The Week In Woke: Experts Abound Edition

Sex-"change" surgeries nearly tripled in the US from 2016 to 2019 due to Obama-imposed policies.

The number of gender surgeries in the US nearly tripled in the three years up until 2019 -- driven by insurance policy changes introduced by former President Barack Obama, a new study says.

Only around 4,550 Americans sought such sex-change surgeries in 2016 -- a number that shot up to more than 13,000 by 2019, according to a Columbia University study published Wednesday in JAMA Network Open.

"Consistent with prior studies, we identified a remarkable increase in the number" of such procedures, study author Dr. Jason Wright wrote.

"These findings suggest that the number of procedures performed in the US has increased dramatically, nearly tripling from 2016 to 2019."

Speaking of the Obamas and transgenderism:

I betcha she's got a dick like a big ol' leg o' lamb.

The genderblender industry has "parasitized" people's emotions for profit, an expert says.

Alasdair Gunn, vice director of advocacy Genspect, warns that the gender industry has "parasitized" people's emotions by pushing the transgender agenda, including hyping up claims about suicidality risk among people who feel different about their sex.

In an interview with Jan Jekielek on the Aug. 17 episode of "American Thought Leaders," Mr. Gunn suggested that even though the gender industry presents itself as some sort of social welfare group, it is purely a business exploiting people's feelings. "They say their little messages about they're saving trans lives, and they put little hearts and unicorns and rainbows. The surgeons aren't charity workers, they're being paid. The people who hold the stocks and shares ... they're not doing it out of the goodness of their [hearts]. This is an industry. And I think that it's an abnormal industry," he said.

"It's an industry which has managed to rig all sorts of quite deeply emotional things in order to serve itself by bringing statutes of limitations down to absurdly short lengths so that if you regret your surgery after three years, in some states in the United States, it's too late. Three years. So, you've got the rest of your life with a body part that you don't want."

"So, it's parasitized people's emotions."

...

Mr. Gunn pointed out that there is a "script" used to push young people into the path of gender transitioning. Youngsters receive the "script" from their friends, he claimed.
"I think the best way to think about this script is, it's like if your child found a poem that resonated. The feeling is probably real. But the information in it is not real. So when they say 'I'm at risk of suicide,' this is something they've learned from their friends."

"Now, we've actually no evidence of that. It's a very complicated and thorny issue, but there's no evidence of that. They tell one another, and they believe it, that they're at great risk of suicide if they don't transition."

Mr. Gunn pointed out that while certain studies do show that suicidality is higher among some young people who question their gender, there are studies showing that suicidal tendencies are even higher among bisexuals.

However, "We don't take all bisexuals and say, 'Right, we must rush you to a doctor,'" he said. "That's not necessarily a medical issue. And it's certainly not evidence of a bodily problem, a physiological problem."

I first wrote that a "critic" said all that. Then I thought about using the word "expert," which he clearly is, by the standard media definition of the term. I don't usually use the word "expert" to describe political actors because it's a inherently, transparently manipulative tactic to make you agree with the "expert" before you even hear his claim, or his evidence for that claim. And the media does this all day, every day, dubbing the uninformed, uneducated people it likes -- all those "Disinformation" experts who realized they were experts in this suddenly-arriving field the moment the government and corporations started paying money to people who put "Disinformation specialist" in their twitter bios -- "experts."

And meanwhile, actual experts who say things they disagree with are termed "conservatives," "right-leaning critics," or, if you're Larry Elder, "the black face of white supremacy."

But whatever, if we just call the people we agree with "experts" and those who disagree with us "extremists," then I'll play too.

You guys are now all officially Experts. Congratulations, you've been waiting for this day for zero days and you worked not at all for this great honor. Like the rest of the media's cadre of "experts."

The expert Alice Cooper offers his expert opinion that trangenderism is "absurd."

Rock legend Alice Cooper -- who pioneered performative gender-bending on stage -- believes that generation woke's obsession with transgenderism is a "fad" that has gotten so out of control that it is now "laughable."

