Gender: A Wider Lens

Ellie was a gender nonconforming 90s kid in the UK. She became a patient of what came to be the Gender Identity Development Services (GIDS) at Tavistock. She was seen at the time by Dr. DiCeglie, a child and adolescent psychiatrist, and the GIDS founder. Ellie describes her psychological treatment with him and her decision, early on in life, that medicalization simply was not an option. She tells us about her family life and coming to terms with being gay in her teens. Ellie is now married to her wife and living happily. But she also talks about gender dysphoria being something she, and many lesbians, simply learn to live with. She offers some fascinating insights about the way technology is used, and social media, in particular, can mimic a kind of schizophrenia experience, with too many competing voices and opinions influencing the minds of teens today. She tells us about being featured in a BBC2 children’s program as a kid, and you can see the YouTube video of this segment in the show notes. We also discuss the book Hannah Barnes has written, soon to be published, for which Ellie was interviewed. If you’ve ever wondered about the desistance literature and hoped to tie a more human, personal story to the statistics, then you’re going to appreciate this discussion with Ellie.

Links:

• BBC2 Short Film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRU8TtOqGSA 

Extended Notes

• From as early as two years old, Ellie rejected dress clothes.
• Ellie has a theory that her sister’s ability to get attention played a part in her gender dysphoria.
• Ellie thought life would be easier if she was a boy and only hung out with boys.
• Why does being a boy or a girl matter?
• Ellie’s mother was a nurse who was treated for a genital condition (DSD) when she was born.
• Ellie’s mother took her to GIDS at Tavistock to treat her gender dysphoria.
• DSD is caused by a recessive gene.
• Ellie’s parents were freely naked in the house and on vacation at nudist beaches.
• When approached with the idea, Ellie thought of medicalization and surgery as a ridiculous option.
• Ellie was treated by the doctor who founded GIDS at Tavistock.
• Some doctors are in the business for status.
• Entering puberty Ellie did have one influential female friend.
• Ellie’s doctor provided a Watchful Waiting period.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer offered Ellie a glimpse into the idea that women could be superheroes and embody their power.
• Everyone naturally has a relationship with their gender.
• The thing, Ellie says, she desired from masculinity is to have height. Surgery couldn’t provide that.
• Gender dysphoria is not static. It is constantly changing.
• Ellie had unrequited crushes on straight girls but her first sexual encounters were with men because that is who approached her.
• Romantically Ellie is interested in women, physically she considers herself bisexual.
• Ellie considers social media to be a drug.
• Ellie was interviewed extensively for Hannah Brown’s upcoming book about the Tavistock Clinic.

Ritchie Herron, also known as TullipR on Twitter, is a 35-year-old detransitioning male who spent almost a decade living as a trans woman. Before his fixation on gender, Ritchie had spent most of his life struggling with debilitating anxiety and obsessional OCD thoughts. As you’ll hear, he is brilliant, articulate, and compelling. But in his teens and young adult life, he forced his big personality into submission. He was terrified of the truth: that he was gay.  Internalized shame, body hatred, and extreme isolation only fed into his OCD.

In the throes of all this, he found an online forum about gender dysphoria, and everything changed in an instant, as Ritchie had a new goal and a new OCD obsession. In this interview, he delivers a moving and powerful account of what happened next. And keep in mind, this is the story of a vulnerable adult, well over 18, but still the victim of a system that missed red flags over and over again. In 2018, after much coaxing from the professionals, he underwent a procedure under the UK’s National Health Service which removed his genitals. The regret set in almost immediately.

Ritchie is now working towards suing the NHS for failing to address serious mental health issues during the diagnostic process. He is active on Twitter, and his brilliant substack, promoting and reposting stories of detransitioners, particularly highlighting the hidden stories of men, bringing awareness to the public about what he calls “the medical scandal of our time.”

