With regard to the comment about this dissenting position becoming one's identity: I often worry that I'm becoming obsessed with this issue, but as a university student, I've started to come to the conclusion that this issue is just obsessed with me. I have tried over and over and over again to say, "That's it! I'm done! I don't care about this stupid issue anymore! Other people can figure it out! I'm gonna live my life!" and just move on from the topic. Inevitably, no more than a few weeks can go by before I am directly confronted with a situation that requires me to deal head-on with this ideology and its vanguard.
Recent examples include: joining a women's sports team, only to find out one of my teammates was a man; going to use the toilet, only to have to help an international visitor (for whom English was not a primary language) figure out if she should use the one labeled "cubicles" or "cubicles and urinals", as opposed to the much more widely known vocab "men" or "women"; making a connection with a cool butch lesbian, only to have her get mad at me for calling her a woman; meeting my personal tutor, only to find out that he's transitioning his teenage son; hitting it off with another cool butch lesbian, only to have her get mad at me for not realising she's nonbinary; resigning from the Feminist Society after they condemned the recent Supreme Court ruling in the UK that protected single-sex spaces; having other students start ranting, unprompted, about their hatred for JK Rowling to me and getting hostile when I don't share their vitriol; meeting YET ANOTHER butch lesbian who turns out to be some flavour of "trans".
I could go on. I peaked via a very traumatic experience with a trans-identifying male that I would absolutely LOVE to move on from and never think about again. My field of study has very little to do with gender or medicine. I don't want to do this for a career. It is 100% in my interest to just forget about this issue and move on, but every time I try to pull back, I get dragged right back into the fray by the utter ubiquity of trans ideology in my life. Seeing as this is how it is, my thinking is that I'll leave this issue alone as soon as it leaves ME alone.
This is an excellent point very well made. "Trans" is shoved down women's throats. Even a woman furthest from the "action" must now contend with the appalling disappearance of regulated, single-sex bathrooms--and must plan each day of her life accordingly.
Yes, I regularly tell myself to take a break, to stop reading and thinking and talking about this. Unlike you, I’m not interacting with it in real life on a daily basis (just occasionally). But I can’t stop thinking about it. I had been bored with the emphasis on gender in academia, but today I think it’s inescapable and is transforming education, medicine, science, and law. So I can’t stop thinking about it.
Relatable. I admit I have been obsessed with this for a very long time, but it feels like it’s also obsessed with me, by happenstance inescapable. On an intellectual level, I understand some people have managed to mostly avoid it, but that’s so foreign from my experience… some of us are maybe a little narratively doomed.
Horrible and heartbreaking to hear from a mother about her son hating his penis and not thinking that was a problem to help him with, not saying he needs to "take care of his penis" so that one day it can be removed to make him into a "girl." Tell that boy he's also beautiful on the outside. Parents like that are pathological imo. And that little boy is in big trouble. Same goes for the little girls in similar situations, but the boys can start hating their bodies at such an early age because their maleness is more exterior. Tragic and unconscionable. Ben is right, it's child abuse.
I think it was Sarah who asked what happens to the gender clinicians now that the clinics are closing. They seem to read the tea leaves, quietly jump ship and embark on a sort of detransition themselves. Here’s the case of one such clinician:
He goes from “any pronouns” to “he”, and there’s no mention of gender anything in his new job bio.
If we needed any evidence that these clinicians are driven by self interest and personal advancement at the expense of other people’s children, here it is.
I'm guessing Dr. JOK opens her own practice? (Although, will she be able to get malpractice insurance?) There must be enough true believers (endocrinologists, etc) to join her gender clinic?
I am afraid that when justice is not served, self interested physicians and clinicians will continue to practice in the same way they always have. The child victim is blamed for not knowing better when adults don't admit their mistakes and the harm caused. As clinicians, I think it is important to do everything in our power to ensure children do not internalize the mistakes of the professionals who treated them.
Your conversation today moved me to tears. Every politician, ever ideologically captured reporter should be made to listen to this podcast to the end. Jamie, your description of the medical abuse was chilling. All of you were so thoughtful and compassionate. Thank you.
