I'm all for lesbian, gay, and bi rights / relationships. As ItzSebbyyy said, love is love and I completely agree and support that. What I do not agree with or support is transgender based off what I know. I have done a fair bit of reading on it, as well as talking to my inlaws who are trans and for me it's a mix of not understanding as well as not caring. What I mean by that is I don't understand why a biological male or female would want to be the other gender, but I also do not care what you want to identify as. I don't mean that in a bad way such that I would purposely call you out, I simply mean that what you identify as has no bearing on me or my life until you make a big deal out of it. It is hard for me because I see things as they are. 2+2=4, someone with XY chromosomes is a male, and XX is a female and that is that. When you tell me 2+2 =/=4 or the XY can be a female and XX can be a male I strongly disagree. Male or female has to do with what you physically are as unless you were the other, you have no idea what the other gender "feels".

3 out of 5 of my inlaws are trans (biologically 2 females, 1 male). In talking with them about why they feel they are the opposite gender, the key things were that they feel closer to the other gender. I'm not trying to purposely misgender anyone here, I'm using their biological genders so as to avoid confusion. When asking them what they mean by that, they all agree that they prefer to do things that are traditionally done by the other gender. The 2 girls responded with they like to climb trees, one plays baseball and the other rides quads, etc. To me that sounds like what I would refer to as a tomboy. A girl who prefers more masculine things, That does not make them boys, it simply means they enjoy activities traditionally associated with guys, and that's totally fine! The biological male likes to cook, housekeep, likes "pretty things", etc. Again this aligns with tomgirl. Liking what society views as predominately feminine does not make you a girl by any means.

What I have told them along with any trans person I am associated with (be it through work or a friend group) is that when it comes to pronouns I simply won't call you by the opposite gender. I respect that person as a person, but I will not call a biological female he/him and a biological male she/her. I respect that you feel those are your pronouns and I hope you can respect the fact that my views do not align with those ideals, so I will have to go with the gender neutral option and go with they/them. I totally understand there's that category too, but I was raised in a family that absolutely under no circumstances will agree with the trans thing and we have our beliefs in play too, so for us so respect each other, we have to have some leeway on both ends.

Transgender for adults is a little different subject for me than for children. You're an adult, to be honest I think it's a suboptimal use of a persons focus but if that's what you want to do than go for it. I do things that could be described the exact same way so I don't have a lot of room to talk. I think it's a lot different for children and to be honest, I believe "gender affirming care" is child abuse. The reason I say that is simple. At that age we are either going through puberty, or just got past it. Things are A LOT different in our body and can be hard to understand. The whole "coming of age" thing can be a doozy for many people. If you're an adult now, think back to that time. Do you remember all the out right defiance? So many kids start to have issues communicating with family, they totally shut down from that side of things as their body changes. This is also when we see kids starting to try drugs or alcohol and basically try to rediscover themselves as they are not who they were a year or 2 ago. Adding the whole gender issue in there is just a recipe for disaster in my opinion. Kids think that they are a different gender, that has to be it! Then they get gender affirming care and in the case of 2 of my inlaws, they start hormone therapy which has effects that cannot be reversed.

There's so many things to touch on here but one last thing I would like talk about is acceptance. I can love an accept you without wanting to be around you. One of my inlaws is not even close to passing but still dresses the part so I would describe them as cross dressing. I, as a more masculine, cis, predominately republican male do not want to go out in public with you because what you are dressed like does not align with my beliefs and that's ok! Also, way back when in the US military there used to be the rule of "don't ask don't tell" (yes technically it's still there, I know). I am a firm believer that's how anything sexual should be. I don't care if you are straight, gay, lesbian, or bi, but you do not have to advertise it. There are many more interesting things about you and your sexuality should not be a character trait of yours. I as a straight male so not advertise that I love women. When I was dating I focused on women and I downloaded dating apps for men to find women. seriously, this isn't charades. Have respect for other, don't force your beliefs on others, and don't go advertising your sexuality like a used car dealer advertises a good deal.

Again, I mean no hate to anyone, I just wanted to put some sort of context out there as a couple of us have explained our beliefs without explaining our views in this thread. I hope you can understand where I'm coming from with this message and I hope that even if you don't agree with me, you can see or understand why I have the views I do. I don't believe this is the thread to start a conversation on the topic as it started as someone saying they like the pride flag lol, but if you'd like to have a conversation please feel free to PM me or start a new thread. I may or may not reply to replys on this as I don't want to hijack someone else's thread but I also don't want it to look like me or anyone is just spreading hate.