ColonizationAcademic article claims that "gender identity is [an] innate and immutable characteristic" with no evidence supporting that claim.

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[–]fr_bandersnatchghey... 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (15 children)

Could you educate us: How can we tell that this has/has not been peer-reviewed? How can we tell that this is a "letter to the editor"? Can you provide a link to another article demonstrating where that information (ie, the degree of technical scrutiny an article has passed) would typically be displayed?

[–]reluctant_commenter[S] 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (14 children)

Good question! At the top of the page, it says "Additional article information" in blue text. If you click on that, it'll send you to the bottom of the article where you can see the DOI.

If you click on the DOI, it will send you to this link, where the article is clearly archived as a "Letter to the Editor", as noted near the top of the page.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10508-011-9805-6

If you would like to read more about Letters to the Editor in academic journals, this is a paper about it. The "Letter to the Editor" is not itself peer-reviewed-- it is a type of peer-review (which sometimes have statements that are just the opinion of the reviewer-- I have seen this before).

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4881237/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CLetter%20to%20the%20Editor%E2%80%9D%20or%20%E2%80%9CCorrespondence%E2%80%9D%20is%20considered,%E2%80%9Cpost%20publication%20peer%20review%E2%80%9D.&text=They%20are%20generally%20listed%20in,the%20journal%20editors%20and%20readers.

It is worth clarifying-- this article is not an example of academia failing in its process, but IMO it is an example of how willing academics are to believe transgender ideology (edit: see additional context at the top of the post) pervasive transgender ideology is within academia without the facts to back it up.

I think I'll actually edit my post, so that people can see this easier. Thank you for asking! It's important to be clear about this stuff.

edit: Also here's the DOI, for reference. A DOI is an identifier for a publication-- if you want to find a specific article, you can often do it just by having the authors' names and year of publication, but the DOI is often faster.

doi: 10.1007/s10508-011-9805-6

[–]Gearbeta 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (13 children)

I'm just going to add on to this, while I'm not a scientist, I did go to grad school for a hard science so reading scientific papers is something we did a lot. And even in hard sciences it wasn't uncommon to see poor research papers being done. In the case of TRAs theres many scientific papers that are supposed to be peer reviewed but have obvious glaring flaws. For example, there's a paper that's I believe peer reviewed about biological women having AGP. The author ignored the fact that by definition, this is not possible (because to have AGP you cannot be female) and the author also didn't ask questions that were AGP equivalents. Just recently, a paper got through peer review about how transitioning helps the mental health of trans people and several letters to the editor proved that even the most surface level analysis of the paper's own data did not come anywhere close to supporting their conclusion. That study that TRAs will often quote about how transwomen after a year on hormones are equivalent to biological women in terms of athetlic ability's data came from transwomen who self reported their own strength. So can't really be trusted. Gender studies has a real problem with poor and biased research coming out of that field and the fact that many of these people will protest against research doesn't help either.

[–]luckystar 5 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 0 fun6 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

This is true, I went to grad school too and agree. It's incredibly depressing to realize that even the scientific field, which should theoretically be the least politicized and the most factual, is still influenced by politics. First, there's a ton of interpersonal politics (the idea of "blind review" doesn't actually hold muster when you consider most people's research niches are so narrow/a paper gets presented at conferences, workshops, and such before submission for publication, that fellow academics can often recognize the author of an article based on content alone).

But for issues like trans stuff ideological politics also are at play. Especially, the university administrations don't want negative press brought to the university for having a "transphobic researcher" (and basically anything short of blind 100% praise and affirmation will be called "transphobic" by the genderists). Also scientists themselves tend to be left leaning and there's an uneasy cognitive dissonance about anything that could result in "undesirable" results (like the Harvard study that accidentally showed diversity makes groups less effective, that they massaged the data and rephrased the arguments until it went back to saying Diversity Good).

I doubt we will get any legitimate research on trans people anytime soon since the issue is SO sensitive and trans groups are SO rabid and obsessed with "canceling" anyone that goes against the narrative. Which is really quite sad because it means that people who are having gender dysphoria are the ones who get hurt here-- if we can't research possible negative side effects of SRS or hormones, then people who do them are more at risk. But that's the outcome of cancel culture and the "only affirmation is acceptable" ideology of the trans community. Why would a scientist pick such a risky topic to study when they can do research on possible negative side effects of say, some random diabetes medication, or anti seizure medication, or literally anything else, and have almost zero risk of controversy?

