Thing that really sticks in my throat here.

The most generous current estimate of trans % by population is 0.6%.

The mother of the child here is a vehement and very pro-active trans rights campaigner.

I don't know the proportion of life long trans campaigners, but I'm pretty sure the odds of them having a trans kid are vanishingly small. Much more so for such an extreme and unusual case as this one.

We are both relegated to pure speculation here but, I know at least one example (my brothers partner) of a girl being raised by a lesbian mother, who had deep emotional problems instilled into her from a very early age. i.e. men are bad, she should be attracted to women etc.

Took her well into adulthood to get over that and she is still a mixed up person (mother is to put it politely; a bit mental)

This is a different example of course, but the underlying problem and how it messed her up for most of her childhood seems like it could be similar. We are so used to the prejudices against "normal" gender roles and sexual orientation that it is perhaps easy to forget that this can work just as easily in reverse.
The problem can essentially be asshole parents instilling a mixed up and narrow concept of what is normal. Which either restricts their existing exploration of identity, or actively coerces towards a particular outcome.

IDK, you may just be right and the kid manifested this underlying genetic problem at a very early age. Her mother may be a perfectly even handed and caring person etc. etc.

It just concerns me that it could so easily be the other way around. But you are right about many people simply adopting alternative gender roles rather than physically transitioning. But if this kid starts the hormone blockers, she is sterile for life and will undergo irreversible changes in her development.

If she were to change her mind later in life as she matures... that 40% suicide rate is no joke

& yeh there are certainly strong arguments from inside the trans community against ideas of non binary genders. Most trans people are one gender wishing to transition to, or be treated as the other gender.

I can see an argument for perhaps having a third intermediary gender, beyond that it seems more like lifestyle choices than actual gender issues. e.g. like you say a T.V. man who likes to dress as a woman isn't someone who wants to be a woman, or even gay. It's just a man who likes to feel beautiful in a dress and makeup (to quote Eddie Izzard "male lesbian").

Anyway I don't think you have said anything offensive. This is a mire of a subject and anyone reasonable is going to appreciate your (our) confusion & concerns.

Is there someone better educated on the physiological and psychological science of this that can explain why gender transition at that age is not child abuse?

Because from everything I understand about how complicated and frequently fraught with remorse and confusion that issue is for adults....how in the name of fuck can someone that young be mature enough to make that kind of life changing decision? (or indeed have it made for them)

Gender dysphoria is usually only diagnosed in adulthood and usually requires years of psychotherapy and adoption of the desired gender role before any respectable doctor in the UK would allow the transformative process of hormone therapy to begin. (let alone reassignment surgery)

The suicide rate for transitioned people is about 40% I'm told. This appears to mostly be a combination of depression brought on by using the idea of transition to avoid other underlying emotional problems and/or remorse in later years.

None of this is to say people should not transition. There is plenty of evidence to support many a diagnosis of dysphoria and many a success story. But the thing those happy transitions seem to have in common is a very through and mature understanding of themselves.

i.e. things a child is incapable of doing when their mind and personality are still developing.

IDK, the very idea deeply concerns me. Is she actually happy transitioned? Or has she had that idea re-enforced by her parents and such?

I have this hypothetical vision of them panicking at their little boy playing with dolls and tea sets and finding solace in the idea that they are just the wrong gender, instead of being "odd".

I know how silly that sounds, but especially in the south of the USA, gender transition is sometimes considered more socially acceptable than homosexuality and/or being an effeminate male (or so some people in the trans community tell me).

Am I just behind the times on this one? Seems like there would have to be some pretty fucking spectacular medical science to back it up where children that young are concerned...

Pop quiz, which reaction proves maturity?

Well, to be fair, we don't have any real idea of the living conditions on planets in nearby systems that are roughly earth sized. We haven't been able to detect them until the last few years, and most of those are orbiting too close to the sun (because those are the easiest to detect), and getting any kind of real idea of their atmospheres is currently unavailable. There could be several systems with habitable planets within 30 ly, we just don't know yet. We are improving our capacity to detect these every year, so perhaps by the time we have colonized Mars, we should have a few viable extra-solar earthlike planetary candidates to send probes. Still would be another 50-100+ years after sending probes to receive back enough data to justify sending colonists. Hopefully by then our tech has matured enough to make it possible, and the war with Mars has settled down enough.

