Robert Webb in the Times

Hello @BoreOfWhabylon

I'm just testing...

🦡🤍🌈

That's Philosophy Tube. No relation to Mr and Mrs Thorn.

No, the Dad of the transchild, Jesse Thorn is a beardy woke American podcaster

There is an Abigail Thorne who is a newly transed you-tuber?

Is Thorn trans?

One response to one of them was "that should be obvious". classic

The answer to your questions, Cardinal, as far as I can see is:

'Don't ask, it's not nice'.

I am a man, and never for a moment felt otherwise
How do you know? How can one ever identify their gender?

Gender is inside you?
Is gender a social construct or not?
Is it separate from gender expression and gender identity?
What does 'gender' connote that isn't covered by 'masculine' and 'feminine'?
What does gender have to do with bodies?
What does gender identity have to do with bodies?
What does gender expression have to do with bodies?
What is a woman? What is a man?
Which sex(es) "matches" which gender(s)? Are 'male' and 'female' genders?
What, specifically, is 'living as a woman' / 'living as a man'?

Answers to all of the above have been constantly avoided (or given contradictory answers) by the people who come here claiming to know better than us about gender. Yet berate us for not being kind enough to understand.

I'm trying very hard to believe there's something more to gender than people performing stereotypes - because surely all of this can't just be about stereotypes - but every time I try to dig deeper I have more questions that don't get answered.

This thing reminds me so much of the Chinese medicine craze that seemed to dominate parents groups back in the 90s and 00s.

It made no sense to hear triumphant parents boasting of simmering bags of unidentifiable twigs and pouring the resultant nasty liquid down their children's throats. If you mentioned you had consulted a GP for eczema or such like you were looked at sadly. The twig enthusiasts could not tell you what the bags of twigs contained (written in Chinese) or what the "doctor" in the shop had said about treatment (only spoke Chinese) but somehow this was better than the researched safe GP treatment. The Chinese creams sold eventually turned out to have 6 times the actually steroid levels of the prescribed steroid creams. I was baffled at the almost religious fervour and irrationality. This seems very similar.

Indeed. 😳

SunsetBeetch what a brilliant post. Agree 100%

The angriest people, in my experience, are generally those who feel guilty or worried they might be getting something wrong and can’t bear anything that challenges their position. They can often lash out at whoever is nearest. I think that’s exactly what we’re dealing with here

Also feel like these parents are trying to recruit as many others as possible to make themselves feel more comfortable with what they have done.

Man's just tweeted this:

'I love jewelry, antiques, fashion, theater and Almodovar movies. I am a man, and never for a moment felt otherwise. My kid loves monsters, baseball, Jurassic Park and Captain Underpants. She is a girl and never for a moment felt otherwise. Gender is inside you.'

In what way is she a girl?

According to some inner feeling? Okay.

What does it mean to feel 'like a girl'?

Anyone?

Awful that RW is being shat on by the likes of OJ and Thorn.

I will never understand how it can possibly be harmful to allow a child to just be and wear what they want without labelling and affirming whatever they say as a pre-schooler, and it's less harmful to tell them there is something physically wrong with them, point them in a direction that will forever other them (however much they push for acceptance) and put them on a pathway to lifelong medication and procedures that will also mean they never experience and enjoy sex the way other people do and will never be able to become a biological parent. That is actually the decision being made when they go along with something said by a child with zero understanding of anything that's ahead. It's astonishing.

This one was pretty well known beforehand and is broadcast on National Public Radio across the States as well. So unfortunately it's not just a weirdo in a shed. It has previously had crossovers with podcasters I really admire so I've got everything crossed they don't wade in.

There are a lot of these podcasters around now - it has become a thing since lockdown. I suppose the advantage and disadvantage is that they are not tied to traditional broadcasters.

It is probably always worth looking at what they are flogging.

Agree Katy.

And following that, he made a HUGE thread on twitter to follow up, but all about his trans child, amplified by Owen Jones.

I think he made his thread about his kid first.

I think Webb handled it brilliantly. Polite but adamant. Hardly a crumble as the Sanctimonious Morph is trying to spin it.

That said, I'd advise Webb to do his Twitter research before doing podcast interviews, then he won't get ambushed by weirdo new religionists.

Am I getting this right anyway? Thorn had Mitchell and Webb on to talk about their work, etc. He then shoehorned in a bit about Webb's comments about Mermaids. And following that, he made a HUGE thread on twitter to follow up, but all about his trans child, amplified by Owen Jones.

Seems rather self-serving. And just weird. And like he had to call in the cavalry to reassure him he's right and good.

Hmmmnnn...

There's so much to unpack psychologically speaking from this tweet in that thread:

She hated getting haircuts and always wanted her hair long like my wife's, but we just figured kids hate haircuts. She loved The Jungle Book, especially the part where Baloo the bear dresses up in a hula skirt, but what kid doesn't love that?

Baloo is dressing up as an orangutan to dupe the orangutans that he's just like them, whilst the orangutans sing about wanting to be just like the humans.

Loving this is taken as a retrospective sign their child is transgender. A scene where a male bear is literally posing as a female orangutan to get something they want, I mean... what other comparisons could be drawn from it...

There's so much able-bodied privilege in Thorn's thread. He just does not understand what it means to be on a lifelong medical pathway, with the daily grind of appointments and medications and side effects and management, and the seriousness of putting a child down that road on the basis of a childish comment in the bath. It's all just shrugged off as "Surgery? Sure!" He has no conception of what he's actually doing to that poor child.

Comments from the OJ camp are rather telling.
On the plus side that's another book Mumsnet 'radicalisation' has alerted me to. I have already read, "How not to be a boy" and it's good. Will have to reread now I have a boy of my own.

It makes the kid sound like Yoda - some wise old sage who was just waiting for the parents to catch up.

That's well put, and it seems to be really common.

Like PPs I would also highly recommend Robert Webb's book - How not to be a boy