Our feelings are determined not by what happens, but by the stories we tell ourselves about what happens. This is how I frame my daughter’s story, though she would tell it in a much different way
In my small world I already know two men who had themselves operated on and a young lady too. I wish they knew that you can be fine in your body and still invite these other "energies" and express them in our culture. Why do doctors go along with this? Not just for the money. I think they truly believe that they are doing the right thing. Medieval.
That definitely seems to be the case. And a healthy society would also foster healthy relationships. Today everyone seems to be frustrated and confused. The most intimate is made into the most public as supposed entertainment. Everything is about getting attention, even bad attention.
My wife has an autistic, anime-obsessed niece who began pretending to be a boy at about the age of fourteen. Now she's eighteen, yet seems more like a very odd thirteen-year-old boy. Her parents and slightly younger brother seem to go along with it all quite cheerfully, fully immersed in the charade and hostile to anyone who would question it. I have a strong suspicion it has gone beyond just pretending, and that drugs and surgery have been involved. Her mother (my wife's sister), and all the women in the family, have large breasts, yet this young adult is absolutely flat-chested. She speaks in a strange, deeper, not-female yet not-quite-male voice that I originally thought was an affectation, but I now suspect is hormonally induced. I can't play along with the lunacy, so I steer clear. Observing from a distance, it's creepy to watch this tragedy progress. The most horrifying part of it is that I'm certain her parents have facilitated the pharmaceutical and surgical butchering of their own teenage daughter. In Hell, Dr. Mengele is smiling.
Excellent post. No idea why society continues to glorify this transgender ideation on children. Adults is one matter but children? These kids can’t even balance a checking account, never mind their mental health. I find it scary that for an adult to medically transition they must go thru rigorous psychological testing, but a child needs only one short session. It’s so asinine.
Which is exactly why I found your post so refreshing. I’m so glad you stood up for the truth. I hope you opened the eyes of many. Myself, being the mother of a trans daughter, have personally lost many friendships. Yet, every friend I lost did not have a trans child. They have no idea of the pain and isolation it creates for parents. Hopefully, thru your post, they at least catch a glimpse of reality. May the New Year ring in more empathy and compassion for everyone that has been emotionally and/or financially destroyed by this transgender cult that believes in medically transitioning our children into eunuchs. The truth hurts. Tragic.
Thank you for posting this. These were/are exactly my thoughts the moment I found out about my son's declaration that he is a female. This is hell on Earth for everyone.
True. I don't know what to say about that. Covid restrictions and private internet access for kids may have been part of the problem. We need to find the key to unlock the door and gain access to the common conversation again. I get the impression that detransitioned kids must be supported and have a place in the narrative, because I really don't care much if one wants to play pretend for a while, but when it comes to cosmetic surgery that irreversibly destructs the healthy body of these seekers, that is where I firmly want to draw a line, because it is irresponsible and as Jordan Peterson likes to frame it, criminal. Just think of all the stupid things so called doctors did in medieval times. A few hundred or less years from now, these "top-surgeries" and the like will be viewed like that.
Where are the adults? Where is truth? Where can a young person learn wrong and right today? We need more truth tellers today. We need more skepticism, more questioning, more real science, the elect, the experts, the elite have all failed us. Stand for truth!
But we have to know what to do! Every problem has a solution. First, I determined, that this is not about sex, gender and sexuality, but about identity. Then the question arises, what is our true identity? When we examine therapy, it shows that when we really learn to listen to someone else, magic can happen. What does it mean to really listen for a parent? It is very hard not to project your own feelings, hopes and aspirations on your child. That is almost a natural thing to do. So what do these kids find in us, that they can act our against? Why is our love not felt? Thus I think that we can focus on forms of love for now. When you love someone, there needs to be some reciprocity. At least, when it comes to mature and material relationships. My identity is subservient to the higher goal of staying together as a couple or as a family. Still, I want to be able to speak my truth. In fact, only that which I truly embody, is worth noticing.
