Autotomy–And a Left-Handed Way to Get to My Point
Photo credit: ABC action news
In writing the kind of non-fiction that a Speculative Faith post is, good form comes from getting to the point right away. Tell them what you intend to tell them up front, tell them again in detail, and if necessary, summarize.
I’m not doing that with this post, but hope you will continue to read anyway to see what I’m talking about. I hope the images of young people having cut themselves that I’ve shared will catch your attention to the point you will want to know why I shared them. And you’ll keep reading to find out.
Note I’m still not continuing with the series I had planned, A Speculative Fiction Writer’s Guide to Warfare. I’m still working on collaboration with Travis Chapman, a situation which has not been worked out by any means…
To return to my indirect (“left-handed”) means to make a specific point, I once imagined writing a modernized version of Pilgrim’s Progress. If you aren’t familiar with that 1678 work by John Bunyan, it’s highly and obviously allegorical, with character names like Wordly Wiseman, Christian, Hopeful, Ignorance, and the Giant Despair, wherein the names of the characters sum up who the characters are.
In the version I pondered writing, the character names would be less obvious, but still sum up their nature. I thought of creating a knight named “Autotomy”–a word which comes from Greek roots meaning “self-cutting.” The knight, when first met and asked if his name is actually supposed to be “Autonomy” (since that’s a regular word in English and “autotomy” isn’t), he would answer, “Yes, you can call me that, too.” So “Autonomy” is what they’d call him most of the time.
The story would show the knight bleeding for unknown reasons over a good long while and eventually would reveal that he was cutting himself–the lesson in the name being that wandering from the Lord (via autonomy) is equivalent to doing harm to yourself directly, which I imagined as the knight slicing the inside of his arms and legs with his sword when he thought nobody was watching and then covering up what he was doing with his armor. By the way, this character idea was based on observations of my own life, believe it or not.
I think that idea for a character first crossed my mind around twenty years ago–even before my first short story was published circa 2002. I did not know of a single person cutting himself or herself in the late nineties–and it certainly was not the cultural phenomenon that it is now.
Let’s time travel (and who doesn’t like time travel?) to the present. I recently happened to meet a young person I originally planned to say more about, but I decided it’s better not to share too many details for the sake of her anonymity. This person had visible markings on the inside of her left arm where she has cut herself repeatedly in the past. I wound up talking to the girl on multiple occasions (in full view of other people, by the way).
I offered her an empathetic ear and found out that she believes she is actually male. She recently began living with family members who take her to church. She wasn’t that thrilled about church and wonders if she is an atheist. And she’s a science fiction and fantasy fan, an avid reader. She and I discussed the difference between reincarnation and resurrection and she actually didn’t even really understand what resurrection was, but understood reincarnation just fine. I wondered if stories she has read influenced her understanding. She also wondered why Christians hate “people like her.” I tried to explain that not all do.
You know something, when I was around 13, I didn’t cut myself, but I had a distant, alcoholic father, and a promiscuous mother who exposed me to things I should not have been exposed to (I could say what with more specificity, but don’t want to traumatize all the people reading this who had childhoods that did not feature abuse). I contemplated suicide. And I read science fiction. I read a lot of science fiction–it was my escape and comfort. And based on what I read in science fiction, I wondered if I really should be an atheist–like Isaac Asimov, science fiction writer extraordinaire, whom I admired.
I wondered who I was, I wondered what I was, and I certainly hated myself quite a lot. Intense loathing, in fact. I found a deliverance from all that in submitting myself to God and experienced God rescuing me, there’s no doubt in my mind on that point. Yet for many years, I would voluntarily wander away from God, in spite of what he had done for me, hurting myself again. Like Autonomy/Autotomy. (In fact, I still do this, but far less now.)
And with that background, there I was, talking to someone also rather like my character Autotomy, a character I hadn’t even put down in writing anywhere until crafting this post. This young person (quite young), who was born a female but now struggling with the idea she should be male–expressed interest when I told her about science fiction written from a Christian perspective. I gave her some books. She’s reading them. I don’t know now how that’s going to turn out. I hope what she reads helps reset her point of view, at least a little.
Let me be clear that I know that works of fiction are not primarily for the purpose of reaching a lost world for Christ. That’s what Christian believers are for, you and I. And let’s not forget the power of the words and images of the Bible.
Yet Bunyan’s work had a powerful influence in its day–and it was a work of fiction. A work of speculative (albeit allegorical) fiction.
Why would a young science fiction reader clearly know what reincarnation is but not resurrection? Why would the modern cultural trend of cutting and another cultural trend of a transgender self-concept be something fully understood, but basic concepts of Christianity seem foreign?
II Corinthians 10:5 and Proverbs 23:7a (“For as he thinks in his heart, so is he,” NKJV) are just two of many verses in the Bible that talk about the importance of what we think. And Proverbs 4:23 (NIV) says, “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”
Let me submit to you that the fiction we write becomes the backdrop of the thoughts of human beings, a substance that pours into human hearts. At least sometimes. Especially for people who are young and impressionable.
Sure, I understand when Christians choose to write for the general market–I in fact publish some short stories that would fit in fine in the general market. But note that I felt, when talking to a younger, female version of Autonomy (er, I mean, “Autotomy”) and handing her a small stack of books, a strong sense that this is why I write what I write. To put ideas in the minds of people, especially young people, other than what our culture revels in–ideas that have a different vision of the world than one that leads people to cut themselves.
And that is my point, friends. Writing speculative fiction as Christians can be a simple act of creation, without regard to spiritual influence on the audience. Yes, true–but it also can have the capacity to offer at least a little shift in perspective, a view of reality unlike what the rest of the world has.
If that’s what God has led you to do, to write with spiritual truths permeating your story(ies), don’t let anything discourage you: There’s a need for it. A genuine and desperate need.
I’ve never cut myself. I’ve always had a wound-up cat to do it for me. /lame joke
Poor lil trans egg. I want to give them all the pronouns they want. I’ve seen it in real time, when one of my friends transitioned (mostly on Facebook ’cause we’re long-distance), they’ve been SO MUCH happier (like, in the long-term and not just in the immediate mood) afterwards.
But I’m curious about word usage. Americans generally value independence, but you’ve cast autonomy as a vice here. Is that just an easy way of distinguishing between the two, that bad-type independence is “autonomy” and good-type autonomy is “independence”?
The flip side of my use of “autonomy” is the idea embedded within American culture that submission is a bad thing–that it’s slavery. When what I maintain here is that submission to God is in fact a good thing, a necessary thing, a healthy thing. And based on submission to God, I also accept some measure of submission to human beings as well–but because God says so.
My personality in fact does not like to submit to anyone about anything at any time–but that kind of autonomy is dangerous and wrong. There is an appropriate level of submission–first to God, then secondarily to others as necessary. I find that submitting to God does not impinge upon my independence at all–but it does keep me from hurting myself. (And from being a danger to others.)
As for the young lady who thinks she is male, look, I wondered for reasons that I did not detail here about my own sexuality and sexual identity. I was fortunate that it was not a cultural thing then to identify everybody with thoughts like I had as having a condition that required surgery–I am happier that I got the chance to come to terms with who I was on my own.
I think the tremendous increase in the number of people saying they need to change gender in recent years is an indicator that this phenomenon is a cultural virus, a virus of an idea that has spread and which far exceeds the interest in changing genders of any previous generation. If the increase in interest is up (and I would say it clearly is) then we are not talking about a condition that has always been around that people are finally learning to treat. We’re talking about a condition our culture has created. Obviously this is my opinion, but other views in fact make less sense.
You may offer anecdotal evidence that people who change gender are happier after doing so–and I’m willing to accept there are in fact some such people. Yet, the suicide rate of people after gender assignment surgery is much higher than the national average. Which suggests people aren’t happy after the surgery, at least a very distressingly high proportion of the time. (Though the common explanation for this by people who support transgender surgeries is that this lack of post-surgical happiness is caused by all the closed-minded people not fully accepting the gender change. In any case though, it is clearly false to say that that surgical change=100% happiness.)
I would say also that a young teenager often does not know very much about the world and does not know very much about himself or herself. To proclaim that this young person or young people in general merit the freedom of choice (or “autonomy” if we want to use that word) that will alter their biological makeup for the REST OF THEIR LIFE is tremendously irresponsible. Young people should not be given that power–there is a reason they are still considered minors.
This is one of the ways (not the only way) in which I would say our modern culture is demonstrably abusive to young people in the name of freedom–of autonomy from the idea that God made us with certain requirements and we are obliged to submit to those requirements whether we feel like it or not. Doing so, I’m saying, submitting to God’s standards, including in sexuality and gender identity, in the end benefits a human being.
There’s been plenty of other cultures that have concepts about third genders or other non cis/het expressions of personhood. It’s not a new trend.
Not all trans people get surgery. Some simply don’t want to. It’s not a requirement. Some people identify as “nonbinary” or “genderfluid” rather than one (Western) concept of gender or another. I understand them because I “round down” to cis-female. I don’t feel particularly strongly about being female, but I don’t really object to being female when there’s no sexist crap attached to the concept. Also I’m willing to bet that there are far fewer suicides of post-surgery transpeeps than transpeeps who do want surgery and have hardcore body dysphoria.
