BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Putting together ones life with the modern world.
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Nefastos
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Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Nefastos »

Gangleri wrote: Sun Jun 27, 2021 3:28 pm
Nefastos wrote: Sun Jun 27, 2021 11:41 am
Gangleri wrote: Sat Jun 26, 2021 10:53 pmThe way I see it however, if we make formless freedom and the fulfillment of desires the basis of our medical ethics, we are on a very dangerous grounds then; for where to draw the line?

But aren't we on even more dangerous grounds if we make the basis of medical ethics out of stating what other people should do with their most intimate property, their own body?


Both stances taken dogmatically can lead to situations where ethics are thrown out of the window. I'll take an example that might clarify: perhaps I feel that inside I'm a Conan, a He-Man or a Hulk, and I will want to become that also externally. Good. I'll go see a doctor and demand from him hormonal therapy that will transform myself externally into a muscle monster. It is my body after all, and I'll do with it what I want, I argue. Of course no responsible doctor would assign me with GH/Testo/IGF-1 therapy to satisfy my desires, first of all because messing with the hormonal and chemical balance of my body can lead to numerous mental, psychical and physical problems.

Doesn't occultism also state that we do not actually own our body? Is it responsible ethics to agree with self-mutilation? There also isn't a consensus whether gender dysphoria is simply psychopathology; some have argued so, one criteria being being out of touch with (bodily) reality. Perhaps people with gender dysphoria would need a good therapist before a surgeon.

You didn't actually answer my question: Shouldn't it be foremostly everyone's own choice what to do with one's own body, even though other people will necessarily have different opinions? I say "necessarily," because every one of us is somehow breaking someone else's code of how human body should seem and function: One would like to force overweight people to jog, for their own benefit of course; another would ban tattoos as useless, degrading to human dignity, and potentially harmful; third would deny abortion; fourth contraception; and the fifth would like to castrate all human beings because of overpopulation or because all life is suffering anyway. Personally I would love to enforce that last option, but I understand that it is not and should not be my decision to make, or even suggest in earnest. For my personal view is so situated that I truly cannot understand how other people experience their bodily existence in full.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
Gangleri

Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Gangleri »

I think I answered very well in the first sentence and then I provided an example of how freedom and desires can sometimes be conflicting with proper (medical) ethics; of course not anything goes with regards to the use of one's body and there have to be boundaries of behaviour that should be expected from the professionals. Otherwise we'll be witnessing suicide clinics where self-destructive people are "assisted" in making that great transition from life willfully.
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Aquila
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Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Aquila »

Gangleri wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 1:51 am I think I answered very well in the first sentence and then I provided an example of how freedom and desires can sometimes be conflicting with proper (medical) ethics; of course not anything goes with regards to the use of one's body and there have to be boundaries of behaviour that should be expected from the professionals. Otherwise we'll be witnessing suicide clinics where self-destructive people are "assisted" in making that great transition from life willfully.
Well, it's your choice to take whatever stance you may want. I just want to say that how you justify it, shows a lot of common misunderstandings, rumours and opinions based on the very margin of the margin (detransition, children etc. - these are valid points but don't really have much to do with most of the people who are dealing with this. They are not valid against other contexts we have here). In this context, terms like "proper ethics" need a lot of elaborating, what it means and includes, what situation they fit into, how they are considered in them, etc. The Conan example was totally different from the topic at hand because it is not about fulfilling all crazy desires one might have. The path you take from the gender issue to suicide clinics is extremely far-fetched and unites two different topics that are not connected. Yet it's a common fear-fuelled, even paranoid scenario. That is the way which leads to one of those dogmatic interpretations that you mentioned.

In general I don't mind even the strangest esoteric interpretations and paths chosen for oneself. There's not much I would criticize. When it comes to issues of making choices for other people and thinking that you know better than those having experience and knowledge, it gets more complicated ethically and you have to be prepared to face some criticism. That is nothing negative but a good chance of seeing how your arguments stand against other ethical points brought into discussion. I say this because it seems you only accept views that support your opinion and discard everything that does not.
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Nefastos
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Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Nefastos »

Gangleri wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 1:51 amI think I answered very well in the first sentence

That first sentence was:
Gangleri wrote: Sun Jun 27, 2021 3:28 pmBoth stances taken dogmatically can lead to situations where ethics are thrown out of the window.