1. I hate writing lists like this.
2. but only because I'm afraid I don't have enough cool stuff to put on them
3. I swear.. a lot, but I get away with it... in person, because I'm Irish, and in writing, because I'm an eloquent motherfucker
4. When I was a kid, I really wanted to be a space shuttle pilot. My entire room was covered in space posters, until I was eventually convinced this wouldn't happen in my early teens (kinda hard to be a shuttle pilot when you live in a country with no space program or even an airforce).... at which point....
5. I started listening to heavy metal and for years I wanted to be a touring musician. Played in a few bands, even recorded some stuff, but I was never really that good, but I did teach my brother to start playing
6.... who is now waaaay better than I ever was, has a degree in music and releases some of my favourite music.
7. I am by a long way the most level-headed member of my family.
8. I like to think I'm resourceful (read as "watched one too many episodes of macgyver as a kid") and set myself little challenges all the time (like trying to break into my own house)
9. I've been arrested once and spent a night in a cell
10. I love the mountains (snowboarding, mountain biking) but didn't realise this until my late 20s. It's one of my great regrets that I didn't start these things sooner.
11. I'm a 3rd dan (soon to be 4th!) black belt in Aikido, but....
12. I haven't been in a fight since high school.
13. A small immature part of me really wants someone to attack me so I can find out.
14. The rest of me isn't nearly that stupid.
15. I love to cook (especially BBQ), and will happily spend all day preparing a meal for my wife or my friends.
16. I don't have or want kids, but I get on great with them (I suspect they think I roughly as mature as they are).
17. I teach a kids Aikido class.
18. I'm very good at my job, but it's just a means to an end for me. If I never needed to work again, I wouldn't.
19. No-one will read this far.
20. I think people are basically good, but they're also stupid and easily manipulated... this goes for me too.
21. I really want to travel again, but life keeps getting in the way.
22. I'm a total geek.
23. I like to look at everything from all angles, but there are somethings I have no time for (homepathy, racism, homophobia, climate deniers, etc). I don't believe in debating these people.
24. I sometimes wonder if I should put my money where my mouth is and run for public office, but then I remember that that would seriously cut into my snowboarding/mountainbiking/aikido-ing time.
25. I am very tempted to delete this list.

it's funny perhaps because when you're young those little moments, glimpses of infidelity seem so much bigger, more dramatic than the actual impact it has on your life before adulthood. It feels almost like mock passion; how one thinks one should respond. But it is a pure and naive response; romantic and tragic.

Also, honest and hurt and emboldened to make a video to send as a form of retribution. Yet what retribution did she really have? She threw a bracelet which she only momentarily cherished into a riverbed, as if it were the wedding ring worn for thirty years, now tarnished by her husband's revealed secrets.

It's funny because of it's contrast with our adult experiences and understanding, having experienced or known of this early form of love betrayal in our youth, we are now mature and knowing of human nature, but now reminded in an amusing way because of what she doesn't know yet that we know: irony.

Perhaps a scandal to all of her 12 year old classmates, to some it is frivolous and others an amusement. Something to acknowledge and also chuckle at, but also to admire in her self worth and conquering spirit. It's beautiful, I think. I'm with eric on this: you go girl! hahaha!

Start by calling them women.

It will instantly shift your energy from puppy to man.

And they will like it. It shifts their energy from object to person with oomph.

And if they don't like it, find yourself a more mature woman.

In my opinion, of course. In my opinion.

(This advice video is also non-gender specific. Nothing said here would be changed in the least if the genders were different -- or only one is different!)

Probably fake, but the technology is absolutely mature enough.

Self-driving cars are a solved problem. It's a matter of regulation, not research at this point.

