When less than one out of a million men tried to pass themselves off as "women," men like "Renee" Richards and "Jan" Morris, the "transsexual"/"transgender" scam posed no real threat to women, children, or the whole of society. But today, when tens of thousands of teenage daughters demand double mastectomies, when intact male sex offenders rape their female cell mates, when little boys and girls are brainwashed into believing they can change their sex, the "transgender movement" threatens everyone.
"Debbie" Hayton has a problem with the Pride Parade. Fine. But because Mr. Hayton wears womanface in public, calls himself "Debbie," and tries to pass himself off as some type of "woman," he is a major part of the "transgender" scam whether he acknowledges it or not. Like it or not, there is no such thing as "transgender." There is no such thing as "transsexual." We are the sex we were conceived as. That says it all.
Mr. Hayton is a man. Not just a biological man. But a man in every sense of the word. He is no more entitled to pass himself off as a woman, any type of woman, not even a "transsexual woman," than I can munch on a Milk-Bone biscuit, douse myself with Frontline," and register at the American Kennel Club.
And isn't it ironic that on a substack entitled "Reality's Last Stand" hosted by Colin Wright, whose very admirable life's work as an evolutionary biologist has always appeared to be to establish that there are only two sexes, male and female, that humans cannot change sex, and following from that, that there's no such thing as "trans," "transgender," or "transsexual," Wright platforms a man who, in the preface to his piece, claims the identity of "transsexual" and that there is such a group as "transsexuals," despite everything Wright has taught us about biology?
I thought, Colin, that humans cannot change sex. How, then, is this man "trans sex"?
Curious how you think that giving a voice to a male who promotes the fantasy that there's such a thing as "transsexuality" is furthering the cause of standing up for material reality. To many of us, giving voice to this bogus "transsexuality" narrative greatly undermines the work we all do to protect women, LGB people, confused kids and their well-meaning parents.
As long as there is such a phenomenon as gender dysphoria there will be people who view themselves as transgender. When I was a medical student nearly fifty years ago, such people were vanishingly rare, but if they managed to persuade the establishment to give them surgery, they were usually pleased and then content to disappear into their new lives. They did not want to be 'trans' nor to be known as anything other than their desired sex. To pretend none of it had happened, or at most that a mistake had been corrected and that they were just an ordinary man or woman. I did not find them difficult and they did not politicize their predicament. I certainly had reservations about treating a delusion by reinforcing it, as we just don't do that for any other delusion, but since we had no other treatment to offer...
Those folk are not the enemy. We are faced with a much larger group of confused kids and malcontents who don't want to be a man or a woman: they want to be 'trans' or one of the other dozens of genders that have been made up out of whole cloth. They are the people we have to disagree with as they are asking for something that is not reality-based. They don't even suffer from actual gender dysphoria, but from a host of other psychiatric and social issues that we perversely decline to examine, instead jumping straight to affirmation, and a positive feedback loop that funnels more and more confused kids into the gender sausage machine, along with all the money to be made from this new industry of manufacturing Soylent Trans. And the warm and fuzzy feelings of 'doing good' draw ever more well-meaning open-minded social-justice hyphens into the maelstrom. Perfectly ordinary people are the only ones left to argue against it, and since we are in a large majority we can win. We just have to be stirred up to stand up, not for ourselves, but for our children.
That makes no sense at all, and is patently absurd. Most of us pushing back come from the left and are appalled that the left's anti-woman and homophobic agenda has it pushing these synthetic sex identities on non-conforming children and adults for corporate profit.
Everything after the LGB is straight people, and these identities have nothing to do with same sex attraction. Notice they keep adding letters that have nothing to do with LGB people. As of last week, WPATH has added the synthetic sex identity of eunuch!
It's Big Pharma/Big Med's opening markets in synthetic sex identities for profit that's pushing this narrative. It's ridiculous to claim that women and LGB people are the reason the left is pushing this stuff. That's just laughable. The people in charge of pushing this movement's agenda are primarily heterosexual men with the sexual fetish of autogynephilia. Which is what Hayton is, by the way.
It might just be a little paranoid to blame Big Pharma (who certainly have enough sins to answer for) for the trans agenda. Take, for example, Lupron, the GnRH antagonist used as a puberty blocker, but which is only approved for precocious puberty and prostate cancer. About 99.9% of Lupron prescribed is for prostate cancer, and the tiny fraction of a percent going to confused kids - that's where the lawsuits will come from when they open their eyes and understand what they, their parents and their doctors have done. Drug companies like big profitable markets, not so much the tiny and risky ones.
To look at it the other way round, if Big Pharma is the cause of this nonsense, you'd have to believe it simply would never have happened save for the manufacturers of GnRH antagonists and sex hormones. I think we have enough crazy people into woke fantasy that we can get here all by ourselves without invoking the old spectre of Big Pharma.
BTW, I strongly recommend 'Bad Pharma' by Ben Goldacre. A very entertaining read, that I enjoyed passing on to colleagues and pharmacists when I was in practice!
Transgendered people have been with us since the dawn of humanity. Gender dysphoria doesn't go away simply because you dislike it. To profess such a belief is the height of arrogance. The same argument is applicable to you if, as you claim, you are "gay". There is no such thing as "gay" or "lesbian". There are only confused heterosexuals. Being "gay" is obviously a mental illness treatable by trained professionals. There you go. Case closed. If, as you claim, the author is a transvestite then so be it. The author's views on bathroom etiquette are of no more import than yours or mine in any case. And if you are, as you claim, a confused heterosexual then you know better than anyone that gender does not define sexual attraction. But you say it does. You say the author is attracted to women, therefore he is a man. You imply that you are attracted to the same gender. That means you must be a man. You merely prove my point that "gayness" is not real. It's just another mental illness, just like gender dysphoria. Strangely enough, neither can be cured by any means known. To be sure, the assault on our children's psyche's being mounted by the left must be stopped by any means possible. But you must remember that you enabled this assualt by insisting that "gayness" was "normal". You hold "gay pride" events where lewd exhibitionism is practiced by your "normal" comrades. You pretend that that's ok because that's just the way you are. Ultimate hypocrisy.
Being homosexual doesn't involve being cut up and billions in profit for big pharma.
Being homosexual does not involve denying the reality of biology in fact it affirms biological reality.
"Transgendered people have been with us since the dawn of humanity." If you are going to argue this present some evidence. Also please explain how the transgender paradigm can exist without medicalised big pharma identities.
Are you one of those heterosexual women who claim a gay male identity? Because it sounds like that's where you're coming from. As such, it seems like you want to undermine the concept of same-sex attraction and promote "same gender" attraction based on stereotypes of masculinity and femininity to which you appear to adhere. Only a person who wants to undermine sex-based attraction would make the arguments you are making. And it seems like you are a woman who thinks she's a man, possibly a gay man. What's your deal?
I disagree. Feminists are the ones who blindly promoted the idea that to be equal to men, women must be the same as men. We must hold the same jobs, perform the same tasks, embrace the same attitudes towards sex. Worse, it’s a caricature of men that feminists want us to seek sameness with. I was inundated throughout high school, undergrad, and grad school with this crap.
Now at 40, I have several middle management single friends. We aren’t very close anymore because our lives have no real overlap, and college memories are beginning to fade. Plus, it makes me sad to be around them. They are miserable because they decided to try and emulate the caricature of men pushed on us by feminists in our gullible youth - as young adults these women followed the feminist’s formula - they became obsessed with work, and sexually promiscuous. They bought $150K vehicles before they made 6 figures and chose jobs based on how good the title sounded or how hip the city in which the job was located seemed. They never laid down roots or learned how to have healthy intimate relationships. Loneliness overwhelms them today as they slink back to the cities and towns of their youth only to discover life there didn’t stop awaiting their return.
Their careers are slowing, their lives feel empty, their futures uncertain, their finances in tatters despite decent incomes in the low-mid 6 figures, and the interest from “better” sexual partners these days comes largely from the divorced over 55 crowd. None of these feminists warned them that if they mainly focused on “me, myself, and I,” their friend group would eventually shrink to the person looking back at them in the mirror.
While family and children are not for all women, the eternal truth is that it’s how the majority of women find happiness and fulfillment. Feminists lie to all women by failing to acknowledge this biological reality. For feminists, It’s always been about making women more like their negative perceptions of men.
It’s no wonder many, if not the majority, of feminists have embraced the overt misogyny of gender ideology. After decades of claiming women should aim to be just like men, claiming men can actually be women is the next logical step in the process of erasing societal acknowledgement of immutable and material sex based differences.
No one said they were. But they are now. Now you attempt to claim that people who are not like you are "impossible" and that they "can't exist". Tribalism rules.
