As someone who has been openly skeptical of the trans movement for years, I've recently had a lot of friends and colleagues—every single one of whom would describe themselves as liberals or progressives—reach out to me to ask questions and express their own serious reservations about trans activism. So I do get the sense that the tide is turning in the US.
Excellent article. Charles Mackay wrote in 'Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds' (1841), “Is it a dull or uninstructive picture to see a whole people shaking suddenly off the trammels of reason, and running wild after a golden vision, refusing obstinately to believe that it is not real, till, like a deluded hind running after an ignis fatuus, they are plunged into a quagmire?” Mackay covers an eccentric miscellany of popular delusions, from the witch mania of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to alchemists, magnetizers, slow poisoners, and the “influence of politics and religion on the hair and beard.” Much more recently in 'The Delusions of Crowds: Why People Go Mad in Groups' by William J. Bernstein (2021) writes 'Errors appear when individuals become overly influenced by what others think. The more a group interacts the more it behaves like a real crowd, and the less accurate its assessments become…. As put most succinctly by Friedrich Nietzsche, "Madness is rare in the individual - but with groups, parties, peoples, and ages it is the rule." Mackay also recognized this in his 'Extraordinary Popular Delusions' "Men, it is said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses more slowly, and one by one." I suspect the latter observation refers to why there will be no sudden and 'contagious' end to the transcult, no clearcut 'ending of a tide', as there was at its start. The return to sanity will be gradual, enduring, a slow 'one by one' recovery as deluded individuals emerge on their own from this monstrous nightmare (Goya: "The Sleep of Reason produces Monsters"). There is no arguing or debate to be had with transcult members, for, as Swift observed centuries ago, "... it is futile to reason someone out of a thing that he was not reasoned into." We can conclude that the transcult, like other cults, owes its remarkable power to survive every criticism to the fact that it is not directed towards truth but towards the power needed to maintain a delusion.
Simon, I appreciate your response very much. After being a life long Democrat, it was hard for me to see what my “progressive” group is evolving into. That is until the safeguarding of children and women was sacrificed at the alter of “gender identity.” I think you are correct when you say that it will be individuals peeling away one by one. The deep curiosity and courage to question, hopefully rises in these individuals with the restorative force it did in me. Once in possession of ones mind, it’s impossible to deny the incongruence of reality and lies.
Thanks, Jan. Yes indeed ... 'deep curiosity and courage'. In an account of her early life in Mao's China, Jung Chang wrote, in 'Wild Swans', of her reaction as she began to grasp that her's, her imprisoned family's and her fellow citizens' revered hero was not the figure in whom she'd been taught since birth to have faith. She described her reaction as 'panic' - not at being mistreated in the ingeniously unpleasant ways the Chinese Communist Party treated (and still treats) its dissidents. Hers was the alarm that accompanied waking from a dream; of abruptly comprehending the depth of her indoctrination and the duplicity in which she had innocently cooperated. The transgender cult can look at first (and second) sight like every 'good fight' for civil rights for an oppressed group. It takes time (not necessarily in your case) but certainly for friends of ours to recognise that this cult is rooted in the ancient soil of misogyny.
Yes, Simon, it takes time to recognize the obvious especially after fighting for same sex rights all my life. The “T” along with all the other corrupting “Q” (slur) alphabet, simply s usurped a worthy movement. My first indication that something was wrong occurred when I consulted a National lesbian rights organization to consult with on the issue of males in female sports. They were completely captured by the notion that trans women are women. When I checked into other traditionally same sex organizations I discovered that they too had been corrupted. It was chilling. Invasion of the body snatchers was happening in plain sight. It’s been over two years now since I’ve returned to my active rational mind rather than depending on my brand or tribe. I think to your point of individuals waking one by one, we benefit by this slow recovery, almost like developing natural immunity to illness after suffering debilitating sickness. We must not allow ourselves to be discouraged by the pace of recovery.
"We must not allow ourselves to be discouraged by the pace of recovery." Yes, indeed. In the film you mention the 'horror' is achieved by just that - 'happening in plain sight.' I described that film (not showing it) to our 8 year old grand-daughter who was intrigued, as she is by the many tales we read and invent for her and her brother. Afterwards Hannah went out of our kitchen door and knocked on it. "Come in!" I said "Hullo Hannah my love, what have you been up to?" whereupon she did a superb imitation of the starring eyes open mouth pointing moment that reveals a repossessed body in the 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' film. Since then our Hannah can't resist repeating this little performance, which I enjoy too. I hope this amounts to a sort of childhood 'vaccination' against the ever present seduction of cults (which is what that brilliant film was all about), but we have to keep our fingers firmly X'd.
That is why new women's and LGB groups have come into being, the legacy orgs were all captured and threw women and LGBs under the bus for the big 'trans' money. The 'trans' movement is primarily driven by the male, heterosexual, cross-dresser sexual fetishists, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishist, some of whom had a lot of wealth to fund their agenda/movement. Read the following as just one example of how these men treat women who don't submit to their agenda. https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/stonewall-still-trying-to-kick-womens?
I, too , have been a lifelong Democrat, but I shall not be voting for them...not sure if I shall vote at all, but it will not be for any Democrat who supports the authoritarian insanity of the trans cult.
Like Dave Chappelle, I'm partial to "Team TERF." Like others here, I'm also a lifelong Democrat. I've never been a single-issue voter and will not take that path now. My overriding priorities are fighting climate change and wealth inequality. In foreign affairs, I take an internationalist view and support Biden's Ukraine policy. Where I'm heterodox is in regard to gender and "defund the police" issues. I also prefer a class rather than "identity" approach, particularly with respect to economic policy. So, while I will argue as forcefully as I can for gender-critical perspectives with electeds and on social media, I will not make this a litmus test for how I vote in the general election. I'm very sensitive to the authoritarian character of the trans activist project, but it is clear to me that a far graver and more immediate authoritarian threat is posed by Donald Trump and the Republican Party. I will take the long view with respect to the gender debate, but keeping Trump from regaining power in 2024 is far and away the biggest imperative right now. Preserving our democracy matters most. If we do that, there is hope of better outcomes for a wide range of issues.
While I appreciate your comment greatly, I'm curious what you make of the Mass Formation Psychosis hypothesis as a better explanation of this phenomenon? And while the behavior of crowds in economic bubbles is seen as 'irrational' from a distance, in fact, if one simply stops investing fundamentally and uses 'momentum' to trade, one can make a lot of money playing a bubble. Our current real estate market is a perfect example of exuberance and irrationality that's made more real millionaires in my social circle than I can count. Keep in mind they are chasing economic gains and have strong incentives and feedbacks to do so, to set aside their fundamental analysis.
COVID and the Trans madness I think are much better explained by Mass Formation Psychosis. Do note that this literature in large part stems from psychological study of totalitarian societies and how they succeed in doing great evil with mass popular support, only to later look at it in horror. I think that's what we are involved in. The totalitarian control of thought and speech and behavior to suit govt/elites. Trans is merely one bat they are beating us with, yes?
The trans front is really about realizing Queer Theory. This is why it's so important to them, as according to Marcuse's Critical Theory ideas, they must destroy all social norms wrt sex and the family to have any chance of their Utopia emerging. To them, family and sex roles are how we oppress and control people, it's specifically how we transmit this opressive system from generation to generation. From a Marxist POV, the family and sex roles are the 'means of cultural production' that they must destroy. Trans is seen as the ultimate liberation from all that by Leftists who subscribe to this anti-science.
I'm not at all sure that Mass Formation Psychosis is a real thing. But I have a heuristic I use for understanding information that is surprisingly reliable. The more the mainstream denies and shames a concept/idea/person, the more interested I am in the idea/person.
As for your understanding of what might broadly be called 'cultural marxism', I do think you are missing something. It's not at all about liberating us from conservative values. Rather, as per Marcuse, it's part of the dialectic and how 'history' is stopped from creating us if you will. Queer Theory is apex social ideology as it is not about sex and any meaningful way. It's merely about transgressing ALL social norms. No matter from whom they arise. The way the dialectic works (all stemming from German historicism ultimately) is that if one is doing deconstruction properly, a Utopia will emerge that we can't even begin to imagine from our current position in our social order. The current order blinds us. Only when all of it is destroyed may a new one emerge.
Your last statement is quite mystifying, you dismiss 'engaging' with these ideas. I'm sorry, where has the Right been seriously engaging these ideas? We live in a world utterly shaped by ideas published by Herbert Marcuse 60 years. How many on the right even know this, no less do battle against them, or him? The real problem is we are deeply subverted already, that campaign began 100 year ago in earnest. FDR's hard core socialism (much of which was eventually found to be unconstitutional) was where we started sliding down the shitter. There was a real fight against the Marxists by the likes of Joe McCarthy (who was joined by JFK, Nixon and many others who were gravely concerned by the thousands of commies who'd penetrated local and federal govt) but now you are told that he was a monster (he was nothing of the sort). In fact, he was the first victim of 'cancel culture'. If you doubt me, read M. Stanton Evans brilliant book, Blacklisted by History. You'll see how badly we are lied to about him.
Nixon was impeached cuz he had the nerve to not give up on exposing Alger Hiss, who sat at FDR's side a Yalta and was a key organizer of the U.N., lol, a hard core agent of influence. Part of the 'third international' the Soviets started after WWII.
Our children are only taught that there was this thing called "the Red scare" and that mean conservatives used this technique called "Red Baiting" as Joe McCarthy did in his hearings. But what isn't known is that every single person on McCarthy's list had already been investigated by the State Dept and/or FBI and was guilty as hell. He was correct in almost everything he asserted. And he was not alone, the congress was investigating communist subversion for 30 years by that point.
Yet most folks on the Right proceed in their philosophizing about our politics as though the major institutions of our society haven't been intentionally subverted by Marxist lunatics to bring about a 'revolution' of sorts. We are living through that 'cultural revolution' right now. We are already being locked up, soon the re-education camps will become official. We will never win another POTUS election, I find it so amusing that people think Ronbo or Trump or who ever can save us - they will not win the election no matter what.
It makes me really sad that so few people actually understand how we got here. It's like their subversion worked so well that conservatives brains have become rewired. I often here my fellow conservatives use terms like "McCarthyism" - he did nothing wrong. All he did was call commies, commies. But even in the '50s, you couldn't get away with that...Think about how long ago that was. And think about how few people on the Right have a freaking clue about what we are up against.
I haven't read much on it but I thought the phenomenon of mass formation psychosis described more localised events of hysteria. I feel like its a high intensity version of crowd behavior, which is reasonably explained by Girard's mimetic ideas.
Also I'm a dan of revisionist takes, and my knowledge in that space is dim, but surely McCarthy was also captured by a group-think that acted upon him as the red scare, domino theory etc, and surely this period also impacted moderates or incidental people adjacent to the communist movement?
Read Blacklisted by History by M. Stanton Evans as recommended above. As you state, you aren't well informed on the subject. So this would get you there...You'll be shocked by how badly you've been lied to.
Excellent assessment. As a long time investment advisor, I keep Mackays book handy. What better madness than investors freaking out and believing gibberish on the thinnest of news reports or opinions. Thanks!
Well written and well reasoned with good examples of previous herd mentalities.
Sadly , the “one by one” return to sanity will take a long time , especially since it is not only the “madness of crowds” but also the profit being made from that madness. I have hope, though at 94, I wonder if I’ll ever witness the end of this particularly extensive cult...seemingly in all “progressive” circles throughout much of the world.
You may have heard of 'de-programming' and, since that's been discredited, 'exit counselling'. I hear nothing positive about these hoped for remedies. Thanks for the flattery about my comment. 20 years ago we had the only encounter with the relentless grip of an obsession when the girl friend of a good friend of ours developed a daunting mix of bulimia and anorexia from which after three years she withered away and died. I had never encountered the real strength of a delusion until then. For the first year all this lovely person's closest friends did was to try to reason S out of her fixation on body-weight. I truly, and naively, thought that kindness, tact and persistence would work a remedy. I had not reckoned with the vice-like grip that such an obsession can have over another human being. Reason in which I've long had faith was futile. S's partner would regularly see her accepted for a few weeks' psychiatric care in a prestigious institute - but professional expertise proved as futile as our earlier attempts at reasoning. S rejected all interventions. She shrank to a skeleton before us, sharing images of herself with others like her, fascinated with pictures of striped coated death camp survivors who she saw as having the physical shape to which she aspired. I could almost understand the medieval fantasy that a person was inhabited by an evil spirit and that we might - never seriously considered it - try exorcising it. At least in those days those closest to a person possessed by anorexia had the support of doctors and psychiatrists and the understanding of health agency staff. What's so bad these days about being a relative of someone determined to change their gender is that any scepticism, let alone resistance to that determination, that wish to have surgical mutilation and take meds for life, risks being labeled in the most negative ways as a 'hater', a 'transphobe', deserving, if they are parents, of having their child taken from them by the government, while they face criminal legal action in the courts. Imagine if the state of anorexia and/or bulimia were, as is transitioning now, widely celebrated as some kind of liberation from a heteronormative matrix, and those trying to help, as we were in the case of S, were labelled as obstructive phobic criminals. At the moment UK government policies, amid much public controversy, seem to be striving to place emphasis on 'watchful waiting' on people self-reporting with gender dysphoria as opposed to immediate 'affirmation' leading to pharmaceutical and medical interventions. For reasons I've already mentioned the transgender cult is for the time being impenetrable with its champions having taken such robust 'possession' (that word again) of so many public and private agencies - corporations, civil services, democratic assemblies, health services, the police, the military, publishers, retailers, sporting bodies, churches, schools and universities - that I fear we can only wait for the cult to burn itself out via a vast number of individually evolved remissions.
'...prayer and forgiveness' indeed, Katie! You better know that in conversing with me in cyberspace you are in touch with a failed atheist, or should I say 'lapsed' (:)). Long ago I was in our campus art gallery looking at a medieval painting of a 'The Trinity', among other paintings, in company with an Iraqi citizen, Dhia Al-Asaadi, who we'd managed to get into one of our Phd programmes after life for a secularist (of the Shia faith but secularist in government, imprisoned with relatives under Sadaam) became hazardous in his country. His English was perfect, probably better than mine. I said "I've never been able to understand the Trinity" He, a Muslim, gently explained his understanding of its meaning, to which I replied, perhaps crassly, "you do know I have no faith". D replied "Simon. You cannot reason your way to faith, for all the work of the early Christian theologians trying to prove the existence of God. Faith comes by revelation and that may never happen, or if it did you might not notice." Dhiaa has long been back in Iraq, and though I'm now 81, he still promises that if I come to his country "we will stand together on the ruins of Ur" - where civilisation is supposed to have begun. You know the phrase that goes something 'shook my faith'. Dhiaa's remark shook my reason. It makes me no less wedded to rationality and the endless conversation of science, but in my old age I'm more alert to revelation; which I now know is a sibling to reason. If an apple dropped suddenly on my head I'd probably curse. Newton though 'gravity'. When I get in a bath and the water rises I think 'careful it doesn't overflow'. Archimedes noted this very normal event and jumped naked from his tub, ran down the street, shouting 'eureka', having discovered the solution to measuring the specific gravity, and therefore the precious metal content of an irregular object. Many more examples. I am surrounded by revelations... 'sharing truth and testimony'.
