could be.
"the play's the thing wherein I'll catch the conscience of the king,
Orlanth wrote:I would start with gender alignment surgery.
Patient: 'I feel like a man/woman inside, gimme a free sex change and hundreds of hours of after care via specialist clinics.'
Politically correct doctor: 'Oh you poor person, have lots of funding and medical support on the NHS. Equality, comes first. We can always short change another someone who lost their leg to an IED to make money for it, easy.'
Realist doctor: 'You dying, you sick, you injured? No? Get over it then. If you really want it we can advise you, but you pay for it yourself. Why should we make you a different gender, people in all walks of life have to make do with the cards dealt them, this isn't a medical problem really.'
Doctor who's aware of the overwhelming medical consensus on transsexualism, and their own obligation as a doctor to follow NHS guidelines on how to treat transsexual patients, and who doesn't base their diagnoses on the ill-informed opinions of angry people on the internet: 'OK, well then you have a recognised medical condition, this is a specialised field for which I'll refer you to a gender identity clinic.
There could be a bit of a wait, as a massive proportion of the NHS budget is reserved for buying sports cars and yachts for the shareholders of construction, pharmaceutical, transport and tech companies, but at least by treating your condition in the way advocated by the overwhelming majority of people who've studied people with your condition we'll probably make a net long-term saving in giving you counselling for depression and/or paying you benefits when that depression makes it impossible for you to hold down a job.
If only fewer people obsessed over arguing that conditions they clearly don't understand should be left to the private sector and instead looked at the bigger picture of why the NHS is haemorrhaging money whilst shareholders and execs laugh all the way to the bank, I might be able to offer you a shorter waiting time.
Seriously though, how hard is it to grasp my point?
Its 2011, we can fix pretty much anything these days, and its going to get worse with increasing technology and medical skill, should the tax-payer fund it ALL?
And always fund it all, all the time in case we fething upset people?
Hair, eyes, teeth, tits, genitals, what about if you really want blue eyes and we can do that? What if you really want bigger feet and we can do that?
We need to draw a line in the sand.
ie. Sure, we will pay for your tits if they were ruined by cancer, we just wont if you just really want nice big juicy ones cos they look dead good.
Pay for your own gak.
We are arming Syrian rebels who support ISIS, who is fighting Iran, who is fighting Iraq who we also support against ISIS, while fighting Kurds who we support while they are fighting Syrian rebels.
Why should people born with malformed genitalia only be eligible for corrective surgery if you don't think the malformation makes them passable for someone of the opposite sex?
Who's talking about 'malformed genitalia'? I'm talking about people who think they are a different gender to the one they actually are, in a biological sense. Unless that's just 'right-on' psychobabble to describe 'being born into the wrong body', in which case it's nonsense. No-one is born the 'wrong' gender.
Why have the NHS in all likelihood have to spend a far greater sum on a longer need for more regular counselling, and probably having to treat the depression arising from these problems going untreated?
Because that is the correct way to treat a psychological disorder, all politics aside. Once again, if people choose to mutilate their bodies, they can. I just don't think I should be paying for it. Do you think we should pay for sufferers of body dysmorphia to have plastic surgery? Or how about people with body integrity identity disorder? Should we pay for them to have limbs removed?
This 'we could save money by telling transsexual people whose conditions I don't understand to naff off to the private sector' approach only proposes false savings that make a bigger bill for other departments. It's an argument that's most frequently presented by those who put their head in the sand and refuse to listen when anybody tries to calmly and rationally discuss the wider NHS budget being bled dry by outsourcing building, treatment, production, transport and cleaning to for-profit companies. And furthermore, in practice it's bigotry against transfolk and the poor, because what it means is advocating that only well-off transsexuals should be allowed to stop existing and start living.
Actually, I'm opposed to NHS gender reassignment on moral, not financial grounds. GID not being considered a mental illness is a political decision, not a medical decision.
At best, it's an example of entrenched ignorance. At worst, it's using borderline hatespeech to draw attention away from the real problems faced.
If it makes you feel better to label me as ignorant or a bigot, then fine. I'm thick-skinned. It is a shame that there will probably never be a proper debate on this subject though, as you have just illustrated.
The NHS will not save money by knee-jerk withdrawals of treatment at the behest of people with almost zero understanding of the condition being treated or the long-term cost implications of withdrawing that treatment. If y'all continue to argue for such things, it'll be difficult to draw any conclusion other than that you either want the NHS to overspend and regard ruining transfolk's lives as a price worth paying, or else you want to ruin transfolk's lives and regard NHS overspending as a price worth paying.
In return, it would be easy to draw the conclusion that 'y'all' are happy to take our money in order to disfigure the body you were born into, and not so happy when we question why. It's not about making transgendered people's lives a misery - it's about the best way to make it better. I just think we would be better-off trying to help people to make their peace with the gender they were born. I don't hate trans people. I don't find them creepy or weird. I'm not afraid of them. When I see them I just feel a little sad, and that there simply must be a better way of coping with their condition than resorting to major surgery and clinical procedures.
...Of course, this mindset of hers makes her very unattractive to potential employers. But then that means it's the DWP paying out, not the DH, and I'm sure we can tell ourselves ad infinitum that the issues are not related.
Can we? Don't make assumptions about my intelligence, thanks. I'm not even remotely overawed by yours.
mattyrm wrote: Seriously though, how hard is it to grasp my point?
Its 2011, we can fix pretty much anything these days, and its going to get worse with increasing technology and medical skill, should the tax-payer fund it ALL?
And always fund it all, all the time in case we fething upset people?
Hair, eyes, teeth, tits, genitals, what about if you really want blue eyes and we can do that? What if you really want bigger feet and we can do that?
We need to draw a line in the sand.
ie. Sure, we will pay for your tits if they were ruined by cancer, we just wont if you just really want nice big juicy ones cos they look dead good.
Pay for your own gak.
Once again, you make the false comparison between 'vanity' cosmetic surgery which most people - myself included - will put at the bottom of the 'things to do' list, and genital reconstruction, which the overwhelming medical consensus regards as a necessary step for enabling many transfolk to live a normal, healthy life.
If you were simply arguing that the NHS should only treat accidental injury and infection, that'd be one thing.
And yet it always seems to be the case that you choose to illustrate your position by citing GRS, and going on to paint a picture of gender dysphoria that is completely false. The overwhelming scientific consensus flatly contradicts what you imagine gender dysphoria to be.
That, combined by the work you create for the wordfilter, does not paint a picture of a cool-headed, rational position. Weren't you saying that politicians should be ignoring the opinions of unreasonable people whose opinions are not based on fact?