When you grew up with your child, a door was open. The child drank our milk and ate our food. It watched closely to every move we made. I became part of my childs mind. But when they grow up, they want to form a mind of their own. This is the tricky part and I understand that my words here remain very shallow, when they are not backed up by some solid proof. "What can I do to make you happy?" That is the spiritual question we have to ask ourself. Who am I serving? So with all of that in mind, maybe a new attitude can be found, a new more universal category in which we are one, in which we can cooperate and communicate. I do not have to impose my context on your mind, I can invite you into my house and show you around. That is what a mature and adult conversation looks like, but it is also exactly what you see young children playing do. They invite and kick. They give and take. They love and bite. There is a constant dynamic at the border, at the silverlining between self, world and other. We have to find a proper and respectful balance. I don't know what else to say.
I react strongly to anything that implies this current gender identity phenomenon is in any way the fault of parents . I don't think my son chose to go down this path because he we made him wear clothes as a kid. And I don't think my reasonable standards for nudity and propriety regarding sex is to blame either. The excessive , over the top sexualization of everything is to blame. No standards is to blame. And the organized push to normalize unhealthy and perverted ideas held by a minority of powerful people by capturing every institution in society is to blame. Enticing vulnerable young people like those with emotional issues and autism is to blame. Not "prudish" parents. And this is happening in cultures all over the western world and beyond. It just seems more intense in the US because excess tends to be a part of the American experience (for a variety of reasons). Standards and expectations for behavior is simply part of civilization. I bristle at even a hint of blame being placed on parents. I don't want to distract from the wonderful article..so I'm done now.
Susan, I agree that it's not the fault of parents but it doesn't mean that it has nothing to do with how we parent and it is important to talk about. My daughter has several food allergies. Is it my fault? No, it's not. Is it related to the fact that I didn't raise her on a farm and without pets? Quite likely. I am not going to feel guilty about being vigilant about hygiene when she was a baby but it is most likely related to her allergies and perhaps future parents can learn something from it. Same with trans identity. Is it my fault? I don't think so. Would she have found this identity if I raised her differently? Maybe, maybe not. Hopefully, we can figure out what family features make children more susceptible to this and other cult and help others - without blaming ourselves. It's a complicated problem and we need to consider all aspects honestly. Of course there are those who are to blame, such as big pharma and greedy doctors but we know that already. They are monsters. What we want to learn how and if we can teach our children to recognize and avoid the monsters.
I'm 74 and often think back to my teenage years in comparison to today. I remember feeling very awkward and self conscious around 7th and 8th grade. This is when dances started. I was never part of a group. I think that was true for most of us. There were the popular kids and the rest of us.
Social media has changed a lot of the growing up experience. I wish parents could limit social media, especially TikTok and photos. I was overweight and very self-conscious about it. I don't know how girls handle not having the right body today. I avoided boys and rarely had a date all through college. I came out as a lesbian in my 20s. Times are much more confusing today.
I am posing a suggestion here. Let's see how it goes. Your American culture is quite prude. Sexual matters are not things to talk about easily and openly. In the sauna, people wear clothes, breast feeding in public is condemned, children are hardly ever naked, just running around in the sun, parents may feel awkward in the nude with kids around. Just wonder what this mentality does with our mind. Maybe it has repressed our reality to such an extend, that there is no positive inner representation of the body in its natural state. We could do so much better!
Therefore sex and gender may indeed seem "assigned" and interchangeable. They are actually not really grounded in objective factuality, when so much is kept a taboo. That gives power to ideologies that influence our ideas about what is possible as a way of being someone in society. Why not change gender at will? We must respect the privacy of the individual and as a teenager you become interested in your own social identity. This trans-pseudo-cult seems to play along with this desire and the parents never grounded their own material reality positively in the mind of the withdrawn child, because there is no culture that enables such natural notion.
It is a confrontation with taboo and that gives the cult power and attracts those who just begin to learn what it means to become an adult.
Hi Marc, America is a big place with lots of variety. From what I can tell the entire English speaking world is being deluged by this as is most of the western world- including Germany and the Norse countries.
Males thinking they are or should be female has been around for decades. The numbers were small. Females thinking they were male was quite rare. Less than 1% of the small number of males.
Then phone-enabled social media became available and the numbers exploded. Not only that females in this situation now greatly exceed males. I believe that is the major cause.
Open and frank discussions of sexuality along with frequent low key viewing of nude people might help. However, 15 years ago in the west this wasn’t an issue at all. If countries with sauna along with other norms does far better than, say, the UK then we can have a great conversation.