[–]PassionateIntensity 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I honestly think we have enough evidence already to know. And yes, that's a right wing link but the scientific studies are all linked and accurately described. You've also got studies from trans advocates that show cross sex hormones increase dysphoria and puberty blockers increase suicidal ideation AND dysphoria and persistence.

[–]reluctant_commenter[S] 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

And even in hard sciences it wasn't uncommon to see poor research papers being done.

Completely agree. That has been my experience as well, and it goes for all STEM subjects. I have read a number of papers in a technical field unrelated to transgender research, and am dismayed at how often these scientists (edit: I wonder if some even deserve that word..) do not use proper methods of scientific inquiry (or even record the steps they take!). It is frustrating to see.

In the field of psychology-- one of many fields with a "replication crisis" of studies not being able to re-produce their findings-- a project from like 2014-2015 or so, found that 2/3 of the supposedly reputable studies they re-did, did not show the same results upon reproduction. I was honestly surprised that 1/3 of the studies WERE believable, lol.

[–]fr_bandersnatchghey... 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Got it, thanks. I'm surprised that the level of review of a publication isn't immediately made apparent front-and-center.

[–]reluctant_commenter[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I agree, it should be. My guess why it's not is that most academics are so unused to imagining how someone outside academia would perceive journals, that they don't think to put basic information in a clear and readily accessible place.

[–]PassionateIntensity 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

The Yale study, which was later retracted, was used to change AMA and APA policy and used as a basis for WHO, APA, AAP, and the Endocrine Society to lobby legislators for medicare funded GRS. The study was incorporated into Continuing Medical Education's training, which doctors need to keep their licenses. None of this changed back or was even commented on when the study was retracted! The mainstream media touted the original study everywhere and hasn't mentioned the retraction.

[–]reluctant_commenter[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Jesus, that's so messed up.

It feels dystopian to google stuff about trans issues or statistics and see almost exclusively pro-trans results. Then you go on DuckDuckGo or similar and the material is significantly different.

[–]Q-Continuum-kin 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

Why can't a woman have agp? I knew a guy that was pretty aroused by his own male body, idk why that also couldn't be true for a woman.

[–]Gearbeta 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Women can't have AGP because the definition of AGP excludes them. That's not to say that a woman couldn't be aroused by her own body, just that whatever she had that made that possible wouldn't be AGP. Its sort of like you know how TRAs like to say that gay people have a "genital fetish"? Well that inherently is not possible since the definition of the word "fetish" excludes genitals.

As for the research paper I was talking about here's an interview where Ray Blanchard talks about it https://quillette.com/2019/11/06/what-is-autogynephilia-an-interview-with-dr-ray-blanchard/ And here is a criticism of the paper that claimed that women could experience AGP https://sci-hub.tw/https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00918360903445749

TLDR of the criticism the author of the study was comparing things like women getting aroused by wearing sexy clothing like lingerie to AGP transwomen getting aroused by putting on a women's T-shirt. Or comparing women getting aroused by preparing for an upcoming sexual encounter with AGP transwomen getting arousing from putting on make up to walk out of the house.

[–]reluctant_commenter[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

It is called something like "autoandrophilia" or something for women. If you look in the link the other person replied, Blanchard talks about it more.

[–]Q-Continuum-kin 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

autoandrophilia is when a woman is sexually aroused by the idea of herself as a man. its the opposite.

[–]reluctant_commenter[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Oh, I think I misread what you wrote.

I mean I guess it is possible, but-- autogynephilia includes being aroused by the idea of yourself being a woman who is menstruating, the idea of yourself being a woman wearing bras, etc. I could see a woman being aroused by bras for example, but that is kind of a different thing.

Within the parameters that Blanchard set as defining AGP, it is impossible to apply to women, as far as I know, but I guess if you changed the definition then you maybe could?

If anyone else is more familiar with Blanchard's work or other AGP articles, feel free to chime in.

[–]Gearbeta 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Hm. There might be an equivalent among women, but Mosier's study didn't prove it. Also, reminds me of the extremely weird sub called something like r/ftmpunished where transmen sometimes get off to being... feminized... Or forcibly told they are girls. Which is weird because they're already female. So I think whatever is happening there might be similar to AGP. But there's no studies done on them and probably won't be ever so who knows.