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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 24, 2022

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This is the equivalent of wokes using “white supremacy” to include timeliness, dress codes and objectivity.

False equivalency. Wokes using "white supremacy" to include anything they don't like about Red Tribe values is qualitatively distinct from using "groomer" to include behaviors that are, in fact, preparing children to be exploited or abused, and then exploiting or abusing them.

Here's how: "white supremacy" is fundamentally the idea that white groups or individuals are inherently superior to (at least some) non-white groups. To call, say, expectations of timeliness "white supremacy" is gobbledygook. If the claim is that non-whites can't be timely, then that claim is itself an assertion of white supremacy. If the claim is that timeliness is a "white value" but not a superior value, and that non-whites can be timely but rewarding timeliness or punish tardiness unfairly discounts non-white values, then it is also a claim that not rewarding timeliness, or even rewarding tardiness, unfairly discounts white values. You can't reasonably hold that timeliness is "white supremacy" without holding inconsistent ideas. (This is a frequent pattern in identitarian thinking: it is very often just self-refuting nonsense.)

By contrast, "grooming" describes the act of preparing a child to be abused or exploited, and some common known approaches to grooming are: asking children explicit questions about their sex and sexuality, exposing children to sexually explicit materials, and encouraging children to keep secrets or distance themselves from their parents. These are all things that wokes have demonstrably advocated for, from arguing for the inclusion of sexually explicit material in children's libraries, to keeping secrets from parents, to refusing to return runaway children to their parents. You might ask whether it counts as "grooming" if Party A is doing the grooming but Party B does the abuse, and whether it's still grooming if Party B never shows up to accomplish the abuse. I myself am comfortable with the idea that abusers can and do sometimes employ accomplices as groomers, as well as with the idea that a groomer who fails to follow through on abuse is still a groomer. This is not self-refuting, and so cannot be aptly compared with treating timeliness or objectivity as white supremacy.

And yes--you could certainly argue that the real abuse was families all along! Many on the left do believe this, and it is a genuine values dispute. Even DeBoer doesn't actually come out and say "families are good, actually"--his position appears to be something like "stop saying they're bad so we can win, maybe then we can actually abolish the horrid institution." But when the wokes are out there actually engaged in textbook grooming behaviors and passing laws to enable those behaviors, it's hardly a "dishonest" or "transparent attempt to leverage conditioned emotional reactions." It's more like calling a spade a spade. As I said in the linked discussion last time--if tabooing "groomer" seemed likely to reduce cases of actual abuse, I'd be all for it. But in the current debate, it seems like the desire to taboo "groomer" is just deliberate obfuscation of a real and serious political problem.

render your child homeless

Isn't that obviously a point where the state has pre-existing authority to step in? Can teachers conceal anything from parents if they merely claim to be worried about the parent overreacting?

I can cite this if need be.

Sure, if you don't mind. How is kicking your minor child out for any reason not an obvious, easy crime to prosecute?

This is the status quo for everything except physical or sexual abuse disclosed to them, as they're mandated reporters for that.

I was thinking more like suicidal ideation, or bad grades, where there would normally be an expectation that parents be informed either due to severity or routine.

All of the "gay" questions don't seem like something where it would be reasonable to go out of your way to tell parents, just as it would be for straight analogues. That probably wouldn't justify lying about it without a specific reason.

I agree, but much red state legislation does not appear to agree.

If it's something like "you must out any minor suspicion", then yes, that is fucked up. The only bill I've read in detail was the Florida one, and that just prohibited deliberate deception, which is not obviously bad.

Boy named Jack wears makeup at school now, and asks you to call him "Jane".

That seems like the sort of thing a parent might have a serious interest in being aware of. Especially if that involves being referred or funneled towards medical professionals.

More comments

What you and /u/FCfromSSC both dance around here ...

The only person dancing around anything here is you.

Should the law require have required my teacher to tell this parent that his son was gay, thus subjecting the kid to homelessness?

Too fucking right it should. It's not the teacher's place to manipulate families based on her own personal values. Schoolteachers are public employees and ultimately answerable to parents. Concealing material information from parents is pedagogical malpractice.

