How did our society evolve to devalue the natural body? How did we fail to impart to our kids that we’ve all gone through phases of not liking aspects of our bodies and that most people can be distressed about parts of their bodies throughout their lives? Most women I know, including myself, will look at a photo of themselves and request a re-do if the angle of the shot or the way we posed accentuates an area that makes us feel self-conscious. I have been known to place my arms in positions that made them look a bit better, tilt my head or body one way or another to have my neck look less wrinkled, or adjust my pose to make my belly look less plump. Women, and probably men, too, start changing how we dress as we age to cover up less attractive body parts, ones that are not as firm as they were in our youth.
Women not liking their bodies or appearances has been around since antiquity - think of all the myths and fairy tales where a woman or goddess is jealous of another female’s beauty. In the last hundred-plus years, people have had more time to fixate on their bodies because they have less work to do. No more riding your horse to the store, or chopping firewood, or sewing all your clothes. Technology advances meant that people went from watching famous people’s bodies once a week at the movies to being able to see them every single second on a smartphone if they want to. Airbrushing and Photoshop and filters were invented. Plastic surgery became destigmatized and affordable to the middle class.
“I know of no one who found navigating puberty and the changes their bodies went through to be an easy time.”
I actually did. I had painless periods, I didn’t gain a significant amount of weight, and I had A-cup breasts, so I just put in a tampon and put on a bra and got on with life. 🤷♀️ My body after having two kids is a different story…
I just finished watching a Netflix documentary The Edge of Paradise on Netflix about a hippie community in Kauai in the late 60’s into the early 70’s. A time when many people accepted and celebrated their bodies.
The people of this community walked around nude or semi nude. To see woman with their natural breasts and loving their bodies was so beautiful.
On one level it had nothing to do with this current trans crisis with our children and yet I think it holds keys to healing.
Immersing oneself in nature, finding the divine within and the absolute wonder, beauty and gift of our bodies and life here on Mother Earth.
My heart goes out to all the families and children suffering in these times.
What bothers me even more is than body modification is the lack of brain maturation that is part of "gender affirming care". We now have an entire generation of pseudo adults with limited frontal lobe capacity and this is not going to end well! https://lucyleader.substack.com/p/knowledge-is-proud-that-it-knows
It seems that young people think of their bodies as malleable, as objects to mold, decorate, and carve up as they please. I don't know how else to explain the popularity of tattoos, body piercings, and yes, the "gender affirming" surgeries. I don't understand it.
Thank you an excellent article. I appreciate the comments about unreal expectations for female bodies, and would like to add that we should normalize "normal" bodies for men as well. A man does not have to be 6'4", have perfect hair and teeth, and a chiseled six pack to be worthy of respect, admiration, love, friendship, success or to be considered manly. Men too, are affected by unrealistic expectations for appearance and fitness. Yes, men handle it differently, but still they are affected. As the proud wife of a good man who sports a "dad-bod" and a son who has a slender build, I have strong feelings about unreasonable expectations on men's appearance. I will believe (until someone proves me wrong) this "failure" develop into an idealized version of what a man should look like was a part of my son's seduction into the trans cult. I think my son is handsome and perfect the way he is,, but social media told him otherwise and now he wants to destroy himself with surgery and drugs. God help us all.
I started comparing the trans agenda to body dysmorphic disorder years ago, people called me nuts. Especially anorexia. I know, because I was anorexic. I know intimately how it feels to be disgusted with your own body. I'm 60 years old, and yet I remember that feeling quite well. The trans thing sounds just like that: Starts in adolescence when (let's face it) most hate their body and how it's changing. Anorexia (among other things) was both an attempt to achieve an impossible body standard, but also regressing one's body (for as long as possible) to childlike; anorexic teens stop having periods and don't develop curves like non-anorexic girls do, in some cases (like mine). It all makes me sad. Now plastic surgery is off the charts because of kids seeing themselves through filters and then being disappointed by how they look in real life. If only other things besides looks were valuable to them.