I left AA after 30 years because the Church of Trans managed to manipulate Alcoholics Anonymous General Service Conference into violating AA’s own 10th Tradition, no small feat – “Alcoholics Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the A.A. name ought never be drawn into public controversy” – when it changed the wording of its 1947 Preamble from “Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women…” to “Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of people...”, thus giving a nod to an ideology that demands we celebrate an entirely made up “trans” identity and eradicate biological sexual female and male identities from our language and society. https://irislee.substack.com/p/hazelden-and-rehabs-in-trans-church
I had not heard that. Hard group to boycott! I hope someone is trying to get them back in the real world. Who knows how far the leadership has drifted since the founding. I always wonder what these activists say on a call to harass a business. Especially this one. "Hello, AA?" "Yes?" "I am calling as a trans activist, and you had better not say men or women at meetings or, why we'll......just you see!
Hang up and send them a thank you for not making our meetings 10 times more dramatic.
Sadly, some chapters have stopped reciting the Lord's Prayer during meetings. Wouldn't want to offend an atheist.
At my job, the 30-and-unders definitely fell under the ‘even more feverishly than before’ category. And THEY are the ones who volunteer on the DEI team, making bulletin boards and sending out ‘Inclusion’ emails. During Women’s History Month, there was a bulletin board celebrating 12 (yes, TWELVE) memoirs by trans women. I’m bracing myself for Pride month. When I speak to the older people (first I have to carefully bring the subject up because people are too scared to talk about it) there does seem to be apprehension and even some anger, so I do hope the tide is turning. But I think these people need to speak up more. And sooner. I was thinking about this recently--if one vocal, angry person had balked and spoken out after the first pronoun bulletin board went up, then maybe it would’ve been enough to get it taken down. And we wouldn’t be in the situation we’re in now, with pronoun bulletin boards around every corner.
Don't underestimate the power of marketing. There's a wealthy family - the Pritzkers, I think- who are trans and are heavily invested in the financial aspects of the Trans Medical Complex, which is worth billions. They started at the top of governments, with Obama and Trudeau, and got trans ideology written into our laws before anyone knew what was happening. The first clue Middle America saw was cheater Lia Thomas being forced on a women's collegiate swim team. Pro-trans, anti-woman laws and policies were already in the books by that time. This is a primary reason Biden won't support publishing the new Constitution including the ERA. They want to include gender instead of sex, which will erase the legal protections women had as a sex class. Women need to speak up while we can.
Really interesting Eliza, I’ve noticed similar, but it’s hard to know for sure.
In my circles people late 40’s + seem bemused or enraged and younger people seem to be disengaging. However, as Helen Joyce has written, what I see hugely at my university and associated orgs is that the EDIs are on warp drive. Even if majority of actors in them don’t agree with GI they are bound by these directives to sound and look like they do. Also yes, very much those in 30’s on board seem fanatical. One in particular openly declaring this a war with some very questionable calls to action. Troubling they are linked with major organisations and funders too.
Complicating things even further is that many of the EDIs goals are blended with old school, equality concerns so going against them/questioning them positions people problematically as being against all equality concerns. For many on the left and certainly in education this is the last thing they would want to do.
And then there’s the issues with funding....and with work in this sector. For example, if I applied for a post without pronouns in my bio would the PI privately discriminate against me et cetera? (Or vice versa). This wouldn’t persuade me to use pronouns, but many others might feel they have to.
So at least in my environment at university (UK, Oxford), it’s hard to know what people outwardly do and what they inwardly really think, even if others speak up. I’ve spoken with several people at my Uni on issues of GI, VAWG, and data collection particularly and they just politely listen but say nothing. Not only are they feeling unable to speak freely (likely for a variety of reasons including being knowledgeable, I mean how many of people have time to read all of the in-depth articles, pseudoscience and understand all of the discussion points!?), but also, perhaps they don’t want to be finding themselves in agreement with ‘the right/TERFS/fascists/bigot [insert social shame label here]’ like us!
Absolutely. The self censoring is deeply worrying every time I experience it. And I believe they know this too, wherever they’ve got to on the subject.
Ok, I guess I’m going to be the contrarian here: no, the tide definitely is not turning in the US.
- Most liberal and centrist people are not deep in the weeds of this issue like you and your readers are. They’re not reading or hearing about the excesses. They’re not reading the long Reuters articles that very cautiously bring some me of these issues to the mainstream media for the first time. They didn’t read Jesse Singal’s Atlantic article and they certainly haven’t read his long substack articles picking apart the research. They’ve probably heard of Lia Thomas and will say the sports issue is complicated, but they don’t see it in the sports they watch. The whole Bud Light controversy reinforces the idea that a lot of what they hear on this issue is just internet drama that is best ignored.
- As long as this issue is as politicized as it is, NOTHING will change in the US. We’re about to have a repeat of Trump vs Biden in 2024 with Biden being 100% for transitioning children and Trump promising he’ll make laws to ban it. The politics and culture war forces are powerful. I know many liberals who privately have deep concerns about what’s going on with teen girls but they fall in line with the official Democrat position.
Don't believe the "43%". Trans activists are organized and will gather a mob to skew polls in their favor every time one is posted in an article. If you look at the polls BEFORE the TRAs get to them, the consistent percentage for disbelief in trans ideology is always 98%. Always.
Sorry this feels like speculation. I can’t imagine how you or any of us would get to the polls “before the TRAs” and neither do I believe polls show anything “always”
Unverified claims put gender skeptics in the same belief/culty position as trans allies.
It isn't speculation. It's what I've seen firsthand on every poll that discusses trans ideology on social media. The first thousand or so responses are random, but once the trans borg gets the word out, the poll gets mobbed and the numbers start tilting in their favor. They don't have the support of the general public, so they have to cheat to make it look like they do.
In social psychology, pluralistic ignorance is a situation in which a majority of group members privately reject a norm, but go along with it because they incorrectly assume that most others accept it. This is also described as "no one believes, but everyone thinks that everyone believes".
It's important that we understand how informal internet polls work, and how activists game the system. It's easy to open another browser and vote multiple times. My point being, you are asking ME for receipts without considering the polls are deeply flawed and do not represent the true sentiments of the general public. You should be demanding the pollsters prove their results cannot be hijacked by a swarm of bored children. Sadly, they cannot make that guarantee.
Yes, you may be correct, but, like any situation in which the “spiral of silence” operates, it’s very difficult to gage. I have “come out” to more friends and relatives recently, but only ones I believed it was “safe” to speak to. Their responses, with one exception, indicated an openness to questioning the madness. Does that mean anything? I don’t know, but I hope the “peaking” is just beginning.
Yes, many are afraid to speak out and many are still unaware of what is going on or the extent of it and who is driving it. Stealth and fear-based silence has enabled the 'trans' movement immensely and glomming onto the LGB movement.
I was getting my hair cut awhile back and my hairdresser was shocked when I told her that most LGBs do not support the 'trans' movement. And then I told her, as Helen Joyce who wrote the book, "Trans, When Ideology Meets Reality" said, the nuclear reactor of the 'trans' movement is the male, heterosexual, cross-dresser sexual fetishists, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishists, the men w/ the driving compulsion to 'be' women and to force others to see them that way too. And Joyce said if these men were not driving the 'trans' movement it would not have gotten this far and yet this key part of the movement is rarely discussed.
So I bring it up over and over not only b/c it is important for understanding who these male sexual fetishists are but b/c so many just thought 'trans' was Gay 2.0--it is not. It is misogynist and homophobic. And male fetishes, paraphilias, and erotic compulsions under the guise of 'gender identity' are not worthy of legal civil rights protection. And women need to know when these men insist on invading women's spaces it is about domination and eroticism--they are getting off on it. Women are unwittingly players in these men's fetish play--it is predatory, sexual harassment and is disgusting and women need to say 'No' they will not submit to it.
The potential for maintaining a tribal stance in the face of enormous cognitive dissonance. I have a friend who agrees with me on many specific points I bring up, but when it comes to taking a stance seems to drift back to 'its complicated'.
Also, apathy is built into our cognition. It's often quite sensible to sit things out and focus on what's at hand, work, fixing a fence whatever. I've been curious how, while I am clear this is a medical and social travesty, my level of care, or affect, about it rises and falls...
Absolutely. There is no "turning of the tide" because that would require too many Democrats to admit they were wrong on this issue, and that is something they absolutely will not do. Just recently every single House Dem voted against a bill that would ban men from invading women's sports. They are NOT close to changing their minds on this issue, and won't be until they have an inarguable reason to associate their trans ideology with significant election losses.
I think you’re right that many older people have started to see the light, but my worry is that the young people are so fully indoctrinated that they’ll never come around. The activists are playing a long game - it doesn’t matter much what people over 40 think if your goal is that in 40 years we’ll live in a society where this has completely taken over all aspects of life.
I’ll admit I changes my views. I remember reading stories about young kids who had insisted for years that they were the opposite sex, and I thought there must be something biological to it - why would people lie? So I supported the idea although I hadn’t thought too deeply about it. Then my 14 year old daughter fell down the rabbit hole. And I saw the narrative I’d been fed wasn’t true at all. The people saying they’d “always felt this way” WERE actually lying, and had actually been brainwashed by some weird cult. I found substack and started reading and became a terf (although a very closeted one for now because I can’t alienate my daughter any more than she already is). I see other parents proudly proclaiming their kids’ trans identities and it’s unfathomable to me that someone could be so indoctrinated that they don’t see the truth even when it’s their own child, and that they are willing to sacrifice their kid to this cult.
I do hope you’re right that the tide is turning. But I don’t think I’ll be convinced until I see high school and college students start to doubt the ideology, and I’m not seeing that yet.
By the way, Eliza, I think you’re one of the best and most convincing writers on this topic and I appreciate all your articles. If the tide really is turning, I think you and some of the other writers who aren’t afraid to say what you think are playing a part in that!
There are 2 lawsuits in the works from girls who were transed as teens by Kaiser Permanente. As with so many things in America, the lawsuits will burst the bubble. This is going to be a huge medical scandal.
Another good article, Eliza. Does this article mean you are a liberal overall? I was never sure, sometimes thinking you might be a conservative. Unfortunately, another anti-trans person I admire, Blaire White, proudly showed off her automatic weapon in a recent video, and then started to bash pro-abortion liberals. (Love affair over.) The trans debacle is only going to end when BOTH liberals and conservatives are against it.
The continued somnambulism of the media surprises me. My long love of the Washington Post ended over this issue. It became clear to me that someone in power at the Post had a trans family member, and so their entire editorial stance becamee *unquestioning affirmation*. Their subsidiary publication, The Lily, was supposed to be for women, but now it is mostly devoted to trans people. (One would think that trans people were 20% of the population. I keep wondering how they find enough of them to write about. Of course, most trans people these days are people who jumped on the trans bandwagon and don't have actual dysphoria.)
I have a very special relationship in my life these days, a disabled woman who was once one of my mother's aides. She is one of those people who has incredibly sharp radar for bullshit. Because she is poor, she wanted to do housework for me, and I agreed (and I pay her extremely well, although she works slowly). We got to talking about transgenderism yesterday evening, and it turns out she knows a lot of transgender people, including trans children. She was surprised when I told her that I count myself as "anti-trans" (anti-trans ideas, not anti-trans people). When I explained it to her, she understood everything I said, and I think she may be a convert now. As I was explaining it to her, she even filled in the blanks as I went. "Oh, I see. Figuring out you are not gay just requires sleeping with someone of your own sex, but figuring out you are not trans can lead you down a road that ruins your body and your life." She understood immediately. So I think I may have gotten us a convert. We need to keep converting them one at a time.
I was totally shocked. However, she warned us often enough, saying repeatedly that she was a conservative. But as long as she stuck to the trans issue, I hoped that meant she preferred limited government or some other innocuous thing.
Meh, the only silver lining with trans is that it tends to dissolve left/right polarization. They have the Negative Midas touch, everything they touch turns to shit.
And on the left all the TRA handmaidens just fall into their stereotypical sex-roles to placate and appease the males! Who are claiming to be women! Because as unfeminist as it may sound, the conditioning is 'you don't say no to men'.
Perry I think if men like Blair are accepted we will legally have difficulty keeping other men pretending to be women out of women's sex-class thereby supplanting their rights and opportunities. As for Buck, I don't know if she is still in the porn industry but she was and is not a good role model imo. In fact, how do we tell young people not to 'transition' while approving of Blair and Buck who are walking 'transitioned' role models? (I don't think Blair is fully 'transed').
I don’t think rejecting transgender ideology requires us to reject the existence of men who want to dress and appear as women. That’s very unlikely to succeed. We can reject nonsense claims that by so doing those males are or become women and are entitled to the legal status and rights of women.
Yes, that is my meaning, that is, keeping men out of the sex-class of woman/female and the legal implications of that for women in society. Men must be considered for all purposes as men who are pretending to be women and will not have any legal recognition as women.
Well for one, they became the Wachowski sisters. Larry became Lana and I can't remember the other bro's new name. They came by the sissy fetish because Larry was a customer of Buck's partner who is a pro dominatrix. I can't point to any particular stories as this was around 2015 or somethng, but Buck and her partner had a hand in it. The real pity is that they haven't really done much since. It's all kinda gross because it is so obvious it's a fetish they are exhibiting and they are getting recognition and awards for being top grossing "female" directors.
Let me start out by saying that I'm not the one who praised Buck, who strikes me as odd. Also, I'm not holding anyone up as a role model. I simply enjoyed watching Blaire's videos because she has the right idea on trans issues.
When someone has worked so hard to attain the image of the opposite sex, I respect that by referring to them as the pronouns they prefer. I just won't do the "they" and "them" thing for "non-binary" people.
Hey Perry, you said re Blaire you "admired her" so perhaps I misunderstood you. As to pronouns, since the 'trans' movement is in large part linguistic, I will not use their language or pronouns. I think using their language and pronouns was the 'camel's nose under the tent' and has caused confusion and enabled the 'trans' movement to advance. Of course men pretending to be women affects women more than men so that is prob. why so many women are adamant about not engaging in these men's fiction. And I just cannot deny what my eyes and ears and gut tells me when I clock a man pretending to be a woman. It is women's rights that are being affected and we should not have to be 'kind' and 'respectful' to those who are part of the abrogation of our rights.
Why are we arguing? We agree on 99% of everything. I'm just willing to call trans women "she" and trans men "he" when they have gone to a great deal of effort and expense to appear as the sex they want to be. I don't believe that all trans people are fakers; some of them do feel intensely that they were born the wrong sex. Since I expect people to believe me when I say that I'm attracted to my own gender, the least I can do is to believe trans people who say they feel they should be the opposite gender. It's simply a matter of respect.
