Tag: Abigail Shrier

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Embrace, Don’t Affirm

(Originally posted June 18, 2021)
I ended the last post with a stat from Facebook. That statistic came from 2016, so perhaps the number is even higher today.1I just found out the number is over 70 today! Of course, this is Facebook. Young people left Facebook a long time ago (in internet time). Tumblr, Reddit, Tiktok, YouTube, Instagram & Snapchat are more their style. And the gender categories celebrated there are head spinning. Let’s just say “gender fluidity” is the norm. Here are a few:

  • Agender
  • Asexual
  • Bigender
  • Binary
  • Bisexual
  • Cisgender
  • Gay
  • Genderfluid
  • Genderqueer
  • Lesbian
  • Non-binary
  • Pansexual
  • Polysexusal
  • Third gender
  • Transgender
  • Transexual
  • Trigender
  • Two-spirit

Facebook, today’s hangout for “ole fuddie duddies” had 56 of these in 2016.

56.

Staking out your territory on the gender map has the feel of a competitive sport. Young people have always tried to carve out a niche for themselves, even though, truth be known, they tended to fall into congregational coolness. But today, because of the Internet, their potential universe of “friends” has grown exponentially with increasing variety. Finding someone “just like you” on the Internet is relatively easy. In the past, as a group young people weren’t all that different. Just different from their parents. But today the difference is dangerous in a way that a tattoo, a piercing, or the “Goth” look never was.

***

I do want to be clear about this. Gender dysphoria2Gender Dysphoria — formerly known as “Gender Identity Disorder” is characterized by a severe and persistent discomfort in one’s biological sex. is real. A very small number of people suffer from it. They need all the help we can give them.

If you know someone with gender dysphoria, or even if they just think they have gender dysphoria (most), you should become their friend.  Don’t avoid.  Embrace.  I have atheist friends who are, in my opinion, mentally and morally confused about God.  And they know that I believe that about them.   We are still friends.  Unlike what happened to Rev. Randall, they won’t report me to the authorities because my view of their Atheism makes them uncomfortable.  Or attacks their dignity.  Or their sense of self-worth and well-being.  I still treat them with respect.  I still love them.  And they know it.  They think I’m wrong.  And I think they are wrong.  But we are still friends.   I embrace but I don’t affirm.

Now, of course, gender dysphoria is psychologically debilitating for those who really have it. And, unlike my Atheist friends, someone with gender dysphoria suffers mental anguish.  They need a different kind of help.  But, as a Christian it would not be loving to affirm what I believe is mental and emotional confusion. 

I can love someone with anorexia nervosa3An emotional disorder characterized by an obsessive desire to lose weight by refusing to eat. (another dysphoria) without affirming her body destroying behavior.  It would be wrong of me to say, “you’re looking good girl, keep going!  I affirm your desire to be more comfortable with your body.”  It would be wrong and unloving to do that.  She hates her appearance and is slowly killing herself.  No matter how strongly she feels about it, I will not affirm that belief. 

But also as a Christian it would be wrong to exclude her from my peer group simply because she is suffering and different. Exclusion may be more “comfortable” for me and my peers but it would be unloving. We must lovingly include her and ask God for practical wisdom as we live together. There are few “hard and fast” rules here. Reaching out and embracing is the overarching rule. The details of how we interact will no doubt vary from situation to situation.

Still a Christian mustn’t lie. A “trans-man” is not really a man. A “trans-woman” is not really a woman. But you don’t need to say everything all at once. Presenting a “solid argument” to someone who is hurting won’t work. Putting your arm around them, walking with them, listening to them, ironically, offering your embodied self to them will work much better. Paul’s great chapter about love in 1st Corinthians, the one you hear at weddings all the time, describes love first and foremost as “Patient.” And then “Kind.” So, by all means, a Christian should patiently, prayerfully embrace. It won’t be easy. But it could work wonders.

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The comparison between anorexia nervosa & gender dysphoria is appropriate because “transitioning” via puberty blockers, cross-sex hormone treatment and sex-reassignment surgery does real physical and irreversible damage to the body.  Believing in a Creator should keep Christians from affirming those who deny the body God gave them. We certainly can’t affirm their desire to do damage to that body. There are some clinicians and surgeons, Christian and non-Christian, who are getting out of the specialty they trained for because they can’t advise or perform double mastectomies on perfectly healthy breasts. This is not what they “signed up for” they say. They entered their professions to be healers.

