They say it’s at night that our truest thoughts and feelings bubble to the surface. Something about the quiet, the relaxed state of the mind and body, the solitude. Another place is the shower, where we’re naked and alone, vulnerable. It’s why I get most of my writing ideas when I’m covered in suds, hurriedly rinsing off before the thoughts escape my mind, or why I always feel like tweeting when I’ve just lain down to sleep.
Last night was no exception. As soon as my head hit the pillow, my thoughts drifted to the Current State of Things, in particular Biden’s latest executive order regarding “LGBTQI+” youth. In it, the president charges the Department of Education with “releasing a sample school policy for achieving full inclusion for LGBTQI+ students.” And he charges the Department of Health and Human services to “explore guidance to clarify that federally-funded programs cannot offer so-called ‘conversion therapy’” and “to work with states to promote expanded access to gender-affirming care.”
On their surface, Biden’s charges sound noble. Schools should be inclusive. Conversion therapy, as it has been practiced on gays and lesbians, is a debunked and abusive pseudoscience. And the bills that Republicans have pushed through state legislatures to ban gender-affirming care for minors seem driven by ignorance and cruelty.
Beneath the surface, though, I know that Biden’s directives will likely put even more potentially gay and lesbian kids on a fast track to medicalization.
I don’t trust this administration’s education department to put together a school policy that isn’t informed by gender identity ideology, which teaches kids that if one feels radically different from his/her same-sex peers (as gay kids often do), he/she can simply identify out of his/her sex.
I don’t trust this administration to properly distinguish between “conversion therapy for trans kids” and exploratory therapy that takes into account a trans-identified child’s comorbidities such as preexisting depression and anxiety, PTSD, eating disorders, and autism, or the possibility that the child is internalizing homophobia.
And I trust neither this administration nor gender clinicians not to sacrifice children’s futures for votes, donations, and fees. I fear that they will double-down on even the most unethical medical and therapeutic practices because of hubris, greed, and fealty to ideology.
On this issue, I’ve come to realize, this country is totally lost. We’ve been led by radical academics and activists into a dark wood, only to be told that the woods, and the dark, aren’t real. “Just remember,” they say, before abandoning us. “Your kids might kill themselves.”
Last night, I felt depressed, ruminating over the implications of gender ideology’s capture of Western institutions: policies and practices that resemble the authoritarian state of Iran’s, which criminalizes homosexual acts but funds gender-reassignment to deal with the “problem” of gender-nonconforming, same-sex-attracted people; the reification of rigid gender norms; the vilification of people who attempt to inject reason into the conversation. And, like always, I felt a sense of urgency: how do I get more people to properly understand what’s going on? Restless, I lobbed off a few tweets:
Tweeting, I know, isn’t the best way to communicate. I should probably just focus on serious writing. And, since tweeting is so easy, and my phone is always right there, there’s a decent chance that whatever I write will come from an emotional mindset instead of a rational one.
I’m trying to be better. There are a lot of tweets I don’t send. And I choose my words carefully. For example, in that first tweet, I wanted to write “chemical castration for kids,” but that seemed too incendiary and would only turn off the people I’m trying to reach. (Even though chemical—and surgical—castration is precisely what’s happening to gender-nonconforming kids—and vulnerable adults, as I’ve learned from interviewing detransitioned gay men.) Then again, so many of the people I want to reach—the people who would react angrily to calling puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones “chemical castration”—are probably already beyond reach.
I wrote before that I felt depressed last night. But that’s not accurate. Although I do get depressed about this issue, most of the time, like last night, I’m incredulous. Just absolutely exasperated by how many people have bowed to a regressive, incoherent ideology that erases gays, lesbians, and women.
My Twitter thread came out of that exasperation. So I guess I failed to leave my emotions out of it. Ah well.
A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of meeting the legendary feminist Julie Bindel on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. She interviewed me for her new Substack podcast. Check it out by clicking on the link below.
Thank you for reading and subscribing!
On Biden's "LGBTQI+" Executive Order
I do my best ‘writing’ while I’m driving or riding my bike! (And then struggle to get the words out when the computer is in front of me.)
One of these days we need to address how Trump broke people’s brains. Democrats got so hysterical about Trump and the ‘death of democracy’ that they fail to see the evils of their own party. I’m continually astounded by the people around me who still believe the Democrats are good people. I did not and would not ever vote for Trump...but looking back at his presidency, I struggle to think of anything he did that is as horrific as what Biden is doing now.
This is a bold position to take. Which cult got ahold of you? Do you need help to escape?