“My friend who’d written a book about trans teens five years before told me that I should never mention detransitioners...It was too dangerous for trans people, she said.”
This quote alone deserves its own essay, its own deep analyses and questioning, it’s own placement in the public spotlight. When a rights movement’s methods and messaging requires silencing, hiding, shaming, and degrading a group of harmed, vulnerable people, they are no longer “challenging power structures” or a movement about “love, diversity, or kindness.”
The backlash against Pride has focused on the pushing of adult themes into children. But I struggle seeing “love is love,” “y’all means all,” “you are loved,” “free mom/dad hugs,” “hate has no place here” from the same people telling detransitioners and desisters to shut up and get out, telling them that the very existence of their harm and pain is a danger that must be silenced, minimized, invalidated, and dismissed.
I remember literally getting shouted down by five kids online because I was trying to tell them about my desistance. I'd "known" these kids for years. And to think, just a few minutes before they were praising the notions of "lived experiences" and "personal truths."
Perhaps the most disturbing trend in America today is that of silencing people when they try to have a calm discussion, or ask a question. If 'Covid' taught us nothing, sadly it taught us that powerful people and institutions can and will shut down free speech. Words can indeed be hurtful and dangerous, but it is far more dangerous to forbid speech.
Yesterday I met with a local politician to try and persuade her not to vote for the conversion therapy ban which has been proposed in my state. I am the parent of an ROGD afflicted teen, and tried to explain a ban would limit the ways parents could help their gender dysphoric kids. She told me I sounded transphobic, which shocked me, as I was being so careful to use neutral language. "Your use of the word 'help' implies they need fixing, that there's something wrong with them. They need support not help", she corrected me.
The captured automatically see anyone who questions gender affirmation as transphobic, so reasonable debate is not possible. That's when I realised I had no hope of convincing her not to vote for the ban. No matter what we say, they don't believe we love our children and are just trying to protect them from harm. Instead, they see us as abusive parents who belong in gaol. I went home and cried.
Yes, I fell prey to this too - as a parent, and the political context of "if people whose views I don't share believe this, I must not agree" - and with profound consequences. You are doing such important work to get us all past that right-left thinking. Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for saying so, Suzanne. My new line is: I don't want "progressivism" replaced with conservatism. I want it replaced with heterodoxy."
I broaden the field by researching trans widows, whose husbands suddenly became obsessed with porn and crossdressing, both of which reinforce the most odious of sexual stereotypes. There is a new trailer for Behind the Looking Glass, the documentary in which I and many other trans widows are interviewed, at Lime Soda Films. The filmmaker, Vaishnavi Sundar, predicts a tsunami of trans widows in her part of the world, as Indian and South Asian men take to the idea of "gender surgeries."
For results of our 20 Questions to Ask a Trans Widow Survey, visit Trans Widow Ute Heggen YT channel, for periodic updates. About 40 responses so far, which unfortunately include 5 of us who were raped by these lingerie-wearing men, the half of us who have lived in poverty for some time after the split-up, and the almost half of us who were defamed/vilified either in court or on social media by our exes. No surprises there. This information never gets back to the diagnosing "therapists'" who typically tell us we are "too traditional" when we refuse to try out "sex with a strap-on" with him pretending to be "a woman." One of us was dangerously injured in the C-section scar when she acquiesced. This is the reality no one reports on.
Ute, I have seen your posts sporadically for months now, and I am just shocked to hear these heartbreaking reports. It's disgusting how people act like all "trans" folk are innocent little angels, and completely ignore the fact that there are men who are abusers that use a dress and $10 wig to disguise their terrible acts.
Yesterday, I read a Christopher Rufo article that linked to a medical paper about 'gender reassignment surgeries,' specifically for 'bottom-surgery.'
God...I've never seen more horrifyingly graphic medical imagery in my life. And to think...I was going to go down that path, had I continued identifying as trans.
It's mind-boggling how sick this whole movement is. It chews people up and spits them out.
And all for what? Because they're afraid of a girl that wants to wear a tux or a boy wants to wear nail polish?
My 3-year-old grandson has his toenails painted red. His mom was doing her nails, he asked to have his done, she did them, no big deal to anyone. I hope more fervently than I can express that he (and his parents) will continue to see such things as expressions of his joyful and exuberant personality and will NOT slip into thinking this means there's something wrong with him as the little boy he is. I watched him yesterday playing with his favorite toy dump truck, with his brightly painted red toenails shining on his bare feet. He isn't concerned about gender stereotypes in either direction, and I do so hope he can hold onto that.