I agree, while I listened to this podcast, I kept thinking I have to save this one to share other pro affirmative care. It was very good. I was moved by what Cori shared about living life with a medicalized body. I find that Cori doesn't speak often but when he does it is very meaningful, I also want to hear more from Cori.
I am sure that for many this is true. Sadly. I can't help but think, though, that a lot of the Democratic politicians are just cowards. They go along to get along with the party apparat and the interest groups. Doubtless, the fact that Trump is moving to stop this abuse makes them less willing to listen to testimony from detransitioners and Jamie. I suspect some of these politicians may not be members of the Church of Trans. Rather, they can't allow themselves to question party dogma...and the Democratic party has enshrined chemical castration and removal of children's body parts as a civil right.
Yes, but I find that some episodes are dominated by different hosts and it was certainly nice having Ben take the lead for this one. There are other episodes where Sarah and Cori have more to say.
Dining/hanging out with octogenarians: Strongly recommended, as often as possible, for all of us.
Being in the body you're in: Nope, we are not IN bodies, we ARE bodies; we are the bodies we are, male and female. The idea of a separate "essence" inhabiting bodies is part of what enabled the mutilation frenzy to begin with.
Our societal attachment to "helping" has driven us to some really unhealthy places. We ought to remember this to the extent that we hope to be any use at all to the people who became objects of transmania--objects acted upon by "helpers."
I heard so much resignation about accountability for this. Sure, there *won't* be much accountability if everyone resigns from holding anyone accountable! How about withholding declarations about how little you are willing to accept moving forward--and inviting some supercharged, supersmart...lawyer, say (Glenna?), to develop accountability structures and strategies we can rally around from the start! Jamie, your fire will be crucial for this...
Yes, being "in" a body implies that the mind is separate from the body. Yes, we "are" bodies and our minds are part of our bodies--not separate, not hovering over us like a ghost following us around.
I was pleased to see that the comments on the New York Times article about clinics in blue states closing were overwhelmingly critical of these treatments, and that these critical comments were the most highly recommended. There were only very few who tried to perpetuate old myths like blockers being reversible or the regret rate being below that of other surgeries, and they were swiftly fact-checked by others. There are apparently a good number of well-informed NYTimes readers out there! Or is it just that the gender critical people flock to the comments of these articles, and this is not at all representative of the Times' general readership? Either way, if they read these comments, they will hopefully learn something.
I had to ask my 12-year-old what "based" means here (I'm not a native speaker), and he explained it, haha. I seem to remember that the last time I read NYTimes readers' comments on this topic, there were more people who were still arguing in favor of gender identity ideology, but it may have been on the sports issue, which may not yet have lost as much support as the medicalization of kids.
I think the NYT was happily censoring GC commenters right up until Trump got reelected, then they started easing up a bit. There was definitely a pattern where their highest rated comments on trans articles were often very, very carefully worded criticisms of pro Trans arguments.
Did you mean criticisms of anti-Trans arguments? Or did you notice a pattern of carefully worded criticisms of pro-Trans arguments that were designed to criticize very gently? I'm too new to this topic to have observed anything about the NYT comments prior to Trump's election.
I mean readers would criticise the pro trans arguments, but loads of those comments would get deleted for failing to use the "correct" terminology. Only the most carefully worded critiques would survive, and because of that they often accumulated a lot of upvotes.
We're going to need a truth and reconciliation process for these families. We're going to need structured self-help support meetings (La Leche League, AlAnon model) where people can receive understanding, information, and support. We will need new endocrine/psych/functional med practices doing post care, that help people put themselves back together hormonally or go forward in best possible way health and MH wise. We will need to educate all of society in compassion & tolerance for very nonconforming looking people who were medically harmed, & deserve peace and tolerance with their various outcomes (but no lying re 'sex'), until the bubble of those so harmed goes away like the foot bound women went away.