If this were the case we would have seen very large numbers of transgender people in the 18th and 19th centuries and earlier. As a world we have become less and less inhibited and more sex positive, especially over the last 5-10 years as the rate of people who identify as transgender has increased. More specifically the rate of teenage girls identifying as transgender has increased 4000% over the last few years. I think the evidence does not support your hypothesis.
Sweden and Finland are also experiencing a large increase in adolescents identifying as Trans. Sweden in particular has seen such a rise that it has now started to restrict access to medication treatments for those under 18. Both of these countries are very comfortable with nudity and have a strong family sauna tradition.
Marc, I think your comment is very narrow and unfair. Actually, the culture I have seen emerge as an adult past 60 years now is greater and greater sexual expression, nudity, and sexualizing EVERYTHING!. so please get a grip. There is nothing wrong with appropriate modesty and having a little class. That does not equate to shame and sexual repression. It is a mature understanding of a time and place. A respect for the intimate. And a heathy sense of what and where to express sexuality. Privacy does not equal shame. Frankly in all areas of life we would all be better off learning a bit of restraint . After many years of being a nurse and seeing all manner of people in an undressed state I have no problem with nudity if it is related to helping a person to get better, improve their health, and get the requisite help they need. I breast fed my 3 kids and was happy to do a healthy natural act for my babies. But that is not exhibitionism. So please keep your arm chair analysis of American culture to yourself. Your assessment is shallow and infantile. And has absolutely nothing to due with the ridiculous cult of transgenderism. Taste and decorum does not equal repression.
Taste and decorum equal repression per definition as they place an implicit value structure on the world, thus imposing an opinion. I personally find transwomen confusing to say the least. It is their liberty to do and dress so, but I am not to like it. I find a man more beautiful in all his male ugliness than a person all dressed up like a puppet. When you have male anatomy, learn to live with it. Same with female anatomy. Live with pimples, live with breasts. Live with armpit hair and smells of sweat. Live with dandruff and whatever else. Even gods have to go to the toilet once in a while.
But make life beautiful, refine your choices, make good use of your time on earth and don't pretend to be more than a savage animal, when you eat your meat and wave your flag and praise your Lord, because He knows you are full of shit.
I just want to say that if you really want to come closer to your kids and defeat this pseudo-cult, you will have to drop ALL pretence. Then consider what is true virtue, vice and beauty. ... love is.
I don’t think any of us know what to do. There seems to be such vitriol with the narrative our once sweet & loving children bestow upon us. Others have talked about times where they have followed a way of life that is similarly cult like. They eventually went back to their families. How easy was it to do that I wonder, the worse things get, I can’t imagine how they have the nerve to return. Most of us try to keep the door open, but unless you affirm they don’t hear it, & presume the door is closed. They close the door
Whatever and it is missing the point. Which is, why can this cult get such a grip on your society? Why is it not that extreme elsewhere. Mine was just a suggestion. A naive and stupid one, maybe, but helping people as a professional is not the same as going to a German sauna with the family and just feel at ease among dozens of nude people of all ages.
Yes, this subliminal and explicit use of sexual seduction for commercial purposes is not appropriate, but neither do you live in a strict Taliban regime.
What is it, that makes these kids so vulnerable to this deception? I don't know, but I do see at home that the two years of lockdown and increased private internet access on phones for young teenagers may have something to do with it. We give them access to the unfiltered human collective mind and wonder that some sensitive ones drift off into these enstranging places.
Yes, i am an armchair psychologist, this is the damn internet right on. But did you get my point instead of resisting by an ad hominem. You are not culture. You are hunan. America does not exist. There is nothing to be proud off. A hundred years back and a hundred years forward into the future all these fake identities will be replaced by other brands. So what is trans as a product? How to talk to your kids from a perspective that is both personal and vulnerable, open and strongly opposing to self harm? I don't know. My parents could have kept me from smoking as a teenager, but they did not want to impose themselves on me. They tried with a few words, but which teenager really listens to their parents? Good luck.
I actually don’t think it’s just America. The explosion in people identifying as trans is also happening in the UK, and Canada, and Sweden, to name a few I’m familiar with. It’s an interesting suggestion but for me it’s not ringing true that discomfort with nudity is a cause. I will admit that we are a bit strange in the US in that we are uncomfortable with “real”, everyday nudity and discussion of sex, but are constantly bombarded with, and generally ok with, commercialized and unrealistic depictions of nudity and sex.