If you were to meet Blaire White and called her "he" out of principle, I think that would be rude. I prefer not to be rude. However, there are some trans people whose pronouns I would never respect, like Lia Thomas and that cyclist who has said so many hateful things.
Well, I'm not ready to abandon the Democrats. Republicans are just too extreme. And with a majority of Republicans being Trump supporters (75% to 80%), I feel that we have to keep the Republicans out of power as much as possible.
The trans madness that has infected liberals is unfortunate. The problem is that liberals/Democrats are too willing to accept the propaganda coming from trans activists. That propaganda goes something like this: "It is so exquisitely painful to be existing in the wrong body that trans people must be given everything they want in order to make them feel better, including any and all social accommodations they ask for, such as entry into women's spaces. The pain for trans children is even worse, so much so that children must be allowed (even encouraged) to transition immediately." It is all bullshit, of course, but it is a story which has captured the imagination of liberals, and that is what we are up against. I have tried to talk some liberals out of the propaganda, but for some reason they want to believe in it. Liberals/Democrats are very proud of being the group in this country that eschews prejudice, and accepting trans people whole-heartedly is proof that they really are the best people in the world (even if a lot of them ARE prejudiced in various ways, and are just fooling themselves). Accepting the trans story-line goes right to the heart of being a liberal.
The Dems have let fellow Dems and liberals (and even Liberals) down--esp. women and LGBs when they bully women to accept men in our sex-class and all of the implications that flow from that. Being LGB does not require deceptive pronouns or hormonal or surgical medicalisation in order to be authentic and there is no attempt or need to impose on another's sex-class. Women and men can be more 'masculine' or feminine in their personal expression but they cannot opt into another sex-class. This is fundamental.
LGB equality was about integrating into society but 'trans' 'gender identity' is about disrupting it and reifiying those old stereotypes women and men have fought to eliminate. Women have worked hard for their rights and opportunities and they will not allow men to take them no matter the men's efforts to larp as women. There are times and places when sex does matter. See the website, 'Sex Matters' to see all of the ways it does when making laws and policies.
And we need to remember that the male, heterosexual, cross-dresser sexual fetishist, the men w/ an erotic compulsion, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishists, are a distinct cohort under the vast 'trans' umbrella. They are inside the 'Trojan Horse' that is outwardly presented as LGB, Intersex (DSD), the invented 'trans child,' and 'gender non-conforming people many of whom are just LGB. It is pernicious and dangerous esp. for women and LGBs whose rights are sex-based and not based on a fanatasy in some male-bodied person's head that they are the opposite sex. The Dems have backed the wrong horse re the 'trans' issue and they need to understand they may well lose the next race b/c of it.
I’m not at all sure this issue is big enough to tip win into lose. I’d also like to put trans into the problems with masculinity box not out on a limb by themselves. Lots of good men sure but the trans probs are shared by a lot more men.
The tide IS turning, but the undercurrents of institutionalization are very strong and very well-funded. Just today on NPR, the narrative was skewering us from the "what about the children?" angle, reporting that our concern about kids is clearly a smokescreen for our bigotry and supposed genocidal aims. I want to ask them: are you saying you don't care about the children? The newly peaked in my life believe it is all falling apart like a cheap suit and are confident it cannot last. I think they are right (the truth of this medical scandal IS getting through) but also wrong because of who holds power, who is teaching the children, who is running the hospitals, the media, etc. Details changed to protect identity, but here's a recent exchange. My dental hygienist yesterday told me a horror story about a 17 year old in her family who has undergone surgeries (breasts amputated, also phalloplasty!) and has a full beard. "Her eyes are dead!" Julie said. "The parents didn't know what to do, but they wanted her to be happy, so they supported it. If it had helped her I'd be cheering and waving a trans flag, but she is miserable." When I suggested she contact PITT with her story, she said, "Oh no, this is very private!" I suspect there may be many families who are going through this hell privately, who don't even know of any resources. Nobody is helping them. They may or may not listen to NPR, but they know it's not right. I am heartened by the changes, but we are still up against these powerful industries and institutions who benefit from gender ideology.
Can you define what you mean by “the tide is turning?” What you are reporting is that an increasing number of people in your broader social circle are becoming more skeptical or even peaking. Yet under 30s are holding their beliefs even more tenaciously, and major institutions remain captured. Are you actually supposing there is a scenario in which these institutions can be recaptured?
I would say that there is increasing public awareness of the issue and a shift in our direction among certain demographics. A turning tide? Not so much.
I think that the situation is so awful and so absurd that we want to believe that it cannot sustain itself. There is an implicit belief that historical trends will self-correct. That’s possible, and there are hopeful signs. But it’s also possible that things will get a lot worse.
I am a typical "bleeding heart" liberal, and have been all my life. I've been an outcast in my conservative family. When I recently discussed trans ideology with my father, he reacted, at first, like I was trying to trick him. He hesitantly said he didn't think men should be allowed to compete against women in sports. I commended him for taking that position, and started talking to him about the side effects of puberty blockers on kids, how drag queens are generally adult entertainers, with disgusting degenerate personal lives, who have no business being in the same room with a child. I explained autogynephilia. I told him how our women's prisons in California were allowing men, even convicted rapists, to identify as women and be housed with them in dorm-style settings. I explained how trans-identified men were intent upon infiltrating women's rape crisis centers and domestic violence shelters. I heard him gasp several times as I told him these things. He knew there was something seriously "off" about the trans movement, but he didn't know the details. He and I rarely agree on ANYTHING, so this was a huge deal.
I think we take it for granted that all conservatives are against trans ideology, but many of them have started to evolve on a few issues, like gun control, so it's important to encourage them to hold the line against trans ideology, and arm them with facts so they can defend their original position with confidence.
There were a community of drag queens (trannies back then) in the city I grew up in. I liked my encounters with them, including in the work environment. This type of generalisation is not fact based: “drag queens are generally adult entertainers, with disgusting degenerate personal lives, who have no business being in the same room with a child.” It expresses an attitude that I’m tempted to describe as very close to actual transphobia. There is a lot of rightwing Christian propaganda claiming this and other similar things about anyone they perceive to be sexually active in ways they disapprove of.
The trannies I knew in SF were ALL prostitutes and most were heroin addicts. Drag has never been appropriate for children. Maybe you didn't want to know what they did in parks and back alleys, but I saw it myself. Fetishists of ANY kind have no business being around children. I'm not transphobic- I don't fear them. I LOATHE them. YOU sound like a pathetic handmaiden, determined to be blind to the reality of their dysfunction and innate misogyny and homophobia. Drag is NOT for kids. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMSZdI2KVko
I don’t want to support an intolerant society where those who want to be different are hated. That was your experience but mine was not like that. I found some things about the transsexuals irritating but they weren’t trying to convert me (unlike transgender advocates) and I felt there was room for them and me.
I also come from a country that has decriminalised sex work and I feel the best way forward to discourage prostitution is to 1/unionise sex workers & ensure they can get police protection against abusive clients and 2/ to change male attitudes (bring up boys) to sexuality. Most “fetishists” like domestic violence perpetrators are in the home with their wives and kids. Some of the trannies still live in my city, they’re old now and have had okay lives. I’m glad my life has been very different to theirs but I don’t begrudge their existence.
Ok you are fine with MEN putting on womanface and having our oppressors make a MOCKERY of us and our lives, but god forbid we should EXPOSE their disgusting kinks? Maybe you haven't been paying attention, but trans have been masturbating in women's bathrooms, changing rooms, and locker rooms, and FILMING themselves ejaculating on clothing that they return to the racks. They tape from inside and outside bathrooms stalls, often with women and children present, then upload these films to porn sites, and social media. I've seen a film in which a tranny is filming himself fingering his butthole and sucking on his fingers, saying "Yummmy!" while a child's voice can be heard nearby. Bathroom stalls are not made well in the US, and the child would be able to SEE THIS if he wandered near the stall, as the bottom of the stall is 10" above the floor.
Stop spreading the LIE that we don't want some people to "exist". Of course they exist, as men with sexual paraphilias or gender dysphoria. I have zero sympathy for the former, and only feel sympathy for the latter if they are seeking therapy to make peace with their internalized homophobia and misogyny. Otherwise, fuck them. THEY are haters of women, and I don't owe them the time of day.
As for prostitution, there is no form of it that is not thoroughly destructive to women. It MUST be illegal, otherwise trafficked victims have very little ability to escape. The only acceptable solution is to give women a program through which they are supported and given career training to escape that life. The punters who rape women for money need to go to JAIL. Stripping and porn should be illegal, too. It is NOT empowering for women to build a career around keeping men's dicks happy.
YOU support the "intolerant society" that doesn't believe women's rights, safety, privacy, and dignity have more value than an erection.
The men you are talking about are heterosexual, male, cross-dresser sexual fetishists, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishists. Men w/ erotic compulsions and paraphilias who insist on being in women's spaces to get their sexual thrills. These men are predatory and their erotic compulsion drives them to engage in behaviors that are a threat to women and disregard women's feelings altogether. And some of them insist they are lesbian--it's disgusting. As I said elsewhere, Helen Joyce says these men are the drivers of the 'trans' movement b/c there are some very wealthy ones who have put money into pushing the 'trans' agenda to drive men into women's sex-class. And some of these men are in key positions to further their agenda. See The 11th Hour Blog. And the Asst. Head of HHS is a man pretending to be a woman who has misrepresented the facts regarding 'transitioning' children by saying there is medical agreement about the issue when there is not. See Reduxx.info.
The main perpetrators of this type of crime are family men (there’s a huge number more of them). It used to be called thinks like indecent exposure. It’s not okay but let’s not pretend the only men with problems are transwomen. I object strongly to transgender ideology but I’m not interested in reviving anti-trans bigotry. As for “woman face” get a life please.
Thank you for confirming what many of us are starting to see- instead of screaming "Transphobe" and blocking us for posting GC articles and comments on social media, my online friends and acquaintances are "liking" the comments, and even responding with cautiously-worded questions. Back in 2015, I used to preface any remark about trans ideology with some kind of disclaimer, along the lines of "Of course trans people should be protected from discrimination, but..." Now I have dropped any kind of appeasement, in favor of blunt disgust and OUTRAGE over the imposition of trans ideology on our rights, and the blatant denial of science that so many braindead virtue-signaling lemmings have cosigned. I am THRILLED to finally see a women's cycling competition podium EMPTY, except for the lone troon asshole sheepishly gripping his medal. Those optics are priceless. The UK press has doggedly followed every single case of a trans assaulting a woman or child, and every man being held in a woman's prison. And it couldn't have happened too soon, as Australia attempts to shut down free speech on their own continent and ours. Riley Gaines and Meghan Kelly are pulling no punches. It's refreshing to observe the sea change from "Let's have some more research on puberty blockers" to "GET MEN THE HELL OUT OF OUR SPORTS AND SPACES RIGHT NOW!!!" The Emperor is indeed buck naked, and we are calling his ass OUT!
I don’t preface any remarks with the need to protect transgender people either. There are too many of them that have turned downright vicious, and in any case, they have been able to swing the laws in their favor. They have made their choice and I really have no sympathy for them anymore! People who try to lord it over others don’t deserve respect.
I assume there are some transies that stay to themselves.. and that’s fine. As long as they don’t try to tell the rest of us what to believe.
I think the tide is turning a bit in that greater numbers of people are speaking out and finding they can manage the hostile tides. But the stupid hive mind still succeeds in labeling all opposition as “right-wing” and thus automatically negligible. For the most part college administrators and media managers, even if they don’t drink the Kool Aid at home, are too afraid of resisting the twenty-something’s they oversee. And what will happen when these twenty-something’s are forty-something’s? Will maturity bring wisdom? I fear it may not. The damage has been done.
Another thing — further progress will be impossible as long as the cult and its minions continue to get away with the alphabet trick, the pretense that “LGBTQ” is actually a thing. I don’t think it’s widely appreciated how powerful this trick is. It means that you can’t be opposed to trans without being an anti-gay bigot at the same time. The very fact that our entire society has accepted the moral and legal rights of gay people is, ironically, what gives this trick its power because no one wants to be thought of as anti-gay.
And yet what gives me hope is that reason will triumph because without it we are nothing. Human beings who deny that 2+2=5 are not going to go away.
LGBs don't require fake names, fraudulent, deceptive pronouns or exogenous, cross-sex hormones and plastic/cosmetic sugeries to be their authentic selves. And, yes, the T glommed onto the LGB to make people think it was Gay 2.0--it is not. Let them call you transphobe or homophobe or TERF but don't let them silence you and make you submit to their 'trans' lunacy.
That's why I always identify myself as gay when speaking out against trans ideology. Being part of the LGBT alphabet soup gives me more credibility. But you know, most gay people DO accept the trans propaganda, and I have gay people in my life calling me a bigot for not being pro-trans. I feel totally estranged from the gay community (not that I ever felt that close to them).
A lot of lesbians I know are very opposed to biological males in women’s sports and intimate settings such as locker rooms, showers, and saunas. Most of us don’t speak out publicly for fear of being attacked verbally or physically, but we talk amongst ourselves and write letters to politicians expressing our concerns. I have contacted our US vice-president, among others. I support all persons being able to live the life they want to live as long as doing so doesn’t cause harm to others or take away others’ rights to live the lives that they want to live. Obviously there are gray areas, and that’s what the courts are for, but trans lives should not be prioritized over an already disadvantaged group.
I completely agree with you. I am with Lesbians on this issue, every step of the way.
What I keep saying is this: Men who become trans women have made a choice to transition (I use that word though we know that transitioning is only superficial). Having decided to transition, it isn't fair for trans women to now expect real women to bear the burden of accepting them into their private spaces, where a man doesn't belong. The bottom line is that a trans woman is a man, and always WILL BE a man. If he wants to be in competitive sports, let him transition at 50 instead of 20, or let him engage in non-competitive sports. You can't change reality with wishful thinking and a little surgery.
Excellent. Yesterday, the Times had a long article on how the red states were banning transgender care for children based on just a few regret stories (I will not link to it), making it a typical left-vs-right issue. No "Here's what the rest of the world is doing," in fact, it was totally fact-free.
Instead, to see how the tide is turning, just read how the readers tore the story and the reporting apart. Not a single comment that I read (especially the ones most liked - sort the comments by Readers' Picks) argued for the "points" made by the article. It included parents, teachers, you name it.
And now the Times has completely hidden the story. It was a page-one news article last morning, and now you cannot find it on the Times' home page (and Times has a HUGE homepage that runs for miles), which is so rare for the Times. Even if you search for it, it is buried deep down on the search page.
Wonderful, look forward to it. Also, while I have your attention, I recently wrote a review of the literature on the effect of surgery and hormones on the male body. All are in peer-reviewed, respected medical journals. Unlike the "affirming" literature, which reports on how patients "feel," this stream looks at how the drugs change the body and the brain. https://bit.ly/estro_on_men. And the results are uniformly consistent. Psychologically or physiologically, estrogen is lethal for the young men.