Alice Cooper took particular issue with gender transitions for children in an interview this week with Stereogum.

"I'm understanding that there are cases of transgender, but I'm afraid that it's also a fad, and I'm afraid there's a lot of people claiming to be this just because they want to be that," he said. "I find it wrong when you've got a six-year-old kid who has no idea. He just wants to play, and you're confusing him telling him, 'Yeah, you're a boy, but you could be a girl if you want to be.'"

He continued:

I think that's so confusing to a kid. It's even confusing to a teenager. You're still trying to find your identity, and yet here's this thing going on, saying, "Yeah, but you can be anything you want. You can be a cat if you want to be." I mean, if you identify as a tree... And I'm going, "Come on! What are we in, a Kurt Vonnegut novel?" It's so absurd, that it's gone now to the point of absurdity.

The expert Alice Cooper also declares: "I don't know one person that agrees with the woke thing. I don't know one person. Everybody I talk to says, "Isn't it stupid?"

Cooper, a devout Christian, went on to say that the desire to "respect" others' gender non-conformity has gone too far.

"It's getting to the point now where it's laughable. If anybody was trying to make a point on this thing, they turned it into a huge comedy," he said.

I feel like, at this point, I should have known that he was a devout Christian, but I never did hear that.

Alice Cooper. Wow. Would not have called that. I knew he leaned a bit to the right side (or to the sane side, at least) but would have not have thought of "Alice Cooper" and "Devout Christian" in the same sentence.

Is there any possibility that the expert Alice Cooper is right, and that the "fad" of transgenderism is just spreading among young people because they are sad, lonely, afraid and confused?

Why, as a matter of fact, there is a great deal of evidence to support the expert Alice Cooper's expert opinion.

There was a pretty dramatic story published by NBC News [last] Wednesday about a surging mental health crisis among teens. Teens are said to be overwhelming local ERs which aren't really equipped to provide the level of support that seems to be needed.

"The scope of this problem is really great," said Dr. Mohsen Saidinejad, a professor of emergency medicine and pediatrics at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. "But our ability to solve it is not there."...

Dr. Willough Jenkins, medical director of emergency and consultation liaison psychiatry at Rady Children's Hospital in San Diego, is on the front line of the surge.

She said that the number of kids seeking psychiatric emergency care in her ER has grown from approximately 30 a month in recent years to 30 a day.

"The volume is astronomical, and I don't know that people fully understand how many people are struggling," said Jenkins, who was not involved with the new policy statement...

"The bulk of these children are coming in with depression, anxiety and trauma," Jenkins said.

Could it be that teenage girls, a cohort in which transgenderism has exploded by, what was it, 7000%?, are in a state of particularly poor mental health?

Well yes, it could be, according to the CDC, which you all know are Experts who never make mistakes, ever, and if they do, then those were Good Mistakes which needed to be made.

Almost 3 in 5 teenage girls reported feeling so persistently sad or hopeless almost every day for at least two weeks in a row during the previous year that they stopped regular activities -- a figure that was double the share of boys and the highest in a decade, CDC data showed.

Girls fared worse on other measures, too, with higher rates of alcohol and drug use than boys and higher levels of being electronically bullied, according to the 89-page report. Thirteen percent had attempted suicide during the past year, compared to 7 percent of boys.

John Sexton then writes:

There's also an interesting political element to this discussion. It turns out that the kids struggling the most tend to be liberal/progressive teens.

You don't say.

You don't say.

You don't say.

You don't say.

Say not you do, said Yoda.

NY Times columnist Michelle Goldberg initially planned to write an article about this trend claiming that Donald Trump was driving progressive teens crazy but after researching the issue (to her credit) she concluded that wasn't what was happening. In fact, the problem the NBC News story above is highlighting is one that has been building since before Trump was president.

Read the rest of the piece if this interests you. Even noted vicious partisan monster Matthew Yglesias admits there's a problem with the mental health of progressive kids, and suspects that it might have something to do with the progressive culture of frailty, the culture of "empowerment" by cultivating weakness, as well as the constant propaganda of soon-arriving cataclysms that these young, stupid, progressive kids are bombarded with every single day just to make sure they yank the lever for the Democrats on their eighteenth birthday.