Fantasy vs reality and I notice that reality is relaxing. But everything needs a proper context and embedding and all these things should be kept much more in the private sphere and intimate "sacred" spaces. This sex in the media is not the sex that feels personal. It is just appropriating a human propensity for another human propensity.
Interesting comments Marc. Anecdotally, where I live -- California -- would almost argue for the opposite conclusion. There is a lot of skin here, "body positivity", along with an alarming rise in transgender ideology. I do think that relationship of a body to a young mind not able to process all the influences thrown at them is a key problem. The idea of culture holding up a body image that is not attainable (or healthy) for much of society has been around for a long time, but social media has exploded this problem to a much greater level.
So much more reasons for exposing ourselves to the truth of physicality early and naturally, that bodies differ, get old and die and this is what it looks like. That is why i say that this whole cult is not at all about sex, gender and sexuality, but in fact just trying to construct a new reality, that is powerful and puts mind over matter. It is just an illusion.
The bodies that get us horny are exceptions. Most normal and natural bodies when nude just make you feel relaxed and at ease. They have all sorts of flaws and make people people.
As an American, that hasn't been my experience, nor that of the numerous families raising children while I was. My children were all breastfed in public, and through their toddler years. We were fairly nudist in my household, until my son became uncomfortable around age 7. On the contrary, bringing my 6 year old daughter to a clothing optional hot spring, to witness strange men's schlongs is one of my greatest regrets- awkward for both of us. She survived and is happily married. My gender confused son, however, claims that children in our culture are "sexually repressed"(children are not sexual). American culture is anything but prude, and not in a good way, as some countries might be.
Your sentence about "witness strange men's schlongs" confuses me. The whole point I am trying to make is, that nudity can be neutral, normal, not connotated with adult sexual feelings or even associations. When I was in the sauna in Germany here today, everyone was naked. That is why it is not allowed to bring phones there. You just see everything, mostly older folks though.
I am just probing here, but isn't it very true, that we suppress sexuality at all ages, so that porn on the Internet can flourish. Sexuality is a damn difficult topic. It deals with our strongest primal energies. How comfortable are you with that? I know I am not and I think it is normal and the theme should be played out in a respectful private intimate sphere, and yet, sex is a mighty influencer, subliminally. So what has trans that seduces kids? Why can it grip their minds and bodies so strongly and create this cult-like situation, where families are ripped apart and thrown away as if they are evil. We must act with conscience and precision and be honest about our own shadow, otherwise the ideology can rule them by manipulating the subconscious mind.
The issue isn’t seeing nudity , the issue is an immature, not fully developed mind being told that if you want to be a boy but you ate a girl that is ok, you can just change it. The issue is not healthy sexual expression, the issue is the prevalence of porn and the type of porn today that shows violent sex, choking, women being used as a servant for men’s pleasure. If young people today were exposed to true intimacy and mutually loving and pleasurable sex their minds would be so warped when it comes to what they think sexuality is. I’ve got a young adult child who thinks she is transgender. She had been through a lot of trauma in her life and knowing what I know now, I can tell you that the trauma is the cause of her feelings that she is transgender. Our kids are being manipulated in the name of “helping” them but the reality is the help is making things much worse.
I was invited to the hot spring by a friend (a teacher I worked under), who often brought her young daughter. Because I had always been open with my children, as far as bodies being natural, and speaking openly about it, I'd convinced myself that it would be fine. My daughter and I are highly sensitive to energy. The energy of the older men "strutting their stuff" was definitely not child friendly. I became much more modest & "prude" after that experience. I think I see what you're saying, but I think of a Japanese soak with extended family as opposed to a public exhibition of random folks' private parts. I'm comfortable with modesty, and don't think I need shadow work in that area. For some reason one of the posits of queer/trans theory is that children are sexual, and with so many in that "community" sharing public spaces, it might just be best to make nudity private again.
My daughter is in the same situation. Going to college having no friends thinking she's a lesbian, then bi then non binary changing her name want to change physical appearance. I pray every day that she will be her true self the confident, strong woman I know she is. And turn by to God.
You could be writing about my daughter too. Such low self esteem and always a victim. GSA club was her place to go. Little did we know back then what they were doing there.