Links & Resources:

• Ritchie’s Substack — TullipR: https://tullipr.substack.com/
• Ritchie’s harrowing tweet thread on being a detransitioner: 

https://twitter.com/TullipR/status/1536422533230206976?t=QXFZlhxy7GKaTd812rAlTA&s=08

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/TullipR

Extended Notes

• Ritchie didn’t set out to be a mouthpiece for male detransitioners.
• Most people don’t understand the pressures associated with gender clinics and therapy.
• He longed to express himself as a child but he held it in which caused anxiety and OCD.
• During his teens and as his parents went through a divorce, Ritchie suffered in silence.
• He began SSRIs in his early 20s.
• He hated his body.
• When Ritchie told his psychologist he was trans, it was noted but not worked through.
• The gender clinic knew Ritchie was OCD.
• Forums helped implant the idea that Ritchie could be a woman who is loved by men.
• Paying the gender clinic with a PayDay loan, Ritchie had his transsexual diagnosis within two days.
• Estrogen tablets didn’t block Ritchie’s testosterone levels.
• Ritchie embodied a character of who he thought he should be instead of who he was.
• Pre-gender reassignment surgery, Ritchie’s mother attempted to warn the medical staff of his mental issues.
• When Ritchie discovered the waitlist for surgery was over four years, he decided to reaffirm and have the surgery.
• Shame and regret kicked in almost immediately after the surgery.
• Ritchie felt the anti-antigen was a big part in inducing his psychotic state.
• When Ritchie first found the detrans community he was angry but then realized he needed to talk.
• In trans discourse, males are regarded less than females.
• Vulnerability doesn’t have an age limit.
• Ritchie shares some of the physical repercussions of gender reassignment surgery.
• Ritchie’s advice to others is to avoid surgery at all...
  
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If you’ve ever asked yourself: how is this happening? How are so many institutions completely captured by contemporary gender beliefs? How are medical bodies, educational institutions, and courts operating in ways that seem crazy? Well, then you really need to listen to this insightful and clarifying discussion with Leor Sapir.

Leor is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. A driven researcher with a Ph.D. in Political Science from Boston College, Dr. Sapir previously completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Program on Constitutional Government at Harvard University. His academic work, including his dissertation on the Obama Administration’s Title IX regulations, has investigated how America’s political culture and constitutional government shape public policy on matters of civil rights.

Similarly, at the Manhattan Institute, Dr. Sapir will apply his knowledge of political theory and American government to policy issues, homing in, particularly on issues of gender identity and transgenderism. His inaugural essay in the Winter 2022 issue of City Journal explores a series of recent court rulings surrounding transgenderism, demonstrating how bad ideas translate from fringe academic theory into law and policy. Previous web pieces for City Journal have explored evolving athletic guidelines and media coverage surrounding transgender issues. He discussed these pieces in a recent episode of City Journal’s 10 Blocks podcast.

Leor asserts the collapse of liberal optimism has brought about mindless apathy and subsequently, a kind of soft despotism. Leor makes the razor-sharp observation that being non-judgemental is our new civic religion. We talk about institutional capture, whether courts are the best place to decipher complex social issues, and what the impending malpractice lawsuits will mean for gender medicine. We also discuss the difference between the U.S. system and systems in progressive European countries, where a reversal of affirmation medicine seems to be taking place. We get into so much here: political philosophy, the virtue of tolerance vs. apathy, and what’s at stake when members of a society begin to lose their sense of engagement and responsibility to one another and to truth itself.

