Sonia John is a translator and activist who helped translate large parts of this site. John also wrote some interesting essays during the J. Michael Bailey book scandal.
Bailey is an evolutionary psychologist, a controversial ideology that believes “counting number of descendants one leaves” is the ultimate measure of human “fitness.” In evolutionary psychology, LGBT people are among those who are “a big mistake” in terms of evolution.
Transgenderism: Fertility and the Ancient Texts
by Sonia John, 2003
For a number of years I had a friend from Germany living in my city while she was pursuing a degree in International Relations. A philosophical type from an early age, when she was about ten she asked her grandfather, who raised and butchered pigs for a living, what was the purpose of life. He answered, “reproduction.” Â
I think that one of the reasons GLBT people threaten the world view of the conservative sectors of societies is because of low GLBT reproductive rates. The imperative to reproduce, to assure the survival of the ego, family, clan, tribe, nation, etc., is so firmly ingrained in our biology and culture that most people scarcely think about it. This is scarcely surprising, because through most of human history survival was often in doubt, but this is not a threat that has obtained in most of the world in modern times. Nonetheless, lowered fertility is one tangible and emotionally-felt answer some would give to the question, “what harm do GLBT people really cause society?”  Â
Although ZPG (zero population growth) as a political movement has always been very marginal, invisible almost everywhere, its goal has nonetheless been met–and very alarmingly to some, exceeded–in a few European countries, and that goal is close at hand in some other Eruopean countries as well. If it weren’t for the influx of immigrants, who have higher fertility rates than the native-born, the US and Canada would probably also be at or on the verge of ZPG. All of this fertility reduction has occurred by voluntary action, without the assistance of plagues or war, and unlike most previous fertility declines, it has occurred in an environment of peaceful prosperity.   Â
As usual, a trend such as this has first been manifested in the “advanced” societies. Many people assume that a decline in fertility will also eventually occur in the less-advanced societies but that strong population growth will still be the norm there for at least a number of decades. This situation is tailor-made for xenophobes, whether grounded in fears of racial, cultural, military or economic eclipse. Up to this point, it has mainly been conservative religious groups, abetted at times by ultra-nationalistic political elements, that have labored in vain to limit the use of fertility-reducing technology, finding their justifications in ancient religious texts. But a wider variety of conservative groups are also pro-natalist because they–and a great many others who would not necessarily identify themselves as conservative–view perpetual population growth as a fundamental requirement for the financial well-being of businesses, governments, and eventually, according to the rosy scenario, individuals.   Â
Although the bulk of the decline in population growth in the developed countries can be attributed to popular birth control practices, a certain amount of it is also likely the consequence of greater acceptance of gay and lesbian people–and now, the transgender. Given the more relaxed contemporary attitudes toward homosexuality, marriages of convenience (and whatever children are thereby produced) occur much less frequently. The same is increasingly true for transgender people, especially as they are now coming to understand their own nature at earlier stages of their lives.
It is perhaps understandable that the emergence and acceptance of transgender individuals, above all the others in the GLBT grouping, would most viscerally alarm fertility advocates because the chemical and surgical interventions transpeople typically undertake significantly impair or destroy their procreative capabilities. If it were possible to change one’s genitalia and body chemistry and not lose the natural ability to procreate–as in some distant imagined future–transpeople might be much less alarming to the overall pro-natalist society.
The concern about fertility also is important in understanding resistance to liberalizing marriage laws. The purpose of the institution of marriage is seen by many people as primarily a framework and an incentive for reproduction. For many, a childless marriage is still seen as an unfulfilled and pointless one, just as is sexual intercourse with no immediate procreative purpose. Childlessness after a certain age–regardless of marital status–is still often seen as tragic and as an affront to established norms of masculinity and femininity. These attitudes easily find their way into legislation, such as that which narrowly restricts the definition of marriage and which furnishes significant tax incentives to child-bearing.
It’s also understandable that some biologists would become involved in the debates about GLBT people. The persistence in the population of GLBT individuals–long viewed as a relatively inconsequential minority–has been a puzzle for biology because it seems to contradict Darwinian tenets. But now, with growing awareness of the true number of GLBT people and the “problem” they represent for fertility, the concerns of biologists with conservative leanings have acquired an additional urgency.   Â
The controversy over the causes of GLBTism, which is likely to continue apace over the next decades, informs the attitudes of various interest groups that are concerned with public policy on GLBT issues. There is some tantalizing but as yet no conclusive evidence that the presence or expression of GLBTism is caused principally by genetic or biochemical factors, but some features of the gender-variant landscape are well-established:
1. GLBT individuals are generally the offspring of non-GLBT parents;
2. GLBT parents are likely to give birth to non-GLBT children;
3. GLBT individuals exist in all societies and represent approximately the same proportion of populations everywhere;
4. GLBT individuals, in their majority, can be induced by the forceful application of social, legal, etc. pressures to conform to societal norms, including procreation.
Point #4 above is crucial because it has almost always been the means by which societies, absent until recently any knowledge of modern genetics, have handled their “undesirable” GLBT members. It is a major point of agreement by all who object to GLBT expression, whether they view it as an innate characteristic or as a sinful choice inspired by some devil figure. Â
It is likely that some dream of having the potential to intervene in genetic processes to reduce the number of GLBT individuals who are born, and this capability may emerge during our lifetimes; whether its application would ever become accepted as ethical is an open question. It may also be that there are extremists plotting organized genocidal strategies against GLBT people, but such plans stand, in my opinion, little chance of success in the constitutional democracies that govern in most developed countries today. This is not to say that these eventualities are impossible, and so it is worthwhile to have alert sentinels who are willing monitor the activities of fringe groups as well as the progress and application of potentially unethical scientific research.
