A World Built on Lies

As I write this, detransitioner Johnny Skinner is giving interviews where he describes the side effects he experienced from being put on puberty blockers and estrogen at 13. “Nipple leakage, brain fog, chest pain, depression. I was urinating blood and had ulcers in my bladder and was too weak to attend school. When I told my doctor how sick I was, he looked at me and said, welcome to womanhood.” There are many critical comments towards him on X/Twitter, many accusing him of lying.

However, it is easy to see the hypocrisy here. Many say he looks too masculine for it to have been possible for him to have been on blockers and estrogen from such a young age.

Others accuse him of being a biological woman based on their “analysis” of his bone structure. Some claim these aren’t the side effects of these hormones. Others say he knew these were the side effects of hormones and consented to them anyway so his criticism doesn’t matter now.

If his “lies” are so “obvious” than which story is the “obvious” truth and which is the lie? They are all lies because the goal of those criticizing him isn’t to fact check him, it is to discredit him. Many people say he must be lying because “nobody is put on puberty blockers and estrogen at the same time”.

Anyone with even a basic knowledge of medical transitioning knows that using these drugs together is very typical. Those who have been following this topic for any amount of time know this isn’t the only widely told lie. For years people insisted no minors ever got transition surgeries. When that became impossible to deny, the story changed to it only happening to 17-year-olds who were getting double mastectomies. But they we heard stories of girls as young as 13 getting double mastectomies so the story changed to claim that that was the only surgery being performed. But we all know of Jazz Jennings and the vaginoplasty he had at 17 from the show on TLC. Doctors admitted to performing vaginoplasties on patients as young as 15. Yet, we still hear people say that no transition surgeries happened to any minors.

Why are we surprised by these lies when this entire ideology is built upon them? That a man can be a woman because of “gender identity” and vice versa. I have not seen a definition of gender identity that is indistinguishable from gender stereotypes along with an “innate sense”. Funny how gender identity is innate and known since childhood yet gender is also fluid. If you question any of these narratives you are a hateful person. You must simultaneously accept them all.

To justify medicalizing gender identity, we got a narrative to back it up. “Girl brain in a boy body”, they said, citing a study to back it up. But in this study, the participants did not have female brains, just an average more similar to females than that of other males, still a male brain. So, others offered another narrative that’s less easy to disprove. “Born in the wrong body”. But this has no scientific basis either. It is more like a religious belief. But if you reject this belief, you are hateful, you are transphobic, bigoted, ignorant, and/or dangerous. On the same topic of medicalization, you are expected to believe that transition procedures are lifesaving but you also must believe that being trans is not a mental illness, or you are a bigot.

If a “transphobe” is someone who notices hypocrisy, why care if you are called that? Because when you label something as “lifesaving care” the only reason you would be against it is out of ignorance or hatred.

“Educate yourself on trans” they say. But many who do find themselves to be more “transphobic” the more they learn, because they see these lies, cult tactics, and abuse. There are also detransitioners who speak against this. How much more “educated” can they get? Those people must be hateful. The alleged reason they must be against trans ideology is the same reason why Nazis hate Jews, why the KKK hates black people - pure violent hatred. People speak of a “trans genocide” and say that they are the “most marginalized group on earth”.

Maybe some people are aware of their lies but, perhaps even more alarmingly, many people are not. As a teenager, I was trans-identified for about four years. These lies were presented to me as fact, starting from childhood. I read about transgender and gender identity in sex-ed books that were intended to teach about puberty. I saw videos on YouTube, medical documentaries about trans kids, which presented transitioning as healthcare enabling them to live their true self. I also saw videos which had scenarios featuring trans-identified characters and the “kind” bystanders who affirmed them and who told off people who didn’t buy it. I saw films and stories that portrayed coming out as trans as similar to coming out as gay, something that’s just a part of you. After growing up on lies, I thought it was the truth. I thought that my discomfort with my body and self meant I was a boy, and that transitioning was the only possible way to feel better. When my mom did not affirm me, I became genuinely afraid of her abusing me despite her never hurting me. I lived a double life and lied to uphold my world built on lies. I must be affirmed wherever I could but without my mom’s knowledge. I told all my teachers at school and specifically asked them not to tell my mother.

In middle school they all affirmed me. In high school teachers either affirmed or didn’t, but didn’t tell a soul. The teachers didn’t particularly encourage me, the internet however was a different story. I worked overtime to avoid getting caught. After my mom said she wasn’t affirming me I said I would stop identifying as trans, but I did not. I wanted to medically transition and I planned on doing so the moment I could. I hid what was going on at school. I remember once I was worried about my mom seeing my changed name in my school notebooks, so I ripped out every page with my changed name on it and threw them away. I wasn’t allowed to use social media, so I accessed trans forums (TrevorSpace, TransPulse) on a different browser connected to an alternative email. I got my phone taken once because I was in trouble for a different reason, and if I logged in to TrevorSpace on a computer the site would email me about the login attempt and my mom would see. So I logged into a website I knew my friend used because that website wouldn’t email me, and I told him I was in trouble and to post on my profile that I can’t log in right now. I couldn’t even go a day without using that site, despite it functioning similar to a cult. They said it was a safe and accepting space, but that was another lie. There were many ever changing rules about what was acceptable to say, and users were shunned for stepping out of line. You learn you are only liked when you fit a narrative, and you believe this is the only place you will be accepted, so you learn to watch your mouth. I have seen Tumblr be described the same way.

Its lie after lie, on both an ideological and personal level. But that is because trans ideology itself is built on a lie, and lies create more lies, until your life has more lies than truth and you don’t know what reality is anymore.