Here’s a linky to a map marking cultures with third-gender concepts: http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/content/two-spirits_map-html/. In addition to that, I’ve seen some people discuss the Japanese concept of “bishounen” as arguably a third gender. They’re bio-males, but they’re celebrated for feminine looks and behavior and considered attractive to both men and women.
As for authority/submission, I don’t think much of it. I think it’s healthier to largely replace it with a cooperative dynamic.
Sometimes it looks like there’s genuinely people that are trans and would be happier after surgery, but our culture makes such a big thing of it now that some people succumb to “If only” type thinking. So, unfortunately, it doesn’t seem nearly as clear cut as advocates want it to be.
From what I’ve heard people say, some people want the surgery and go through with it, but now and then a few of those people are still deeply unhappy even after surgery because even if they become the biological gender they wanted to be, their body still isn’t always going to align with what they wished it would be in terms of getting rid of every last trace of their old gender.
As for authority/submission, exactly what could be said about it would probably depend on how we’re defining it in this case. Even in cooperative dynamics, there tends to be one person that leads and another that follows, even if those roles might change around a lot.
If two people are married, for instance, and one person knows how to remodel a particular room in the house, the person that knows how to remodel is probably going to have more authority on that particular project and the other person will have to submit enough to let the other person instruct or delegate tasks. That doesn’t have to be a destructive dynamic where one person puts the other one down. Especially since it would switch around based on who knows more about the task at hand.
A man named Walt Heyers had surgeries and hormones to become a woman. He was desperately unhappy before but even more afterward. A church took him in and loved him unconditionally. Now he is happy as a man. But it was tough going back and he’ll always legally be a woman in the state of California.
Huh, I’m surprised that he got surgery in 1986 (if I’m reading his bio correctly). I’d want to know more details about his case, but there’s a good reason why professionals advocate for living as the chosen gender for a period before getting the surgery.
Lil Egg up there might have some more exploring to do before they find their groove, but surgery is only a part of transitioning. They can cut their hair, wear different clothes, use different pronouns. My friend did the nonbinary thing before they realized that being that one particular gender was what they wanted for real and started hormone therapy.
The thing that is claimed about the transgender situation most often is that it is a biological condition. IF that were true, since humans are pretty much biologically alike except for relatively minor regional differences, then the rate of transgender ideation would be pretty much identical in all societies.
But it is NOT identical in all societies. Which means it is a cultural phenomenon, like language, like ideas of, say, property. And it happens to be true that our culture is in the process of a shift towards an emphasis on third sex identity. Which is coinciding with a huge increase in people identifying as belonging to another gender.
I think certain conditions of self-loathing, exposure to certain kinds of porn, and exposure to sexual abuse, lead people who would otherwise not see themselves as belonging to a different gender as needing to be a different gender. So I’m saying there are individual environmental experiences that push people out of their birth gender.
And there are sometimes genetic factors in gender dysphoria–at times actual genetic code or genitalia issues. But these are really quite rare.
What modern culture does it tell people that any sense of discomfort means they must make a change–yes it is true that not all trans people have surgery. But many do–and that’s a permanent change. Whereas perhaps we at least need to give them a sense they should try to be the best one of what they were born with as they can be.
By the way, your PBS map is pretty loose on its definition of third gender–this sort of thing does exist and has existed, but is not really as normal as the map implies. And again, a cultural variation demonstrates culture is a factor–and out culture is changing in a unhealthy direction. Actually, I’m of the opinion that ubiquitous porn and a massive emphasis on sexual gratification have a lot to do with it.
As for suicide rates, I have not fully researched this topic. I have heard stats that say that remaining your birth gender is better–but those stats may be biased and I’m disinterested in false facts used to support a political position. The actual facts are good enough.
And the actual facts are horrible–no 12 year old, not anywhere, should be allowed to petition for medications that suppress puberty. But that’s exactly what some people suggest should happen. Doing so is a form of institutionalized abuse, cultural influences driving people to make changes in their bodies that are permanent for sentiments that may well not be. It’s monstrous. Yet modern people are blind to the affects of what they support.
You disagree, of course. But you are a follower of modern trends. I am a follower of no trends. No group wholly agrees with me and I wholly agree with no group. It gets lonely being me, in fact, but I readily criticize both the past when we talk about things like race-based slavery and the the present with its transgender-inspired abuse and rampant sexual slavery.
As for authority/submission, you putting cooperation as an alternative is a false dichotomy. The truly non-submissive person doesn’t want to cooperate either, because never submitting means always seeking your own way–which allows for no cooperation. To cooperate, you have to at least submit to the idea that somebody else or a group of somebodies get to make decisions you may not agree with, but you will go along with for the sake of cooperation. You have to also submit to ideas of fair play and downplay aggression.
Also on the topic of submission, all of creation both submits to God in a way now, in that God is the creator of all your atoms and all other constituent parts of you and while you can will that these parts do whatever you want, but in fact, they are limited by parameters God laid down that you have no power to change. And all of creation will submit in a more direct way, when we stand before our Maker at our death, or he opens the heavens and intervenes directly on Earth.
But choosing of my own free will to submit to God now, I exercise the freedom he gave me for my own benefit. Instead of facing the consequences of me being continually in rebellion against all rules and all authority…
“I am a follower of no trends.”
LOL aren’t you adorable.
Feel free to name a group you think I belong to I will explain to you the ways in which I stand out as different in that group. It may be you will successfully name something I’m not thinking of that I follow 100%. But I can’t think of anything.
Feel free to assert your own independence as well. I imagine you believe in it (since you deviated from how you were raised), but you seem quite the submissive follower to me…just a submissive follower of different ideas than those you were raised with.
Everyone has a slightly different set of beliefs, which means both you and notleia possess both similarities and differences to the groups in which you belong. Since you’ve viewed your own thought process, you’ve seen how you’ve come to those conclusions on your own and thus assume you aren’t a ‘follower’.
Similarly, you haven’t seen the process that went into the formation of notleia’s beliefs, and thus, since you disagree with her, you are biased to think she’s automatically a submissive follower, as if she couldn’t have possibly come to her beliefs on her own.
Bro prolly thinks that because he doesn’t agree 100% with any given system that he’s an “original thinker.”
Boy, there are some distinct blind spots in his self-awareness.
Well, not agreeing 100% with any “party line” is in fact an indicator that you are doing some original thinking. The fact that you seem to me, Notleia, to agree 100% with quite a number of modern trends on the other hand seems to indicate you DON’T engage in original thinking…
I’m actually kinda hoping you will reveal at some future point that you disagree with a certain party line on something you think–say in this context, you see that certain aspects of how transgender is portrayed is baloney, even if you agree with the rest. Or in another context, if you think Feminists as a whole are mostly right, but you sharply disagree with them about something. Anything.
I’d love to see evidence that you actively think for yourself, other than your one big leap away from the Christian body of thought I believe you were raised with into believing pretty much everything that’s common to a certain segment modern culture.
Of course, not every single thought that passes through my mind is original. But I know who I am. Though lest I boast about myself in a prideful way, let me point out that my uniqueness is a first a product of God’s work in my life and second, there are in fact other people who are not simply finding a crowd they agree with and then following that group wherever it goes. There are people who base their lives on their own personal reasoning instead of following a crowd–I am by no means the only one. But a surprisingly massive amount of people in fact DO follow crowds. Even people with high IQs and high levels of education.
I’m hoping to see signs of independent thought out of you Notleia. That’s my real point, more important than anything I have to say about myself.
So far, I’m still not seeing it…
Ha. I’ve deliberately distanced myself from this whole thread because I am getting angrier than it’s really worth, but if I were as sheeple as you seem to think I am, I would be a prime target for the mainstream to convince me I’m trans or lesbian, desu ne?
Except I don’t. People have read me as butch enough to ask me if I’m a lesbian, but I’m not actually a lesbian. And the people who have asked have never tried to convince me I’m a lesbian or bisexual or trans. No one on the liberal depths of the internet, either, has tried to convince me that I should be a lesbian. I’ve had times when I’m tired enough of stereotypical male behavior that’d it almost be a relief to be a lesbian, but I still married a guy (who was a psychology major and has emotional intelligence and knows how to do his own emotional labor).
So either I’m a freakin’ magical unicorn of a person (not entirely wrong tho, if I may have the vanity to say so), or your theory of peer pressure has some faults in it.
You’re also mistaken that liberals are all monolithic in thought. There’s plenty of variation within the liberal and feminist worlds. There are schools of pro-porn and anti-porn feminist thought, and I think both have their merits.
I don’t think liberals are all monolithic in thought. I think you personally believe a lot of things because a set of people you found yourself admiring believe–not because they actually make sense or you gave their positions critical thought.
I don’t believe liberals usually actively recruit anyone to be a lesbian or transgender…so what you said about lesbian or trans makes no sense to me (but they do make that available to people and if you say that’s what you are interested in, they will tell you to cut off anyone in your life who asks you if maybe that isn’t the best way to be. At least some will).
