I cannot apologize for not affirming an ideology that is causing widespread harm to children, teens, vulnerable adults, the human body, family relationships, and society. My writing is intended to support and encourage protective parents and others who want to learn more about gender identity ideology. I do not intend to offend or hurt those who have adopted and embraced this ideology.
Feelings have usurped common sense, facts, and truth and are seemingly worshipped in a manner that isn’t helpful or healthy for society as a whole. Feelings, which may be temporary, give children and teens access to body-altering and life-altering drugs without question or consideration for the wide range of ramifications of using those drugs. Feelings lead minors and adults to have surgeries to remove healthy body parts and organs upon demand. And feelings now get legal protections, no matter how they affect anyone else.
I deeply care about the long-term health of our physical bodies and minds and honoring the bodies we were born with. I believe that sexed bodies are not mistakes to be fixed; a child’s sex is wonderfully right, not inherently wrong. And so I encourage acceptance and preservation of the natural body. Without good health, not much matters. Yet our medical system is focused on sickness and disease, even creating ill health with the heavy promotion of pharmaceutical quick fixes because good health and wellness don’t pay out well.
Our bodies, particularly child, teen, and young adult bodies, are usually at the height of natural, healthy function in the first several decades of life. If left alone, our youth may enjoy abundant good health without needing much more than wellness visits and appointments for minor injuries and illnesses. When a belief system interrupts the innate performance of each bodily organ system and disrespects and tampers with that function, natural health will be compromised. And that’s where money can be made. Profiteering industries will double down to ensure a lifetime of control of kids who are made medically dependent in order to capitalize on a profit stream for the life of the child. They camouflage the atrocities in a supposed “social justice and human rights” campaign while waving colorful flags and pretending to be progressive, inclusive, loving, and righteous. It is not working anymore. People are beginning to see it for what it really is. It’s not good, and it’s not loving.
A belief system that tells our youth they must take synthetic hormones, endocrine, and other body-altering drugs that will adversely affect the natural, miraculous functioning of the body for the rest of their lives doesn’t sit well with me. Undergoing surgeries to modify sex traits, including the removal of healthy body parts and healthy reproductive organs, sets off loud alarm bells that I am unable to turn off. Does a child or young adult have the capacity to understand the ramifications of the drugs and surgeries they believe will fix the complex issues that they have blamed on the body? Or have kids been told that changing their bodies will make them authentic? Is the quest for a promised utopia realistically possible in the long term? They may think they need more drugs and more surgeries to continue reaching for the out-of-reach, ever-moving target and promised land of happiness. And if the kids cannot obtain true contentment, they often blame the non-affirmers because if those people, usually parents, had agreed with the kids’ beliefs that they were born in the wrong body and had gone along with the kids’ new presentation as the opposite sex, then it would have worked out okay.
Do these kids pause and consider how radical interventions will affect their bodies in the decades to come? Are they rushing into these drastic measures because influencers have told them that drugs and surgeries will quickly relieve trauma, pain, distress, discomfort, or confusion? What if they have doubts or regrets? What if they can’t back out?
Eliza Mondegreen writes that those “who voice concerns about serious complications may be chastised for ‘ableism,’ guilty of valuing a healthy body over a sick or disabled one. (‘There’s nothing wrong with being a lifelong medical patient …’ is a common refrain.)” Based on this view, some people will label me an “ableist” on top of all the other labels that have been stacked upon me.
Mondegreen goes on to say, “Patients often cling to the mistaken belief that they’ve been evaluated, diagnosed, and provided with safe, effective, ‘medically necessary’ care, rather than understanding that they’re signing up for experimental cosmetic interventions with a wide range of known and unknown risks and questionable benefits on the basis of their own self-identification as trans. Patients may think they’re being evaluated when they’re actually being affirmed.” I would add that parents and outsiders often assume that sound medical care is happening, when it is not.
As we move beyond this current culture that lost its way, sacrificing many kids and unraveling relationships and shattering many families, some will forget or bury the reality of what really happened. Kaeley Triller Harms suggests how we can learn from the past in an article, “As We Celebrate the Return of Sanity, Never Forget How We Lost It.”
She says, and I echo, “I want people to know about the many other grieving parents who lost this battle and had to watch their brilliant young daughters undergo double mastectomies and pump their bodies full of testosterone because a compromised medical industrial complex convinced them this was the solution to their trauma-related issues.” Readers may choose to look away or pretend it didn’t happen, but I faced it. I watched it happen before my eyes. I’m a witness, and I won’t forget. But I wonder how the story will be told after I’m gone.
Kellie-Jay wrote “Too Loud to Cancel: The High Price of Speaking for Women.” She says, “In a culture that rewards compliance and punishes truth-telling, we have been cancelled, banned, demonetised, and now debanked. And yet, we are still here.” And I am still here, even though I have been told that I must be silent. She goes on to say, “The reason I keep going is simple. When I ask myself, ‘If not you, then who?’ and ‘If not now, then when?’—the answers are ‘Me’ and ‘Now.’ I simply can’t walk away until the job is done.” My answer is me and now too. That is why I write.