Anyway, that is not the main story here. I recently wrote an email to the Endocrine Society, summarizing my review. Specifically to the authors of their 2017 guideline document (https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/102/11/3869/4157558) that is used by endocrinologists. I did not expect a response but received one from Maureen Corrigan, the Society's Director of Clinical Practice Guidelines, and cc-ed to Dr. Robert Lash, the Society's Chief Medical Officer, and Dr. Marie McDonnell, one of the world’s leading endocrinologists and a member of the Society (interestingly, my email was NOT addressed to any of them). The email did not refute anything I had mentioned but said, "The Endocrine Society continually surveils the portfolio of published clinical practice guidelines for potential updates to make sure we are providing timely, evidence-based recommendations for clinical care and practice. This guideline has been prioritized for an update to start development this year. Our guideline methodology has changed since the development of the 2017 guideline [emphasis mine], and you can read about it here [the link was to https://www.endocrine.org/clinical-practice-guidelines/methodology]."
I found the response interesting because it admitted that the Endocrine Society had changed its guideline methodology after 2017 to now follow the GRADE methodology that ranks evidence based on its quality. So, tacitly, the Endocrine Society was telling me that their 2017 guideline document, which the medical establishment currently follows, is (a) not current since it needs revision and (b) not quite evidence-based, as per GRADE guidelines. Also, the email tries to convey a sense of urgency in the Society's response without committing to any deadline as to when the new guidelines might come out. Meanwhile, young men are being pushed towards medicalization which, published research says, is clearly harmful to them.
Dirty Deleting is the new fashionable MO of major publications and search engines. A few days ago, Google deleted the archive "TRA Violent Threats", a massive collection of screenshots of miscellaneous threats that trans activists have posted to women on social media the past few years. I've been using that archive for years to demonstrate to the "be kind" crowd that feminists did NOT throw the first rock, and that our concerns about the agenda of men who want access to our spaces is well-founded. I have challenged people over and over to post similar threats and hateful comments that a trans person has received from women, but there just aren't any.
Women are not oppressors. We are not predators. We are not bullies. We are not attacking anyone. It's breathtaking how quickly society decided that when a woman defends herself, it's an act of aggression against the man who attacked HER! 1 in 4 women will be raped in her lifetime. No man has ever been owed the benefit of the doubt. We have centuries of proof that women and children need safeguarding from men. Instead of doing better, men have decided to just fucking LIE and lie and lie. If men would put as much energy into addressing their misogyny as they do working their DARVO, we could resolve countless problems. This agenda of entitlement pervades every institution, because they are ALL governed by men.
The last shred of integrity in journalism is circling the drain. Rather than listen to us or adjust their position on the trans issue, the corporations that have been entrusted to supply the public with information have decided it's more expedient to destroy evidence. Wherever the public sentiment doesn't go in the direction they want, they close comments and delete all the detractors. Emerging generations are learning that it's acceptable to evade accountability by way of deceit and aggression. It's up to us to change minds by direct interactions with as many people as we can. Abusers isolate their victims. We need to get the message out to would-be dissenters that they are not alone.
This is good news. Similar things were happening on the Washington Post site. Every article attracted dozens of people who would post anti-trans comments, including me. Indeed, I got kicked off the Post for doing that (even though my comments were always rational and polite). Publications need to be made aware that their readers don't agree with them. The Times is so liberals that you know most of those commenters were liberals too, and that's good -- we need more liberals turning against trans ideology.
It's hard to believe that there are any people in the world who actually believe that letting a girl cut off her breasts could help her in any way. Talking about lobotomies, Dr. Walter Freeman, the doctor who aggressively promoted them in the mid-20th century, was so certain that they were beneficial that he would spontaneously lobotomize people if their families wanted it. He didn't bother to do it in a sanitary surgical environment. He just brought an ice pick with him and did it on the spot. There was one story I read in which he visited a boys' school (it might have been a home for delinquent boys; I don't remember), and he lined some of the boys up on desks and lobomotized all of them right there. Lobotomies became his trademark. Freeman is proof positive that many doctors are more interested in making money and/or a name for themselves than in doing the right thing.
"One of my closest friends made an interesting observation the other day: she said can't think of any other social cause that ‘progressive’ people are expected to support so loudly and passionately and often viciously."
This seems wrong to me. It's true that trans issues are the worst for this this year, but overall black lives matter and (in Canada at least) indigenous rights are issues in which you are required to be just as loud and vicious and to ignore contrary evidence just as much.
Remember in 2020 when we had health professionals who weeks before said florida was commiting mass murder by opening beaches coming together to declare that violent mass protests were okay because 'racism is a public health crisis'? At the time I was a member of a nationwide covid information group on facebook for canadian physicians that was explicitly non-political until the day in july where they posted a petition to abolish the vancouver police department because it was 'a legacy of slavery and jim crow'.
Think about the reaction in Canada after the residential school 'mass graves' story, we literally had people burning down churches and mainstream figures were applauding it. Or the weird situation we're in now that it's been debunked but nobody respectable is willing to acknowledge that out loud.
There are ways in which trans issues are unique but there are plenty of mainstream leftwing causes which demand crusading fervor and willful ignorance of common sense or contrary evidence.
The thing I've noticed that trans and BLM have in common is that they are both very loud, with permissible violence while doing absolutely nothing for the people they purport to champion. Trans people, in my opinion, are as much victims of the medical establishment as they are oppressors of GC women (and women in general). At the end of the day, there are no trans "winners", only celebrated pawns with more mental problems and suicidality than at their "onset". BLM likewise has done nothing to better the lives of black people, instead degrading black culture and substituting it with a cookie-cutter identity and entrenched victimhood. Both have created a pool of pc fans that being without purpose, find it through virtue-signaling and NGO/corporate "activism". Both are very prominent and well-funded examples of the social engineering our society is being subjected to. These populations are being used to usher in a more Orwellian era for all of us. It won't even matter when they become less fashionable trends tomorrow, leaving broken people in their wake. As tools they will have served their purpose for the establishment of the NWO the parasite class is imposing. Trans will be dropped once the 'new important thing' becomes established, like the dystopian trans-humanist nightmare-world which they presage.
People are in their information silos and the 'other side' has been demonized such that they will not listen to anything outside of their group. I have been rather vilified at times for speaking out on the 'trans' issue--including that there is no such thing as 'trans,' it is invention-- and accused of being 'right-wing' but have been a Dem liberal and even Liberal all of my life.
“It’s a sobering process to witness because every single person, without exception, got worse: more fragile and less able to function in day-to-day life, more rigid in their thinking, more self-obsessed and self-surveilling—not to mention less interesting to talk to.”
I think this is an underrated point. Whether it was the 100% untransitioned male “woman” in my Women in Art History class in college who would always chip in to share his agonizing emotional pain at looking at art depicting female bodies, or my sensitive, emotionally-fragile but kind high school stem teacher who transitioned (can’t imagine how his wife and kids felt- especially since his daughter had severe anorexia), and promptly went off the deep end- getting fired for apparently making multiple lewd comments to a female student about her “tits,” or the friend of a friend (who got into “queer culture,” announced herself a man, got a mastectomy and started T, announced her engagement to her girlfriend and decided to celebrate that by getting on tinder and pursuing “ethical non monogamy”) wheedling my lesbian friend about her own passé “identity”…even before I had my own personal experience with gender identity theory and trans, these examples were always at the back of mind mind like “yes they’re trans, but that person has problems, and them being trans has nothing to do with that.” Until I realized, it did.
So I went to the early-onset gender dysphoria/homosexual group to see if THESE people were leading mostly happy and functional lives with the gender dysphoria mostly reduced…and listened to Blaire White (the poster child of the trans med “I did this to treat a mental condition and I know what sex I am and am so glad I transitioned” camp) talk about how he has to go off hormones every once in a while bc it gives him cognitive problems and he “can’t get anything done” bc he can’t think clearly, and how he lets his testicles kick back into gear to clear his head, and how when he’s on hormones, he has no sex life whatsoever even though “it seems like I do from pictures,” but actually doesn’t, as in, none, and is mostly alone, and I’m like…who does this actually help?
Yes, it seems obvious to me that heterosexual people who transition tend to go completely bonkers, as do many homosexual people who transition, but there is a minority of homosexual trans people who do pretty ok, but then reveal these major life difficulties in specific areas of their life that they have managed to sort of silo off via medical transition. Like someone will say, I have pretty much no more gender dysmorphia and I love how I look and how people treat me, but I can’t orgasm so I can’t have romantic relationships.” Or “I have a functional body with minimal health issues and a great social life...but then if someone misgenders me I have to go home and will sob all day.” But they still view it as far better to be dealing with than the gender dysphoria they had before. I’ll have to take their word for it. But I agree there’s a large degree of sunk cost fallacy.
I always wondered if the cross-gender identity is a security blanket, a coping mechanism for the underlying issue of obsessive intrusive thoughts that their body is wrong aka body dysmorphic disorder mixed with social ostracization and shame, and wonder if they wanted to undergo exposure therapy, if the whole issue would just resolve. I can think up a whole exposure script: “I look at myself in the mirror and I see my sex (go into detail). It’s horrible and I feel sick. Everyone treats me in ways that make me feel like they don’t see me as the person I am (go into detail). I’ll never feel comfortable with myself, and I’ll never find love.” <- I bet if a gender dysphoric person did an exposure script like this every day for a week, they’d suddenly find that they went a whole day not even feeling any gender dysphoria and that before long, they could accept their body. The issue is you can’t do an experiment with exposure therapy bc you can’t make people do it- they have to consent, otherwise it’s tantamount to torture.
To add: something like BDD or OCD you can’t treat with exposure bc the person HATES the thoughts and wants to be rid of them. With something like a cross-gender identity, the person WANTS to be the opposite sex and therefore wants to transition. But would they really want to transition if they were told (honestly) that they’d never change their sex? That’s the question. So if you view gender transition as the compulsion and gender dysphoria as the obsession...then it’s no different to any other OCD or BDD anxiety disorder. But we’ve sold people the lie that this particular compulsion coping mechanism (gender transition) actually WILL make the anxiety go away. It seems to me like it won’t.
Excellent points. When it comes to transition, the main driver of sunk cost fallacy is the prospect of losing face. For many dysphoric people, and especially the younger ones, they initially experienced significant pushback from parents when they indicated they wanted to advance from social transition to puberty blockers and surgeries. Even in cases where the parents have immediately given support to the trans-identified person to go forward with transition, the person is surely going to detect the anxiety and confusion of their family members. That's quite a burden of guilt. And the costs are staggering when insurance doesn't cover it. If the person is lucky and there are no complications, they're looking at spending $15,000 - $30,000. But there are always complications. Insurance often doesn't cover the additional surgeries, and it rarely covers any procedure related to detransition. One estimate, from the first counseling appointment, to double mastectomy, to completion of phalloplasty, and management of complications, was $275,000. Imagine telling your parents that you made a mistake, after demanding a medical procedure that cost more than their mortgage, and threatening suicide when they balked. It would be tough to admit it was all for nothing. On top of that, they know how detransitioners will be treated by the trans community, especially if they gained any amount of celebrity in their community or the media when they started their "journey". Someone who already had an anxiety disorder wouldn't stand a chance.
That’s a really good point about the financial and psychosocial barriers to detransition/desistance. I can’t imagine the emotional strength you’d have to have to withstand it. Spending your parents mortgage? Holy shit. I imagine the shame would be almost unbearable. But I think that most people love their kids enough that they’d do more than go bankrupt- they’d take a bullet for them- they wouldn’t set any price on their child’s or adult child’s health and happiness. $275,000 doesn’t just slide down the drain bc your kid’s an idiot or fucked up. Many, many therapists and doctors basically committed medical fraud and malpractice against your unwell child. There really need to start being lawsuits. Once the first successful lawsuit happens in the US, it’s (the unregulated, zero-evidence gender medicine industry) all over.
That's why so many left-leaning lawyers, judges, and legal organizations are so hellbent against letting any such lawsuits happen. It will be quite a while before we see any relief on that front.
My brother works in the medical industry and he just worked with a doctor whose whole approach revolutionized forearm surgeries. This man’s whole point was that basically a million people have been crippled by forearm surgeries that have 1. No evidence to support their technique 2. Ample evidence and basically intuitive knowledge that they COULDN’T work. His talk was all about doctors creating problems bc they don’t think and question what they’re doing constantly. That is like half of medicine: 50% is wrong, and we don’t know which. I would argue 95-99% of gender medicine is totally wrong and ineffective treatments and methods for gender dysphoria just by thinking it through, without any need for a medical degree. A lot of people who don’t work with doctors or don’t know someone who does don’t seem to understand that doctors are fallible average people, many of whom, whether intelligent or not, don’t know how to think properly, and who are constantly figuring out, experimenting, making shit up and backtracking just like everyone else.
I think anxiety disorders (which I would classify gender dysphoria as) can only get better it you face the cause of the anxiety. Unfortunately, it’s extremely counter-intuitive and horrifically terrifying/upsetting for someone experiencing anxiety and therefore a hard sell for clinicians. Like, “hey want to essentially be tortured for a year? You’ll get over your anxiety quick!” This is deeply unpopular and most people go with 1. Compounding unhealthy coping mechanisms and lifelong and only moderately successful talk therapy. Talk therapy can work but eventually you will need to do some exposure work if you want to not be controlled by your anxiety.
Well said! I just hope this cult is going to fall apart! It reminds me way too much of the Germany of the 30’s where everyone had to go along with the lies put forth by the regime! Of course, there are many differences, but there are too many similarities as well Since I lived that nightmare, I want this one gone.
Eliza, I just saw your article on Unherd about the NYT getting detransitioning all wrong. Congratulations if this was your first article for them. That is a highly thought of publication. If it is not your first, then more congratulations!
When the Lt. Governor of MN, an Ojibwa woman, wears -that- shirt while cheering on kids who happened to like dress up and being pretty, and their parents and doctors cheer on their “trans” identity? I voted for her to raise up Native issues and health care. Sadly guess what turned out to be the priority in the legislature.
I don’t use the word Toxic for anyone since it’s overused into meaningless. I’m just sad that the priorities got so twisted in MN. The DFL is a unique Democratic Farmer Labor coalition that has been subsumed by the national [progressive] movement . And not the Walter Mondale, Paul Wellstone kind, “We all do better when we all do better”. The DFL could have focused on actual small farming families and Hmong and other minority farmers, labor rights, small business support... instead....
