Nope, it's nothing new. About 3 or 4 generations back from me, around or just before the turn of the 20th century, I had two great uncles who were "intersexed" I think, according to modern terminology. Back then, they were "hermaphrodites", which I think is now a term reserved mostly for plants.
They were brothers, and one day were seen at the cabin splitting fire wood in dresses, as they had been raised as girls, but sporting beards. The sheriff was sicced on them, and they had to flee hearth and home for the great beyond ahead of the arresting officers. It was illegal in those days for a man to wear women's clothes, and from the evidence of the beards, they were determined by observers to be men dressed as women - but, in reality, had both boy parts and girl parts to some degree, and so they had to go on the run. They ended up at a logging camp as "men", and became the camp cooks.
From there, they went farther west where there was no one who ever had known of them, and lived their lives out as men, both getting married, and one adopting the daughter of his wife by a previous husband. I knew nothing of any of this until 5 or 6 years ago, when an elderly female cousin who knew all of the family secrets and where all the bodies are buried told me.
That life has never been easy, and it has been around for millennia.
I think, personally, that using it as a political football to ramp up fear and loathing - and that is being done by BOTH sides, each trying to one-up the other - does a disservice not only to the people actually involved, but to society as a whole. We have so much more to worry about than who sticks what where, or who has girl parts or boy parts and can certify it. It's a useless distraction on the part of both parties, and I have to wonder what it is that each is trying to distract us FROM. I bet nothing good.
I also think that it is nowhere near as common as the MSM would have us believe. Kids and teens live during an already confusing time of life, and it's downright criminal to flood their already complicated worlds with such nonsense. Those who have an actual vested interest in the matter already know they do, and no one else has any business interfering in their decisions. It's not a goddamned spectator sport, it's a private matter for them to wrestle with and get sorted out. It's between them, their doctors and support people, and their families, and NO ONE else.
Splashing it all over the evening news doesn't help anyone other than political operatives trying to submerge logic beneath emotional response, and that emotional response is being elicited in folks with no damned say in the matter at all.
I think, personally, there are two genders, and no more. There are "he's" and "she's", and unless I'm going to get involved with an individual myself, it ain't none of my damned business which plumbing they have. If I'm not personally going to be exploring around down there, I ain't got no dog in that fight. It does, however, confuse the hell out of me to hear someone referred to as a "trans-man" or a "trans-woman". Why can't they be just a man or a woman? Throwing "trans-" into the mix just leaves me wondering if the latter designation is the beginning stage or the end product, and since I don't know which, I don't know whether to refer to them as "ma'am" or "sir". For the love of God, just introduce yourself as "Mr." or "Ms.", and I can take it from there. Identifying as "trans" just means to me that you are still in a transition from one to the other, and I don't know which direction that transition is moving in.
And those silly-assed "evangelicals" need to finally meet their God, and stop worrying over anyone else's life. They've got their own worries to deal with, since they are claiming a God they've never met. That won't go well for them in the hereafter, and they ought to be seeing to THAT, rather than running everyone else's life.
In the matter of "same-sex marriage", I've always been for it, to the extent that I care at all. This is NOT a "Christian nation" - Gods do not play politics. If "Evangelicals" ever bothered to crack open their Bibles, they'd be surprised to find that right there in their own claimed book, it says that God's Kingdom is "not of this world" - it's spiritual, not temporal, and that is why gods do not play politics - it's not in their lane. It also says that God "allows the sun to shine on the Just and the Unjust alike", so who the hell do they think they are to override God's own decisions just because they can be infected with fear of the "Other"?
With that being the case, the Constitution guarantees equal treatment and equal rights to all citizens, and if heterosexuals can get married to one another, homosexuals have that same right as any other citizens. End of. The only right they don't have is to force a clergyman to endorse a Civil matter (marriage - It's "civil" rather than a "religious" matter, since one has to get permission from the State in the form of a license in order to engage in it)) against his own scruples, any more than I have a right to force a Catholic priest to perform my marriage - they won't, because I've been married so many times before, and that is something I must respect, a personal matter of their own that I cannot breach or force.
