I read the paper after you shared it last week after you shared the link so that I could form my own thoughts before hearing yours. Overall impressions are basically the same (what it's trying to do is pretty transparent), though you all brought up quite a few things I hadn't considered. Here are a few of my own that didn't come up in the episode.
- You spent very little time talking about the "methodology" of the paper, which I thought was appropriate given how secondary it was to the content itself. It reminded me of some papers I wrote in high school (or the Rafferty paper, for that matter): I had a thing I wanted to say, and then I went and found a bunch of sources I could plausibly include so that it would seem all sciency. They could have made the same point in an op-ed.
- One thought kept coming up for me as a read the paper: The only way to explain it's existence in the first place is that somehow *protecting the treatments itself* has become the ultimate goal of the authors (and the gender-affirming movement in general) rather than promoting the well-being of the people seeking them. This includes not only blockers, hormones and surgeries, but social transition as well. Anything that undermines their validity or availability seems to be against the movement and a target for criticism, regardless of the actual impact they have on people. I thought it was interesting when Cori mentioned that the ultimate goal is self-actualization and I really had to think about whether I thought that was true instead. But I don't think so. Otherwise, shouldn't self-actualization also include things like desistance and detransition?
A quick tangent on the topic of informed consent: Jesse Singal's coverage of the Yale Integrity Project's critique of the Cass Review included a link to lead-author Meredithe McNamara's deposition from earlier this year. I read it recently and found a section I haven't seen discussed anywhere else. Three times she is asked directly whether she agrees that "informed consent" for an adolescent receiving GAMT means that they have the psychological maturity to understand the role having children might play in their future happiness in the future as an adult. Twice, she answers that those discussions should be informed by the best available evidence, which of course is beside the point. The third time, she answers "I don't have a different answer for you," and the deposition moves on. Point being, I think it's reasonable to conclude that Meredithe McNamara does NOT think adolescents need be able to understand that they might want children in the future to receive GAMT that may result in their sterilization. The interaction is on pages 122-123 if anyone else happens to be interested in reading it. It's an interesting read in and of itself. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.almd.77755/gov.uscourts.almd.77755.558.9.pdf
How about a deep dive into the career of Dr Johanna Olson-Kennedy and her spouse Aydin Olson-Kennedy--a woman who identifies as a man and who enforces in the therapy room what the doctor wants to do?
JOK strikes me as a keystone figure in this industry: pushing the field farther along when colleagues hesitate. She's the avant-garde, so to speak.
I watched this interview of her and her spouse and was astonished even though I didn't think I could still be astonished:
I’m on a tight budget & it is so hard to figure out who/what to subscribe to & pay for on Substack…I just became a paying subscriber. I have listened to a few of your podcasts & they are so informative. I really appreciate the mix of intellectual & personal.
Many really good points as always. Thank you! The parenting discussion was good- reminded me of Abigail Shrier's book Bad Therapy. I think we could fix all this if we got the kids off social media (no iphones in school), taught civics in school instead of DEI/SEL and got the focus back on family values but that's the long game;-) At the Genspect conference in Denver after Michael Shellenberger did his presentation on How WPATH Ends, someone stood up and asked a question, or made a statement, about how none of the scandal discovery of their (WPATH) organization will matter because the believers and followers and transactivists will just say that gender affirmation care is a human right and the research, or the lack of, isn't the point. They were right! As a RN I know that to get coverage there needs to be a diagnosis, codes and evidence based consent. (Billing and malpractice lawsuits will keep lawyers busy for years to come.) Therefore, if the suicidal ideation and life-saving concept pushed to parents stopped working, "they" needed to change minds to agree with the victimhood, queer theory, social justice, DEI and "true self" (without question) narrative. These university campus ideologies (transhausen by proxy moms aside) have been riding the coattails of LBG and other activists movements, that have also taken their arguments to the supreme court, and are trying to stay relevant and in business. The major difference and major tweak to the playbook was that they included children. I don't think this has been done before!? Should society pay for these experimental meds and plastic surgery choices that young people are usually coerced into by influencers? Why infiltrate the K-12 public schools to create allyship? The 'right to regret' and 'bodily autonomy' for children is like something a predator would push for. Those that inflict terror and confusion such as cult leaders and groomers love permissiveness and the boundaryless. Yes, the activist keep moving the goalpost because they have the support (and $$) of decision makers in society to keep doing that. The bad actors via the media and advocacy groups are in control, very savvy and nefarious. It needs to be stopped now by a strong leader. Enough is enough! This short film was made in 2015 and was a big warning for us all. https://youtu.be/iKcWu0tsiZM
I loved this episode; felt like a perfect encapsulation of where the field of “gender affirming care” stands right now - calling in Dr. Andrea Long Chu for reinforcements. Well, he *is* a fantastic writer, even though the things he’s writing are somewhat insane. But still, a good indication that the primary argument here is indeed slipping outside the domain of medicine.