In a political environment that forecloses options of being able to directly control the number and specific types of people who are to be born, traditional and conservative elements are limited to advocating general pro-natalist policies that reward those who express a preferred behavior, along with repressive and stigmatizing policies to deal with those whose behavior they do not sanction. The struggle over these policies represents the working out of social and cultural evolution rather than of biological evolution, which requires many millennia.
It may be true that the majority of people everywhere resist change in their lives, particularly when they believe that change will degrade any advantaged position they may hold. In the early days of NASA, during a congressional hearing on the possible benefits of including women in the astronaut corps, John Glenn stated, “The fact that women are not in this field is a fact of our social order.” Note that he did not say that this was a happy or unhappy fact, nor did he justify the status quo by appealing to any authority to rationalize it; he was like many complacent advantaged people who simply say “what is, is.” However, it would not technically be correct to say that conservatives always resist change, because many desire to change back to the way things were in the past (one may pick from a wide variety of defunct utopian eras). Also, conservatives heartily endorse evolution in the labor market of capitalist economic systems. What conservatives rarely ever do want is a forward movement of social evolution, even though it is in social evolution that the human race excels as a means of confronting the unpredictable challenges of life on this planet. The main reason for this is that social evolution has the greatest potential for altering the existing power structure, which continues to involve men holding most of the power and women performing most of the duties of reproduction and child-rearing.
It has never been enough for conservatives who are attempting to influence social policy to state, as John Glenn did, that a particular status quo merely exists and therefore should be preserved; with all of the urgent attacks on the contemporary social order, an appeal to a higher authority is necessary. For the religious side of the conservative house, the ancient scriptural texts suffice as unassailable authority, but belief in religious authority is not what it once was–for many people it has been supplanted to a significant degree by a belief in science. The challenge thus for conservatives is to find scientific authority for their wish to preserve the social status quo, and certain biologists have heeded their call by appealing, in a very biased way, to the most ancient text of them all–the human genome. But what does the human genome really say about how human beings should evolve? Does the genome have an intelligence, does it have preferences? Is this much different from asking if the earth “cares” about whether its atmospheric composition is X or Y, or whether it is the home to a greater or lesser number of plant and animal species? These are, in the end, unresolvable theological debates that obscure the reality that imputed evolutionary preferences are nothing more than the preferences of individuals living today. The important debate is about the kind of people and society we want to have in the future, and this debate can’t be limited to self-appointed scientific or theological Brahmins–everyone, especially the members of the GLBT communities, must participate in it.Â
We do know that the human genome is an extraordinarily complex system and that we have only just begun to grasp a few of the mechanics of its functioning. We also know that it is intricately connected by an ecological web to the genomes of other organisms and also to the physical environment, all of which also change over time. Then, we know that it is the nature of the genome to produce an enormous diversity of individuals and that this contributes greatly to its stability and capacity to adjust to changing circumstances–the vulnerabilities of monocultures are well-known. Finally, we take as a given that the genome ought to be allowed to continue to evolve, but the main question here has become, “under whose guidance, if under anyone’s?”
With the advance of technology, our species’ potential to effect change in the biosphere–which includes the human genome–is increasing more and more rapidly. Decisions about whether and how to employ this potential have typically been made by those who possess the technology, for the primary benefit of their own groups and in view of their own short moment of time. Long-term considerations have frequently been neglected, as have been considerations of impacts on human outsider groups, non-human groups, and the physical environment.
There has been a genetic experiment of significant scale–an intervention in the human genome–proceeding for a number of years now in several Asian countries. Using simple technology, many families have been selectively aborting female fetuses to the extent that in some areas of India, for example, 55% or more of the children being born are male. This means that for every thousand children born in these areas, there is an excess of one hundred males who will not be able to find mates, assuming the continuation of the prevalent social norms of monogamy and heterosexuality. Though the government in these areas opposes this sex-selection, the majority of the populace does not, and so it continues, albeit in the shadows. Does anyone have a clear idea of the full ramifications of such an unbalanced ratio between the sexes? To a greater or lesser degree, a preference for male children characterizes most human societies in the world today, and far more advanced (as well as less brutal) technology for sex-selection of children is available in the developed countries, though at a price most in India cannot afford. Even granting that preferences for male children are less pronounced here than in India and the technology less-often utilized, what justification is there for allowing (or alternatively, banning) this technology which contravenes the genome’s natural output of an approximate parity between males and females?
I would suggest that society has a serious and legitimate interest in limiting or even prohibiting the use of technology in this way. Furthermore, I would view this technology as “a solution in search of a problem,” whose application is driven mainly by the profit motive. Maintaining parity in the sex ratio of newborns is viewed by most as beneficial for societies, but individuals desire exceptions for themselves because of social and cultural beliefs that can also have financial implications; this is where individuals’ rights must be weighed against the collective long-term well-being of societies. This situation also illustrates the folly of necessarily equating a beneficial collective genetic outcome with the sum of the genetic outcomes preferred by the individuals within that society. A much more satisfactory solution to the “problem” of those who desire to avoid having female children (and one far less fraught with unforeseen consequences) involves addressing the societal reasons that male children are so inordinately preferred, even if the required adjustments to the social status quo might be temporarily wrenching.
In a similar way, many of the thoughts and theories emanating from confederations such as the Human Biodiversity Group seem to be “solutions in search of a problem,” appealing to popular prejudices and dislikes such as the Indian parent’s dislike of having “too many” daughters. With respect to GLBT people, once more the question has to be asked, “what harm do they really do to society?” Clearly, on the positive side, they have made innumerable brilliant contributions to society. On the negative side, is there evidence that they are particularly given to destructive or criminal behavior? This is a case that cannot be made, especially with the understanding that the HIV pandemic is not solely a GLBT phenomenon.