In my small world I already know two men who had themselves operated on and a young lady too. I wish they knew that you can be fine in your body and still invite these other "energies" and express them in our culture. Why do doctors go along with this? Not just for the money. I think they truly believe that they are doing the right thing. Medieval.
That definitely seems to be the case. And a healthy society would also foster healthy relationships. Today everyone seems to be frustrated and confused. The most intimate is made into the most public as supposed entertainment. Everything is about getting attention, even bad attention.
My wife has an autistic, anime-obsessed niece who began pretending to be a boy at about the age of fourteen. Now she's eighteen, yet seems more like a very odd thirteen-year-old boy. Her parents and slightly younger brother seem to go along with it all quite cheerfully, fully immersed in the charade and hostile to anyone who would question it. I have a strong suspicion it has gone beyond just pretending, and that drugs and surgery have been involved. Her mother (my wife's sister), and all the women in the family, have large breasts, yet this young adult is absolutely flat-chested. She speaks in a strange, deeper, not-female yet not-quite-male voice that I originally thought was an affectation, but I now suspect is hormonally induced. I can't play along with the lunacy, so I steer clear. Observing from a distance, it's creepy to watch this tragedy progress. The most horrifying part of it is that I'm certain her parents have facilitated the pharmaceutical and surgical butchering of their own teenage daughter. In Hell, Dr. Mengele is smiling.
Excellent post. No idea why society continues to glorify this transgender ideation on children. Adults is one matter but children? These kids can’t even balance a checking account, never mind their mental health. I find it scary that for an adult to medically transition they must go thru rigorous psychological testing, but a child needs only one short session. It’s so asinine.
Which is exactly why I found your post so refreshing. I’m so glad you stood up for the truth. I hope you opened the eyes of many. Myself, being the mother of a trans daughter, have personally lost many friendships. Yet, every friend I lost did not have a trans child. They have no idea of the pain and isolation it creates for parents. Hopefully, thru your post, they at least catch a glimpse of reality. May the New Year ring in more empathy and compassion for everyone that has been emotionally and/or financially destroyed by this transgender cult that believes in medically transitioning our children into eunuchs. The truth hurts. Tragic.
Thank you for posting this. These were/are exactly my thoughts the moment I found out about my son's declaration that he is a female. This is hell on Earth for everyone.
True. I don't know what to say about that. Covid restrictions and private internet access for kids may have been part of the problem. We need to find the key to unlock the door and gain access to the common conversation again. I get the impression that detransitioned kids must be supported and have a place in the narrative, because I really don't care much if one wants to play pretend for a while, but when it comes to cosmetic surgery that irreversibly destructs the healthy body of these seekers, that is where I firmly want to draw a line, because it is irresponsible and as Jordan Peterson likes to frame it, criminal. Just think of all the stupid things so called doctors did in medieval times. A few hundred or less years from now, these "top-surgeries" and the like will be viewed like that.
Fully agree.
Where are the adults? Where is truth? Where can a young person learn wrong and right today? We need more truth tellers today. We need more skepticism, more questioning, more real science, the elect, the experts, the elite have all failed us. Stand for truth!
But we have to know what to do! Every problem has a solution. First, I determined, that this is not about sex, gender and sexuality, but about identity. Then the question arises, what is our true identity? When we examine therapy, it shows that when we really learn to listen to someone else, magic can happen. What does it mean to really listen for a parent? It is very hard not to project your own feelings, hopes and aspirations on your child. That is almost a natural thing to do. So what do these kids find in us, that they can act our against? Why is our love not felt? Thus I think that we can focus on forms of love for now. When you love someone, there needs to be some reciprocity. At least, when it comes to mature and material relationships. My identity is subservient to the higher goal of staying together as a couple or as a family. Still, I want to be able to speak my truth. In fact, only that which I truly embody, is worth noticing.
When you grew up with your child, a door was open. The child drank our milk and ate our food. It watched closely to every move we made. I became part of my childs mind. But when they grow up, they want to form a mind of their own. This is the tricky part and I understand that my words here remain very shallow, when they are not backed up by some solid proof. "What can I do to make you happy?" That is the spiritual question we have to ask ourself. Who am I serving? So with all of that in mind, maybe a new attitude can be found, a new more universal category in which we are one, in which we can cooperate and communicate. I do not have to impose my context on your mind, I can invite you into my house and show you around. That is what a mature and adult conversation looks like, but it is also exactly what you see young children playing do. They invite and kick. They give and take. They love and bite. There is a constant dynamic at the border, at the silverlining between self, world and other. We have to find a proper and respectful balance. I don't know what else to say.