Another thing I think about in kids like Avery who were socially transitioned very young is that they will also be going through certain developmental cognitive changes that could cause a lot of new and confusing feelings about their identity. For example, outgrowing magical thinking and developing more abstract thinking skills. They are also developing higher levels of theory of mind and being able to imagine what other people are thinking and how they and others can have false beliefs that affect how they see and understand things. I suspect that growing but still incomplete awareness of how their parents have them living in a way that's not true has got to be extremely distressing and confusing and they would not have the language to talk about that.
Regarding parents giving children an off-ramp, one thing I've seen a few times is parents telling their child they have a "birth defect" that needs to be fixed. I understand that these terribly misguided parents are looking for a way to talk to their children in a way they feel makes sense to the child, but when that language is used, how can there possibly be an off-ramp? What does that do to a child's understanding of who they are and their body?
I worry that many kids like Avery who underwent puberty blockade won't ever fully mature. They'll be locked into a state of perpetual childhood or adolescence for the rest of their lives.
Jamie - YES! Hospitals and clinics should be offering those supports, the bone scans, fertility, psychological, endocrine support, for kids. And I really wish we could hear from more dads
Cold take: Saying "no" to kids is thoroughly satisfying as an adult. Saying "go fuck yourself" is even more satisfying, but it can get you in trouble with their parents...
Another Cold take: If Sarah started a lifestyle blog (focused on fashion, interior décor, and foreign travel) as a side hustle I would totally tune in. I'm guessing it would be one long dunk on modern design trends coupled with lots of pictures of Europe.
In my clinic was a child (a girl, in this case) who plunged into a deep depression after she got a puberty blocker implant. I just happened to see her for a viral illness in the winter time and I was stunned, because she was near catatonic. She was the most depressed child I had ever seen. This was back in 2019, I think and she is now (also) identifying as non-binary.
So yeah, there are going to be many such cases.
I have to take issue with all the use of past tense about this industry, the pediatric sex trait modification industry. This is still ongoing and in my state of Oregon, it's full steam ahead.
>> ...in my state of Oregon, it's full steam ahead. <<
Dr. Mason--how do you survive in that environment? Do you have some sane colleagues or a local sex-realist circle of friends? Are there hobbies and interests you can pursue or community groups you can join that are *not* overrun? How do you safely "find your people"--or do people come to you at this point because you have been so brave?
I'm a founding board member of SEGM and we have regular meetings - in 2019 it was a real lifeline, to be on a Zoom call with people in America, Ireland, England, Europe, Australia, sometimes South America who all shared the same concerns.
I'm very lucky to work in a small privately owned pediatric practice and have a libertarian boss who thinks I'm doing good work.
My big interest has been and continues to be permaculture and I look forward to retiring to my 40 acres and mostly garden.
Re Ben's point about people who go from far right into liberal bubbles: I had a childhood friend who was a staunch Republican raised by staunch Republican parents. We stayed in touch over the years and she did the lefty lurch. She and I went a few rounds on "gender" on Facebook. One day, she posted on Facebook about the tragic murder of a man ("trans woman") in Indianapolis and said JK Rowling "and other feminists" were to blame. I commented to the effect that even if you believe in "gender identities," blaming JK Rowling for a murder that took place in Indianapolis IN was ridiculous. A mutual childhood friend agreed with me. She instantly blocked us both.
It’s a tiny world. The man murdered was known as Sara Blackwood. He was an employee of my neighborhood Kroger where he oversaw the self-checkout lane. He’d dress in the same clothes every shift. He was killed in a robbery on Washington Street late at night after working a shift at a nearby fast food place. It was a crime of opportunity, not deliberate targeting. I never introduced myself to him, and I wasn’t sure what to say. His girlfriend is apparently is/was a gender-special too. The killer was found and prosecuted. It’s terrible when homicides happen, but there are many that happen in Indianapolis—mostly of minorities—and groups like HRC are content to ignore those deaths. Sara’s was special! Why? Because his ~~identity~~ and no other reason. Dark stuff.