Consider, then, a research or position paper outlining the present scientific understanding of the etiology of disease (regardless of whether the focus is on genetic or microbial causation, or both), continues with speculation about what this might mean for ameliorating an additional disease or social problem, and then selects the existence of GLBT people as that single important problem (disease). Given the lack of any creditable evidence that GLBT people constitute a societal problem, this selection is tantamount to simply saying “we don’t like them.”
Ordinarily in the modern world problems come to light and are assessed for their severity by considering the cumulative costs associated with them–costs borne by individuals and society as a whole. In some respects an analysis of dollars-and-cents costs may be a crude way to measure a problem, but it is a tool that most people can agree on as a starting point. Preliminary conclusions can thus be reached about the relative importance of any number of social or medical problems–obesity, drug addiction, or violent behavior, for instance. These three are fine examples to contrast with the alleged “problem” of GLBT people, because they too are all considered to have at least some roots in genetic predisposition. In the case of violent behavior, which psychologists are apt to categorize under headings such as “anti-social personality disorder” or “explosive anger syndrome,” enormous costs result, including physical damage to individuals and property, psychological damage to individuals, lost employment productivity, and the expense of treatment, law enforcement and incarceration.
What are we to make of those who pursue an interest in ridding the world of GLBT people when there are so many more serious problems that might be confronted? Is it a simple phobia based essentially on a primeval antipathy toward non-procreative individuals? I believe this to be true, but there is also a related and highly emotional secondary issue in play–the extreme malleability of human sexual and gender behavior. Humans have, in common with other primates, far more sexual energy than is required merely for reproduction, and this energy is often expressed in non-procreative–including same-sex–activity depending on the individual and the social situation. Likewise with gender, given the notoriously arbitrary and shifting precepts of gender normality, variance in this dimension occurs in all shadings depending in part on the time and place. In effect, it’s entirely likely that the majority of the human population is “queer” to some extent. If this is true and it becomes common knowledge, both the technical and political feasibility of a genetic intervention fades to nothing. This is the principal reason that anti-GLBT eugenics advocates place such great emphasis on minimizing the count of GLBT people and on denying the existence of bisexuality: their program requires a small and very clearly definable minority.
Despite their different belief systems, in the end what the restless conservative scientists object to is the same as what religious conservatives object to: not wayward genetic evolution, but “undesirable” social evolution. Both groups abhor the idea that society could change so as to include and accommodate GLBT people. For them, this means the end of the world as they know it.
I received the following response from Kristina-Maia DeMott:
Reproduction rates cycle up and down regardless of popular, political, socially conscious, and religious movements to manipulate them. Julian Huxley predicted in the 1930s (“What Dare I Think” was the book) that the reproductive rates of the UK and Western Europe would hit a low in the 1970-80s. Many things were factored into Huxley’s work, along with all known earlier reproductive data curves. Indeed, we are now at the bottom of this predicted curve, if a bit beyond the date horizon. Still, pretty good work for 70-odd years ago.
Social factors and cycles have much to do with declining birthrates in the general populace as technology succeeds, including the Veblenian concept of conspicuous consumption by the upwardly mobile (the ‘me’ generation DINKS, for instance) leading to a disapproval of large families, since urban-dwelling children cannot lend functional support to the family in leaner times as a pig-farmer’s children would, with their ability to take on crucial farming chores at an early age. Having large families decreases the financial ability to amass physical tokens that emulate the trappings of a higher-class lifestyle (these days it’s imported autos, technical toys, expensive pets, vacation properties, designer clothing, etc.). Still, the drive to reproduce emerges later, leading to things like the current upsurge in 50-something parents with only-children in 1st grade. These longer generations of well-off children will function as a gene-preservation vehicle, something unforeseen, but also create social consequences in a decade or so when children reared under “Me Generation” home attitudes find themselves in college with the children of Generation Xers. Hmm … I feel a movie script coming on: “Escape from the Gated Community”? In any case, mid-20th Century ponderers could not have foreseen GLBT people as a factor in any population trend, although it had been noted that ‘dandyism’ (covert homosexuality) and other factors such as inbreeding did lead to low birthrates among the Euro nobility, and even in much earlier times, as in the population decline in upper classes of the Roman Empire.
What we ARE in the midst of, during this “population bust,” is a swing upward of the fundamentalist religious and nationalist pendulum worldwide. Fundamentalists of nearly all religions, along with zealots for national and racial supremacies, will support a strong mandate for reproduction of their OWN kind. This always seems to happen around the time reproductive rates hit a low, like a spark plug starting a motor. These groups will push, in competition with others, for having as many children as they can, in order to increase the influence of their own “correct” offspring — this was the gist of the National Socialist “Bund Maedel” agenda, it also appears to be a component of the “family values”-fixation being promoted in the US.
While it may be handy propaganda to stigmatize GLBT individuals in general for not following “God’s laws,” for not being reproductively active, still, as a whole the socially ultraconservative are not in favor of reproduction by the “godless” or the “inferior.” Whether they believe in Darwinian evolution or not, most fundamentalists do accept the gene theory of inherited traits. GLBTs represent for them the kind of people that they — and here add the social Darwinist eugenicists, devolutionists, etc. — would rather see thinned out of the gene pool. It follows that what upsets them is not GLBT individuals’ low birthrates, rather it is the potential of sperm-donor babies and surrogate births to married gay, lesbian, and transgender couples that will pass the “nonconformist gene” (of whatever kind) down the generations, compounding the “problem” as they see it.
