These are common objections, but not really pertinent to the argument. The first one is an irrational fear. No one is suggesting that we should set up some kind of arbitrary standard to determine who can get care or not. The area is complex enough and people variable enough, that self identification, after good counseling, is the best way to go. The reason biology is important is to establish the legitimacy of the trans community. The transphobes and GC crowd argue that we are all mentally deranged and can be cured through conversion therapy or other mental health techniques. This is quite simply a fallacy. The way to prove it is to establish that there are biological differences in the brains of trans people versus cis people. Gatekeeping does not enter into the equation. It’s a matter of winning rights and legitimacy. if we are not driven by whim or emotion or delusion and there really is a physiological difference, it is hard to argue that we are defective and therefore we should be recognized as a legitimate variant of the human condition. We already see this happening in some advocacy groups. As a starting point you might review Anna B’s March article entitled being transgender isn’t a choice. In it she references a Stony Brook study on trans children where the results concluded there is no difference in the responses of trans girls and cis girls. The same was true for trans boys and cis boys.
As to your second point you seem to be positing two different ideas and mixing them together. On the one hand you are suggesting why not change the brain rather than the genitals? The simple answer is that this cannot be done, but you can change the genitals especially for trans women where they become indistinguishable from those of a natal woman under gynecological examination and in terms of sexual response. I should know, I am one of those women.
Mixed in with this is something I also often hear which revolves around the concept of plasticity. The brain changes as it is exposed to various stimuli during a persons life. We all know and accept this. The assumption by those who would reject science however is that any brain can be changed with the right stimuli to either enhance it to a male or female identity. This is the fallacy in the argument. Plasticity only goes as far as the basic structures will allow it to go. If you could change any brain into another one merely through the right input, psychotherapy would solve the trans problem (and for that matter the gay problem as well). This idea has been firmly rejected by the mental health community. Being trans or gay is an innate part of the make up of people who fall into those categories. It cannot be modified. It is a fundamental part of the way they were born. So the blank brain may be plastic, but that does not mean it can be changed into anything you want. Certain things, such as perception of gender internally, or hardwired at birth. Those gender identities appear naturally, not as a result of external input.The brains of trans women resemble those of cis women, not the men they are assumed to be. This is a scientific fact that is becoming more evident every day, and as more proof emerges and it becomes more widely accepted, so will the trans community.
