New Yorker essay - 'Who My Child Was And Would Be'

[bonfireoftheverities]

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/11/10/who-my-child-was-and-would-be (archive.ph/N3gyJ)
Starts well: “What do I know about being a woman?” Nat said. “Sometimes I have to ask myself. The thing is, I don’t know shit about womanhood.” Contains a few other nuggets of reality, but ultimately the author, a seemingly educated man, actually thinks his son changed sex. https://x.com/jamesamarcus/status/1985490935120028041

I assume he's currently very busy blocking people on TwiX; he wasn't amused when I levelled the same criticism at him that he did at someone else ("self-soothing pablum").

Another choice quote: "I'm not interested in new meanings of basic words."

Looks like I have the thread to myself!

Considering how intolerant Marcus is of even mild criticism, I'm surprised he hasn't yet locked his account, which often enough is the way these things go.

I will give him credit for using right sex pronouns for the first part of his essay, switching after his son became his idea of a daughter. This naturally attracted criticism, because as we all know, once you've decided you're the opposite sex, it means you've always been that sex.

Really interesting article, thanks for sharing. I don't know James Marcus at all (and avoid Twitter these days) but thought he sounded sad about what had happened, but was trying hard not to give that impression.