In the 12th and 13th century John Scotus introduced nominalism, thus denying that "good" and "evil" could actually exist. Relativism starts there. In the 15th century the Reformation split the Western church and the new Protestants put nominalism on steroids by rejecting post-apostolic miracles, trans-substantiation, and mysticism and embracing strict rationalism. Anglican Francis Bacon embraced this 100% and encouraged us to stop trying to understand nature and focus on controlling it for our benefit. Pascal tried to remind us of natural law but we preferred Descartes navel gazing.
Machiavelli was the first indication where this was going ("screw right and wrong; it's power all the way down"), but we really thought Locke had saved us with that "universal rights of man" stuff. Unfortunately, this turned out to be a Trojan horse, since if individual rights is the highest good, all collective definitions of "good" must bow before it, invalidating any regulation of human behavior beyond consent. Thank J.S. Mill for popularizing that tidbit.
Hume and Kant and a few others tried to solve this moral reasoning problem (how to have a collective definition of "good" without a divine source) before Nietzsche finally threw in the towel, acknowledged that God was dead, we'd killed Him, and predicted a new race of "overmen" (Morlocks to we Eloi perhaps?) who would build a new morality without Him. Unfortunately, the overmen we got were named Hitler and Stalin and Mao, which a few people like Chesterton and Lewis warned us would happen, but we were too busy enjoying our new rights to bother with definitions of "right" from 800 years ago, so we ignored them just like we'd ignored Pascal.
Meanwhile, while the bad guys were slaughtering millions, and the good guys were irradiating and blowing up millions to stop them (ignoring that we can't define "good" or "bad" objectively anymore), the problem of how to define the limits of acceptable human behavior in the absence of God never went away. Nietzsche's descendants, calling themselves "postmodernists", detonated a truck bomb called The Sexual Revolution in the middle of this gaping moral hole at the heart of Western civilization, and we've been living with the philosophical carnage for the last 60 years.
So how did our society evolve to devalue the natural body? Because we spent the last 500+ years building a society that refused to accept any natural limits on man's behavior.
How do we fix it? Well, as C.S. Lewis says, "when you're on the wrong road, the most progressive man is the one who turns around first."
Sorry for the rant, but as I've said here before, most of this was not only predictable but was actually predicted by many people along the way, most of whom were denounced as reactionaries, bigots, haters, enemies of progress, enemies of democracy, etc...
Thank you for this excellent summary of philosophical history. This piece reminds me of the dismal education I received in high school and college. Some of the ideas of the people you mention may have had some merit, but they were taken to the extreme or accepted without criticism. Our universities no longer value Western Civilization or the lessons we can learn from its successes and failures. I remember the chant on university campuses, “Western Civ has got to go.” It also reminds me of Ecclesiastes 1:9 “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun.”
Yeah, it was fun to write. You're right that most philosophers and political theorists are diagnosing real problems. Their solutions are often disastrous, but the problems are real. For example, Karl Marx and Charles Dickens are both writing about power imbalances in industrial capitalism. That doesn't mean we should all become commies, but we can't ignore that very real problem either. (That particular problem is once again growing, and as it does, Marxist class analysis is becoming useful again.)
If you're interested, I just started a Philosophy 101 series on my own substack. I taught it last year at my homeschool coop, so I thought I would make it available here while it was in my brain. Plato's Republic should be posted late this week.
This is excellent and so true. Another aspect that could really change things for girls and women is to know that motives for "changing sex" can be very different from males. All girls and women are sexually harassed and many are sexually assaulted. I know a woman who "transitioned" who said simply "I don't want to be raped anymore."