What they don’t want to accept is the fact that the human race is slowly becoming gender-depolarized, on a grand evolutionary and genetic scale, despite attempts to continue the increasing sexual polarization of society in media. Why do the conservative-owned media (don’t whimper, they really are … conservative-owned that is) care so much about, put so much money into, establishing cookie-cutter supergendered figures like Jennifer Lopez and Britney Spears, Brad Pitt and George Clooney? Because they preserve remnants of an image that is passing away. Schwarzenegger as Saviour. To take another small example of the kneejerk reaction: to see the hand of the would-be social engineer at work, one has only to look at the public-relations hoopla surrounding the resurgence of the “man’s man image” in the supposed rebirth of the conservative Brooks Brothers clothing stores. What was different? They make more women’s suits now. Wish I could afford one.
But it won’t last. This is the tide they cannot hold back, and cross-gendering will become so much more common in the future that today’s anti-GLBT bigots will seem as silly as the farmer yelling at the automobilist, “Get a Horse!”
References
1. Bailey interview on KOOP-FM, Austin, TX May 2003.
gender role and orientation as male or female, established while growing up
making biased claims about trans women:
Transsexualism and Sex Reassignment (1969)
“devious, demanding and manipulative” and incapable of love (1970)
John Money should have died in prison along with other “leading lights” of late 20th-century sexology. The astonishing lack of accountability or responsibility makes him easily the most unethical sexologist in history.
John Money vs. J. Michael Bailey
Takes one to know one, they say.
John Money was an ethically-challenged sexologist at Johns Hopkins whose work led to the woes of untold intersex people around the world until his “science” was debunked and his academic misconduct exposed.
Mike Bailey is an ethically-challenged sexologist at Northwestern whose work nearly led to the woes of untold transgender people around the world until his “science” was debunked and his academic misconduct exposed.
John Money put out a book in May 1990 with the title:
The similarities in titles certainly beg a comparison, as do the remarkable similarities in the lives of the two well-known sexologists.
Why would Bailey and friends replace “in-between” with “lying”? Below is a very interesting passage from pages 108-110 of John Moneyâs Gay, Straight, and In-Between: The Sexology of Exotic Orientation.
“Gender Crosscoding”
by John Money
Among adolescents who circumvent homosexual activity or who quit in panic, there are some who coerce themselves into heterosexuality, only to find as husbands and fathers (or wives and mothers, in the case of females) that the lid on Pandoraâs box springs open. These are the people who, when young adulthood advances into midlife, begin the homosexual stage of sequential bisexuality. For some the transition is to homosexual relations exclusively, whereas for others heterosexual relations also may continue. The transition may take place autonomously, or it may be a sequel to the divorce or death of the spouse or to sexual apathy in the marriage. When the youngest child leaves home, there may be a degree of freedom hitherto unavailable. The bisexualism of a parent is not transmitted to the offspring, and is not contagious. However, to avoid offending a heterosexual child, a bisexual parent may be self-coerced into suppressing homosexual expression.
The late expression of homosexuality in sequential bisexuality may be associated with recovery from illness and debilitation (e.g., recovery from alcoholism) that had masked the homosexual potential. Hypothetically, it might, conversely, be associated with premature illness and deterioration from brain injury or disease, as in temporal lobe trauma and Alzheimerâs disease. However, although brain pathology may release the expression of sexuality formerly strictly self-prohibited as indecent or immoral, it is not especially associated with releasing bisexuality.
In sequential bisexuality, the transition from homosexual to heterosexual expression is also known to occur autonomously in adulthood. Since this transition is socially approved and not registered as pathological, it is not likely to be recorded. If the individual were at the time in some type of treatment, the transition might be wrongly construed as a therapeutic triumph.
More than sequential bisexuality, concurrent bisexuality may be jocularly considered as having the best of two possible worlds. But it has a dark and sinister potential also. Its most malignant expression is in those individuals in whom it takes the form of a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. The split applies not simply to heterosexuality and homosexuality, but to good and evil, licit and illicit, as well. The two names are not gender-coded as male and female as they are in the two names of the tranvsvestophile, nor are the two personalities and the two wardrobes. Instead, the two names, wardrobes, and personalities are both male (or in the less likely case of women, female), but one, the given name with its wardrobe and personality, is for the heterosexual, and the other, an alias or a nickname, for the homosexual. The heterosexual personality is the servant of righteousness and the acolyte of a vengeful God. The homosexual personality is the servant of transgression and a fallen angel in the legions of Lucifer. The heterosexual personality has the pontificating mission of a sadistic grand inquisitor, bent on the exorcism of those possessed of homosexuality, himself included. The homosexual personality has the absolving mission of officiating indulgences in the place of masochistic penances for homosexuality, but only for himself and nobody else.
The absolute antithesis of homophobia and homophilia in this malignant form of bisexuality takes its toll in self-sabotage and the sabotage of others. Self-sabotage is an ever-present threat that materializes if there is a leakage of information from those in one antithetical world to those in the other. The greater danger is, of course, that knowledge of the illicit homosexual existence will leak out to the society that knows only of the heterosexual existence. The ensuing societal abuse and deprivation, legal and social, may be extreme.
The sabotage of others is carried out professionally by some individuals with the syndrome of malignant bisexualism. Their internal homophobic war against their own homosexuality becomes externalized into a war against homosexuality in others. The malignant bisexual becomes a secret agent, living in his own private and secret homosexual world, while spying on its inhabitants, entrapping them, assaulting and killing them, or, with less overt violence, preaching against them, legislating against them, or judicially depriving them of the right to exist.
