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Should tax dollars be used for gender reassignment surgery?

Should tax dollars be used for gender reassignment surgeries

  • Yeah

    Votes: 11 20.0%
  • No

    Votes: 44 80.0%

  • Total voters
    55

Peter Grimm

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Self explanatory. Do you think the government should pay, or help pay, or subsidize insurance companies, or in any other way funnel money toward assisting people to undergo gender reassignment surgeries?

If so, to what extent?
 
Assuming it's to fix a documented and real medical condition it should be treated like any other real medical condition from an insurance and government aid standpoint.
 
What real medical condition does gender reassignment treat?

Gender dysphoria.

I voted yes.

Where there is a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria and gender reassignment surgery is indicated as necessary treatment then the surgery should be covered by insurance or subsidized by the government in the same way that any other medically necessary treatment would be covered.
 
What real medical condition does gender reassignment treat?

I'm not a doctor. I'm only pointing out that if someone is suffering from a legitimate medical condition related to gender identity then that condition should be treated like any other. In other words the mere fact that it's gender related is completely irrelevant to how it should be treated and paid for.

The DSM-5, which is the bible for the psychiatric world recognizes gender dysphoria as a legitimate medical condition. While I haven't done more research on it than that, the topic doesn't really interest me to be honest, that would indicate to me that it's a disease to be treated like any other.
 
Nope.

If private insurance wants to cover it? Fine.

Tax money going into it? A lot more research must be done. I could give a flying flipping mother****ing stupid ****ing **** if you want to "Feel comfortable in your skin." There better be some hardcore scientific proof before forcing people to have their tax money go into such a thing.
 
Nope.

If private insurance wants to cover it? Fine.

Tax money going into it? A lot more research must be done. I could give a flying flipping mother****ing stupid ****ing **** if you want to "Feel comfortable in your skin." There better be some hardcore scientific proof before forcing people to have their tax money go into such a thing.

As I've pointed out it seems that it's a recognized illness. What more research needs to be done?
 
The DSM-5, which is the bible for the psychiatric world recognizes gender dysphoria as a legitimate medical condition.

I found the same thing earlier and have been thinking about it since.

DSM-5 recognizes gender dysphoria as a mental disorder.

That's a medical condition, sure enough, and as I've said, so long as it's a legitimate medical condition I'm comfortable with government subsidizing gender reassignment surgery to the same degree that they'd subsidize any other medical treatment.

But thinking about this in conjunction with the Bruce Jenner thing, is necessary treatment for a mental disorder something that should really be celebrated?

Is a mental disorder something that should be considered "normal"?

Understand that I bear no ill will toward Jenner or anyone else suffering from gender dysphoria, whether that condition has been treated by full blown gender reassignment surgery or whether it's simply being treated as best as possible through transvestism.

But we don't "celebrate" Anorexia, or Sexual Masochism, or Alcoholism (or other Substance Use Disorders), or really any other mental disorders as defined by the DSM. And we certainly don't tell our children that these things are "okay", or "normal" or that "those people are just like you and me".

I'm wondering if maybe we should be showing transvestites the same pity and providing them with the same care that we would a heroine addict, while not necessarily considering their condition anything more than a very serious mental disorder that we're really glad we don't have.

Live next to them, work with them, share a pew in church with them, same as we would anyone else, but let's maybe not make a form a mental illness the current cause célèbre.
 
Gender dysphoria.

I voted yes.

Where there is a medical diagnosis of gender dysphoria and gender reassignment surgery is indicated as necessary treatment then the surgery should be covered by insurance or subsidized by the government in the same way that any other medically necessary treatment would be covered.

Gender dysphoria is a mental illness—a damaged mind.

To think that it is an appropriate treatment to damage a healthy body in order to treat a damaged mind, while doing nothing to address the damaged mind, is as insane as the condition being thus treated.
 
Just "No" isn't quite adequate as a response to such a question.

Stealing from everyone to pay for an elective cosmetic surgery would be unconscionable.

Government has no business being involved in this or anything like this.
 
I found the same thing earlier and have been thinking about it since.

DSM-5 recognizes gender dysphoria as a mental disorder.

That's a medical condition, sure enough, and as I've said, so long as it's a legitimate medical condition I'm comfortable with government subsidizing gender reassignment surgery to the same degree that they'd subsidize any other medical treatment.

But thinking about this in conjunction with the Bruce Jenner thing, is necessary treatment for a mental disorder something that should really be celebrated?