Excellent article. Charles Mackay wrote in 'Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds' (1841), “Is it a dull or uninstructive picture to see a whole people shaking suddenly off the trammels of reason, and running wild after a golden vision, refusing obstinately to believe that it is not real, till, like a deluded hind running after an ignis fatuus, they are plunged into a quagmire?” Mackay covers an eccentric miscellany of popular delusions, from the witch mania of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to alchemists, magnetizers, slow poisoners, and the “influence of politics and religion on the hair and beard.” Much more recently in 'The Delusions of Crowds: Why People Go Mad in Groups' by William J. Bernstein (2021) writes 'Errors appear when individuals become overly influenced by what others think. The more a group interacts the more it behaves like a real crowd, and the less accurate its assessments become…. As put most succinctly by Friedrich Nietzsche, "Madness is rare in the individual - but with groups, parties, peoples, and ages it is the rule." Mackay also recognized this in his 'Extraordinary Popular Delusions' "Men, it is said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses more slowly, and one by one." I suspect the latter observation refers to why there will be no sudden and 'contagious' end to the transcult, no clearcut 'ending of a tide', as there was at its start. The return to sanity will be gradual, enduring, a slow 'one by one' recovery as deluded individuals emerge on their own from this monstrous nightmare (Goya: "The Sleep of Reason produces Monsters"). There is no arguing or debate to be had with transcult members, for, as Swift observed centuries ago, "... it is futile to reason someone out of a thing that he was not reasoned into." We can conclude that the transcult, like other cults, owes its remarkable power to survive every criticism to the fact that it is not directed towards truth but towards the power needed to maintain a delusion.
Simon, I appreciate your response very much. After being a life long Democrat, it was hard for me to see what my “progressive” group is evolving into. That is until the safeguarding of children and women was sacrificed at the alter of “gender identity.” I think you are correct when you say that it will be individuals peeling away one by one. The deep curiosity and courage to question, hopefully rises in these individuals with the restorative force it did in me. Once in possession of ones mind, it’s impossible to deny the incongruence of reality and lies.
Thanks, Jan. Yes indeed ... 'deep curiosity and courage'. In an account of her early life in Mao's China, Jung Chang wrote, in 'Wild Swans', of her reaction as she began to grasp that her's, her imprisoned family's and her fellow citizens' revered hero was not the figure in whom she'd been taught since birth to have faith. She described her reaction as 'panic' - not at being mistreated in the ingeniously unpleasant ways the Chinese Communist Party treated (and still treats) its dissidents. Hers was the alarm that accompanied waking from a dream; of abruptly comprehending the depth of her indoctrination and the duplicity in which she had innocently cooperated. The transgender cult can look at first (and second) sight like every 'good fight' for civil rights for an oppressed group. It takes time (not necessarily in your case) but certainly for friends of ours to recognise that this cult is rooted in the ancient soil of misogyny.
Yes, Simon, it takes time to recognize the obvious especially after fighting for same sex rights all my life. The “T” along with all the other corrupting “Q” (slur) alphabet, simply s usurped a worthy movement. My first indication that something was wrong occurred when I consulted a National lesbian rights organization to consult with on the issue of males in female sports. They were completely captured by the notion that trans women are women. When I checked into other traditionally same sex organizations I discovered that they too had been corrupted. It was chilling. Invasion of the body snatchers was happening in plain sight. It’s been over two years now since I’ve returned to my active rational mind rather than depending on my brand or tribe. I think to your point of individuals waking one by one, we benefit by this slow recovery, almost like developing natural immunity to illness after suffering debilitating sickness. We must not allow ourselves to be discouraged by the pace of recovery.
"We must not allow ourselves to be discouraged by the pace of recovery." Yes, indeed. In the film you mention the 'horror' is achieved by just that - 'happening in plain sight.' I described that film (not showing it) to our 8 year old grand-daughter who was intrigued, as she is by the many tales we read and invent for her and her brother. Afterwards Hannah went out of our kitchen door and knocked on it. "Come in!" I said "Hullo Hannah my love, what have you been up to?" whereupon she did a superb imitation of the starring eyes open mouth pointing moment that reveals a repossessed body in the 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' film. Since then our Hannah can't resist repeating this little performance, which I enjoy too. I hope this amounts to a sort of childhood 'vaccination' against the ever present seduction of cults (which is what that brilliant film was all about), but we have to keep our fingers firmly X'd.
😂🤣😂Wonderful! Thanks for the charming story. I think she has an excellent chance of growing up free.❤️
Thanks Jan.
The original version from 1956 might be fine for an 8 year old. I adored old horror films at that age. (I still do.)
That is why new women's and LGB groups have come into being, the legacy orgs were all captured and threw women and LGBs under the bus for the big 'trans' money. The 'trans' movement is primarily driven by the male, heterosexual, cross-dresser sexual fetishists, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishist, some of whom had a lot of wealth to fund their agenda/movement. Read the following as just one example of how these men treat women who don't submit to their agenda. https://grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/stonewall-still-trying-to-kick-womens?
I, too , have been a lifelong Democrat, but I shall not be voting for them...not sure if I shall vote at all, but it will not be for any Democrat who supports the authoritarian insanity of the trans cult.
Like Dave Chappelle, I'm partial to "Team TERF." Like others here, I'm also a lifelong Democrat. I've never been a single-issue voter and will not take that path now. My overriding priorities are fighting climate change and wealth inequality. In foreign affairs, I take an internationalist view and support Biden's Ukraine policy. Where I'm heterodox is in regard to gender and "defund the police" issues. I also prefer a class rather than "identity" approach, particularly with respect to economic policy. So, while I will argue as forcefully as I can for gender-critical perspectives with electeds and on social media, I will not make this a litmus test for how I vote in the general election. I'm very sensitive to the authoritarian character of the trans activist project, but it is clear to me that a far graver and more immediate authoritarian threat is posed by Donald Trump and the Republican Party. I will take the long view with respect to the gender debate, but keeping Trump from regaining power in 2024 is far and away the biggest imperative right now. Preserving our democracy matters most. If we do that, there is hope of better outcomes for a wide range of issues.
While I appreciate your comment greatly, I'm curious what you make of the Mass Formation Psychosis hypothesis as a better explanation of this phenomenon? And while the behavior of crowds in economic bubbles is seen as 'irrational' from a distance, in fact, if one simply stops investing fundamentally and uses 'momentum' to trade, one can make a lot of money playing a bubble. Our current real estate market is a perfect example of exuberance and irrationality that's made more real millionaires in my social circle than I can count. Keep in mind they are chasing economic gains and have strong incentives and feedbacks to do so, to set aside their fundamental analysis.
COVID and the Trans madness I think are much better explained by Mass Formation Psychosis. Do note that this literature in large part stems from psychological study of totalitarian societies and how they succeed in doing great evil with mass popular support, only to later look at it in horror. I think that's what we are involved in. The totalitarian control of thought and speech and behavior to suit govt/elites. Trans is merely one bat they are beating us with, yes?
The trans front is really about realizing Queer Theory. This is why it's so important to them, as according to Marcuse's Critical Theory ideas, they must destroy all social norms wrt sex and the family to have any chance of their Utopia emerging. To them, family and sex roles are how we oppress and control people, it's specifically how we transmit this opressive system from generation to generation. From a Marxist POV, the family and sex roles are the 'means of cultural production' that they must destroy. Trans is seen as the ultimate liberation from all that by Leftists who subscribe to this anti-science.
Thoughts?
I'm not at all sure that Mass Formation Psychosis is a real thing. But I have a heuristic I use for understanding information that is surprisingly reliable. The more the mainstream denies and shames a concept/idea/person, the more interested I am in the idea/person.
As for your understanding of what might broadly be called 'cultural marxism', I do think you are missing something. It's not at all about liberating us from conservative values. Rather, as per Marcuse, it's part of the dialectic and how 'history' is stopped from creating us if you will. Queer Theory is apex social ideology as it is not about sex and any meaningful way. It's merely about transgressing ALL social norms. No matter from whom they arise. The way the dialectic works (all stemming from German historicism ultimately) is that if one is doing deconstruction properly, a Utopia will emerge that we can't even begin to imagine from our current position in our social order. The current order blinds us. Only when all of it is destroyed may a new one emerge.
Your last statement is quite mystifying, you dismiss 'engaging' with these ideas. I'm sorry, where has the Right been seriously engaging these ideas? We live in a world utterly shaped by ideas published by Herbert Marcuse 60 years. How many on the right even know this, no less do battle against them, or him? The real problem is we are deeply subverted already, that campaign began 100 year ago in earnest. FDR's hard core socialism (much of which was eventually found to be unconstitutional) was where we started sliding down the shitter. There was a real fight against the Marxists by the likes of Joe McCarthy (who was joined by JFK, Nixon and many others who were gravely concerned by the thousands of commies who'd penetrated local and federal govt) but now you are told that he was a monster (he was nothing of the sort). In fact, he was the first victim of 'cancel culture'. If you doubt me, read M. Stanton Evans brilliant book, Blacklisted by History. You'll see how badly we are lied to about him.
Nixon was impeached cuz he had the nerve to not give up on exposing Alger Hiss, who sat at FDR's side a Yalta and was a key organizer of the U.N., lol, a hard core agent of influence. Part of the 'third international' the Soviets started after WWII.
Our children are only taught that there was this thing called "the Red scare" and that mean conservatives used this technique called "Red Baiting" as Joe McCarthy did in his hearings. But what isn't known is that every single person on McCarthy's list had already been investigated by the State Dept and/or FBI and was guilty as hell. He was correct in almost everything he asserted. And he was not alone, the congress was investigating communist subversion for 30 years by that point.
Yet most folks on the Right proceed in their philosophizing about our politics as though the major institutions of our society haven't been intentionally subverted by Marxist lunatics to bring about a 'revolution' of sorts. We are living through that 'cultural revolution' right now. We are already being locked up, soon the re-education camps will become official. We will never win another POTUS election, I find it so amusing that people think Ronbo or Trump or who ever can save us - they will not win the election no matter what.
It makes me really sad that so few people actually understand how we got here. It's like their subversion worked so well that conservatives brains have become rewired. I often here my fellow conservatives use terms like "McCarthyism" - he did nothing wrong. All he did was call commies, commies. But even in the '50s, you couldn't get away with that...Think about how long ago that was. And think about how few people on the Right have a freaking clue about what we are up against.
I haven't read much on it but I thought the phenomenon of mass formation psychosis described more localised events of hysteria. I feel like its a high intensity version of crowd behavior, which is reasonably explained by Girard's mimetic ideas.
Also I'm a dan of revisionist takes, and my knowledge in that space is dim, but surely McCarthy was also captured by a group-think that acted upon him as the red scare, domino theory etc, and surely this period also impacted moderates or incidental people adjacent to the communist movement?
Read Blacklisted by History by M. Stanton Evans as recommended above. As you state, you aren't well informed on the subject. So this would get you there...You'll be shocked by how badly you've been lied to.
Excellent assessment. As a long time investment advisor, I keep Mackays book handy. What better madness than investors freaking out and believing gibberish on the thinnest of news reports or opinions. Thanks!
Excellent reply, Simon! Thank you!
Well written and well reasoned with good examples of previous herd mentalities.
Sadly , the “one by one” return to sanity will take a long time , especially since it is not only the “madness of crowds” but also the profit being made from that madness. I have hope, though at 94, I wonder if I’ll ever witness the end of this particularly extensive cult...seemingly in all “progressive” circles throughout much of the world.
You may have heard of 'de-programming' and, since that's been discredited, 'exit counselling'. I hear nothing positive about these hoped for remedies. Thanks for the flattery about my comment. 20 years ago we had the only encounter with the relentless grip of an obsession when the girl friend of a good friend of ours developed a daunting mix of bulimia and anorexia from which after three years she withered away and died. I had never encountered the real strength of a delusion until then. For the first year all this lovely person's closest friends did was to try to reason S out of her fixation on body-weight. I truly, and naively, thought that kindness, tact and persistence would work a remedy. I had not reckoned with the vice-like grip that such an obsession can have over another human being. Reason in which I've long had faith was futile. S's partner would regularly see her accepted for a few weeks' psychiatric care in a prestigious institute - but professional expertise proved as futile as our earlier attempts at reasoning. S rejected all interventions. She shrank to a skeleton before us, sharing images of herself with others like her, fascinated with pictures of striped coated death camp survivors who she saw as having the physical shape to which she aspired. I could almost understand the medieval fantasy that a person was inhabited by an evil spirit and that we might - never seriously considered it - try exorcising it. At least in those days those closest to a person possessed by anorexia had the support of doctors and psychiatrists and the understanding of health agency staff. What's so bad these days about being a relative of someone determined to change their gender is that any scepticism, let alone resistance to that determination, that wish to have surgical mutilation and take meds for life, risks being labeled in the most negative ways as a 'hater', a 'transphobe', deserving, if they are parents, of having their child taken from them by the government, while they face criminal legal action in the courts. Imagine if the state of anorexia and/or bulimia were, as is transitioning now, widely celebrated as some kind of liberation from a heteronormative matrix, and those trying to help, as we were in the case of S, were labelled as obstructive phobic criminals. At the moment UK government policies, amid much public controversy, seem to be striving to place emphasis on 'watchful waiting' on people self-reporting with gender dysphoria as opposed to immediate 'affirmation' leading to pharmaceutical and medical interventions. For reasons I've already mentioned the transgender cult is for the time being impenetrable with its champions having taken such robust 'possession' (that word again) of so many public and private agencies - corporations, civil services, democratic assemblies, health services, the police, the military, publishers, retailers, sporting bodies, churches, schools and universities - that I fear we can only wait for the cult to burn itself out via a vast number of individually evolved remissions.
'...prayer and forgiveness' indeed, Katie! You better know that in conversing with me in cyberspace you are in touch with a failed atheist, or should I say 'lapsed' (:)). Long ago I was in our campus art gallery looking at a medieval painting of a 'The Trinity', among other paintings, in company with an Iraqi citizen, Dhia Al-Asaadi, who we'd managed to get into one of our Phd programmes after life for a secularist (of the Shia faith but secularist in government, imprisoned with relatives under Sadaam) became hazardous in his country. His English was perfect, probably better than mine. I said "I've never been able to understand the Trinity" He, a Muslim, gently explained his understanding of its meaning, to which I replied, perhaps crassly, "you do know I have no faith". D replied "Simon. You cannot reason your way to faith, for all the work of the early Christian theologians trying to prove the existence of God. Faith comes by revelation and that may never happen, or if it did you might not notice." Dhiaa has long been back in Iraq, and though I'm now 81, he still promises that if I come to his country "we will stand together on the ruins of Ur" - where civilisation is supposed to have begun. You know the phrase that goes something 'shook my faith'. Dhiaa's remark shook my reason. It makes me no less wedded to rationality and the endless conversation of science, but in my old age I'm more alert to revelation; which I now know is a sibling to reason. If an apple dropped suddenly on my head I'd probably curse. Newton though 'gravity'. When I get in a bath and the water rises I think 'careful it doesn't overflow'. Archimedes noted this very normal event and jumped naked from his tub, ran down the street, shouting 'eureka', having discovered the solution to measuring the specific gravity, and therefore the precious metal content of an irregular object. Many more examples. I am surrounded by revelations... 'sharing truth and testimony'.
I left AA after 30 years because the Church of Trans managed to manipulate Alcoholics Anonymous General Service Conference into violating AA’s own 10th Tradition, no small feat – “Alcoholics Anonymous has no opinion on outside issues; hence the A.A. name ought never be drawn into public controversy” – when it changed the wording of its 1947 Preamble from “Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women…” to “Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of people...”, thus giving a nod to an ideology that demands we celebrate an entirely made up “trans” identity and eradicate biological sexual female and male identities from our language and society. https://irislee.substack.com/p/hazelden-and-rehabs-in-trans-church
I had not heard that. Hard group to boycott! I hope someone is trying to get them back in the real world. Who knows how far the leadership has drifted since the founding. I always wonder what these activists say on a call to harass a business. Especially this one. "Hello, AA?" "Yes?" "I am calling as a trans activist, and you had better not say men or women at meetings or, why we'll......just you see!
