Answers run the gamut from “a few seconds” to “decades” but I’m struck by the number of answers in the one day to a couple of months range, and how closely medical interventions follow on the heels of these ‘epiphanies’: depending on how you look at it, either a month or 38 years or something in between
In some ways, the most interesting response is this one:
"Somewhere between 14 years and a month, depending how you look at it. I was ok with saying I was "androgynous" for about 14 years before I really stopped to think about what that means. Then a month of crisis before coming out."
'Ok saying I was androgynous for about 14 years'...
It would be fascinating to talk to this person in depth, and what they mean when they say '..before I really stopped to think what that means'.
It sounds as if they accepted being gender-non-conforming for years.
But then what happened in the 'month of crisis'? Was it a month of falling down an internet rabbit hole?
What a great mechanism to indirectly expose the break down of critical/objective thinking skills in our respective global societies. We have been infantilized, where messaging on just about any issue or talking point...even the most benign and inconsequential, is done via a cartoon presentation.
I'm in the aerospace industry (I work for one of the B ig ones), we routinely have virtual and web based trainings, in cartoon form. Sorry, but it pisses me off on two fronts...I am a professional adult, not a child and this company is telling the more feeble minded, that this is the norm, not just in a fortune 100 setting, but adult life in general. I am seriously waiting to see someone, on a virtual meeting in a fury costume...I'm not joking at all.
As I am sure you have covered previously (I only found your stack recently), this points to another part of this grooming strategy, that has been an underlying presence for decades in education, religion and entertainment.
Early exposure and grooming (kindergarten) for any identity and ideology agenda is the invisible elephant in the room. Much like heavy metal poisonings was and still is, for many neurologic and behavioral issues.
The typical 5 year old responds to bright colors, noise, silly language and behaviors, recognition and praise. Just using a non-scientific observation...libs of tiktok...you see all these behaviors and attractive props present in these grooming rooms. Give me a day or two and I sure I could convince virtually ANY 5 year old, that they are an animal, dinosaur, boy, girl, vegetable,, etc., and that their parents are wrong about everything.
Aside from the boy/girl and last part, I have done this with my nephews and niece, when playing. Of course my goal was not to indoc them into an ideology, but if it were and I were given a school year and showed them video of parades, parties, cartoons and fun stuff...with adults, reflecting the false reality, they would readily adopt the false identity....especially if they went home to parents, that sincerely said, yes Jimmy, you are a cabbage dinosaur and we need to get you medication and surgery.
I would love to see a study/experiment done, where over the span of months, kindergarteners are presented with different identities and an adult example/advocate for those identities (teacher). How many would be adopted and how quickly could you get them to shift to another. Of course that would be mentally cruel and abusive...so why don't we see the trans and sexual grooming the same way?
My apologies for veering way off the course you set here.
Thanks for doing great work, it's very appreciated!
Very scary. If this isn't proof of social contagion, I don't know what is.
When my then husband did his PhD and non-credentialed groomer appointments back in the 1990s, it was all about whether he liked how he looked cross-dressing. They did not tell him honestly that that "affirmation" he was getting in Manhattan's Greenwich Village should not be taken seriously. He entered a foreign world with different language, different social habits--perhaps it helped him run away from the beatings his father gave him and his younger sister when young, and the pretend BS that it didn't happen from their mother?
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (iuniverse, 2022)
In some ways, the most interesting response is this one:
"Somewhere between 14 years and a month, depending how you look at it. I was ok with saying I was "androgynous" for about 14 years before I really stopped to think about what that means. Then a month of crisis before coming out."
'Ok saying I was androgynous for about 14 years'...
It would be fascinating to talk to this person in depth, and what they mean when they say '..before I really stopped to think what that means'.
It sounds as if they accepted being gender-non-conforming for years.
But then what happened in the 'month of crisis'? Was it a month of falling down an internet rabbit hole?
So weird that so many people who "dont't exist" (ROGD transitioners) would be posting their stories.
Eliza,
What a great mechanism to indirectly expose the break down of critical/objective thinking skills in our respective global societies. We have been infantilized, where messaging on just about any issue or talking point...even the most benign and inconsequential, is done via a cartoon presentation.
I'm in the aerospace industry (I work for one of the B ig ones), we routinely have virtual and web based trainings, in cartoon form. Sorry, but it pisses me off on two fronts...I am a professional adult, not a child and this company is telling the more feeble minded, that this is the norm, not just in a fortune 100 setting, but adult life in general. I am seriously waiting to see someone, on a virtual meeting in a fury costume...I'm not joking at all.
As I am sure you have covered previously (I only found your stack recently), this points to another part of this grooming strategy, that has been an underlying presence for decades in education, religion and entertainment.
Early exposure and grooming (kindergarten) for any identity and ideology agenda is the invisible elephant in the room. Much like heavy metal poisonings was and still is, for many neurologic and behavioral issues.
The typical 5 year old responds to bright colors, noise, silly language and behaviors, recognition and praise. Just using a non-scientific observation...libs of tiktok...you see all these behaviors and attractive props present in these grooming rooms. Give me a day or two and I sure I could convince virtually ANY 5 year old, that they are an animal, dinosaur, boy, girl, vegetable,, etc., and that their parents are wrong about everything.
Aside from the boy/girl and last part, I have done this with my nephews and niece, when playing. Of course my goal was not to indoc them into an ideology, but if it were and I were given a school year and showed them video of parades, parties, cartoons and fun stuff...with adults, reflecting the false reality, they would readily adopt the false identity....especially if they went home to parents, that sincerely said, yes Jimmy, you are a cabbage dinosaur and we need to get you medication and surgery.
I would love to see a study/experiment done, where over the span of months, kindergarteners are presented with different identities and an adult example/advocate for those identities (teacher). How many would be adopted and how quickly could you get them to shift to another. Of course that would be mentally cruel and abusive...so why don't we see the trans and sexual grooming the same way?
My apologies for veering way off the course you set here.
Thanks for doing great work, it's very appreciated!
You know how I know I'm NOT trans? I find the idea "I would have to be male to have the thoughts and feelings I'm having" utterly insulting.
Religious converts I have known could have said many of these things in almost the exact same way.
Very scary. If this isn't proof of social contagion, I don't know what is.
When my then husband did his PhD and non-credentialed groomer appointments back in the 1990s, it was all about whether he liked how he looked cross-dressing. They did not tell him honestly that that "affirmation" he was getting in Manhattan's Greenwich Village should not be taken seriously. He entered a foreign world with different language, different social habits--perhaps it helped him run away from the beatings his father gave him and his younger sister when young, and the pretend BS that it didn't happen from their mother?
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (iuniverse, 2022)
uteheggengrasswidow.wordpress.com
I looked through the reddit. My brain stopped.