Females are still treated as inferior and denied equal rights, so that makes "transitioning" very tempting. Being allowed dignity, not having body parts groped and leered over, getting basic respect, etc. could help girls feel happier in their bodies. Even some women who identify as "feminists" promote fake "feminine" and pornified images of women as being beautiful or even spiritual (dancing by moonlight in silly long gossamer gowns that in reality would not be wise to do outside.) So girls who do not like that or want to be part of that end up thinking they must be male. There are very few images of females in the media who look solid, grounded, and attractive. (Tracy Chapman and Brandi Carlisle do, but the majority of women admired as singers or actors are half naked and in crippling high heels. ) At least there are a few women who really look like natural women, but over 50 years ago the girls I knew did not emulate movie stars and wanted no part of grotesque makeup, ugly clothes, high heels, etc. But now most women choose it. It's been very sad to see the television shows about young people trying to become singing stars where the men are dignified, but the girls who look natural when practicing are transformed onstage into caricatures with fake hair, eyelashes, makeup, revealing clothes, etc. They are even expected to compete as singers while barely able to stand, while the men are in solid shoes and clothes. Who wouldn't want the option with more privilege?
In case you find yourself unable to comprehend how and why this sort of thing continues to happen... it is simply because you (like me) are a good person. Firstly you are unable to even believe that such evil would be perpetuated--for money, yes, but there are other higher motivations working on those for whom money is not an issue. Allow me to recommend Elizabeth Nickson's recent work, particularly "They Break Every Family, Every Country," April 27, 2024. Her Substack "Welcome to Absurdistan" is free. The bright side is that many formerly naive people such as myself are figuring this out and constantly thinking of ways to defeat our depraved culture. Here is the link: https://substack.com/inbox/post/144047945 Don't be discouraged. Keep the faith. All the best
There are so many arguments against trans surgery for children and young adults, many of which are mentioned here. One thing that boggles my mind is the idea that youths can give informed consent to hormone therapy and/or surgery. What child or teenager knows whether they want children or not? The mere fact that messing with puberty/the normal maturation process can lead to sterility should be enough reason to bar these treatments in children and minors. I read that the very first inkling that Chloe Cole had that she had made a tragic mistake is when, during a science class, the teacher was discussing breast feeding. It hit her that she would never be able to nurse a child. (She had already had her breasts removed.) I wonder if she even knows IF she can have children at this point.
Very good writing - thank you. You wrote: "...profoundly disturbed that an ideology masquerading as science has been working against our kids and dismantling our families." That is indeed the truth, and we all feel the same way. There seems to be only one road these kids are allowed to travel on - the road to self-harm, and there is no Exit Door for these kids to escape from this evil cult. The longer a child travels on this path of lies, the deeper their self-esteem and common sense deteriorates. Damaging these young bodies with puberty blockers and the mental confusion that they will feel better is cruel as we all know this is not the truth or safe or the answer. We need the truth to be told and believed and we must stay strong and not give up hope. We must win this insane war and save our children.
It’s not a good idea to let children “express themselves” however they want. It sounds good on paper but it never in the best interest of the child who frequently wants rules and the alibi of “super strict” parents. Ms Manners once said children just want to look like biscuits. Bigger and more golden brown than other biscuits but still just biscuits.
"Parents like me are profoundly disturbed that an ideology masquerading as science has been working against our kids and dismantling our families."
After our 22 year old SON was enabled to decline phsyically and mentally with his horrid hormones, my husband and I are more than "profoundly disturbed." We are heartbroken and enraged with a relentless shadow of sorrow sullying our 19 years of effort to offer loving attentive parenting. Our society has truly declined to allow our children down an obvious path of decline rather than, as the author posits, " attempt to uncover, sort, and heal underlying issues that led to proclamations of being born wrong..." I am dumbfounded, disheartened, and very sad. I am also grateful to all the PITT writers who recognize the vital need to find the wherewithal to share our stories.
Correct! There is nothing compassionate about affirming someone is in the wrong body, nothing. Trans ideology is destructive at every level of society, the individual level, the family level, the community level, the state level, and national level. I am shocked and saddened to my core at the complicity of this abuse across our once respected institutions (medical,educational, govt legislation, etc). Come this election do not be casual with your vote. Value your vote, it will make a difference. The radicals need to be voted out! It does not mean you need to change your party affiliation but you need to muster up the humility to know which party, at the moment, is pushing radical, destructive policies…and it’s coming from the top under the guise of “compassion”. Our two main parties are much closer on the other policies of culture than the main mainstream media would have you believe. Responsible voters will vote on policy not personality. Candidates who support trans ideology will not get my vote.
