My Transness is Inherently Spritual

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And like... you do get that that is kinda insane, right?

Because this is something that so often leads to suffering. And I am saying this as someone disabled, who had so many issues due to this in his childhood.

Just three examples: when I was 7, I was supposed to get checked for autism. My mother did not want an autistic child. Since she just could have a "neurotypical" child by refusing diagnosis, she did just that.

When I was 12, my mother had decided I needed a certain plastic surgery (one that had a minor health benefit, but still was largely a beauty thing). I did not want it. I really, really did not want it. We still went through almost the entire process until thankfully there was a doctor who went: "Wait, this is elective. I am refusing to do this on a child that does not want it."

And when I was 14 my mother refused to get me to the hospital when I had severe food poisoning. She refused me hospital treatment for almost two weeks. By the time I got actually taken to the hospital I was almost dead.

And here is the thing: all of this should just not happen. The doctor when I was 12 was cool, but... he refused to do the surgery because he had the right to make a conscience call. Legally my mother was in the right to force me into that elective surgery. And that just should not be the case.

A lot of children die and suffer due to their legal inability to consent - or refuse consent - to medical treatments. And I wish y'all would understand that.

getting hrt or surgery does not oppress those who can't, but some of the other systems that create that inequality are oppressive. my access to gender medicine is not oppressive, but my position as a US citizen is, and it's part of how i have access to that kind of medicine. so from one perspective, the medicine is not the privilege in itself, but it is partly a result of privilege.

however in general use i think most people have heard of "privilege" in the sense of "it's a privilege, not a right," and in that case gender medicine is not a privilege, but simply access to our rights that too few of us have

imo because the second definition of privilege is more widely understood it makes more sense to use that one, to be more inclusive of people new to these conversations. otherwise there is a lot of confusion about how having basic rights is considered "privileged," as though it's some kind of bonus or reward.

Generally speaking, the easiest way to identify the widely accepted meaning of a theory term is to find how it was originally defined.

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack by Peggy McIntosh, the original article on privilege that I have been able to find, describes both kinds of privilege mentioned by @homeless-dionysus. McIntosh specifically refers to them as “unearned advantage” (things which should be an “unearned entitlement” but currently aren’t) and “conferred dominance” (things that “work to systematically over empower certain groups”). Since she’s explaining this concept in the context of white privilege, I think it’s very fair to say that both types count as privilege in the context of systemic oppression.

Given that I have consistently seen recent articles use the term privilege to refer to both unearned advantage and conferred dominance, I would be incredibly surprised if this is somehow no longer the case.

I highly recommend that everyone read this article. It’s only three pages long and I think it does a good job of making it very clear what privilege is and what it isn’t.

remember ace discourse? remember how people got really comfortable just openly mocking ace people, saying they were all homophobic, claiming they weren't really lgbt...