Thank you!! I do too -- and I hope the same for his 18-month-old brother, who is an extraordinarily sunny little soul with a smile that enchants everyone who meets him. I fear for them in so many ways -- but given current trends, I think I'd be even more fearful if they were girls.
Well written. From the original Dutch protocol study group(70 children), 1 developed post op infection after vaginoplasty and died. What’s eye opening is the push to start drugs on children pre pubescent limits the amount of , to be blunt, penile tissue that would be used to create a neo vagina later so intestinal tissue is used instead with a higher complication rate. I have no idea how well these details are discussed with families and children considering it.
Somehow, modern doctors have created a more barbaric version of turning boys into eunuchs than Middle Eastern empires could have ever thought of. It's a shame.
Your NYT piece on your daughter was a turning point for me— or rather the reaction to it. It was such an interesting article— and then there were these utterly deranged calls from TRAs to kidnap your child to save her from an abusive anti-trans parent. Freak outs over the title of the piece. I watched it all unfold just shocked by the intensity and insanity of the response— and started realizing how deranged this movement was. (So many moments of realization but that was probably the first.)
Please, does anyone know of teachers organizing around resisting this? Talk about being caught between progressives and conservatives, we are quite literally in the crossfire! In blue states we have directives about keeping information from parents about issues schools should never be litigating. We are pressured to post pride flags and ally statements and go to pride parades. It happened gradually and then all at once as they say, and teachers are confused and terrified. The unions are completely captured by gender ideology and so are administrators in my blue state. Teachers face the possibility of violence at school every day anyway, and all the heated rhetoric from both sides puts our lives at risk! Individuals who speak up will get fired, slandered and possibly attacked as we've seen. How can we push back effectively? Help!
I'm also Gen X. I live in Seattle, full of older gay people and young trans people. The gay people are generally happy. I've never met an openly happy trans kid. Something is deeply wrong here, even anecdotally.
It's clear that among the people encouraged to transition are effeminate young boys and more masculine girls. In other words, sissy boys and tomboy girls.
The pathologizing mid-20 century discourses on homosexuality are not so much about homosexuality, instead, about effeminacy. For a few decades we got away from that. But look at the way it got re-introduced........and along with that comes misogyny.
This is so close to Iran's practice of forcing some gay men, and lesbians, to have sex changes whether they want them or not.
I appreciate this piece. I also strongly oppose any teaming of LGB with T, even in something as noble-sounding as an "LGBT Courage Coalition." However you feel about either group, they are not the same; in some instances, their interests are diametrically opposed. The forced pairing by trans activists and acceptance by gay people who did not think through the consequences has done and continues to do a great deal of harm to females, especially lesbians and -- as your article notes -- young people of both sexes who, barring "transition," would otherwise emerge from "gender dysphoria" as gay. The association needs to be clearly and permanently broken, beginning with acronyms; personally, I cannot support any organization that perpetuates the fallacy of "LGBT." It's simply wrong, and it hurts too many people.
Totally agree. I'm not gay but it's very clear that LGB people have nothing in common with TQ +++. If journalists ,politicians and the rest would only engage their brain for one second they would realise this.This is a misogynistic , homophobic movement hiding behind the very legitimate gay rights movement ,which they seek to destroy ,and people need to understand this ASAP.
If this is your view....change won't happen. The AAP is not going to allow for a review of the science EVER if it comes from people who don't find common humanity in good people who happen to be trans.
No one is denying common humanity nor saying there are no good trans people. I am saying sexual orientation and gender identity are different things, which of course they are. I don't see how that fact should influence AAP or any other group in its willingness (or unwillingness) to review the science around "trans", which we all wish they would do, as have their braver peers in other countries.
What would you say to "LGB&T" or perhaps "LGB/T"? I think you're right to push back on the acronym, yet the voices of adult trans people are also important, and frankly I think they do help reach people on the left. The idea that they are transphobic is obviously ridiculous. Is there a way to revise the acronym to make it more clear that gay and trans are separate things, yet this and other groups consist of both -- coming together against the extremes of gender ideology?
I think it's fine if adult trans people who are appalled at the current extremism of younger activists want to stand up for sanity. I wish they would, as their voices could be the most effective. Most seem to be cowering. And the fact remains that "trans" has nothing to do with LGB. In my view, any continuing association of one with the other -- acronyms or elsewhere -- links us (I'm lesbian) with harms we oppose. Everytime I hear or read "LGBTQ+," I feel ill, and every chance I get to say "I'm lesbian and I oppose gender ideology," I do.