But note that God has given me a bit of talking to about my tone. Being a “jerk for Jesus” is not actually a thing. If I am to say I believe in “loving my neighbor as myself” (and I do believe in that) then I should be treating you much better than I have been–even if I am sure I’m right.
So, I need to dial back my rhetoric and treat you like someone I deeply care about. Not someone who needs a scolding. Or to be more explicit, I’ve been rather a jerk. I’m sorry.
Huh, so you don’t believe in the peer pressure theory?
Travis well said. You might be interested in the fact that an apologist Abdu Murray has written a book entitled Saving Truth in which he contrasts freedom and autonomy. Here’s a bit from my post on the subject (https://rebeccaluellamiller.wordpress.com/2018/04/19/autonomy-vs-freedom/): “The problem with autonomy, of course, is that my autonomy and your autonomy may collide. And then, as Mr. Murray points out, might makes right. The stronger of the two dictates to the weaker. In other words, autonomy is actually the gateway to tyranny, with anarchy a stop along the way.”
I kind of feel we’re in that place now of society dictating to our young people. As a friend of mine pointed out, we are so certain that when mind and body don’t seem to agree, it’s the body that needs to change. Why are we not just as willing to change the mind?
Really good thoughts.
Becky
The point where different autonomies collide is colloquially referred to as “the social contract.” There are several different varieties that humanity has come up with, that we can judge by the results. Authoritarian constructs seem to end up in tyranny much more reliably.
It’s popular in Christian circles to pretend that transgender peeps are like children and don’t know what’s best for themselves, which is A) gaslighting, B) rude, and C) not actually true very often. Quite a few Christians like to play at being the world’s Designated Adults, but it’s not actually a privilege they’ve earned or even deserve.
Actually, quite a few supposedly transgender folks ARE children. Literal minors. Yet people are asserting they have the right to suppress puberty.
And you can’t have any form of social contract if you refuse to submit to anything. You may not be aware of this personally, but it is true. And submitting to authority when appropriate does not equal authoritarianism. Honest.
This is where we begin to distinguish between harmful and nonharmful behaviors, which Christian culture as a whole is particularly crap at. On a societal level, it does not even freakin’ matter what gender a particular individual is (otherwise that society is tres sexist), so there is no demonstrable harm in an individual performing as whatever gender they prefer. And yes, on a societal scale, gender is largely performance.
I’d actually like to see you refute that without reverting to sexist stereotypes. And don’t even with birthing statistics. We are nowhere near a population crisis (quite the opposite, unless you’re a racist afraid of a white minority in 2050), and even if all the trans peeps had surgery, there will always be enough people who want to give birth.
Taking hormones is not irreversible. Blockers only prevent puberty, the person can still go through it later. Even hormone replacement isn’t irreversible, or it wouldn’t be possible to transition as an adult, either.
There’s a suite of things here:
1. You are not entirely wrong about societal harm, though note you are engaging in a straw man argument because I am not against adults who chose to identify themselves as trans doing what they wish. I do think this does the individuals involved harm (which I can explain in detail if you like, but in short, it’s not really possible to change your birth gender other than in superficial ways), but such is the consequence of a society in which we allow for freedom of thought and freedom of choice. People get to harm themselves to a certain degree. Though:
a. I would argue that transgender ideation is the fruit of a sexual revolution that does have aspects which directly harm people–the focus on sexual “you can do what you want” feeds into exploitative porn and even direct sexual slavery. Yes, usually for women, but also for trans people too.
b. At a certain level, it is the whole concept of transgender that tends to rigidly reinforce gender stereotypes. In, say, the Victorian Era, if a man seemed a little feminine he mostly was still expected to marry and have children and mostly still did so. Likewise a woman who was a somewhat masculine by the standards of that day would be accepted as a woman. This is ironic because the society had rather rigid gender roles, but it is in fact true that a variety of behaviors were accepted as male and female. TODAY, if someone is not as masculine as Duane Johnson or not as feminine as Kim Kardashian, that person may think “I’m not really a boy” or “I’m not really a girl”–the irony being here that our society of more supposed (and actual) gender fluidity is LESS tolerant of non-stereotypical behavior. This is part of why people start to think of themselves as non-male and non-female. Because they don’t match rigid stereotypes–so our society is in some ways unmercifully accepting of stereotypical ideas. I think that’s wrong. Psychologically damaging.
2. You are wrong about puberty blockers having permanent effects. Please reference the evil-right-wing-conspiracy-site known as “Wikipedia” under the title of “puberty blocker” and look under the “Effects” section. Bone density and future fertility are mentioned as certain effects–and some people wonder if delaying, say, menstruation until you are 18, might keep you from socializing normally, i.e. psychological development. (I can’t comment on that point from personal experience, since I have never socialized normally anyway, but perhaps it’s valid.)
When do minors have rights to make major changes in their physical makeup in our society? Mostly never, right? Why are we (or a sub-section of our society) making an exception for sexual identity? Why are we so sexually obsessed? I submit to you this is an indicator of a serious problem.
Or do you think the concept of a legal minor is an old-fashioned notion that needs to be done away with?
3. What is wrong with telling people to accept the body they were born into? Isn’t that helpful in general? Sure, remaking oneself to a degree is normal, we change our hair, tan, work out–but why do we rebel at the idea that our birth is in a sense destiny–because to a degree, it is? Why do we elevate an emotional sense of not belonging to the level of needing to change? This is modern mythology–feeling like you don’t belong is pretty normal, though some people have more extreme cases of that than others. The idea that we can treat that “feeling” assumes modern science is progressing forward without any problems or harmful side effects and can take care of what are simply biological errors. But they are not biological errors–they are cultural and environmental and many other issues and only a tiny bit biological and you only have to be moderately observant about human behavior to know that. And in spite of what our modern culture tends to think, science is NOT able to make major changes without major side effects.
Though in fact every culture has its own set of maladies. The cultures of our past had their own issues. So why do so many people of every era swallow hook, line, and sinker the latest trends? Why don’t people actually think independently? And this is a definitely a trend–it did not use to be around the way it is today.
Further, remember the woman who made national news for identifying as black when she is white? She was roundly mocked for that in the collective consciousness–but race in fact is around 99% made up nonsense that is only real in that thinking of yourself as a race includes associating with groups that have real cultural differences. So your gender biology, which is real, is whatever you want–but the race you were born, which is made up, is your lifelong destiny? Can’t you see that people are out of their minds?
Though in fairness, people have always been out of their minds. We are a powerfully irrational species, majorly influenced by trends as a general rule. This is why the Bible lists “the world” as an enemy of the Christian–because what the society as a whole has believed is right, in any epoch, has included generous doses of nonsense and things that defy what God expects from human beings. In the Old Testament, it was largely idol worship, in the New Greek weird ideas about division of mind and spirit, in the Medieval era (and far beyond) whole-scale adoption of attitudes about warfare that are essentially Pagan. For a while, overt racism. We have lost some of these old errors, though we certainly are not getting any better overall, because we keep making new ones!
You have a sharp mind, use it. Don’t just reject the unthinking notions of Christian people, reject the unthinking notions of everyone. You’ll be better off for it–and allowing minors to harm themselves permanently for feelings that may be transient is, um, not good. Muy malo.
You’re conflating gender with sexuality, for one. It’s not really the same thing. That’s what’s crippling most of your arguments.
And how do you know their feelings are transient? Do they get to be taken seriously once they suffer for 30-ish years? The medical problems pale in comparison to societal problems like trans women getting murdered at several times the national average.
This may be only anecdata, but the stricter gender expectations I’ve experience have pretty much never come from the liberal end of the spectrum. They do not give a crap if I don’t conform to all the feminine expectations. They don’t care that I don’t want to have kids and they’ll support my efforts to make that so, like increased access to birth control. I receive pressure to conform most often from conservative environments, where if they had the chance to control me, they’d saddle me with kids and ignore that it would make both me and the kids miserable.
TL;DR: You need to learn to admit when you don’t know enough about a subject. Do you know trans people? Have you listened to their experiences without trying to paternalize them and explain to them why their feelings are wrong and unimportant?
To say sexuality and gender are divided inseparably is to repeat ideas I do not accept as true. One of the defining characteristics of gender is (or should be) who you find attractive. People experience ideas of discomfort about their own gender identity based on SEXUAL notions, at least at times. Especially in the era of ubiquitous porn–I think sometimes people want to have the sexual role of a man or a woman in such a production, even though that’s not their gender.
That’s a notion based on things I experienced in my own mind as well as certain articles I’ve read. I can’t prove that’s true, but proving anything on this topic (causes of transgender ideation) is actually impossible, believe it or not (I can explain why if you want to know).
And as for pressure to conform to gender stereotypes, perhaps you missed the meaning of my examples. The most vigorous enforcement of gender stereotypes is from modern consumer culture–images of ripped manly men and ultra-feminine women. Is consumer culture politically conservative? Um, check out the dresses most (but not all) Hollywood feminists wear to the Oscars–er, plenty of feminists buy into this culture with their actions, if not their words.
