This has to be stopped.
An adult-enabled cult of adolescent self-harm
I don’t understand.
Parents who would be horrified if they caught their kid cutting themself, or concealing rituals of bulimia or anorexia, are willing to submit them to hormonal interference and surgical mutilation in the name of gender ideology.
How does that make sense?
The soaring numbers make the conclusion unavoidable that, with rare exceptions, adolescent gender dysphoria is at its most benign a part of the “identity crisis” normal to this searching life stage, and at its most malignant a morbid fad, a social contagion such as regularly sweep adolescent peer groups—from “pro-ana” and “pro-mia” websites to peer-group epidemics of “Tourette’s” and “dissociative identity disorder” (formerly known as multiple personality disorder), and more.
In my “neither nor” view there would be nothing to fear in letting adolescents try out living as the other sex, or neither sex, socially and sartorially; even better, encourage them to mix and match and explore the common human traits that tradition has artificially labeled “masculine” or “feminine” (e.g., girls don’t think, boys don’t feel). (I’m not saying there are no differences. I’m saying there are real differences but also a lot of fake differences. We are two sexes, but we are also one species—and eight billion unique individuals. Much of traditional sex stereotypes is cruel and arbitrary in placing large swaths of one’s own humanity off limits, and also in being far too one-size-fits-all. Not everyone born male is a warrior type, for example, and making that the benchmark of a “real man” leads to bullying and a widespread fear of failure.)
To encourage minors whose identity is not yet settled to inflict irreversible damage on their bodies, their future health and their fertility seems to me criminal. If a conviction of transsexual identity persists and deepens into adulthood, an adult has full custody of their own body and the right to do with it as they see fit. They are presumed capable of deciding how the risks and benefits of medical transition balance out for them. A teenager’s confusion should be held and honored as an open-ended search, not exploited to justify adults’ choices, or interpreted in a way that prematurely closes off the possibilities that beckon to them.
Have read there is about a 2% difference in DNA between males and females. Have also read that there is about a 2% difference in DNA between humans and chimpanzees. These two independent facts led a friend of mine to be convinced that men and women were different species that only came together to mate and more often than not, raise a family.
Am all for children wearing whatever they want to school or anywhere else, so long as it is at least covering what most of society believes should be covered. Beyond that, talk therapy is a good start, just how much is peer pressure, how much is not wanting to be gay or lesbian, and finding it so much easier to be a girl or boy instead. These are things we just cannot know, but once a child gets to the point of, say 16, perhaps puberty blockers might be a real improvement. In any case, no surgeries till 18 and they are an adult and decide for themselves with no one else to blame.