The malignant bisexual is the perfect recruit for the position of homosexual entrapment officer or decoy in the employ of the police vice squad. Supported by clandestine operations, blackmail, and threats of exposure, in espionage or in the secret police of government surveillance, he may achieve legendary power, such as that attributed to J. Edgar Hoover of mythical FBI fame.
People in high places may have the power to keep under cover for a lifetime, with the homosexual manifestations of their bisexuality never exposed. Others have their career blown, as did the bisexual former U.S. congressman from Maryland, Robert E. Bauman, a fanatical homophobic ultraconservative of the religious new right, who subsequently published a biography of his own downfall (Bauman 1986).
Bauman was exposed by a combination of surveillance and the testimony of a paid informant and blackmailer. Nowadays there is a hitherto nonexistent way of being suspected or exposed, namely by dying of AIDS. This is what happened to Roy Cohn (New York Times, August 3, 1986), the malignantly bisexual legal counsel for the homosexual witch hunter from Wisconsin, U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy, himself suspected of malignant bisexuality. Together, they destroyed the lives of many American citizens, simply by publicly accusing them of being homosexual, falsely or otherwise.
âŠ
Scratch the surface of the self-righteous and find the devil. This is a maxim of widespread acceptability, not only to the self-righteous in high places of homophobic power, influence, and authority, but also to the homophobic, gay-bashing hoodlums who, as in the case with which this section began, pick up or are picked up by a gay man, have sex with him, and then exorcise their own homosexual guilt by assaulting and maybe killing him. Both versions of homophobia are manifestations of malignant bisexuality that, in an interview with the journalist, Doug Ireland, for New York Magazine (July 24, 1978), I called the exorcist syndrome.
There must be a very widespread prevalence of lesser degrees of the exorcist syndrome in the population at large. If it were not so, otherwise-decent people would not persecute their homosexual fellow citizens nor tolerate their persecution. Instead they would live and let live those who are destined to have a different way of being human in love and sex. They would tolerate them as they do the left-handed. Tolerance would remove those very pressures that progressively coerce increasing numbers of our children and grandchildren to grow up blighted with the curse of malignant bisexuality.
Bullough, Vern L. âThe contributions of John Money: a personal view.â The Journal of Sex Research, vol. 40, no. 3, 2003, pp. 230â236. https://doi.org/10.1080/00224490309552186
John Money and John G. Brennan, âHeterosexual vs. homosexual attitudes: male partnersâ perception of the feminine image of male transsexuals,â The Journal of Sex Research, 6, 3 (1970): 193â209, 201, 202. https://doi.org/10.1080/00224497009550666
Downing, Lisa; Morland, Iain; Sullivan, Nikki (26 November 2014). Fuckology: Critical Essays on John Money’s Diagnostic Concepts. Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press.
Goldie, Terry (2014). The Man Who Invented Gender: Engaging the Ideas of John Money. Vancouver, British Columbia: University of British Columbia Press.
Money, John; Hampson, Joan G; Hampson, John (October 1955). “An Examination of Some Basic Sexual Concepts: The Evidence of Human Hermaphroditism”. Bull. Johns Hopkins Hosp. Johns Hopkins University. 97 (4): 301â19. PMID 13260820.
Colapinto, John (11 December 1997). “The True Story of John/Joan”. Rolling Stone: 54â97. Archived from the original on 15 August 2000. Retrieved 27 September 2014.
“David Reimer, 38, Subject of the John/Joan Case”. The New York Times. 12 May 2004. Retrieved 27 September 2014. https://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/12/us/david-reimer-38-subject-of-the-john-joan-case.html
R Green, J Money – Archives of General Psychiatry, 1966
Note: In 2025, this site phased out AI illustrations after artist feedback. The previous illustration is here.
Vaush is the stage name of Ian Kochinski, and American media personality supportive of trans and gender diverse people.
Background
Kochinski was born on February 14, 1994 in Los Angeles and grew up in Beverly Hills. Kochinski earned a bachelor’s degree from Humboldt State University in 2018.
Kochinski became known for debating conservative people and conspiracy theorists, including Stefan Molyneux, Carl Benjamin (Sargon of Akkad), Tomas Bogardus, and Debra Soh.
Chaya Raichik is an American conservative activist who created the Libs of TikTok social media accounts. Raichik frequently targets transgender and gender diverse people and their supporters. The project’s avatar is the transgender symbol styled in TikTok logo colors.
Raichik reposts social media posts made by others, often with commentary, which typically inspires followers to abuse and harass those Raichik has featured.
Since Raichik began targeting upcoming drag and pride events, anti-transgender protesters have been showing up at these events, requiring the presence of police and additional security.
Since Raichik began targeting Jewish and Christian youth camps with inclusive policies for all children, staff had to take steps to ensure security.
Since Raichik began targeting medical professionals who support transgender and gender diverse youth, death threats and bomb threats have been called in to children’s hospitals and clinics that help trans youth. Some hospitals have switched to telemedicine appointments to protect children and their families.
Libs of TikTok is sometimes styled Libs of Tik Tok and abbreviated LoTT or LTT. It has become a primary pipeline for anti-liberal and anti-progressive content, similar to other anti-transgender “drama” platforms like Blocked and Reported and The Matt Walsh Show. Content that generates enough outrage then gets featured on mainstream conservative outlets hosted by people like Megyn Kelly and Tucker Carlson.
Several people are named Chaya Raichik, including an author and a homemaker. In Chabad-Lubavitch communities, Raichik is a common surname and Chaya is a common given name. Please do not contact anyone with this name directly.