Hang up and send them a thank you for not making our meetings 10 times more dramatic.
Sadly, some chapters have stopped reciting the Lord's Prayer during meetings. Wouldn't want to offend an atheist.
At my job, the 30-and-unders definitely fell under the ‘even more feverishly than before’ category. And THEY are the ones who volunteer on the DEI team, making bulletin boards and sending out ‘Inclusion’ emails. During Women’s History Month, there was a bulletin board celebrating 12 (yes, TWELVE) memoirs by trans women. I’m bracing myself for Pride month. When I speak to the older people (first I have to carefully bring the subject up because people are too scared to talk about it) there does seem to be apprehension and even some anger, so I do hope the tide is turning. But I think these people need to speak up more. And sooner. I was thinking about this recently--if one vocal, angry person had balked and spoken out after the first pronoun bulletin board went up, then maybe it would’ve been enough to get it taken down. And we wouldn’t be in the situation we’re in now, with pronoun bulletin boards around every corner.
Don't underestimate the power of marketing. There's a wealthy family - the Pritzkers, I think- who are trans and are heavily invested in the financial aspects of the Trans Medical Complex, which is worth billions. They started at the top of governments, with Obama and Trudeau, and got trans ideology written into our laws before anyone knew what was happening. The first clue Middle America saw was cheater Lia Thomas being forced on a women's collegiate swim team. Pro-trans, anti-woman laws and policies were already in the books by that time. This is a primary reason Biden won't support publishing the new Constitution including the ERA. They want to include gender instead of sex, which will erase the legal protections women had as a sex class. Women need to speak up while we can.
Really interesting Eliza, I’ve noticed similar, but it’s hard to know for sure.
In my circles people late 40’s + seem bemused or enraged and younger people seem to be disengaging. However, as Helen Joyce has written, what I see hugely at my university and associated orgs is that the EDIs are on warp drive. Even if majority of actors in them don’t agree with GI they are bound by these directives to sound and look like they do. Also yes, very much those in 30’s on board seem fanatical. One in particular openly declaring this a war with some very questionable calls to action. Troubling they are linked with major organisations and funders too.
Complicating things even further is that many of the EDIs goals are blended with old school, equality concerns so going against them/questioning them positions people problematically as being against all equality concerns. For many on the left and certainly in education this is the last thing they would want to do.
And then there’s the issues with funding....and with work in this sector. For example, if I applied for a post without pronouns in my bio would the PI privately discriminate against me et cetera? (Or vice versa). This wouldn’t persuade me to use pronouns, but many others might feel they have to.
So at least in my environment at university (UK, Oxford), it’s hard to know what people outwardly do and what they inwardly really think, even if others speak up. I’ve spoken with several people at my Uni on issues of GI, VAWG, and data collection particularly and they just politely listen but say nothing. Not only are they feeling unable to speak freely (likely for a variety of reasons including being knowledgeable, I mean how many of people have time to read all of the in-depth articles, pseudoscience and understand all of the discussion points!?), but also, perhaps they don’t want to be finding themselves in agreement with ‘the right/TERFS/fascists/bigot [insert social shame label here]’ like us!
Absolutely. The self censoring is deeply worrying every time I experience it. And I believe they know this too, wherever they’ve got to on the subject.
Malevolence. Excellent description.
Ok, I guess I’m going to be the contrarian here: no, the tide definitely is not turning in the US.
- Most liberal and centrist people are not deep in the weeds of this issue like you and your readers are. They’re not reading or hearing about the excesses. They’re not reading the long Reuters articles that very cautiously bring some me of these issues to the mainstream media for the first time. They didn’t read Jesse Singal’s Atlantic article and they certainly haven’t read his long substack articles picking apart the research. They’ve probably heard of Lia Thomas and will say the sports issue is complicated, but they don’t see it in the sports they watch. The whole Bud Light controversy reinforces the idea that a lot of what they hear on this issue is just internet drama that is best ignored.
- This recent poll from the Washington Post. Yes, they report a “clear majority” doesn’t believe you can be a different gender than what you were at birth, but I would argue that 43% saying it can differ is not a turning tide. https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2023/05/05/trans-poll-gop-politics-laws/
- As long as this issue is as politicized as it is, NOTHING will change in the US. We’re about to have a repeat of Trump vs Biden in 2024 with Biden being 100% for transitioning children and Trump promising he’ll make laws to ban it. The politics and culture war forces are powerful. I know many liberals who privately have deep concerns about what’s going on with teen girls but they fall in line with the official Democrat position.
Don't believe the "43%". Trans activists are organized and will gather a mob to skew polls in their favor every time one is posted in an article. If you look at the polls BEFORE the TRAs get to them, the consistent percentage for disbelief in trans ideology is always 98%. Always.
Sorry this feels like speculation. I can’t imagine how you or any of us would get to the polls “before the TRAs” and neither do I believe polls show anything “always”
Unverified claims put gender skeptics in the same belief/culty position as trans allies.
It isn't speculation. It's what I've seen firsthand on every poll that discusses trans ideology on social media. The first thousand or so responses are random, but once the trans borg gets the word out, the poll gets mobbed and the numbers start tilting in their favor. They don't have the support of the general public, so they have to cheat to make it look like they do.
In social psychology, pluralistic ignorance is a situation in which a majority of group members privately reject a norm, but go along with it because they incorrectly assume that most others accept it. This is also described as "no one believes, but everyone thinks that everyone believes".
It's important that we understand how informal internet polls work, and how activists game the system. It's easy to open another browser and vote multiple times. My point being, you are asking ME for receipts without considering the polls are deeply flawed and do not represent the true sentiments of the general public. You should be demanding the pollsters prove their results cannot be hijacked by a swarm of bored children. Sadly, they cannot make that guarantee.
Sorry I wasn’t counting social media polls. I thought you were referring to serious research or polls carried out by pollsters belonging to companies.
Yes, you may be correct, but, like any situation in which the “spiral of silence” operates, it’s very difficult to gage. I have “come out” to more friends and relatives recently, but only ones I believed it was “safe” to speak to. Their responses, with one exception, indicated an openness to questioning the madness. Does that mean anything? I don’t know, but I hope the “peaking” is just beginning.
Yes, many are afraid to speak out and many are still unaware of what is going on or the extent of it and who is driving it. Stealth and fear-based silence has enabled the 'trans' movement immensely and glomming onto the LGB movement.
I was getting my hair cut awhile back and my hairdresser was shocked when I told her that most LGBs do not support the 'trans' movement. And then I told her, as Helen Joyce who wrote the book, "Trans, When Ideology Meets Reality" said, the nuclear reactor of the 'trans' movement is the male, heterosexual, cross-dresser sexual fetishists, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishists, the men w/ the driving compulsion to 'be' women and to force others to see them that way too. And Joyce said if these men were not driving the 'trans' movement it would not have gotten this far and yet this key part of the movement is rarely discussed.
So I bring it up over and over not only b/c it is important for understanding who these male sexual fetishists are but b/c so many just thought 'trans' was Gay 2.0--it is not. It is misogynist and homophobic. And male fetishes, paraphilias, and erotic compulsions under the guise of 'gender identity' are not worthy of legal civil rights protection. And women need to know when these men insist on invading women's spaces it is about domination and eroticism--they are getting off on it. Women are unwittingly players in these men's fetish play--it is predatory, sexual harassment and is disgusting and women need to say 'No' they will not submit to it.
Yes! This! Every word!
The potential for maintaining a tribal stance in the face of enormous cognitive dissonance. I have a friend who agrees with me on many specific points I bring up, but when it comes to taking a stance seems to drift back to 'its complicated'.
Also, apathy is built into our cognition. It's often quite sensible to sit things out and focus on what's at hand, work, fixing a fence whatever. I've been curious how, while I am clear this is a medical and social travesty, my level of care, or affect, about it rises and falls...
Absolutely. There is no "turning of the tide" because that would require too many Democrats to admit they were wrong on this issue, and that is something they absolutely will not do. Just recently every single House Dem voted against a bill that would ban men from invading women's sports. They are NOT close to changing their minds on this issue, and won't be until they have an inarguable reason to associate their trans ideology with significant election losses.
I think you’re right that many older people have started to see the light, but my worry is that the young people are so fully indoctrinated that they’ll never come around. The activists are playing a long game - it doesn’t matter much what people over 40 think if your goal is that in 40 years we’ll live in a society where this has completely taken over all aspects of life.
I’ll admit I changes my views. I remember reading stories about young kids who had insisted for years that they were the opposite sex, and I thought there must be something biological to it - why would people lie? So I supported the idea although I hadn’t thought too deeply about it. Then my 14 year old daughter fell down the rabbit hole. And I saw the narrative I’d been fed wasn’t true at all. The people saying they’d “always felt this way” WERE actually lying, and had actually been brainwashed by some weird cult. I found substack and started reading and became a terf (although a very closeted one for now because I can’t alienate my daughter any more than she already is). I see other parents proudly proclaiming their kids’ trans identities and it’s unfathomable to me that someone could be so indoctrinated that they don’t see the truth even when it’s their own child, and that they are willing to sacrifice their kid to this cult.
I do hope you’re right that the tide is turning. But I don’t think I’ll be convinced until I see high school and college students start to doubt the ideology, and I’m not seeing that yet.
By the way, Eliza, I think you’re one of the best and most convincing writers on this topic and I appreciate all your articles. If the tide really is turning, I think you and some of the other writers who aren’t afraid to say what you think are playing a part in that!
There are 2 lawsuits in the works from girls who were transed as teens by Kaiser Permanente. As with so many things in America, the lawsuits will burst the bubble. This is going to be a huge medical scandal.
Another good article, Eliza. Does this article mean you are a liberal overall? I was never sure, sometimes thinking you might be a conservative. Unfortunately, another anti-trans person I admire, Blaire White, proudly showed off her automatic weapon in a recent video, and then started to bash pro-abortion liberals. (Love affair over.) The trans debacle is only going to end when BOTH liberals and conservatives are against it.
The continued somnambulism of the media surprises me. My long love of the Washington Post ended over this issue. It became clear to me that someone in power at the Post had a trans family member, and so their entire editorial stance becamee *unquestioning affirmation*. Their subsidiary publication, The Lily, was supposed to be for women, but now it is mostly devoted to trans people. (One would think that trans people were 20% of the population. I keep wondering how they find enough of them to write about. Of course, most trans people these days are people who jumped on the trans bandwagon and don't have actual dysphoria.)
I have a very special relationship in my life these days, a disabled woman who was once one of my mother's aides. She is one of those people who has incredibly sharp radar for bullshit. Because she is poor, she wanted to do housework for me, and I agreed (and I pay her extremely well, although she works slowly). We got to talking about transgenderism yesterday evening, and it turns out she knows a lot of transgender people, including trans children. She was surprised when I told her that I count myself as "anti-trans" (anti-trans ideas, not anti-trans people). When I explained it to her, she understood everything I said, and I think she may be a convert now. As I was explaining it to her, she even filled in the blanks as I went. "Oh, I see. Figuring out you are not gay just requires sleeping with someone of your own sex, but figuring out you are not trans can lead you down a road that ruins your body and your life." She understood immediately. So I think I may have gotten us a convert. We need to keep converting them one at a time.
So sad about Blair. I liked her videos too especially the one with Buck Angel.
I was totally shocked. However, she warned us often enough, saying repeatedly that she was a conservative. But as long as she stuck to the trans issue, I hoped that meant she preferred limited government or some other innocuous thing.
Meh, the only silver lining with trans is that it tends to dissolve left/right polarization. They have the Negative Midas touch, everything they touch turns to shit.
And on the left all the TRA handmaidens just fall into their stereotypical sex-roles to placate and appease the males! Who are claiming to be women! Because as unfeminist as it may sound, the conditioning is 'you don't say no to men'.
Perry I think if men like Blair are accepted we will legally have difficulty keeping other men pretending to be women out of women's sex-class thereby supplanting their rights and opportunities. As for Buck, I don't know if she is still in the porn industry but she was and is not a good role model imo. In fact, how do we tell young people not to 'transition' while approving of Blair and Buck who are walking 'transitioned' role models? (I don't think Blair is fully 'transed').
I don’t think rejecting transgender ideology requires us to reject the existence of men who want to dress and appear as women. That’s very unlikely to succeed. We can reject nonsense claims that by so doing those males are or become women and are entitled to the legal status and rights of women.
Yes, that is my meaning, that is, keeping men out of the sex-class of woman/female and the legal implications of that for women in society. Men must be considered for all purposes as men who are pretending to be women and will not have any legal recognition as women.
Buck has a lot to answer for. She was complicit in a couple of big Hollywood transings (with lovely BDSM overtones) the Wachowski bros being foremost.
What's the problem with the Wachowski bros? Can you suggest some magazine article or something?
Well for one, they became the Wachowski sisters. Larry became Lana and I can't remember the other bro's new name. They came by the sissy fetish because Larry was a customer of Buck's partner who is a pro dominatrix. I can't point to any particular stories as this was around 2015 or somethng, but Buck and her partner had a hand in it. The real pity is that they haven't really done much since. It's all kinda gross because it is so obvious it's a fetish they are exhibiting and they are getting recognition and awards for being top grossing "female" directors.
Let me start out by saying that I'm not the one who praised Buck, who strikes me as odd. Also, I'm not holding anyone up as a role model. I simply enjoyed watching Blaire's videos because she has the right idea on trans issues.
When someone has worked so hard to attain the image of the opposite sex, I respect that by referring to them as the pronouns they prefer. I just won't do the "they" and "them" thing for "non-binary" people.
Hey Perry, you said re Blaire you "admired her" so perhaps I misunderstood you. As to pronouns, since the 'trans' movement is in large part linguistic, I will not use their language or pronouns. I think using their language and pronouns was the 'camel's nose under the tent' and has caused confusion and enabled the 'trans' movement to advance. Of course men pretending to be women affects women more than men so that is prob. why so many women are adamant about not engaging in these men's fiction. And I just cannot deny what my eyes and ears and gut tells me when I clock a man pretending to be a woman. It is women's rights that are being affected and we should not have to be 'kind' and 'respectful' to those who are part of the abrogation of our rights.
Why are we arguing? We agree on 99% of everything. I'm just willing to call trans women "she" and trans men "he" when they have gone to a great deal of effort and expense to appear as the sex they want to be. I don't believe that all trans people are fakers; some of them do feel intensely that they were born the wrong sex. Since I expect people to believe me when I say that I'm attracted to my own gender, the least I can do is to believe trans people who say they feel they should be the opposite gender. It's simply a matter of respect.
