Gender transitioning is great for the 1 percent

The trans question is not about individuals. As any other question, it is about its effect on the majority of people.

I'm not very good at following the news cycle. So it was only a few months ago that I learnt about a catwalk model called Hunter Schafer. 

Hunter Schafer, February 2022, Wikimedia Commons

 As would be customary when hearing about any model, I made a quick image search as soon as I heard of Hunter. I found a visually extraordinary human being. Not a woman. Not a man. Most of all, a teenage boy. A 24-year-old teenage boy. Finally, a real human cyborg. 

Hunter was born a boy, but liked girly stuff. At 16, he went through medical treatment to look as much as possible as a woman instead of a man. (I think it was at 16. The internet is rather vague about the technical details behind this marvel. If puberty blockers were set in earlier that could explain some of the impressive result.) 

The Hunter Schafer story shows very clearly why trans proponents want teenagers to be allowed to undergo life-changing treatment before 18. At 18, most females are already women and most males are at least close to being men. People who transition after 18 will somehow look like patched-over men and women. If people are allowed to take puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones earlier, a new way of looking human is created.

Brave new world 

I don't question one bit that Hunter Schafer is happy with his choice. A boy who loved fancy girls' clothes became a catwalk model. A modern fairy tale for sure. Every time I think something negative about hormonal treatment and surgery for trans-identifying teenagers, I will have to think about how much Hunter would have missed from having to wait until 18. Every time I oppose teenage transition, I will have to concede that I'm prepared to take happiness away from someone like Hunter.

But why would I only want to make people like Hunter happy? Aren't there many other people that could benefit from being cyborgs? Hunter shows that developing into the fully adult version of oneself is not technically necessary. How many others couldn't be interested in that option?

First of all, I'm thinking of homosexual men. I haven't seen much gay porn. But I have seen enough to know what a twink is. A twink is a boyish, slender young man. How many gay men wouldn't like to retain those boyish looks instead of developing into stocky, hairy, too muscular men who look 28 when they are 28? I have read that among gay men who prefer the submissive role, competition is fierce, because there are more bottoms than tops. The gay he-men can pick and choose.¹ In that light, I assume that gaining a competitive advantage through puberty blockers would benefit the happiness of many young gay men.

Also in heterosexual porn, as we all know, youthfulness is highly celebrated. Being over 18 and looking like under 18 is a selling point for porn stars, because then they can squeeze into the teens segment. A girl who knows at 15 that she wants to become a star of teens pornography could benefit hugely from blocking her growth right away. Denying her those hormones is denying her agency.

And, for that matter, how many women wouldn't have preferred to look more girly? Becoming too big is indeed an issue among teenage girls who have such genetic dispositions. A few tall women look majestic. Many more just wish they could take up less space. I have heard this many times from taller and larger-boned females around me: Finding a tall enough boyfriend is an important issue that limits their searching scope. Also, they are losing out from not being considered as cute as smaller women. For a woman, being of moderate size is a very simple way of being feminine. Also smaller men will feel masculine by your side, which makes interaction easier. So would I deny girls the opportunity of making themselves girlier as adults? If a movement of girls claiming the right not to grow beyond 170 centimeters sprang up, I'm sure it would be filled with success stories from women whose outer selves finally matched their petite inner selves. 

No, I don't advocate that

In the trans debate, everything centers on the individual. This particular individual could get a worse life without this or that medical intervention, so the rest of us are morally obliged to allow it, pay for it and even celebrate it.

But if I started defending the interests of people who want to be sexy twinks or porn star teens or just petite girly women also as adults, most people would say I was wrong, because giving in to such interests would make society worse. 

Pornography and beauty competition is unwholesome. Surely we shouldn't steer teenagers into such paths, no matter how much they say they wish it, because it would teach them superficial values. I think most people would reason that even though it would make some individuals genuinely happier than they would be otherwise, that wouldn't outweigh the harm created to those who would be happier without the intervention. The harm created by the opportunity to shape oneself to a teenage-looking adult would outweigh the utility it creates for some people. 

We don't even have to get into an imaginary future of eternal teens to see that society actually doesn't care that much about individuals. There are countless individuals who are feeling very bad over their looks, their height and so on. Helping for example male teenagers who would have liked to be taller would be no technical challenge at all: Just give them growth hormones. Still, that isn't being done except in extreme cases. Not because it wouldn't benefit many short boys who identify as tall; it certainly would. It is because helping them would be good for most of them but bad for the majority of teenagers, who would learn that tinkering with your height is a thing to do.

It is never about the individual

I wrote this post months ago when Hunter Schafer somehow stole the show at the Oscar gala. I hesitated to publish it because it felt like I was writing too obvious things. The trans question is controversial enough as it is, without me participating in the controversies.

I changed my mind when I read Scott Alexander's argument that people should stop arguing over the trans issue, because a crushing majority of people who take hormones as teenagers are happy with their choice. That was his argument. Apparently, also otherwise intelligent people think society is about maximizing the well-being of every individual. Or think the trans question is an exception where the principle that the majority of people and society as a whole come first doesn't apply.

No society can afford to focus on the well-being of a non-reproducing minority. Not for real. It can say that it does, as a kind of religion. But if it actually does, it will get outcompeted by societies that offer the majority realistic opportunities to produce and reproduce. 

The reason why society should not celebrate plastic surgery and hormonal body modification is not that a few people go through irreversible body transformations and regret it. The reason is that accepting one's body as it is and focusing on something else is a great advantage in life for most people.

Our society is letting a few teenagers down through persuading them that their bodies are wrong although those bodies are as good as any. It is letting a majority of young people down through creating an environment where most pleasures are described as dangerous and only-for-adults, but where the opportunity of a certain kind of body modification stands open. Our society is letting teenagers down by depicting body modification as a perfectly fine route of agency, while blocking out most other things they could be doing.

Let's just stop pretending that the trans question is about the minority of individuals who are feeling a strong enough urge to heavily modify their bodies. It really is about the majority who are fed the message that individuals who invest exorbitantly in their looks are role models to admire and follow. 

1. Sai Haddam and Ogi Ogas, A Billion Wicked Thoughts, 2011, chapter 7, 36 percent