All I need is an existence proof. Almost all trans people are aware of feelings of being trans well before they’ve heard the term, and there are still many of them. Therefore, trans people exist.
No one is deputing that trans people, in the sense of people who claim to be “really the opposite gender”, exist. The questions being discussed are:
1) whether someone wondering whether “they’re trans” is asking a meaningful question, and
2) the related question of what causes people to claim to be “really the opposite gender”.
Let’s consider how you’re explanation applies to the questions above.
The obvious unremoveable question, in languages with gendered grammar, is “Which gender should I use to refer to you?”
This says nothing about question (2). Applying it to question (1) someone asking “am I trans?” becomes someone asking “which pronoun do I want to be referred to by?” Since the pronoun issue appears to be an epiphenomenon of some other issue, this isn’t helpful.
Also, the ever-present bathroom question. Should they be allowed in single-gender spaces/colleges/clubs/etc., and which ones?
This has the same problem as the pronoun definition above, but with the added complication that one needs to consider why the bathrooms/spaces/etc. in question are single-gender. The answer is generally because the attendees feel more comfortable doing whatever they do there if members of the other gender aren’t present. Thus we need to take into account their comfort and not just that of the trans person when doing utility calculations.
No one is deputing that trans people, in the sense of people who claim to be “really the opposite gender”, exist. The questions being discussed are:
1) whether someone wondering whether “they’re trans” is asking a meaningful question, and
2) the related question of what causes people to claim to be “really the opposite gender”.
Let’s consider how you’re explanation applies to the questions above.
This says nothing about question (2). Applying it to question (1) someone asking “am I trans?” becomes someone asking “which pronoun do I want to be referred to by?” Since the pronoun issue appears to be an epiphenomenon of some other issue, this isn’t helpful.
This has the same problem as the pronoun definition above, but with the added complication that one needs to consider why the bathrooms/spaces/etc. in question are single-gender. The answer is generally because the attendees feel more comfortable doing whatever they do there if members of the other gender aren’t present. Thus we need to take into account their comfort and not just that of the trans person when doing utility calculations.