Parent Rabbi Yaakov Raichik, aka Yankee Raichik, is a Los Angeles-based chaplain in the California Department of Corrections.
Chaya Raichik worked in New York as a licensed real estate investor at Evergreen Realty / ERNY LLC in Brooklyn (listed as Chaya Raichek). Raichik created what became the Libs of TikTok Twitter account in November 2020.
Soon after, Raichik claimed to have participated in the January 6 United States Capitol attack. Photographic evidence appears to place Raichik trespassing on restricted Capitol ground, standing on the plaza steps among others prosecuted for insurrection.
Raichik’s New York real estate license expired in February 2021. Raichik reportedly moved from Brooklyn to Los Angeles since becoming an anti-transgender activist.
Twitter timeline
Raichik was not a heavy social media poster before Twitter. Raichik’s account was inspired by and supported by other conservative accounts, some of which have since been suspended:
Liberal_Ls [suspended]
johnny_commie [suspended]
_callmeriss [suspended]
consoftiktok [suspended]
BidenLs
basedtiktok
Accounts Raichik has mentioned are almost all conservative media figures and include:
Year in review: Libs of Tik Tok top 3 highlights of 2021: 1. Contributed to the removal of FIVE bad teachers from schools ?? 2. Four shoutouts (plus a dm) from Joe Rogan ? 3. Got fact checked by Snopes on a sarcastic tweet ?
In 2022, software developer Travis Brown revealed that the Twitter account used for Libs of TikTok had used the screen names @shaya69830552, then @shaya_ray. Raichik used @chayaraichik until late February 2021, and that name appears on the libsoftiktok.us domain registration.
According to the Washington Post, Raichik claimed to have attended the January 6 protests:
In January 2021, Raichik started talking about traveling to D.C. to support Trumpon Jan. 6 at the Stop the Steal rally. When violence broke out at the Capitol that day, she tweeted a play-by-play account claiming to be on the ground. âThey were rubber bullets from law enforcement. 1 hit right next to me,â she said. She posted videos from the crowd and spoke of tear gas being deployed nearby. After saying she left the riot, she used Twitter to downplay the event, claiming that it was peaceful compared to a âBLM protest.â
Began posting “a lot about the LGBTQIABCD… community” specifically targeting trans and nonbinary people
Raichik credits Joe Rogan with helping the account grow after he began promoting the channel in June 2021
Began targeting teachers supportive of LGBTQ rights
Began calling people supportive of LGBTQ youth “groomers”
Began attacking drag events, especially those with young people present or participating
Began attacking specific medical professionals, their employers, and their facilities.
In April 2022, Raichik said, “Whenever we have a big victory through my account, like a crazy groomer teacher being fired, it really fires me up a lot.”
The next day, The Washington Post profiled the site and confirmed Raichik’s name. Raichik announced a monetizing plan via Substack:
Substack has become the platform of choice for “hate actors,” said Center for Countering Digital Hate CEO Ahmed, because the company and its leaders fail to enforce the rules and guidelines that it sets to keep the platform safe.
That week, Babylon Bee CEO Seth Dillon announced that he had personally made a deal with Raichik âthat will turn her heroic, high-risk work into a career.â
Bans and suspensions
TikTok account
permanently banned in March 2022
Twitter account
temporarily suspended on April 13, 2022 for promoting “violence, threats or harassment against others based on their sexual orientation or other factors such as race or gender,” reinstated
temporarily suspended on August 27, 2022, for “hateful conduct,” reinstated
Instagram account
automatically suspended on May 27 for multiple copyright complaints, reinstated
Facebook account
suspended on August 17 for one day “in error,” reinstated
Attacks on Jewish children’s camps
In 2022, Raichik began a “social media offensive” against Camp Ramah for their gender-inclusive policy. Camp Ramah is a network of summer overnight camps and day camps affiliated with Conservative Judaism. Camp leadership responded, “We are in contact with our security partners out of an abundance of caution.”
Attacks on Christian children’s camps
In 2022, Raichik posted an attack on Camp Akita, a nondenominational Christian camp in Ohio, for its gender-inclusive policies. The camp is affiliated with First Community Church, part of The United Church of Christ and The Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). Staffers have not responded publicly to the attack.
Attacks on drag and pride events
Raichik frequently posts about scheduled events featuring drag performers at libraries and other public locations, as well as drag performances at restaurants and entertainment venues. In several instances, the events were then protested, disrupted, or cancelled outright due to potential violence.
Attacks on children’s hospitals
Raichik began targeting Boston Children’s Hospital, an early innovator in trans health services for young people. Threats quickly followed:
According to VICE and other mainstream media outlets, doctors and other hospital staff are now receiving death threats. The Hospital confirmed that they are receiving a âlarge volume of hostile internet activity, phone calls and harassing emails including threats of violence toward our clinicians and staff.â
Raichik, Matt Walsh, Chris Rufo, and other anti-trans activists immediately began dismissing the threats to this and other targeted hospitals as fake news.
On September 15, the FBI announced the first arrest in connection to the threats. Catherine Leavy, a 37-year-old from Westfield, Massachusetts admitted that calling Boston Children’s Hospital on August 30, 2022, and made the threat, âThere is a bomb on the way to the hospital. You better evacuate everybody. You sickos.â Leavey made over 200 contributions to conservative causes since 2016, including former President Trumpâs Campaign, MAGA PACs and other Republican campaigns.