In fact, once they reach critical mass, the problem actually becomes a lot easier from a technological standpoint. If all the cars on the road are AI, their behaviour becomes much more predictable, and a highway full of self-driving cars could easily communicate with each other, allowing increased traffic flow and reducing accidents.

Think about a simple scenario right now. You're driving in the fast lane on a multilane highway and your exit is coming up in a km or two. You need to cross 3 lanes, so you indicate and wait for a safe gap. You're completely dependent on the drivers in the other lane to let you in. But human nature being what it is, they might not want to let you in. Even if the first lane lets you through, the outer lanes have no idea what you want until they see you, so you have to repeat this manoeuvre a few times.

But with a highway of self-driving cars? Your car broadcasts its intentions on a localised network, and the other cars create a gap all the way to the exit. You move through and traffic resumes.

Yeah...no.

We can't only vote for candidates that align perfectly with our ideals. We can support those candidates but if they don't make it to the general election then you vote for the candidate that most closely matches your values. I cannot even conceive of the level of self entitlement I would need to feel to endorse the idea that only my first pick is deserving of my vote.

We can order one pizza. I want sausage but I do not like onions. Everyone else wants onions. I sit in the corner and pout and refuse to eat.

The only mature position is to encourage people to do more to actively support their preferred candidate. That is positive action. To advocate boycotting elections when you don't get your way is untenable...because everyone CAN'T get their way. You have to accept that your views will not always be in the majority. You have to be prepared to get some of what you want if you can't get everything.

This notion that YOUR candidate is the only right choice and everyone else is being manipulated....its just immature and naive.

How about I respect your beliefs by not assuming that you're only holding onto them until the day I come around to convince you to think like me, by disingenuously pretending to consider your opinions just so I can educate you on mine?

If you assume that people come across their beliefs through mature, thoughtful reflection, then it becomes much easier to call them an ignorant jackass to their faces. Because you weren't going to change their minds anyway.

If you can't respect their ideas, respect their convictions enough to tell them how stupid you think they are.

My Uncle used to work at the animal control facility at Mirabel International Airport North of Montreal. I visited him when I was young and he would have all manner of exotic animals at his house (parrots, a chimp, etc).

At one point someone, I kid you not, tried to smuggle in a cub Mountain Cougar. Algernon was confiscated and put into my Uncles care.

He ultimately took on ownership of Algernon. When I was just 7 years old I remember visiting him and being chased down and scratched by young Algernon. He was cute, but those claws let you know what he would grow into.

Fast forward another 7 years and my Uncle moved to Ontario close to our town. We would visit every now and then and see Algernon. At his maturity he was 15 foot from head to tail. He would live inside the house in a converted room for his needs with a huge cage door. He would spend time outside on a very long, very fortified run. To feed Algernon my Uncle would open the door to his room, close it behind him and deliver the food. My Uncle is all 5' 4" tall, but you wouldn't know it. Algernon would put his front paws up on my Uncles shoulders and you would just hear my Uncle in a slightly annoyed voice "shoo" Algernon off like he was a pesky kitten trying to jump on him for dinner.

I remember sitting at the foot of his cage door looking into his eyes. A few things I learned... never look directly into a large cats eyes and never... never turn your back to a large cat.

Algernon eventually went on to a wildlife preserve that took great care of him until end of life... although not lucky to be taken out of his habitat he sure was well kept post smuggling.

Couldn't agree with you more. Less pointing fingers. More acting like the mature adult you are suppose to be.

@greatgooglymoogly

Thanks for taking the time to watch it.

Like I said in my previous comment, this talk needs to take a lot of shortcuts, otherwise its length would surpass anyone's attention span.

So, point by point.

By "balanced budget", I suppose you refer to the federal budget. A balanced budget is not neccessarily a bad thing, but it is undesirable in most case. The key reason is sectoral balances. The economy can divided into three sectors: public, private, foreign. Since one person's spending is another person's income, the sum of all spending and income of these three sectors is zero by definition.

More precisely: if the public sector runs a surplus and the private sector runs a surplus, the foreign sector needs to run a deficit of a corresponding size.