Is a mental disorder something that should be considered "normal"?

Understand that I bear no ill will toward Jenner or anyone else suffering from gender dysphoria, whether that condition has been treated by full blown gender reassignment surgery or whether it's simply being treated as best as possible through transvestism.

But we don't "celebrate" Anorexia, or Sexual Masochism, or Alcoholism (or other Substance Use Disorders), or really any other mental disorders as defined by the DSM. And we certainly don't tell our children that these things are "okay", or "normal" or that "those people are just like you and me".

I'm wondering if maybe we should be showing transvestites the same pity and providing them with the same care that we would a heroine addict, while not necessarily considering their condition anything more than a very serious mental disorder that we're really glad we don't have.

Live next to them, work with them, share a pew in church with them, same as we would anyone else, but let's maybe not make a form a mental illness the current cause célèbre.

All good questions and ones I've been giving some thought to myself.

First I deliberately tried to avoid the term "mental disorder" or "mental disease" where possible because there's a lot of unwarranted stigma associated with real mental disorders. I don't for a second think that the majority of people have mental disease that requires therapy or treatment as some in and out of the profession believe, I rather think we're all a little "off" in one way or another and that that's perfectly normal and most people just need to grow up and deal with their personal idiosyncrasies and get on with life. That said there are legit mental disorders that warrant treatment and, as I've said, if we as a society decide that we the taxpayers should foot the bill in certain cases I see no legitimate reason to exclude gender dysphoria.

Does that mean that gender reassignment surgery is the only recourse? I'm really not qualified to answer the question. It's up to the person and their doctor as with any other medical condition.

Should we celebrate these people? No, I don't think so. Jenner gets attention because he's a celebrity who's having what to most people is a novel procedure. There've been lots of people before him who've had the surgery that we've, rightfully, never heard of. If he wasn't Bruce Jenner and a part of the Kardashian celebrity machine we wouldn't have heard about him either. But he's famous, apparently something of an attention whore, and people on both sides of the question are going to use that for political advantage. It's the way our world works.
 
Gender dysphoria is a mental illness—a damaged mind.

To think that it is an appropriate treatment to damage a healthy body in order to treat a damaged mind, while doing nothing to address the damaged mind, is as insane as the condition being thus treated.

Is nothing being done to treat the damaged mind?

That doesn't seem to be the case.

Everything that I just went and read (information from WebMD, the American Psychiatric Association, the UK's National Health Service, even the World Professional Association for Transgender Health) all indicate that psychological and psychiatric therapy are key components of treating gender dysphoria.

I'm sure that, as with anything else being handled by insurance companies and government bureaucracy (where it relates to individual benefits), or the medical industry where cost of care and malpractice fears are rampant, when it comes to gender dysphoria they start with the lest invasive and least expensive forms of treatment and work their way up from there as indicated.

I mean, if you can demonstrate in some way that teenaged kids are walking in to clinics and having their peckers lopped off without being required to speak to a social worker about their disorder then, yeah, I agree with you, that should be stopped.

But I really don't think your concerns are grounded in reality.
 
Self explanatory. Do you think the government should pay, or help pay, or subsidize insurance companies, or in any other way funnel money toward assisting people to undergo gender reassignment surgeries?

If so, to what extent?

No, because there is more to gender reassignment than just a surgery. Saying tax dollars should go to the surgery is also saying we should subsidize what the DSM-4 guide calls "Gender Identity Disorder" later changed in the DSM-5 guide to "Gender Dysphoria." It is extremely unlikely that someone walks into a doctors office one day with a complaint along these lines and ends up with gender reassignment surgery, usually the whole thing ends up in the hands of mental health to navigate long before surgery is considered. Insurance covered I can see, government subsidized I would not agree with. There is also a new more defined age factor for a mental health professional to deal with. The point is that process of removal of what is defined as "distress" from DSM-4 to DSM-5 (think how homosexuality was altered from a "disorder" to a condition that did not in itself mean being mentally unhealthy) means that it becomes dubious to expect the tax payer to be on the hook for something that is not a mental or physical disorder. But rather a condition that someone has to meet certain criteria to even qualify for to get to the surgery stage. We have ended up creating a nebulous area somewhere between definable physical and/or mental ailment and an elective procedure, and while in that gray area I find it unreasonable to put the tax payer on the hook for it. Especially since there is so much more to this than surgery.
 
Gender dysphoria is a mental illness—a damaged mind.

