Being 'held hostage' by "trans" teenage kids

[TryingToGetOrganised2]

In my day, we were goths and emos.

Nowadays, it's gender expression. Don't get me wrong, I am 100% behind the kids that truly feel they were born in the wrong body, but oh for goodness sake, it's not half the flipping population?!

There are a lot of kids who really have gender dysphoria, who I really feel for and support. However, I'm so fed up of being told I'm a transphobe, because I dare question and gently encourage soemone to unpick where their feelings come from. (Read: my own 17 year old son, who is autistic and doesn't know where he fits in the world)

The main military operation is my 16 year old daughter, who is, on the whole, a wonderful human whom I adore. She's just so far down this road of 'you can be anything you want, sod biology' that anyone who asks a question, is shot down and cut off, for having a (possibly) more rounded, adult perspective. She can't see further than her own underdeveloped frontal lobe, and it's driving me insane.

Of course, I'm presenting, gentle, measured, acceptance mum (which, of course - I truly am, if that's who you truly are!) But I feel like she's pushing my son into a lifestyle because he's questioned who he is. Am I being unreasonable to feel frustrated? Or should I suck it up and encourage my boy to be a girl, even though I don't really think it's what he actually wants?

Please be gentle. I've got 3 kids with autism and adhd, amd, having both myself, it's the blind leading the blind. I'm exhausted and just need a bit of support in either direction.

I think a lot of the people populating this side of the site might be incels. I've never been on any feminist site at all where JP was considered quotable. Regardless of views on gender or anything else. Very very suspicious.

Yes, his stuff is weird. Something very nasty and dishonest about it.

Dear all, thank you for all your thoughts.

To answer a couple of questions - DD is autistic and ADHD, didn't attend school for the last 2 years but now does attend college. She's been really depressed (massive thing at school that wound her up till she snapped) but has now moved out of that. She still can't cope with many people and prefers her bed to anything!

She is currently she/her/they/them, going by a different 'non-binary' name, that is a section out of the middle of her given name.

She and I spend quite a bit of time together- she has joined the choir I run in a neighbouring city, so we have a long drive together each week, and we recently went away for the weekend for a competition.

He also sings, plays d&d, wants to persue a career in maths and is generally well liked by his cohort at college. He has gotten a bit chunky as he's gone through puberty and has signed up to the gym at college, but hasn't yet managed to go. Ive encouraged him to look after his body better before he writes it off so he can know how he really feels about it when its in good condition.

My son is now talking about HRT and possible surgery - he showed no signs of this as a child, hence the scepticism. He has now told me he wants to be known as she/her and has picked a nondescript, perfectly pleasant 'girls' name. He's about to turn 18. I just need to keep him away from the medical stuff until he's actually old enough and developed enough to truly understand the ramifications.

My sister's youngest (also 18) is also male born/female presenting and autistic. My daughter and nephew/niece are very close - that's the only way she'll leave the house, to hang out with them.

My sister is doing much the same as me - oh really, that's nice, have you done your laundry?

It's just a bit scary and stressful when there's a 16 year old in the middle, preventing good conversations from finding their mark.

Thank you all again.

Agreed, why is everyone tip toeing around fhis?

You misunderstand. I'm not saying sexism as in mysoginy is new. I'm saying the concept of sexism is new.

Im saying that its only in recent years where life has gotten easier in general that we have had the headspace to recognise it and - give it a label. Let alone the time and resources to invest in changing it.

I'm not saying women never had it harder.
And I am most definitely not an incel ffs 🙄

Im saying that I agree with what he said in that video. Everyone was struggling back then.

Rich women had a better life in many ways than poor men. And what about slaves? Recon they had a hard time too don't you think!

Those times were different.
People had 'roles' and had less time in their hands to worry about things. Because they were just focusing on surviving.

Sexism as an idea is a new thing. Like, last hundred/hundred and fifty years or so.

I also already said I don't agree with some of petersons women centered views. Personally I've never seen him say anything 'incelly' in the slightest though. But a pp has linked some stuff so maybe there's things on there. Not if it's just like the prior clip of him I'm commenting about though. His comments on that were perfectly fair.

People who have largely conformable lives, food, shelter, saftey etc... usually start to then find fault in other areas of their lives that need fixing. It's human nature.

All teenagers push back and rebel against their parents to feel like they are gaining control over their lives. Many young people do things that later affect their whole lifes. Only very few continue when they get into their mid-20's. However TG could be dangerous as it is involving the healthcare professionals that could damage their trust in the system later.

Alot of the TG rhetoric as come from universities and is based in theory and the exploration of ideas not in objective reality. TG Males and Females have been told that how they feel is really who they are and is the path to mental wellbeing not what their body it. They have also learned that everyones feelings about themselves should be respected. This leads them to believe that people who don't see them in the same way they see themsleves are openly being hostile towards them. This is not how the rest of society behaves.