Of course you, and people like you, with opposite-sex ideation, "exist," Noah. It's ridiculous to make that silly claim that we think you "don't exist." All humans exist. If you didn't exist, how would you have typed your comments? Do we think you're a man just because YOU think you are? No we don't. But we see you. We just don't see your inner thoughts. We see your material reality. You are not your anime avatar.
Yes. We oppose AGPs who invade women's prisons and rape and impregnate their female cell mates.
Yes. We oppose "trans" people who brainwash young children into thinking that boys can be girls and girls can be boys.
Yes. We oppose doctors who poison teens and young adults with puberty blockers, cross sex hormones and genital mutilation surgery.
Yes. We oppose anyone and everyone who supports this blatant nonsense, the harmful "transgender" propaganda. And if you fail to understand that, you are in no way "gender critical."
The author of the piece opposes many of those things too. You do not get to decide who is gender critical or not because it's a broad church, from right to left and includes gay and trans people
What's a "trans person"? Is there a new category of human that's been created that can change sex through cosmetic surgeries and taking poison drugs? Really, I'm curious who you think these people are, and why you think this.
A trans person subjectively believes they are the sex other than the sex they are and therefore try to live as that sex. I believe it's no one else's business how they identify or live UNLESS it complicates the situation for women, such as access to women-only spaces.
But, evidently, your question is not posed in good faith because you clearly despise these people for reasons probably best kept to yourself (because I don't give af what triggers your disgust response).
'Groomer' is a childish slur, which precludes taking you seriously. I wouldn't care about the illiberal & intolerant types, like you, were it not for the fact that you give the lunatic misogynistic trans activist fringe the energy they need to push their idiot narratives about everyone hating trans people.
If it's true, as some say below, that the author is a biological male and still a heterosexual, then this article is brilliant satire (though satire isn’t what I'm paying for here). And further, if the author is a heterosexual, biological male, and the piece isn't brilliant satire, then it's... what? Pathetic nonsense? It's kind of like Rachel Dolezal, apparently a caucasian, becoming a leader in the NAACP, only instead of being found out and pilloried, let's say instead she became disenchanted with the direction of the NAACP and pilloried them? Talk about the pot calling the kettle... wait, maybe the Wedgewood Porcelain calling the...? I give up. I identify as a chef with a headache whose tired of hearing the cupboard inhabitants holler at each other. Where is my parade?
Until Hayton detransitions and stops using the T word to describe himself, he has zero credibility. All he's doing is safeguarding the old definition against the new definition. There is no evidence foundation in his writing.
This is a great essay and very aligned with the thesis of one I wrote on Religion as a Psychology. The author and I pretty well align on that concept and it's true. Everyone is religious, we just have to realize what we are doing with ours!
Thank you for posting. We are all religious, but to use Megan Kelly, the difference between a religion and a cult is what happens if you leave. If you stop being Catholic, no one ex/communicated you. If you stop being Jewish, you aren’t dead to your family and friends. If you stop supporting the insanity of wokeism the followers are as terrible as any doomsday cult - you are fully ex-communicated and the cult attempts to destroy your life.
Religions actually ground people and give them purpose and a steady moral compass while cults destroy people in the name of their faux religion.
Islamic threaten death to those who leave the Muslim religion. Many other religions do great harm to those who leave. That definition does not stand.
The true difference between a cult and a religion is the comparison to alternate media and mainstream media.
Success of religiosity only works WITHIN that faith context. It does not work in different circumstances. Religions are social constructs. The same way voodoo sorta works on people who believe in voodoo.
I disagree. All cults are religions, but not all religions are cults. I stand by my definition. The size of a religious following has nothing to do with if it’s a cult - the replicated behavior of those who follow the religion, and the treatment of those who leave or criticize it, determine if a belief system is also a cult.
I agree that all cults are religions but not all religions are cults.
same way: all alternative media provide news, but mainstream news does not address the non corporate profiting news.
I agree that size is irrelevant, just as size of news outlet is irrelevant.
But replication patterns and departure consequences are across the board (to varying intensities), except for the the two main branches of Christianity, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism... and some cults.
Religion promotes people NOT learning how to develop a moral compass, and therefore relying on the religion to tell them what is right and wrong; what is moral or immoral. Religion teaches people to not think for themselves. It isn't grounding, because ones center isn't in oneself and one's relationship to the ground. It's about relying on the religion, and therefore is ungrounded. I'm not putting this very well. But I can't think of anything more ungrounded than relying on another group to give me a sense of purpose and moral compass. That means being guided by externals: the religious group.
I believe in reading widely from across the ideological spectrum in general, and on any given issue, and then using my critical thinking skills to carefully evaluate each source and what it says, and then thinking and deciding for myself. It is a grounding experience. I know I can always rely on myself to arrive at the best answers for myself. I seek out the viewpoints of others, but then evaluate and decide for myself. It is empowering and grounding. I feel solid in myself. My atheist parents taught me critical thinking skills before entering kindergarten, so that I would be able to critique, see through, and not be susceptible to religious myths and relying on others to do my thinking and reasoning. I encourage anyone who has not been taught this to study critical thinking and learn how to do it for oneself, and build confidence in their ability to decide for themselves what is and isn't moral.
I disagree completely. Based on observed outcomes, people who have a faith are far more moral - they contribute more to their communities, volunteer more, raise more fulfilled and successful children. Based on replicated data, religious people are on average materially more moral than non religious people.
Kids raised with religion are more likely to have a more successful life in every regard as adults - mental health, financial achievement, sense of happiness, and contributions to others. Success comes from the ability to make decisions and children raised with religion are more successful and less prone to self destructive habits.
You’re assertions about religion teaching people not to think is laughably inaccurate. It appears you were actually taught you to make assumptions and mistake them for facts. It’s clear you are a bigot towards religious people, so I won’t continue this any further, but I also won’t let such an ignorant and uniformed response to my comment go entirely unanswered.
Sure, people who's definition of morality is religious morality see more morality among the faithful of that morality. That is completely logical, and simultaneously completely irrelevant ;)
Other than the "moral compass" part I totally agree. Morality and social mores are nothing more than social constructs. All cultures through time and geography have had high degrees "moral" variability.
I think the word should be gotten rid of.
We live in cultures, these cultures have laws, we each fight for which laws seem more grounded to us, and against those that seem idiotic. Then through our social contract, we "obey" the rules we disagree with... or don't ;)
I think it was Henry David Thoreau who once wrote (I paraphrase from memory), "The English obey the law cuz it's the law, the French obey laws if they seem reasonable". :D
This is a thoughtful essay about important issues. If we have a purity test to determine who is allowed to speak out on these issues, then we are no better than the Pride purveyors or the pronoun police, and we will never defeat them. The only thing accomplished by ad hominem attacks and vitriol will be the silencing of influential people who could have helped to make the case against gender mythology.
He's been allowed to speak his words, as we're used to men of ill character are always allowed to speak over women.
And all of the complainers in this comment section also have the right to speak on principles and how he is dishonest, specially since most of these female comments are from lesbians.
Hayton is of course 'allowed' to say what Hayton wants. I don't see anyone arguing for him to be censored. I certainly have not.
Where are the 'ad hominem attacks'? Pointing out he is male? Pointing out he is a fetishist (which he admits himself)? Pointing out that he has no claim to LGB pride as a heterosexual man? That he unilaterally imposed this on his wife & kids? Those are facts.
Yes, they are about what he wrote in this essay. Because he is claiming that pride was originally for people like him, when it was never for him, for the reasons outlined above.
"LGB" is a movement invented in the 21st century by gender critical activists. As a person who actually is same-sex attracted, this is an undeniable truth.
As the ex-wife of a man who identified publicly as female in his mid-thirties, and says he's the mother of our 2 sons, I have to comment on the God talk. I don't get it. I don't see the place for it.
It is notable that God is "he" in this essay, causing me to conclude traditional Christianity, regarding the 'sexed" existence of God, in the mind of the author. As a Jew, (converted with Masorti rabbis in 1987) I believe the writing regarding "God's wrath" in the Pentateuch, in context of its antiquity, is about humans not knowing geology, seeking to understand floods, droughts, earthquakes and other traumatizing phenomena; why so many innocent humans die in them?
Using God in discussions of transsexuality, cross-dressing, cross-sex ideation and the like, is not part of my spirituality--and I consider myself to be a woman of faith. The "sexed soul" mantra hides between the lines here, in my reading of this unusual essay. This brand of mysticism has long been cultivated by the "sexologist" diagnosticians. It is not a useful schema, in a discussion of how to stop the harms gender ideology brings to a new generation in crisis. I do not see God discussions as useful here.