Laws saying teachers don't have to disclose aren't there so that teachers can keep secrets to groom children. They're there so that teachers can use discretion and judgement to figure out what the right course of action is.

That's not a level of discretion government employees get to have over families, not in any sane system. If a child is being physically abused, malnourished, etc. then the law might get involved, and it's tragic and messy but sometimes understandable. If a child is confused about sex or sexuality, that is not the government's business to decide how to address that. By making it the government's business, Democrats are actively grooming children.

If you think it's "abuse" to tell a child that they don't get to date or have sex or wear inappropriate clothing, like, we just have a clear values disagreement. I do think many "transgendered" children are actually victims of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, which is enough like sexual abuse that I might be persuaded that child protective services should also be allowed to intervene in such cases... but even then, absent any other concerns I'm reluctant to get the government involved. I don't know--do you think I should be more willing to get the government involved in such cases?

Show me what's objectionable in these books, and tell me what age you think you should be in order to access this material, and why.

I mean, for starters. Children's libraries are no place for these materials. Making such materials available to children is textbook grooming. Do you honestly advocate for distributing such things to children? If so, you're a groomer, too, by every definition offered in the thread thus far.

Concealing material information from parents is pedagogical malpractice.

... If a child is confused about sex or sexuality, that is not the government's business to decide how to address that. By making it the government's business, Democrats are actively grooming children.

Don't be ridiculous. You're seriously trying to say that it's "grooming" if someone believes that a teacher doesn't have to tell a kid's homophobic parents that their kid is gay? You want to call keeping a secret from someone who will hurt their kid if they know the same as deliberately trying to make it easier for someone to sexually abuse a kid? That is absurd.

You're seriously trying to say

No, I'm saying only what I'm saying--not trying to say other things.

Do you think teachers who suspect parents of hitting children for receiving school discipline should conceal the administration of school discipline?

Do you think teachers who suspect parents of requiring children to be vegan should be permitted to secretly provide the child with meat?

Children who confide in teachers are placing themselves in an exploitable position. Often it is merely political indoctrination to which those children have unwittingly exposed themselves. Sometimes it is abuse. Parents are the legal and moral guardians of their children. Temporary custodians (like teachers) who withhold material information about those children from parents, on grounds that the custodian doesn't like the things the parent has said about a particular subject (like homosexuality and the likely consequences of coming out), are not helping children. They are imposing their own outsider judgments on the operations of a family they have no business manipulating.

The government is not "deliberately trying to make it easier for someone to sexually abuse" kids. The government is deliberately abusing kids (in the form of exposing them to inappropriate materials), and deliberately doing things that make it easier for someone to abuse kids (like requiring teachers to conceal material information from parents). It's an easy conflation to make, but I encourage you to engage more closely with the facts about what is being said or done, without (twice in one comment) making misleading loaded claims about what I or others are "trying" to do.

I was not intending to mislead. Inaccurate paraphrases by me are the result of genuine confusion on my part as to exactly whom you are attempting to accuse of knowingly aiding and abetting child abuse and for what. You said that it was "grooming children" for the government to be involved in choosing whether to tell homophobic parents about their child's sexuality in the same paragraph in which you referred to teachers as "government employees." As a result, I read you as accusing any teacher who chooses not to tell a child's homophobic parents that their child is gay of grooming children.

Your response suggests to me that this reading was not accurate. I am glad to hear this. Even by the standards of "groomer" discourse, that would be unusually absurd.

Now, since you've also asked me some direct questions, I'll answer them.

Do you think teachers who suspect parents of hitting children for receiving school discipline should conceal the administration of school discipline?

I don't think they should be required to conceal it, but I wouldn't outlaw such mercy.

Do you think teachers who suspect parents of requiring children to be vegan should be permitted to secretly provide the child with meat?

Happens all the time. Seriously, do you know how hard it is to get a slice of the vegetarian pizza when there's just one in the whole classroom and the meat-eating kids think nothing of taking a slice of it while you're still figuring out which one it is?

Now, deliberately trying to make the vegan kid eat meat, or going out of your way to provide it specifically, would indeed be anti-social behaviour. On the other hand, if the kid deliberately chooses to eat meat of their own accord and you don't tell their parents, well, that's less of an issue. I don't think teachers are required to rat kids out to their parents for every little thing the parents might not like.

