Sep 20, 2021
Why in the last decade, has the diagnosis "gender dysphoria" transformed from a vanishingly rare affliction, applying almost exclusively to boys and men, to an epidemic among teenage girls?
We are all disordered in some way because of sin - we all have sins and struggles and thoughts and feelings that don't correspond to truth and reality. Our challenge is not to conform to the patterns of this world but to be transformed by the renewing of our mind (Romans 12:2)
In this episode, Scott reads and reflects from Irreversible Damage: the Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters, by Abigail Shrier.
1) What did you think about Scott’s opening analogy about a girl
going to the doctor for anorexia, where the doctor affirmed all of
her thinking that she was in fact fat, even though she was severely
underweight by medical standards? Do you think this is a good
analogy for the issue of gender dysphoria, and what is currently
happening in our culture?
2) Scott pointed out that in Abigail Shrier’s book “Irreversible
Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing our Daughters”, she says
that before 2012, there was no scientific literature on girls (ages
11-21) ever experiencing gender dysphoria. Before that, it affected
.01 percent of the entire population, and that number was nearly
exclusively boys. Why do you think there is this explosion of talk
about this issue and apparently people experiencing it in the last
several years?
3) In the book, Shrier offers some thoughts about why this shift in
identifying as transgender is happening. She mentioned that it’s
mostly upper-middle-class white girls and that they may be trying
to carve out a niche of rebellion or be able to identify as
minorities. What do you think about that? Agree? Disagree? Why?
4) She also said that many of these kids come from progressive
families, raised with few walls, so they hunt for barriers to knock
down. Have you seen this happening with your own children?
Children/teenagers/young adults you know? What do you think they
really are looking for? What do they need?
5) She also mentions our modern-day obsession with mental health.
Medicating everyone toward the optimal level of happiness. Is this
dangerous? Are we shooting ourselves in the foot by not allowing
people to just deal with tough emotions? Where does that lead us if
we continue that pattern of just looking for a quick fix to treat
our “symptoms”?
6) Have you ever thought about how you would handle it if one of
your children voiced that they identify as a different gender? It’s
easy to point fingers and judge from a far-off perspective, but
what if it happened to you? What do you do? What truths from
scripture would you rely on in helping?