If you were to meet Blaire White and called her "he" out of principle, I think that would be rude. I prefer not to be rude. However, there are some trans people whose pronouns I would never respect, like Lia Thomas and that cyclist who has said so many hateful things.
Well, I'm not ready to abandon the Democrats. Republicans are just too extreme. And with a majority of Republicans being Trump supporters (75% to 80%), I feel that we have to keep the Republicans out of power as much as possible.
The trans madness that has infected liberals is unfortunate. The problem is that liberals/Democrats are too willing to accept the propaganda coming from trans activists. That propaganda goes something like this: "It is so exquisitely painful to be existing in the wrong body that trans people must be given everything they want in order to make them feel better, including any and all social accommodations they ask for, such as entry into women's spaces. The pain for trans children is even worse, so much so that children must be allowed (even encouraged) to transition immediately." It is all bullshit, of course, but it is a story which has captured the imagination of liberals, and that is what we are up against. I have tried to talk some liberals out of the propaganda, but for some reason they want to believe in it. Liberals/Democrats are very proud of being the group in this country that eschews prejudice, and accepting trans people whole-heartedly is proof that they really are the best people in the world (even if a lot of them ARE prejudiced in various ways, and are just fooling themselves). Accepting the trans story-line goes right to the heart of being a liberal.
The Dems have let fellow Dems and liberals (and even Liberals) down--esp. women and LGBs when they bully women to accept men in our sex-class and all of the implications that flow from that. Being LGB does not require deceptive pronouns or hormonal or surgical medicalisation in order to be authentic and there is no attempt or need to impose on another's sex-class. Women and men can be more 'masculine' or feminine in their personal expression but they cannot opt into another sex-class. This is fundamental.
LGB equality was about integrating into society but 'trans' 'gender identity' is about disrupting it and reifiying those old stereotypes women and men have fought to eliminate. Women have worked hard for their rights and opportunities and they will not allow men to take them no matter the men's efforts to larp as women. There are times and places when sex does matter. See the website, 'Sex Matters' to see all of the ways it does when making laws and policies.
And we need to remember that the male, heterosexual, cross-dresser sexual fetishist, the men w/ an erotic compulsion, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishists, are a distinct cohort under the vast 'trans' umbrella. They are inside the 'Trojan Horse' that is outwardly presented as LGB, Intersex (DSD), the invented 'trans child,' and 'gender non-conforming people many of whom are just LGB. It is pernicious and dangerous esp. for women and LGBs whose rights are sex-based and not based on a fanatasy in some male-bodied person's head that they are the opposite sex. The Dems have backed the wrong horse re the 'trans' issue and they need to understand they may well lose the next race b/c of it.
I’m not at all sure this issue is big enough to tip win into lose. I’d also like to put trans into the problems with masculinity box not out on a limb by themselves. Lots of good men sure but the trans probs are shared by a lot more men.
sure you can have a sane rational dialogue until abortion comes up.
I have not been able to decide if it's worth it.
The tide IS turning, but the undercurrents of institutionalization are very strong and very well-funded. Just today on NPR, the narrative was skewering us from the "what about the children?" angle, reporting that our concern about kids is clearly a smokescreen for our bigotry and supposed genocidal aims. I want to ask them: are you saying you don't care about the children? The newly peaked in my life believe it is all falling apart like a cheap suit and are confident it cannot last. I think they are right (the truth of this medical scandal IS getting through) but also wrong because of who holds power, who is teaching the children, who is running the hospitals, the media, etc. Details changed to protect identity, but here's a recent exchange. My dental hygienist yesterday told me a horror story about a 17 year old in her family who has undergone surgeries (breasts amputated, also phalloplasty!) and has a full beard. "Her eyes are dead!" Julie said. "The parents didn't know what to do, but they wanted her to be happy, so they supported it. If it had helped her I'd be cheering and waving a trans flag, but she is miserable." When I suggested she contact PITT with her story, she said, "Oh no, this is very private!" I suspect there may be many families who are going through this hell privately, who don't even know of any resources. Nobody is helping them. They may or may not listen to NPR, but they know it's not right. I am heartened by the changes, but we are still up against these powerful industries and institutions who benefit from gender ideology.
Can you define what you mean by “the tide is turning?” What you are reporting is that an increasing number of people in your broader social circle are becoming more skeptical or even peaking. Yet under 30s are holding their beliefs even more tenaciously, and major institutions remain captured. Are you actually supposing there is a scenario in which these institutions can be recaptured?
I would say that there is increasing public awareness of the issue and a shift in our direction among certain demographics. A turning tide? Not so much.
I think that the situation is so awful and so absurd that we want to believe that it cannot sustain itself. There is an implicit belief that historical trends will self-correct. That’s possible, and there are hopeful signs. But it’s also possible that things will get a lot worse.
This could be a very long haul.
I am a typical "bleeding heart" liberal, and have been all my life. I've been an outcast in my conservative family. When I recently discussed trans ideology with my father, he reacted, at first, like I was trying to trick him. He hesitantly said he didn't think men should be allowed to compete against women in sports. I commended him for taking that position, and started talking to him about the side effects of puberty blockers on kids, how drag queens are generally adult entertainers, with disgusting degenerate personal lives, who have no business being in the same room with a child. I explained autogynephilia. I told him how our women's prisons in California were allowing men, even convicted rapists, to identify as women and be housed with them in dorm-style settings. I explained how trans-identified men were intent upon infiltrating women's rape crisis centers and domestic violence shelters. I heard him gasp several times as I told him these things. He knew there was something seriously "off" about the trans movement, but he didn't know the details. He and I rarely agree on ANYTHING, so this was a huge deal.
I think we take it for granted that all conservatives are against trans ideology, but many of them have started to evolve on a few issues, like gun control, so it's important to encourage them to hold the line against trans ideology, and arm them with facts so they can defend their original position with confidence.
There were a community of drag queens (trannies back then) in the city I grew up in. I liked my encounters with them, including in the work environment. This type of generalisation is not fact based: “drag queens are generally adult entertainers, with disgusting degenerate personal lives, who have no business being in the same room with a child.” It expresses an attitude that I’m tempted to describe as very close to actual transphobia. There is a lot of rightwing Christian propaganda claiming this and other similar things about anyone they perceive to be sexually active in ways they disapprove of.
The trannies I knew in SF were ALL prostitutes and most were heroin addicts. Drag has never been appropriate for children. Maybe you didn't want to know what they did in parks and back alleys, but I saw it myself. Fetishists of ANY kind have no business being around children. I'm not transphobic- I don't fear them. I LOATHE them. YOU sound like a pathetic handmaiden, determined to be blind to the reality of their dysfunction and innate misogyny and homophobia. Drag is NOT for kids. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMSZdI2KVko
I don’t want to support an intolerant society where those who want to be different are hated. That was your experience but mine was not like that. I found some things about the transsexuals irritating but they weren’t trying to convert me (unlike transgender advocates) and I felt there was room for them and me.
I also come from a country that has decriminalised sex work and I feel the best way forward to discourage prostitution is to 1/unionise sex workers & ensure they can get police protection against abusive clients and 2/ to change male attitudes (bring up boys) to sexuality. Most “fetishists” like domestic violence perpetrators are in the home with their wives and kids. Some of the trannies still live in my city, they’re old now and have had okay lives. I’m glad my life has been very different to theirs but I don’t begrudge their existence.
Ok you are fine with MEN putting on womanface and having our oppressors make a MOCKERY of us and our lives, but god forbid we should EXPOSE their disgusting kinks? Maybe you haven't been paying attention, but trans have been masturbating in women's bathrooms, changing rooms, and locker rooms, and FILMING themselves ejaculating on clothing that they return to the racks. They tape from inside and outside bathrooms stalls, often with women and children present, then upload these films to porn sites, and social media. I've seen a film in which a tranny is filming himself fingering his butthole and sucking on his fingers, saying "Yummmy!" while a child's voice can be heard nearby. Bathroom stalls are not made well in the US, and the child would be able to SEE THIS if he wandered near the stall, as the bottom of the stall is 10" above the floor.
Stop spreading the LIE that we don't want some people to "exist". Of course they exist, as men with sexual paraphilias or gender dysphoria. I have zero sympathy for the former, and only feel sympathy for the latter if they are seeking therapy to make peace with their internalized homophobia and misogyny. Otherwise, fuck them. THEY are haters of women, and I don't owe them the time of day.
As for prostitution, there is no form of it that is not thoroughly destructive to women. It MUST be illegal, otherwise trafficked victims have very little ability to escape. The only acceptable solution is to give women a program through which they are supported and given career training to escape that life. The punters who rape women for money need to go to JAIL. Stripping and porn should be illegal, too. It is NOT empowering for women to build a career around keeping men's dicks happy.
YOU support the "intolerant society" that doesn't believe women's rights, safety, privacy, and dignity have more value than an erection.
The men you are talking about are heterosexual, male, cross-dresser sexual fetishists, autogynephiles/transvestic fetishists. Men w/ erotic compulsions and paraphilias who insist on being in women's spaces to get their sexual thrills. These men are predatory and their erotic compulsion drives them to engage in behaviors that are a threat to women and disregard women's feelings altogether. And some of them insist they are lesbian--it's disgusting. As I said elsewhere, Helen Joyce says these men are the drivers of the 'trans' movement b/c there are some very wealthy ones who have put money into pushing the 'trans' agenda to drive men into women's sex-class. And some of these men are in key positions to further their agenda. See The 11th Hour Blog. And the Asst. Head of HHS is a man pretending to be a woman who has misrepresented the facts regarding 'transitioning' children by saying there is medical agreement about the issue when there is not. See Reduxx.info.
The main perpetrators of this type of crime are family men (there’s a huge number more of them). It used to be called thinks like indecent exposure. It’s not okay but let’s not pretend the only men with problems are transwomen. I object strongly to transgender ideology but I’m not interested in reviving anti-trans bigotry. As for “woman face” get a life please.
Thank you for confirming what many of us are starting to see- instead of screaming "Transphobe" and blocking us for posting GC articles and comments on social media, my online friends and acquaintances are "liking" the comments, and even responding with cautiously-worded questions. Back in 2015, I used to preface any remark about trans ideology with some kind of disclaimer, along the lines of "Of course trans people should be protected from discrimination, but..." Now I have dropped any kind of appeasement, in favor of blunt disgust and OUTRAGE over the imposition of trans ideology on our rights, and the blatant denial of science that so many braindead virtue-signaling lemmings have cosigned. I am THRILLED to finally see a women's cycling competition podium EMPTY, except for the lone troon asshole sheepishly gripping his medal. Those optics are priceless. The UK press has doggedly followed every single case of a trans assaulting a woman or child, and every man being held in a woman's prison. And it couldn't have happened too soon, as Australia attempts to shut down free speech on their own continent and ours. Riley Gaines and Meghan Kelly are pulling no punches. It's refreshing to observe the sea change from "Let's have some more research on puberty blockers" to "GET MEN THE HELL OUT OF OUR SPORTS AND SPACES RIGHT NOW!!!" The Emperor is indeed buck naked, and we are calling his ass OUT!
I don’t preface any remarks with the need to protect transgender people either. There are too many of them that have turned downright vicious, and in any case, they have been able to swing the laws in their favor. They have made their choice and I really have no sympathy for them anymore! People who try to lord it over others don’t deserve respect.
I assume there are some transies that stay to themselves.. and that’s fine. As long as they don’t try to tell the rest of us what to believe.
I think the tide is turning a bit in that greater numbers of people are speaking out and finding they can manage the hostile tides. But the stupid hive mind still succeeds in labeling all opposition as “right-wing” and thus automatically negligible. For the most part college administrators and media managers, even if they don’t drink the Kool Aid at home, are too afraid of resisting the twenty-something’s they oversee. And what will happen when these twenty-something’s are forty-something’s? Will maturity bring wisdom? I fear it may not. The damage has been done.
Another thing — further progress will be impossible as long as the cult and its minions continue to get away with the alphabet trick, the pretense that “LGBTQ” is actually a thing. I don’t think it’s widely appreciated how powerful this trick is. It means that you can’t be opposed to trans without being an anti-gay bigot at the same time. The very fact that our entire society has accepted the moral and legal rights of gay people is, ironically, what gives this trick its power because no one wants to be thought of as anti-gay.
And yet what gives me hope is that reason will triumph because without it we are nothing. Human beings who deny that 2+2=5 are not going to go away.
LGBs don't require fake names, fraudulent, deceptive pronouns or exogenous, cross-sex hormones and plastic/cosmetic sugeries to be their authentic selves. And, yes, the T glommed onto the LGB to make people think it was Gay 2.0--it is not. Let them call you transphobe or homophobe or TERF but don't let them silence you and make you submit to their 'trans' lunacy.
#LGBwithoutT is a movement to drop the TQI from the LGB.
That's why I always identify myself as gay when speaking out against trans ideology. Being part of the LGBT alphabet soup gives me more credibility. But you know, most gay people DO accept the trans propaganda, and I have gay people in my life calling me a bigot for not being pro-trans. I feel totally estranged from the gay community (not that I ever felt that close to them).
A lot of lesbians I know are very opposed to biological males in women’s sports and intimate settings such as locker rooms, showers, and saunas. Most of us don’t speak out publicly for fear of being attacked verbally or physically, but we talk amongst ourselves and write letters to politicians expressing our concerns. I have contacted our US vice-president, among others. I support all persons being able to live the life they want to live as long as doing so doesn’t cause harm to others or take away others’ rights to live the lives that they want to live. Obviously there are gray areas, and that’s what the courts are for, but trans lives should not be prioritized over an already disadvantaged group.
I completely agree with you. I am with Lesbians on this issue, every step of the way.
What I keep saying is this: Men who become trans women have made a choice to transition (I use that word though we know that transitioning is only superficial). Having decided to transition, it isn't fair for trans women to now expect real women to bear the burden of accepting them into their private spaces, where a man doesn't belong. The bottom line is that a trans woman is a man, and always WILL BE a man. If he wants to be in competitive sports, let him transition at 50 instead of 20, or let him engage in non-competitive sports. You can't change reality with wishful thinking and a little surgery.
No men in women's sports or spaces or sex-class ever at any age. They are men --no exceptions.
Excellent. Yesterday, the Times had a long article on how the red states were banning transgender care for children based on just a few regret stories (I will not link to it), making it a typical left-vs-right issue. No "Here's what the rest of the world is doing," in fact, it was totally fact-free.
Instead, to see how the tide is turning, just read how the readers tore the story and the reporting apart. Not a single comment that I read (especially the ones most liked - sort the comments by Readers' Picks) argued for the "points" made by the article. It included parents, teachers, you name it.
And now the Times has completely hidden the story. It was a page-one news article last morning, and now you cannot find it on the Times' home page (and Times has a HUGE homepage that runs for miles), which is so rare for the Times. Even if you search for it, it is buried deep down on the search page.
I just wrote a piece for UnHerd about that shameful article. Should go up later today.