Links & Resources:

• Leor Sapir’s writings: https://www.manhattan-institute.org/expert/leor-sapir
• Winter 2022 issue of City Journal:
• https://www.city-journal.org/magazine?issue=345
• Leor Sapir’s essay on athletic guidelines:
• https://www.city-journal.org/confused-and-flawed-debate-over-transgender-inclusion-in-womens-sports
• Leor Sapir’s essay on media coverage:
• https://www.city-journal.org/misguided-affirmations
• City Journal’s 10 Blocks podcast episode on the gender identity debate
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Jennifer Lahl is the founder and

president of The Center for Bioethics and Culture Network. She has 25

years of experience as a pediatric critical care nurse, hospital

administrator, and senior-level nursing manager, and more recently,

she’s also become a successful filmmaker. In 2010, she made her

writing, producing, and directing debut producing the documentary

film

Eggsploitation,

which has been awarded Best Documentary by the California Independent

Film Festival and has sold in more than 30 countries. She is also the

Director, Executive Producer, and co-writer of Anonymous

Father’s

Day

(2011), a documentary film exploring the stories of women and men who

were created by anonymous sperm donation. In 2014 she completed three

films on the ethics of third-party reproduction, aka surrogacy, with

a trilogy called: Breeders:

A

Subclass

of

Women?.

In July 2015, she released a documentary short called

Maggie's

Story,

which follows one woman’s egg donation journey. Lahl’s next

feature film, #BigFertility

was released in the fall of 2018.

And of course, we were particularly

interested in Jennifer’s films that focus on gender medicine. Trans

Mission:

What’s

the

Rush

to

Reassign

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Bob Ostertag published his book, Sex Science Self: A Social History of Estrogen, Testosterone, and Identity in 2016. At the time, few people took much notice. Six years later, however, this book is causing a stir among gender critical circles and provoking considerable thought and discussion.

Today, Bob Ostertag expands on the book, which explores the way pharmaceutical companies have been marketing testosterone as the essence of manhood and estrogen as the essence of womanhood. Pioneering physicians have also been looking long and hard for a condition, even if they have to fabricate one, for which these hormones offer a solution. Bob’s work raises important questions about the beliefs people hold about these substances and what those substances mean for their personal identity. And of course, these beliefs are changing rapidly as society expands its understanding of gender identity, for better or worse.

Bob also reminds us that no aspect of history should be off limits for exploration. Studying the history of hormones, in and of itself, can be upsetting to people who hold strong beliefs about them. Nevertheless, knowing this history is important for anyone curious about the intersection between medicine and identity.

Bob’s writing style is powerful, witty, and gripping. As you’ll see, he is a very thoughtful and cautious conversationalist. Towards the end of the discussion, Bob also raises some challenges to me and Stella about our show, and how some of our guests frame the biological or organic determinants of sexuality and identity. This conversation gave us much to think about and we will continue exploring these ideas in subsequent episodes. So without further delay, here’s our discussion with Bob Ostertag.

Links & Resources:

• Sex Science Self: A Social History of Estrogen, Testosterone, and Identity, by Bob Ostertag, University of Massachusetts Press, 2016, 
• https://www.amazon.com/Sex-Science-Self-Estrogen-Testosterone-ebook/dp/B07CHB9B7Y
• ISBN: 978-1-62534-213-3 

Extended Notes

• In his book, Sex Science Self: A Social History of Estrogen, Testosterone, and Identity,

Bob describes the extraordinary claims by big pharma and the medical establishment about hormones determining gender.

• Is human gender chemical-based?
• Bob offers examples of the meaning of how hormones affect the body and how that meaning has changed.
• A deeper dive into the marketable idea that testosterone represents masculinity.
• How to better anticipate the landmines of pharmaceutical propaganda.
• Pharmaceutical hormones were the miracle cure without a disease.
• At the time, the thought was whoever could synthesize testosterone was going to be rich.
• Gay liberation groups did not want to talk to the medical establishment.
• Transgender issues are reflective of all the problems we have in the world today.
• In the past, a transition was only accomplished through physical surgery.
• All human identities are becoming chemically constructed.
• A project out of UC Berkeley is attempting to debunk the Low T campaign.
• Bob dispels some myths about hormone imbalances and the medical conditions they supposedly cause.
• Inspecting the ethical dilemma of consumer-led medicines.
• For 10 years, Bob’s book was mostly ignored.

This podcast is sponsored by ReIME and Genspect. Visit https://rethinkime.org/ and

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.widerlenspod.com