Women not liking their bodies or appearances has been around since antiquity - think of all the myths and fairy tales where a woman or goddess is jealous of another female’s beauty. In the last hundred-plus years, people have had more time to fixate on their bodies because they have less work to do. No more riding your horse to the store, or chopping firewood, or sewing all your clothes. Technology advances meant that people went from watching famous people’s bodies once a week at the movies to being able to see them every single second on a smartphone if they want to. Airbrushing and Photoshop and filters were invented. Plastic surgery became destigmatized and affordable to the middle class.
“I know of no one who found navigating puberty and the changes their bodies went through to be an easy time.”
I actually did. I had painless periods, I didn’t gain a significant amount of weight, and I had A-cup breasts, so I just put in a tampon and put on a bra and got on with life. 🤷♀️ My body after having two kids is a different story…
I just finished watching a Netflix documentary The Edge of Paradise on Netflix about a hippie community in Kauai in the late 60’s into the early 70’s. A time when many people accepted and celebrated their bodies.
The people of this community walked around nude or semi nude. To see woman with their natural breasts and loving their bodies was so beautiful.
On one level it had nothing to do with this current trans crisis with our children and yet I think it holds keys to healing.
Immersing oneself in nature, finding the divine within and the absolute wonder, beauty and gift of our bodies and life here on Mother Earth.
My heart goes out to all the families and children suffering in these times.
What bothers me even more is than body modification is the lack of brain maturation that is part of "gender affirming care". We now have an entire generation of pseudo adults with limited frontal lobe capacity and this is not going to end well! https://lucyleader.substack.com/p/knowledge-is-proud-that-it-knows
It seems that young people think of their bodies as malleable, as objects to mold, decorate, and carve up as they please. I don't know how else to explain the popularity of tattoos, body piercings, and yes, the "gender affirming" surgeries. I don't understand it.
Thank you an excellent article. I appreciate the comments about unreal expectations for female bodies, and would like to add that we should normalize "normal" bodies for men as well. A man does not have to be 6'4", have perfect hair and teeth, and a chiseled six pack to be worthy of respect, admiration, love, friendship, success or to be considered manly. Men too, are affected by unrealistic expectations for appearance and fitness. Yes, men handle it differently, but still they are affected. As the proud wife of a good man who sports a "dad-bod" and a son who has a slender build, I have strong feelings about unreasonable expectations on men's appearance. I will believe (until someone proves me wrong) this "failure" develop into an idealized version of what a man should look like was a part of my son's seduction into the trans cult. I think my son is handsome and perfect the way he is,, but social media told him otherwise and now he wants to destroy himself with surgery and drugs. God help us all.
I started comparing the trans agenda to body dysmorphic disorder years ago, people called me nuts. Especially anorexia. I know, because I was anorexic. I know intimately how it feels to be disgusted with your own body. I'm 60 years old, and yet I remember that feeling quite well. The trans thing sounds just like that: Starts in adolescence when (let's face it) most hate their body and how it's changing. Anorexia (among other things) was both an attempt to achieve an impossible body standard, but also regressing one's body (for as long as possible) to childlike; anorexic teens stop having periods and don't develop curves like non-anorexic girls do, in some cases (like mine). It all makes me sad. Now plastic surgery is off the charts because of kids seeing themselves through filters and then being disappointed by how they look in real life. If only other things besides looks were valuable to them.
Is how we got here really that unclear?
Short form:
In the 12th and 13th century John Scotus introduced nominalism, thus denying that "good" and "evil" could actually exist. Relativism starts there. In the 15th century the Reformation split the Western church and the new Protestants put nominalism on steroids by rejecting post-apostolic miracles, trans-substantiation, and mysticism and embracing strict rationalism. Anglican Francis Bacon embraced this 100% and encouraged us to stop trying to understand nature and focus on controlling it for our benefit. Pascal tried to remind us of natural law but we preferred Descartes navel gazing.