Some conscientious professionals who subscribe to the Hippocratic oath, “first do no harm” are being asked to go against their conscience or leave their chosen professional field. Surgeons in the Western world are being told that if they perform double mastectomies on cancer patients then they must perform the same surgery on the perfectly healthy breasts of a young woman who claims she is a man trapped in a woman’s body.

I repeat the question from my post about Rev Randall. Is this the world we want to live in? We need to come up with some answers quick. Things are moving swiftly.

***

A sword of Damocles hangs over many heads now. Professionals are being told they must agree with the patient’s self diagnosis. Those who counsel otherwise, and advise young patients to “wait and see” may lose their license or be fired. I’ll blog about one notable person soon. They are wrongheadedly called “conversion therapists.” Some 19 U.S. states at last count have banned mental health professionals from engaging in so-called “conversion therapy” at the risk of losing their license. The U.K., Canada, and Australia have anti-conversion therapy laws. Conversion Therapy has been used in the past to “convert” homosexuals so the concept packs quite a rhetorical punch when used by Transgender Activists today. However, homosexuals don’t deny their biological sex. This is different.

There are more than a few adult homosexuals, some professional clinicians, who openly thank “their lucky stars” that they were not born in this generation. Had they been, their “gender non-conformity” may have taken them down the Trans path of irreversible bodily alteration.

Apply your practical wisdom to this question, who is the conversion therapist?

Is it the one who is trying to help a person align their thoughts and feelings with the body they were given at birth or the professional who disregards the body and proposes irreversible radical surgeries combined with life-long hormone treatments in hopes of aligning that outer body with a patient’s inner desires?

Who is the conversion therapist here?

Quite an Orwellian twist, don’t you think?

Increasingly the only acceptable approach is the real conversion therapy resulting from the “affirmative care model.”

We are told we should begin our interactions, whether social or professional, with the conclusion. And that conclusion must be that a person has gender dysphoria if they say they have it. Using this “affirmative care model” clinicians are placing our teenagers on an irreversible path after a single counseling session. I’ve lost count of the stories I’ve read or seen in the last 9 months of young people who have come to regret their decision to transition (they are called de-transitioners). They tell stories of how after a single session, a one hour meeting(!) with a clinical therapist they were prescribed puberty blockers and/or cross-sex hormones. As I mentioned in my last post, Oregon’s “age of consent” for certain healthcare services means a self diagnosing 15 year old girl can walk into a Planned Parenthood clinic and receive a dose of Testosterone 40 times the natural female level. A note from a therapist or mom is not required. She just has to sign a consent form (which no doubt has been cleared by lawyers in case a 15 year old regrets her decision and thinks about suing later in life.) After taking “T” for three months her body is forever changed. Double mastectomy is the next step of her transition, halted only by legal-age requirements which are country and state specific.

For natal females in almost every case the combination of puberty blockers to halt natural biological development and treatment with Testosterone causes infertility. And often an inability to experience orgasm in the future. There will be no going back. This is lunacy masquerading as “compassionate patient-centered care.” How many young people do you know who could wisely decide something as monumental, as life altering, as this? But parents are letting them make this choice at earlier and earlier ages because they are being told by health care professionals that their child’s well-being depends upon it. [See this post which rebuts the Suicide Myth.]

Because of the affirmative care model co-morbidities of depression, severe anxiety, autism, are largely ignored and prescribed medical treatments (testosterone or estrogen depending on the natal sex) begin these patients down an irreversible path. This is not how medicine and therapy have ever been practiced.

De-transitioners, those who regret their adolescent choice, and the body disfiguring path they’ve been on, are beginning to cry out. Like Cari. They need to be heard. Sometimes they are mocked by the online Trans community as never being Trans in the first place. Mockery is an art form on the Internet, even by those who claim to be the most tolerant and open to difference. But in spite of the obvious embarrassment of having made such a life-altering decision, de-transitioners courageously step forward to tell their updated story. I’ll highlight some of them in a later post.

We need to listen.

For it is heartbreaking.

I believe most young people claiming gender dysphoria are simply misdiagnosed. And this mad rush toward transition is disfiguring our confused young people. It is hurting them beyond physical repair. For their sake we desperately need to pay attention. Embrace. Don’t affirm.

***

Here’s where I put on my Christian hat again (actually, I never took it off).