Glenn Reynolds recently wrote about neuroticism, particularly female neuroticism, and it's central and vital importance to the Democrat Party.

Neurotic, unhappy women are the most dieheard of Democrat diehards. That is obvious.

And the Democrats are doing everything in their power to make women more neurotic and more unhappy.

As Tyler Cowen observes, "I've said this before, but the evidence for the proposition continues to mount: current political debate in America cannot be understood without the concept of neuroticism -- as a formal concept from personality psychology -- front and center.'

And we seem to be getting more neurotic all the time, as a society. Though really, the sector that's growing neurotic the fastest is single, liberal women, who as Michael Barone points out are really outliers in the electorate.

...

Likewise, Jonathan Haidt notes that the rapid decline in mental health among young (under 35) people took place first and fastest among young liberal women, and the charts he displays are dramatic.

...

Reading all of these pieces I'm seeing a story that goes something like this: Depressed, neurotic people (especially single women) are more likely to support Democrats. Democrats support policies and messaging that produce more depressed, neurotic people, especially single women.

Now maybe this is an accident, but maybe it isn't....

Making the populace (especially women) more fearful, depressed, and neurotic is undoubtedly bad for societal wealth and happiness. But does it yield votes for Democrats? Clearly yes. Are they doing it on purpose?

In my expert opinion, we need to study this issue more carefully before chancing firm answers, but that said, my firm answer is "Yes, obviously."

Mrs. Meyer's soap has released an ad, which I guess is supposed to appeal to women, featuring a drag queen mocking women.

The ad is really too much. Click on the link to see it.

Latest to put out an ad featuring an insulting approximation of womanhood is Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day, in collaboration with Christopher Griffin, who self-describes as "black, queer, and nonbinary femme."

Most of the time I find this kind of thing more laughable than insulting, but this is an exception, up there with Nike's decision to have a rail-thin, titless man model sports bras. It has long been pointed out that whatever trans (or black, queer, and nonbinary femme) people identify as when they say "woman" is just a cacophony of the shallowest and most air-brained stereotypes of the biological category of adult human females. This is no exception.

If anything, the added layer of domestic labor makes it. . . worse? One of the most foundational aspects of first- and second-wave feminism was getting women out of the captivity of domestic roles and into the workforce, smashing the idea that a woman's place is necessarily in the home. But Griffin's performance seems to suggest that being "femme" means being a dutiful, diligent-- not to mention ditzy-- housewife.

What's the difference in messaging between Griffin prancing around in heels and a headscarf, spritzing cleaning product (and using WAY too much dish soap-- do we women not even get the compliment of being economical?) and Griffin demanding of some broad, "Make me a sandwich"?

There really is no getting around the fact that this is mocking, uncharitable "impersonation" of a woman.

So how are the drag queens getting away with this? How are they actually praised by leftwing feminists?

I think I know: Leftwing feminists grasp that this is a mockery of women. But they approve of it, because drag queens perform a mockery of 50s-60s era traditionalist women. Not the mannish, severe, unsmiling scolds of modern "enlightened" feminism. So the left finds this to be an attack on their enemies, and approves.

Speaking of feminists, this particular pro-transgender woke feminist admits that all of the "hatred" that feminists rail against is actually coming from... feminists themselves, in the form of internnalized hatred of themselves for being women. That's at 1:11, if the auto-cue doesn't work.

Speaking of "experts:" NBC is blaming LibsofTikTok for the shooting of a woman in LA, supposedly after an argument about the LGBT "Pride" flag she hung outside her store.

They cite an "online safety expert," a vicious male transgender with a history of hateful tweets -- he encouraged his antifa allies to make Supreme Court Justices feel threatened -- for this absurd attack.

"Online safety expert," y'all.

I'd like to think that garrett is an online safety expert, by which I mean, of course, a total pussy.