My ex-husband's fluctuations were weekly, daily, hourly, before his PhD psychologist decided I, his wife, "caused" him to "decide to live full-time as female" (direct quotes from 1996 sworn affidavit submitted in custody case) as a result of my choice not to stay in the marriage. Based on his own narrative of when he felt "transsexual" (his word, back then) and when he didn't (because sometimes he didn't, he said), I do not regard the underpinnings of this identity to be stable.
The PhD "sexologist" became a female "God," who meted out punishment of me through alienation of affection and propagandistic claims regarding our children's predicted "non-reactions." No. Our then 9 year old son said he wanted to kill himself and named three ways. The "sexologist" was completely wrong in saying our children would not be affected emotionally, but no one in this field follows up the family, finds out how the trans widow manages or whether someone in that unit experiences trauma. The feelings of the transsexual always weigh more than the rest of us. I will leave it to readers here to spend their own time looking up this author and his wife's public statements regarding her experiences during her husband's "transition." My heart goes out to her every time I see her husband publishing another essay, the constant self-referential habit, the everlasting claim to be "one of the good ones." My ex-husband, the "first female COO" in his company, has the same modus operandi, except he goes one step further, and pretends I do not exist.
Somatic therapy, Feldenkrais and Alexander work, psychoanalysis into the flaws of the male God schema, examination of childhood experiences of sexism and trauma, should be the first steps towards psychic/somatic wholeness/wellness when any individual goes for professional help with cross-sex ideation. It is not a stable diagnosis, there is no reliable measure to predict who will detransition and when.
Pride parades, for decades already, are over-focused on campy, overt sexuality, drag masquerades and the commodification of a lifestyle, a part of life that should be more private, more personal. See under: wildly successful, absolutely unrealistic, California-fied Grace and Frankie series, in which everyone moves on in a materialistic, silly and thoughtless consumerism when two men decide they love each other and leave their 30 years marriages. "Where's my beach house?" ask all the trans widows. "Where's the right to even tell my story?" we ask. I was assured recently that I'm right, only right wing media would interview me, and as well, Women's Declaration International. (Female Erasure by Ute Heggen--on YouTube)
As a step in the direction towards "first do no harm," I've posted somatic movement sets to heal from trauma, to reconnect mind/body, to feel your bones, your sinews, which are yours, which are sexed since birth, claim them for your best life.
We owe it to the next generation to regard every one of ourselves as potential influencers, as mentors, as examples. The pharma of "transition" is not wellness, at any age.
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (iuniverse, 2022)
"Behind the rainbows and the sparkles, and the banners and the flags, there is a totalitarian mindset that demands compliance."
This. So much this. I'm bi and have NEVER felt like I would actually belong at ' Pride ' due to the leftist political mindset & sexual exhibitionism that currently gets presented as part of the package deal to be welcome & have fun. I understand why some may have issues with this piece but I'm glad you're on our side, Debbie.
It’s frustrating to see some of the bile in these comments, which appear to take no account of the author’s story. This style of gender critical discourse only energises the people it castigates.
I'd assume I don't agree with everything Debbie Hayton thinks or advocates for, but I'm happy to join hands with anyone willing to openly pushback against the speech-policing, bullying, misogyny, and authoritarianism that characterizes today's LGBTQ+ activism. And that includes any trans person who is honest about his/her origins, who isn't trying to impose an unhinged denial of biology and reality (eg "transwomen are women"). I don't know much about Debbie Hayton, but I looked for some background and found this UnHerd piece, which provides some useful context for the one published here.
I oppose the recent shift away from medical "gate keeping" to self-declared trans ID, which opens the flood gates to anyone for any purpose—including predatory—being able to access women's spaces; I also oppose the cult ideology that has grown out of Queer Theory and is indoctrinating children and steamrolling women's rights. In the prior "gate keeping" model, such easy access wasn't available and my sense is that it wasn't really a societal problem. If you have other information or perspectives on that I'm open to hearing them.
Well, he admits to being a fetishist and getting off on dressing up and LARPing as a woman, and he also teaches children, while dressed up as a woman, therefore he is parading his fetish in front of children. No one actually concerned with safeguarding should ignore that.
He ignores his wife's obvious distress over his 'transition' as can be seen via video. His fetish is more important than his wife & kids.
Thanks for explaining and providing the video link.
I'm curious whether you (or others objecting here) would denounce and label as LARPing someone like Blaire White, who transitioned due to severe gender dysphoria from early childhood? Are you objecting to all transitioning, or only that which can be linked to paraphilias like AGP? Does it make any difference if the person goes through full surgery? If their transition doesn't involve abandonment of a marriage or children?
Aaaand THAT is called "grooming." You and people like Graham Linehan, who accompanied Hayton to a serious feminist event at which Hayton thought it would be helpful to swan about the feminist event in a sundress, and men like you and Linehan support this behavior and defend him. Kellie Jay confronted him about it, but I don't see you supporting Kellie Jay and the feminists who don't want to see this men in a dress lauded for his behavior and supported and defended by men like you and Linehan, who are allowing themselves to be groomed by this groomer to the extent that you will defend him against critics who are women. Very telling about your priorities and your values! Listen to men who LARP as women, even at a feminist event, and not women.
This is SO well articulated—our societal moment in a nutshell:
"But those God-shaped holes are still there. We still have that innate need to be seen as good people, and that desire is unlikely to evolve out of our species any time soon. So, my former neighbor goes to Pride, because Pride checks the boxes. There is ritual, and there is tradition. Parades are public: simply being a good person is not enough, we need others to see we are good people. If that is insufficient, we post it on social media.
"The churches—sorry, organizations—that organize, perpetuate, and benefit from Pride have their creeds and their commandments: Transwomen are Women, and Thou shalt not misgender. They collect donations (tithes?) from individuals and organizations to proselytize their gospel of equality, diversity and inclusion. They ask allies to express guilt for their original sin—straight or “cis”-privilege.
"There is a special priestly class—the trans—that supposedly possesses some mysterious special knowledge about what it means to be human. With their claims of a special soul, or rather “gender identity,” they are revered and lauded. But only so long as they keep the faith."
I see the writer's point--but perhaps it's progress that Pride has become many things to many people. In my small New England town, Pride celebrations have been a wonderful celebration of diversity and individuality--when anyone can dress or look however they want. As a straight, cis man, I've always loved the celebratory nature of the event as well as its inclusivity. It's message of "you're welcome and worthwhile just as you are," seems hopeful regardless of your sexuality.
I suppose there's a need to not be integrated--to protest whatever the status quo is and to root out inequality, intolerance, and injustice. To put it in a more negative light: if you aren't identified as a victim, you need to look for more ways to say you are one. (This is especially true of teenagers and young adults!) But PRIDE seems more of an antidote to that impulse than an accelerator.
PR$DE was not about victimization, it was a show of strength by and for same-sex attracted people. You have it totally wrong. It was not a place for non-same-sex-attracted people to celebrate their sexuality. It was a community bonding event for same sex attracted people. Married heterosexual fathers who like to wear dresses and LARP as women were never much of a presence because these men are historically extremely homophobic and did not want to be included with gay people. That is an historic fact. Now you come along with your revisionist history, mischaracterizing PR$DE from you heterosexual male POV. The fact that you had never noticed that PR$DE has been hijacked away from same-sex attracted people, and that you see it as some kind of celebration of victimization, means you are clearly part of the problem and don't know any history. Maybe look at the history of PR$DE from a historically LGB POV, not an interloper's POV, which is what you have. Maybe you should not have been there in the first place. You OR Hayton, despite the fact that you both feel completely entitled to be there.
Hmm. I don't think I can find a way to put this kindly. You need to get out of your defensive ideological crouch and actually learn how to read. I did not write that Pride was a celebration of victimization. What I actually wrote was: "PRIDE seems more of an antidote to that impulse than an accelerator." It obviously pushes your buttons to listen to a heterosexual male's perspective. You leap to the conclusion that you're being "straightsplained." Okay, I get that. But maybe resist that impulse and actually pay attention to what's being said.