During the discussion about people getting procedures "because I want it," I started thinking about how this might be the logical outcome of a culture that emphasizes individual liberty at the expense of all else.
What we desire matters more than anything else. We must feel good. We're encouraged to pursue our dreams. We must find ourselves (did I mislay myself somewhere along the way?).
Maybe it's time for me to reread Christopher Lasch's Culture of Narcissism?
Just want to say although I haven’t had time to watch every episode I continue to be impressed with the insights I glean from you all, the level of discourse is consistently very high and in terms of general process I really enjoy LSD’s role in facilitating and the time & space you give each other without talking over each other, the pace allows me to really fully absorb and reflect on each of your contributions and you each bring a knowledge base that is invaluable to this subject and each episode is filled with quotable nuggets—I loved the steering into the skid analogy LIsa offered, the definition I found online is quite apt: "Steer into the skid" means turning the steering wheel in the same direction the rear of the car is sliding. This aligns the tires with the direction of the slide, allowing them to roll with the inertia instead of fighting it.” Yes, indeed
Just a note on Lisa’s suggested resource Unspeakeasy, I looked into it and the annual subscription is quite steep alongside all the other paid subscriptions I have with following you all individually as well as your new podcast subscription is there anyway to offer some sort of package deal? Or get a subscriber discount for resources you might plug on your show? Thanks!
And Lisa’s comment on ‘Heteronormative.. cumulo-nimbus’ made me laugh out loud, and I did that thing I thought people only do in the movies – splutter on my morning coffee and spray hot mouthfuls all over my brand new shirt..
Me again;-) I was glad to hear Lisa pepper in the big picture (I'm a big picture thinker). The bourgeoisie!...YIKES! I haven’t figured out how to explain this concept simply and how it relates to today. Transgenderism compared to Marxism! In history, what has happened when a society or civilization loses its boundaries, has become too permissive, too secular and an enabler of dysfunctional behavior? Did Bad Actors intentionally cause this to happen? Or was it just opportunists from within? This may be too deep;-)
I read the paper after you shared it last week after you shared the link so that I could form my own thoughts before hearing yours. Overall impressions are basically the same (what it's trying to do is pretty transparent), though you all brought up quite a few things I hadn't considered. Here are a few of my own that didn't come up in the episode.
- You spent very little time talking about the "methodology" of the paper, which I thought was appropriate given how secondary it was to the content itself. It reminded me of some papers I wrote in high school (or the Rafferty paper, for that matter): I had a thing I wanted to say, and then I went and found a bunch of sources I could plausibly include so that it would seem all sciency. They could have made the same point in an op-ed.
- One thought kept coming up for me as a read the paper: The only way to explain it's existence in the first place is that somehow *protecting the treatments itself* has become the ultimate goal of the authors (and the gender-affirming movement in general) rather than promoting the well-being of the people seeking them. This includes not only blockers, hormones and surgeries, but social transition as well. Anything that undermines their validity or availability seems to be against the movement and a target for criticism, regardless of the actual impact they have on people. I thought it was interesting when Cori mentioned that the ultimate goal is self-actualization and I really had to think about whether I thought that was true instead. But I don't think so. Otherwise, shouldn't self-actualization also include things like desistance and detransition?
A quick tangent on the topic of informed consent: Jesse Singal's coverage of the Yale Integrity Project's critique of the Cass Review included a link to lead-author Meredithe McNamara's deposition from earlier this year. I read it recently and found a section I haven't seen discussed anywhere else. Three times she is asked directly whether she agrees that "informed consent" for an adolescent receiving GAMT means that they have the psychological maturity to understand the role having children might play in their future happiness in the future as an adult. Twice, she answers that those discussions should be informed by the best available evidence, which of course is beside the point. The third time, she answers "I don't have a different answer for you," and the deposition moves on. Point being, I think it's reasonable to conclude that Meredithe McNamara does NOT think adolescents need be able to understand that they might want children in the future to receive GAMT that may result in their sterilization. The interaction is on pages 122-123 if anyone else happens to be interested in reading it. It's an interesting read in and of itself. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.almd.77755/gov.uscourts.almd.77755.558.9.pdf
How about a deep dive into the career of Dr Johanna Olson-Kennedy and her spouse Aydin Olson-Kennedy--a woman who identifies as a man and who enforces in the therapy room what the doctor wants to do?
JOK strikes me as a keystone figure in this industry: pushing the field farther along when colleagues hesitate. She's the avant-garde, so to speak.