Two examples:
- the government runs a balanced budget, no surplus, no deficit
- the private sector runs a surplus (savings) of 2% of GDP
- the foreign sector must, by definition, run a deficit of 2% of GDP (your country runs a current account surplus of 2% of GDP)

- the government runs a deficit of 2% of GDP
- the foreign sector runs a surplus of 3% (your current account deficit of 3%)
- your private sector must, by definition, run a deficit of 1% of GDP, aka burn through savings or run up debt

If you intend to allow the private sector to net save, you need to run either a current account surplus or a public sector deficit, or both. Since we don't export goods to Mars just yet, not all countries can run current account surpluses, so you need to run a public sector deficit if you want your private sector to net save. No two ways about it.

Germany runs a balanced public budget, sort of, and its private sector net saves. But that comes at the cost of a current account surplus to the tune of €250B. That's 250 billion Euros worth of debt other countries have to accumulate so that both the private and public sector in Germany can avoid deficits. Parasitic is what I'd call this behaviour, and I'm German.

If you feel ambitious, you could try to have both surplus and deficit within the private sector by allowing households to net save while "forcing" corporations to run the corresponding deficits. But to any politician trying that, I'd advise to avoid air travel.

As for the "devaluation of the currency", see my previous comment.

Also, she didn't use real numbers, because a) the talk is short and numbers kill people's attention rather quickly, and b) it's a policy decision to use debt to finance a deficit. One might just as well monetise it, like I explained in my previous comment.

Helicopter money would be quite helpful these days, actually. Even monetarists like AEP say so. If fiscal policy is off the table (deficit hawkery), what else are you left with...

As for your question related to the Fed, let me quote Eric Tymoigne on why MMT views both central bank and Treasury as part of the consolidated government:

"MMT authors tend to like to work with a consolidated government because they see it as an effective strategy for policy purpose (see next section), but also because the unconsolidated case just hides under layers of institutional complexity the main point: one way or another the Fed finances the Treasury, always. This monetary financing is not an option and is not by itself inflationary."

MMT principle: the central bank needs to be under democratic control, aka be part of government. The Fed in particular can pride itself on its independance all it wants, it still cannot fulfill any of its goals without the Treasury's help. It cannot diverge from government policies too long. Unlike the ECB, which is a nightmare in its construction.

Anyway, what does he mean by "one way or another the Fed finances the Treasury, always"? Well, the simple case is debt monetisation, direct financing. However, the Fed also participates by ensuring that Primary Dealers have enough reserves to make a reasonable bid on treasuries. The Fed makes sure that auctions of treasuries will always succeed. Always. Either by providing reserves to ensure buyers can afford the treasuries, by replacing maturing treasuries or buying them outright. No chance whatsoever for bond vigilantes. Betting against treasuries is pointless, you will always lose.

But what about taxation as a means to finance the Treasury? Well, the video's Monopoly example illustrated quite nicely, you cannot collect taxes until you have spent currency into circulation. Spending comes before taxation, it does not depend on it. Until reserves are injected into the banking system, either by the Fed through asset purchases or the Treasury through spending, taxes cannot be paid. Again, monetary financing is not optional. If the Treasury borrows money from the public, it borrows back money it previously spent.

Yes, I ignored the distribution of wealth, taxation, the fixation on growth and a million other things. That's a different discussion.

Isn't that what they did though? As long as you have a set demographic reacting to videos, couldn't it be argued that you're infringing on their trademark?

Trademarks are much more broad and powerful protection than copyright. They protect your brand and/or logos and slogans. They also protect against things “confusingly similar,” so it’s possible you could be sued for naming your video “Kids have emotions.”

Source:
http://ryanmorrisonlaw.com/attorneys-react-the-fine-bros-react-trademark/

So please explain to me why this lawyer is wrong. And you might want to tone it down a little - you're sounding on par with the worst that reddit has to offer, and disproving the notion that the videosift community is more mature and capable of having a civil conversation.

Who did it first is the thinking of a child (he hit me first) imo. Most mature adults, i assume, are going to look and see the bigger picture.