I am a heterosexual female who used to go to Pride because several of my dearest friends were gay and came out at a time when there was still a lot of stigma. I liked to go to pride with them to celebrate them. I liked the experience also of being removed from hetero society for the weekend of celebrations (as mainstream hetero society which was very male-ruled at the time often felt quite threatening to me as a young woman). But I definitely did notice over the years the random hetero people who weren’t content to just watch from the sidelines as I was but who wanted to feel like a deeper part of the community. It is one thing to be uncertain about your sexuality and trying to figure it out when you’re young; it is another to keep pushing and pushing to try and be a part of a community that really has no place for you because it isn’t about you… I know people like that, straight women who only date men but have fooled around with women so always claimed to be “queer.” They always attended pride wanting so badly for it to be all about them. Now that they can slap the non binary trans label on themselves to legitimize their queer obsession. An old friend of mine (not friends anymore) now calls herself queer and applies for special grants for queer artists etc because she decided to call herself non binary, even though she only dates men. She also dresses like a woman and likes to rant about how non binary people don’t “owe” anyone androgyny. She has always been someone who wants the spot light on herself and tries to make everything about her. It was when people like her started being more and more in the spotlight at pride that I stopped going. That and when BLM made demands from pride in our city that were totally bizarre and idiotic and did nothing to help relations between cops/the gay community whatsoever. Then it just became obvious that pride was not for gay people anymore; it was for trendy left wing political statements and for people who have a serious victim complex and just want attention for it. So I’ll leave them to that.
And that is who Hayton is, a married heterosexual father who likes wearing dresses who now thinks that he's integral to the original intent of PR$DE, not one of the horrid interlopers who've ruined it for same-sex attracted people. That is precisely why I object to Colin Wright platforming his idiocy and hubris as if it makes sense. This is supposed to be Reality's LAST Stand. It seems like reality is truly losing on this blog. Very sad.
Colin will "be kind" actual homosexual people to their graves. Using preferred pronouns for people who agree with him is insidious because it proves lying is quite alright as long as the person you're lying to is agreeable. How about a piece written by actual LGB on why they don't attend Pride? Because Debbie Hayton would be one of the reasons. "Rules for thee and not for me!"
The truth as you see it. I note both of you are really big on labelling everything according to your religion. Every person must fit in a box so everyone can be perpetually oppressed. You're welcome to your view of the world. Your insistence on using the wrong pronouns is equally "telling". Only you are the arbiter of truth. LoL.
I commented the same thing and it was deleted. Debbie is a man who is attracted to women. He doesn't belong at Pride. He's called himself a lesbian and has actively pushed for mixed sex toilets in England. A wolf in sheep's clothing.
Well, my comment hasn't been deleted so far. This article is a shocking act of opprobrium, and so far commenters see that. I wonder how many comments have been deleted other than yours?
And he showed up at a feminist event a few months back parading around in a sundress, where he knew he would make women uncomfortable. Kellie Jay spoke to him about it, Linehan defended him.
And now he's acting like HE has any business speaking about PR$DE? Could Colin not find an actual LGB person to write this article rather than a heterosexual married autogynephilic male whom lesbians and bisexual women find GREATLY offensive? This is quite shocking. Everytime this man is allow to write/speak for women and/or LGB people, it is beyond offensive. Sad that Colin, for whom I have great respect, does not understand this.
If an LGB person would like to send me an article about why they no longer attend pride, I'd be more than happy to evaluate it for publication. It would be great to get a variety of perspectives on this topic.
I would not be able to write that piece, because I attend all PR$DE events specifically to document (among other issues) the enormous number of these heterosexual LARPers, male and female, who lay claim o the now-cool "queer" identity and who have almost completely usurped PR$DE (along with all orgs originally created by and for same-sex attracted people), along with the straight supporters of these LARPing men and women who center and promote them and their POVs. This straight male no longer wants to attend PR$DE because of the take over of men like him and his supporters? Ironic, and not very self-aware. Not that I'm surprised by that. Shame.
I've mostly stopped reading Lineham since then. It's too bad, because in Lineham's early days, he was much more firmly in the camp of radical feminists, since then he's shifted gears and is more into clickbait than principles.
I think the two used to be conflated because trans was such a small and insignificant group that there wasn’t much point in celebrating them separately and alone so they just sort of glomped onto the LGB Pride movement. But now bizarrely here they are trying to take over the entire thing. Even though they are still the smallest group—a tiny minority in society.
The latest statistics from elite women's colleges, such as Smith, have the LG+alphabet soup category at 40%. Smith is a women's liberal arts college, and on these campuses, the influence of gender ideology promotes this higher level of self-identification. The self-ID as "lesbian" is much lower, something like 2.6%. A woman who thinks she's a man once said to me, "There are more of us than people originally thought--my job is to help educate everyone." It's a zealous, jealous ideology, where the ethos of family & helping the less fortunate, is subsumed by politically motivated identity-recruitment. What boggles the mind is the capitalist and profit-oriented mindset of treatments involving hormone and surgeries, loads of extra make-up and wardrobe. These kids are much more self-involved than the hippies of my day.
We always get these simplistic questions with the word "hate" strategically placed. Davis E, do your research. In a podcast at OurPath.org, Hayton and wife Stephanie reveal how Stephanie was railroaded into staying in this marriage, which she clearly said she wanted out of. Belissa is expressing the frustration women experience, (regardless of sexual orientation) when men who have this mental illness insist on being "treated as a full-time woman" in our spaces. This means that men like D. Hayton, who openly says he is an autogynophile (a man who is sexually stimulated by the thought of himself as a woman) and at the same time claims to remember times in his early childhood prior to the age when a child is actually able to retain memory. The God language in this essay represents a religious stance/experience which is not uncommon among those who ideate they are the opposite sex. The religious context indicated stereotyped behaviors and roles for men and women, ingrained in children raised within this sex-delineated schema. D. Hayton has spoken of taking over the bread making in his family when he was going through "transition," as if there have not been male bakers since antiquity. The author of this piece has also said that he does consider whether he might have made a mistake in doing the surgeries and putting his family through the entire process, but as he said in a British magazine called Hood, he did it, it is irreversible, so there's no going back. He does use the women's facilities when he attends conferences, despite saying he knows he's male. He does not warn adult males of the serious dangers of cross-sex hormones and surgeries; incontinence, repeated emergency surgeries, bone demineralization, organ failure and early onstage dementia. This happens in males who took this path well into adulthood. Your use of the word hate is irrelevant.
I disagree with Belissa about whether Colin Wright should host this essay, though. It is quite revealing of the convoluted thinking of "the good ones."
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (iuniverse, 2022)
Great point, Belissa. It all boils down to whether "true trans" exists. I do not see it as real, and I was next to it, hearing the obsessive, "I'm so feminine" narrative from my then-husband, having fights with him about trivia like how long his fingernails were, how he's accidentally scratching our 3 year old, because he doesn't know how to move with long nails.
While the desire to morph into the opposite sex might feel very traumatic and frightening, it is actually no different from any other complex PTSD. The "sexologists" want to reach down into childhood diagnoses, because their etiology is all about "since childhood." It is pure and simple mental health malpractice, conflicts of interest because of how lucrative it is. There is no other area in psychology where the patient has to obtain the holy grail, a letter to a surgeon. This in itself created conflict of interest. The defensiveness stems from the fact that there is no validity in the trans diagnosis. Traumatized, in crisis--yes. Opposite sex in your head? Not real.
When less than one out of a million men tried to pass themselves off as "women," men like "Renee" Richards and "Jan" Morris, the "transsexual"/"transgender" scam posed no real threat to women, children, or the whole of society. But today, when tens of thousands of teenage daughters demand double mastectomies, when intact male sex offenders rape their female cell mates, when little boys and girls are brainwashed into believing they can change their sex, the "transgender movement" threatens everyone.
"Debbie" Hayton has a problem with the Pride Parade. Fine. But because Mr. Hayton wears womanface in public, calls himself "Debbie," and tries to pass himself off as some type of "woman," he is a major part of the "transgender" scam whether he acknowledges it or not. Like it or not, there is no such thing as "transgender." There is no such thing as "transsexual." We are the sex we were conceived as. That says it all.
Mr. Hayton is a man. Not just a biological man. But a man in every sense of the word. He is no more entitled to pass himself off as a woman, any type of woman, not even a "transsexual woman," than I can munch on a Milk-Bone biscuit, douse myself with Frontline," and register at the American Kennel Club.
And isn't it ironic that on a substack entitled "Reality's Last Stand" hosted by Colin Wright, whose very admirable life's work as an evolutionary biologist has always appeared to be to establish that there are only two sexes, male and female, that humans cannot change sex, and following from that, that there's no such thing as "trans," "transgender," or "transsexual," Wright platforms a man who, in the preface to his piece, claims the identity of "transsexual" and that there is such a group as "transsexuals," despite everything Wright has taught us about biology?
I thought, Colin, that humans cannot change sex. How, then, is this man "trans sex"?
Curious how you think that giving a voice to a male who promotes the fantasy that there's such a thing as "transsexuality" is furthering the cause of standing up for material reality. To many of us, giving voice to this bogus "transsexuality" narrative greatly undermines the work we all do to protect women, LGB people, confused kids and their well-meaning parents.