I think in the conversation about “who is to blame” Cori is expressing and perhaps shining light on something profound. All this time we talk about the ROGD and social contagion as if it is something that happens to a child. Social contagion is not limited to young people. Social systems are formed, shaped and spread by adults not children. The belief in gender ideology is a social “contagion” in Western culture like any cultural belief system. I think parents and most of us adults generally really are trying to do the best we can at any given moment with the information we’ve got and with our individual capacities for meaning-making. Ultimately there will be no institution or profession or government to hold to account from which to extract enough justice. But adult children WILL ask of their parents’ generation’s choices and behaviors: “How did this happen?” Because that is what humans have always done.
Regarding the Avery's and Jazz's of this world. We put these children on television. For our amusement. And as Cori said no institutions will fall for this.
This fad of messing with kids will have a slow, long and hard death. The monies drying up so the "glitter train" will pack up and leave too.
But to Jamie's point, practitioners, must pickup the many shattering pieces of these children and their family's life's.
On the discussion around 22:30. While I don't doubt that social transition is a major factor in preserving a trans identity in children and teenagers I think puberty blockade from the age of 12-16 and beyond was probably the thing that did more to lock in the trans identity as it prevents the maturation that usually eliminated the cross sex ideation.
Social transition of children too young for puberty blockers locks in the trans identity until they can go on puberty blockers that will keep the trans identity locked in until they are adults, at which point they may realize that this path created more problems than it solved.
I appreciate all of the hosts for various reasons, but want to say thank you to Jamie for the insights about the clinical uses and effects of these hormones and drugs. I'm approaching a year since being diagnosed with breast cancer and it has added a new perspective to my understanding of medicalizing for gender.
The breast cancer reddit is rife with patients coming to look for help with the various side effects of ovarian/estrogen suppressing treatments that are wreaking havoc on their lives, and these are grown women in various stages of life, many like me, perimenopausal and in a stage of life where they often have had children, are done with that phase of their life, have lived fully, but in agony over being forced into menopause earlier than anticipated. I've read posts from women calling the treatment we endure "barbaric" and say that if it were men forced to do it, science would have found a better solution. At some point in my treatment I realized that most of the side effects I was aware of, came not from discussions about menopause but from falling down the gender rabbit hole and learning what endocrine related medicalization did to people, particularly young girls and women. I have a teen daughter, who is surrounded by gender madness and has succumbed to it in varying degrees, but we have avoided medicalization, though she has close friends on that track. She understood the heartbreak I felt over having to have a mastectomy, but having grown up with "top surgery" being such a commonly discussed thing, it affected her understanding and minimized it to some degree. Not long after my diagnosis she told me about her friend's hope to have top surgery and I asked her "gently" to please consider how awful it was for me to hear about a young woman choosing to remove her healthy breasts, when I was preparing myself for the brutality of having mine removed so I could hopefully live many more healthy years.
I hope that there can be some help on the horizon for both sets of patients, those with breast cancer and those harmed by gender related medicalization by having those clinicians and patients apply their research and experiences more broadly. With the rise in younger women being diagnosed with bc, increasingly both sets will have similar needs and concerns to navigate, from mental health to fertility, to learning to live the best life possible in a body that's been altered. I know the siloing and specialization in medicine often makes this difficult, but I hope to find out this is already happening.
Thanks for the thoughtful conversations. I have felt ready to take a break from this topic for a while, but y'all keep me coming back to hear what you have to share.
With regard to the comment about this dissenting position becoming one's identity: I often worry that I'm becoming obsessed with this issue, but as a university student, I've started to come to the conclusion that this issue is just obsessed with me. I have tried over and over and over again to say, "That's it! I'm done! I don't care about this stupid issue anymore! Other people can figure it out! I'm gonna live my life!" and just move on from the topic. Inevitably, no more than a few weeks can go by before I am directly confronted with a situation that requires me to deal head-on with this ideology and its vanguard.