What externalities have I avoided engaging on?

This wasn't a discussion about externalities, but a discussion about direct costs. By moving to hypothetical "externalities" you simply sidestepped the conversation altogether.

Do parents have an absolute right to know 100% of their teenagers mental contents at all times?

Nobody said anything like that. Your strawmen have no power here.

Should you read your daughter's diary entries?

If you think there is cause for concern, damn straight you should read your daughter's diary entries. Monitor her internet use, too. Kids don't generally need to live in a panopticon but sometimes it makes sense to take that approach. I'd rather my children be upset about an occasional "invasion of privacy" than be confident in the sanctity of their phones or diaries and run off with an internet boyfriend, and that's not a hypothetical example. I had a neighbor whose 12-year-old daughter snuck away with a 23-year-old "boyfriend" she met online. That sort of thing is terrifying. Privacy is just not a very important thing for children to get from their parents.

You want to turn teachers into a Stasi.

Not at all. To the contrary--you want to turn teachers into parents. I want teachers to share material information with parents, because they work for the parents, literally on the parents' dime. If that information does result in abuse, there are legal protections in place for that sort of thing. If a teacher merely believes that information will result in abuse, that's in many cases just the teacher being bigoted, which is also material information a teacher should share. "I hate your kind so much that I will actively undermine your parenting" is the kind of warning teachers really ought to give to parents, so parents can make an informed choice about where to send their children to be educated. (Wishful thinking, I know.)

your current position is that the state shouldn't punish parents who deprive their children of healthcare

I don't think that at all. "Gender-affirming" treatments are not healthcare any more than a nose job is. We do clearly have a straight values disagreement here--you think that mutilating people is "health care," and I don't.

I don't really give a shit if they're in a high school though, because kids find worse on the internet.

Yeah, see above I guess. "The internet is worse, so it's fine if my kid's library peddles porn" is certainly a take, I'll give you that.

Very funny. You're a child molestor. There are gay and trans children out there, and you think they should be molested* by their teachers. You even suggested their parents should be molested* by the state for allowing their child to access gender affirming care.

Well, this is the values disagreement though, isn't it? It boils down to you thinking it's healthy for teachers to talk to kids about sex and sexuality without their parents' knowledge, because some parents might do objectionable things as a result, and I think it's not healthy for teachers to talk to kids about sex and sexuality without their parents' knowledge, because some teachers might do objectionable things as a result. You want teachers to make judgment calls at the expense of the parent-child relationship, and I want parents to be the ones making maximally-informed judgment calls, both because parents are generally in a better position to make those calls, and because I think parents have some right to make those calls. Or in other words:

government employees exist to serve the societal good at large, not your personal whims.

I think this is perhaps the real site of our disagreement. You don't think schools exist to help parents, except accidentally. You think they exist "to serve the societal good at large." But if that's the case, sending children to public school is a horrible choice and no parent should make it. They're just sending raw materials to the collective culture-factory, which will do with those children as it sees fit. I'm sure most public educators would want to walk you back, a lot. Your reference to "personal whims" is of course pure rhetorical bullshit: every school my children have ever attended has been explicit, nay anxious, about ensuring good school-parent partnerships, finding ways for teachers and parents to cooperate, collaborate, and coordinate. Open sharing of concerns and information is central to the proper functioning of a school. Getting lost in value conflicts about the sexuality of children is not only kinda creepy (yes, even in high school), it's detrimental to the whole damn enterprise. It allows identity politics to interfere with what is actually best for the child: well-supported parenting.

you've just dropped essentially every single one of those argumentative threads with no reply

I skipped all the parts where you put words in my mouth; I don't see much use in responding to outrageous strawmen and maximally-uncharitable takes where you impose an invented narrative on me and then castigate me for it. Attributing to me views I do not hold, and conclusions I have not endorsed, is not helpful and clarifies nothing.

Just to furnish one ready example, I have absolutely never called Democrats "pedophiles," nor ever implied that you were yourself one; I never even used that word. Please CTRL-F if you don't believe me! Coming back with "well you obviously meant the word groomer to imply--" No. I meant what I said, and I said what I meant. I rather specifically distinguished accomplice-groomers from groomers-who-go-on-to-abuse; if you missed that explanation, all I can do is ask you to read it again and try to think with nuance instead of rage. I am sorry that this was upsetting to you, but it was your own bad reading that appears to have upset you--not the words I actually wrote.