Absolutely right, Belissa. With friends like "Debbie" Hayton who needs enemies. I'm surprised Colin doesn't realize that.
As long as there is such a phenomenon as gender dysphoria there will be people who view themselves as transgender. When I was a medical student nearly fifty years ago, such people were vanishingly rare, but if they managed to persuade the establishment to give them surgery, they were usually pleased and then content to disappear into their new lives. They did not want to be 'trans' nor to be known as anything other than their desired sex. To pretend none of it had happened, or at most that a mistake had been corrected and that they were just an ordinary man or woman. I did not find them difficult and they did not politicize their predicament. I certainly had reservations about treating a delusion by reinforcing it, as we just don't do that for any other delusion, but since we had no other treatment to offer...
Those folk are not the enemy. We are faced with a much larger group of confused kids and malcontents who don't want to be a man or a woman: they want to be 'trans' or one of the other dozens of genders that have been made up out of whole cloth. They are the people we have to disagree with as they are asking for something that is not reality-based. They don't even suffer from actual gender dysphoria, but from a host of other psychiatric and social issues that we perversely decline to examine, instead jumping straight to affirmation, and a positive feedback loop that funnels more and more confused kids into the gender sausage machine, along with all the money to be made from this new industry of manufacturing Soylent Trans. And the warm and fuzzy feelings of 'doing good' draw ever more well-meaning open-minded social-justice hyphens into the maelstrom. Perfectly ordinary people are the only ones left to argue against it, and since we are in a large majority we can win. We just have to be stirred up to stand up, not for ourselves, but for our children.
Folks like you are the reason why the left spends so much time pushing the LGBTQIA+++ agenda so hard.
That makes no sense at all, and is patently absurd. Most of us pushing back come from the left and are appalled that the left's anti-woman and homophobic agenda has it pushing these synthetic sex identities on non-conforming children and adults for corporate profit.
Everything after the LGB is straight people, and these identities have nothing to do with same sex attraction. Notice they keep adding letters that have nothing to do with LGB people. As of last week, WPATH has added the synthetic sex identity of eunuch!
It's Big Pharma/Big Med's opening markets in synthetic sex identities for profit that's pushing this narrative. It's ridiculous to claim that women and LGB people are the reason the left is pushing this stuff. That's just laughable. The people in charge of pushing this movement's agenda are primarily heterosexual men with the sexual fetish of autogynephilia. Which is what Hayton is, by the way.
It might just be a little paranoid to blame Big Pharma (who certainly have enough sins to answer for) for the trans agenda. Take, for example, Lupron, the GnRH antagonist used as a puberty blocker, but which is only approved for precocious puberty and prostate cancer. About 99.9% of Lupron prescribed is for prostate cancer, and the tiny fraction of a percent going to confused kids - that's where the lawsuits will come from when they open their eyes and understand what they, their parents and their doctors have done. Drug companies like big profitable markets, not so much the tiny and risky ones.
To look at it the other way round, if Big Pharma is the cause of this nonsense, you'd have to believe it simply would never have happened save for the manufacturers of GnRH antagonists and sex hormones. I think we have enough crazy people into woke fantasy that we can get here all by ourselves without invoking the old spectre of Big Pharma.
BTW, I strongly recommend 'Bad Pharma' by Ben Goldacre. A very entertaining read, that I enjoyed passing on to colleagues and pharmacists when I was in practice!
Transgendered people have been with us since the dawn of humanity. Gender dysphoria doesn't go away simply because you dislike it. To profess such a belief is the height of arrogance. The same argument is applicable to you if, as you claim, you are "gay". There is no such thing as "gay" or "lesbian". There are only confused heterosexuals. Being "gay" is obviously a mental illness treatable by trained professionals. There you go. Case closed. If, as you claim, the author is a transvestite then so be it. The author's views on bathroom etiquette are of no more import than yours or mine in any case. And if you are, as you claim, a confused heterosexual then you know better than anyone that gender does not define sexual attraction. But you say it does. You say the author is attracted to women, therefore he is a man. You imply that you are attracted to the same gender. That means you must be a man. You merely prove my point that "gayness" is not real. It's just another mental illness, just like gender dysphoria. Strangely enough, neither can be cured by any means known. To be sure, the assault on our children's psyche's being mounted by the left must be stopped by any means possible. But you must remember that you enabled this assualt by insisting that "gayness" was "normal". You hold "gay pride" events where lewd exhibitionism is practiced by your "normal" comrades. You pretend that that's ok because that's just the way you are. Ultimate hypocrisy.
Being homosexual doesn't involve being cut up and billions in profit for big pharma.
Being homosexual does not involve denying the reality of biology in fact it affirms biological reality.
"Transgendered people have been with us since the dawn of humanity." If you are going to argue this present some evidence. Also please explain how the transgender paradigm can exist without medicalised big pharma identities.
Are you one of those heterosexual women who claim a gay male identity? Because it sounds like that's where you're coming from. As such, it seems like you want to undermine the concept of same-sex attraction and promote "same gender" attraction based on stereotypes of masculinity and femininity to which you appear to adhere. Only a person who wants to undermine sex-based attraction would make the arguments you are making. And it seems like you are a woman who thinks she's a man, possibly a gay man. What's your deal?
Feminists are not responsible for the left's misogyny.
I disagree. Feminists are the ones who blindly promoted the idea that to be equal to men, women must be the same as men. We must hold the same jobs, perform the same tasks, embrace the same attitudes towards sex. Worse, it’s a caricature of men that feminists want us to seek sameness with. I was inundated throughout high school, undergrad, and grad school with this crap.
Now at 40, I have several middle management single friends. We aren’t very close anymore because our lives have no real overlap, and college memories are beginning to fade. Plus, it makes me sad to be around them. They are miserable because they decided to try and emulate the caricature of men pushed on us by feminists in our gullible youth - as young adults these women followed the feminist’s formula - they became obsessed with work, and sexually promiscuous. They bought $150K vehicles before they made 6 figures and chose jobs based on how good the title sounded or how hip the city in which the job was located seemed. They never laid down roots or learned how to have healthy intimate relationships. Loneliness overwhelms them today as they slink back to the cities and towns of their youth only to discover life there didn’t stop awaiting their return.
Their careers are slowing, their lives feel empty, their futures uncertain, their finances in tatters despite decent incomes in the low-mid 6 figures, and the interest from “better” sexual partners these days comes largely from the divorced over 55 crowd. None of these feminists warned them that if they mainly focused on “me, myself, and I,” their friend group would eventually shrink to the person looking back at them in the mirror.
While family and children are not for all women, the eternal truth is that it’s how the majority of women find happiness and fulfillment. Feminists lie to all women by failing to acknowledge this biological reality. For feminists, It’s always been about making women more like their negative perceptions of men.
It’s no wonder many, if not the majority, of feminists have embraced the overt misogyny of gender ideology. After decades of claiming women should aim to be just like men, claiming men can actually be women is the next logical step in the process of erasing societal acknowledgement of immutable and material sex based differences.
The left was misogynist before feminism even existed.
I'm also not advocating for liberalism. or liberal feminism. Nor shagging around.
Having an independent income is a good thing.
No one said they were. But they are now. Now you attempt to claim that people who are not like you are "impossible" and that they "can't exist". Tribalism rules.
You did, by saying that feminism is the reason that the left loves lgbtqia++++++.
Of course you, and people like you, with opposite-sex ideation, "exist," Noah. It's ridiculous to make that silly claim that we think you "don't exist." All humans exist. If you didn't exist, how would you have typed your comments? Do we think you're a man just because YOU think you are? No we don't. But we see you. We just don't see your inner thoughts. We see your material reality. You are not your anime avatar.
Oh yeah, sure. Let's all cave in and agree to have our genitals hacked off. That'll show 'em.
Non sequitur. Lol.
So sorry that it went over your head.
It’s why the rest of us on the gender critical side of these issues have to waste our time answering to the charge that we “just hate trans people”.
Yes. We oppose AGPs who invade women's prisons and rape and impregnate their female cell mates.
Yes. We oppose "trans" people who brainwash young children into thinking that boys can be girls and girls can be boys.
Yes. We oppose doctors who poison teens and young adults with puberty blockers, cross sex hormones and genital mutilation surgery.
Yes. We oppose anyone and everyone who supports this blatant nonsense, the harmful "transgender" propaganda. And if you fail to understand that, you are in no way "gender critical."
The author of the piece opposes many of those things too. You do not get to decide who is gender critical or not because it's a broad church, from right to left and includes gay and trans people
What's a "trans person"? Is there a new category of human that's been created that can change sex through cosmetic surgeries and taking poison drugs? Really, I'm curious who you think these people are, and why you think this.