Wonderful, look forward to it. Also, while I have your attention, I recently wrote a review of the literature on the effect of surgery and hormones on the male body. All are in peer-reviewed, respected medical journals. Unlike the "affirming" literature, which reports on how patients "feel," this stream looks at how the drugs change the body and the brain. https://bit.ly/estro_on_men. And the results are uniformly consistent. Psychologically or physiologically, estrogen is lethal for the young men.
Anyway, that is not the main story here. I recently wrote an email to the Endocrine Society, summarizing my review. Specifically to the authors of their 2017 guideline document (https://academic.oup.com/jcem/article/102/11/3869/4157558) that is used by endocrinologists. I did not expect a response but received one from Maureen Corrigan, the Society's Director of Clinical Practice Guidelines, and cc-ed to Dr. Robert Lash, the Society's Chief Medical Officer, and Dr. Marie McDonnell, one of the world’s leading endocrinologists and a member of the Society (interestingly, my email was NOT addressed to any of them). The email did not refute anything I had mentioned but said, "The Endocrine Society continually surveils the portfolio of published clinical practice guidelines for potential updates to make sure we are providing timely, evidence-based recommendations for clinical care and practice. This guideline has been prioritized for an update to start development this year. Our guideline methodology has changed since the development of the 2017 guideline [emphasis mine], and you can read about it here [the link was to https://www.endocrine.org/clinical-practice-guidelines/methodology]."
I found the response interesting because it admitted that the Endocrine Society had changed its guideline methodology after 2017 to now follow the GRADE methodology that ranks evidence based on its quality. So, tacitly, the Endocrine Society was telling me that their 2017 guideline document, which the medical establishment currently follows, is (a) not current since it needs revision and (b) not quite evidence-based, as per GRADE guidelines. Also, the email tries to convey a sense of urgency in the Society's response without committing to any deadline as to when the new guidelines might come out. Meanwhile, young men are being pushed towards medicalization which, published research says, is clearly harmful to them.
I have now read it and it is very good.
Dirty Deleting is the new fashionable MO of major publications and search engines. A few days ago, Google deleted the archive "TRA Violent Threats", a massive collection of screenshots of miscellaneous threats that trans activists have posted to women on social media the past few years. I've been using that archive for years to demonstrate to the "be kind" crowd that feminists did NOT throw the first rock, and that our concerns about the agenda of men who want access to our spaces is well-founded. I have challenged people over and over to post similar threats and hateful comments that a trans person has received from women, but there just aren't any.
Women are not oppressors. We are not predators. We are not bullies. We are not attacking anyone. It's breathtaking how quickly society decided that when a woman defends herself, it's an act of aggression against the man who attacked HER! 1 in 4 women will be raped in her lifetime. No man has ever been owed the benefit of the doubt. We have centuries of proof that women and children need safeguarding from men. Instead of doing better, men have decided to just fucking LIE and lie and lie. If men would put as much energy into addressing their misogyny as they do working their DARVO, we could resolve countless problems. This agenda of entitlement pervades every institution, because they are ALL governed by men.
The last shred of integrity in journalism is circling the drain. Rather than listen to us or adjust their position on the trans issue, the corporations that have been entrusted to supply the public with information have decided it's more expedient to destroy evidence. Wherever the public sentiment doesn't go in the direction they want, they close comments and delete all the detractors. Emerging generations are learning that it's acceptable to evade accountability by way of deceit and aggression. It's up to us to change minds by direct interactions with as many people as we can. Abusers isolate their victims. We need to get the message out to would-be dissenters that they are not alone.
This is good news. Similar things were happening on the Washington Post site. Every article attracted dozens of people who would post anti-trans comments, including me. Indeed, I got kicked off the Post for doing that (even though my comments were always rational and polite). Publications need to be made aware that their readers don't agree with them. The Times is so liberals that you know most of those commenters were liberals too, and that's good -- we need more liberals turning against trans ideology.
Very true. We need to make the natural allies understand the dangers of this modern-day lobotomy under the guise of compassionate care.
It's hard to believe that there are any people in the world who actually believe that letting a girl cut off her breasts could help her in any way. Talking about lobotomies, Dr. Walter Freeman, the doctor who aggressively promoted them in the mid-20th century, was so certain that they were beneficial that he would spontaneously lobotomize people if their families wanted it. He didn't bother to do it in a sanitary surgical environment. He just brought an ice pick with him and did it on the spot. There was one story I read in which he visited a boys' school (it might have been a home for delinquent boys; I don't remember), and he lined some of the boys up on desks and lobomotized all of them right there. Lobotomies became his trademark. Freeman is proof positive that many doctors are more interested in making money and/or a name for themselves than in doing the right thing.
"One of my closest friends made an interesting observation the other day: she said can't think of any other social cause that ‘progressive’ people are expected to support so loudly and passionately and often viciously."
This seems wrong to me. It's true that trans issues are the worst for this this year, but overall black lives matter and (in Canada at least) indigenous rights are issues in which you are required to be just as loud and vicious and to ignore contrary evidence just as much.
Remember in 2020 when we had health professionals who weeks before said florida was commiting mass murder by opening beaches coming together to declare that violent mass protests were okay because 'racism is a public health crisis'? At the time I was a member of a nationwide covid information group on facebook for canadian physicians that was explicitly non-political until the day in july where they posted a petition to abolish the vancouver police department because it was 'a legacy of slavery and jim crow'.
Think about the reaction in Canada after the residential school 'mass graves' story, we literally had people burning down churches and mainstream figures were applauding it. Or the weird situation we're in now that it's been debunked but nobody respectable is willing to acknowledge that out loud.
There are ways in which trans issues are unique but there are plenty of mainstream leftwing causes which demand crusading fervor and willful ignorance of common sense or contrary evidence.
The thing I've noticed that trans and BLM have in common is that they are both very loud, with permissible violence while doing absolutely nothing for the people they purport to champion. Trans people, in my opinion, are as much victims of the medical establishment as they are oppressors of GC women (and women in general). At the end of the day, there are no trans "winners", only celebrated pawns with more mental problems and suicidality than at their "onset". BLM likewise has done nothing to better the lives of black people, instead degrading black culture and substituting it with a cookie-cutter identity and entrenched victimhood. Both have created a pool of pc fans that being without purpose, find it through virtue-signaling and NGO/corporate "activism". Both are very prominent and well-funded examples of the social engineering our society is being subjected to. These populations are being used to usher in a more Orwellian era for all of us. It won't even matter when they become less fashionable trends tomorrow, leaving broken people in their wake. As tools they will have served their purpose for the establishment of the NWO the parasite class is imposing. Trans will be dropped once the 'new important thing' becomes established, like the dystopian trans-humanist nightmare-world which they presage.
People are in their information silos and the 'other side' has been demonized such that they will not listen to anything outside of their group. I have been rather vilified at times for speaking out on the 'trans' issue--including that there is no such thing as 'trans,' it is invention-- and accused of being 'right-wing' but have been a Dem liberal and even Liberal all of my life.
“It’s a sobering process to witness because every single person, without exception, got worse: more fragile and less able to function in day-to-day life, more rigid in their thinking, more self-obsessed and self-surveilling—not to mention less interesting to talk to.”
I think this is an underrated point. Whether it was the 100% untransitioned male “woman” in my Women in Art History class in college who would always chip in to share his agonizing emotional pain at looking at art depicting female bodies, or my sensitive, emotionally-fragile but kind high school stem teacher who transitioned (can’t imagine how his wife and kids felt- especially since his daughter had severe anorexia), and promptly went off the deep end- getting fired for apparently making multiple lewd comments to a female student about her “tits,” or the friend of a friend (who got into “queer culture,” announced herself a man, got a mastectomy and started T, announced her engagement to her girlfriend and decided to celebrate that by getting on tinder and pursuing “ethical non monogamy”) wheedling my lesbian friend about her own passé “identity”…even before I had my own personal experience with gender identity theory and trans, these examples were always at the back of mind mind like “yes they’re trans, but that person has problems, and them being trans has nothing to do with that.” Until I realized, it did.
So I went to the early-onset gender dysphoria/homosexual group to see if THESE people were leading mostly happy and functional lives with the gender dysphoria mostly reduced…and listened to Blaire White (the poster child of the trans med “I did this to treat a mental condition and I know what sex I am and am so glad I transitioned” camp) talk about how he has to go off hormones every once in a while bc it gives him cognitive problems and he “can’t get anything done” bc he can’t think clearly, and how he lets his testicles kick back into gear to clear his head, and how when he’s on hormones, he has no sex life whatsoever even though “it seems like I do from pictures,” but actually doesn’t, as in, none, and is mostly alone, and I’m like…who does this actually help?
Yes, it seems obvious to me that heterosexual people who transition tend to go completely bonkers, as do many homosexual people who transition, but there is a minority of homosexual trans people who do pretty ok, but then reveal these major life difficulties in specific areas of their life that they have managed to sort of silo off via medical transition. Like someone will say, I have pretty much no more gender dysmorphia and I love how I look and how people treat me, but I can’t orgasm so I can’t have romantic relationships.” Or “I have a functional body with minimal health issues and a great social life...but then if someone misgenders me I have to go home and will sob all day.” But they still view it as far better to be dealing with than the gender dysphoria they had before. I’ll have to take their word for it. But I agree there’s a large degree of sunk cost fallacy.
I always wondered if the cross-gender identity is a security blanket, a coping mechanism for the underlying issue of obsessive intrusive thoughts that their body is wrong aka body dysmorphic disorder mixed with social ostracization and shame, and wonder if they wanted to undergo exposure therapy, if the whole issue would just resolve. I can think up a whole exposure script: “I look at myself in the mirror and I see my sex (go into detail). It’s horrible and I feel sick. Everyone treats me in ways that make me feel like they don’t see me as the person I am (go into detail). I’ll never feel comfortable with myself, and I’ll never find love.” <- I bet if a gender dysphoric person did an exposure script like this every day for a week, they’d suddenly find that they went a whole day not even feeling any gender dysphoria and that before long, they could accept their body. The issue is you can’t do an experiment with exposure therapy bc you can’t make people do it- they have to consent, otherwise it’s tantamount to torture.
To add: something like BDD or OCD you can’t treat with exposure bc the person HATES the thoughts and wants to be rid of them. With something like a cross-gender identity, the person WANTS to be the opposite sex and therefore wants to transition. But would they really want to transition if they were told (honestly) that they’d never change their sex? That’s the question. So if you view gender transition as the compulsion and gender dysphoria as the obsession...then it’s no different to any other OCD or BDD anxiety disorder. But we’ve sold people the lie that this particular compulsion coping mechanism (gender transition) actually WILL make the anxiety go away. It seems to me like it won’t.
Excellent points. When it comes to transition, the main driver of sunk cost fallacy is the prospect of losing face. For many dysphoric people, and especially the younger ones, they initially experienced significant pushback from parents when they indicated they wanted to advance from social transition to puberty blockers and surgeries. Even in cases where the parents have immediately given support to the trans-identified person to go forward with transition, the person is surely going to detect the anxiety and confusion of their family members. That's quite a burden of guilt. And the costs are staggering when insurance doesn't cover it. If the person is lucky and there are no complications, they're looking at spending $15,000 - $30,000. But there are always complications. Insurance often doesn't cover the additional surgeries, and it rarely covers any procedure related to detransition. One estimate, from the first counseling appointment, to double mastectomy, to completion of phalloplasty, and management of complications, was $275,000. Imagine telling your parents that you made a mistake, after demanding a medical procedure that cost more than their mortgage, and threatening suicide when they balked. It would be tough to admit it was all for nothing. On top of that, they know how detransitioners will be treated by the trans community, especially if they gained any amount of celebrity in their community or the media when they started their "journey". Someone who already had an anxiety disorder wouldn't stand a chance.
That’s a really good point about the financial and psychosocial barriers to detransition/desistance. I can’t imagine the emotional strength you’d have to have to withstand it. Spending your parents mortgage? Holy shit. I imagine the shame would be almost unbearable. But I think that most people love their kids enough that they’d do more than go bankrupt- they’d take a bullet for them- they wouldn’t set any price on their child’s or adult child’s health and happiness. $275,000 doesn’t just slide down the drain bc your kid’s an idiot or fucked up. Many, many therapists and doctors basically committed medical fraud and malpractice against your unwell child. There really need to start being lawsuits. Once the first successful lawsuit happens in the US, it’s (the unregulated, zero-evidence gender medicine industry) all over.
That's why so many left-leaning lawyers, judges, and legal organizations are so hellbent against letting any such lawsuits happen. It will be quite a while before we see any relief on that front.
Sorry I meant CAN treat BDD or OCD with exposure
My brother works in the medical industry and he just worked with a doctor whose whole approach revolutionized forearm surgeries. This man’s whole point was that basically a million people have been crippled by forearm surgeries that have 1. No evidence to support their technique 2. Ample evidence and basically intuitive knowledge that they COULDN’T work. His talk was all about doctors creating problems bc they don’t think and question what they’re doing constantly. That is like half of medicine: 50% is wrong, and we don’t know which. I would argue 95-99% of gender medicine is totally wrong and ineffective treatments and methods for gender dysphoria just by thinking it through, without any need for a medical degree. A lot of people who don’t work with doctors or don’t know someone who does don’t seem to understand that doctors are fallible average people, many of whom, whether intelligent or not, don’t know how to think properly, and who are constantly figuring out, experimenting, making shit up and backtracking just like everyone else.
I think anxiety disorders (which I would classify gender dysphoria as) can only get better it you face the cause of the anxiety. Unfortunately, it’s extremely counter-intuitive and horrifically terrifying/upsetting for someone experiencing anxiety and therefore a hard sell for clinicians. Like, “hey want to essentially be tortured for a year? You’ll get over your anxiety quick!” This is deeply unpopular and most people go with 1. Compounding unhealthy coping mechanisms and lifelong and only moderately successful talk therapy. Talk therapy can work but eventually you will need to do some exposure work if you want to not be controlled by your anxiety.
A couple of very good Helen Joyce interviews.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xUrtNW6Fzo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTZsfk6Ms6s
Well said! I just hope this cult is going to fall apart! It reminds me way too much of the Germany of the 30’s where everyone had to go along with the lies put forth by the regime! Of course, there are many differences, but there are too many similarities as well Since I lived that nightmare, I want this one gone.
Eliza, I just saw your article on Unherd about the NYT getting detransitioning all wrong. Congratulations if this was your first article for them. That is a highly thought of publication. If it is not your first, then more congratulations!
My fifth, I think!
When the Lt. Governor of MN, an Ojibwa woman, wears -that- shirt while cheering on kids who happened to like dress up and being pretty, and their parents and doctors cheer on their “trans” identity? I voted for her to raise up Native issues and health care. Sadly guess what turned out to be the priority in the legislature.
I don’t use the word Toxic for anyone since it’s overused into meaningless. I’m just sad that the priorities got so twisted in MN. The DFL is a unique Democratic Farmer Labor coalition that has been subsumed by the national [progressive] movement . And not the Walter Mondale, Paul Wellstone kind, “We all do better when we all do better”. The DFL could have focused on actual small farming families and Hmong and other minority farmers, labor rights, small business support... instead....