Virtually every parent that contacted author Abigail Shrier about their concern for their daughters would self identify as “progressive” or “liberal” on the political spectrum. In telling their stories Shrier hints at the possibility that a lack of boundaries, that is to say a certain “post-modern fluidity” may contribute to their daughter’s initial confusion. She only hints at the possibility. I would do more than hint. Teenagers test boundaries. They press limits. They need guidance from the adults in the room. Unfortunately for some confused teens

What they lack in life experience, they make up for with a sex-studded vocabulary and avant-garde gender theory.  Deep in the caverns of the internet, a squadron of healers waits to advise them. - Abigail Shrier, author of Irreversible Damage.

They need guidance and healing from their Creator in the bodily form of those who know and represent that Creator.

Let me finish with a quote from an influential non-Christian. 20th century Psychologist & Psychotherapist, Carl Jung, discovered the consequences of a fluid outlook on life. Here’s how he puts it:

“I have treated many hundreds of patients, the larger number being Protestants, a smaller number of Jews and not more than five or six believing Catholics.  Among all my patients in the second half of life [that is, over 35], there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life.  It is safe to say that every one of them fell ill because he had lost that which the living religions of every age had given their followers and none of them has really been healed who did not regain his religious outlook” (emphasis added). --Carl Jung, Swiss Psychologist and Psychotherapist.

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Jung’s practical wisdom aligns itself with a Classic Christian’s understanding of our Created yet broken world.

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Parental Authority & Our Schools – (repost)

Originally posted June 30, 2021

Abigail Shrier in her book Irreversible Damage spends a chapter on the parents who are in pain and whose authority is being disregarded. Let me mention a few parents and their daughters. (Names have been changed by Shrier.)

JULIE

Two Midwesterners, Shirley and her lesbian partner were raising an academically successful, physically energetic but socially challenged young girl. Shrier gives her the name of “Julie.” She had crushes on boys growing up, which was just fine with her two moms. Julie was a member of the Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA) at school, which her mothers took as a welcome sign of solidarity.

Julie had no history of gender dysphoria (the scientific literature unequivocally shows GD occurs mostly in boys and usually presents itself around the ages of 2-4. Little boys will say things like, “but no mommy, I’m not a boy, I’m a girl.” Natal Females almost never do this.) Julie didn’t either. Shirley said, “As far as I knew, she identified as straight. She was pretty girly and feminine.”

At the GSA she met a girl named Lauren, who introduced her to anime, computer-animated images of anthropomorphized creatures. “I had no idea it was tied into this whole trans culture,” said Shirley. Julie began to visit DeviantArt, a website where Trans folk hang out and gender ideology is discussed at length.

Julie loved ballet. And was good at it. She was on route to becoming a professional ballet dancer, “nabbing top roles in her dance company.” She landed the coveted part of Cinderella in the ballet by the same name. But, after “crushing” her performance and coming out onstage to take her bows and receive the high praises of the audience, Julie caught the eye of her closest friend, Lauren. Shirley describes what happened next, she “sort of looked like she was ashamed of herself and faded. All of her joy sucked out of her body.” Unbeknownst to Julie’s parents, Lauren had recently come out as “transgender.” Julie would soon follow.

"Gendered performances, such as occur in ballet, fly in the face of trans identification.  To transgender adolescents, gendered behavior that accords with one's sex is the ultimate blunder--it unmasks as frauds those who lack commitment, who are really just "cis"1"Cis" means on this side of gender, "trans" means on the other side after all.  - Irreversible Damage, Abigail Shrier

Like the culture of eating disorder patients who regard “thinness” as a virtue, and extremism in pursuit of the noble goal as a sign of personal integrity, transgenderism tracks the same disordered trajectory. There are pro-anorexia sites all over the social media internet preaching the purity of the pursuit. Same with the Online Trans world. It is an “Us” vs. “Them” division.

Julie’s parents wanted to be on the side of their daughter so they followed along too. And began using new names and pronouns, thinking maybe this was the right thing to do. But Julie was getting angrier and more distant and emotionally detached. So they stopped doing that.

Shrier then recounts what she described in an online interview as one of the most disappointing parts of this whole Trans story; in loco parentis (in place of the parent) has taken on a new meaning within many of our public & private schools. 