Recent examples include: joining a women's sports team, only to find out one of my teammates was a man; going to use the toilet, only to have to help an international visitor (for whom English was not a primary language) figure out if she should use the one labeled "cubicles" or "cubicles and urinals", as opposed to the much more widely known vocab "men" or "women"; making a connection with a cool butch lesbian, only to have her get mad at me for calling her a woman; meeting my personal tutor, only to find out that he's transitioning his teenage son; hitting it off with another cool butch lesbian, only to have her get mad at me for not realising she's nonbinary; resigning from the Feminist Society after they condemned the recent Supreme Court ruling in the UK that protected single-sex spaces; having other students start ranting, unprompted, about their hatred for JK Rowling to me and getting hostile when I don't share their vitriol; meeting YET ANOTHER butch lesbian who turns out to be some flavour of "trans".
I could go on. I peaked via a very traumatic experience with a trans-identifying male that I would absolutely LOVE to move on from and never think about again. My field of study has very little to do with gender or medicine. I don't want to do this for a career. It is 100% in my interest to just forget about this issue and move on, but every time I try to pull back, I get dragged right back into the fray by the utter ubiquity of trans ideology in my life. Seeing as this is how it is, my thinking is that I'll leave this issue alone as soon as it leaves ME alone.
This is an excellent point very well made. "Trans" is shoved down women's throats. Even a woman furthest from the "action" must now contend with the appalling disappearance of regulated, single-sex bathrooms--and must plan each day of her life accordingly.
Yes, I regularly tell myself to take a break, to stop reading and thinking and talking about this. Unlike you, I’m not interacting with it in real life on a daily basis (just occasionally). But I can’t stop thinking about it. I had been bored with the emphasis on gender in academia, but today I think it’s inescapable and is transforming education, medicine, science, and law. So I can’t stop thinking about it.
Relatable. I admit I have been obsessed with this for a very long time, but it feels like it’s also obsessed with me, by happenstance inescapable. On an intellectual level, I understand some people have managed to mostly avoid it, but that’s so foreign from my experience… some of us are maybe a little narratively doomed.
Horrible and heartbreaking to hear from a mother about her son hating his penis and not thinking that was a problem to help him with, not saying he needs to "take care of his penis" so that one day it can be removed to make him into a "girl." Tell that boy he's also beautiful on the outside. Parents like that are pathological imo. And that little boy is in big trouble. Same goes for the little girls in similar situations, but the boys can start hating their bodies at such an early age because their maleness is more exterior. Tragic and unconscionable. Ben is right, it's child abuse.
Yes, it's heartbreaking. Help him love himself as he is.
I think it was Sarah who asked what happens to the gender clinicians now that the clinics are closing. They seem to read the tea leaves, quietly jump ship and embark on a sort of detransition themselves. Here’s the case of one such clinician:
Before: https://adaa.org/learn-from-us/from-the-experts/blog-posts/conference-professional/gender-affirming-physical-mental
After: https://www.mainehealth.org/news/2025/05/mainehealth-names-new-chief-lead-behavioral-health-services
He goes from “any pronouns” to “he”, and there’s no mention of gender anything in his new job bio.
If we needed any evidence that these clinicians are driven by self interest and personal advancement at the expense of other people’s children, here it is.
I'm guessing Dr. JOK opens her own practice? (Although, will she be able to get malpractice insurance?) There must be enough true believers (endocrinologists, etc) to join her gender clinic?
That’s my guess as well… private clinic that takes patients with private insurance.
I am afraid that when justice is not served, self interested physicians and clinicians will continue to practice in the same way they always have. The child victim is blamed for not knowing better when adults don't admit their mistakes and the harm caused. As clinicians, I think it is important to do everything in our power to ensure children do not internalize the mistakes of the professionals who treated them.
Amazing. And super creepy. Thanks for this.
Super creepy is right!
Your conversation today moved me to tears. Every politician, ever ideologically captured reporter should be made to listen to this podcast to the end. Jamie, your description of the medical abuse was chilling. All of you were so thoughtful and compassionate. Thank you.
