Wishful thinking and bullshit-laundering

Oh what a tangled web we weave / When first we practice to self-deceive

Source...

Trans communities set out to dismantle every reasonable reservation a young person expresses about transition. If a young person worries about the implications of becoming a lifelong medical patient, her new glitter family will assure her that there’s nothing “wrong with being a ‘lifelong medical patient’ at all (besides bs stigma based on nothing).” If a young person fears the social frictions that will accompany transition, he’s encouraged to transport himself into a realm of pure imagination, where he can transition seamlessly and no one will bat an eye. And when a 16-year-old girl asks whether “trans men have a physical disadvantage to cis men?”, she’ll be assured that there is no difference that transition—and willpower—cannot overcome:

Just read that because we have the bone structure and ligament attachment points of women, we're more likely to get ACL injuries and it affects our performance too. Plus, when cis guys go through puberty, they get lung, heart, and other advantages that we'll always be limited by in sports.

Is this all true? I'm really interested in competing with other men once I'm older but I'm afraid I won't make it because this.

Of course, women who identify as men do not magically become the physical equals of men in sport, no matter how much testosterone they ingest—though I hear they reliably outcompete ‘cis’ men in the whole ‘giving birth’ department.

The focus on ligament attachment points also shows just how deep in the weeds trans-identified young people can go in their quest to identify and abolish the perceived ‘wrongness’ of their bodies, and how young people overlook the big picture—your sex is written into every cell in your body and your entire body developed along those lines—in favor of hyperfocusing on details. There’s a tinkering mentality at work here: change this, change that, slice here, up my dose, and don’t dare zoom out.

Elsewhere, this girl described herself as “pre-everything” (no testosterone, no surgeries—yet) and expressed the fear that her body will be seen as “something unnatural” if she takes steps toward transition. She just wants to be a “normal dude.” In other words, she has impossible transition goals. You can hear the echo of the words she will say in five years, or 10, when she desists or detransitions: if I could choose, I still wish I’d been born a man, but what transitioned offered wasn’t enough, would never be enough.

Now she shares another impossible goal—her desire to compete in men’s soccer at a “pro level”—alongside her fears that she won’t be able to do so.

Her fellow trans-identified women jump in to console—and mislead—her:

I have no idea but if you're good enough I don't see why not? If people know you're trans there might be shitty rules about it but that's not the same as your biology preventing you… Don't let transphobes convince you you're biologically inferior. If you're pro level you're better than most cis men.

Two key messages here: Any barriers she encounters will be based on prejudice, not reality, and female = “biologically inferior,” rather than, simply, different.

Biological disadvantages matter very little once you're above a certain level, and football is, surprisingly, pretty diverse.

Elsewhere, other young women claim biological differences only matter above a certain level. Which one is it? (Never mind that some of the best female professional soccer players in the United States lost to a league of under-15 boys!)

Bones and ligaments don't have sex differences lol. The only differences are things like height, muscle mass, skin texture, etc. And all that is because of hormones. Muscle mass becomes more like cis men's. Yeah, a taller man's going to have some advantages over a shorter man, but that's not because one's cis or trans. Once you're on HRT for a while, it's all the same.

Bones and ligaments do have sex differences, and, no, it’s not all because of hormones. “Hormone replacement therapy” (I’ll say it again: cross-sex hormones are not “hormone replacement therapy”) does not even the playing field.

Others tell her she has the opportunity to show everyone up:

No one really knows if someone could make it as a men's professional soccer player while being trans. You could be one of the first. If it's something you really want, you've got nothing to lose, you are in uncharted territory, you're young, be one of the first, no reason not to. People don't make it as a pro for a lot of reasons, maybe this will be one, but also man, maybe not. Only you can find out.

“One impossible quest is not enough! Here’s another!”

If—when—she fails to achieve her goals, for transition and athletic performance, who will be to blame? Transphobic bigots who make “shitty rules” and try to “convince [her she’s] biologically inferior”? Trans communities that sold her impossible fantasies?

Or is she being set up to blame herself?

If she fails in sports, she didn’t try hard enough. (“Bones and ligaments don't have sex differences lol”!)

If her transition fails, she didn’t believe hard enough. She bailed too soon.