15 votes

How Ben got his penis

11 comments

  1. [7]
    thetastelessturtle
    (edited )
    Link
    I (trans man) cringed out of my skin reading this article. I don't want millions of people leering over the details of how my penis does or doesn't work, or the body horror I've had trying to live...

    I (trans man) cringed out of my skin reading this article. I don't want millions of people leering over the details of how my penis does or doesn't work, or the body horror I've had trying to live without one and getting one. I'm not a circus freak show with a "frankenweenie" or trying to make any kind of philosophical claims about "the malleability of sex and the essentialist claim that the penis makes the man." Good god.

    15 votes
    1. [6]
      JakeTheDog
      Link Parent
      And yet, articles like this provide invaluable perspective to the rest of the population, and display the feats of medical technology and engineering which serves to disperse the "frankenweenie"...

      And yet, articles like this provide invaluable perspective to the rest of the population, and display the feats of medical technology and engineering which serves to disperse the "frankenweenie" caricature.

      10 votes
      1. [5]
        thetastelessturtle
        Link Parent
        What specific details from this article were "invaluable" to you? Genuine question. From my perspective the article has given a lot of internet strangers a very detailed mental image of how my...

        What specific details from this article were "invaluable" to you? Genuine question. From my perspective the article has given a lot of internet strangers a very detailed mental image of how my genitals likely look and function differently from theirs, some tips on where to start looking if they want to find pictures or more details and/or a network of trans men trying to help each other through the medical process, and the incorrect idea that the gender dysphoria that drives someone to go through the pain of phallo is some kind of philosophical stance on the platonic ideal of manhood, and/or a practical decision to be able to use urinals, etc. I see some of that as inaccurate and the true parts as private traumas of my life I'd rather not be aired for everyone to read about and then ask me about IRL. But maybe I'm misunderstanding how this is useful to the public, and/or to me?

        6 votes
        1. [4]
          cfabbro
          (edited )
          Link Parent
          I think you might have this part backwards. I can only speak for myself, but now that I have read the article (despite its various flaws), and feel more informed on the subject, I will actually be...

          aired for everyone to read about and then ask me about IRL

          I think you might have this part backwards. I can only speak for myself, but now that I have read the article (despite its various flaws), and feel more informed on the subject, I will actually be far less likely to ask anyone about this particular transition surgery now. Not that I ever would have asked someone about that in public in the first place; I would likely have only ever done so in private, if I knew the person well, and also knew they were totally comfortable with answering questions like that. But even so, I think that's at least one potential benefit of the article.

          Whereas keeping everything a complete mystery, and also refusing to let anyone else even talk about it, seems more likely to illicit question from others, IMO.

          p.s. Regardless, I am genuinely sorry to hear this article was painful to read or traumatic for you though. The last thing I want to do, even by voting on an article here, is hurt other people like that. So I'm sorry if my curiosity or reply here contributed to that. :(

          11 votes
          1. [3]
            thetastelessturtle
            (edited )
            Link Parent
            That's a fair counterpoint. I'm annoyed mostly because I'm pattern matching this article to a broader problem. There's been an explosion of public visibility of trans people over the past ten...

            That's a fair counterpoint. I'm annoyed mostly because I'm pattern matching this article to a broader problem. There's been an explosion of public visibility of trans people over the past ten years. But the type of information that's blown up has been focused on how horrific and strange the medical procedures are, and how (horrific or amazing) and strange it is for people to want to be considered a different gender socially than what they look like. There has been almost no broad discussions of the actual subjective experience of gender dysphoria, what's been tried in the past to treat it, the evidence we have for what does/doesn't work.

            This biased visibility has IMO caused a huge backpedaling in trans rights instead of a helping. On average the public sees medical procedures as outrageous and thinks that trans people should "just" get therapy instead. As of a week ago it is now a felony for doctors to give trans 18 year olds medical care for gender dysphoria in parts of the US, vs in the 00s when it was legal (if hard to find). There are many bills on the way that will cause this to happen in more places, and possibly for greater age ranges. Many people are being assumed to be trans in public who could have lived quietly and been treated as their gender before, and now people are getting outed as trans based on their literal scars. I read this article as portraying phallo through a similar lens (here's this shocking procedure and process, people get it because lol gender I guess??, here is where you can go to identify more trans people doing this bizarre extreme thing) and so I see it as playing into the broader problem.

            Basically I agree that more info is good, I just hate that the info that is being spread is so selectively chosen for what is going to get clicks and shares. In isolation this would be fine.

            Edit for your edit: It's cool, I'm not traumatized by reading it and life is suffering anyway lol. I would disengage if I thought it was doing damage to me and you have been polite. I normally wouldn't comment at all if the only thing I had to say was an emotional reaction, because I broadly find those kinds of comments not worth my time to read and don't want to contribute to the problem. I broke my own rule here because I thought it would be unlikely for another trans man to step in and give a more eloquent perspective, so better than nothing.

            8 votes
            1. [2]
              cfabbro
              (edited )
              Link Parent
              That's a very fair point too. Media (and political discourse) has definitely not been kind to trans people, especially lately, and especially not in the US or UK. And I can see how focusing on the...

              That's a very fair point too. Media (and political discourse) has definitely not been kind to trans people, especially lately, and especially not in the US or UK. And I can see how focusing on the medical procedure aspects can potentially further that negativity. However, I know you're relatively new here, so I think it's worth pointing out that this site is one of the few social media sites I know of where those expressing hateful views towards trans people get sitewide banned (E.g. I can point to several instances of that happening, some where even intentional misgendering resulted in a ban). So I think it's worth giving the active users here the benefit of the doubt with articles like this, especially ones posted to ~lgbt.

              p.s. I didn't mean that to come off as a dismissal of your concerns, which are definitely valid. I just think it's worth pointing out that this place is a relatively safe space for those of us in the LGBT+ community, all things considered.

              7 votes
              1. thetastelessturtle
                Link Parent
                My negative response is specifically to the article + the broader political landscape in which it is being published for mass consumption + my own history, not to the act of sharing it on this...
                • Exemplary

                My negative response is specifically to the article + the broader political landscape in which it is being published for mass consumption + my own history, not to the act of sharing it on this specific forum. I apologize if my comment sounded like a rebuke or hostile to any specific user here, that wasn't my intention.

                8 votes
  2. [4]
    autumn
    Link
    Holy hell that was a good read. Thank you for sharing!

    Holy hell that was a good read. Thank you for sharing!

    4 votes
    1. [3]
      Nivlak
      Link Parent
      Care to give me a quick rundown? I am curious but locked out due to paywall.

      Care to give me a quick rundown? I am curious but locked out due to paywall.

      1. kyotja
        Link Parent
        If you block JavaScript on the page you can bypass the paywall, at least in Firefox.

        If you block JavaScript on the page you can bypass the paywall, at least in Firefox.

        2 votes