Religious conservative ideas that “men are hunters” and “women are nurturers” are not anywhere as powerful in enforcing these stereotypes in my opinion as the ripped man and curvy women that the commercial world puts in our faces in order to make sales. Though I suppose religious conservatives contribute to this. A little.
Yes, you are quite right that the political left is more tolerant, more expectant even, of people adopting non-standard gender roles. Yet this same political left has rallied to the cause of the idea that people need to change their gender if they believe they need to…and why are people changing gender, if we look at say, Caitlyn Jenner? Former Bruce adopted the crassest and most stereotypical ideas about being a woman as far as I can tell–being a woman for him seemed all about being “hot” and wearing curvy high fashion dresses. And most Feminists, who have fought against gender stereotyping, are against this…er I MEAN THEY ARE FOR it…because…um, I don’t know why (actually, I can offer theories why–but feminists really should be AGAINST this, not for it).
As far as feelings being transient, note I have been a teenager. I was always envious of girls for their neat handwriting and liked talking to girls more than boys. I liked to play with dolls. I liked to imagine with words more than play sports. I also was sexually molested by a male babysitter over a period of years and was extremely confused about who I was and what kind of person I should be–in sexuality and I think I was only a stone’s throw away from deciding I should be a different gender. Though that wasn’t a “thing” when I was a kid, so it didn’t even cross my mind as an option.
YET those feelings went away. They proved transient. So if those feelings can go away in one case, I’m certain they can go away in other cases.
Hey, guess what, a lot of feelings people have when they are young prove to be transient. That’s actually normal for someone around 12-13 years old. Though sometimes a young person changes ideas in a way that proves permanent, yes, that happens too.
But there is no way for anyone to know if, say, a desire to be a gender other than birth gender will be transient. To say that we must give that person puberty blockers! Give them now! Is adopting a massively damaging point of view. For what?
I was about to answer the “for what?” Question myself, but you can answer if for me. Feel free. But if your answer includes “even when young, people know what is best for themselves” I am going to tell you are wrong. It wasn’t true for me and so I know it is at least sometimes untrue for other people.
Oh, last point, I have in fact known several people who are trans. One in the last several years who was a friend and two others I knew years ago who were not really friends, but I knew them pretty well.
Your whole concept of me “paternalizing” on this subject is wrong, by the way.
I already gave a response about people convincing me to be lesbian up above, but I’ll throw some more argument your way.
Studies have shown that trans behaviors start as young as 3 or 4. Not just as simple as playing when dolls or trucks or whatnot, but knowing about gender tropes and still identifying as one they weren’t assigned at birth. So by the time they hit puberty, these feelings have lasted for several years. Granted, culture at large still trivializes kids’ feelings, but that’s not really okay.
The real argument behind the anti-trans or -gay people (bigots, in other words) is about control. If some dude was flaming gay as the love child of Elton John and Jonathan Van Ness but if he could be controlled by anti-gay bigots (which wasn’t that long ago), they wouldn’t really care. He’d be miserable, but they still wouldn’t care. The Rules would be more important than his wellbeing was.
The scare-mongering is more of a reaction to the loss of control than it is about anything based in reality.
“Studies show.”
As per MY comment above, I think I need to change my tone, which means dropping attack mode–but it does not mean leaving the conversation. So, in regard to the studies you reference, I am going to ask you to specifically show where the studies came from, please. (Then we can talk in a polite way about the nature of the studies you’re talking about.)
And please note I have not made blanket anti-trans statements–I have argued against minors being allowed to make permanent changes based feelings that nobody knows whether they are permanent or not.
What I’m saying relates to the entire concept of being a minor. And perhaps it is true that you don’t believe in that concept–but the idea is (not to be condescending, but to be clear) that someone under a certain age is not allowed to do certain things because of a presumption of the law that they are not yet fully competent. This is why they can’t vote until 18, can’t legally drink alcohol until 21 (which seems too old to me, to be honest), can’t join the military until 17 (and then, only with parental approval), can’t get a driver’s license until an age that varies by state but which is around 15-16, can’t give legal medical consent for surgeries or medical procedures for themselves until 18, and can’t legally have sex with someone over 18 if they are under 18 (though the older person will be punished, not the the minor). A natural concomitant idea of “being a minor” is that you should not be allowed to make permanent changes in your body until you are a legal adult.
Are you in fact against the idea of “legal minor”? Or are you against it only in the case of someone saying “I’m trans?”
If you are against minor status in general, please say why. If you are against the status of being a minor only in the case of trans people, please state why. Or some other combination–I’m willing to hear what you have to say about this.
It ties into my ideas of informed consent. Legal minority is related to that idea, but lemme give some examples.
I don’t believe in piercing babies’ ears. Even if “they’re going to anyway” (which is the reason I hear a lot) — let the 4yo or 6yo or whatever make the choice about their own body, even if they DO just do it anyway. But that doesn’t mean I think they need wait until they’re 18. Kids can grasp concepts about the pros and cons of some things, like drinking before 21 (which I actually agree with you about).
If they’ve had trans-ideas for several years before they hit puberty, that at least proves that it’s not a temporary, fleeting feeling. They probably KNOW for damn sure that not conforming to gender ideas makes them a target (“not conforming” in itself makes kids a target), but if they STILL want to, that’s a feeling still worth weight and worth taking into consideration.
But I think a kid taking hormone blockers is less damaging than letting them go thru puberty (because puberty is in its own way irreversible) that sends them in the direction they don’t want.
As for studies, I don’t have the spoons to look for scholarly stuff (I have to do the adult chores I’ve been putting off today), but if you’ll accept some anecdata as a starter, Jazz Jennings is an example of transitioning from a young age. https://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=3088298&page=1
The story you shared is an interesting one, but I am afraid I am of the opinion that anecdotes provide the primary support for this kind of thing. That’s in part because real studies take time, and this phenomenon by all available data seems to have increased exponentially in less than the last 20 years.
This sort of thing was almost unheard of 30 years ago but now is fairly common, from what data is actually available to me on this topic. Which is the thing that really astounds me on this subject. Clearly (it seems to me) kids are picking up cultural messages and expressing interest in things they hear in the culture–which is not actually the same thing a some innate biological bias. (Biology hasn’t fundamentally changed in the past 30 years–but American culture has.)
I think in some circles it’s cool to be anything BUT cis-gender-heterosexual. I’ve heard a load of anecdotal evidence this is the case, though no studies (but an anecdote at least indicates something CAN happen). Of course there are other contexts where identifying as trans is dangerous–but to assume young people don’t applaud one another for declaring themselves transgender–I have actually witnessed that happen and know it’s true. A kid in most places in today’s America will be cheered on by at least some friends and classmates for saying “I’m trans.” (And in addition will be told to cut off anyone who does not agree with their change, no matter how kind that person is.)
I actually think a person does not even really know what gender means in its entirety before going through puberty. So that someone can say “I’m a boy and I know it” when born female (or vice versa) and still pre-puberty–I am really dubious about that.
Note I say this not because I never had any interest in girl things, but for just the opposite reason. My lack of certainty about myself went away–but not immediately.
Note too how much this very idea is rooted in strong concepts of binary male/female identity, which feminists have been against for at least 50 years. How would anyone know “I’m a girl” when born a boy (or vice versa) if we are to say being male and female are not binary opposites but simply aspects of personality on a continuum (as many feminists have in effect said)? Three and four year olds don’t understand such subtleties. They DO understand simple binaries. Transgender thinking at the little kid level could not happen without kids embracing strong gender stereotypes. Why aren’t feminists rallying AGAINST this sort of thing? (Rhetorical question, because I think I know–but I do want you to think about it, too.)
And taking puberty blockers is a much bigger deal that getting one’s ears pierced. Effects on fertility I previously mentioned may prove to be permanent, though I don’t think anyone knows that for sure. You know why they don’t know that for sure? Because puberty blockers for kids identifying as transgender is such a new thing that long-term studies of effects decades after the fact are insufficiently available.
Do we conventionally release massive use of medications in our country when long term studies have not been performed? No, not usually. Why are we making an exception about this? (Not a rhetorical question–please answer.)
I should admit a bias because fertility is not really a concern on my radar. I’ve never tried to be preggers, so I don’t even know if my system can hold its ducks in a row long enough to complete a gestation cycle (tho I suspect not).
But infertility is not a problem confined to trans people. This is a problem that already has a lot of ink spilled on the subject, so I don’t feel like I have to cover it.
It’s not great to be a slave. The Apostle Paul said slaves should become free if possible.
The real evil is in being a slave owner.
Thank you for sharing such an intimate topic Travis. In my early teens it was characters in books that became my primary male role models as my dad traveled a lot; if it weren’t for authors creating examples to look up to, and situations to see how their actions affected themselves & the world at large, I’m not sure how my life would have turned out! Your efforts are going to be a crown someday.
For readers eagerly anticipating more spec-fic war posts, mea culpa on my part for interrupting Travis’ efforts! We’re looking at what we want to accomplish and I know I’m realizing the broad scope we want to tackle and how best to do it. Whether it’s Travis or T^2, it’s going to be great and value-added for all.
The fun part about stories and influence is that the same story can influence two people in two different ways, especially depending on where that person is in their life. We do need good stories that will influence people for the better, but should keep in mind that now and then people may be influenced in ways we don’t intend.