Albatross wrote:I'm talking about people who think they are a different gender to the one they actually are, in a biological sense. Unless that's just 'right-on' psychobabble to describe 'being born into the wrong body', in which case it's nonsense. No-one is born the 'wrong' gender.
Can you present a peer-reviewed scientific study that supports this opinion? There's any number of such studies finding that the brains of transsexuals are more similar to the brains of cisgender people of their identified sex than they are to the brains of cisgender people of the sex you've decided them to be.
Albatross wrote:(A long period of counselling) is the correct way to treat a psychological disorder, all politics aside.
GID is a psychiatric classification, not a psychological disorder.
Albatross wrote:Once again, if people choose to mutilate their bodies, they can. I just don't think I should be paying for it.
Okay, so I can see you're for whatever reason unwilling to use language that won't offend transfolk. I won't waste my time trying to convince you stop articulating your position in ways that will cause offence.
What I will say is that you're now making the 'I don't want to be given the bill for this' argument', a sentence after advocating a potentially lifelong period of counselling to put out fires over a cheaper alternative with a much higher success rate in helping the patient.
Albatross wrote:Do you think we should pay for sufferers of body dysmorphia to have plastic surgery?
No, I don't think that cosmetic surgery is a cure for mental illness. The majority medical opinion is that GID is not a mental illness.
Albatross wrote:Or how about people with body integrity identity disorder? Should we pay for them to have limbs removed?
No, I don't think that cosmetic surgery is a cure for psychiatric disorders. The majority medical opinion is that GID is not a psychiatric disorder.
Albatross wrote:GID not being considered a mental illness is a political decision, not a medical decision.
How many elections have been won or lost over this "political decision"?
At any rate, there are a significant number of transsexuals and advocates who argue that GID should be considered a mental illness, on the grounds that there are so many peer-reviewed studies finding that the brains of transsexuals are more similar to the brains of cisgender people of their identified sex than they are to the brains of cisgender people of the sex you've decided them to be.
I personally disagree with them, as the term 'mental illness' perpetuates the misconception that it's a problem with the transsexual's mind that can be resolved by counselling. This is no more successful in helping the patient move on than the old days when transsexuals were beaten by police, raped by cellmates and/or tortured by psychiatrists until they could convincingly pretend to be happy in what the ignorant and the bigoted decided their gender was.
Albatross wrote:It is a shame that there will probably never be a proper debate on this subject though, as you have just illustrated.
There's plenty of debate.
One side is backed up by the overwhelming consensus amongst peer-reviewed scientific studies, and the other side dismisses these sources.
Albatross wrote:It's not about making transgendered people's lives a misery - it's about the best way to make it better.
Every survey I've seen of post-op transsexuals reports a very high success rate in making their lives better. The range of results I've seen is from 86% to 99.9%. The 86% figure came from patients who were treated several generations of thought earlier; the counselling process is a lot better at identifying who will benefit than it was then.
These were all published, peer-reviewed studies. If you think they were wrong, go and make your name in medical science by proving them wrong.
mattyrm wrote: How on earth is it entrenched ignorance?
The politically correct have two modes. They can either accuse critics of entrenched ignorance, or if they are feeling particularly dogmatic entrenched bigotry. Both are essentially the same thing, just taken to different levels of doctrinal conflict.
Political correctness is a power system working on the principle that the politically correct are 'right' and everyone else 'wrong'. While right and wrong is often seen as a fair individual choice, indeed the politically correct like to propose this 'diversity' as a dogma. However hypocritically they have zero tolerance of diversity when it crosses thier own boundaries of right and wrong. So to the politically correct bankrolling a minority group or someone politically seen as 'disadvantaged' without limit is the right thing to do, and if it is not done seen to be endorsed wholeheartedly then the feedback of the PC dogma kicks in. Anyone who resists political correctness is an ignoramus to be reshaped, anyone who resists it is a bigot to be opposed, and this threat of blanket accusation of bigotry, often without any recourse paralysed civil servants and businessmen alike.
Political correctness is a system to milk, a powerbase and an opportunity to reshape power demographics. Most of the politically correct are themselves dupes, or well meaning people who have been deceived into thinking that PC is the was to equality and 'fairness'. In all honesty this is what some are repeatedly taught, i would prefer to say indoctrinated. i remember this indoctrination myself as an employee of the Youth and Community service. What made matters worse was that to not absorb this teaching was to fail to learn or adapt to modern progressive times, which of course meant no completion of official training or accreditation, let alone promotion. I felt a bit like the guy in the killing Fields saying 'taxi taxi' and otherwise holding his tongue while the brainwashing sessions were endured. Some think they are genuinely bringing in equality, even when they see disproportionate representation in terms of state empowerment or even representation in the courts or in politics. The hard reality is that this system was enabled from the top, it was the lifeblood of how new Labour were able to reshape the nation in their image, not for the benefit of any minority, that was a fringe benefit, but to reshape the demographics and most importantly to reorganise the civil service to keep the government of the time in power.
When you understand this you will understand why sounded veterans from Iraq got low priority treatment and often four figure compensation for crippling injury wheras causing offense by chatting up a lesbian yields six figure compensation. It explains why women only shortlists and affirmative action were commonplace, in complete contradiction to the 'level playing field' and equality preached by those in power. Meanwhile employers were in fear of lawsuits by minrity candidates who lose out in juob interviews to others.
I don't believe in political correctness gone mad, some idiot PC decisions occured, like banning the St George cross flag as 'racist' and renaming Christmas 'Winterval', but for every wooly PC minor official there was a well thought out hostile policy designed to disadvantage anyone not in with the New Labour political machine. From what I hear it may take up to eight years to fix this mess, I find that conservative (sic) estimate.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/06/09 23:24:02
n'oublie jamais - It appears I now have to highlight this again.
It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion. By the juice of the brew my thoughts aquire speed, my mind becomes strained, the strain becomes a warning. It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion.
Nice to see consistency of policy across the board. By making minor cuts in divisive areas (Gender, Employment) you give the impression you are "doing something" whilst continuing to contribute more to shareholders bank accounts/managers wages than is saved in "cuts". And people are so busy fighting over whether it is right to let a trans have an op, or a poor person have a baby, that they never notice they are still payin out a lot of money for very little of worth. Meanwhile "bigoted comics" publish inaccuracy to sell issues and fuel the fire.
Also, last report I read said we were getting worse at dealing with cancer, not better. (This morning.)
"There's a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious—makes you so sick at heart—that you can't take part. You can't even passively take part. And you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all" Mario Savio
mattyrm wrote: How on earth is it entrenched ignorance?
The politically correct have two modes. They can either accuse critics of entrenched ignorance, or if they are feeling particularly dogmatic entrenched bigotry. Both are essentially the same thing, just taken to different levels of doctrinal conflict.