Libs of TikTok
@libsoftiktok

NBC and trans activists are blaming a murder on @MattWalshBlog
and myself because we dared criticize shoving the progress pride flag down the throats of children.

Thr media is truly the enemy of the people. They deserve your disgust and contempt.

And so they shall have it!

An Illinois grade-school teacher who was a trans Satanist with a history of "mania and psychosis" has been fired in a rare instance of prioritizing kids' safety and mental health over their teachers'.

An Illinois elementary school teacher has been fired after Libs of TikTok exposed posts they had made on social media worshipping Satan, slamming police, and admitting to suffering from bipolar disorder with mania and psychosis.

Kris Martin's posts went viral, and eventually caused the Homer Community Consolidated School District 33C to take action and terminate the recently hired teacher.

BREAKING: @Homer33c board just voted unanimously to fire the satan worshipping teacher who suffers from “mania and psychosis” which leads him to be “violent and hurtful.” https://t.co/PC0MYkX086 pic.twitter.com/oILKT3Ukwh

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) August 20, 2023

Via David Strom, who notes that we've had to deal with insanity and perversion for all 300,000 years of human history.

What is new and dangerous, however, is the mad embrace of these things by our Learned Classes.

gender is harmful
@genderisharmful

One last note on this...

Whatever this man is doing, wherever he is doing it, there are many many people, teachers, other education related professionals and others, who have been complicit in indulging him and what he does.

They are all to blame for facilitating this.

Yes, exactly.

This twitter user, "gender is harmful," objected to this obviously severely damaged individual having free unsupervised 1-on-1 meetings with children who are themselves disturbed or "odd," and had the police contact him, warning that he was being investigated for a crime.

From Reduxx:

But while the short thread posted by Gender is Harmful provided only general information already in the public domain, the user was quickly contacted by Northumbria police. Curiously, the force is one Smith has worked with in the past, providing training on "how to better support people with autism who come into police custody."

Speaking to Reduxx, Gender is Harmful, who wished to stay anonymous for his safety, provided copies of the multiple emails he was sent by police constable Will Sutton.

In the first, Sutton asks to speak to whoever is responsible for the Gender is Harmful X account, to which the user declined. Sutton then wrote once again shortly after, this time clarifying his reasons for communications and stating a "grown up conversation" was required. In an email littered with grammatical errors, Sutton wrote:

"I'm wanting to speak to them regarding a post that has caused a lot of negative comments and abuse which at this stage I may be able to deal with via a grown up conversation with those involved although if it continues it might lead to criminal matters around harassment or malicious communications so if you could let me know who it is that would be useful. If needs be I'll have to go through relevant channels," Sutton wrote. "I look forward to your decent, helpful and law abiding response."

And speaking of exercising reasonable caution: An FBI contractor has been charged with Committing the Crime That Leftists and LGBT Extremists Claim Does Not Exist.

The U.S. Department of Justice charged a former FBI contractor with child sex crimes on Wednesday, alleging that the Virginia man had contacted roughly a dozen minor boys.

Brett Janes, 26, allegedly contacted the boys on the Snapchat and Discord messaging apps. He also allegedly used his position with the FBI to entice the victims into conversations and relationships with him.

"He allegedly groomed the minors by telling them he worked for a U.S. intelligence agency before repeatedly threatening suicide if the minors did not continue to communicate with him," the DOJ wrote in a Wednesday statement.

"Janes allegedly enticed one victim, a 13-year-old boy whom he met through the first-person shooter game Valorant, to strip and masturbate over a live video Discord call by threatening to kill himself and by paying him money over CashApp," the statement continued.

"He allegedly enticed a 12-year-old boy to create and send him child sexual abuse material (CSAM) over Discord through flattery and repeated begging. Janes allegedly received child sexual abuse material from these two minors, as well as two separate minor victims, and attempted to meet up with a minor. He also allegedly purchased hundreds of videos and images of child sexual abuse material from Telegram," the DOJ further alleged.