A trans person subjectively believes they are the sex other than the sex they are and therefore try to live as that sex. I believe it's no one else's business how they identify or live UNLESS it complicates the situation for women, such as access to women-only spaces.
But, evidently, your question is not posed in good faith because you clearly despise these people for reasons probably best kept to yourself (because I don't give af what triggers your disgust response).
'Groomer' is a childish slur, which precludes taking you seriously. I wouldn't care about the illiberal & intolerant types, like you, were it not for the fact that you give the lunatic misogynistic trans activist fringe the energy they need to push their idiot narratives about everyone hating trans people.
You are the trans activists' friend. Well done.
If it's true, as some say below, that the author is a biological male and still a heterosexual, then this article is brilliant satire (though satire isn’t what I'm paying for here). And further, if the author is a heterosexual, biological male, and the piece isn't brilliant satire, then it's... what? Pathetic nonsense? It's kind of like Rachel Dolezal, apparently a caucasian, becoming a leader in the NAACP, only instead of being found out and pilloried, let's say instead she became disenchanted with the direction of the NAACP and pilloried them? Talk about the pot calling the kettle... wait, maybe the Wedgewood Porcelain calling the...? I give up. I identify as a chef with a headache whose tired of hearing the cupboard inhabitants holler at each other. Where is my parade?
There's no "if". Hayton is a plain ole heterosexual male with a fetish who CONTINUES to take women's spaces.
Until he detransitions and lives honestly as a man who likes sexist feminine stereotypes, he has no credibility.
A man being feminine is sexist against women?
You might want to try rereading my comment.
Until Hayton detransitions and stops using the T word to describe himself, he has zero credibility. All he's doing is safeguarding the old definition against the new definition. There is no evidence foundation in his writing.
This is a great essay and very aligned with the thesis of one I wrote on Religion as a Psychology. The author and I pretty well align on that concept and it's true. Everyone is religious, we just have to realize what we are doing with ours!
https://polymathicbeing.substack.com/p/religion-as-a-psychology
Thank you for posting. We are all religious, but to use Megan Kelly, the difference between a religion and a cult is what happens if you leave. If you stop being Catholic, no one ex/communicated you. If you stop being Jewish, you aren’t dead to your family and friends. If you stop supporting the insanity of wokeism the followers are as terrible as any doomsday cult - you are fully ex-communicated and the cult attempts to destroy your life.
Religions actually ground people and give them purpose and a steady moral compass while cults destroy people in the name of their faux religion.
Islamic threaten death to those who leave the Muslim religion. Many other religions do great harm to those who leave. That definition does not stand.
The true difference between a cult and a religion is the comparison to alternate media and mainstream media.
Success of religiosity only works WITHIN that faith context. It does not work in different circumstances. Religions are social constructs. The same way voodoo sorta works on people who believe in voodoo.
The human brain is very capable at delusion.
I disagree. All cults are religions, but not all religions are cults. I stand by my definition. The size of a religious following has nothing to do with if it’s a cult - the replicated behavior of those who follow the religion, and the treatment of those who leave or criticize it, determine if a belief system is also a cult.
I agree that all cults are religions but not all religions are cults.
same way: all alternative media provide news, but mainstream news does not address the non corporate profiting news.
I agree that size is irrelevant, just as size of news outlet is irrelevant.
But replication patterns and departure consequences are across the board (to varying intensities), except for the the two main branches of Christianity, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism... and some cults.
Religion promotes people NOT learning how to develop a moral compass, and therefore relying on the religion to tell them what is right and wrong; what is moral or immoral. Religion teaches people to not think for themselves. It isn't grounding, because ones center isn't in oneself and one's relationship to the ground. It's about relying on the religion, and therefore is ungrounded. I'm not putting this very well. But I can't think of anything more ungrounded than relying on another group to give me a sense of purpose and moral compass. That means being guided by externals: the religious group.
I believe in reading widely from across the ideological spectrum in general, and on any given issue, and then using my critical thinking skills to carefully evaluate each source and what it says, and then thinking and deciding for myself. It is a grounding experience. I know I can always rely on myself to arrive at the best answers for myself. I seek out the viewpoints of others, but then evaluate and decide for myself. It is empowering and grounding. I feel solid in myself. My atheist parents taught me critical thinking skills before entering kindergarten, so that I would be able to critique, see through, and not be susceptible to religious myths and relying on others to do my thinking and reasoning. I encourage anyone who has not been taught this to study critical thinking and learn how to do it for oneself, and build confidence in their ability to decide for themselves what is and isn't moral.
I disagree completely. Based on observed outcomes, people who have a faith are far more moral - they contribute more to their communities, volunteer more, raise more fulfilled and successful children. Based on replicated data, religious people are on average materially more moral than non religious people.
Kids raised with religion are more likely to have a more successful life in every regard as adults - mental health, financial achievement, sense of happiness, and contributions to others. Success comes from the ability to make decisions and children raised with religion are more successful and less prone to self destructive habits.
You’re assertions about religion teaching people not to think is laughably inaccurate. It appears you were actually taught you to make assumptions and mistake them for facts. It’s clear you are a bigot towards religious people, so I won’t continue this any further, but I also won’t let such an ignorant and uniformed response to my comment go entirely unanswered.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2018/09/17/raising-kids-with-religion-or-spirituality-may-protect-their-mental-health-study/?sh=17af4c332874
Sure, people who's definition of morality is religious morality see more morality among the faithful of that morality. That is completely logical, and simultaneously completely irrelevant ;)
Other than the "moral compass" part I totally agree. Morality and social mores are nothing more than social constructs. All cultures through time and geography have had high degrees "moral" variability.
I think the word should be gotten rid of.
We live in cultures, these cultures have laws, we each fight for which laws seem more grounded to us, and against those that seem idiotic. Then through our social contract, we "obey" the rules we disagree with... or don't ;)
I think it was Henry David Thoreau who once wrote (I paraphrase from memory), "The English obey the law cuz it's the law, the French obey laws if they seem reasonable". :D
Great Article
grrrrrr gender critics need to stop giving Hayton the time of day.
This is a thoughtful essay about important issues. If we have a purity test to determine who is allowed to speak out on these issues, then we are no better than the Pride purveyors or the pronoun police, and we will never defeat them. The only thing accomplished by ad hominem attacks and vitriol will be the silencing of influential people who could have helped to make the case against gender mythology.
He's been allowed to speak his words, as we're used to men of ill character are always allowed to speak over women.
And all of the complainers in this comment section also have the right to speak on principles and how he is dishonest, specially since most of these female comments are from lesbians.
Amazing how they label lesbians defending their very definition as “purity politics”.
Hayton is of course 'allowed' to say what Hayton wants. I don't see anyone arguing for him to be censored. I certainly have not.
Where are the 'ad hominem attacks'? Pointing out he is male? Pointing out he is a fetishist (which he admits himself)? Pointing out that he has no claim to LGB pride as a heterosexual man? That he unilaterally imposed this on his wife & kids? Those are facts.
They may be facts, but they are about him, not about anything he wrote in this essay. That's the definition of ad hominem.
Yes, they are about what he wrote in this essay. Because he is claiming that pride was originally for people like him, when it was never for him, for the reasons outlined above.
"LGB" is a movement invented in the 21st century by gender critical activists. As a person who actually is same-sex attracted, this is an undeniable truth.
100%
As the ex-wife of a man who identified publicly as female in his mid-thirties, and says he's the mother of our 2 sons, I have to comment on the God talk. I don't get it. I don't see the place for it.
It is notable that God is "he" in this essay, causing me to conclude traditional Christianity, regarding the 'sexed" existence of God, in the mind of the author. As a Jew, (converted with Masorti rabbis in 1987) I believe the writing regarding "God's wrath" in the Pentateuch, in context of its antiquity, is about humans not knowing geology, seeking to understand floods, droughts, earthquakes and other traumatizing phenomena; why so many innocent humans die in them?
Using God in discussions of transsexuality, cross-dressing, cross-sex ideation and the like, is not part of my spirituality--and I consider myself to be a woman of faith. The "sexed soul" mantra hides between the lines here, in my reading of this unusual essay. This brand of mysticism has long been cultivated by the "sexologist" diagnosticians. It is not a useful schema, in a discussion of how to stop the harms gender ideology brings to a new generation in crisis. I do not see God discussions as useful here.
