A false sense of danger

You may notice that many children and adults who identify as transgender can seem urgently demanding and distrustful. They seem to genuinely believe that you hate them if you do not follow every demand, many to the point of cutting off family and friends who care about their wellbeing. I will explain why many transgender teenagers have this distrust, as a desister who has lived through it myself.

According to the CDC, roughly 20% of teenagers, and 70% of trans identified teenagers, have clinical depression. It's hard to understand if you have never experienced it, so I will do my best to explain. Depression is linked to neurotransmitter imbalances. A major part is dopamine, a chemical messenger the drives motivation and reward. For people with depression, dopamine is under-active. This means that things that used to or should feel rewarding do not. You lose your drive and purpose to do things and sometimes the ability to feel simple pleasures. Another major part is the function of the amygdala. The amygdala is an area of the brain that processes fear and sadness. It functions to react to stress and danger. The amygdala is overactive in people with depression. This makes negative painful thoughts more intense and harder to forget or ignore. A small rejection may feel like a major failure. Recalling a sad memory may feel as fresh and painful as when it first happened. Normal life setbacks may seem impossible to overcome, leading to a feeling of hopelessness that cannot be drowned out by positivity or purpose; your brain does not respond to that anymore.

An overreactive amygdala also increases self-criticism and self-loathing. Most teenagers struggle with body image and self-esteem, but depression can make it a lot stronger and harder to overcome. Another condition that causes self-loathing is social anxiety, which causes the intense fear of being judged by others. I will also try to explain it for those who do not understand. This fear is as strong as many other common fears, like heights, bugs, or needles. The panic and avoidance you experience over your personal fear is the same amount of panic and avoidance someone with social anxiety may face at the thought of being negatively judged by others. It's not a "stupid" fear. As social creatures we feel safe when we are accepted by others. Being alone and rejected is dangerous and leaves you vulnerable. Love and acceptance from others protects you. Many take steps to avoid their phobias. If you have a fear of heights, you won't go on a tall rollercoaster or visit your friend in their penthouse. If you are afraid of bugs, you may keep bug spray handy, get netting for your windows, and never leave trash in your kitchen or bathroom. People with social anxiety attempt to protect themselves too by being overly self-critical. Correcting everything potentially off putting about yourself can protect you from being judged. It may lead to you hating the sound of your own voice or thinking you talk too much, watching your movements closely to make sure you don't stand out, dressing plainly or following trends so that people won't judge your outfits, or refusing to raise any objections because you don't want to upset anyone. It haunts you even when you're alone. If you're scared of needles and you know you have an upcoming vaccine appointment, you may dread it for hours or even days in advance. People with social anxiety may dread having to go out or talk to others. 10% of teenagers have social anxiety, as well as almost 80% of trans-identified teenagers.

The Wikipedia definition of gender dysphoria is "the distress a person experiences due to inconsistency between their gender identity—their personal sense of their own gender—and their sex assigned at birth."

The signs listed by simply psychology are common. "Wish to have sex characteristics of another gender." Many people feel insecure about their sex characteristics, especially during puberty. I have heard several girls say that they did not want their breasts, especially if it got them negative attention. Not wanting your period is extremely common. Feeling your body change through puberty is known to be hard for everyone. This is portrayed in A Goofy Movie where Max has a nightmare about growing up into his father, his body becomes morphed to make him more unrecognizable. This could be seen as a metaphor for growing into secondary sex characteristics, which happens to everyone during puberty. "Preferring clothes or hairstyles of the opposite gender, rejecting gender stereotypes, discomfort or distress at being treated as assigned gender at birth, and preferring toys typical of another gender", all of these are so normal that I am genuinely shocked that they are now considered medical symptoms. I think everyone knew a tomboy and many people knew a feminine boy as a kid. A lot of them were very uncomfortable with the idea of acting gender conforming. Instead of accepting that there is nothing wrong with them, it is now considered a sign of gender dysphoria, with medical "treatment" recommended. This is how many kids come to believe they are transgender, when normal things are considered symptoms.

This can come with distress and insecurity about your body, which is normal for teenagers and kids and exacerbated by mental illness. However, instead of being taught to love your body and personality and that you are perfect the way you are, there is a different message being spread in trans affirming social circles, which is:

• You will never get over your discomfort unless you transition.

• There is no treatment for any discomfort you are experiencing, except transition.

• You are denying your "true self" by not transitioning.

• You are living a lie, and you can only take it for so long.

• You will be driven to suicide if you do not transition

It's a dangerous message, especially considering the high comorbidity of other mental illness. Over 50% of people with depression and 40% of people with social anxiety will contemplate suicide. The idea that you will never be comfortable with yourself or will never be happy without transitioning is sure to make you spiral.

This is why any kind of questioning or pushback isn't taken well. Denying them any form of transition is denying them what they believe is their only chance at being happy. You are their enemy because being skeptical of transition means you must want them to commit suicide.

Many people, including myself, have found relief from dysphoria and various mental health issues without transitioning, or have found that transitioning has harmed them. However, criticism of gender affirming care is labeled as a kind of conversion therapy. Conversion therapy is a serious accusation given what it usually implies. Electric shocks, nausea inducing drugs, and even castration and brain surgery were used to attempt to turn gay people straight. Since trans has linked itself with homosexuality, it is now defined by many as any attempt to change someone's sexuality or gender identity. So, questioning and pushback of transition is equated to horrific physical abuse of people for being gay.

But why would someone disagree with transitioning as treatment? There is only one explanation as to why you would want to deny them "lifesaving care": you hate transgender or LGBTQ people. You hate them and you want them to die. Many people consider legal pushback against trans ideology as a step in genocide. They consider the UK's ruling defining women as erasing trans people in the law. When Marcy Rheighton was arrested for using the women's bathroom as a man, they considered it a political arrest of an innocent person and compared it to holocaust imprisonments. They consider protecting minors from gender affirming care to be medical abuse and an attempt to erase them from society or drive them to suicide.

This is because they genuinely believe this to be their true self, as legitimate as their ethnicity, and because they genuinely believe medical transition is the only way to prevent their suicide. They consider parents refusing to affirm their transgender identity as child abuse. They believe their family is denying them lifesaving healthcare out of hatred for their child or their "true" identity. Many of these kids end up cutting off their family or running away.

In reality many people who criticize transitioning are trying to save trans-identified youths from a path of self-destruction.