What a fuckin' clown world we live in today!
.
They were brothers, and one day were seen at the cabin splitting fire wood in dresses, as they had been raised as girls, but sporting beards. The sheriff was sicced on them, and they had to flee hearth and home for the great beyond ahead of the arresting officers. It was illegal in those days for a man to wear women's clothes, and from the evidence of the beards, they were determined by observers to be men dressed as women - but, in reality, had both boy parts and girl parts to some degree, and so they had to go on the run. They ended up at a logging camp as "men", and became the camp cooks.
From there, they went farther west where there was no one who ever had known of them, and lived their lives out as men, both getting married, and one adopting the daughter of his wife by a previous husband. I knew nothing of any of this until 5 or 6 years ago, when an elderly female cousin who knew all of the family secrets and where all the bodies are buried told me.
That life has never been easy, and it has been around for millennia.
I think, personally, that using it as a political football to ramp up fear and loathing - and that is being done by BOTH sides, each trying to one-up the other - does a disservice not only to the people actually involved, but to society as a whole. We have so much more to worry about than who sticks what where, or who has girl parts or boy parts and can certify it. It's a useless distraction on the part of both parties, and I have to wonder what it is that each is trying to distract us FROM. I bet nothing good.
I also think that it is nowhere near as common as the MSM would have us believe. Kids and teens live during an already confusing time of life, and it's downright criminal to flood their already complicated worlds with such nonsense. Those who have an actual vested interest in the matter already know they do, and no one else has any business interfering in their decisions. It's not a goddamned spectator sport, it's a private matter for them to wrestle with and get sorted out. It's between them, their doctors and support people, and their families, and NO ONE else.
Splashing it all over the evening news doesn't help anyone other than political operatives trying to submerge logic beneath emotional response, and that emotional response is being elicited in folks with no damned say in the matter at all.
I think, personally, there are two genders, and no more. There are "he's" and "she's", and unless I'm going to get involved with an individual myself, it ain't none of my damned business which plumbing they have. If I'm not personally going to be exploring around down there, I ain't got no dog in that fight. It does, however, confuse the hell out of me to hear someone referred to as a "trans-man" or a "trans-woman". Why can't they be just a man or a woman? Throwing "trans-" into the mix just leaves me wondering if the latter designation is the beginning stage or the end product, and since I don't know which, I don't know whether to refer to them as "ma'am" or "sir". For the love of God, just introduce yourself as "Mr." or "Ms.", and I can take it from there. Identifying as "trans" just means to me that you are still in a transition from one to the other, and I don't know which direction that transition is moving in.
And those silly-assed "evangelicals" need to finally meet their God, and stop worrying over anyone else's life. They've got their own worries to deal with, since they are claiming a God they've never met. That won't go well for them in the hereafter, and they ought to be seeing to THAT, rather than running everyone else's life.
In the matter of "same-sex marriage", I've always been for it, to the extent that I care at all. This is NOT a "Christian nation" - Gods do not play politics. If "Evangelicals" ever bothered to crack open their Bibles, they'd be surprised to find that right there in their own claimed book, it says that God's Kingdom is "not of this world" - it's spiritual, not temporal, and that is why gods do not play politics - it's not in their lane. It also says that God "allows the sun to shine on the Just and the Unjust alike", so who the hell do they think they are to override God's own decisions just because they can be infected with fear of the "Other"?
With that being the case, the Constitution guarantees equal treatment and equal rights to all citizens, and if heterosexuals can get married to one another, homosexuals have that same right as any other citizens. End of. The only right they don't have is to force a clergyman to endorse a Civil matter (marriage - It's "civil" rather than a "religious" matter, since one has to get permission from the State in the form of a license in order to engage in it)) against his own scruples, any more than I have a right to force a Catholic priest to perform my marriage - they won't, because I've been married so many times before, and that is something I must respect, a personal matter of their own that I cannot breach or force.
What a fuckin' clown world we live in today!
.