Since I am apparently not a party to the conversation happening in your head, I will also now excuse myself from the conversation happening here.

If I tell my ten year old daughter she's a fat retard every day and I wish she was never born, should the state intervene or leave me alone?

Granting the premise that this comparison is reasonable, the state should not intervene, no. Cultures, religions, and ideologies propogate themselves through childhood discipline. State intervention presupposes that certain psychologically abusive treatment is valid because it instills favored values. (For example, children who cannot stay in their desk and be quiet during class are subjected to quite frightful forced isolation and verbal abuse until they conform to expected standards.) The Amish and Orthodox Jews subject their children to a rather crippling upbringing and it is understood that the government cannot intercede because freedom of religion. The situation with hypothical "fat retard calling" parent is much the same.

Once children become adults they are obviously entitled to judge their parents' instilled culture by themselves and accept or reject it.

Very good, when you publish this research it may inform future education policies. Until such a time, it's unclear to my why I should privilege your opinion is on how transgender children should be treated and insist that it be enforced in education policy.

The current policies and proposed policies are based on politics, not disinterested research, if such even exists for this topic. In any case, public schools are funded by and serve the parents.

Also, that sarcasm is beneath you. "You are not a PhD in this subject so be quiet", as if arguments you see online, in media, or politics are informed by one.

Certainly the red-tribe plan of abusing them out of it has been unsuccessful thus far. [...] where do you believe transgender adults come from? My claim is that prior to reaching age 18, they are first age 17. And before that, they are invariably age 16. And before that...

The "red tribe plan", such as it is, is to ignore trans children to the extent they exist and let them figure it out as adults. This plan worked for most of human history. High teen suicide, whether the cause be misgendering or borderline personality, is a modern phenomenon so I don't think you can lay that on conservatives.

How did you come to this conclusion? What flaws do you see in the studies that inform current medical practice? [...] Fair point, but I feel there should be some burden on those arguing against a vast amount of establishment consensus to show otherwise

A few years ago LGBT activist organizations campaigned against John Hopkins publishing transphobic research results. John Hopkins ultimately retracted. An open letter from 'the faculty'. (Scroll to the bottom to see which departments have names represented, and which don't.)

As faculty at Johns Hopkins, we are committed to serving the health needs of the LGBTQ community in a manner that is informed by the best available science — a manner that is respectful and inclusive and supports the rights of LGBTQ people to live full and open lives without fear of discrimination or bias based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. [...]

Because of the report, the Human Rights Campaign has warned Johns Hopkins that it is reviewing, and may remove from the institution, its high ranking in the HRC Healthcare Equality Index. The national benchmarking tool evaluates health care facilities' policies and practices related to equity and inclusion of their LGBTQ patients, visitors and employees.

In situations where institutions can have their proto-DEI score docked for producing certain results, and where such results prompt a buzzword-filled moral struggle session from the parts of the faculty that study "human rights" and "reproductive health", the consensus of academia is meaningless to me. Academia has been scared into mumbling about other topics. Why not this one?

From Freddie's linked article:

"Yes, Marx and Engels took their stab at the family, including in The Manifesto, but everything about post-revolutionary life under communism is a little underdrawn, and if we’re going to go to the mattresses for anything the Papas Smurf argued for, I would prefer it not be the family. Because I like the family! And so does almost everybody else, of any gender, race, ideology, or circumstance."

I'll admit that he never said "families are good," but I think you're misrepresenting him.

Not only did he never say "families are good," he said

I understand that there are cogent critiques of the nuclear family or the traditional family or similar.

Furthermore, from Freddie's linked article, immediately following the bits you quoted:

To be anti-family really does strike me as looking for the thing that will piss the most people off, for the least possible political gain. I would prefer it if the most influential socialist press would not casually engage in this kind of useless leftist posturing, when we have so many more important and realistic goals.