I watched this interview of her and her spouse and was astonished even though I didn't think I could still be astonished:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNQmhoPHMN8
I’m on a tight budget & it is so hard to figure out who/what to subscribe to & pay for on Substack…I just became a paying subscriber. I have listened to a few of your podcasts & they are so informative. I really appreciate the mix of intellectual & personal.
Many really good points as always. Thank you! The parenting discussion was good- reminded me of Abigail Shrier's book Bad Therapy. I think we could fix all this if we got the kids off social media (no iphones in school), taught civics in school instead of DEI/SEL and got the focus back on family values but that's the long game;-) At the Genspect conference in Denver after Michael Shellenberger did his presentation on How WPATH Ends, someone stood up and asked a question, or made a statement, about how none of the scandal discovery of their (WPATH) organization will matter because the believers and followers and transactivists will just say that gender affirmation care is a human right and the research, or the lack of, isn't the point. They were right! As a RN I know that to get coverage there needs to be a diagnosis, codes and evidence based consent. (Billing and malpractice lawsuits will keep lawyers busy for years to come.) Therefore, if the suicidal ideation and life-saving concept pushed to parents stopped working, "they" needed to change minds to agree with the victimhood, queer theory, social justice, DEI and "true self" (without question) narrative. These university campus ideologies (transhausen by proxy moms aside) have been riding the coattails of LBG and other activists movements, that have also taken their arguments to the supreme court, and are trying to stay relevant and in business. The major difference and major tweak to the playbook was that they included children. I don't think this has been done before!? Should society pay for these experimental meds and plastic surgery choices that young people are usually coerced into by influencers? Why infiltrate the K-12 public schools to create allyship? The 'right to regret' and 'bodily autonomy' for children is like something a predator would push for. Those that inflict terror and confusion such as cult leaders and groomers love permissiveness and the boundaryless. Yes, the activist keep moving the goalpost because they have the support (and $$) of decision makers in society to keep doing that. The bad actors via the media and advocacy groups are in control, very savvy and nefarious. It needs to be stopped now by a strong leader. Enough is enough! This short film was made in 2015 and was a big warning for us all. https://youtu.be/iKcWu0tsiZM
I loved this episode; felt like a perfect encapsulation of where the field of “gender affirming care” stands right now - calling in Dr. Andrea Long Chu for reinforcements. Well, he *is* a fantastic writer, even though the things he’s writing are somewhat insane. But still, a good indication that the primary argument here is indeed slipping outside the domain of medicine.
He is very skilled at documenting his own insanity!
During the discussion about people getting procedures "because I want it," I started thinking about how this might be the logical outcome of a culture that emphasizes individual liberty at the expense of all else.
What we desire matters more than anything else. We must feel good. We're encouraged to pursue our dreams. We must find ourselves (did I mislay myself somewhere along the way?).
Maybe it's time for me to reread Christopher Lasch's Culture of Narcissism?
Just want to say although I haven’t had time to watch every episode I continue to be impressed with the insights I glean from you all, the level of discourse is consistently very high and in terms of general process I really enjoy LSD’s role in facilitating and the time & space you give each other without talking over each other, the pace allows me to really fully absorb and reflect on each of your contributions and you each bring a knowledge base that is invaluable to this subject and each episode is filled with quotable nuggets—I loved the steering into the skid analogy LIsa offered, the definition I found online is quite apt: "Steer into the skid" means turning the steering wheel in the same direction the rear of the car is sliding. This aligns the tires with the direction of the slide, allowing them to roll with the inertia instead of fighting it.” Yes, indeed
Just a note on Lisa’s suggested resource Unspeakeasy, I looked into it and the annual subscription is quite steep alongside all the other paid subscriptions I have with following you all individually as well as your new podcast subscription is there anyway to offer some sort of package deal? Or get a subscriber discount for resources you might plug on your show? Thanks!
Great discussion. Really enjoying these podcasts.
And Lisa’s comment on ‘Heteronormative.. cumulo-nimbus’ made me laugh out loud, and I did that thing I thought people only do in the movies – splutter on my morning coffee and spray hot mouthfuls all over my brand new shirt..
(I will be sending Lisa the dry cleaning bill)
Me again;-) I was glad to hear Lisa pepper in the big picture (I'm a big picture thinker). The bourgeoisie!...YIKES! I haven’t figured out how to explain this concept simply and how it relates to today. Transgenderism compared to Marxism! In history, what has happened when a society or civilization loses its boundaries, has become too permissive, too secular and an enabler of dysfunctional behavior? Did Bad Actors intentionally cause this to happen? Or was it just opportunists from within? This may be too deep;-)