I agree, while I listened to this podcast, I kept thinking I have to save this one to share other pro affirmative care. It was very good. I was moved by what Cori shared about living life with a medicalized body. I find that Cori doesn't speak often but when he does it is very meaningful, I also want to hear more from Cori.
"Every politician, ever ideologically captured reporter should be made to listen to this podcast to the end."
It is important to understand that this would have no effect on them at all.
Plenty of them have sat through multiple heartbreaking detransitioner testimonies. They are completely unmoved.
This is a religious movement. It can only be defeated by nonbelievers acquiring more brute force political power than the believers.
I am sure that for many this is true. Sadly. I can't help but think, though, that a lot of the Democratic politicians are just cowards. They go along to get along with the party apparat and the interest groups. Doubtless, the fact that Trump is moving to stop this abuse makes them less willing to listen to testimony from detransitioners and Jamie. I suspect some of these politicians may not be members of the Church of Trans. Rather, they can't allow themselves to question party dogma...and the Democratic party has enshrined chemical castration and removal of children's body parts as a civil right.
I would love to hear more from Sara and Cori. Generally speaking.
Yes, but I find that some episodes are dominated by different hosts and it was certainly nice having Ben take the lead for this one. There are other episodes where Sarah and Cori have more to say.
Each member of this podcast brings something important and unique. Generally speaking, I would like to hear more from Sara and Cori.
ME TOO!!!!
Dining/hanging out with octogenarians: Strongly recommended, as often as possible, for all of us.
Being in the body you're in: Nope, we are not IN bodies, we ARE bodies; we are the bodies we are, male and female. The idea of a separate "essence" inhabiting bodies is part of what enabled the mutilation frenzy to begin with.
Our societal attachment to "helping" has driven us to some really unhealthy places. We ought to remember this to the extent that we hope to be any use at all to the people who became objects of transmania--objects acted upon by "helpers."
I heard so much resignation about accountability for this. Sure, there *won't* be much accountability if everyone resigns from holding anyone accountable! How about withholding declarations about how little you are willing to accept moving forward--and inviting some supercharged, supersmart...lawyer, say (Glenna?), to develop accountability structures and strategies we can rally around from the start! Jamie, your fire will be crucial for this...
Yes, being "in" a body implies that the mind is separate from the body. Yes, we "are" bodies and our minds are part of our bodies--not separate, not hovering over us like a ghost following us around.
I was pleased to see that the comments on the New York Times article about clinics in blue states closing were overwhelmingly critical of these treatments, and that these critical comments were the most highly recommended. There were only very few who tried to perpetuate old myths like blockers being reversible or the regret rate being below that of other surgeries, and they were swiftly fact-checked by others. There are apparently a good number of well-informed NYTimes readers out there! Or is it just that the gender critical people flock to the comments of these articles, and this is not at all representative of the Times' general readership? Either way, if they read these comments, they will hopefully learn something.
The NYT comment section has been based for YEARS.
I had to ask my 12-year-old what "based" means here (I'm not a native speaker), and he explained it, haha. I seem to remember that the last time I read NYTimes readers' comments on this topic, there were more people who were still arguing in favor of gender identity ideology, but it may have been on the sports issue, which may not yet have lost as much support as the medicalization of kids.
I think the NYT was happily censoring GC commenters right up until Trump got reelected, then they started easing up a bit. There was definitely a pattern where their highest rated comments on trans articles were often very, very carefully worded criticisms of pro Trans arguments.
Did you mean criticisms of anti-Trans arguments? Or did you notice a pattern of carefully worded criticisms of pro-Trans arguments that were designed to criticize very gently? I'm too new to this topic to have observed anything about the NYT comments prior to Trump's election.
I mean readers would criticise the pro trans arguments, but loads of those comments would get deleted for failing to use the "correct" terminology. Only the most carefully worded critiques would survive, and because of that they often accumulated a lot of upvotes.