My ex-husband's fluctuations were weekly, daily, hourly, before his PhD psychologist decided I, his wife, "caused" him to "decide to live full-time as female" (direct quotes from 1996 sworn affidavit submitted in custody case) as a result of my choice not to stay in the marriage. Based on his own narrative of when he felt "transsexual" (his word, back then) and when he didn't (because sometimes he didn't, he said), I do not regard the underpinnings of this identity to be stable.
The PhD "sexologist" became a female "God," who meted out punishment of me through alienation of affection and propagandistic claims regarding our children's predicted "non-reactions." No. Our then 9 year old son said he wanted to kill himself and named three ways. The "sexologist" was completely wrong in saying our children would not be affected emotionally, but no one in this field follows up the family, finds out how the trans widow manages or whether someone in that unit experiences trauma. The feelings of the transsexual always weigh more than the rest of us. I will leave it to readers here to spend their own time looking up this author and his wife's public statements regarding her experiences during her husband's "transition." My heart goes out to her every time I see her husband publishing another essay, the constant self-referential habit, the everlasting claim to be "one of the good ones." My ex-husband, the "first female COO" in his company, has the same modus operandi, except he goes one step further, and pretends I do not exist.
Somatic therapy, Feldenkrais and Alexander work, psychoanalysis into the flaws of the male God schema, examination of childhood experiences of sexism and trauma, should be the first steps towards psychic/somatic wholeness/wellness when any individual goes for professional help with cross-sex ideation. It is not a stable diagnosis, there is no reliable measure to predict who will detransition and when.
Pride parades, for decades already, are over-focused on campy, overt sexuality, drag masquerades and the commodification of a lifestyle, a part of life that should be more private, more personal. See under: wildly successful, absolutely unrealistic, California-fied Grace and Frankie series, in which everyone moves on in a materialistic, silly and thoughtless consumerism when two men decide they love each other and leave their 30 years marriages. "Where's my beach house?" ask all the trans widows. "Where's the right to even tell my story?" we ask. I was assured recently that I'm right, only right wing media would interview me, and as well, Women's Declaration International. (Female Erasure by Ute Heggen--on YouTube)
As a step in the direction towards "first do no harm," I've posted somatic movement sets to heal from trauma, to reconnect mind/body, to feel your bones, your sinews, which are yours, which are sexed since birth, claim them for your best life.
https://wordpress.com/post/uteheggengrasswidow.wordpress.com/4778
We owe it to the next generation to regard every one of ourselves as potential influencers, as mentors, as examples. The pharma of "transition" is not wellness, at any age.
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (iuniverse, 2022)
"Behind the rainbows and the sparkles, and the banners and the flags, there is a totalitarian mindset that demands compliance."
This. So much this. I'm bi and have NEVER felt like I would actually belong at ' Pride ' due to the leftist political mindset & sexual exhibitionism that currently gets presented as part of the package deal to be welcome & have fun. I understand why some may have issues with this piece but I'm glad you're on our side, Debbie.
This is where Hayton is most dishonest. He still demands compliance... to his trans narrative, vs the more recent trans narrative.
It’s frustrating to see some of the bile in these comments, which appear to take no account of the author’s story. This style of gender critical discourse only energises the people it castigates.
I'd assume I don't agree with everything Debbie Hayton thinks or advocates for, but I'm happy to join hands with anyone willing to openly pushback against the speech-policing, bullying, misogyny, and authoritarianism that characterizes today's LGBTQ+ activism. And that includes any trans person who is honest about his/her origins, who isn't trying to impose an unhinged denial of biology and reality (eg "transwomen are women"). I don't know much about Debbie Hayton, but I looked for some background and found this UnHerd piece, which provides some useful context for the one published here.
https://unherd.com/2022/05/the-truth-about-autogynephilia/
But he's not pushing back in the general sense. He's only pushing back at the identity part, not the trans part.
I oppose the recent shift away from medical "gate keeping" to self-declared trans ID, which opens the flood gates to anyone for any purpose—including predatory—being able to access women's spaces; I also oppose the cult ideology that has grown out of Queer Theory and is indoctrinating children and steamrolling women's rights. In the prior "gate keeping" model, such easy access wasn't available and my sense is that it wasn't really a societal problem. If you have other information or perspectives on that I'm open to hearing them.
"sefl-id" is irrelevant.
Strictly no one has a "soul" born into the wrong body
Absolutely no human has any sex change, no matter the amount of surgery and opposite sex hormones.
Only because you've not known this man for as long as we have, or have not paid attention to all the horrible content he's provided over the years.
I don't know the history you're alluding to. Can you be more specific? What horrible content?
Well, he admits to being a fetishist and getting off on dressing up and LARPing as a woman, and he also teaches children, while dressed up as a woman, therefore he is parading his fetish in front of children. No one actually concerned with safeguarding should ignore that.
He ignores his wife's obvious distress over his 'transition' as can be seen via video. His fetish is more important than his wife & kids.
https://odysee.com/@YoureKiddinRight:b/stella-o'malley-and-the-debbie-hayton:7
Thanks for explaining and providing the video link.
I'm curious whether you (or others objecting here) would denounce and label as LARPing someone like Blaire White, who transitioned due to severe gender dysphoria from early childhood? Are you objecting to all transitioning, or only that which can be linked to paraphilias like AGP? Does it make any difference if the person goes through full surgery? If their transition doesn't involve abandonment of a marriage or children?
I've known and corresponded with DH for several years.
Aaaand THAT is called "grooming." You and people like Graham Linehan, who accompanied Hayton to a serious feminist event at which Hayton thought it would be helpful to swan about the feminist event in a sundress, and men like you and Linehan support this behavior and defend him. Kellie Jay confronted him about it, but I don't see you supporting Kellie Jay and the feminists who don't want to see this men in a dress lauded for his behavior and supported and defended by men like you and Linehan, who are allowing themselves to be groomed by this groomer to the extent that you will defend him against critics who are women. Very telling about your priorities and your values! Listen to men who LARP as women, even at a feminist event, and not women.
Well if you don't see the problem with DH you're on the wrong side of history.
This is SO well articulated—our societal moment in a nutshell:
"But those God-shaped holes are still there. We still have that innate need to be seen as good people, and that desire is unlikely to evolve out of our species any time soon. So, my former neighbor goes to Pride, because Pride checks the boxes. There is ritual, and there is tradition. Parades are public: simply being a good person is not enough, we need others to see we are good people. If that is insufficient, we post it on social media.
"The churches—sorry, organizations—that organize, perpetuate, and benefit from Pride have their creeds and their commandments: Transwomen are Women, and Thou shalt not misgender. They collect donations (tithes?) from individuals and organizations to proselytize their gospel of equality, diversity and inclusion. They ask allies to express guilt for their original sin—straight or “cis”-privilege.
"There is a special priestly class—the trans—that supposedly possesses some mysterious special knowledge about what it means to be human. With their claims of a special soul, or rather “gender identity,” they are revered and lauded. But only so long as they keep the faith."
I see the writer's point--but perhaps it's progress that Pride has become many things to many people. In my small New England town, Pride celebrations have been a wonderful celebration of diversity and individuality--when anyone can dress or look however they want. As a straight, cis man, I've always loved the celebratory nature of the event as well as its inclusivity. It's message of "you're welcome and worthwhile just as you are," seems hopeful regardless of your sexuality.
I suppose there's a need to not be integrated--to protest whatever the status quo is and to root out inequality, intolerance, and injustice. To put it in a more negative light: if you aren't identified as a victim, you need to look for more ways to say you are one. (This is especially true of teenagers and young adults!) But PRIDE seems more of an antidote to that impulse than an accelerator.
PR$DE was not about victimization, it was a show of strength by and for same-sex attracted people. You have it totally wrong. It was not a place for non-same-sex-attracted people to celebrate their sexuality. It was a community bonding event for same sex attracted people. Married heterosexual fathers who like to wear dresses and LARP as women were never much of a presence because these men are historically extremely homophobic and did not want to be included with gay people. That is an historic fact. Now you come along with your revisionist history, mischaracterizing PR$DE from you heterosexual male POV. The fact that you had never noticed that PR$DE has been hijacked away from same-sex attracted people, and that you see it as some kind of celebration of victimization, means you are clearly part of the problem and don't know any history. Maybe look at the history of PR$DE from a historically LGB POV, not an interloper's POV, which is what you have. Maybe you should not have been there in the first place. You OR Hayton, despite the fact that you both feel completely entitled to be there.
Hmm. I don't think I can find a way to put this kindly. You need to get out of your defensive ideological crouch and actually learn how to read. I did not write that Pride was a celebration of victimization. What I actually wrote was: "PRIDE seems more of an antidote to that impulse than an accelerator." It obviously pushes your buttons to listen to a heterosexual male's perspective. You leap to the conclusion that you're being "straightsplained." Okay, I get that. But maybe resist that impulse and actually pay attention to what's being said.
