Helen Lewis in the Atlantic - Gender medecine and the suicide lie

I'm assuming people have come across the up and coming young Democrat, Jonah Wheeler? He's very impressive, and very charismatic:

https://x.com/jonahowheeler/status/1904560117036490880

https://x.com/LGBCourage/status/1938324865444147258

The Democrat's continued determination to remain ignorant of the contours of the debate is striking. Questioning any aspect of it is taboo - transgender medicine in children, performance differentials in sports, predatory men using trans identification to access women's spaces, efficacy of treatments, long term health risks, validity of gender identity, degree to which people and institutions are obliged to affirm claimed identities, erasure of homosexuality, erasure of women, the list goes on.

I'm convinced the trans issue alone was enough to elect Trump, and I thought that that would be the case back in 2022 if Biden didn't do an about face, it was completely obvious. One of the reasons I began to suspect that Biden was becoming senile was his inability to understand the political danger and put a stop to it. But Ds who are much younger and seemingly firmly in command of their faculties (e.g. Tim Walz) are even worse.

Meanwhile the world will continue to revolve and legislation will be enacted.

But I think Lewis does have that intellectual belief about the harm. It's just that she knows that voicing it would put her well ahead of the pack and exposed rather than slightly ahead of the pack but to a sufficient degree that when genderism is discredited, she'll be able to claim to have been in the vanguard.

I think it's an excellent article, because it looks at the evidence and explains it in a thoughtful, measured way.

But I do agree with PPs who find her even-handedness irritating. When she says "Acknowledging the evidence does not mean that you also have to support banning these treatments—or reject the idea that some people will be happier if they transition", it's just silly, in my view. It's like meeting flat-earthers half-way.

I think for most of us on here it's not just about looking at evidence that these treatments are harmful, it's that we have an instinctive moral sense that pumping children full of hormones or cutting the breasts of teenage girls is wrong, full stop. And that's coupled with an intellectual belief that the whole idea of people changing sex or being born in the wrong body is completely ridiculous. Lewis doesn't seem to have that - but nonetheless appears to believe that her even-handed approach is more reasonable.

Yes. Both Levine and Strangios backgrounds would have added clarity. I find this article is on par with her other work.

It is like what the NY Times puts out. If you know the full story, you find yourself thinking that there is quite a bit of pertinent information missing. Such as the podcast on the Dutch protocol, it failed to mention the studies that discredit the Dutch Protocol and it felt like only half the story was being told.

I'd be a lot more appreciative of fence-sitters if they didn't go on podcasts and sneer at those with real principles who've got down off the fence and have risked a great deal in taking a stand.

I agree with this.

There's a role for these 'fence sitters' which is to make it possible for those in the middle ground to see the harms being done. It's going to be a long, slow process, but this is a good start.

And ultimately, once one piece of the TRA pyramid falls, it all does eventually. The AGP types need the medicalisation of 'trans kid' for legitimacy.

My personal brand is very much about being as Liberal a Liberal who ever Liberalled as well.

But as a (kind of) classical liberal, not a batshit crazy, anything goes, "neo-liberal" (in the political not economic sense), I am liberal to everything so long as it is not doing harm to others (or harm to the vulnerable).

One can be 100% liberal, 100% pro-people who claim to be trans, whilst being 100% anti-gender ideology

I was struck by the omission of the fact that Levine is transgender, because he was extremely influential in the Biden administration. I rather like Joe, and his wholesale capture by the trans lobby did surprise me somewhat.

I agree. I don’t want to read someone’s emotional response when I am reading something such as this. I would prefer to read precise facts.

I read this and it is still wooliness from her. And still signalling her personal position, not just pointing out the discrepancies.

It is somewhat discordant to read someone writing about misinformation and obfuscating information while they persist in continuing to use someone’s preferred pronouns. Reading about Strangio and Levine, I don’t believe it is clear that both of these people are transgender themselves which does seem pertinent to this article.

I read it, in the US context, as supporting trans peoples rights not to be discriminated against in employment and housing etc. So basically what we have in the UK, but that doesn’t exist in many parts of the USA.

I haven’t seen her argue for allowing self ID into toilets, shelters, sports etc. If you have, I’d be interested to read the link.

I think it’s really good piece written in a very influential way - it’s not inflammatory it just examines actual facts, actual studies etc and cuts through the rhetoric. But I’m a fan of her writing. It is important to look at subjects with clarity and from both sides as a decent journalist which she does well and excellent end point

That sentence:
"We can support civil-rights protections for transgender people without having to endorse an experimental and unproven set of medical treatments—or having to repeat emotionally manipulative and now discredited claims about suicide.”

So she means she realises that mutilating and sterilising minors is really, really unpopular, but thinks the liberals/Democrats can get away with trans-identifying men in women's sports, prisons, rape centres, homeless shelters, changing rooms, toilets, spas, you name it

I like her approach - calm, measured, evidence-based. There’s a place for passion and taking sides, but for me the way Helen Lewis writes and thinks is thought provoking. I find the more emotional arguments just make me wary of a personal motive hiding behind the words, whichever side they come from.

She ends with a sentence that really speaks to me:
”We can support civil-rights protections for transgender people without having to endorse an experimental and unproven set of medical treatments—or having to repeat emotionally manipulative and now discredited claims about suicide.”

When these people thought that genderism was politically beneficial to their tribe, they offered it their support, and now they think it isn't, they're willing to make critical noises. The worst of it though is they're not stupid and will have been aware of some of the harms of genderism for quite some time but will have viewed their impact to have been a price worth paying.

Similar thinking was at work in Rochdale, Rotherham, etc.

Is it HL who is responsible for the tiresomely wishy washy coverage in Private Eye? I find it very annoying. If it were anything else as absurd and harmful, they’d be on it like a ton of bricks.
(But it is essentially a rather louche lad’s mag and the old boys there do probably equate trans with the closeted homosexuality of the mid last century.)

Yes. The Atlantic has a major contingent of the original never-Trumpers on staff and as freelance/guest writers. The ethos that arose was to never criticize the substance of the Democrats' policies unless it can be shown to be electorally harmful to fighting Trumpism. This leads to a position similar to the NYT times, GI is legitimate (at least in some form) but the way TRAs have gone about achieving their ends are counterproductive to their own cause, as formulated by themselves.

i wonder has she said anything about the latest pronoun rumble on twitter. I notice that each time the pronoun debate rumbles around there are less twitter people in support. And more and more vocal about rejecting them. And more and more well articulated points as to why people won’t be using them now. (Actually the points are not new to MN readers, they have been discussed here for years.)

Yes. This sums it up well.

Her position has always been "but I'm reasonable, not like those bigots" while she quietly shifts over into bigot territory more and more as the years go by. This would be less annoying if she didn't do this without firmly asserting her moral superiority.