The Listener's decision to entirely rewrite your very well-written analysis is an indelible stain on its history. I still find it shocking. Still, you turned out to be right, which I assume is some small satisfaction.
Thank you for publishing this Yvonne. I distinctly remember my daughter (who is now sadly on testosterone at 19) - reading the ‘other article’. She kept it in her room for years; all during the time she was being groomed to come out as Trans by the older unsupervised students that were running her high school Rainbow Club. We’ll bake you rainbow cupcakes when you announce they said. Cut all your hair off - you’d look AMAZING with a buzz cut! - pick your new pronouns… what’s your new name going to be, they said. So alluring for a 13 year old that never felt like she fit in. Whilst quirky with symptoms of autism and diagnosed ADHD, she had never been uncomfortable in her body ever before. She was a gymnast - proud of her clever body - quirky, highly intelligent, though emotionally very intense, she was just a little girl that was starting to blossom into a beautiful and talented young woman. She wasted the next 5 years fixating on gender identity with her likewise gender obsessed peer group (at least 5 are still identifying as male, with 3 others also medicalising, that I know of) and scrolling on her phone whilst being cheered on and encouraged by certain teachers and her affirming friend’s parents. This harmful ideology is insidious. I hope everyday that people will wake up to it. But except for the select few that have ‘peaked’, unless it affects them personally, my experience has been that mostly no-one seemingly knows (thank you woke / cowardly MS media) or cares what is happening to this population of vulnerable young people in NZ. My own GP sympathised with me that “it’s hard when the system is broken”, then refused to prescribe my daughter anti-depressants - because it’s not the “first line treatment” for young people with depression (go for a walk in nature she said); then in the next breath referred her off to the Gender Clinic like a lamb to the slaughter for “first line” cross sex hormone irreversible damage ‘treatment’. I’ll send your article to my gravelly voiced Testosterone soaked daughter and hope she reads it. I’ll write to the Listener too. Thanks again for sharing the ‘real’ version 🙏 Please may we all wake up from this dystopian nightmare soon.
I am so sorry you had to endure this and sorry for your daughter too. She has been failed horribly by too many institutions. Your story is instructive esp where you say she kept that amended Listener article. It almost certainly would have influenced her choices. I agree that unless people have experience of this ideology, they are inclined to think it only affects a tiny group. A fringe issue. Nothing to see here. I’m encouraged by the global vibe shift in favour of reality, but I also realise that the deluded will dig in and claim victim hood- and you know how much msm and some politicians love that dynamic. The fight is not over alas. I hope your daughter learns to embrace her sex and her body. Tough for you as a parent though. Thank you for sharing this.
I have just been reading this comment with such heaviness pressing through me. I am so aghast at what happened to you and your daughter. I know and love the quirky girls like your daughter. I was one (still am) and now I have a 12 year old daughter who has all the same vulnerabilities. I am petrified about sending her to high school next year. I never believed in evil until this ideology descended on our kids.
It's hard to like this but thank you for letting the world know what is going on. Stories like yours are all too common; they are heartbreaking for parents, friends and desperate for the young person. They are what keep me plugging away at trying to get others to see what is going on.
Fantastic article, thank you. I have to resist the tendency to dwell on what might have been if this was published at the time, and focus on how to break the media silence and dismantle this destructive ideology. I think you have hit the nail on the head at the start with the concept that so many people are "supporting" someone undergoing medical gender transition, and due to that conflict of interest they are blocking rational discussion, as they can't countenance the idea that they are causing harm. Some media are so resistant to realistic stories on this topic I start to think that leaflet drops on car windscreens at shopping centres or outside large school events might be needed.
Same in terms of trying not to think about what might have been 😞 and yes I often think about this too (leaflet drops), or other ways of getting the message across. Perhaps a gathering outside Parliament on Detrans Awareness Day.
Great piece Yvonne, thank you for publishing this. I just finished listening to a mother talk about her own experiences of having a boy on the spectrum, who has a group of female cheerleaders as she calls them that enable his behaviour. What is so sad is youth who don’t fit in say at school because they are a bit odd then find their tribe on line and then it’s all down hill. I can’t imagine what it must be like for parents watching your children disappear before your eyes with any mental illness like eating disorders where parents continually tip toe around their children, it must be soul destroying. My heart goes out to parents.
Fantastic work! Stupid bloody Listener! Ridculous power these trans tyrants have. Just so tragic for that young lesbian who lost her fertility in her teens to this madness. As she explains: “I think for me becoming trans was an expression of my internalised misogyny. When I came out as lesbian I was proud but I still carried a lot of shame. I was way more visible as a butch woman than I was living as a man." This gets to the crux for so many 'transmen', I would imagine. If only they can be encouraged to wait and see how they feel at 21 at least before considering any surgical intervention. 🤔
Give The Listener six more months, and with the change of climate around gender ideology they may find enough backbone to finally publish your piece unedited.