Machiavelli was the first indication where this was going ("screw right and wrong; it's power all the way down"), but we really thought Locke had saved us with that "universal rights of man" stuff. Unfortunately, this turned out to be a Trojan horse, since if individual rights is the highest good, all collective definitions of "good" must bow before it, invalidating any regulation of human behavior beyond consent. Thank J.S. Mill for popularizing that tidbit.
Hume and Kant and a few others tried to solve this moral reasoning problem (how to have a collective definition of "good" without a divine source) before Nietzsche finally threw in the towel, acknowledged that God was dead, we'd killed Him, and predicted a new race of "overmen" (Morlocks to we Eloi perhaps?) who would build a new morality without Him. Unfortunately, the overmen we got were named Hitler and Stalin and Mao, which a few people like Chesterton and Lewis warned us would happen, but we were too busy enjoying our new rights to bother with definitions of "right" from 800 years ago, so we ignored them just like we'd ignored Pascal.
Meanwhile, while the bad guys were slaughtering millions, and the good guys were irradiating and blowing up millions to stop them (ignoring that we can't define "good" or "bad" objectively anymore), the problem of how to define the limits of acceptable human behavior in the absence of God never went away. Nietzsche's descendants, calling themselves "postmodernists", detonated a truck bomb called The Sexual Revolution in the middle of this gaping moral hole at the heart of Western civilization, and we've been living with the philosophical carnage for the last 60 years.
So how did our society evolve to devalue the natural body? Because we spent the last 500+ years building a society that refused to accept any natural limits on man's behavior.
How do we fix it? Well, as C.S. Lewis says, "when you're on the wrong road, the most progressive man is the one who turns around first."
Sorry for the rant, but as I've said here before, most of this was not only predictable but was actually predicted by many people along the way, most of whom were denounced as reactionaries, bigots, haters, enemies of progress, enemies of democracy, etc...
Thank you for this excellent summary of philosophical history. This piece reminds me of the dismal education I received in high school and college. Some of the ideas of the people you mention may have had some merit, but they were taken to the extreme or accepted without criticism. Our universities no longer value Western Civilization or the lessons we can learn from its successes and failures. I remember the chant on university campuses, “Western Civ has got to go.” It also reminds me of Ecclesiastes 1:9 “What has been is what will be, and what has been done is what will be done, and there is nothing new under the sun.”
Yeah, it was fun to write. You're right that most philosophers and political theorists are diagnosing real problems. Their solutions are often disastrous, but the problems are real. For example, Karl Marx and Charles Dickens are both writing about power imbalances in industrial capitalism. That doesn't mean we should all become commies, but we can't ignore that very real problem either. (That particular problem is once again growing, and as it does, Marxist class analysis is becoming useful again.)
If you're interested, I just started a Philosophy 101 series on my own substack. I taught it last year at my homeschool coop, so I thought I would make it available here while it was in my brain. Plato's Republic should be posted late this week.
This is excellent and so true. Another aspect that could really change things for girls and women is to know that motives for "changing sex" can be very different from males. All girls and women are sexually harassed and many are sexually assaulted. I know a woman who "transitioned" who said simply "I don't want to be raped anymore."
Females are still treated as inferior and denied equal rights, so that makes "transitioning" very tempting. Being allowed dignity, not having body parts groped and leered over, getting basic respect, etc. could help girls feel happier in their bodies. Even some women who identify as "feminists" promote fake "feminine" and pornified images of women as being beautiful or even spiritual (dancing by moonlight in silly long gossamer gowns that in reality would not be wise to do outside.) So girls who do not like that or want to be part of that end up thinking they must be male. There are very few images of females in the media who look solid, grounded, and attractive. (Tracy Chapman and Brandi Carlisle do, but the majority of women admired as singers or actors are half naked and in crippling high heels. ) At least there are a few women who really look like natural women, but over 50 years ago the girls I knew did not emulate movie stars and wanted no part of grotesque makeup, ugly clothes, high heels, etc. But now most women choose it. It's been very sad to see the television shows about young people trying to become singing stars where the men are dignified, but the girls who look natural when practicing are transformed onstage into caricatures with fake hair, eyelashes, makeup, revealing clothes, etc. They are even expected to compete as singers while barely able to stand, while the men are in solid shoes and clothes. Who wouldn't want the option with more privilege?