His clearest concern is certainly not, "families are essential ingredients of a functioning society." His clearest concern is, "this argument makes the glorious revolution look bad." Furthermore, the "when we have..." is a really interesting qualifier. If he did not have so many more important and realistic goals, would he still regard these arguments as useless posturing? I don't get the impression, at all, that Freddie would stand up for families at that point--in part, because he gives no particular defense of them here. His point is never, "families are good." His point is always, "abolishing the family is, for now, a losing issue."

I will grant that he notices, for example, that

Shulamith Firestone . . . suffered from schizophrenia and likely starved to death in her apartment. Her body wasn’t found for a week. She was a giant of second-wave feminism but she died completely alone. I would suggest that this was a person who could have used more family.

But not, apparently, a nuclear or traditional family? His position is clearly underspecified, but I don't think it is a misrepresentation to observe that nuclear and traditional families, at least, are on the chopping block from Freddie's perspective. But--those are the kinds of family that matter most, on my view! All other arrangements are (deliberate--and often important!) imitations of the traditional/nuclear family, imitations so close we even call them "family," but they seem to just be less stable over a lifetime--so giants of second-wave feminism die alone and unnoticed and icons of gay rights can't even get burial costs covered by the law firm that used them to change the nation.

I think it’s a pretty good equivalency.

Yes, spurious claims of white supremacy are a different animal than substantiated claims of grooming. The correct comparison is what happens when it isn’t obviously, or even debatably, child abuse, but the label is applied anyway. You are looking at a biased sample and assuming it’s representative.

Look at @Tanista’s response. Child transition is probably a bad idea and definitely a moral hazard. It is understandable to apply the “groomer” label for adults recommending it. How much of that should apply to adults who would criminalize gender treatments for minors or investigate parents for child abuse? That’s 26% and 17% of Democrats, respectively (source); I’d expect higher rates for more nuanced polls. Those are people who should not be labeled groomers even if they vote for...inclusion in sports, or discrimination protection.

Both debates are over category membership rather than category existence. There are flagrant abusers who obviously belong in the category, and there are normal people who get lumped in. The right would very much like to have a weapon remotely comparable to accusations of white supremacy. Trans activists—especially the vast majority who aren’t pedophiles—would quite prefer to avoid this.

Do you think Libs of TikTok really cares about her false positive rate? “Groomer” doesn’t need to be taboo; it needs to be selective.

Those are people who should not be labeled groomers even if they vote for...inclusion in sports, or discrimination protection.

Okay, but no one in this thread has labeled people groomers on that basis.

So I will do that now!

Both of those view characterizations obfuscate real issues, some of which are also potentially connected with grooming. For example, "discrimination protection" to the extent of allowing this kind of thing looks to me like just another way of shielding a paradigmatically grooming behavior (an adult presenting to children in an indecent, hypersexualized way). Even the inclusion of males in female-only competitions can put young girls in situations where their self-protective instincts toward e.g. modesty get treated by adults as essentially pathological. Finding ways to erode those instincts is also textbook grooming (in the vein of "let's play silly naked games"). So, yeah, even those people have subjected themselves to the label of "groomer," though they may be sad to hear it.

Now, there are surely many people (including many non-Democrats!) who want to make sure that transsexuals aren't being assaulted for it, or losing their job over it, or getting poor healthcare because of it. I, too, believe that transsexuals should enjoy the same legal protections as everyone else! But by and large those are not the issues Democrats are proposing laws about--and certainly those are not the issues addressed by the law proposed in the OP. When someone points out that Democrats are in fact proposing legislation to protect plainly grooming behaviors, it is no answer at all to say "but you have to admit that some Democrats just want rights for transsexuals!"

If you want "groomer" to apply more selectively, start by convincing Democrat politicians to stop legislating the grooming of schoolchildren against their parents' wishes at every opportunity they get.

The right would very much like to have a weapon remotely comparable to accusations of white supremacy.

Looking at the poll numbers, the right may have gotten exactly that.

Trans activists—especially the vast majority who aren’t pedophiles—would quite prefer to avoid this.