Thank you so much for this. Transvestites have infiltrated everywhere and are inculcating children with their bullshit. They aren't 'transgender'. Transvestites that have had a make-over is what they are.
Wi-Hongi is a racist transvestite cockfrocker.
He says shit is racist when he has no argument. Perhaps he could wash his hair, wash it again, and keep his giant man-mouth shut. NO child is born in the wrong body.
Can't get rid of these grooming nonce-adjacent zealots soon enough!
I promise you I asked nicely 10y ago, for men to keep out of our spaces. I find myself aghast at the movement that has enabled predators free rein.
After 100+ death and violence threats, I took my #Glovesoff and have mocked and scorned they/them ever since! #TERFJester I’ll be ‘kind’ and ‘polite’ about skinwalking transvestites and their handlers, enablers, panderers and fans the minute the sun rises over Western Ireland and not before.
I do NOT have to be polite to skinwalkers who would hollow us out and wear us. Shan’t. Not now. Not ever. #FuckYourPronouns #XX #BornNotWorn
Shame on the Listener for not running this. So much for 'without fear or favour'. Very disappointing. It's a nuanced, well researched and balanced piece.
Yes, Yvonne, if only they had had the integrity to publish. The consequences are not just for the people, the children , parents, struggling teens and families anguished by Trans but the political ramifications of the loss of credibility of the 'liberal/leftish' press are profound. I keep coming across people who sign themselves'ex-Democrat' or 'ex-liberal' or who used to vote Labour in Britain and NZ who are now not only not seeing where and what distortions are being generated. The gender gap closed in the last phase of the US election as women moved towards the right and trump on the gender issue.
Yes the failure of the media has a lot to answer for. Like the left, they still don’t get why they are losing their audience. They select and craft their material to fit what they think is a progressive narrative. Actually it’s just dishonest and condescending to the public, who are neither as stupid or gullible as they imagine. Amazing how the media here has barely covered Trump’s edict on gender for fear of it catching on. But thanks to the internet and X , I’m hoping the word will get out anyway.
The Listener's decision to entirely rewrite your very well-written analysis is an indelible stain on its history. I still find it shocking. Still, you turned out to be right, which I assume is some small satisfaction.
Thank you for publishing this Yvonne. I distinctly remember my daughter (who is now sadly on testosterone at 19) - reading the ‘other article’. She kept it in her room for years; all during the time she was being groomed to come out as Trans by the older unsupervised students that were running her high school Rainbow Club. We’ll bake you rainbow cupcakes when you announce they said. Cut all your hair off - you’d look AMAZING with a buzz cut! - pick your new pronouns… what’s your new name going to be, they said. So alluring for a 13 year old that never felt like she fit in. Whilst quirky with symptoms of autism and diagnosed ADHD, she had never been uncomfortable in her body ever before. She was a gymnast - proud of her clever body - quirky, highly intelligent, though emotionally very intense, she was just a little girl that was starting to blossom into a beautiful and talented young woman. She wasted the next 5 years fixating on gender identity with her likewise gender obsessed peer group (at least 5 are still identifying as male, with 3 others also medicalising, that I know of) and scrolling on her phone whilst being cheered on and encouraged by certain teachers and her affirming friend’s parents. This harmful ideology is insidious. I hope everyday that people will wake up to it. But except for the select few that have ‘peaked’, unless it affects them personally, my experience has been that mostly no-one seemingly knows (thank you woke / cowardly MS media) or cares what is happening to this population of vulnerable young people in NZ. My own GP sympathised with me that “it’s hard when the system is broken”, then refused to prescribe my daughter anti-depressants - because it’s not the “first line treatment” for young people with depression (go for a walk in nature she said); then in the next breath referred her off to the Gender Clinic like a lamb to the slaughter for “first line” cross sex hormone irreversible damage ‘treatment’. I’ll send your article to my gravelly voiced Testosterone soaked daughter and hope she reads it. I’ll write to the Listener too. Thanks again for sharing the ‘real’ version 🙏 Please may we all wake up from this dystopian nightmare soon.
I am so sorry you had to endure this and sorry for your daughter too. She has been failed horribly by too many institutions. Your story is instructive esp where you say she kept that amended Listener article. It almost certainly would have influenced her choices. I agree that unless people have experience of this ideology, they are inclined to think it only affects a tiny group. A fringe issue. Nothing to see here. I’m encouraged by the global vibe shift in favour of reality, but I also realise that the deluded will dig in and claim victim hood- and you know how much msm and some politicians love that dynamic. The fight is not over alas. I hope your daughter learns to embrace her sex and her body. Tough for you as a parent though. Thank you for sharing this.