They have another mode. It's called 'having the overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies supporting your position.'
Now, the right have a bunch of "modes", themselves.
One is false dichotomies (funding for gender reassignment surgery OR military aftercare)*.
Another is arguing from morality (which is subjective; by way of example, the Iranian regime provides publicly funded GRS based on its morality, which it asserts to be derived from the Koran).
Another is absolutely refusing to be drawn into commenting on the massive amounts of public money that is leeched out of the system by outsourcing to for-profit firms, and persistently pointing to examples of what they consider to be undeserving cases. (It's difficult to accept at face value claims of simply wanting to reduce operating costs when the claimant consistently ignores the biggest culprits.)
Another is dismissing as 'political' the aforementioned overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies supporting opposing positions.
Orlanth wrote:New Labour New Labour etc
Good thing I'm not even remotely connected to the Mk II Tories with a token patronising daddy-will-do-it-for-you approach to liberation campaigning, then.
*The low level of funding for military aftercare is something that has affected friends of mine and is one of the first issues I raise when discussing my work as an anti-war activist.
mattyrm wrote: How on earth is it entrenched ignorance?
The politically correct have two modes. They can either accuse critics of entrenched ignorance, or if they are feeling particularly dogmatic entrenched bigotry. Both are essentially the same thing, just taken to different levels of doctrinal conflict.
They have another mode. It's called 'having the overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies supporting your position.'
That is a euphemism of volume as opposed to weight of evidence. Propoganda often offers a volume of evidence, and drowns out alternative ideas as 'bigotted'.
Therer are many things that would improve peoples quality of life, a £15 minimum wage would do that, as would free sex changes for any who want them. However neither are realistic, you just cannot tell that to the politically correct if there is a form of minority to fell guilty about. Pointy is while a sexual minority cannot be denied for fear of raising question of 'institutionalised bigotry' other people can easily be asked to do without other things though.
This is not a problem limited to healthcare.
Now, the right have a bunch of "modes", themselves.
lindsay40k wrote:
One is false dichotomies (funding for gender reassignment surgery OR military aftercare)*.
Just one off the cuff example, there are plenty more. Point is its was a nasty one, a rational person might give priority for someone who at government command goes out and getsd shot at. That wouldnt even be unfair, but they often didnt even get equal treatment let alone priority treatment. Why? Because the military cannot adequately complain. Were the PC lobby not so swallowed up in their dogmas they might wonder why they preach equality while practicing the opposite. And no its not bigoted to want an end to 'affirmative action'.
You try getting an NHS dentist, I cant. At one point asylum seekers were guaranteed one. I only say at one point because the information might be outdated, maybe not. Doesnt that strike you as maybe a tad imbalanced?
lindsay40k wrote:
Another is arguing from morality (which is subjective; by way of example, the Iranian regime provides publicly funded GRS based on its morality, which it asserts to be derived from the Koran).
Poitical correctness 'argues from morality', they force it down everyones throats. Which is why you call those who oppose PC dogma 'ignorant' or possibly extending to 'bigoted' (which you have managed to avoid so far). It is the root behind the idea that someone who 'needs' gender reassignment most get the NHS chequebook to pay for it, because its right and proper and their quality of life. actually not it isnt, its a personal preference, not a real medical problem, thats the hard reality. If they want a sex change they should pay for it themselves. That is the moral argument, and a false one at that.
lindsay40k wrote:
Another is absolutely refusing to be drawn into commenting on the massive amounts of public money that is leeched out of the system by outsourcing to for-profit firms, and persistently pointing to examples of what they consider to be undeserving cases. (It's difficult to accept at face value claims of simply wanting to reduce operating costs when the claimant consistently ignores the biggest culprits.)
Yes there are greedy bosses. there are under any administration unfortunately, you think that socialism magically waves it all away. In fact top public sector salaries rose dramatically. I think thats connected to the wider problem but will leave that for now.
lindsay40k wrote:
Another is dismissing as 'political' the aforementioned overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies supporting opposing positions.
Of course its political. You don't get your promotion unless you follow party line. Perhaps you have no idea how close to a totalitarian state we were in under Blair in particular. The civil service was heavily dogmatised as a control measure. So 'we must prioritise the gender reallocation minority' is what they want to hear. Alternate viewpoints don't win promotion, depending on your position an opinion contrary to the dogmas taught might result in failure complete required training. It certainly would in the youth service asnd other departments. I dont think the NHS was too much different.. After all answers contrary to dogma are 'ignorant' and we cannot have ignorance in medicine, thats dangerous!
I remember my own training, one small sample. A political minority cannot be a bigot, so a women cannot be sexist, an ethnic minority racist. etc. They could be discriminatory, but that he,lp lower standards of offense. (even New Labour eventually abandoned this one, but about 99 but it was used to great effect in the first years of their first term to weed out yhose who would not kowtow to the new social order. I.e. 'inequality' via 'equality'.
Convincing dupes to be PC was still a sideline, getting people who were not PC or willing to swallow a bit of bs for career asdvancement purposes was the goal. The results still echoed out into numerous senseless acts of hypocrasy thet even you seem to notice. Such as inferior treatment for veterans.
New Labour didn't hate veterans per se, they got short changed as a result of the dogma the NHS was filled with, people were too busy to appear not 'ignorant or bigoted' and prioritising those people at need on minority grounds. After all what matters to a PC self serving git. Serving patients or spouting dogmas fast enough to get the promotion first.
Blair was very good at what he did, people will be studying the New Labour revolution for decades, it was a brilliant move in terms of taking over and remolding a society, and many people still dont see how it was done, even now. Practically nothing they did was about fairness or equality from Lords reform to equality legislation, it was a power balance shift on a national scale.
lindsay40k wrote:
Orlanth wrote:New Labour New Labour etc
Good thing I'm not even remotely connected to the Mk II Tories with a token patronising daddy-will-do-it-for-you approach to liberation campaigning, then.
Actually the only attitude I am getting from current tory is very clearly "we are in financial gak we need to save save save." I don't see their patronising attitude part, sure they have to tread on eggshells around nurses, because as we know the 'angelic profession' can squander any resources they want and be above reproach. New Tory has a big problem, trying to get nurses to be financially responsible, they understand that the NHS can scupper the governments plans to save our economy. They know they must undo the defect they inherited or Greece/Irelands problems will be our own, worst of all they know that some particularly in traditional left wing industries might want to make sure the system haemorages enough money to see the government fail for party political ends. The fact that the entire nation is in deep gak if that happens is of no concern to them, just so long as they get Milliband in after the next election and they can say I'm all right jack on a NHS pension they couldn't give a feth about the national cost.
