I recently learned a shocking fact: 97% of Americans who have undergone sex reassignment surgery report “increased life satisfaction.” 97%!
And I thought that chopping up perfectly healthy genitals in the name of gender ideology was a bad idea.
At best, these interventions can only produce an outward appearance closer to the opposite sex, but they leave the deeper issues – feelings of inadequacy and the desire to escape bodily imperfections – unresolved.
But just as I was about to send a big reparations check to Dylan Mulvaney's Mangina Foundation, I felt a strange urge to do something that you definitely shouldn't do, especially in the wake of COVID-19.
I decided to investigate for myself, and you can't imagine what I found!
Peer-reviewed myths
Sometimes the truth is elusive, hidden behind layers of complexity, fatigue, and our own impatience, so in the absence of certainty, we improvise: we adopt superstitions.
It's human nature to crave certainty, even if only through strange rituals like relying on the Punxsutawney groundhog to predict the weather, but in their absurdity, these rituals offer a glimpse into a deeper desire: our desperation to make sense of an unpredictable world.
In a society where subjective narratives are increasingly dominant, “my truth” has become both a shield and a sword. “My truth” is often used as an escape route for the intellectually lazy, a subtle way to avoid critical scrutiny. But it is a dangerous path. Accepting subjective truth as reality risks eroding the very foundations of rational inquiry.
Herein lies the tension between superstition and academia: superstition is clearly irrational, while academic research, despite its claims to rigor, is not always as pure as we'd like to believe. After all, what's the difference between peer-reviewed nonsense and folklore, if they have a purpose?
97%
But back to that miraculous statistic for a moment. At the bottom of Harper's beloved Index, Harper's magazine, we find this: “Percentage of Americans who have had sex-reassignment surgery report increased life satisfaction: 97%.”
After all, the data National Center for Transgender EqualityIt is a highly partisan organization whose primary goal is to promote transgender rights.
Even in its most generous interpretation, the organization's findings are more like publicity stunts than a meaningful contribution to science. 97%? That's near perfect. It's a number designed to be accepted without question. But it's also highly questionable.
Can 97% of people ever be satisfied with anything in life, let alone undergo complicated, life-changing “sex reassignment” surgery? Of course the answer is no. As is often the case, the truth is much more complicated.
Transformer sales
First, the 97% figure makes it seem like “gender reassignment surgery” is a panacea for everything from body dysphoria to depression. But it overlooks the many other factors that influence these issues, such as underlying mental illness, social support, or broader cultural climate. It's not the surgery itself that guarantees happiness, but the narrative surrounding it that's being sold.
This is a tactic we've seen before in various political campaigns: statistics are manipulated, manipulated or cherry-picked to support a particular agenda. In this case, the survey that produced these shocking figures was not conducted by an independent body, but by activists who have a deep interest in the results. This is hardly the kind of rigorous, objective research we should rely on to make public policy decisions.
The survey itself was conducted online and was targeted to people who identify as transgender, including people as young as 16. Participants were asked a range of questions, but the focus was clearly on affirming the benefits of gender transition – this was activism disguised as research, rather than academic analysis.
Are they assigned at birth?
One of the key tenets of transgender ideology, and of this study, is the notion that sex is “assigned at birth.” This phrase has become ubiquitous, but it is also highly misleading. Biological sex is not assigned at birth, it is observed. The idea that doctors arbitrarily determine a baby's sex based on genitalia is an absurd distortion of basic biology.
Gender is an ideological concept that is open to interpretation, and while activists have sometimes blurred its definition, the idea of ”assignment at birth” is plainly wrong – a conspiracy the likes of which Planned Parenthood claims. put “Gender is a label, male or female, that is assigned to you by a doctor based on your genitalia and chromosomes at birth. It appears on your birth certificate.”
To insist that gender is “assigned” is to deny an objective reality that has existed for thousands of years. As figures like Richard Dawkins argue, this idea turns science into an ideological tool, distorting facts to fit a societal narrative. And while we may tolerate such intellectual distortions in everyday conversation, they become far more dangerous when they become the basis of public health policies and educational curricula.
Drowning in data
The survey on which the 97% figure is based boasts an impressive sample size of over 90,000 respondents. But sample size alone does not guarantee accuracy. In fact, the larger the sample size, the easier it is to manipulate the data to fit a pre-determined narrative.
For example, the demographic breakdown of the survey showed a disproportionate number of young, white, and non-binary respondents — a group that is far from representative of the transgender population as a whole. Moreover, many of these respondents were still in the early stages of transitioning. Their short-term experiences cannot be extrapolated to the transgender community as a whole, let alone used to justify broad-brush claims about life satisfaction after surgery.
Also notable is the fact that the majority of respondents claim they have not experienced significant harassment or violence because of their gender identity.Yet the survey has been used to support claims that transgender people face widespread persecution, fueling calls for even more extreme measures to “protect” them.
Social contagion
There's another factor at play here that nobody wants to talk about: social contagion. The sudden increase in the number of young people identifying as transgender doesn't just reflect a new acceptance; it's also the product of peer influence, media saturation, and the expanding reach of activist groups.
A few years ago, Psychology Today Ran A list article titled “10 things parents of transgender children need to know.”
Author Devon Frye is not a medical professional of any kind, as is standard for Psychology Today: she is a journalist and editor.
“But the idea that societal forces will start kids on paths that aren't theirs and keep them there is a myth,” Wald said. Social contagion “This theory is not supported by scientific evidence.”
How else can we explain the sudden increase in the number of minors diagnosed with gender dysphoria — from 15,000 five years ago to 42,000 last year — that is. When children are encouraged to question their gender before they understand what their gender means, there is a danger that a real struggle for identity will turn into a passing fad.
The truth is, as uncomfortable as it may be for some, surgery and hormone treatments cannot change a person's gender. At best, these treatments can only make a person appear more like the opposite sex. But the deeper issues — feelings of inadequacy and the desire to escape physical imperfections — remain unresolved.
After all, maybe we're all dissatisfied in some way with our bodies and our identities. Maybe that's just human nature – seeking peace in a world that never quite fits. But the answer to that struggle isn't to isolate ourselves from reality, but to face it head-on and accept that imperfection is part of what it means to be human.
And no amount of exaggerated statistics can change that truth.