I’ll give two examples, Death Note and Wings of Fire Legends: Darkstalker. In these two stories, it should be obvious that Yagami Light (the main char of Death Note) and Darkstalker are in the wrong and serve as strong cautionary tales on how their behavior and thought process are harmful. Yet, there are some people that identify with certain aspects of these chars or think they are cool, and thus almost seem to consider them heroes worthy of emulating. Some readers will even get angry when books like Wings of Fire depict these chars as villains/problems.
There are of course good traits in these chars, such as intelligence/strategy skills, but their bad traits took so much precedence in their lives that they became a problem. Some people that see these chars as heroes may end up realizing their faults and turning out for the better as a result of reading these stories, but there will probably be a few people whose bad traits become WORSE after reading these stories.
So I guess we should realize that now and then the results of our stories may not be intended, and that maybe trigger warnings should be given in certain cases. (If I wrote something with heavy suicidal content I’d probably put a trigger warning in the story’s description)
Yeah, unintended consequences are a thing, but some consequences are right in line with what an author thinks. My own experiences with science fiction, me thinking about atheism based on sci fi (to use just one example) was pretty predictable.
Yeah. And then there’s some authors who intend to stir up debate, rather than guide their audience down any particular path.
Over the last few years I’ve kinda been acclimating myself to the fact that some people might interpret my stories in vastly different ways than they’re supposed to be. That used to be really stressful for me, but now I feel a bit better about it at least and to an extent would probably actually enjoy people having philosophical debates about stuff I write, even though I still hope that most people will glean certain lessons from them.
As a general comment on society now days, I kind of worry about where people place the emphasis at, as far as where they derive happiness from. External (which is very difficult to control) or internal, which, over time, is much easier to deal with.
Obviously we need both things in some measure, so we definitely shouldn’t only emphasize internal factors. We should care about the external enough to be decent towards those around us, learn ways we can improve, make sure people aren’t harassing us, etc. But we shouldn’t usually define ourselves by those external things, or at least not to the extent that they hurt us.
If I was overweight, for instance, and people were making fun of me for it, I might take note of it. I would evaluate whether or not I was that badly overweight, then I might acknowledge that obesity is not healthy and thus exercise more. I might distance myself from people that were harassing me for my weight, too.
But I would do as much as I could to keep their words from hurting my feelings and I definitely wouldn’t let it make me suicidal. Not saying internal/external emphasis is the only thing that contributes to suicide, since some people genuinely have depression and such. But there would probably be less cutting, suicide, unhappiness, etc. if we relied on internal factors more.
Internal factors include things such as personal happiness and fulfillment, what we think about ourselves and what we want, figuring out what actually matters, etc. In the obesity example, I would decide that being at a healthy weight matters, but having the approval of a bully does not. Other than avoiding any danger bullies might pose, the bullys’ opinions don’t need to matter, so one can gradually teach themselves to not worry about it. That puts people in control of their own happiness, rather than waiting for everyone else around them to conform to certain behaviors.
There’s also a matter of carving out one’s own little niche/corner of happiness. If my life was hell because people were constantly being jerks about how much I weighed, I would still find fulfillment in my writing, drawing and reading habits.
Never had issues with obesity, but it was a less complicated example than what I went through, so yeah.
I’m of the opinion that there would be less cutting, suicide, unhappiness, etc. if we had a robust and not mostly-broken healthcare system that let people easily get treatment for their mental health, by means of talk therapy or pills or both.
But then, I’m of the opinion that everybody needs a routine check under the emotional/mental hood every now and then.
Mental health care is another part of it, though the routine part can be a bit tricky. At this point in my life I wouldn’t feel like getting a yearly checkup for mental health because I actually don’t need to and thus it’d be a waste of everyone’s resources. But then other people might need a regular check regardless of whether they feel like it, so telling someone when they need routine checks can be a bit tricky unless they are having an obvious crisis.
Regardless of the importance of mental health care, though, that doesn’t mean we can’t and shouldn’t work on ourselves. Certain good mental health care providers(therapists, I think) are going to help give their patients tools and perspectives that they need to practice in their daily lives regardless. So if we see someone that has a useful tool/perspective/coping mechanism, there’s nothing wrong with considering it.
Good therapists give you tools to work with, which may or may include meds. Meds did a world of good for me.
Yeah. Meds are good when actually needed. There are cases where doctors prescribe those things like they’re candy, but it’s definitely good that meds are there for people that need them.
When you get a chance sometime, look at the statistics of people who recover from psychological infirmities. Of course, some people never recover from them, but of those that do, a certain percentage recover without any treatment.
The percentage of those seeking treatment who recover is higher, but it is higher at the same rate for most psychological problems NO MATTER WHAT KIND OF TREATMENT a person seeks. At least this was true the last time I checked into the statistics. Feel free to check them for yourself–let me know if you find something different.
That means people generally do better with the support of other people than they do without the support of other people. But it also means than any claims of psychology or psychiatry to know specifically how to cure people is bogus as a general rule. Those who go to group therapy with a Jungian psychologist do as well on average as someone who goes to individual sessions with a Freudian who do as well as someone who goes to a psychiatrist to get medications. The act of seeking help is the important thing according to stats–not what kind of help. (Which means that yes, going to talk to your pastor, even if he has “nutty” non-modern ideas is as effective as sitting with a licensed counselor or M.D.)
There are certain exceptions to this rule. People suffering from specific phobias, say the fear of flying, benefit from specific behaviorist training that works better than anything else–in which people learn to deliberately calm their own pulse while at first merely thinking about the thing that scares them–in my example, flying. Then they meditate/calm self more at the airport, then on a parked plane, and finally on a flying plane. THAT actually works.
And certain medical conditions require certain medical treatments. But one of the most common things treated with medication, depression, in fact gets better with treatment other than medication at the same rate as with meds. Last I checked into the stats. Feel free to search yourself and let me know if new studies have found otherwise.
So given this high level of inability to actually reliably cure people, I would say the entire profession of mental health deserves to be looked at with a dose of reasonable skepticism…
Right now I’m giving you a look as if you’ve admitted to eating spoonfuls of mayo right out of the jar. Also, if all you can cite are Freudians and Jungians, you’re woefully and even pathetically out of date about psychology. There is a lot of Dunning-Kruger in that post right there.
True, a lot can be accomplished with merely a listening ear and an unconditional positive regard, but it’s not that easy to “cure” a mental illness. And sometimes there is no “cure” for mental illness, just management treatment to get and keep you functional.
[Insert “educate yourself” meme]
There are still Junginans and Fruedians. Feel free to look that up.
Sorry the two examples I used didn’t match your sense of latest trends–nothing is as jarring for a trend follower to name a trend that was bigger decades ago than it is now. Not a good tactical move on my part, but it’s actually beside my point.
That doesn’t make me an example of Dunning-Kruger, it means I’m not a part of your culture. Which actually is fine and doesn’t make me wrong, even though you don’t realize it.
Look up the rates of self-cure verses cure with help. Look up the studies performed on the effects of treatment broken down by treatment type. What I mentioned is factual. The concepts of cures as you think of them are in contrast modern mythology–accepted as axiomatically true without evidence.
Tell you what, I will look up the latest studies myself and get back to you, since you insist I’m wrong based on whoo thinking and are unlikely to do a bit of google searching on your own.
Though of course it is possible I will have to eat my words if a new study is out that I’m not aware of. But I’ve been following this trend for a while now, and I think studies, even the newest ones, will bear out what I’m saying.
Hold on a minute…
This is a result of a Google search on “studies on the effectiveness of psychotherapy”–I picked five sources on the first page that were relevant to the topic and from authoritative sources. I will give you my concept of what they mean below each source. Feel free to read them yourself and see if you disagree with me.
https://www.cpa.ca/docs/File/Practice/TheEfficacyAndEffectivenessOfPsychologicalTreatments_web.pdf
(This one directly attacks the idea that use of medications is inherently better than counseling and claims they are basically the same.)
https://digest.bps.org.uk/2017/03/20/have-we-overestimated-the-effectiveness-of-psychotherapy/
(This one questions of the value of studies of effectiveness and points out their limitations. The issue of effectiveness is actually subject to multiple interpretations–no one really knows for certain, which is not what I said, though I do have an opinion, an opinion which follows real data–please refer below.)
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/fighting-fear/201306/the-effectiveness-psychotherapy
(This one admits to ambiguous results in studies, but correctly affirms that treatment of any kind is better than no treatment. As I said.)
http://www.apa.org/about/policy/resolution-psychotherapy.aspx
Here, let me give you some specific nuggets out of this one, since it states what I did in different words:
“that is, variations in outcome are more heavily influenced by patient characteristics e.g., chronicity, complexity, social support, and intensity—and by clinician and context factors than by particular diagnoses or specific treatment “brands” (i.e. the kind of therapy doesn’t matter)
“for most psychological disorders, the evidence from rigorous clinical research studies has shown that a variety of psychotherapies are effective with children, adults, and older adults. Generally, these studies show what experts in the field consider large beneficial effects for psychotherapy in comparison to no treatment, confirming the efficacy of psychotherapy across diverse conditions and settings (Beutler, 2009; Beutler, et al., 2003; Lambert & Ogles, 2004; McMain & Pos, 2007; Shedler, 2010; Thomas & Zimmer-Gembeck, 2007; Verheul & Herbrink, 2007; Wampold, 2001). In contrast to large differences in outcome between those treated with psychotherapy and those not treated, different forms of psychotherapy typically produce relatively similar outcomes.”