By and large the government has done a good job of trying to save money, but they have tackled big spender too quickly and at once, because they need to, and paid the price. Tactically they have made many mistakes, but the strategy is sound. Fortuneately most people still agree that its Gordon Browns fauklt ansd not Camerons. Please keep that in mind. blair/Brown didnt care who ran up the ebt so long as they could appear socialist and cot takes and pay for little dogma projects and give everyone (in a minority) what they 'deserve'. The NHS seems to want to be exempt from helping paying for that by being frugal.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/06/10 02:08:45
n'oublie jamais - It appears I now have to highlight this again.
It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion. By the juice of the brew my thoughts aquire speed, my mind becomes strained, the strain becomes a warning. It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion.
mattyrm wrote: How on earth is it entrenched ignorance?
The politically correct have two modes. They can either accuse critics of entrenched ignorance, or if they are feeling particularly dogmatic entrenched bigotry. Both are essentially the same thing, just taken to different levels of doctrinal conflict.
They have another mode. It's called 'having the overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies supporting your position.'
(People who disagree with me citing an overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies supporting their position) is a euphemism of volume as opposed to weight of evidence. Propoganda often offers a volume of evidence, and drowns out alternative ideas as 'bigotted'.
Aha, so we're basically throwing out the window pretty much everything the scientists have to say on the matter of gender identity studies. Gotcha.
You do realise there are massive incentives to get a study published that debunks the consensus, right?
Orlanth wrote:Therer are many things that would improve peoples quality of life, a £15 minimum wage would do that, as would free sex changes for any who want them. However neither are realistic
Nobody here's proposing either. The more you talk about 'throwing free sex changes at anybody who wants them', the more you look like somebody who either relies on strawmen or else simply does not understand what they are talking about.
Stop PFI contractors from charging three times the cost of the job for building hospitals and instead have NHS trusts directly employ labour to build facilities under NHS trust ownership, and the cost of providing the full gamut of services to gender dysphoric people will be met many times over.
Demand a debate about NHS funding and spend every debate shifting attention away from corporate profiteering and onto cases you've decided are undeserving and you help the funding crisis get worse.
You can complain about New Labour's egregious attempts to present positive discrimination as the be-all and end-all of liberation campaigning whilst continuing down the Thatcherite plan of privatisation and outsourcing. The only thing you'll achieve is contributing to the right wing media's 'trannies and tattoos' smokescreen that distracts from the real problem in the NHS.
Orlanth wrote:Pointy is while a sexual minority cannot be denied for fear of raising question of 'institutionalised bigotry' other people can easily be asked to do without other things though.
This is not a problem limited to healthcare.
So obviously the thing to do is divide the entire service user body and gang up on the minority users and demand their services get cut in the belief that some of the money 'saved' will be used to provide more services for others. (It won't.)
Orlanth wrote:Point is its was a nasty one, a rational person might give priority for someone who at government command goes out and getsd shot at. That wouldnt even be unfair, but they often didnt even get equal treatment let alone priority treatment. Why? Because the military cannot adequately complain.
I'm a long-standing advocate that people in the services should be allowed to organise and demand better conditions.
Orlanth wrote:And no its not bigoted to want an end to 'affirmative action'.
I don't advocate affirmative action.
Orlanth wrote:You try getting an NHS dentist, I cant. At one point asylum seekers were guaranteed one. I only say at one point because the information might be outdated, maybe not. Doesnt that strike you as maybe a tad imbalanced?
You're right, there should be more NHS dentists. What's more, they should be directly employed NHS dentists, not subsidised private sector dentists with massive perverse incentives to fiddle the books and perform bad jobs that need fixing again later.
The funds and staff freed up by withdrawing dental services from refugees would not be used to provide you with a dentist.
Maybe, if more people were opposing the NHS focus on buying sports cars and yachts for shareholders and execs of private companies rather than focussing all of their waiting list frustration on other service users, the waiting lists might be a bit shorter? Just a suggestion. You're welcome to choose the catharsis of bitterly complaining about foreigners and trannies receiving funding over actually getting a dentist, of course.
Orlanth wrote:Which is why you call those who oppose PC dogma 'ignorant' or possibly extending to 'bigoted' (which you have managed to avoid so far).
No, I don't call people ignorant for disagreeing with something I don't particularly advocate, I call them ignorant when they persistently say things that can only be believed if one is ignorant of the facts. An example would be using completely unrelated conditions as comparisons with transsexualism. Another example would be being presented with the fact that the overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies contradict one's opinion, and dismissing them out of hand without even bothering to ask anything about them.
Orlanth wrote:not a real medical problem
No matter how many medics and peer-reviewed published studies disagree with you.
Orlanth wrote:
lindsay40k wrote:
Another is absolutely refusing to be drawn into commenting on the massive amounts of public money that is leeched out of the system by outsourcing to for-profit firms, and persistently pointing to examples of what they consider to be undeserving cases. (It's difficult to accept at face value claims of simply wanting to reduce operating costs when the claimant consistently ignores the biggest culprits.)
Yes there are greedy bosses. there are under any administration unfortunately, you think that socialism magically waves it all away.
It is a fact that outsourcing NHS facility building to the private sector has massively increased opportunities for siphoning off money into sports car dealerships. Is your position on this to shrug your shoulders and say 'it's going to happen, the only thing we can do is to decide who else should lose their services to pay for it?'
I am not naive enough to believe that any system has a zero percent corruption rate. I have seen plenty of evidence that the present system of unelected senior civil servants administering the outsourcing of services to for-profit companies under the direction of unaccountable career politicians has an unacceptably high corruption rate. I would propose massively increasing accountability and taking profiteering out of the equation; the only other solution I've seen presented here is 'withdrawing services from people affected by conditions that don't affect me'.
Orlanth wrote:Perhaps you have no idea how close to a totalitarian state we were in under Blair in particular.
Hello, I'm not a supporter of New Labour.
You seem to consistently present the overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies that disagree with you as being merely a consequence of the public sector adopting a 'don't use the n-word' philosophy and then going a bit too far down the other way with it.
Why, then, are the majority of these studies by researchers operating outside of the UK? Many of them published before gender identity issues started to fall within the purview of public health care, or published in countries where there still is no public funding for gender identity and no imminent likelihood of that changing?
You'd know that if you'd bothered to ask about the studies instead of first deciding to reject them and then working backwards to imagine reasons for this conclusion.
Orlanth wrote:
lindsay40k wrote:
Orlanth wrote:New Labour New Labour etc
Good thing I'm not even remotely connected to the Mk II Tories with a token patronising daddy-will-do-it-for-you approach to liberation campaigning, then.