Janes faces two counts of sexual exploitation of children and production of CSAM, one count of attempted coercion and enticement, and one count of receipt of child pornography. If convicted on all counts, he will face a minimum of 15 years and a maximum of life in prison.

Although the leftwing propaganda media keeps telling me that pedophilia is either just a conspiracy theory or a teeny tiny problem that only madmen and White Supremacists would take seriously, we keep seeing cases of real life pedophiles.

In England, a drag queen featured on television has been caught by pedophile-hunters.

A drag artist known by the stage name 'Miss Gin' had been snared by paedophile hunters, a court heard. Andrew Way, of Clwyd Wen in Wrexham, appeared before a judge at Caernarfon Crown Court having admitted to attempting to engage in sexual communications with a child as well as breaching his existing sexual harm prevention order.

Way, who appeared on Judge Rinder's ITV show back in 2019, was reported to Dyfed Powys Police in July 2023 by a member of a paedophile hunter group for his online activity. Way believed he had been chatting to a 14-year-old boy since June this year.

However, the 'child' was in fact a decoy created by the online group in a bid to snare internet predators. The court heard that the boy's age was "clearly stated" on the fake profile.

Another parent and citizen attempted to read the pornographic books woke government schools are pushing on kids, and was physically removed by security.

I guess he was one of those "terrorists" that Merrick Garland has directed his Stasi Bureau of Investigation to spy on.

But the book Flamer -- or, as AllahPundit* used to call it, Toni Morrison's Beloved -- will continue to be made available to little children, despite the unsuitability of it being read to adults.

Libs of TikTok did succeed in getting this gay porn picture book removed from a Georgia school.

Another book available in that school district is "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl," which features kids talking about cuninglingus.

Is that too passee?

Alright, throw analingus into the mix too.

I'm sure you all recognize that passage from "Toni Morrison's Beloved: The AllahPundit Explicated Edition."

* AllahPundit is of course a Noted Expert in his own right, in the field of obsessive, manic perseveration.

Perseveration, in the fields of psychology, psychiatry, and speech-language pathology, is the repetition of a particular response (such as a word, phrase, or gesture) regardless of the absence or cessation of a stimulus.,

Such as "Buh Muh Trump." Or "Buh Muh Radical Republican Party."

It is usually caused by a brain injury or other organic disorder.[1] Symptoms include "lacking ability to transition or switch ideas appropriately with the social context, as evidenced by the repetition of words or gestures after they have ceased to be socially relevant or appropriate",[2] or the "act or task of doing so",[3] and are not better described as stereotypy (a highly repetitive idiosyncratic behaviour).

In a broader sense, it is used for a wide range of functionless behaviours that arise from a failure of the brain to either inhibit prepotent responses or to allow its usual progress to a different behavior, and includes impairment in set shifting and task switching in social and other contexts.[4]

In other words, perseveration is marked by pointless, futile, purposeless repetition of words (or actions) and an inability to change tracks to direct one's train of thought towards a different destination.

The primary definition of perseveration in biology and clinical psychiatry involves some form of response repetition or the inability to undertake set shifting (changing of goals, tasks or activities) as required, and is usually evidenced by behaviours such as words and gestures continuing to be repeated despite absence or cessation of a stimulus.[1][2][3][4]

More broadly in clinical psychology, it describes mental or physical behaviours which are not excessive in terms of quantity but are apparently both functionless and involve a narrow range of behaviours.

For an example of the word, one would use a scenario. Two women are going camping, and when they briefly leave their campsite and return, they find their belongings missing. One assumes it was their neighbor and perseverates throughout the evening. "I bet our neighbor stole our chairs," and again "it has to be the neighbor." The woman continued the utterance, even well after the crime had taken place.

Come on you know it was Trump.

Etymologically, the term derives from "persevere", meaning "to continue determinedly", from Latin "perseverare", meaning "to persist": persistent behaviour directed toward an identifiable goal is called "perseverance", but when not directed toward such a goal is called "perseveration". In general English, "perseveration" refers to insistent or redundant repetition, not necessarily in a clinical context.[5]