(In other words, people who seek treatment, no matter what treatment, do better than people who don’t seek treatment–but the exact type of treatment doesn’t matter.)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3683266/
TO quote the abstract of one that doesn’t quite agree with me:
“We conducted a meta-analysis of studies in which psychotherapy and antidepressant medication were directly compared in the treatment of depressive and anxiety disorders. Systematic searches in bibliographical databases resulted in 67 randomized trials, including 5,993 patients that met inclusion criteria, 40 studies focusing on depressive disorders and 27 focusing on anxiety disorders. The overall effect size indicating the difference between psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy after treatment in all disorders was g=0.02 (95% CI: −0.07 to 0.10), which was not statistically significant. Pharmacotherapy was significantly more efficacious than psychotherapy in dysthymia (g=0.30), and psychotherapy was significantly more efficacious than pharmacotherapy in obsessive-compulsive disorder (g=0.64). Furthermore, pharmacotherapy was significantly more efficacious than non-directive counseling (g=0.33), and psychotherapy was significantly more efficacious than pharmacotherapy with tricyclic antidepressants (g=0.21). These results remained significant when we controlled for other characteristics of the studies in multivariate meta-regression analysis, except for the differential effects in dysthymia, which were no longer statistically significant.”
So this one has some more grit to it and suggests there are in fact individual differences in effectiveness between use of medications and counseling in various disorders, though looked at overall the effects are the same–though studies like this one are in fact subject to problems with methodology mentioned in previous articles.
So my point of view is definitely justified from the sources I just quoted. IN fact my point of view exactly matches the point of view of the American Psychological Association, though I gave it my own interpretation (just talking to someone and seeking help is better than not) that they did not specifically use.
Still, even though these quoted studies in fact introduce a level of uncertainty to the topic, so future studies may conclusively show that my notions are at least partially wrong, that definitely has not been shown to be true as of now. I’m feeling a bit smug right now and don’t believe that is an appropriate reaction, so I wish to apologize for it–but my point of view is actually based on facts. Yours is not.
Feel free to offer a rebuttal.
Nice job, you did way more work than I was expecting from you.
Problem is, these are comparing the results of professionally conducted therapies, and do not include the results of advice from Pastor Bob who may or may not be dealing in unhelpful platitudes and/or theories pulled straight from his well-meaning but unprepared butt. (Bless his heart for trying, but if Pastor Bob is a hoopy frood, he’ll direct you to someone with accredited training, stat. You should probably be suspicious of a pastor who doesn’t.)
Yeah, I got to be a at times smug know-it-all by being intensely curious, looking stuff up, reading, and learning things. You may think my thoughts are sloppy and lazy–and that may even be true at times. But I wouldn’t hold my breath on that. You’d be wise to assume I’m saying things for a reason, even if I prove to be incorrect. Because I have done loads of personal research in my lifetime.
So, before we turn to the one good point you still think you have, why don’t you actually admit that the modern concept of chemical imbalances in the brain that require treatment with medications in almost all cases (which is an idea lots of modern people hold to) is in fact untrue? Because as far as the factual evidence goes, it is.
In fact, lots of modern notions are not based on facts, but making you eat all of your errors at once, while that might be satisfying for me in a totally vengeful and unchristian sense, would be both morally wrong of me and also contrary to my purpose in engaging you. And that purpose in engaging you is to persuade you to start thinking critically about things you have pretty much accepted as true without fully considering them.
As far as the difference between pastoral counseling and non-pastoral counseling, that is my interpretation of the APA results that people who seek help, no matter what kind of help, do equally as well. The APA itself though limits its comments to professional counselors. The reason for my interpretation is that professional counselors still include (believe it or not) Freudians and Jungians and all kinds of other notions about the human psyche that have nothing to do with one another. SO, I reason that it is the act of seeking help that is significant, rather than the kind of help that is sought.
In other words, talking to someone and attempting to work out a problem together is the key, more than the person in charge of the session actually knowing much of anything, other than how to talk to people. The data–real data now, not imaginary whoo that modern people believe with no factual reason–at least allows for my interpretation of the data.
I did search for a study showing the effectiveness of religious counseling when writing this answer, but found the studies are pretty small and so have questionable results. But what I did find indicates that religious counseling for religious patients does at least as well as “professional” counseling. Or even better.
Here’s a link to the abstract of a study that indicates religious counseling is even better for religious patients than non-religious counseling. Though the study is again, small. And isn’t brand-new (it’s from 1992).
http://psycnet.apa.org/buy/1992-24340-001
Now, feel free to find a study that shows religious counseling is LESS effective for religious patients than standard treatment. I imagine there must be at least one such study somewhere, though I haven’t found any examples.
I’m skeptical you will find solid evidence to support the notion that Pastor Bob is no good unless he is professionally trained. But perhaps you will–I’m genuinely curious, so please share if you find something.
I’m somewhere between you and notleia when it comes to the mental health stuff. There are big issues in the mental health field, such as misdiagnosis, and people would be better served knowing how to cultivate healthy mindsets on their own. But for certain conditions and times in our lives, it’s wise to seek out a mental health professional and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Not sure why you’re so questioning of the mental health profession but are so reliant on studies, because studies aren’t always reliable either. They probably use at least some of the same research methods and include some of the same hard-to-measure-factors as the mental health field does, such as societal factors and the human mind. In fact, studies are partly what shapes the development of the mental health field.
I’m kind of wondering where you both actually stand, though. You both place emphasis on different sides of this, but are you advocating that people avoid getting help from mental health professionals? And is notleia trying to say that mental health professionals are the only way to have a whole and healthy mind and that people shouldn’t bother doing any independent health maintenance? I don’t think either of you are trying to go to such extremes, but I’m slightly curious as to what you both think people should do as far as maintaining their mental health/dealing with mental health crisises.
Autumn, good points and good questions.
First of all, my reason to engage in this subject is not really about mental health–it’s observant of you to wonder where I actually stand. Let me first summarize my attitude on mental health, then why I’m challenging Notleia’s worldview.
A while back on this thread I mentioned that for the most part seeing a psychiatrist was of no particular value beyond seeking help is better than not seeking help, with certain specific exceptions. I didn’t detail those exceptions, though I gave the example of specific phobias. Other exceptions include purely physical causes of certain problems–let’s say a sense of gloom followed by hypothyroidism or anemia, both of which are easily detected by a blood test. Or a brain tumor, easily detected by an MRI. (This is not me giving an exhaustive list of all definite and possible exceptions by the way–only listing some examples.)
That I know there are exceptions means if I started having something bother me that I had no idea where the problem was coming from, especially if it was something I had never experienced before, sure, I might indeed talk to a psychiatrist. But that’s based on my knowledge of science and some idea of what is known and unknown. If I got diagnosed with something that wasn’t linked to a specific physical cause like anemia, thyroid problems, or a brain tumor, say “Severe Major Recurring Depression,” I would refuse to take the medications the psychiatrist would proscribe and go talk to a counselor. My choice almost certainly would be a pastor, though I’m not 100% against talking to someone whose training is only psychological.
But since the bulk of psychological problems are not without known causes, the result of specific circumstances, for most things going to the psychiatrist up front (just to be sure) I would say has no particular value. Say when I was deployed overseas with the Army and had specific family problems that were distressing me for known reasons–I eventually sought help from pastoral counselling, though at first I did not seek any help. The help I received I believed benefited me as much as seeking a psychiatrist or psychologist would have done. (And I think scientific studies back up my point of view.)
By the way, I don’t deny that brain chemistry can be an issue in some “general” disorders, but it seems to be true (scientific evidence seems to indicate) that brain chemistry can repair itself under the right circumstances. Throwing a pill at the issue may help in the short term, but in the end, if we think of psychiatry as an industry, they have lots of reasons to proscribe pills you don’t necessarily need. Avoiding the pills as much as possible (“as possible” acknowledges it may not always be possible) is simply wise.
So my own attitude on mental health professionals is nuanced. I don’t see them entirely as quacks and I would in fact use them at times–though I’m mostly skeptical and would turn to pastoral counseling for most issues.
Now, why am I being a bit hard on Notleia on this on this topic? Because I worry about her. I have theory about her life that I’ve stated to her, which she has never denied, that she was raised in a rather insular Christian background where certain notions were never challenged and never really thought about. She got older and found many of her Christian notions didn’t match up to specific information she heard elsewhere (which was more scientific and more scholarly and was espoused by much more intelligent people than her Christian notions), so she went through a thing called a “paradigm shift,” wherein for her all the left-wing ideas that people she used to know criticized without too much rational basis became the ideas she adopted as wholly true and correct–unquestionable even.