Actually the only attitude I am getting from current tory is very clearly "we are in financial gak we need to save save save." I don't see their patronising attitude part
I was referring to New Labour as the Mk II Tories. On account of their entire economic strategy basically amounted to 'copy from Thatcher, only with an opposition baying for more rather than meekly asking us to stop'.
Orlanth wrote:they understand that the NHS can scupper the governments plans to save our economy.
And yet they're not proposing to do anything that'll stop massive amounts of money being haemorrhaged by PFI contracts, and in fact are planning to massively extend this problem.
Orlanth wrote:some particularly in traditional left wing industries might want to make sure the system haemorages enough money to see the government fail for party political ends.
Funny, that. The Tories are planning to make big cuts to the Inland Revenue. I've seen figures suggesting that every pound they cut from tax collection will enable six pounds of tax evasion. The only explanation I can think of for this is that either the Tories are spectacularly stupid (highly possible), or else they're quite prepared to increase the national debt not for party political ends, but rather for personal 'ensuring that I get a massive golden handshake from a rich friend whom I enabled to dodge billions in tax' reasons.
Orlanth wrote:Fortuneately most people still agree that its Gordon Browns fauklt ansd not Camerons. Please keep that in mind.
Yeah, I'll keep in mind your assertion that most people don't support a guy I don't support.
And I don't recall the Tories having much to say in opposition. In fact, when Blair decided to spend billions on wars of aggression that the sane were warning would cause havoc on the world oil market, the Tories were champing at the bit.
Orlanth wrote:blair/Brown didnt care who ran up the ebt so long as they could appear socialist
In what way did they 'appear socialist'?
Was it when they privatised the railways?
Was it when they made NHS and school building into a massively profitable exercise for private companies?
Was it when they decided to throw blank cheques at military hardware firms to supply wars of aggression?
Was it when they put the blame onto foreigners for the number of vacancies being exceeded by the number of applicants?
Was it when they refused to restart council house building or rescind the most draconian labour legislation in Western Europe?
Was it when they tried to privatise the post?
Or was it when they diverted a huge amount of money from building schools and hospitals into underwriting the gambling debts of private financial institutions?
I think we have established that neither side wants to budge on this issue - how about moving on to other areas of debate in the wider sphere of the NHS?
Albatross wrote:I'm talking about people who think they are a different gender to the one they actually are, in a biological sense. Unless that's just 'right-on' psychobabble to describe 'being born into the wrong body', in which case it's nonsense. No-one is born the 'wrong' gender.
Can you present a peer-reviewed scientific study that supports this opinion? There's any number of such studies finding that the brains of transsexuals are more similar to the brains of cisgender people of their identified sex than they are to the brains of cisgender people of the sex you've decided them to be.
That's not accurate actually. There are not 'any number' of studies. There are a handful of studies, which suggest that this is the case. And it's not that the brains are identical - it's a certain part of the brain, the hypothalamus, in which were found 'several sexually dimorphic nuclei' (Allen & Gorski, 1990; Swaab et. al., 2001). The causes of this are far from certain, and probably depend on a multitude of factors. Also, the studies typically use small subject groups, in fact the Kruijver study was only able to examine the brain of one trans man.
Such studies typically make it clear that this area of study is in it's infancy, and is not the only cause of transsexualism.
SOURCES:
Allen LS & Gorski RA. (1990) Sex Difference in the bed nucleus of the stria terminalis of the human brain,
J Comparative Neurology 302:697-706.
Swaab DF, Chung WCJ, Kruijver, FPM, Hofman MA, Ishunina TA. (2001) Structural and functional differences
in the human hypothalamus. Hormones and Behavior 40:93-98.
Albatross wrote:(A long period of counselling) is the correct way to treat a psychological disorder, all politics aside.
GID is a psychiatric classification, not a psychological disorder.
According to you. It has the word 'disorder' in the title, though. That's a pretty big clue. That you might disagree with the name because you feel it unfairly stigmatises you, is a separate issue. I typically try to steer clear of absolutism when I'm making a statement of opinion. I suggest you do the same.
Albatross wrote:Once again, if people choose to mutilate their bodies, they can. I just don't think I should be paying for it.
Okay, so I can see you're for whatever reason unwilling to use language that won't offend transfolk. I won't waste my time trying to convince you stop articulating your position in ways that will cause offence.
mu·ti·late 1. To deprive of a limb or an essential part; cripple.
2. To disfigure by damaging irreparably: mutilate a statue.
3. To make imperfect by excising or altering parts.
No, I'm OK with that definition. You want to play, I play rough. I'm not going to sugar-coat anything for you. You certainly didn't want to when you were accusing me of bigotry. You are a male. You have had (or are considering) surgery to permanently disfigure your male body in an attempt to become a woman. In my opinion this is mutilation. Don't like that?
Cross me off the Christmas card list.
Albatross wrote:GID not being considered a mental illness is a political decision, not a medical decision.
How many elections have been won or lost over this "political decision"?
Don't be cute. You know what I mean. GID is not classed as a mental illness because some people feel that it would stigmatise transexuals as sufferers. In my opinion they are sufferers, in the same way that people with BIID suffer with their condition. Incidentally, BIID sufferers often feel better after surgery to remove limbs too. It doesn't mean they're not ill.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Oops! Sorry, Silver. You ninja'd me.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2011/06/10 11:06:36
Albatross wrote:
I'm talking about people who think they are a different gender to the one they actually are, in a biological sense. Unless that's just 'right-on' psychobabble to describe 'being born into the wrong body', in which case it's nonsense. No-one is born the 'wrong' gender.
Can you present a peer-reviewed scientific study that supports this opinion?
Yes, here's a study that found that part of the brains of gay men who identify as men are more similar to the brains of lesbians who identify as women than they are to straight men who identify as men; for some reason I believe this to support my opinion that no-one is born the 'wrong' gender (despite one of the researchers seemingly drawing this very conclusion in a follow-up animal experiment). And a study led by by someone else:
Swaab, a source Albatross has cited wrote:<The brain is sexually differentiated> under the influence, mainly, of sex hormones such as testosterone, estrogen and progesterone on the (foetal) brain cells and under the presence of different genes as well.
The changes brought about in this stage are permanent.
Because organ differentiation and brain differentiation occur at different times, in "rare" cases transsexualism can result (transsexualism resulting from having organs of one gender and feelings of the other).
It appears that the direct action of testosterone on the developing brain in boys and the lack of such action on the developing brain in girls are crucial factors in the development of male and female gender identity and sexual orientation.