FBI Boston Special-Agent-in-Charge Joseph Bonavolonta said:
In recent months, Boston Childrenâs Hospital has been the subject of sustained harassment related to the airing of grievances pertaining to services they provide to gender-diverse and transgender individuals and their families. This has caused a huge amount of angst, alarm and unnecessary expenditure of limited law enforcement resources. Specifically, the hospital has received dozens of hoax threats, including harassing phone calls and emails, individual death threats and threats of mass-casualty attacks. This behavior is nothing short of reprehensible, and it needs to stop now. The real victims in this case are the hospitalâs patients. Children with rare diseases, complex conditions and those seeking emergency care who had to divert to other hospitals because of these hoax threats. Threatening the life of anyone who seeks any type of health service is a heinous act and will not be tolerated.
Following the success of these attacks, Raichik began targeting other children’s hospitals and providers.
In 2022, Raichik appeared on Tucker Carlson Today and revealed that Florida Governor Ron DeSantis offered Raichik the guest house at the Governor’s mansion in response to Raichik’s self-outing in public public posts. New Twitter owner Elon Musk began reinstating anti-trans accounts and liking Raichik’s transphobic posts, adding to the surge in transphobic content on Twitter.
In 2024, Taylor Lorenz reported that Raichik was using “anti-woke” job board RedBalloon to hire an investigative journalist.
References
Lorenz, Taylor (November 1, 2024). LibsofTikTok is hiring an investigative journalist to launder her hate campaigns.User Mag https://www.usermag.co/p/libsoftiktok-is-hiring-an-investigative?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=3238&post_id=150807866&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1mn67&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Staff report (December 12, 2022). The artificial growth of hate speech. Chuds of TikTok https://chudsoftiktok.substack.com/p/the-artificial-growth-of-hate-speech
“Libs of TikTok is a popular anti-LGBTQ+ twitter account operated by former real estate agent Chaya Raichik. The account, which has over 1.3 million followers as of August 2022, attempts to generate outrage and stoke anti-LGBTQ+ hostility by reposting selected out-of-context social media content created by LGBTQ+ people and liberals. The individuals, events and organizations targeted by the account are frequent targets of harassment, threats and violence.”
Note: In 2025, this site phased out AI illustrations after artist feedback. The previous illustration is here.
Jennifer Krohn is an American artist, sex segregationist, and anti-transgender activist. Krohn is the unaccepting parent of a gender diverse child. Krohn is a co-founder of Partners for Ethical Care (PEC), an American anti-transgender front group. Krohn and spouse Cyrus Krohn are part of the “parental rights” faction of anti-transgender activists.
Krohn is also an opponent of allowing trans athletes in sex-segregated competitive sport.
Background
Jennifer Lynn Comer Krohn was born in February 1969. Krohn earned a bachelor’s degree from Western Washington University. Krohn was a graphic designer at Michael Courtney Design and Ilium Associates before leaving to raise a family. Krohn is married to tech entrepreneur and political operative Cyrus Krohn (born 1970), and they have three children.
After volunteering to teach art at their children’s child’s school, Krohn began teaching art classes in Issaquah, Washington at Jennifer’s Artistical Garage.
Anti-transgender activism
Krohn became upset when their fifth-grade child began using a different name and they/them pronouns at school before Krohn knew about it.
After the school alerted Krohn that the child had mentioned self-harm in a conversation, the school counselor
“kind of sold to me the idea of using this ‘special therapist’ that was contracted with the school. Because she was under 13, I had to come in and talk to this therapist and give her written permission. At 13, I might not have even known she was seeing this therapist. At 13 in our state, children can get their own mental health without a parent’s consent or knowledge.”
Krohn’s child had ten weekly sessions. In early 2020 the therapist called and “used male pronouns for my daughter” and let Krohn know that they were going to have a family therapy session in three days. “We decided not to have the meeting with the therapist.”
Krohn’s child was also friends with many LGBTQ+ classmates, which Krohn believes “was the source of a lot of her issues.” After Krohn’s child reportedly threatened suicide again, Krohn took all of the child’s devices away.
The final straw was a school camp where Krohn’s child was given the option of staying in the boys’ cabin. Krohn claims this forced the child to say yes. Krohn kept the child from the camp and took the child out of school soon after.
Now without devices, friends, and classmates, Krohn claims the child “desisted.”
Krohn co-founded Partners for Ethical Care to assist other unsupportive parents. “It’s like we have gone to war together. That’s what it feels like. This is like a war on our families.”
Maud Jane Maron was born on June 9, 1971 in New York, New York. Maron earned a bachelor’s degree from Barnard College in 1993 and earned a law degree from Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University in 1998. Maron was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1999. Maron’s career experience includes working as an Attorney with the Legal Aid Society.
Maron is married to private equity executive Juan Pablo Pallordet and has four children: Clara Pallordet (born ~2005), Lucio Pallordet (born ~2006), Liam Pallordet (born ~2010), and Magnus Pallordet (born ~2016).
Maron began collaborating with Bari Weiss and Suzy Weiss to further their political aims around COVID.
Maron claims to have been cancelled in 2021 for opposing critical race theory in New York public schools.
ThirdRail
Maron is founder of ThirdRail, a consultancy created to “facilitate innovation, leadership, and strategy sessions designed to breakthrough thinking without fear of judgment.” The participants include several prominent anti-trans activists:
Maron is a sex segregationist who opposes transgender athletes. Maron also claims to have been cancelled in 2022 for supporting âsingle-sex spacesâ and opposing changes to Title IX,
Staying silent when activists and politicians insist “trans women are women” has real world consequences for real women. The truth is, trans women are biologically male and they should be treated with dignity, love and respect. But many trans activists insist on language that erases the reality of biological women. Their desire to transcend biology, no matter how heartfelt, does not, and cannot, require me to lie or teach a generation of children a falsehood.
