I realize that I may not have been direct enough in my rebuttal of your response to my comment. You made the point that requiring gender dysphoria in order to qualify as trans is not a helpful approach. You suggested it might lead to some people’s views and experiences as being unfairly dismissed and discounted instead of listened to.

This is a bit of a non sequitur. I am perfectly willing to accept anyone’s experience as authentic for them, but that does not necessarily mean you are trans. You grate at being treated as a man or a woman? You feel that no label fits you perfectly? Is this a rejection of societal norms, or distress at being labeled as something you do not feel deep down that you are? There is a difference. One group is trans, the other is not. In acknowledging this, by rejecting that every nonconforming experience is one of being trans, I am not disparaging those trying to understand themselves better. Actually I applaud them. They may merely have a fetish or reject societal norms, and there is nothing wrong with that. Those people are entitled to be treated with respect and acceptance. But that does not mean they are trans.

Many times people claim labels for themselves which do not reflect the underlying reality. At the moment identifying as trans is trendy and appealing to a certain group of individuals, but in reality may more correctly represent confusion about who and what they are. All they really are doing is saying, I am dissatisfied with my position in society and think I need to change my identity to be happy. They are searching, and in many instances, they do not have the innate biological underpinnings of being trans. To accept at face value this kind of arbitrary, ill informed and whimsical conclusion only hurts the credibility and legitimacy of the authentic trans community.

I applaud the people who engage in self examination which may lead them to believe initially that they are trans in their journey to self understanding. Where I draw the line is when they hastily and erroneously conclude that they are transgender, but do not have gender dysphoria, and are vocal about saying that dysphoria is not necessary to be trans. This reveals a total lack of understanding of the nature of being trans and the scientific basis for the phenomenon. Just look at the transphobic legislation which is popping up all over the country. Much of it is also driven by the belief that trans people choose to be trans, and are defective and disturbed, are a threat in grooming children to conform to their identity, and that they must be controlled if they cannot be cured. This is the dangerous and erroneous attitude that needs to be corrected. Accepting everyone’s ill conceived conclusion about themselves is not helpful in establishing the legitimacy of the trans community. It only plays into the bigoted and fearful’s hands.

One other thing that I must disagree with is your conclusion that people are not necessarily transphobic because they believe that some people choose to be trans. There is no continuum of transphobia. You are either transphobic or you aren’t. If you believe that even part of the community chooses to be trans, you are by definition transphobic. There is no choice in being trans. It is innate, biologically fixed in our brains. We are all in this together. There is no gradation of the legitimacy to being trans. You either are or are not.