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stormirdgz 's review for:
Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters
by Abigail Shrier
medium-paced
There are a lot of valid and interesting points in this about the way young girls socialize, the validity of their need to belong, the difficulty of finding your place, and other esteem issues that are always rampant in that age demographic. I think that those core issues are important when looking at pre-teens and teens who want to make permanent or nearly permanent changes to their body.
I appreciated the kindness that adult Trans people were given and the way their humanity was carefully laid out before each interview with them even if the author had issues with their videos and/or choices.
I also thought that the section on Doctor’s responsibilities in all of this was a great addition, and the emphasis needed on being able as a medical professional to question the choices and wants of a teenager was super important as well. The culpability of these children’s choices aren’t on them or even their parents, but on the medical professionals that validate these dangerous choices out of fears of not being inclusionary.
However, there was a lot here that I think went way off the path and can be dangerous for the audience that will pick this up the most.
There was a lot of snide side comments on therapy and therapists for children. This is extremely dangerous because while the conversation on the over-medication of children and the Mis-diagnosis of children’s mental health issues are valid, dismissing therapy for children at best and villianizing it at worst is exceptionally dangerous.
I also thought the suggestions of taking away a child’s access for the Internet, phone, and even moving them to more remote locations to combat the issues presented as horrible. Genuinely horrible. This, in my personal opinion, would only push children more into seeing their online friends and in person friend groups as safer places than their homes. It only further alienates them from their family.
Lastly, I still find myself unsure of who exactly the audience of this book is supposed to be. A lot of the parents interviewed are more socially-liberal and accepting in broad terms but found issue with their daughter’s choice due to what they saw as bad reasoning and decision making. A majority of the audience this will find though are not accepting of the LGBT community period and the suggestions, comments, and other POV’s pushed in this could only make their children’s life less happy and more dangerous possibly. I don’t know if it’s entirety can be appreciated by either political side of the issue really which makes me further confused on who exactly it was written for.
I appreciated the kindness that adult Trans people were given and the way their humanity was carefully laid out before each interview with them even if the author had issues with their videos and/or choices.
I also thought that the section on Doctor’s responsibilities in all of this was a great addition, and the emphasis needed on being able as a medical professional to question the choices and wants of a teenager was super important as well. The culpability of these children’s choices aren’t on them or even their parents, but on the medical professionals that validate these dangerous choices out of fears of not being inclusionary.
However, there was a lot here that I think went way off the path and can be dangerous for the audience that will pick this up the most.
There was a lot of snide side comments on therapy and therapists for children. This is extremely dangerous because while the conversation on the over-medication of children and the Mis-diagnosis of children’s mental health issues are valid, dismissing therapy for children at best and villianizing it at worst is exceptionally dangerous.
I also thought the suggestions of taking away a child’s access for the Internet, phone, and even moving them to more remote locations to combat the issues presented as horrible. Genuinely horrible. This, in my personal opinion, would only push children more into seeing their online friends and in person friend groups as safer places than their homes. It only further alienates them from their family.
Lastly, I still find myself unsure of who exactly the audience of this book is supposed to be. A lot of the parents interviewed are more socially-liberal and accepting in broad terms but found issue with their daughter’s choice due to what they saw as bad reasoning and decision making. A majority of the audience this will find though are not accepting of the LGBT community period and the suggestions, comments, and other POV’s pushed in this could only make their children’s life less happy and more dangerous possibly. I don’t know if it’s entirety can be appreciated by either political side of the issue really which makes me further confused on who exactly it was written for.