Decades? Na. Not that long. A long time but not decades imho. I think the whole house is built on that much sand tbh.
You have the Midmanagement JobsWorth in place, but I think the law will move on and there won't be the money put aside for Diversity Training generally going forward, even with an incoming Labour government. Once cut from Public Sector budgets they won't be reinstated as there isn't the money to justify it. So Stonewall being dropped now on mass isn't likely to reverse. A few more rulings on employment and the Public Sector will also get nervous about disciplining for WrongThink.
The whole thing is largely about the younger generations providing Enforcement too. Thats about the political engagment of young people - but I think the support is more shallow than is credited. A huge amount is about Campus Activism and Online Activism.
As soon as eyerolling teens and twenty somethings start to leave education the game will unravel pretty quick. They are the ones propping up the madness. As this cohort age and gain responsibility the Social Enforcement Brigade shrinks - if for no other reason than because they have less time for it. The fashionable social justice cause has shifted in the last twelve months hugely too. Its now firmly Israel for Student Activists so new recruitment to The Cause is shrinking. (I remember in my teens that The Cause at High School was not testing on animals.) The number of Identifying as well as Enforcers is liable to shrink as the trend passes as well and we are already starting to see evidence of this decline.
Then add in the impact of detransitioning. When everyone in your social group knows a detransitioner, the whole thing also starts to collaspe as a concept very quickly and people. You might be more familiar and know transpeople if you are younger, but that doesn't mean that contact is going to be positive. Unreasonable levels of demand and poor behaviour about pronouns generally isn't going to endeer others to be truly sympathetic long term. Especially if theres a significant level of detransition. The facade of saying you are the opposite sex and then changing your mind isn't going to sit well within a decade, not decades. I do think whole thing is skin deep for this reason.
We shall see, but I think the whole thing accellerated at great speed without a lot of forethought applied and as such its liable to collaspe almost as quickly.
Its like a cult. Cult membership tends to last on average 9 years. I think it will be shorter for most, as this is starting earlier - at schools rather than as an adult - than traditional cults and how your social circles change is much more rapid at this age. I also think social media friendship bubbles tend to burst quicker too.
Its interesting looking into this cult like element. Theres some research into this.
Heres one such example:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165178116319941
Its a small study so has a limited quality but it raises a few questions nontheless.
3.1. Description of former cult members
Thirty-one former cult members were included in the study. Most were women (74.2%) and had more than 12 years of education (61.3%). At the time of the interview, most were employed (74.2%) and lived as part of a couple (58.1%). Nearly half of the sample displayed an anxiety disorder during the year preceding the commitment (51.6%). From commitment to 12 months after departure, the prevalence of anxiety disorders increased progressively (58.1% during the membership period and 61.3% during the year following departure). Six former cult members reported having post-traumatic stress disorder during cult membership. The prevalence of mood disorders tended to decrease between the year preceding the commitment (45.2%) and the membership period (35.5%) but to increase during the year following departure (54.8%). The prevalence of substance use disorders and eating disorders decreased from 12.9% in the year preceding commitment to 9.7% during cult membership and to 6.4% in the year after the member had left the group.
AND
3.3. Experiences of the former cult members in the cultic groupThe mean age of former members at the time of commitment was 31 (SD 1.2). The average length of cult membership was almost 9 years and the time since departure was an average of 9.8 years (SD 7.8). The time between first contact and commitment and between the first desire to leave and departure were similar (22 and 16 months, respectively). Events that facilitated commitment were often a need for personal development, life dissatisfaction or being on a spiritual quest. Social and familial life were the most frequently damaged elements, as reported by the former cult members. More than 80% left the group on personal initiative. They reported that the most frequent obstacle to departure was a romantic relationship or having family members in the cultic group and difficulty in questioning the creeds of the group. The most frequent events that aided in departure were a lack of faith in the creeds of the group and social interventions.
Is this sounding familiar at all in pattern?
The comments from Stonewall are VERY interesting in this context too. The comparison with religion is something we've been saying on here for some time. Now Stonewall are admitting this. The more this starts to happen, the more the comparisons with cults/drug addiction will start to enter people's minds.
We are starting to talk about the negative effects echochambers and immersive culture more and more generally too.
Malcolm Clark has posted this in the last hour or so along the same lines:
Malcolm Clark AT TwisterFilm
Here's a question: If the murder of Brianna Ghey was the fault of an allegedly transphobic culture, why are the crimes of trans offenders not the fault of the warped culture of boundary-breaking trans people are immersed in? My latest in TheCriticMag
https://thecritic.co.uk/the-dangerous-excesses-of-breaking-boundaries/
This is extremely controversial ground, but I think it has considerable merit when you look at the spiral of behaviour of various prominent transactivists and the way they've reacted to every single one of JKR posts and the rather alarming parallels with the Incel Movement which is happening at the exact same time. Its hard to just say that what Malcolm is saying is transphobic - its not about murder as such - its about patterns of behaviour and the failure to condemn behaviour which is clearly unacceptable and would be condemned if done by any other group. The rantings of IW are THE classic example.
When cults collaspe, the collaspe can be spectacularly fast. And can be 'very messy'. They tend to regroup and reform but once they have peaked its hard to replicate as more people are more cautious about the group if they have a known history.
So yeah, I think a decade is a fairly reasonable guestimate of the madness. It won't mean the end of transpeople. It just means there won't be the same willingness to accept at face value and to 'be kind' without thought. Unreasonable demands and behaviour will start to raise eyebrows and be met with "No" with increasing frequency as all of the above starts to kick in.