There are no indications that postnatal social factors could be responsible for the occurrence of transsexuality. (In other words: it's not learned behaviour, it can't be unlearned or - to coin a phrase fondly used by Orlanth - brainwashed out of them.)
Why do I bother?
Albatross wrote:it's not that the brains are identical
Which I clearly did not claim:
The thing I actually said that you actually quoted wrote:There's any number of such studies finding that the brains of transsexuals are more similar to the brains of cisgender people of their identified sex than they are to the brains of cisgender people of the sex you've decided them to be.
Albatross wrote:The causes of sexual dimorphism in the brain) this are far from certain, and probably depend on a multitude of factors.
Indeed. Although it's notable that after finding the SDN, your man Gorski found he could induce apparent transsexualism in rats by throwing testosterone at the foetus at different times in its development. Whilst other factors may exist, there is at least one proven causality there.
And wouldn't you know it, there are also genetic factors that affect the way the body responds to hormones that are also shown to correlate with transsexualism. <Hare, Bernard, Sanchez, Baird, Vilain, Kennedy, Harley, (2009); Bentz, Hefler, Kaufmann, Huber, Kolbus, Tempfer (2008)>
As always, there's a big pot of gold and bags of prestige for anyone who debunks any of this in a peer-reviewed study.
Albatross wrote:Such studies typically make it clear that this area of study is in it's infancy, and is not the only cause of transsexualism.
Indeed, the area is in its infancy. There's a lot of money and prestige waiting for anyone who can debunk Swaab's above claim that there's no evidence for transsexualism being a learned condition, and it is in fact entirely a 'nature' issue.
Albatross wrote:
lindsay40k wrote:
Albatross wrote:(A long period of counselling) is the correct way to treat a psychological disorder, all politics aside.
GID is a psychiatric classification, not a psychological disorder.
According to you. It has the word 'disorder' in the title, though. That's a pretty big clue.
The name's stuck, from a time when homosexuality was regarded as falling under the 'mental illness/psychological disorder' category. For now. Your argument now appears to be hanging on the continued use of a fairly archaic term that no doubt will be dropped within a few DSM revisions. Would it be fair to guess that when that happens, you'll dismiss it as 'political'?
Albatross wrote:You are a male. You have had (or are considering) surgery to permanently disfigure your male body in an attempt to become a woman. That you might disagree with the name (mental illness/psychological disorder) because you feel it unfairly stigmatises you, is a separate issue. GID is not classed as a mental illness because some people feel that it would stigmatise transexuals as sufferers.
Is this a general 'you', or are you referring to me in particular? Because I don't recall referring to transfolk in the first-person at any time. I recall citing an example of a trans friend of mine, but I've certainly not held myself up as a case study of anything.
I disagree with GID being classified as a mental illness, because it no more fits the definition of mental illness - as generally defined as distressing or disabling psychological or behavioural patterns that are not part of normal development - than does homosexuality.
Albatross wrote:I typically try to steer clear of absolutism when I'm making a statement of opinion. I suggest you do the same.
Albatross also wrote:GRS is a form of mutilation; it deprives, cripples, disfigures, irreparably damages or makes imperfect the patient.
Good advice, thanks.
Albatross wrote:You certainly didn't want to (sugar-coat anything) when you were accusing me of bigotry.
I didn't say that you are a bigot, I said that the thing you advocate in practice means bigotry. And if we're going to play tit-for-tat, that remark was in response to your description of post-op transfolk as "mutilated" - which you have now chosen to qualify as meaning "deprived" or "crippled" or "disfigured" or "irreparably damaged" or "imperfect".
If you're going to use terms that will clearly be seen as pejorative and then hide behind a dictionary, you might try using a term that has at least one meaning that has no negative connotations. Why don't you try referring to transfolk as 'freaks'? After all, 'freak' can simply mean 'unusual'.
Albatross wrote:Incidentally, BIID sufferers often feel better after surgery to remove limbs too.
Not that I'm for one minute endorsing your comparison between this and GID, I'll lay my case out:
- I don't understand much about this condition.
- Very little is understood about this condition and it is difficult to get data on it.
- If counselling and medication can't help someone manage or cure their BIID, and they appear certain to either damage the limb to make amputation necessary or else seek a black market amputation, my neurodiversity ethics do indeed extend to providing a safe, professional and sterile mainstream medical option that in the long run reduces the risk of complications. Complications which could both cost the NHS even more money than legal elective surgery, and add difficulty to the patient going on to be a productive member of society.
lindsay40k wrote:
Aha, so we're basically throwing out the window pretty much everything the scientists have to say on the matter of gender identity studies. Gotcha.
One, as Albatross says its not a huge weight of evidence. Also I am throwing away nothing written by good science. What I want to disregard is the politicised NHS politically correct policy decisions.
You see it doesnt matter if a medical scientist better understands gender issues. My point of comment (consistently explained) is that at that point the politcial correct dogmatists will say 'look at this poor minority, fund fund fund'. wheras a rational reaction is ' so that is what is causing the phenomena'. Its an oddity, nothing more. People do not need gender reallocation on the state, its pandering when they do. If you feel you need the work done, pay for it yourself.
However because its a minority support dogma it gets well funded. The bodies of soldiers metaphorically stepped over to help them, is juist a clear example not the extent of the misplaced priorities.
To reinterate NHS professionals for political reasons would clap on disproportionate support for non essentiasl work by the NHS, because it is proof of being not ignorant or bigoted to do so. Conversely those with a more even minded view are rounded on directly or indirectly. I am not suprised you like to mislabel concerns about PC dogma as ignoring scientific findings, its consistent with the propaganda NHS personnel are forces to swallow.
lindsay40k wrote:
You do realise there are massive incentives to get a study published that debunks the consensus, right?
Not if it conflicted with the dogmas of the day, which are still in place sadly.
lindsay40k wrote:
Nobody here's proposing either. The more you talk about 'throwing free sex changes at anybody who wants them', the more you look like somebody who either relies on strawmen or else simply does not understand what they are talking about.
Sex changes not required for quality of life, its required to pander to people who insist on being lobsidedly represented. Assuming the average patient has two eyes two legs ears etc, they are fine. Anythign else is theri own provblem. Come back when you are ill.
Cosmetic surgery, penis enlargement etc etc all these are signs of pandering based on kowtowing to the dogma that people have a 'right' to be dissatisfied with their reality and demand open funding from the government to 'help' them. It even sounds nice, but the dogma often has priority over cases of genuine need, and can be unevenly applied.
lindsay40k wrote:
Stop PFI contractors from charging three times the cost of the job for building hospitals and instead have NHS trusts directly employ labour to build facilities under NHS trust ownership, and the cost of providing the full gamut of services to gender dysphoric people will be met many times over.