The dicussion, language and tactics to change society reflects alot of the change behaviour in the civil rights movement for race, sex and sexuality in the 20th and early 21st century. This focuses on the fact that people were being treating unfairly in society because of things they couldn't change about themselves i.e. their heritage, their sex and their sexuality. TG people require a completely different set of rules as they are trying to CHANGE the reality of who they are.

The above movements merely granted people more freedoms, without restricting other people i.e. the only thing that would stop you from entering a bar with a woman, gay or black person would be your own prejudice about them. TG requires you to actively deny the facts that females and males are physically very different from each other. Males have an increase in strength, muscle mass and cardiovascular output. Females have increased flexibility. These differences are not based in theory like other prejudices but in objective reality.

@Pinkbonbon sorry, I really did misunderstand what you said!

I agree with a lot of what you said in your later post. From the university studies though there was some awareness of sexism even hundreds of years ago but it certainly wasn't the huge movement it became in the late 1800's and the 20th C.

I'd repeat that Peterson generally is downright creepy imo - read one of his books some years ago and they seem superficially sensible and then you realise there's something off about them, and that 'offness' goes all the way down. Dishonest. Couldn't finish the book.

A lot of your other points I couldn't agree more with.

The problem is, our sub-teen culture was something we grew out of and could wipe off with a baby wipe (goth make up)… this subculture, where it’s “culture” and not genuine gender dysphoria, may result in irreversible change through hormone treatment 😕.

Also, it’s all consuming.. it becomes an identity. (I have a nephew and a niece who are affected).. they do nothing else with their life but look for people to battle with.. both are autistic, both have parental attachment issues, both are not your traditional popular kids. They’ve both bullied their parents to allow them to change their names by deed poll.

I feel for their parents (my siblings), but I kind of think my sister and brother brought it on themselves by not prioritising their kids and allowing them to disappear into this subculture.

This is behaviour they are learning from each other. Not statistically possible that all three could have gender identify issues at the same time.. I believe this is deffo the case for my niece and nephew. Niece first picked it up from a friend at school who got special treatment at school for claiming to be TG and then suddenly the whole friendship group are all TG. 🙄 - this was when she was 14. When I asked her what her main reason for feeling like this, she said it’s because she wasn’t attracted to boys (she went to a girls school and never even knew any boys). Also, not being funny, I’m as straight as they come, but I didn’t have any raging sexual desires for boys at that age!!

my assessment is that an over sexualised society made my niece feel out of place so she felt there was something wrong with her for not gagging for boys at 14. She saw the friend receive special treatment, she herself had a crap relationship with her Dad, and especially mum (mum left the country with her younger half siblings and new husband during lockdown)… and so my poor niece found comfort in her friend’s alternative culture.

Don’t talk daft.

Ive just looked it up - it seems likely he does indeed have quite a following among incels. Expressed sympathy and apparently tears for this misunderstood and lonely section of the population makes him highly popular with them.

Of course, he doesn't really talk about their hatred and their entitlement and some of the weirder recesses of their movement such as believing they really should be entitled to own women.

In the last few days there was a thread deleted about a withheld study from Dr Olsen-Kennedy. The House Committee on Oversight and Accountability have now written to research body asking for clarification.

The thread was interesting and then it was deleted so I will not start one here in AIBU, but for those who also saw it, I thought they should know that there is something being done officially.

www.mumsnet.com/talk/womens_rights/5202949-the-house-committee-on-oversight-and-accountability-letter?reply=139570150

Oh god it’s all just so attention seeking and virtue signalling isn’t it… a woman I know online who is a blogger is always banging on about how all her children are LGBTQIA+++ and how AMAZING and SPECIAL they are and it’s just - bleugh.

One of the boys in particular changed his name to a girls name for a while, grew his hair out and bleached it and it was all “Sally this” and “Sally that” (I’ve changed the name) for a while and carefully referring to “them”. You could just sense the desperation for someone to reply using the “wrong” pronoun so she could scold people 🙄. Then he stopped appearing in her posts for a bit. Last time I saw him in her photos he’d cut his hair and she was referring to him by his birth name again so presumably he got over the silliness to a degree. Funnily enough his birth name is kind of unisex anyway depending on spelling but I guess that wouldn’t have got enough attention.

Now because of what’s going on in America she’s back posting about how she’s always there to support any LGBTQIAblahblah children “mum hugs for trans kids” and all that garbage. I’m thinking “just keep away from other peoples kids you bloody menace”.

I agree and think this is the best comment here. Trans still reinforces that you have to be a woman to enjoy make-up or be a man to be comfortable with your body hair. Or a woman wanting to be a man because you can’t accept or feel society can’t accept that you’re a lesbian. Which is perfectly fine and is in fact completely natural as opposed to wanting to remove your breasts and fashion a fake penis from the skin of your arm…!

He’s pretty clear that they don’t deserve women- as in, they have nothing to offer women and need to shape up and step up.

I mean, I haven’t watched or listened or read everything but it’s not all tripe.

I suspect people hear what they expect, according to preconceived ideas about him.