Shirley met with the school administrators, who assured her that as long as Julie was at their all-girls’ school, they would treat her as a girl and use her given name and female pronouns. “Well, that’s not what happened.” Without her mothers’ knowledge or permission, Julie’s teachers, administrators, and friends all acceded to Julie’s request and began referring to her as a male student and by her new male name. Julie began to lead a kind of double life. “When she was too much at school, too much at her computer, she became morose, withdrawn, angry. We had no idea she was indoctrinating herself with these YouTube videos.” - Irreversible Damage by Abigail Shrier

But the die was cast. And it seemed like most were playing along. Even dance company choreographers: 

At eighteen, Julie moved out of the house, signed up for Medicaid—although she was still on her mothers’ insurance—and began a course of testosterone. Julie found a local dance company that would permit her to train as a male. But she wasn’t strong enough, Shirley told me. “From what I understand, the choreographer had to rechoreograph it three times because she couldn’t keep up [as a man]…. She dropped a couple of dancers.” Her mother was frightened that Julie’s apparent fixation was going to hurt her or someone else. She reprimanded her, “It’s not just your body and your career. You’re talking about someone else’s body and their career. You’re going to hurt them.” But by then, Julie was done taking advice from her mothers. She abruptly cut off contact with them. She has hundreds of followers on Instagram; her mothers are blocked from viewing her account. “We have someone who’s been able to snoop in on her [Instagram]… I saw the picture of her, right after her mastectomy, lying in the hospital bed, talking about how this is the best day of her life, tears of joy, this kind of thing, and four hundred of her cheerleaders saying, ‘Yay,’ ‘Awesome job,’ ‘We’re so proud of you,’ ‘You can do this.’ You know—the usual.” - Irreversible Damage, Abigail Shrier

Instead of standing in place of the parents, and representing the parents wishes for the children in their charge, schools are disregarding parental concerns. They go around parents and often kids like Julie become more and more distant from the ones who love them most. Parents who don’t affirm are regarded as “toxic.” This “toxicity” charge will be leveled not just by the legions of Internet Trans Influencers but by school teachers and administrators. I’ll go into more detail about that in a minute, but first another story.

***

GAYATRI

Her father an Indian immigrant and physician and her mother a software engineer came, as all do, for the abundant opportunities of American life. Once again, Gayatri showed no signs of childhood gender dysphoria. She was born with a minor neurological disorder affecting her motor skills, and as a result, by the time puberty hit, more than the usual awkwardness followed. In middle school one of her elementary school friends came out as Trans and began “transitioning” by binding her breasts and announcing her new male name, and asking others to use her new male pronouns.

In ninth grade Gayatri was given a laptop and after much pleading a smartphone. She spent a lot of time on Tumblr and DeviantArt (mentioned earlier). Every free moment she spent online. But since both her parents were comfortable with technology and the Internet, nothing up to this point concerned them. 

In the second half of her freshman year, one of her teachers nominated her for a leadership retreat, and her parents were thrilled, eagerly paying the fee. “I always had great appreciation and respect for all the institutions in the United States, starting with the government, and the federal nature of everything, the school districts being independent and all that,” her father said. He examined the flyer for the retreat, believing his daughter had been recognized for a special honor. The flyer contained “all positive things” about leadership and social justice, which sounded like a good thing. “I trusted the school completely.” At the end of the weekend-long retreat, the students performed a play for the parents. “The whole play focused on sexuality and gender,” Gayatri’s mother told me. “It was all about these depressed kids with no motivation.” Each kid stood up and introduced themselves with some alleged hardship identity—“I’m depressed,” “I’m gay.” Then, Gayatri stood up. “ ‘I’m transgender, and I go by they/them.’ We were like in tears, we didn’t know what to do,” her mother said. After the camp, Gayatri discarded all of her girls’ clothes and set up an Instagram account announcing her new name. One day, while she was walking the dog with her parents, Gayatri floated the idea of starting testosterone and getting top surgery. Her parents became alarmed. By then, they had learned that Gayatri’s school had been using her “new name” and pronouns (though never on any documentation sent home) entirely without their knowledge. No longer merely the class bungler, Gayatri had reinvented herself as the edgy trans kid. The “likes” and emojis showered on her Instagram profile spoke for themselves: this new identity was an upgrade. As a “trans boy,” Gayatri had friends—lots of them. [emphasis mine] - Irreversible Damage by Abigail Shrier

If you ever wonder why so many parents have become deeply disillusioned with the state of public education in America, this might now be exhibit A.