200% markup on construction is not much, it just sounds a lot on an angry leftie soundbyte. Expect 3x actual costs if you have a house built and more when you buy a product from a manufacturer. actually when you look at that rationally its actually not a bad deal really. You think what you buy in the shops or online is only 3x the construction cost. You think that when we had state construction agencies they were paragons of efficiency. Dream on.
Things have gone particularly bad of late, but then what do you expect with an especially corrupt government as the one we just been rid of. You know those hospitals you are complaining about are from contracts signed under Blair. The Blair years were rife with this type of corruption, backhanders galore. However to the dumber formk of socialist because its now 2011 it must have been Camerons doing.
lindsay40k wrote:
Demand a debate about NHS funding and spend every debate shifting attention away from corporate profiteering and onto cases you've decided are undeserving and you help the funding crisis get worse.
We cannot sort out the funding fiascos, the funding is usually ringfenced to prevent it. Billions of pounds went missing in 2009, though that was a bad year. merndleson squandered 18billion that has yet to be accounted for. Though much of thast was a punishment for the British people for not sticking with New Labour and a hope that if the economy if fethed up big enough people will eventually blame Cameron and Labour will be back in power soon.
we see glipses of this with the aircraft carriers, Cameron wanted to scrap them, that was a mistake but in a way understndable - we need an economy, we can build a navy later once we can (re)afford it. However he could not scrap them, the funding was ringfenced.
This story is echoed over the nation, Wembley, Millenium Dome. The Uk used to be relatively honest in its big construction projects. New Labour wanted a lot of finger in pie, and gave card blanche for dodgy businesses to rake in millions in poorly policed projects. After all with the BBC in their pocket and a party politicised civil service they could do as they pleased.
lindsay40k wrote:
You can complain about New Labour's egregious attempts to present positive discrimination as the be-all and end-all of liberation campaigning whilst continuing down the Thatcherite plan of privatisation and outsourcing. The only thing you'll achieve is contributing to the right wing media's 'trannies and tattoos' smokescreen that distracts from the real problem in the NHS.
Thatcher caused many problems, but what she did was necessary. In 1979 the UK was union blighted, any industry in danger of making any money was held to ransom by its workforce. We were living on borrowed time and borrowed money. Either the unions had to be crushed or the Uk would be drained of its ability to maintain an economy. Privitisation was one of many keys.
Its interesting to note that while Thatcher crushed much of the political powerr of the unions she did not crush employee rights. Blair did that, supported by Prescott. Prescott was a socialist trade unionist, i.e. climb the ladder, pullmit up after him. Employers know that they can utilise unfair practices, lie through their teeth and practice constructive dismissal because employees are now disempowered and without any support.
I know of a veteran who joined the security industry, as many veterans do. The security industry is generally badly run and has no employer ethics whatsoever in the majority of cases. If you are one of the clique you are ok, if your just a veteran wanting a job, expect a gak sandwich. Anyway after having pay going missing, and having hours messed up and employee bonuses renaged on he had had enough. His story was by no means unusual constructive dismissal is rife. One methodology was that he or other workers outside tghe clique were told to turn up at a depot for a shift, then told to go to other depots once there (often a considerable drive away) when there then told he would be deducted pay for being later 'again' alongside 'we told you last week'. Of course no compensation would be given for travel. Now this happened to my friend with two different companies. the first time he was forced out he went somewhere else, he couldnt sue because he could get no legal aid and the constructive dismissal methods had drained him of all finances. However they never attempted this on an ethnic, because they could get help.
The second company tried the same thing, he wasn't picked up, just wasnt part of the clique. Its common in the industry. However this time at the point of being out by constructive dismissal he got ill, and worse more he was now disabled. Disabled, ah thats a minority. Suddenly he had rights he hasd a free lawyer and the company got very scared.
The point being, you should have to be in a minority to have rights, but under New Labour you did, because it is how the dogma works. NHS is just a small part of this.
lindsay40k wrote:
So obviously the thing to do is divide the entire service user body and gang up on the minority users and demand their services get cut in the belief that some of the money 'saved' will be used to provide more services for others. (It won't.)
Actuallyb the ansr is to treat people the same. Which ironically is what equal opportunities is all about. Then again New Labour was never about genuine equality. Be assured if there wasnt a minorty drium to beat on sex changes it would have been considered a frivolous expense and flatly turned down as many drugs and procedures are.
lindsay40k wrote:
I'm a long-standing advocate that people in the services should be allowed to organise and demand better conditions.
Mentioned as a transparent example, but it should go further than that. You needd to question the dogma that allowed this to happen. Soldier = no minority drum to beat, so a second class patient in terms of NHS priority. One of New Labours darker betrayals, especially because they sent those men into combat without protection. Look as to where the priorities were and you will see the dogmas behind them. Some priorities are easy and defendable, life saving surgery, A&E. Others are just pure government dictat.
lindsay40k wrote:
You're right, there should be more NHS dentists. What's more, they should be directly employed NHS dentists, not subsidised private sector dentists with massive perverse incentives to fiddle the books and perform bad jobs that need fixing again later.
Amen to that, but that still doesnt address why refugeese and asylum seekers got priority. It would have been enough to say, let them join the same queue as everyone else with few people getting served. But that wasn't happening, they were getting preferential treatment, and many peopkle were getting none whatsoever.
Tories never tried anything so drastic in all the years of the NHS. However you and other Labout apologists never cry out 'the NHS is not safe under Labour'. Even when treatment is blanket unavialable. however as soon as Tories try anything that results in less resopurces then before the wailing starts. I wonder if the NHS dogmatists care about patients at all or just think its all fine so long as Westminste ris red and my wage comes through ok.
lindsay40k wrote:
I call them ignorant when they persistently say things that can only be believed if one is ignorant of the facts. An example would be using completely unrelated conditions as comparisons with transsexualism. Another example would be being presented with the fact that the overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed published studies contradict one's opinion, and dismissing them out of hand without even bothering to ask anything about them.
Its all in the head. You dont like the cards you were dealt with, get over it. We cannot all be the gender we want, the ethnicity we want, built for pro football etc etc. Lets not make it a 'human right' to change ject because the technology exists to mask our own disagreements with our biology.
NHS funding should be for need, sex changes are not a point of genuine need, but genuine preference. Yes it makes a didfference to some people, so would doubling their wage. You cannot always have what you ask for we cannot afford a Santa Claus government, especially one with blank chequebooks for dogmas, but a short change for everyone else.
You are an unwitting apologists for a misspoken cause, as we can see from your next criticism. political correctness was funded out of all proportion as a political tool to keep New Labour in power. It has so little to do with helping people or equality, if it were it would be equal and it would hel p people in general as opposed to lobsidedly funding select subgroups.
lindsay40k wrote:
Orlanth wrote:blair/Brown didnt care who ran up the ebt so long as they could appear socialist
In what way did they 'appear socialist'?