It basically says nothing at all, since it is self-evident that "dogmatical" stance of any kind certainly will lead to problems. This was not what I was talking about, however.

Gangleri wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 1:51 amof course not anything goes with regards to the use of one's body and there have to be boundaries of behaviour that should be expected from the professionals.

I gave the list above to give an example how arbitrary it is for anyone to decide where that boundary goes. I think it mostly goes where anyone personally would like it to go, which is the direct opposite of what is sought from such a boundary. It becomes a question of will against will, to make someone's personal subjective as other people's objective, i.e. sociologial power-struggle in its primitive form.

Gangleri wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 1:51 amOtherwise we'll be witnessing suicide clinics where self-destructive people are "assisted" in making that great transition from life willfully.

You see from the end of my post that this idea which you presented as horrible in extreme is not horrible to me at all. I made that list of examples exactly to point out how impossible it is to find a personally intuitive answer which would be such to all the other people.
Faust: "Lo contempla. / Ei muove in tortuosa spire / e s'avvicina lento alla nostra volta. / Oh! se non erro, / orme di foco imprime al suol!"
Wyrmfang
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Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Wyrmfang »

I think Aquila put the point quite well. Not only in this particular topic but basically in all other issues as well it is important to remain skeptic towards one´s own metaphysical commitments in the sense that they never dictate what other people are over the self-conception of those people. Obviously, one´s self-conception can be biased as well, but in 99% of cases people know for example their sex or sexual orientation better than other people. It is by no means certain there such thing as re-incarnation for example, on which much of the discussion here is based on. Indeed, perhaps the majority of people think that it is obvious that there is no such thing. Whatever kind of metaphysics is actually true, nothing changes the fact that at least now we feel very authentically that we are living here with other people whose exact situation we never completely understand.

When it comes to the topic itself, there is one issue I´m particularly interested in. Transsexuality still operates within the male/female dyad, as do some forms of non-binary sex. However, there are also non-binary people who experience that the male/female binary does not apply to them at all but they are something else entirely. I would be interested if there are any such people on the forum or people who know well this kind of non-binary people who are into esotericism. At least at the surface the conception itself challenges the polar world-view inherent in at least most forms of esotericism.
Tariq
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Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Tariq »

I think it can be interesting to keep in mind that all humans are initially female. I think some species instead of having the options of female-male have options both-male. I also have read that for example clown fish sex depends on the size of the fish, where the biggest fish becomes female and the smaller ones remain male.

Also in addition to the non-binary trans people, are are also intersex people. Sadly I don't know more about these topics, although I do find it interesting.
Gangleri

Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Gangleri »

Nefastos wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:58 am It basically says nothing at all, since it is self-evident that "dogmatical" stance of any kind certainly will lead to problems.
I think does: it says in a simplified form that things need to be evaluated on a case-to-case basis.
Nefastos wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:58 am
You see from the end of my post that this idea which you presented as horrible in extreme is not horrible to me at all.
So on the other hand you are saying that a suicide is a decision of a downward path (Seven Faces of Satan), and on the other you are applauding if we reach the point in liberty where there are suicide clinics. Isn't it contradictory and unethical to the greatest degree?
Gangleri

Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Gangleri »

Aquila wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:52 am The Conan example was totally different from the topic at hand because it is not about fulfilling all crazy desires one might have.
You still seem to be on the misunderstanding that I actually compared the two things, while I was making an example of how medical ethics and fulfillment of desired can be in conflict. And how do we really know - like I said, there isn't a consensus whether gender dysphoria is actually psychopathology - we are not fulfilling crazy desires in this topic at hand?
Aquila wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:52 amThe path you take from the gender issue to suicide clinics is extremely far-fetched and unites two different topics that are not connected.
That is a logical end-point of taking human liberty to do what one desires to one's body, and was directed to Nefastos' argument dealing with that ethical question.
Aquila wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:52 amI say this because it seems you only accept views that support your opinion and discard everything that does not.
I wouldn't be discussing the issue here or anywhere else if i didn't ponder on and/or accept other points of view.
Gangleri

Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Gangleri »

Aquila wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:52 amI say this because it seems you only accept views that support your opinion and discard everything that does not.
Are you sure you are not simply projecting your own liberal intolerance on me? If you read my posts carefully without a prejudice, you can see that I have pondered the issue from several different viewpoints and also from a larger point of view (bringing the issue of minors into the discussion, for example), and one can also understand that I'm playing the Devil's Advocate, who has a crucial role to play in the declaration of sainthood.
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Aquila
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Re: BEING A TRANSEXUAL AND COSMETIC SURGERY?

Post by Aquila »

Gangleri wrote: Tue Jun 29, 2021 5:57 pm
Aquila wrote: Mon Jun 28, 2021 9:52 amI say this because it seems you only accept views that support your opinion and discard everything that does not.
Are you sure you are not simply projecting your own liberal intolerance on me? If you read my posts carefully without a prejudice, you can see that I have pondered the issue from several different viewpoints and also from a larger point of view (bringing the issue of minors into the discussion, for example), and one can also understand that I'm playing the Devil's Advocate, who has a crucial role to play in the declaration of sainthood.
Discussion is not about considerations that we leave unsaid but what we actually write here. It's pointless if you answer to my or someone else's argument that of course you have considered it and you accept those views and then move on to continue with the same as before without making any visible attempts at showing how you have considered other ideas and what you think about them. Playing the devil's advocate is also somewhat unnecessary if you only bring up opinions you agree with. You can easily express different opinions without taking any roles. Disagreements are allowed and even necessary. Disagreeing with your writings is not about judging you but being critical of some of the things you say.

If you want to discuss the medical ethics behind the issue, you have to define those ethics in some way. Others have no intuitive knowledge of what the said ethics include. How do they work in this situation? How is it possible that other ethics lead to suicide clinics and everyone losing their responsibility and no longer being able to consider other options? Should we place these ethics in some specific context and think that they might not work similarily in other contexts? Gender transition and suicide clinics might follow somewhat different ethics and every situation should be looked at individually like you said. But whatever we decide to use as ethical guidelines, there's always situations they don't work in. Even with ethics that generally work well, there will be mistakes. But if those mistakes are rare and risks are relatively small, it is better than denying the freedom.

You say that human liberty logically leads to suicide clinics (and probably some other ends as well?). The problem with this argument is that you seem to think about human liberty like it was separated from all considerations that humans are able to, from all reactions that our actions will cause and generally from the living situations that life brings us to. It is like saying that if you allow more freedom in the world, people will only start following their blind desires. People are much more nuanced and multileveled than that. They have desires that are in conflict with each other. They have the ability of considering things from rational, emotional, maybe even spiritual points of views. They are well-adapted in accepting some suffering in their lives and not hurrying to suicide clinic to end it before thinking of other options. The same goes with genders and sexes. You don't just book a meeting with the doctor to see if maybe you should have some operation and the doctor immediately takes you to the surgery. After all there is no such thing as complete human liberty. There's always a lot things that keep us from following simple desires, starting from our own selves and continueing to the social situation around us. Such human liberty is a strawman that does not exist and no one can ever achieve it in the way you present it.

I'm completely fine with different opinions and I'm not really interested whether I'm liberal, conservative or something else. I'm interested in what is the best information and knowledge available, what are the most credible arguments AND what potential counter-arguments could either complement or contest them. Most discussions are not about finding the one argument that wins all but searching for complete and nuanced views where it is possible to reach a holistic picture of the issue.


When you wish to present arguments based on science, you can not say that the information you provide is free of ideology and the information others brought up was ideologically biased. With this kind of arguments you can basically say whatever you want and always claim that arguments criticizing yours are ideological, they are projecting liberal intolerance etc. I encourage you to remain sceptical but I know you could do it much better.

I will later return to your example of medical Conan Hulk transition and how it compares in this context. I believe a little closer look at it can bring some beneficial clarity to the topic.
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