Modern medicine is a negation of health. It isn’t organized to serve human health, but only itself, as an institution. It makes more people sick than it heals.
–Ivan Illich
Munchausen syndrome by proxy: a condition where a caregiver or spouse fabricates, exaggerates, or induces mental or physical health problems in those who are in their care, with the primary motive of gaining attention or sympathy from others. (Wikipedia)
Many detractors of gender medicine have pointed out that trans identification in children often smacks of Munchausen syndrome— attention-seeking parents, craving attention and accolades on social media, long for and eventually create a “special” child, to make themselves feel special. These special children, today, are more often than not, America’s “trans” children. A group that has seemed to grow exponentially as America’s presence on the world stage declines.
But, I have a different—or perhaps additional—theory. What if trans is (or also is) Doctor Munchausen by proxy? Are today’s doctors so fixated on the limelight, so eager to be “special” that they are willing to create “special” or “different” children to grow their own fame and prestige, and esteem within their communities?
Many doctors want to be remembered as medical pioneers for creating the latest innovation or discovery. Some doctors want such success so badly that they’ll stoop to any level to provide evidence to support their theories, no matter how outlandish. Sadly, gender medicine attracts the most controversial and unethical of the profession, who consider it appropriate to medicalize identity formation and puberty in children, teens, and young adults. They have now convinced kids that if you’re uncomfortable in puberty, it means you’re trans. They push kids through the gender factory. The kids announce they are the other sex, medically alter their bodies, and live happily ever after. And, they get to be part of an exclusive “authentic “ and “brave” trans club— and so do their doctors.
But, did these doctors help “trans youth”, or did they create them?
Once approximating the features of the opposite sex became medically possible, doctors, started to jump on the bandwagon, bringing to mind that iconic quote by fictional chaos scientist, Ian Malcolm, in the movie Jurassic Park: “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.”
John Money was one of these snake oil salesmen that started this whole sordid affair. He thought he could prove that you could change sex, and he experimented on kids to try to prove his thesis. David Reimer, a twin, was the unfortunate victim of this experiment. David’s penis had been accidentally amputated as an infant, and Money seized his chance, encouraging David’s parents to raise him as a girl and his twin brother as a boy. It didn’t work. David knew something was wrong, and eventually he discovered the truth about his biology and decided to live the rest of his life as a male. Both boys eventually committed suicide. The trauma from this human experimentation could not be overcome. This did not stop Money from declaring success, and using his data to provide more sex reassignment services.
From that point forward, unethical, publicity-seeking doctors also jumped on the latest trend, some directly from other discredited psychology and medical movements. One well known gender doctor found her way to trans medicine after jumping ship from the discredited Satanic rituals controversy. This doctor now peddles the theory, to great public accolades and fame, that even preverbal toddlers can signal trans identities, through removing barrettes or unsnapping onesies to make a tiny dress.
Other well known trans medical activists have found fame on twitter, and through New York Times guest essays as trans subject matter experts.
How many more children need to be harmed for these doctors’ experiments and Machiavellian scheming for fame, or should we say, Doctor’s Munchausen Syndrome?
It is estimated that the fraction of trans identifying teens in high school went from 0.5% in 2011 to ~2% in 2019, and ~3% of young adults in college identify as transgender, so we are current talking about almost a million kids. In ten years, the United States went from 1 gender clinic to 50, not including Planned Parenthood, college health centers, and online providers, which are myriad. It seems clear now that doctors and activists are creating trans people.
Why are they doing this? Because they can, without repercussion, achieve fame and fortune in this growth industry— which is not growing because there are more “trans” people, or because more people feel free to be trans in today’s political and social climate—but rather because our society is under tremendous emotional and mental stress, and these activists are offering a risk-free cure for mental pain. But, this is snake oil, and the promise cannot be kept. But that’s irrelevant to the fame seeking doctors who are willing to sell whatever people are willing to buy, regardless of what’s right and what’s wrong.
We’re starting now, to see the fall out. Detransitioners, who were led to believe they were trans, took drugs and/or underwent surgeries to become their “authentic selves”, only to find they were misled by those they cared about, and their doctors, are now appearing, and attempting to revert back to living as their sex.
Predictably, instead of having their backs, gender doctors and fan club members are claiming they were never really trans to begin with, which is why the snake oil didn’t work on them, but will definitely work on the “right” people. They are saying it was all the detransitioners fault for believing that they were trans, and the medicine would work on them.
My son is 6 months from 18—the magical age at which liquor is still prohibited, but wrong sex hormones are readily prescribed. He has heard the snake oil pitch, and he believes it. Unfortunately for him, and many others, we live in the era where young adults are encouraged to pay to mutilate themselves in the name of gender expression, where trans is created by doctors for their own fame and gain.
There will always be deceptive opportunists. Snake oil salesmen were always good at staying one step ahead of regulation— skipping town before being discovered, just in front of the angry mob. It’s only a matter of time before these gender doctors do the same thing.
Originally published at https://pitt.substack.com/p/parent-munchausen-syndrome-by-proxy reproduced by kind permission.