I am a heterosexual female who used to go to Pride because several of my dearest friends were gay and came out at a time when there was still a lot of stigma. I liked to go to pride with them to celebrate them. I liked the experience also of being removed from hetero society for the weekend of celebrations (as mainstream hetero society which was very male-ruled at the time often felt quite threatening to me as a young woman). But I definitely did notice over the years the random hetero people who weren’t content to just watch from the sidelines as I was but who wanted to feel like a deeper part of the community. It is one thing to be uncertain about your sexuality and trying to figure it out when you’re young; it is another to keep pushing and pushing to try and be a part of a community that really has no place for you because it isn’t about you… I know people like that, straight women who only date men but have fooled around with women so always claimed to be “queer.” They always attended pride wanting so badly for it to be all about them. Now that they can slap the non binary trans label on themselves to legitimize their queer obsession. An old friend of mine (not friends anymore) now calls herself queer and applies for special grants for queer artists etc because she decided to call herself non binary, even though she only dates men. She also dresses like a woman and likes to rant about how non binary people don’t “owe” anyone androgyny. She has always been someone who wants the spot light on herself and tries to make everything about her. It was when people like her started being more and more in the spotlight at pride that I stopped going. That and when BLM made demands from pride in our city that were totally bizarre and idiotic and did nothing to help relations between cops/the gay community whatsoever. Then it just became obvious that pride was not for gay people anymore; it was for trendy left wing political statements and for people who have a serious victim complex and just want attention for it. So I’ll leave them to that.
And that is who Hayton is, a married heterosexual father who likes wearing dresses who now thinks that he's integral to the original intent of PR$DE, not one of the horrid interlopers who've ruined it for same-sex attracted people. That is precisely why I object to Colin Wright platforming his idiocy and hubris as if it makes sense. This is supposed to be Reality's LAST Stand. It seems like reality is truly losing on this blog. Very sad.
Colin will "be kind" actual homosexual people to their graves. Using preferred pronouns for people who agree with him is insidious because it proves lying is quite alright as long as the person you're lying to is agreeable. How about a piece written by actual LGB on why they don't attend Pride? Because Debbie Hayton would be one of the reasons. "Rules for thee and not for me!"
That's right. If you don't spout the approved orthodoxy you can't be a Brownshirt.
So telling the truth is akin to "approved orthodoxy" and being a Brownshirt in your eyes? Very telling.
The truth as you see it. I note both of you are really big on labelling everything according to your religion. Every person must fit in a box so everyone can be perpetually oppressed. You're welcome to your view of the world. Your insistence on using the wrong pronouns is equally "telling". Only you are the arbiter of truth. LoL.
I commented the same thing and it was deleted. Debbie is a man who is attracted to women. He doesn't belong at Pride. He's called himself a lesbian and has actively pushed for mixed sex toilets in England. A wolf in sheep's clothing.
Well, my comment hasn't been deleted so far. This article is a shocking act of opprobrium, and so far commenters see that. I wonder how many comments have been deleted other than yours?
Not sure. Maybe Colin can weigh in on how many he's deleted?
Don't forget parades his self-admitted autogynophilic fetish at school every day where he works.
And he showed up at a feminist event a few months back parading around in a sundress, where he knew he would make women uncomfortable. Kellie Jay spoke to him about it, Linehan defended him.
And now he's acting like HE has any business speaking about PR$DE? Could Colin not find an actual LGB person to write this article rather than a heterosexual married autogynephilic male whom lesbians and bisexual women find GREATLY offensive? This is quite shocking. Everytime this man is allow to write/speak for women and/or LGB people, it is beyond offensive. Sad that Colin, for whom I have great respect, does not understand this.
If an LGB person would like to send me an article about why they no longer attend pride, I'd be more than happy to evaluate it for publication. It would be great to get a variety of perspectives on this topic.
I would not be able to write that piece, because I attend all PR$DE events specifically to document (among other issues) the enormous number of these heterosexual LARPers, male and female, who lay claim o the now-cool "queer" identity and who have almost completely usurped PR$DE (along with all orgs originally created by and for same-sex attracted people), along with the straight supporters of these LARPing men and women who center and promote them and their POVs. This straight male no longer wants to attend PR$DE because of the take over of men like him and his supporters? Ironic, and not very self-aware. Not that I'm surprised by that. Shame.
I've mostly stopped reading Lineham since then. It's too bad, because in Lineham's early days, he was much more firmly in the camp of radical feminists, since then he's shifted gears and is more into clickbait than principles.
So women can wear whatever they want, but a man can't wear a sundress if he so pleases? How does that make any sense?
Great to see you here, Belissa! Please come back to the thread for my comments, as the ex-wife of a man similar to this author. Ute Heggen
I think the two used to be conflated because trans was such a small and insignificant group that there wasn’t much point in celebrating them separately and alone so they just sort of glomped onto the LGB Pride movement. But now bizarrely here they are trying to take over the entire thing. Even though they are still the smallest group—a tiny minority in society.
The latest statistics from elite women's colleges, such as Smith, have the LG+alphabet soup category at 40%. Smith is a women's liberal arts college, and on these campuses, the influence of gender ideology promotes this higher level of self-identification. The self-ID as "lesbian" is much lower, something like 2.6%. A woman who thinks she's a man once said to me, "There are more of us than people originally thought--my job is to help educate everyone." It's a zealous, jealous ideology, where the ethos of family & helping the less fortunate, is subsumed by politically motivated identity-recruitment. What boggles the mind is the capitalist and profit-oriented mindset of treatments involving hormone and surgeries, loads of extra make-up and wardrobe. These kids are much more self-involved than the hippies of my day.
We always get these simplistic questions with the word "hate" strategically placed. Davis E, do your research. In a podcast at OurPath.org, Hayton and wife Stephanie reveal how Stephanie was railroaded into staying in this marriage, which she clearly said she wanted out of. Belissa is expressing the frustration women experience, (regardless of sexual orientation) when men who have this mental illness insist on being "treated as a full-time woman" in our spaces. This means that men like D. Hayton, who openly says he is an autogynophile (a man who is sexually stimulated by the thought of himself as a woman) and at the same time claims to remember times in his early childhood prior to the age when a child is actually able to retain memory. The God language in this essay represents a religious stance/experience which is not uncommon among those who ideate they are the opposite sex. The religious context indicated stereotyped behaviors and roles for men and women, ingrained in children raised within this sex-delineated schema. D. Hayton has spoken of taking over the bread making in his family when he was going through "transition," as if there have not been male bakers since antiquity. The author of this piece has also said that he does consider whether he might have made a mistake in doing the surgeries and putting his family through the entire process, but as he said in a British magazine called Hood, he did it, it is irreversible, so there's no going back. He does use the women's facilities when he attends conferences, despite saying he knows he's male. He does not warn adult males of the serious dangers of cross-sex hormones and surgeries; incontinence, repeated emergency surgeries, bone demineralization, organ failure and early onstage dementia. This happens in males who took this path well into adulthood. Your use of the word hate is irrelevant.
I disagree with Belissa about whether Colin Wright should host this essay, though. It is quite revealing of the convoluted thinking of "the good ones."
Ute Heggen, author, In the Curated Woods, True Tales from a Grass Widow (iuniverse, 2022)
It contains many facts. Sorry about that.
What is a "trans person"? Can you define that?
Can humans "trans" sex somehow? Isn't this dude just a dude? And if this dude isn't just a dude, what makes him not a dude?
If you think that a person can "trans" sex, maybe "Reality's Last Stand" isn't the place for you!
Great point, Belissa. It all boils down to whether "true trans" exists. I do not see it as real, and I was next to it, hearing the obsessive, "I'm so feminine" narrative from my then-husband, having fights with him about trivia like how long his fingernails were, how he's accidentally scratching our 3 year old, because he doesn't know how to move with long nails.
While the desire to morph into the opposite sex might feel very traumatic and frightening, it is actually no different from any other complex PTSD. The "sexologists" want to reach down into childhood diagnoses, because their etiology is all about "since childhood." It is pure and simple mental health malpractice, conflicts of interest because of how lucrative it is. There is no other area in psychology where the patient has to obtain the holy grail, a letter to a surgeon. This in itself created conflict of interest. The defensiveness stems from the fact that there is no validity in the trans diagnosis. Traumatized, in crisis--yes. Opposite sex in your head? Not real.
uteheggengrasswidow.wordpress.com for somatic mind/body alternatives for dissociation
And thanks, BC!
Calling a lesbian an "illness" for not wanting a straight man at Pride... hilarious.