Lisa, you mention Ken Zucker's long term study on boys/young men, which showed that watchful waiting in this cohort of boys/young men resulted in about 75% of them identifying as gay, and most of them desisting.
I frequently hear this paper applied to girls/young women. Are there any long-term studies of watchful waiting in girls?
More generally, to me, there is something disturbing about the fact that so many people assume that studies done on boys/young men will automatically apply to girls/young women.
Good article. No one should be afraid to engage with the 'other side' or of breaking rank with gender fanatics who slavishly follow a 'party line.' These rabid vocal 'activists' are often bullies and generally misinformed and misdirected. Tucker Carlson, Ingraham, and especially brilliant gay cultural commentator Douglas Murray offer wonderfully balanced liberal views.
It seems that for girls who had experienced gender identity disorder in childhood at followup in their 20s, "3 participants (12%) were judged to have GID or gender dysphoria. Regarding sexual orientation, 8 participants (32%) were classified as bisexual/homosexual in fantasy, and 6 (24%) were classified as bisexual/homosexual in behavior. The remaining participants were classified as either heterosexual or asexual."
Let's not make the mistake of assuming the girls currently caught up in this social contagion are all lesbians. That's a mistake too. The study looked at boys before the social contagion took off. Make no assumptions. Guide them to understand why they don't feel right in their bodies. Some likely are gay but some likely just wanted friends, acceptance, to feel part of a community etc.
Good points. In Abi Shrier’s book, she writes on that very issue. Girls/young women have experimented with one another for long before social media existed and it wasn’t because they were/are all gay. Her point was boys not being emotionally ready, other girls were stand ins, so to speak until the boys matured.
“My friend who’d written a book about trans teens five years before told me that I should never mention detransitioners...It was too dangerous for trans people, she said.”
This quote alone deserves its own essay, its own deep analyses and questioning, it’s own placement in the public spotlight. When a rights movement’s methods and messaging requires silencing, hiding, shaming, and degrading a group of harmed, vulnerable people, they are no longer “challenging power structures” or a movement about “love, diversity, or kindness.”
The backlash against Pride has focused on the pushing of adult themes into children. But I struggle seeing “love is love,” “y’all means all,” “you are loved,” “free mom/dad hugs,” “hate has no place here” from the same people telling detransitioners and desisters to shut up and get out, telling them that the very existence of their harm and pain is a danger that must be silenced, minimized, invalidated, and dismissed.
I remember literally getting shouted down by five kids online because I was trying to tell them about my desistance. I'd "known" these kids for years. And to think, just a few minutes before they were praising the notions of "lived experiences" and "personal truths."
They don’t have the mental maturity or capacity to see the hypocrisy in their words. That is the nature of kids.
My only hope is that they did mature from then until now!
Perhaps the most disturbing trend in America today is that of silencing people when they try to have a calm discussion, or ask a question. If 'Covid' taught us nothing, sadly it taught us that powerful people and institutions can and will shut down free speech. Words can indeed be hurtful and dangerous, but it is far more dangerous to forbid speech.
Yesterday I met with a local politician to try and persuade her not to vote for the conversion therapy ban which has been proposed in my state. I am the parent of an ROGD afflicted teen, and tried to explain a ban would limit the ways parents could help their gender dysphoric kids. She told me I sounded transphobic, which shocked me, as I was being so careful to use neutral language. "Your use of the word 'help' implies they need fixing, that there's something wrong with them. They need support not help", she corrected me.
The captured automatically see anyone who questions gender affirmation as transphobic, so reasonable debate is not possible. That's when I realised I had no hope of convincing her not to vote for the ban. No matter what we say, they don't believe we love our children and are just trying to protect them from harm. Instead, they see us as abusive parents who belong in gaol. I went home and cried.
Yep.
"I didn’t want to play for the other team."
Yes, I fell prey to this too - as a parent, and the political context of "if people whose views I don't share believe this, I must not agree" - and with profound consequences. You are doing such important work to get us all past that right-left thinking. Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for saying so, Suzanne. My new line is: I don't want "progressivism" replaced with conservatism. I want it replaced with heterodoxy."
I very much do want to play for the other team. Communists are fascists, and I hate fascists.
I broaden the field by researching trans widows, whose husbands suddenly became obsessed with porn and crossdressing, both of which reinforce the most odious of sexual stereotypes. There is a new trailer for Behind the Looking Glass, the documentary in which I and many other trans widows are interviewed, at Lime Soda Films. The filmmaker, Vaishnavi Sundar, predicts a tsunami of trans widows in her part of the world, as Indian and South Asian men take to the idea of "gender surgeries."
