This post is inspired by a recent user I interacted with accusing me of being transphobic due to disagreeing with the concept of “xenogenders”
Without going too in depth, this user identified as “swarmgender”, and believed they are part of a literal hive mind. This led me down a path of reflection, wanting to be accepting of someones identity while trying to understand it rationally, and I came to a pretty firm conclusion:
They’re fucking nuts.
I’m not saying this in a transphobic sense, there is nothing wrong with being trans. (Original statement: But the medical terminology for what’s being experienced is gender dysphoria. It’s a mental illness.) It was pointed out to me by a commenter that this statement is inaccurate as of the updated DSM-5 definition, which sorta complicates my view here but doesn’t subtract from the overall point.
It’s important to acknowledge this because there’s a bit of a slippery slope going on where individuals with more severe mental issues are using gender politics to either
A: make themselves the bestest most specialist snowflake
Or
B: Obfuscate how fucking insane they actually are under the guise of anyone disagreeing being transphobic.
Anyway, this thread’ll be fun
Edit: the aforementioned Swarmgender joker has started posting about people in this thread on their own little community dedicated to how much of a victim they are lol
Illness/disorder is the key part here. All of us experience sadness, depression, anxiety, urges like murder or fetishes, compulsions and dysphoria or whatever to some degree. It becomes an illness when it becomes so distressing that we can’t manage it to ourselves and cause negative results that is beyond manageable. And where that line is will vary.
Labeling a huge group as being mentally ill just seems a bit fucked to me. Am I mentally Ill because I drink every night even though I stop when I want. When does it become alcoholism? When do I go from being depressed to depression or anxious to having generalized anxiety. And when does my gender identity become a dysphoria. I go to the gym because I’m not as big as I want to be or think I should be. That’s a dysphoria but is it an illness?
I would say if someone is able to live their life as they want without harm to themselves or others then its not really illness because I don’t know where the illness part is. But if I force them to identify as something they tell me they’re not then maybe I’m forcing the illness on them and I don’t like to do that. But I also don’t agree wolfkin and the other shit you mention are similar
This really is the key. The question, in my opinion, is not whether the person is nuts or not but if their belief, condition, behavior is so strong that it affects their life in a detrimental way. If it does then it’s a disorder and they need help to get their life back on track. If not, well, their life is alright and not affecting anyone else in a detrimental way? They are free to live out their life as they want to
As a recovering alcoholic, I will answer your question as to when you become alcoholic. I drank every night for 22 years before I started having issues in the day. It took me a while to figure out that I was going through withdrawals. I didn’t think I could be having withdrawals, because I drank last night. The withdrawals got steadily worse until I had to start taking a sip at lunch just to calm them. After some time the sip at lunch turned into a sip after lunch, a sip before lunch, and eventually a drink every hour just to ward off the massive withdrawals.
Addiction is a progressive disease. It always gets worse, but not at the same rate for everyone. I had a friend that died of alcoholism at 27. I drank just like he did, sobered up at 44, and am still here.