In case you find yourself unable to comprehend how and why this sort of thing continues to happen... it is simply because you (like me) are a good person. Firstly you are unable to even believe that such evil would be perpetuated--for money, yes, but there are other higher motivations working on those for whom money is not an issue. Allow me to recommend Elizabeth Nickson's recent work, particularly "They Break Every Family, Every Country," April 27, 2024. Her Substack "Welcome to Absurdistan" is free. The bright side is that many formerly naive people such as myself are figuring this out and constantly thinking of ways to defeat our depraved culture. Here is the link: https://substack.com/inbox/post/144047945 Don't be discouraged. Keep the faith. All the best
Thank you for standing with Parents of Trans Children/Adults.
There are so many arguments against trans surgery for children and young adults, many of which are mentioned here. One thing that boggles my mind is the idea that youths can give informed consent to hormone therapy and/or surgery. What child or teenager knows whether they want children or not? The mere fact that messing with puberty/the normal maturation process can lead to sterility should be enough reason to bar these treatments in children and minors. I read that the very first inkling that Chloe Cole had that she had made a tragic mistake is when, during a science class, the teacher was discussing breast feeding. It hit her that she would never be able to nurse a child. (She had already had her breasts removed.) I wonder if she even knows IF she can have children at this point.
Very good writing - thank you. You wrote: "...profoundly disturbed that an ideology masquerading as science has been working against our kids and dismantling our families." That is indeed the truth, and we all feel the same way. There seems to be only one road these kids are allowed to travel on - the road to self-harm, and there is no Exit Door for these kids to escape from this evil cult. The longer a child travels on this path of lies, the deeper their self-esteem and common sense deteriorates. Damaging these young bodies with puberty blockers and the mental confusion that they will feel better is cruel as we all know this is not the truth or safe or the answer. We need the truth to be told and believed and we must stay strong and not give up hope. We must win this insane war and save our children.
It’s not a good idea to let children “express themselves” however they want. It sounds good on paper but it never in the best interest of the child who frequently wants rules and the alibi of “super strict” parents. Ms Manners once said children just want to look like biscuits. Bigger and more golden brown than other biscuits but still just biscuits.
Embedded in this excellent essay:
"Parents like me are profoundly disturbed that an ideology masquerading as science has been working against our kids and dismantling our families."
After our 22 year old SON was enabled to decline phsyically and mentally with his horrid hormones, my husband and I are more than "profoundly disturbed." We are heartbroken and enraged with a relentless shadow of sorrow sullying our 19 years of effort to offer loving attentive parenting. Our society has truly declined to allow our children down an obvious path of decline rather than, as the author posits, " attempt to uncover, sort, and heal underlying issues that led to proclamations of being born wrong..." I am dumbfounded, disheartened, and very sad. I am also grateful to all the PITT writers who recognize the vital need to find the wherewithal to share our stories.
Correct! There is nothing compassionate about affirming someone is in the wrong body, nothing. Trans ideology is destructive at every level of society, the individual level, the family level, the community level, the state level, and national level. I am shocked and saddened to my core at the complicity of this abuse across our once respected institutions (medical,educational, govt legislation, etc). Come this election do not be casual with your vote. Value your vote, it will make a difference. The radicals need to be voted out! It does not mean you need to change your party affiliation but you need to muster up the humility to know which party, at the moment, is pushing radical, destructive policies…and it’s coming from the top under the guise of “compassion”. Our two main parties are much closer on the other policies of culture than the main mainstream media would have you believe. Responsible voters will vote on policy not personality. Candidates who support trans ideology will not get my vote.
Hedonism has eclipsed sacrifice on the value hierarchy. The nations always fall under hedonism.