For results of our 20 Questions to Ask a Trans Widow Survey, visit Trans Widow Ute Heggen YT channel, for periodic updates. About 40 responses so far, which unfortunately include 5 of us who were raped by these lingerie-wearing men, the half of us who have lived in poverty for some time after the split-up, and the almost half of us who were defamed/vilified either in court or on social media by our exes. No surprises there. This information never gets back to the diagnosing "therapists'" who typically tell us we are "too traditional" when we refuse to try out "sex with a strap-on" with him pretending to be "a woman." One of us was dangerously injured in the C-section scar when she acquiesced. This is the reality no one reports on.
Ute, I have seen your posts sporadically for months now, and I am just shocked to hear these heartbreaking reports. It's disgusting how people act like all "trans" folk are innocent little angels, and completely ignore the fact that there are men who are abusers that use a dress and $10 wig to disguise their terrible acts.
Thanks so much. Please go to Lime Soda Films YouTube channel and see the 2 trailers of Vaishnavi Sundar's new documentary, Behind the Looking Glass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dH4XQ6Ie8O0&t=7s
Ute, I'm very sorry for what happened to you. I look forward to watching Vaishnavi Sundar's film.
Here's a roundup of the desistance literature by James Cantor—not just the one study that peaked me! http://www.sexologytoday.org/2016/01/do-trans-kids-stay-trans-when-they-grow_99.html
Yesterday, I read a Christopher Rufo article that linked to a medical paper about 'gender reassignment surgeries,' specifically for 'bottom-surgery.'
God...I've never seen more horrifyingly graphic medical imagery in my life. And to think...I was going to go down that path, had I continued identifying as trans.
It's mind-boggling how sick this whole movement is. It chews people up and spits them out.
And all for what? Because they're afraid of a girl that wants to wear a tux or a boy wants to wear nail polish?
My 3-year-old grandson has his toenails painted red. His mom was doing her nails, he asked to have his done, she did them, no big deal to anyone. I hope more fervently than I can express that he (and his parents) will continue to see such things as expressions of his joyful and exuberant personality and will NOT slip into thinking this means there's something wrong with him as the little boy he is. I watched him yesterday playing with his favorite toy dump truck, with his brightly painted red toenails shining on his bare feet. He isn't concerned about gender stereotypes in either direction, and I do so hope he can hold onto that.
I hope he continues being confident in who he is into puberty and adulthood <3
Thank you!! I do too -- and I hope the same for his 18-month-old brother, who is an extraordinarily sunny little soul with a smile that enchants everyone who meets him. I fear for them in so many ways -- but given current trends, I think I'd be even more fearful if they were girls.
In 2023 we are telling confused kids they need to mutilate themselves to fit in and calling it progress.
Well written. From the original Dutch protocol study group(70 children), 1 developed post op infection after vaginoplasty and died. What’s eye opening is the push to start drugs on children pre pubescent limits the amount of , to be blunt, penile tissue that would be used to create a neo vagina later so intestinal tissue is used instead with a higher complication rate. I have no idea how well these details are discussed with families and children considering it.
Somehow, modern doctors have created a more barbaric version of turning boys into eunuchs than Middle Eastern empires could have ever thought of. It's a shame.
Your NYT piece on your daughter was a turning point for me— or rather the reaction to it. It was such an interesting article— and then there were these utterly deranged calls from TRAs to kidnap your child to save her from an abusive anti-trans parent. Freak outs over the title of the piece. I watched it all unfold just shocked by the intensity and insanity of the response— and started realizing how deranged this movement was. (So many moments of realization but that was probably the first.)
Please, does anyone know of teachers organizing around resisting this? Talk about being caught between progressives and conservatives, we are quite literally in the crossfire! In blue states we have directives about keeping information from parents about issues schools should never be litigating. We are pressured to post pride flags and ally statements and go to pride parades. It happened gradually and then all at once as they say, and teachers are confused and terrified. The unions are completely captured by gender ideology and so are administrators in my blue state. Teachers face the possibility of violence at school every day anyway, and all the heated rhetoric from both sides puts our lives at risk! Individuals who speak up will get fired, slandered and possibly attacked as we've seen. How can we push back effectively? Help!
I'm also Gen X. I live in Seattle, full of older gay people and young trans people. The gay people are generally happy. I've never met an openly happy trans kid. Something is deeply wrong here, even anecdotally.
It's clear that among the people encouraged to transition are effeminate young boys and more masculine girls. In other words, sissy boys and tomboy girls.