I have seen some trans activists publicly support Republican efforts to prevent Democrats from legislating the grooming of schoolchildren against their parents' wishes, so good on them. But it is not at all my impression that they form any kind of majority; certainly they are not a vast one. What their actual sexual preferences are is irrelevant. As far as I can tell, trans activists are overwhelmingly in favor of empowering public schools to groom children against their parents' wishes. This aligns completely with my broader experience of leftist politics as explicitly anti-family.

inclusion in sports

In my opinion no human, no matter their genitals or gender identity, should on these grounds be excluded from the open/mens category.

But demanding womens category be opened up to biological men, while claimining it is "exclusionary" to refuse to do so, is like calling discrimation that a person whose age-sex is 25 years, but who claims their age-gender is 14 years, isn't allowed to compete in a U15 tournament.

In my opinion no human, no matter their genitals or gender identity, should on these grounds be excluded from the open/mens category.

Even if they're taking testosterone supplements?

Can natal men also take testosterone supplements and participate in the open/mens' league?

We should just get rid of the women category in sports. Let’s them compete at making the most beautiful, smart, compassionate children instead.

But demanding womens category be opened up to biological men, while claimining it is "exclusionary" to refuse to do so, is like calling discrimation that a 25 year old agefluid person isn't allowed to compete in a U15 tournament.

Similarly, claiming it is discriminatory to reward athletes in the open men's tournament better than athletes in the restricted women's category is like calling it discrimination that a 14-year old doesn't get the same rewards for winning a U15 tournament that a 25-year old gets for winning the open.

More or less.

I find banning the performance-enhancing drug testosterone from the women’s group to be perfectly reasonable; the linked polls suggest I’m not alone, as it’s the most popular restriction across party. This is a decent barometer for the level of discomfort Americans feel regarding trans inclusion.

It’s also a good example of policy debate that isn’t tied to “grooming.”

To TLDR for you: Grooming is not an ends. Grooming is a means. Everything gender activist are doing to kids in schools is text book, to the letter, grooming. What are the ends? Doesn't matter. Could be fucking kids. Could be talking them into cutting their tits off. Could be getting them to drink the magic cool aid to catch a ride on the Hail Bob comet. Could be nothing, but I doubt it. Grooming as a means opens the door wide to enormous, unaccountable, irreversible damage. It removes probably the single oldest and most effect reality checks, the involvement of the family. The fact that Democrats endorse it on a national, institutional level, is horrifying.

By contrast, "grooming" describes the act of preparing a child to be abused or exploited, and some common known approaches to grooming are: asking children explicit questions about their sex and sexuality, exposing children to sexually explicit materials, and encouraging children to keep secrets or distance themselves from their parents. These are all things that wokes have demonstrably advocated for

Even if we put that aside there's a serious risk that puberty blockers entomb kids into the ideology they've been "groomed" into. Most people who suffer gender dysphoria desist but the study on those on puberty blockers showed that nearly everyone persisted in the new identity.

So that alone would be chemically and medically assisted "grooming" which is imo much, much more egregious than some of the other examples. Especially given potential health risks of blockers and the hormones that apparently inevitably follow.

Most people who suffer gender dysphoria desist but the study on those on puberty blockers showed that nearly everyone persisted in the new identity.

This is comparing apples to oranges. Studies showing high levels of desistance often include children who are "subthreshold" for diagnosis. By contrast, children who actually go on puberty blockers are subject to stronger constraints on access.

Studies showing high levels of desistance often include children who are "subthreshold" for diagnosis.

That article only takes a look at one study and makes contentious claims about it, e.g. Jesse Singal takes aim at the claim that the researchers did no followup and just assumed non-responders were desisters, which would be pretty egregious

By contrast, children who actually go on puberty blockers are subject to stronger constraints on access.

Maybe when using the Dutch protocol which, iirc, is stricter. There's a reason UK and Sweden have shut down gender clinics and stopped applying puberty blockers outside of experimental trials and have walked back claims of them being "totally reversible" - stuff like that was used precisely to open up the use of blockers.

“The methodology of those studies is very flawed, because they didn't study gender identity,” said Diane Ehrensaft, director of mental health at UCSF’s Child and Adolescent Gender Clinic “Those desistors were, a good majority of them, simply proto-gay boys whose parents were upset because they were boys wearing dresses. They were brought to the clinics because they weren't fitting gender norms.”

Yeah, I think that's exactly right even today.