I react strongly to anything that implies this current gender identity phenomenon is in any way the fault of parents . I don't think my son chose to go down this path because he we made him wear clothes as a kid. And I don't think my reasonable standards for nudity and propriety regarding sex is to blame either. The excessive , over the top sexualization of everything is to blame. No standards is to blame. And the organized push to normalize unhealthy and perverted ideas held by a minority of powerful people by capturing every institution in society is to blame. Enticing vulnerable young people like those with emotional issues and autism is to blame. Not "prudish" parents. And this is happening in cultures all over the western world and beyond. It just seems more intense in the US because excess tends to be a part of the American experience (for a variety of reasons). Standards and expectations for behavior is simply part of civilization. I bristle at even a hint of blame being placed on parents. I don't want to distract from the wonderful article..so I'm done now.
Susan, I agree that it's not the fault of parents but it doesn't mean that it has nothing to do with how we parent and it is important to talk about. My daughter has several food allergies. Is it my fault? No, it's not. Is it related to the fact that I didn't raise her on a farm and without pets? Quite likely. I am not going to feel guilty about being vigilant about hygiene when she was a baby but it is most likely related to her allergies and perhaps future parents can learn something from it. Same with trans identity. Is it my fault? I don't think so. Would she have found this identity if I raised her differently? Maybe, maybe not. Hopefully, we can figure out what family features make children more susceptible to this and other cult and help others - without blaming ourselves. It's a complicated problem and we need to consider all aspects honestly. Of course there are those who are to blame, such as big pharma and greedy doctors but we know that already. They are monsters. What we want to learn how and if we can teach our children to recognize and avoid the monsters.
I'm 74 and often think back to my teenage years in comparison to today. I remember feeling very awkward and self conscious around 7th and 8th grade. This is when dances started. I was never part of a group. I think that was true for most of us. There were the popular kids and the rest of us.
Social media has changed a lot of the growing up experience. I wish parents could limit social media, especially TikTok and photos. I was overweight and very self-conscious about it. I don't know how girls handle not having the right body today. I avoided boys and rarely had a date all through college. I came out as a lesbian in my 20s. Times are much more confusing today.
I am posing a suggestion here. Let's see how it goes. Your American culture is quite prude. Sexual matters are not things to talk about easily and openly. In the sauna, people wear clothes, breast feeding in public is condemned, children are hardly ever naked, just running around in the sun, parents may feel awkward in the nude with kids around. Just wonder what this mentality does with our mind. Maybe it has repressed our reality to such an extend, that there is no positive inner representation of the body in its natural state. We could do so much better!
Therefore sex and gender may indeed seem "assigned" and interchangeable. They are actually not really grounded in objective factuality, when so much is kept a taboo. That gives power to ideologies that influence our ideas about what is possible as a way of being someone in society. Why not change gender at will? We must respect the privacy of the individual and as a teenager you become interested in your own social identity. This trans-pseudo-cult seems to play along with this desire and the parents never grounded their own material reality positively in the mind of the withdrawn child, because there is no culture that enables such natural notion.
It is a confrontation with taboo and that gives the cult power and attracts those who just begin to learn what it means to become an adult.
So, ... what to do?
Hi Marc, America is a big place with lots of variety. From what I can tell the entire English speaking world is being deluged by this as is most of the western world- including Germany and the Norse countries.
Males thinking they are or should be female has been around for decades. The numbers were small. Females thinking they were male was quite rare. Less than 1% of the small number of males.
Then phone-enabled social media became available and the numbers exploded. Not only that females in this situation now greatly exceed males. I believe that is the major cause.
Open and frank discussions of sexuality along with frequent low key viewing of nude people might help. However, 15 years ago in the west this wasn’t an issue at all. If countries with sauna along with other norms does far better than, say, the UK then we can have a great conversation.
I replied as a new comment, sorry.
If this were the case we would have seen very large numbers of transgender people in the 18th and 19th centuries and earlier. As a world we have become less and less inhibited and more sex positive, especially over the last 5-10 years as the rate of people who identify as transgender has increased. More specifically the rate of teenage girls identifying as transgender has increased 4000% over the last few years. I think the evidence does not support your hypothesis.
