It's not only the trans phenomenon, everything you mentioned there is politically radioactive. Are you really allowed to worry about environmental endocrine disruptors if hormonal contraceptives are a substantial contributor to that problem?

Every age has its taboos and its sacred cows and all our "enlightened" society has managed to do is obscure that immutable fact.

We don’t even need to go that deep. Microplastics are everywhere. BPA is everywhere. PFAS is everywhere. These aren’t “sacred cows” to anyone but chemical company shareholders but it turns out to be a lot easier to make a mess than clean it up.

Exposure to microplastics, forever chemicals and pesticides is a frequent topic of open conversation and criticism. Those remain politically intransigent because of competing economic interests.

By comparison, it's hard to even approach a discussion about environmental pollution if it intersects with some issue regular people find personally important like birth control.

I don’t think any discussions about the effects of hormonal birth control pollution are being suppressed. What I do see are a lot of websites with an ax to grind against any form of contraception saying that it is being “suppressed”.

> politically intransigent because of competing economic interests

Maybe we shouldn’t just blow past this point. It is not an acceptable state of the world that the welfare of our children is even considered against the wealth extraction for a few multinational companies. Politicians that take kickbacks to allow companies to poison their water supplies is something that should never happen in a functional democracy.

So let me understand. You think that wide spread endocrine disruption is not detrimental to humanity, or did you just cling on the trans issue because it goes against your political views ?

I do not understand why exploring the reasons for the prevalence of people identifying as trans has to affect their identity.

> Even if it is detrimental to humanity as a whole.

You make this argument, and while the burden of proof is on you, you refute the answer with "because it goes against your political views".

These "trans issues" have existed for thousands of years[1] and yet humanity is still thriving.

And even assuming that your argument was founded and right, trans issues would be close to the bottom of the list of priorities compared to other detrimental behavior expressed by humanity. Wars, actively destroying our own planet and environment, discrimination, over-consumption.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_history

> These "trans issues" have existed for thousands of years

Not really, it's a recent cultural phenomenon: https://bprice.substack.com/p/trans-is-something-we-made-up

and your source for that is a substack blog by someone equally as ignorant of classical and non western history?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transgender_history

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_transgender_histor...

FWiW I'm neither here nor there on the matter, I just happen to have read books and travelled the world for 60 odd years.

It's a well-argued piece which examines the phenomenon from a perspective outside of the cultural context in which it was created.

If you disagree with the author's argument, could you be more specific as to why?

For one, the author of the blog you posted claims there are no proofs of brain-body mismatch where there's ample research confirming this.

https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg23230954-600-transgen...

> It is known that the brains of males and females are different. Evidence further suggests that brain anatomy and neuronal signaling pathways are more closely aligned with a person’s perceived gender identity.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7415463/

I've written a response but unfortunately it doesn't fit in a comment. I think this is reasonable since your linked article doesn't either. Hopefully you'll consider this:

https://pastebin.com/m4TuVvbH

Thanks for taking the time, and being vulnerable.

Thank you for taking the time to read, too.

South East Asia seems to be fine and healthier. Is that an enough of an example? But then maybe soy has nothing to do in any of this...

Unfortunately it seems to be multiple confounding factors including diet, pollution, lifestyle.. And pollution is the hairy one. From the immense amount of microplastic on clothing or food, to multiple relatively unstudied sources with unknown effects like tire or brake pad powder (non exhaust car emissions)

> brake pad powder

Are there other concerns than asbestos like particles from those?

You ignoring everything and clinging on those two words is exactly what is causing our problems.

Did I claim that trans did not exist in the past ?

No, I did not. The prevalence however does NOT suggest that in the past all these people have been oppressed.

Is it that controversial to imagine that exposure to endocrine disruptors while in the womb could cause someone to identify as trans later, after more exposure to pollutants ?

Does that take anything away from the identity of trans people ? Does that make me "transphobic" ?