Kellie-Jay also talks about women undermining women, which I have experienced more than once. In her article, “The Currency of Compliance: How Obedience Rewards Women Who Sell Out Other Women,” she speaks clearly: “Here’s the truth: obedience isn’t kindness. Silence isn’t compassion. And complicity is not a virtue. The world doesn’t need more good girls. It needs women who say no. Women who name the harm. Women who refuse to play nice when girls are being hurt.”
Madeleine Albright said, “There is a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.” That’s strong language but worth contemplating in the current culture of not protecting girls and women, often perpetrated by women.
I’ve been punished (mostly by other women) in many ways because I prioritize truth and dare to speak up. Since I could not affirm, then some demanded that I be silent. I failed to affirm or be silent, and the toll is heavy. Protective parents are still blamed, undermined, devalued, and dismissed. Albright spoke wisely when she said, “I used to wish so hard for my parents to be alive again, but you can’t make something happen just by wishing for it.” Many kids today who are caught up in radical ideologies or have adopted a self-centered attitude that everything revolves around them seem to care little about how their behaviors and decisions affect others, especially their parents and elders. Many of the younger generation distance themselves and even reject parents and families as unimportant in their lives or subvert the dynamics of authority. Estrangements are at an all-time high. The popularity of kids going “no contact” because a parent or family member doesn’t agree with them or their choices is a disturbing trend.
I also observe that many well-intentioned people who see some of the falsities and harms of gender ideology still maintain the thought that parents like me must have done something wrong in raising our kids. This view more often comes from those who have never had children or those who have “perfect” kids. They tend to judge other parents harshly. It is easy for those lucky enough to have kids who somehow escaped negative influences, bad luck, trauma, and abuse to pass righteous judgment on parents whose kids did not escape the capture of gender ideology. Then there are those who dismiss our voices and their relevance because they think a gender-critical perspective is tied to politically conservative views, often called “right-wing,” and they have decided that any possible association with the Trump administration, in particular, is abhorrent and must be rejected. They don’t seem to know that many liberals do not support gender medicine and are leading the charge and guiding their party back to reason and reality as Democrats! Learn more from Democrats with an Informed Approach to Gender.
In my experience, most people I speak with can’t bear to hear our stories or read about what has happened in our families. The depth and intensity of parental pain isn’t something they can handle. Some say it is so beyond belief that they choose not to believe us.
The tables have flipped, and the child and/or activist seems to be in control, doling out punishing tactics to make parents comply with their feelings, views, and new rules. Any other perspective is called phobic, toxic, abusive, dangerous, hateful, and anti-“whatever.” The media colludes and uses the same words to intimidate and silence a different viewpoint. All this occurs with a righteous stance that drips with blind devotion and hypocrisy.
However, the tide is turning, and people are waking up. The most courageous people, often facing repercussions, dare to speak and write about the harm they see. I’m riding that wave.
Perhaps you will join me and so many others, many of whom I quoted and showcased in my writing. Together, we can do better. History will harshly judge this time of gender ideology and medicalization practices. We will wonder how it went on as long as it did. The time is now to change course. The reckoning won’t be pleasant as individuals and organizations are exposed for their participation and complicity in a dark and destructive medical scandal.
If your voice and mine encourage even one person to pause on the pathway or take the exit ramp from the gender medicalized superhighway, we may have made a major difference in a life, a family, and society. Imagine how that difference can be multiplied when more people speak up.
I conclude with gratitude to all, many with diverse backgrounds and in countries worldwide, who have united on behalf of protecting children, teens, and vulnerable adults, as well as standing up for girls’ and women’s rights. Parents and women appreciate all efforts and gestures of any size to help, support, respect, and contribute to positive change.
Lisa Shultz advocates for parents’ and women’s rights. She is deeply concerned about the influence of gender identity ideology and the lack of comprehensive, ethical care for children and vulnerable adults.
"It is easy for those lucky enough to have kids who somehow escaped negative influences, bad luck, trauma, and abuse to pass righteous judgment on parents whose kids did not escape the capture of gender ideology.' -> Yes, this is such the throbbing ache. Not only do you lose a child, but you are guilted and blamed for it. Beautiful piece once again, thank you.
Lisa,
Yes, protective parents cannot accept or endorse the mutilation and self-destruction of their child.
And this particular extreme self-destruction is often couched in the flowery language of its opposite: "love", "acceptance", "affirming", etc.
And you are so right. ALARM BELLS SHOULD GO OFF when they are "Undergoing surgeries to modify sex traits, including the removal of healthy body parts and healthy reproductive organs, sets off loud alarm bells that I am unable to turn off".