Schools are being coached by Activists to protect the privacy of the student who identifies as Transgender, even if this means keeping the parents in the dark.

According to Transgender Activists, the starting point is the conviction that,

Privacy and confidentiality are critically important for transgender students who do not have supportive families. In those situations, even inadvertent disclosures could put the student in a potentially dangerous situation at home, so it is important to have a plan in place to help avoid any mistakes or slip-ups. - Human Rights Campaign "Schools In Transition" pg 16

An entire chapter (5) in HRC’s “Schools in Transition” is devoted to “Unsupportive Parents or Caregivers.” But what about those many parents who truly love their children and sincerely believe that transitioning is the worst thing for them. What about those parents who want to assist with a course of therapy (and prayer) that doesn’t include the advice of the “affirmative care model”? What if they believe helping their child align with their birth sex is a better pathway to personal wholeness? What if they believe God created their children as male or female? Are these experts from the Human Rights Campaign and their supporters in our school systems the only experts to be consulted? Are you comfortable with these experts going around the backs of parents? Keeping them in the dark?

I’m not.

Here is a revealing quote in the HRC guidelines.

School officials interact with the student on a daily basis and focus on supporting the student’s growth and development, which gives school personnel unique insight into the student’s needs.

And parents don’t have unique insight into the student’s needs? More than school officials? For the Activists unless these parents adopt the affirm-only, puberty-blocking, sterilizing doctrine of pediatric medical transition they are at best misguided and at worst bigots.  Are you comfortable with that conclusion?

I’m not.

Maybe these parents possess wisdom gleaned from having raised these children from birth, wisdom these school experts and Transgender Activists don’t possess about these particular children. Maybe refusing to be cajoled into going against a parents deepest protective instincts should be respected by those payed to educate their children. Maybe agreeing to a never ending regimen of cross-hormone therapy and radical life altering surgeries is a bridge too far for most parents. Maybe these parents have done their own research and are convinced that the recent explosive growth of teen girls identifying as Trans is not real but evidence of social contagion.

***

Another model the “Policy on Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Students” produced by the National Center for Transgender Equality and GLSEN includes the following guideline:

Staff or educators shall not disclose any information that may reveal a student’s gender identity to others, including parents or guardians... 

Unless absolutely required to do so by law. These guidelines give advice on how to use a student’s preferred name and pronouns in class, but the legal name and normal sex-specific pronouns in communication with parents. Rather than respect parental authority and adhere to the historic in loco parentis expectation, parents are being deceived and disregarded.

***

Many call for public education reform so that the money “follows the student” instead of going to designated school districts, some of which are failing academically, as well as failing to live up to the historic in loco parentis expectation. These reformers insist the 1964 Civil Right’s Act anti-discrimination guidelines will still be followed, guidelines which specifically reference “race, color, religion, national origin” and “sex” discrimination. Nobody wants to “turn back the clock” on those advances. Practical matters like transportation issues can be worked out. These reformers say, let the parents pick the schools on a rational geographic basis. If your local school is “preaching” a gender ideology that you as a parent disagree with, then you should have the flexibility to send your child elsewhere. Just like in Sweden, where the money follows the child. You are not locked into a particular school simply because of where you live. We need to allow parents creative choice solutions to a very real and for them disturbing trend in education.

I would personally support something like the Swedish education model without disregarding the religious “free exercise” clause in our Constitution. A clause which supports freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. Otherwise, we would veer off into anti-religious bigotry. A very real concern these days.

***

Here is an interesting link about the Swedish Culture and Economy. We have been told that Swedish society is based on a socialist model. Well, that was then. 30 years ago. This is now. At around 33:43 into the video, they start talking about how the Swedes do public education. But you might want to watch the whole thing.

***

Some think this too extreme, which given the current state of public education in America, I don’t know why you wouldn’t want to experiment with different solutions.

I know many public school educators. I have great respect for most of them. But, I’ve personally witnessed more than a few inadequate teachers, administrators and failing schools. So if you think American parents like the ones in the stories above will accept this new understanding of in loco parentis and simply roll with gender ideology, you might be mistaken. After the remote learning experience of last year & the unwillingness of schools to reopen many parents are deciding to pull the plug on the current local school option, if at all possible.

Obviously for most parents this is not feasible. But if the money followed the student they just might vote with their feet. And I wouldn’t blame them.

My next post will look at gender ideology propagated in our elementary schools.

***