Was it when they privatised the railways?
Was it when they made NHS and school building into a massively profitable exercise for private companies?
Was it when they decided to throw blank cheques at military hardware firms to supply wars of aggression?
Was it when they put the blame onto foreigners for the number of vacancies being exceeded by the number of applicants?
Was it when they refused to restart council house building or rescind the most draconian labour legislation in Western Europe?
Was it when they tried to privatise the post?
Or was it when they diverted a huge amount of money from building schools and hospitals into underwriting the gambling debts of private financial institutions?
They appeared socialist when they did all those things but also 'delivered ' on socialist dogma. It seems to have worked, you are still defending their legacy as if it were something wholesome. Getting rid of hereditary peers for one example, supposedly over progressive politcas and accountability, actuality it was to fill the upper house with yes men. Accountability called for by New Labour, that is gross hypocrasy of itself. Political correctness is a second 'delivery', they called it fairness, if you still think it fair reread this thread, I hope I and others have established the point how unfair it was. 'Equality and diversity' is a third, it sounds very nice, lets help people less fortunate than ourselves. The real reason was to change the demographics of the nation, equlity of course didnt extend to men/whites etc in certain situations, including state employment.
As fro the putting the blame onto foreigners, ell they might have said something like that. I for one dont remember it. I do remember Borwn being very quiet when a scandal broke of major employers working on state sector projects refused to employ indiginous workers. Allowing for the immense amount of pressure companies fear if they dont employ (insert minority here). I also noticed recruitment freezes on whites in the ambulance service and military. Very PC but not exactly equality isnt it.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/06/10 14:05:36
n'oublie jamais - It appears I now have to highlight this again.
It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion. By the juice of the brew my thoughts aquire speed, my mind becomes strained, the strain becomes a warning. It is by tea alone I set my mind in motion.
I'm in the pub so I can't go into one, ill just reiterate. Nobody here seems to be a bigot. Nobody is "against" transgender people.
It must suck if you feel the need to change your sex. They know, they feel sad. I know.
But that shouldn't mean I pay for it. What did I do?
Your in a healthy body that works. Be that thankful at least for that, and if you want to change it...
Pay for it.
We are arming Syrian rebels who support ISIS, who is fighting Iran, who is fighting Iraq who we also support against ISIS, while fighting Kurds who we support while they are fighting Syrian rebels.
Orlanth wrote:I have read every study in transsexuality and am better at identifying bad science than the peer review process; I'm certainly not ignoring scientific findings because that's only something that people who disagree with me do.
I think that transsexuals are taking away funding for veterans, despite the fact that trusts have no mandate to make funding available and when they do provide funding they can make it as low priority as they choose.
I claim to want to reduce public spending, and yet advocate the more expensive potential lifetime of counselling over a cheaper procedure with a very high success rate.
I claim that a rational reaction is 'so that is what is causing the phenomena', yet when a phenomenon's cause is discovered and explained and verified by experiments I dismiss it as 'bad' science' despite almost certainly not having read the study for myself.
I think that paying three times as much for a building job as it would when done in-house - and then not even owning the building at the end of the lease - is a reasonable deal.
I think that PFI is entirely Blair and Brown's doing, despite the fact that the Cameron government are pushing ahead with starting new PFI projects - in a time when the costs and risk involved in such projects is higher than ever.
I think that someone who persistently criticises the Blair government's policies is a supporter of that government.
I complain about governments taking over and remolding society and bully-boy tactics, and yet support the "crushing" of unions.
I believe that it's governments taking a balanced referee approach to industrial relations whilst courting the Murdochs of the world, not workplace organisation, that guarantees employee rights. I've got an example here of a worker not in a union getting screwed to illustrate my point.
The undercutting of unions with public provision of legal aid for disabled and minority workers is in no way a logical extension of the Thatcherite policy of crushing and marginalising unions, of which I am so fond.
I regard the recommended treatment for most transsexuals to be a frivolous expense, and would prefer to pay a greater expense on counselling when they start to look like becoming one of the statistics on transgender suicides (five times the norm).
I demand answers as to why refugees and asylum seekers got priority for dentistry, and yet don't actually cite any examples of this.
My opponent disagrees with me, and therefore is an apologist for New Labour, and therefore does not criticise New Labour. Even when they persistently criticise New Labour.
The problems that woulds arise from tripling the minimum wage are an argument to advocate a more expensive potential lifetime of counselling over a cheaper procedure with a very high success rate.
A psychiatric condition with proven correlation with genotype and brain physiology is imagined.
Even if my opponent clearly states that they do not advocate positive discrimination, it's still appropriate for me to angrily air my grievances about it at them and hold them responsible. My own position could not possibly be helping the government make cuts to all services, of course.
Being a socialist and increasing the profits of capitalist firms at the expense of their employees are not mutually incompatible.
You know someone is a socialist when they gives jobs to their mates. This is something characteristic of socialists, and not something that capitalists ever do. Also 'socialist' is the crushing of employee rights; socialism has a long history of being capitalism's strongman.
I pay intense attention to the political and economic issues of obscure medical procedures and senior civil service politics, and yet when Gordon Brown started using the slogan 'British Jobs for British Workers' and there was a great outcry that he was trying to work from the BNP playbook, it somehow passed me by.
mattyrm wrote: But that shouldn't mean I pay for it. What did I do?
What you did is, you stated that you wanted to reduce the amount of money the NHS spends, and yet you expressed a preference for an expensive lifetime of counselling over a less expensive procedure with a higher success rate than the counselling. Which do you want to do? Save money, or spend it? There's going to be a cost involved. You can either spend this much on the treatment that nobody here has been able to present a shred of evidence against as being effective for a condition that nobody here has been able to present a shred of evidence against as being a medical condition that seriously affects the patient's ability to function as a person, or you can spend even more money putting out metaphorical fires when their mental well-being deteriorates so much that they become a danger to themselves.
And for the record, folks; asserting that a published peer-reviewed study uses 'bad science' does not constitute evidence against it. Nor does pointing out that the study, and the other studies that support its conclusions, is part of a small field of study.
Automatically Appended Next Post: I bet someone picks up on that point about transsexuals having a high suicide rate and tries to use it as an argument to in effect have the healthcare sector tell transsexuals on low incomes that they will never, ever be able to transition.
There'll be plenty of 'I don't hate transsexuals' disclaimers, of course. They'll outnumber the scientific justifications by a loooong shot, I suspect.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2011/06/10 15:52:26
