Transgenderism, a term that became commonplace thanks in large part to Bruce Jenner after coming out as Caitlyn Jenner in April 2015 on the ABC News show 20/20, is now a controversial topic with people coming down on all sides of the issue.
Jenner, a reality star and former 1976 Olympic decathlon champion, claimed he identified as a woman, and from then on would live as a woman. The actions were universally hailed as the highest act of bravery by the mainstream media. In fact, Jenner was even given the ESPY Arthur Ashe Award for courage, which is one of the most prestigious in sports. Due to Jenner’s current celebrity status and past success in athletics, the former athlete quickly became the face of the transgender movement.
Now, the trend seems more popular than ever, causing many Americans to ask a very important question: has transgenderism really been a taboo identity for all of existence, or is this politicized movement more often than not a cultural trend being used as a vehicle to push for progressive causes?
One pediatrician’s statements suggest it’s likely the latter. But first, let’s look at how this cultural development came to be as visible as it is today.
By the Numbers
An easy way to explain someone being transgender is someone who is born one sex but identifies more with the other.
This goes beyond a girl who likes to wear a ball cap, play in the dirt or climb trees. It also goes beyond a boy who has a leaning towards the theater or would rather stay away from physical activity. It is instead when a person so identifies with the opposite sex that they feel like they are living a lie by living as their birth sex.
According to the UCLA School of Law think tank called the Williams Institute, there are some 700,000 Americans who claim to be transgender. Those who opt for sex reassignment surgery number between 100 and 500 each year, according to the Encyclopedia of Surgery. Worldwide estimations are thought to be two to five times that number.
One option for those who identify as the opposite sex is to have sex reassignment surgery after hormonal treatments. This transforms the outside of the body to match what a person feels or identifies with inside. Physician Fred Ettner, who works with people going through the transition process beliefs that only 25 to 30% of transgender individuals choose to have surgery of any type.
Promoting Child Abuse
Some might wonder what harm could come from allowing a transgender individual to take steps to change their sex. Well, perhaps if one was only considering adults, there might be room for this argument. However, with the explosiveness of the transgender movement across the nation, now even kids and teens, not only adults, are being encouraged to change their sex to match how they “identify.” This, according to the experts, is not only harmful but borderline abusive.
Pediatrician Dr. Michelle Cretella recently sounded off about the dangers of helping a child transition to another sex. The specific treatment she was referencing is the use of puberty blockers that would prevent the child’s hormones from launching their natural phase if they identify with the opposite sex.
“Chemical castration is what you’re doing when you put any biologically normal child on puberty blockers,” she said. “It’s treating puberty like a disease, arresting a normal process which is critical to normal development is bad for kids. Sterilization: not good for kids. Prepping them for what will likely result in a case in girls a double mastectomy at 16–not how you treat depression or anxiety.”
Cretella went on to condemn they way schools and the media are normalizing what she suggests borders on a mental disorder.
“Indoctoring pre-school kids with the lie that you can be trapped in the wrong body, again, that’s disrupting their normal reality and cognitive development,” she added. “Those things are abusive.”
How Science Supports Dr. Cretalla’s Argument
Dr. Cretalla went on to note that scholarly studies praising the indulgence of children in their sudden desire to permanently alter their bodies before they are mature enough to understand the long-term implications simply have no scientific bearing.
Such studies, she says, are “ideology masquerading as science.”
These studies also have an extremely small number of participants to oversee, and are short-term in nature. They also use a control group of “mentally healthy” children who are in most cases the siblings of the “trans-identifying child” and have the child’s parents evaluate the “mental health” of their own children.
Therefore, the only basis that might suggest encouraging a child to explore transgenderism is healthy is most certainly skewed to say that least. This doesn’t sound like a strong enough reason to move forward with a procedure that can alter your physicality for the rest of time.
As scientists struggle to justify this cultural trend, the political left is seizing an opportunity to lock in another vulnerable demographic. By making transgenderism a political issue, leftist politicians and other talking heads have even more ammunition to portray conservatives as cold-hearted and uncaring. Because of this, making this a scientific argument should be a top priority.
~ Conservative Zone