Yet the fact is she needs to go through another paradigm shift. Because the suite of left-wing ideas she holds to now are themselves full of logical contradictions, assumptions made without evidence or even in contradiction to evidence–but with much more intelligent presentation that many Christian ideas usually receive.
For example, on the issue of the Bible, people who challenge major portions of the Bible as fiction in fact have no more evidence backing them up, overall, than people who maintain every word of the Bible is true. But the scholars challenging the Bible are often highly educated and many believers defending the Bible are not that educated. So it may not be immediately evident that a lot of what is said in criticism of the Bible is on very weak intellectual grounds…but is. I can show what I’m saying is true in exhaustive detail but obviously won’t do so here.
But it was Notleia’s expression of confidence in mental health checkups (she even stated everyone should get one) that gave me an opportunity to go after a bastion of ideas left-wingers hold to without good reason (for the purpose of prodding along Notleia’s second paradigm shift–which I am obviously fine with her knowing about, since I have no secret agenda and am saying this openly).
Psychiatry claims to be based on science. It claims to have authority, clinical trials, evidence, certainty. Though in fact the issue is not really with psychiatrists themselves usually–who I think would in fact to admit to a certain degree of uncertainty–but with a certain segment of modern culture who asserts that going to “Pastor Bob” is a waste of your time, while going to the psychiatrist is “of course” what ANY intelligent person knows to do. (The people who believe this are in the in-group of those who hold to Notliea’s current paradigm.)
Yet there is a science of checking into the effectiveness of psychiatric science–yes, these kinds of studies are not themselves perfect–but these are the types of studies science, including psychiatry, itself is built on. A person can’t claim “I believe in psychiatry because SCIENCE” when the actual scientific data is like, “Psychiatry is better than talking to Pastor Bob under some circumstances–but mostly is about the same.”
I want Notleia to ask herself WHY is it she came to believe with certainty that psychiatry is gold-plated awesomeness when real science says it isn’t. I want her to realize she adopted wholesale the attitudes of a group whose ideas don’t in fact always make sense. I want her to challenge her current beliefs and reconsider her old ones and find out that there are non-mouthbreathers who list very good reasons to believe ideas she once turned away from.
NOT that I want her to unquestioningly return to those ideas–I am in fact confident that all I have to do is prod her to question her current set of beliefs and she will find out on her own what ideas of her new paradigm are total bunk and which ideas in “old fashioned thinking” are actually better.
Indirectly, Autumn, I hope to influence people like you so that you do not make the mistake of confusing Notleia’s very evident brilliance with her being right. Because on an awful lot of very important things, she isn’t (which of course, doesn’t mean she is 100% wrong on everything–but you should be alert and skeptical about what she says–FYI).
Well, I definitely don’t assume she’s right, and I do feel like she’s a little overreliant on the mental health industry. At the same time, I understand that that industry definitely has its good points. I’ve also seen ways that she’s differed from other liberals I’ve seen. It also sounds like she likes the mental health industry because it has helped her personally, kind of like how you and me aren’t as crazy about the mental health industry because we didn’t need it to deal with our particular hardships.
To be honest, I rarely ever find myself agreeing with anyone(or even any one post) wholeheartedly. Everything I’ve said thus far is how I’ve felt before this conversation, rather than me being swayed by what either of you are saying. I’m not going to be swayed by notleia’s intelligence anymore than I’d be swayed by your assertion that your viewpoints automatically constitute intelligent free thinking/that anyone holding certain opinions you disagree with is a sheep. I try to be diplomatic, but don’t mistake that for passiveness or an inability to come to my own conclusions.
I kind of see the mental health field like I see the regular field of medicine. At first there were a lot of problematic things about it, but as people pursue it and research it, it’s gotten better. The mental health field still has a long way to go, but it’s progressed enough that it can be helpful in many cases. But, it isn’t gold, and if someone can handle things on their own or through confiding in friends, etc. then they should.
Please note, I don’t assume everyone who disagrees with me is an intellectual sheep. I have had loads of people disagree with me for reasons I respected very much. Yes, it’s true that Notleia isn’t in that category as of right now, but it isn’t true that I think the same way about everyone who disagrees with me. I don’t.
As for me thinking of my own thought process as independent, I have lots of reason to think it is. For example, I list reasons for thinking things that other people I know don’t list. Or I take positions that might agree with, say, Feminists on one position, even if I largely disagree with Feminists on other positions (e.g. I’m in favor of women in combat roles in the military, assuming factors I won’t list here). But if you wish to be skeptical about my independence, feel free. That only bothers me if it means you will automatically shut off what I’m saying without considering it first.
If you wish to be skeptical and challenge my thinking, feel free to do so. But please base your skepticism on factual stuff, not your sense that I’m being a jerk to Notleia (we are both being jerks to each other to a degree–she because it seems she thinks I’m essentially a Neanderthal behind the times–hence her “Dunning-Kruger” comment. And me because I want her to wonder how it is her life went from challenging her old notions to copycat believing a bunch of new notions, assuming that’s actually the truth).
When I challenge Notleia to demonstrate that she isn’t simply following a suite of trends for shaky reasons, she usually repeats things that everyone in the group I perceive her to be in agrees is true, instead of attempting to find objective evidence. For example, in this conversation, it was me who suggested she look up studies and relate whatever they say–when she refused to cooperate with that, I looked them up myself, picking the first pertinent things I found (I did no cherry-picking of sources to support my claim). (Note how SURE Notleia was I had no idea what I was talking about–and then how the scientific studies lined up with what I said in specific detail. Could it be I’d seen enough studies to know I was right before I opened my mouth?)
I have also challenged Notleia to demonstrate independence via stating things she believes that do not fall in line with a certain point of view. She so far has refused to cooperate with that–I am in fact assuming there must be something she thinks that’s basically independent, but I haven’t heard it yet. You say she says things that are not typical for liberals–well, not all liberals are the same. Notleia belongs to a set for which I don’t have a name–but I’ve met others with (as far as I can tell) the exact same set of beliefs as she has.
I would actually be DELIGHTED to find out I’m wrong about this. I am in fact prodding Notleia to show me I’m wrong and would love it if she does so. Though that’s because it will give me something to work with in the future with her…
You, in contrast, in fact do take up positions that do not seem to be along any particular party line, as far as I can tell. Which doesn’t prove independent thinking, but is one possible indicator of such.
Though with Notleia and I, it seems (“seems” is a key word, I know I am partially guessing) you are trying to play mediator, to make sure we play nice. And since it seems you feel I am not playing nice, you said some pretty sharp things to me in your last comment, though covered over with a layer of politeness. Like, it seems what you were aiming for is that I’m a total arrogant jerk who has delusions of grandeur about myself and who treats every person who disagrees with me like a sheep.
I already addressed these ideas–I don’t in fact treat everyone who disagrees like sheep–not even close. Yes, Notleia I do–but I have specific reasons for doing that.
As for whatever I am intellectually–what can I say? Should I say I follow trends or groups of other people when I can’t honestly think of anything I follow 100%? Maybe it’s fair to think I’m at least a little independent? Perhaps enough to justify me challenging Notleia to show me her own independence of thought?
I really do hope she shows me at some point a thought that does not line up with the group I perceive her to be in. But if she won’t do that, yes, I’m going to continue to challenge her to think for herself.
I hope that makes sense. I don’t want you to hate me or think I am arrogant or say things that cannot be trusted–but not enough for me to stop doing what I think is the right thing.
I COULD audition for your approval, but then I decided that was probably WAY too much work, if only because the things I would consider convincing are very obviously not convincing to you.
Honestly, I can’t really hate you (or anyone else for that matter. I get mad often enough when dealing with people, but hating someone is too much work to be bothered with now days) because I understand where you’re coming from when you talk that way. If anything, it reminds me of dealing with my Dad, or how I used to be during highschool.
Maybe to an extent that’s why cringe at some of the ways you approach this, since I’ve seen how that approach tends to make people roll their eyes rather than listen. Your condescending tone in previous comments kind of discredits previous times where you denied paternalizing people, as well. To an extent, maybe I’m trying to help you just as you intend to help me and notleia. I still enjoy the conversation, to be honest, so right now I’m not even that irritated.
Sorry if I sounded harsh, it’s just that trying to be diplomatic means that people tend to brush me off as passive or like I constantly get swayed around by others’ opinions. I wanted to be clear up front that that is not the case.
I’m not all that skeptical about your independence, but I do see parallels between yours and notleia’s journey. Skeptism of the independence of one of you would invite skeptism of the other.
As I said above to Notleia, I believe I’ve been violating the principle of “love your neighbor as yourself” in this conversation. My tone has been too harsh and I have been to happy to gleefully point out how right I am.
Thank YOU for pointing out how I’ve come across. I appreciate your concern for this interaction and your sensible intervention.
And I’m sorry for being a jerk. (Let’s see if I can continue in this conversation in a nicer tone.)
You’re forgiven 🙂 Hopefully I can continue communicating that way(not in the sense of intervening all the time, though. I don’t plan on becoming a pest).
I’m not always that nice, though, so I apologize ahead of time for the times I get overly impatient or snarky.
