this post was submitted on 03 May 2024
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I have a friend who did the same at that age. 10 years later, he and his partner have decided they want kids.
I’m glad that you are happy and sincerely hope that you and your future partners remain happy with this choice for the rest of your life.
For others of your age who might be considering the same, I must say that I do generally discourage making permanent life choices before full frontal lobe development. That is a tome of your life where you’re going through an incredible amount of change, your values and what you want in life might not be the at 21 and 26.
You may not understand how insulting and condescending your comment is.
Just because breeding is the default, you shouldn't be proselytizing against sterilization.
I think you may have misunderstood some of what they were getting at.
To make a bad equivalency: would you have any reservations with someone younger than 18 choosing to have a vasectomy/tubes tied? What about 16? 13?
At some point we are going to agree that making that permanent¹ life choice isn't a good idea as they just simply aren't mature enough.
What the person you're responding to is trying to get at, I think, is that many of these preferences or desires can easily change in your formative years as a young adult (18-25 for full frontal lobe development, I believe).
¹I am aware that vasectomies and tubal ligations can be reversed, but that's not something you would want to be relying on with these choices. Similar to how you don't plan to be able to have a tattoo removed a few years down the line when you decide you don't like it.
Do you think it's appropriate to become pregnant before age 26?
They don't have the legal capacity to decide it, so the question is moot.
No, it's just a question of legality. With your criteria, young trans people would be unable to decide that they need to start a soft transition because they're not "mature enough".
So? If it's that important for them, they can reverse it, and if not, and it's really that important, they can adopt. But less population is a net positive in general. One person is not going to change the general trend anyway.
My criteria would entirely allow for early "soft" transitions as you call them. Hormone therapy is significantly less invasive than any type of surgery you could undergo, as well as being similarly "reversible" like a vasectomy. I would have a similar stance to a child making a monumental choice to fully transition. Beginning on the path of a transition is much different than leaping to the final step.
My concerns typically would lie in the sense of manufactured risk when lower risk options are readily available and effective. Condoms are inexpensive, especially when you're comparing to a surgical procedure. Condoms have a reasonably good efficacy when properly used, and is increased significantly when used alongside other contraceptives (not to mention the additional benefits of lowering risk of STIs/STDs).
And just as an added question for you, if these surgeries were not reversible at all, would your views on this change?
We can leave the question of legality vs morality of the subject to the side.
What "risk" are you talking about for a vasectomy? It's an ambulatory procedure. Care to explain?
You are grossly underestimating the need for most truly convinced childfree people to reduce the probability as close as possible to an absolute zero. Not even vasectomy reaches that, but it's very close.
No. Less children raised by unprepared parents is always a good idea.
There's a lot more that goes into starting to transition than a trip to the clinic with $800 in your pocket.