We're going to need a truth and reconciliation process for these families. We're going to need structured self-help support meetings (La Leche League, AlAnon model) where people can receive understanding, information, and support. We will need new endocrine/psych/functional med practices doing post care, that help people put themselves back together hormonally or go forward in best possible way health and MH wise. We will need to educate all of society in compassion & tolerance for very nonconforming looking people who were medically harmed, & deserve peace and tolerance with their various outcomes (but no lying re 'sex'), until the bubble of those so harmed goes away like the foot bound women went away.
Another thing I think about in kids like Avery who were socially transitioned very young is that they will also be going through certain developmental cognitive changes that could cause a lot of new and confusing feelings about their identity. For example, outgrowing magical thinking and developing more abstract thinking skills. They are also developing higher levels of theory of mind and being able to imagine what other people are thinking and how they and others can have false beliefs that affect how they see and understand things. I suspect that growing but still incomplete awareness of how their parents have them living in a way that's not true has got to be extremely distressing and confusing and they would not have the language to talk about that.
Regarding parents giving children an off-ramp, one thing I've seen a few times is parents telling their child they have a "birth defect" that needs to be fixed. I understand that these terribly misguided parents are looking for a way to talk to their children in a way they feel makes sense to the child, but when that language is used, how can there possibly be an off-ramp? What does that do to a child's understanding of who they are and their body?
I worry that many kids like Avery who underwent puberty blockade won't ever fully mature. They'll be locked into a state of perpetual childhood or adolescence for the rest of their lives.
Jamie - YES! Hospitals and clinics should be offering those supports, the bone scans, fertility, psychological, endocrine support, for kids. And I really wish we could hear from more dads
Cold take: Saying "no" to kids is thoroughly satisfying as an adult. Saying "go fuck yourself" is even more satisfying, but it can get you in trouble with their parents...
Another Cold take: If Sarah started a lifestyle blog (focused on fashion, interior décor, and foreign travel) as a side hustle I would totally tune in. I'm guessing it would be one long dunk on modern design trends coupled with lots of pictures of Europe.
Accurate!
This is basically how I use Twitter at this point lol
In my clinic was a child (a girl, in this case) who plunged into a deep depression after she got a puberty blocker implant. I just happened to see her for a viral illness in the winter time and I was stunned, because she was near catatonic. She was the most depressed child I had ever seen. This was back in 2019, I think and she is now (also) identifying as non-binary.
So yeah, there are going to be many such cases.
I have to take issue with all the use of past tense about this industry, the pediatric sex trait modification industry. This is still ongoing and in my state of Oregon, it's full steam ahead.
>> ...in my state of Oregon, it's full steam ahead. <<
Dr. Mason--how do you survive in that environment? Do you have some sane colleagues or a local sex-realist circle of friends? Are there hobbies and interests you can pursue or community groups you can join that are *not* overrun? How do you safely "find your people"--or do people come to you at this point because you have been so brave?
I'm a founding board member of SEGM and we have regular meetings - in 2019 it was a real lifeline, to be on a Zoom call with people in America, Ireland, England, Europe, Australia, sometimes South America who all shared the same concerns.
I'm very lucky to work in a small privately owned pediatric practice and have a libertarian boss who thinks I'm doing good work.
My big interest has been and continues to be permaculture and I look forward to retiring to my 40 acres and mostly garden.
Re Ben's point about people who go from far right into liberal bubbles: I had a childhood friend who was a staunch Republican raised by staunch Republican parents. We stayed in touch over the years and she did the lefty lurch. She and I went a few rounds on "gender" on Facebook. One day, she posted on Facebook about the tragic murder of a man ("trans woman") in Indianapolis and said JK Rowling "and other feminists" were to blame. I commented to the effect that even if you believe in "gender identities," blaming JK Rowling for a murder that took place in Indianapolis IN was ridiculous. A mutual childhood friend agreed with me. She instantly blocked us both.
It’s a tiny world. The man murdered was known as Sara Blackwood. He was an employee of my neighborhood Kroger where he oversaw the self-checkout lane. He’d dress in the same clothes every shift. He was killed in a robbery on Washington Street late at night after working a shift at a nearby fast food place. It was a crime of opportunity, not deliberate targeting. I never introduced myself to him, and I wasn’t sure what to say. His girlfriend is apparently is/was a gender-special too. The killer was found and prosecuted. It’s terrible when homicides happen, but there are many that happen in Indianapolis—mostly of minorities—and groups like HRC are content to ignore those deaths. Sara’s was special! Why? Because his ~~identity~~ and no other reason. Dark stuff.