To think that it is an appropriate treatment to damage a healthy body in order to treat a damaged mind, while doing nothing to address the damaged mind, is as insane as the condition being thus treated.

How about that. I just finished saying that there's unwarranted stigma associated with mental disorders and look what happens.

Who's to say that changes to the body aren't appropriate treatment for a mental illness?
 
Self explanatory. NO.

No, it's really not self explanatory. Why don't you explain?

No I dont think tax dollars should pay for it.

Why not?

Nope.

If private insurance wants to cover it? Fine.

Tax money going into it? A lot more research must be done. I could give a flying flipping mother****ing stupid ****ing **** if you want to "Feel comfortable in your skin." There better be some hardcore scientific proof before forcing people to have their tax money go into such a thing.

There is hardcore scientific proof. And if "forcing people to have their tax money go into such a thing" is such a high bar, why don't members of the public who are anti-war get to veto military spending? How is that different from funding medical treatments?

I found the same thing earlier and have been thinking about it since.

DSM-5 recognizes gender dysphoria as a mental disorder.

That's a medical condition, sure enough, and as I've said, so long as it's a legitimate medical condition I'm comfortable with government subsidizing gender reassignment surgery to the same degree that they'd subsidize any other medical treatment.

But thinking about this in conjunction with the Bruce Jenner thing, is necessary treatment for a mental disorder something that should really be celebrated?

Is a mental disorder something that should be considered "normal"?

Understand that I bear no ill will toward Jenner or anyone else suffering from gender dysphoria, whether that condition has been treated by full blown gender reassignment surgery or whether it's simply being treated as best as possible through transvestism.

But we don't "celebrate" Anorexia, or Sexual Masochism, or Alcoholism (or other Substance Use Disorders), or really any other mental disorders as defined by the DSM. And we certainly don't tell our children that these things are "okay", or "normal" or that "those people are just like you and me".

I'm wondering if maybe we should be showing transvestites the same pity and providing them with the same care that we would a heroine addict, while not necessarily considering their condition anything more than a very serious mental disorder that we're really glad we don't have.

Live next to them, work with them, share a pew in church with them, same as we would anyone else, but let's maybe not make a form a mental illness the current cause célèbre.

The illness doesn't come from being different. It comes from having to repress that difference. It's the same way that parents sometimes force left-handed children to become right-handed. It makes them more "normal", but it actually does lasting damage to their minds. It isn't being "abnormal" that creates a problem, it's suppressing that difference.

Just "No" isn't quite adequate as a response to such a question.

Stealing from everyone to pay for an elective cosmetic surgery would be unconscionable.

Government has no business being involved in this or anything like this.

No facial reconstruction surgery for car crash victims, either? That's elective cosmetic surgery.
 
How about that. I just finished saying that there's unwarranted stigma associated with mental disorders and look what happens.

Who's to say that changes to the body aren't appropriate treatment for a mental illness?

The parts of the body that are being removed or mutilated were healthy before the operation. They aren't the cause of the problem, and removing or destroying them does nothing to mitigate the problem.
 
If it's for Ted Cruz I'm totally down with it.
 
Nope.

If private insurance wants to cover it? Fine.

Tax money going into it? A lot more research must be done. I could give a flying flipping mother****ing stupid ****ing **** if you want to "Feel comfortable in your skin." There better be some hardcore scientific proof before forcing people to have their tax money go into such a thing.


Are you opposed to tax $ helping any other medically diagnosed DSM level conditions? Schizophrenia, etc?
 
I answered "Yeah" but mostly just to be obnoxious.
 
The parts of the body that are being removed or mutilated were healthy before the operation. They aren't the cause of the problem, and removing or destroying them does nothing to mitigate the problem.

So instead, cut out the brain and kill the person instead?
 

I was thinking initially due to it being an elective cosmetic surgery. However someone on here pointed out Gender dysphoria, actually a couple people have. I am reading up on the medical condition and I am reconsidering some. Now I am still leaning toward that I would not support tax money going to it, but I am closer to maybe as I am reading.

My concern would be people who want a sex change claiming dysphoria to get a free sex change. I don't believe that every person who is transgender is suffering from dysphoria, or people who are mild dysphoria dont really need a free sex change. Now those suffering from severe dysphoria, and who cannot, and who's family cannot, reasonably pay for the operation i am more open to supporting tax dollars helping than I was when i opened this thread.

I am still reading up on this condition today as I get time, so my opinion may continue to change, but right now thats my "why not".
 
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