Does it help differentiate "done for breast cancer reasons" from "done for dysphoria reasons"?
If someone says they got a double mastectomy I would infer there was a non-dysphoria issue.
If they say "top surgery" I assume a dysphoria issue.
Regardless of whether you think these surgeries are justified for dysphoria, that seems like an at least somewhat useful distinction/connotation. (edit: fixed pluralization of surgery)
I don't know... rhinoplasty is rhinoplasty, whether it's done for aesthetic or physiological (breathing) reasons.
But even allowing for the use of different terms, "top surgery" is still a deliberately unclear euphemism chosen precisely because it hides what it does. So if you want a different term, drop the Latin and call it "breast removal" or the like. But not "top surgery" (and "bottom surgery is even worse), which sounds like how you'd explain it to a toddler.
I guess "Top surgery" though _also_ lets you combine both breast augmentation (for trans females) and breast removal (for trans males)
"Bottom surgery" then covers both vaginoplasty and phalloplasty.
I agree that the terms are partly chosen to sound less invasive/serious, but they do _also_ differentiate/categorize in a useful way.
And aren't even 'mastectomy' and 'rhinoplasty' chosen for how they sound?
'Rhinoplasty' sounds much more serious than 'nose job' so it doesn't sound like a vanity project.
'Mastectomy' I think sounds (or sounded - once everyone knows what it means the euphemism treadmill has done its work and they sound the same) less bad than 'breast removal'.
Yeah that’s what I was thinking. Rightly or wrongly, that’s the same connotation I get, even though I technically know that both are essentially the same thing (plus or minus the cosmetic adjustments one may make depending on whether you want the result to look like a male chest or a female chest with tiny boobs)
Does it help differentiate "done for breast cancer reasons" from "done for dysphoria reasons"?
If someone says they got a double mastectomy I would infer there was a non-dysphoria issue.
If they say "top surgery" I assume a dysphoria issue.
Regardless of whether you think these surgeries are justified for dysphoria, that seems like an at least somewhat useful distinction/connotation. (edit: fixed pluralization of surgery)
I don't know... rhinoplasty is rhinoplasty, whether it's done for aesthetic or physiological (breathing) reasons.
But even allowing for the use of different terms, "top surgery" is still a deliberately unclear euphemism chosen precisely because it hides what it does. So if you want a different term, drop the Latin and call it "breast removal" or the like. But not "top surgery" (and "bottom surgery is even worse), which sounds like how you'd explain it to a toddler.
I guess "Top surgery" though _also_ lets you combine both breast augmentation (for trans females) and breast removal (for trans males)
"Bottom surgery" then covers both vaginoplasty and phalloplasty.
I agree that the terms are partly chosen to sound less invasive/serious, but they do _also_ differentiate/categorize in a useful way.
And aren't even 'mastectomy' and 'rhinoplasty' chosen for how they sound?
'Rhinoplasty' sounds much more serious than 'nose job' so it doesn't sound like a vanity project.
'Mastectomy' I think sounds (or sounded - once everyone knows what it means the euphemism treadmill has done its work and they sound the same) less bad than 'breast removal'.
Correction: mastectomy is based on Greek, not Latin.
Yeah that’s what I was thinking. Rightly or wrongly, that’s the same connotation I get, even though I technically know that both are essentially the same thing (plus or minus the cosmetic adjustments one may make depending on whether you want the result to look like a male chest or a female chest with tiny boobs)