I think in the conversation about “who is to blame” Cori is expressing and perhaps shining light on something profound. All this time we talk about the ROGD and social contagion as if it is something that happens to a child. Social contagion is not limited to young people. Social systems are formed, shaped and spread by adults not children. The belief in gender ideology is a social “contagion” in Western culture like any cultural belief system. I think parents and most of us adults generally really are trying to do the best we can at any given moment with the information we’ve got and with our individual capacities for meaning-making. Ultimately there will be no institution or profession or government to hold to account from which to extract enough justice. But adult children WILL ask of their parents’ generation’s choices and behaviors: “How did this happen?” Because that is what humans have always done.
Regarding the Avery's and Jazz's of this world. We put these children on television. For our amusement. And as Cori said no institutions will fall for this.
This fad of messing with kids will have a slow, long and hard death. The monies drying up so the "glitter train" will pack up and leave too.
But to Jamie's point, practitioners, must pickup the many shattering pieces of these children and their family's life's.
There is a tidal wave of " " coming.
On the discussion around 22:30. While I don't doubt that social transition is a major factor in preserving a trans identity in children and teenagers I think puberty blockade from the age of 12-16 and beyond was probably the thing that did more to lock in the trans identity as it prevents the maturation that usually eliminated the cross sex ideation.
Social transition of children too young for puberty blockers locks in the trans identity until they can go on puberty blockers that will keep the trans identity locked in until they are adults, at which point they may realize that this path created more problems than it solved.
Apply that process involving children, anywhere else = "Grooming".
Social Transition is Conversion Therapy. It solved the high desistance rate "problem" in children.
>> Social Transition...solved the high desistance rate "problem" in children. <<
Chilling.
I appreciate all of the hosts for various reasons, but want to say thank you to Jamie for the insights about the clinical uses and effects of these hormones and drugs. I'm approaching a year since being diagnosed with breast cancer and it has added a new perspective to my understanding of medicalizing for gender.
The breast cancer reddit is rife with patients coming to look for help with the various side effects of ovarian/estrogen suppressing treatments that are wreaking havoc on their lives, and these are grown women in various stages of life, many like me, perimenopausal and in a stage of life where they often have had children, are done with that phase of their life, have lived fully, but in agony over being forced into menopause earlier than anticipated. I've read posts from women calling the treatment we endure "barbaric" and say that if it were men forced to do it, science would have found a better solution. At some point in my treatment I realized that most of the side effects I was aware of, came not from discussions about menopause but from falling down the gender rabbit hole and learning what endocrine related medicalization did to people, particularly young girls and women. I have a teen daughter, who is surrounded by gender madness and has succumbed to it in varying degrees, but we have avoided medicalization, though she has close friends on that track. She understood the heartbreak I felt over having to have a mastectomy, but having grown up with "top surgery" being such a commonly discussed thing, it affected her understanding and minimized it to some degree. Not long after my diagnosis she told me about her friend's hope to have top surgery and I asked her "gently" to please consider how awful it was for me to hear about a young woman choosing to remove her healthy breasts, when I was preparing myself for the brutality of having mine removed so I could hopefully live many more healthy years.
I hope that there can be some help on the horizon for both sets of patients, those with breast cancer and those harmed by gender related medicalization by having those clinicians and patients apply their research and experiences more broadly. With the rise in younger women being diagnosed with bc, increasingly both sets will have similar needs and concerns to navigate, from mental health to fertility, to learning to live the best life possible in a body that's been altered. I know the siloing and specialization in medicine often makes this difficult, but I hope to find out this is already happening.
Thanks for the thoughtful conversations. I have felt ready to take a break from this topic for a while, but y'all keep me coming back to hear what you have to share.