Sweden and Finland are also experiencing a large increase in adolescents identifying as Trans. Sweden in particular has seen such a rise that it has now started to restrict access to medication treatments for those under 18. Both of these countries are very comfortable with nudity and have a strong family sauna tradition.
Excellent points. Looks like Germany is no different from other Western countries, at least as far as encouragement by governments. https://www.gendergp.com/germany-introduces-a-law-which-allows-trans-people-to-self-identify/
Marc, I think your comment is very narrow and unfair. Actually, the culture I have seen emerge as an adult past 60 years now is greater and greater sexual expression, nudity, and sexualizing EVERYTHING!. so please get a grip. There is nothing wrong with appropriate modesty and having a little class. That does not equate to shame and sexual repression. It is a mature understanding of a time and place. A respect for the intimate. And a heathy sense of what and where to express sexuality. Privacy does not equal shame. Frankly in all areas of life we would all be better off learning a bit of restraint . After many years of being a nurse and seeing all manner of people in an undressed state I have no problem with nudity if it is related to helping a person to get better, improve their health, and get the requisite help they need. I breast fed my 3 kids and was happy to do a healthy natural act for my babies. But that is not exhibitionism. So please keep your arm chair analysis of American culture to yourself. Your assessment is shallow and infantile. And has absolutely nothing to due with the ridiculous cult of transgenderism. Taste and decorum does not equal repression.
Taste and decorum equal repression per definition as they place an implicit value structure on the world, thus imposing an opinion. I personally find transwomen confusing to say the least. It is their liberty to do and dress so, but I am not to like it. I find a man more beautiful in all his male ugliness than a person all dressed up like a puppet. When you have male anatomy, learn to live with it. Same with female anatomy. Live with pimples, live with breasts. Live with armpit hair and smells of sweat. Live with dandruff and whatever else. Even gods have to go to the toilet once in a while.
But make life beautiful, refine your choices, make good use of your time on earth and don't pretend to be more than a savage animal, when you eat your meat and wave your flag and praise your Lord, because He knows you are full of shit.
I just want to say that if you really want to come closer to your kids and defeat this pseudo-cult, you will have to drop ALL pretence. Then consider what is true virtue, vice and beauty. ... love is.
I don’t think any of us know what to do. There seems to be such vitriol with the narrative our once sweet & loving children bestow upon us. Others have talked about times where they have followed a way of life that is similarly cult like. They eventually went back to their families. How easy was it to do that I wonder, the worse things get, I can’t imagine how they have the nerve to return. Most of us try to keep the door open, but unless you affirm they don’t hear it, & presume the door is closed. They close the door
Whatever and it is missing the point. Which is, why can this cult get such a grip on your society? Why is it not that extreme elsewhere. Mine was just a suggestion. A naive and stupid one, maybe, but helping people as a professional is not the same as going to a German sauna with the family and just feel at ease among dozens of nude people of all ages.
Yes, this subliminal and explicit use of sexual seduction for commercial purposes is not appropriate, but neither do you live in a strict Taliban regime.
What is it, that makes these kids so vulnerable to this deception? I don't know, but I do see at home that the two years of lockdown and increased private internet access on phones for young teenagers may have something to do with it. We give them access to the unfiltered human collective mind and wonder that some sensitive ones drift off into these enstranging places.
Yes, i am an armchair psychologist, this is the damn internet right on. But did you get my point instead of resisting by an ad hominem. You are not culture. You are hunan. America does not exist. There is nothing to be proud off. A hundred years back and a hundred years forward into the future all these fake identities will be replaced by other brands. So what is trans as a product? How to talk to your kids from a perspective that is both personal and vulnerable, open and strongly opposing to self harm? I don't know. My parents could have kept me from smoking as a teenager, but they did not want to impose themselves on me. They tried with a few words, but which teenager really listens to their parents? Good luck.
I actually don’t think it’s just America. The explosion in people identifying as trans is also happening in the UK, and Canada, and Sweden, to name a few I’m familiar with. It’s an interesting suggestion but for me it’s not ringing true that discomfort with nudity is a cause. I will admit that we are a bit strange in the US in that we are uncomfortable with “real”, everyday nudity and discussion of sex, but are constantly bombarded with, and generally ok with, commercialized and unrealistic depictions of nudity and sex.