The pathologizing mid-20 century discourses on homosexuality are not so much about homosexuality, instead, about effeminacy. For a few decades we got away from that. But look at the way it got re-introduced........and along with that comes misogyny.
This is so close to Iran's practice of forcing some gay men, and lesbians, to have sex changes whether they want them or not.
I appreciate this piece. I also strongly oppose any teaming of LGB with T, even in something as noble-sounding as an "LGBT Courage Coalition." However you feel about either group, they are not the same; in some instances, their interests are diametrically opposed. The forced pairing by trans activists and acceptance by gay people who did not think through the consequences has done and continues to do a great deal of harm to females, especially lesbians and -- as your article notes -- young people of both sexes who, barring "transition," would otherwise emerge from "gender dysphoria" as gay. The association needs to be clearly and permanently broken, beginning with acronyms; personally, I cannot support any organization that perpetuates the fallacy of "LGBT." It's simply wrong, and it hurts too many people.
Totally agree. I'm not gay but it's very clear that LGB people have nothing in common with TQ +++. If journalists ,politicians and the rest would only engage their brain for one second they would realise this.This is a misogynistic , homophobic movement hiding behind the very legitimate gay rights movement ,which they seek to destroy ,and people need to understand this ASAP.
If this is your view....change won't happen. The AAP is not going to allow for a review of the science EVER if it comes from people who don't find common humanity in good people who happen to be trans.
We have two hard lines and no compromise.
No one is denying common humanity nor saying there are no good trans people. I am saying sexual orientation and gender identity are different things, which of course they are. I don't see how that fact should influence AAP or any other group in its willingness (or unwillingness) to review the science around "trans", which we all wish they would do, as have their braver peers in other countries.
What would you say to "LGB&T" or perhaps "LGB/T"? I think you're right to push back on the acronym, yet the voices of adult trans people are also important, and frankly I think they do help reach people on the left. The idea that they are transphobic is obviously ridiculous. Is there a way to revise the acronym to make it more clear that gay and trans are separate things, yet this and other groups consist of both -- coming together against the extremes of gender ideology?
I think it's fine if adult trans people who are appalled at the current extremism of younger activists want to stand up for sanity. I wish they would, as their voices could be the most effective. Most seem to be cowering. And the fact remains that "trans" has nothing to do with LGB. In my view, any continuing association of one with the other -- acronyms or elsewhere -- links us (I'm lesbian) with harms we oppose. Everytime I hear or read "LGBTQ+," I feel ill, and every chance I get to say "I'm lesbian and I oppose gender ideology," I do.
Helping kids (and adults) with learning to accept and like themselves for who they are, is a bipartisan undertaking.
Lisa, you mention Ken Zucker's long term study on boys/young men, which showed that watchful waiting in this cohort of boys/young men resulted in about 75% of them identifying as gay, and most of them desisting.
I frequently hear this paper applied to girls/young women. Are there any long-term studies of watchful waiting in girls?
More generally, to me, there is something disturbing about the fact that so many people assume that studies done on boys/young men will automatically apply to girls/young women.
Do you know the name of it? I am searching for it and not sure which it is.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2021.632784/full
thank you.
Thank you for all your work on this topic!
Good article. No one should be afraid to engage with the 'other side' or of breaking rank with gender fanatics who slavishly follow a 'party line.' These rabid vocal 'activists' are often bullies and generally misinformed and misdirected. Tucker Carlson, Ingraham, and especially brilliant gay cultural commentator Douglas Murray offer wonderfully balanced liberal views.
I looked up the parallel paper that Ken Zucker did for girls. It has a smaller sample size and was done earlier:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18194003/
It seems that for girls who had experienced gender identity disorder in childhood at followup in their 20s, "3 participants (12%) were judged to have GID or gender dysphoria. Regarding sexual orientation, 8 participants (32%) were classified as bisexual/homosexual in fantasy, and 6 (24%) were classified as bisexual/homosexual in behavior. The remaining participants were classified as either heterosexual or asexual."
Let's not make the mistake of assuming the girls currently caught up in this social contagion are all lesbians. That's a mistake too. The study looked at boys before the social contagion took off. Make no assumptions. Guide them to understand why they don't feel right in their bodies. Some likely are gay but some likely just wanted friends, acceptance, to feel part of a community etc.
Good points. In Abi Shrier’s book, she writes on that very issue. Girls/young women have experimented with one another for long before social media existed and it wasn’t because they were/are all gay. Her point was boys not being emotionally ready, other girls were stand ins, so to speak until the boys matured.