I always enjoy these sorts of conversations, too! It's nice when things don't need to devolve into anything hostile. Here are a couple of my own articles I've written on the subject if you're at all curious:

https://medium.com/my-side-of-the-aisle/the-trans-debate-d8797fafb00e

https://medium.com/life-as-seen-through-a-lens/a-wrong-time-to-object-673b35b0d8f

Admittedly, there was an element of backtracking in the second piece that I don't feel 100% great about, but that my opinion on this has continually shifted around just goes to show that it's a complicated subject.

As far as gender identity vs sexual orientation, I don't view one as more innate than the other. To me, recognizing someone's gayness is pretty on par with recognizing them as they'd like to be recognized in terms of gender. But with something so internal and unproveable as the way we feel inside, I think there's just simply no quantifying which is more or less natural. I agree that the outward manifestation of trans identity is more noticeable than gayness most of the time, but I don't really think that it's any less real or intrinsic of an experience. I think it does give rise to certain issues that sexuality in itself doesn't, though: for example, equality in sports. But just so long as someone's trans identity doesn't actually impede on my ability to live life and be a happy person, I'm happy to concede a possibly unwarranted pronoun.

Even if I have my personal doubts about whether every single person who claims to be trans actually is, I'm happy to recognize them as the gender they'd prefer. I'd just think it was ridiculous if they wouldn't forgive me for the occasional pronoun slip-up, or if, god forbid, I actually face legal consequences for misgendering or "dead-naming" someone. That's as orwellian as it gets.

Thanks again for the dialogue! That point about the function of our specific biologies I have a pretty hard time refuting and I think that enters into some incredibly complicated territory. It always frustrates me when people treat this as a completely day and night issue. I think it's one of the most complicated political dilemmas of our time.