I, for one, am content with you playing the reasonable middle (and I suppose someone needs to remind us to play nice), if only for the wider audience’s sake.
But my pro-mental health professionals stances come from the fact that the culture I grew up in was ENORMOUSLY sh*tty (and I don’t use that word lightly in this space) about mental health advice. And I didn’t come from that fringe of a culture within rural Southern Christian culture (Southern and Christian culture are pretty much in a Venn diagram relationship).
Not all advice is created equal. And a lot of things are beyond the experience of a layman. Professionals at least have a wider experience and training to deal with a wider set of problems. (Also there’ve been a LOT of cases of pastors giving crap advice, like to stay with abusive spouses.)
I don’t actually object to skepticism about the psychological profession, but mostly the details, not whether or not it actually works in the first place, because that was part of the sh*tty stance that f*cked me over in first place.
If I had gotten help sooner, that would have meant that would have spent SO MUCH less time suffering.
No, I’m not going to admit that, because it doesn’t fit the evidence, which I may have more of than you because I’ve formally studied some psychology (like, freshman-level stuff but still seems more than you).
My depression was partly chemically based. I have a family history of depression/anxiety on both sides (largely undiagnosed, but the patterns are easy to recognize), so just talking about it wouldn’t have solved much of anything. My situation isn’t uncommon, either.
My basic-level study of neurotransmitters gives evidence that some ADHD-type problems are caused by an imbalance of chemical neurotransmitters like serotonin. My graduate student teacher told us about studies that showed promise for medical treatments for ADHD (a subject we got waaaay into because one of my classmates has an ADD-spectrum kid and asked tons of questions about it), if it were controversial still, I doubt it would have reached us at the baby level yet.
Notleia, my psychology professor in my Freshman psych class back in the early nineties was the one to mention studies on the effectiveness of psychological treatment–so as much as I like to trumpet my independence, this is a notion I got from a specific person, a notion that I have at times checked back on as I read through various types of science, including psychological science, to see if it’s still true. It had been a while since I’d last checked, maybe five years, so I was frankly relieved in answering this thread that the status of studies are the same as the last time I checked. (“Relieved” for a rather base reason–I did not like you pulling out “Kruger Dunning” on me and I was eager to show you what I was saying was based on reality. Which isn’t the same as me employing my reason for your benefit, which is what I told myself I was doing.)
Note that in addition to being an Army Reserve officer and an author and publisher, I also work as a foreign language translator in Spanish and French, who has the rather specific job of translating medical records of people applying for US Social Security Disability. Medical records are part of the application because they establish medical need and some records come from foreign-language medical treatment. Most of the records I translate are from Puerto Rico (because that’s a Spanish-speaking enclave under US control). A good proportion of cases are psychiatric patients–and I see how messed up medications make some of these people.
Though a group who is applying for disability is a group who are self-selecting for things that have gone wrong, of course. A person for whom psychiatric pharmacological treatment works like a dream isn’t going to apply for disability based on a problem. So this evidence counts as anecdotal–but I see case after case after case where the treatment doesn’t work. Which usually goes like this: when one medication causes insomina, the doc tries another, which causes 24/7 sleepiness, so the doc tries another, which causes nightmares, so the doc tries another, which causes impotence, etc, etc, which leads me to believe from personal experience that some psychiatrists are just guessing at what works and keep throwing pills at the problem until it gets better–or until it doesn’t get better, so sorry, too bad.
But note that psychiatry and psychology claim the mantel of scientific objectivity. They claim they can deliver results and prove it. So studies on the results they deliver are appropriate–and these studies have been going on for decades now.
The studies show–yes, very clearly and objectively, that people who seek help do better than those that don’t, but other than that all treatments are basically the same, with certain specific exceptions in which specific treatments really ARE better. You can argue with the studies based on your personal experience if you like–people engage in that kind of reasoning all the time. BUT doing so comes with a consequence–for example, it means that you will have to admit you are not standing with the consensus of actual academic findings.
Now, why is it that almost every psychiatrist believes psychiatric treatment works at levels beyond which such treatment can be demonstrated to work, as does almost every psychologist believe the same for radically different kinds of treatment? Well, you tell me. How do you suppose that people could wind up overestimating the effectiveness of their own profession and presenting their profession in a way that the objective evidence only partially supports at best?
(By the way, note that meds are tested in general to see if they work versus no treatment, the “control” group. They are not in general tested to see how well they work against non-medical treatment. This is a piece of the puzzle as to why psychiatrists can lose perspective about their profession…)
(Oops, we seem to be breaking the nesting)
I’ve no objection to trying other things — the results are what matters, after all. You can totally throw some talk therapy or some habit-reform training in there. Most counselor types seem to be bleeding hearts who put the patients’ problems over their own egos.
But I’m SUPER leery of just letting Pastor Bob (just to give the theoretic person a name) swan into the situation if he has a narrative he wants the patient to fit into even when they don’t (like “Jesus-ing harder solves everything, even chemical depression”). “Agenda” is too loaded of a word, but basically, they have an agenda that might not coincide with what actually helps the patient.
As for Pastor Bob, the rather odd thing is that I have not already mentioned is the patient needs to have confidence in the counselor. So if you have no confidence in Pastor Bob, you actually shouldn’t talk to him.
And I will agree with you a bit further–while my ideas follow along with the studies on the value of what actually helps and I’m not believing things for purely anecdotal reasons, if Pastor Bob indeed does not care about my well-being at all and is in fact trying to push an agenda of his own, I’m also in that case better off not talking to him. (But it’s my opinion most pastors care deeply for the well-being of their congregants. “Most” being an important caveat.)
But “throwing in some talk therapy” has been shown, by rigorous academic study, that is, the best objective information available, over a period of decades, to not be some extra frosting on the really solid treatment of handing out medications. NO, actually, talk therapy is every bit as good as the meds for the vast majority of conditions. Why is that? The WHY reveals something about the nature of psychology. It reveals that human brain chemistry can be self-correcting, at least for most conditions. It reveals that dispensing pills for problems–which will in fact produce actual verifiable results or they would not be dispensed–is not what some people think it is. Because the results from directly adjusting brain chemistry are no better than talking to someone in almost every case. That means, in most cases, the pills are in fact unneeded, even if they will work.
It also means that what you were taught in your Freshman psych class and even your own experience seeking treatment are only part of a whole story and in fact have led you to believe something that is not in fact what established science agrees is true.
Now, you can disagree with established science if you like–I do it often enough myself. But I think you imagine your concept of treatment lines up with established science.
But, my friend, it DOESN’T. For your information.
Okay, I’m sorry about calling you Dunning-Kruger.
You’re just wrong about gender without having the excuse of being misinformed 😛
Well said. There have been so many times I’ve been willing to talk with someone and the best response I get is “you wouldn’t understand, it’s a (insert particular background> thing .” Which just tells me they don’t consider me a fellow human being, someone with whom they refuse to have common ground. But then, I don’t have any particular abusive or bizarre background, so nobody gives a damn that I’ve considered suicide a few times myself. I do wish people would allow communication instead of throwing up walls and throwing stones and thinking their own problems are unique and overwhelming.
Yeah. We all have problems–all humans. Nobody has it all together. Though some people think they do.
We all need God’s help and are suffering from a pathology of some kind if we refuse to seek a relationship with our Creator. (And often enough even if we do seek Him.)
I had a weird problem when I was young. I wanted to be a woman; I supposedly was female but I felt like my body was not really female. It was too fat and ugly–I had been told–so I felt like I wasn’t really a girl after all.
I kept going on starvation diets of 600-800 calories. I hated my ugly body rendering me unworthy of love. I never was worthy of having a family I guess.
God has made me female. That’s enough. Too bad no man ever appreciated the way God made me. I don’t need anyone tearing me down all the time anyhow. All the young men I knew when I was marriageable either cruelly insulted me or saw me as sexless. At 45 I don’t care anymore.
Women can look beyond external ugliness. Remember Beauty and the Beast? Sadly no man alive can look past the surface. But most leave you when you turn 40 so you can never keep ’em anyhow.
Glad God looks at the heart!
Yeah. I wouldn’t say NO man can look past the surface or weight, or that aesthetics don’t matter to women, because they definitely do and they can get bored with a guy they don’t find attractive. But I personally think singleness is just as much of a gift as a romantic relationship is.
One time in a Christian dating and marriage lecture I attended in college, one of the best things they said was ‘If you aren’t ready/happy to be single, you aren’t ready for marriage’. They basically meant that it is healthier for someone to date only when they are truly happy with who they are and still happy even when single.
Why? Because someone that feels extremely lonely or desperate to get married is more likely to make desperate choices or unhealthy compromises. Relationships are good, but when people aren’t healthy and stable on their own, their relationships are more likely to be unhealthy and unstable, too.
In which case why marry at all? Lol. You’re blissfully happy so why rock the boat?
I’m fine as a single now and don’t care how ugly people find me.
This post was seasoned with well-earned anger and just enough bitterness to deepen the complexity of the flavor. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
I did not marry primarily for looks. Sorry I did not meet you at a time I was single. Though I am happy with my married life.