Fantasy vs reality and I notice that reality is relaxing. But everything needs a proper context and embedding and all these things should be kept much more in the private sphere and intimate "sacred" spaces. This sex in the media is not the sex that feels personal. It is just appropriating a human propensity for another human propensity.
Interesting comments Marc. Anecdotally, where I live -- California -- would almost argue for the opposite conclusion. There is a lot of skin here, "body positivity", along with an alarming rise in transgender ideology. I do think that relationship of a body to a young mind not able to process all the influences thrown at them is a key problem. The idea of culture holding up a body image that is not attainable (or healthy) for much of society has been around for a long time, but social media has exploded this problem to a much greater level.
So much more reasons for exposing ourselves to the truth of physicality early and naturally, that bodies differ, get old and die and this is what it looks like. That is why i say that this whole cult is not at all about sex, gender and sexuality, but in fact just trying to construct a new reality, that is powerful and puts mind over matter. It is just an illusion.
The bodies that get us horny are exceptions. Most normal and natural bodies when nude just make you feel relaxed and at ease. They have all sorts of flaws and make people people.
As an American, that hasn't been my experience, nor that of the numerous families raising children while I was. My children were all breastfed in public, and through their toddler years. We were fairly nudist in my household, until my son became uncomfortable around age 7. On the contrary, bringing my 6 year old daughter to a clothing optional hot spring, to witness strange men's schlongs is one of my greatest regrets- awkward for both of us. She survived and is happily married. My gender confused son, however, claims that children in our culture are "sexually repressed"(children are not sexual). American culture is anything but prude, and not in a good way, as some countries might be.
Your sentence about "witness strange men's schlongs" confuses me. The whole point I am trying to make is, that nudity can be neutral, normal, not connotated with adult sexual feelings or even associations. When I was in the sauna in Germany here today, everyone was naked. That is why it is not allowed to bring phones there. You just see everything, mostly older folks though.
I am just probing here, but isn't it very true, that we suppress sexuality at all ages, so that porn on the Internet can flourish. Sexuality is a damn difficult topic. It deals with our strongest primal energies. How comfortable are you with that? I know I am not and I think it is normal and the theme should be played out in a respectful private intimate sphere, and yet, sex is a mighty influencer, subliminally. So what has trans that seduces kids? Why can it grip their minds and bodies so strongly and create this cult-like situation, where families are ripped apart and thrown away as if they are evil. We must act with conscience and precision and be honest about our own shadow, otherwise the ideology can rule them by manipulating the subconscious mind.
The issue isn’t seeing nudity , the issue is an immature, not fully developed mind being told that if you want to be a boy but you ate a girl that is ok, you can just change it. The issue is not healthy sexual expression, the issue is the prevalence of porn and the type of porn today that shows violent sex, choking, women being used as a servant for men’s pleasure. If young people today were exposed to true intimacy and mutually loving and pleasurable sex their minds would be so warped when it comes to what they think sexuality is. I’ve got a young adult child who thinks she is transgender. She had been through a lot of trauma in her life and knowing what I know now, I can tell you that the trauma is the cause of her feelings that she is transgender. Our kids are being manipulated in the name of “helping” them but the reality is the help is making things much worse.
I was invited to the hot spring by a friend (a teacher I worked under), who often brought her young daughter. Because I had always been open with my children, as far as bodies being natural, and speaking openly about it, I'd convinced myself that it would be fine. My daughter and I are highly sensitive to energy. The energy of the older men "strutting their stuff" was definitely not child friendly. I became much more modest & "prude" after that experience. I think I see what you're saying, but I think of a Japanese soak with extended family as opposed to a public exhibition of random folks' private parts. I'm comfortable with modesty, and don't think I need shadow work in that area. For some reason one of the posits of queer/trans theory is that children are sexual, and with so many in that "community" sharing public spaces, it might just be best to make nudity private again.
What you wrote exactly describes my son. I wish so much I could get him to see that.
My daughter is in the same situation. Going to college having no friends thinking she's a lesbian, then bi then non binary changing her name want to change physical appearance. I pray every day that she will be her true self the confident, strong woman I know she is. And turn by to God.
Here praying that all our sons and daughters can break free from this cult.
You could be writing about my daughter too. Such low self esteem and always a victim. GSA club was her place to go. Little did we know back then what they were doing there.