I have just been reading this comment with such heaviness pressing through me. I am so aghast at what happened to you and your daughter. I know and love the quirky girls like your daughter. I was one (still am) and now I have a 12 year old daughter who has all the same vulnerabilities. I am petrified about sending her to high school next year. I never believed in evil until this ideology descended on our kids.
It's hard to like this but thank you for letting the world know what is going on. Stories like yours are all too common; they are heartbreaking for parents, friends and desperate for the young person. They are what keep me plugging away at trying to get others to see what is going on.
Fantastic article, thank you. I have to resist the tendency to dwell on what might have been if this was published at the time, and focus on how to break the media silence and dismantle this destructive ideology. I think you have hit the nail on the head at the start with the concept that so many people are "supporting" someone undergoing medical gender transition, and due to that conflict of interest they are blocking rational discussion, as they can't countenance the idea that they are causing harm. Some media are so resistant to realistic stories on this topic I start to think that leaflet drops on car windscreens at shopping centres or outside large school events might be needed.
Same in terms of trying not to think about what might have been 😞 and yes I often think about this too (leaflet drops), or other ways of getting the message across. Perhaps a gathering outside Parliament on Detrans Awareness Day.
Great piece Yvonne, thank you for publishing this. I just finished listening to a mother talk about her own experiences of having a boy on the spectrum, who has a group of female cheerleaders as she calls them that enable his behaviour. What is so sad is youth who don’t fit in say at school because they are a bit odd then find their tribe on line and then it’s all down hill. I can’t imagine what it must be like for parents watching your children disappear before your eyes with any mental illness like eating disorders where parents continually tip toe around their children, it must be soul destroying. My heart goes out to parents.
This article is fantastic, it makes me sad to think of the difference it would have surely made, had it been published four years ago. Thank you.
Fantastic work! Stupid bloody Listener! Ridculous power these trans tyrants have. Just so tragic for that young lesbian who lost her fertility in her teens to this madness. As she explains: “I think for me becoming trans was an expression of my internalised misogyny. When I came out as lesbian I was proud but I still carried a lot of shame. I was way more visible as a butch woman than I was living as a man." This gets to the crux for so many 'transmen', I would imagine. If only they can be encouraged to wait and see how they feel at 21 at least before considering any surgical intervention. 🤔
Give The Listener six more months, and with the change of climate around gender ideology they may find enough backbone to finally publish your piece unedited.
Thank you so much for this. Transvestites have infiltrated everywhere and are inculcating children with their bullshit. They aren't 'transgender'. Transvestites that have had a make-over is what they are.
Wi-Hongi is a racist transvestite cockfrocker.
He says shit is racist when he has no argument. Perhaps he could wash his hair, wash it again, and keep his giant man-mouth shut. NO child is born in the wrong body.
Can't get rid of these grooming nonce-adjacent zealots soon enough!
Can’t disagree with any of that!
I promise you I asked nicely 10y ago, for men to keep out of our spaces. I find myself aghast at the movement that has enabled predators free rein.
After 100+ death and violence threats, I took my #Glovesoff and have mocked and scorned they/them ever since! #TERFJester I’ll be ‘kind’ and ‘polite’ about skinwalking transvestites and their handlers, enablers, panderers and fans the minute the sun rises over Western Ireland and not before.
I do NOT have to be polite to skinwalkers who would hollow us out and wear us. Shan’t. Not now. Not ever. #FuckYourPronouns #XX #BornNotWorn
Shame on the Listener for not running this. So much for 'without fear or favour'. Very disappointing. It's a nuanced, well researched and balanced piece.
Yes, Yvonne, if only they had had the integrity to publish. The consequences are not just for the people, the children , parents, struggling teens and families anguished by Trans but the political ramifications of the loss of credibility of the 'liberal/leftish' press are profound. I keep coming across people who sign themselves'ex-Democrat' or 'ex-liberal' or who used to vote Labour in Britain and NZ who are now not only not seeing where and what distortions are being generated. The gender gap closed in the last phase of the US election as women moved towards the right and trump on the gender issue.
Yes the failure of the media has a lot to answer for. Like the left, they still don’t get why they are losing their audience. They select and craft their material to fit what they think is a progressive narrative. Actually it’s just dishonest and condescending to the public, who are neither as stupid or gullible as they imagine. Amazing how the media here has barely covered Trump’s edict on gender for fear of it catching on. But thanks to the internet and X , I’m hoping the word will get out anyway.