Girls and young women are being swept up in a social contagion which has them believing they are men. Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria, in which young women with no early childhood expression of gender dysphoria suddenly identify as trans, has spiked in the last decade.
Lisanne Anderson is an American amateur photographer and “autogynephilia” activist. Anderson created and maintained The Autogynephilia Resource website between 2004 and 2012 and was one of the three people responsible for about two-thirds of all the content on the main âautogynephiliaâ discussion group before it was banned by Yahoo.
Background
Lisanne Ferne Anderson was born on January 11, 1956 and is a native and lifelong resident of Brooklyn, New York. Anderson has extensively documented Brooklyn neighborhoods and collects historical artifacts related to the borough.
Like Canadian counterpart Willow Arune, Anderson is on disability for some unspecified ailment and is a well-known internet kook. Anderson variously claims to have mild to moderate cerebral palsy, scoliosis, or anxiety disorders which leave Anderson unable to work. Anderson has “detransitioned” at least once in 1995 and was once married.
Anderson has previously had conversations and arguments online from 1998 to 1999 with Lori Anjou, a sockpuppet Anderson created.
“Autogynephiia” activism
Despite being one of the major proponents of the disease, Anderson said on 13 June 2004, “I am not autogynephilic⊠I believe that all views have credibility, but that those who attempt to silence those who disagree with them lose some of their credibility in doing so.”
All views do have credibility to someone who can argue with an alter ego online. This biography documents and contextualizes the statements made by all parties in this matter, so there’s a historical record of who said what when this fake disease is finally discredited.
Proponents featured on autogynephilia.org included:
Since I made the decision three years ago to involve myself with the question of Autogynephilia I have been constantly asked why I have placed myself in such a position. Indeed, there have been times when I have wondered so myself. The intensity of hatred shown towards anyone who considers autogynephilia to be scientifically sound would make most people pause in their tracks. But the realization that the causative factor for their animosity is often fear makes it imperative to provide a venue for the dissemination of factual information about the theory.
My initial step was to involve myself with the creation of an e-mail discussion list on Autogynephilia. My hope was to create a dialogue between those on both sides of the controversy regarding the theory. However, it was during this time that Autogynephilia was becoming a focal point of politicalism within the transsexual community, and civil discussion was becoming quite difficult. One of the casualties of this environment was my own neutrality. As the arguments against Autogynephilia grew more emotional, and the decision was made by some of more visible members of the community to extract an ounce of blood from advocates of the theory I found myself compelled to speak out against such excesses. Along the way I came to believe that the motivations of these individuals came more from self-aggrandizement than concern.
Their attempts at discrediting the theory had the result of increasing awareness of it. I cannot answer with certainty whether this was an unexpected outcome, or one which the leaders had no concern towards; their only true goal was increasing their own public profile.
The need for factual information on Autogynephilia became quite plain. The source for such information would have to be those who are most familiar with it, and best able to explain it precisely and clearly.
Since the Internet (and its various search engines) makes it relatively easy to find material on almost any subject a web site devoted to Autogynephilia would be invaluable. This despite the fact that there was some intelligent content already available.
Resources
The Autogynephilia Resource (autogynephilia.org) [2004â2012 – archive]
Amy Eileen Hamm is a Canadian nurse and anti-transgender extremist.
Hamm co-founded anti-trans group Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights (caWsbar). Hamm was fired in 2025 following a hearing brought by the nursing regulatory board, which found that Hamm publicly identified as a nurse while engaging in anti-transgender activity.
Background
Hamm earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Thompson Rivers University, followed by a bachelor’s degree in nursing from University of British Columbia in 2012.
Hamm worked for 7 months as a psychiatric nurse in Vancouverâs Downtown East Side. Hamm then became a nurse educator in the psychiatric unit at a hospital in Richmond (part of Vancouver Coastal Health). Hamm resides in New Westminster, British Columbia.
In 2011, Hamm responded to the question “If you could live in a certain time period and place what would it be?” Hamm said:
1950s, small-town ‘merica. I could go for some “ignorance is bliss”. I’d be a stupid housewife with a stupid optimistic outlook on life.
It has been a few years since I left my marriage, and I did end up meeting someone wonderful. In the time between, I realized that single motherhood is the largest unquestioned stigma of my era. It can be achingly lonely andâif you let it get to youâit can crush your self-esteem.
Hamm is a sex segregationist who co-founded gender critical group Canadian Women’s Sex-Based Rights (caWsbar) in 2019. Hamm claims to be fighting “the harms that gender-identity ideology was inflicting on women and children.”
In 2021 and 2022 Hamm and “Esme Vee” hosted Gender Critical Story Hour podcast. Episodes include:
10 – Heather Mason and Linda Blade (April 7, 2022)
11 – Sue-Ann Levy (April 26, 2022)
12 – The Haters Inside the Canadian “Anti-Hate” Network (July 25, 2022)
13 – How Far Can They Go: Are we reaching peak trans? (September 29, 2022)
Hamm and Holly Stamer co-founded GIDYVR, an anti-trans speaker series based in Vancouver. Their first event at the Vancouver Public Library on January 10, 2019 featured Meghan Murphy, Fay Blaney, and Lee Lakeman, moderated by Mary-Lee Bouma. Vancouver Public Library Chief Librarian Christina de Castell issued a statement about the event.
Hamm is best known for purchasing billboards that say “I â„ JK Rowling” with Chris Elston. They have been quickly removed for being a reference to anti-transgender views of transphobic author J.K. Rowling.
Hamm’s writing has appeared in conservative and fascist publications including the Post Millennial, The New Westminster Times,Human Events, and Quillette.
Disciplinary hearing
In 2022 the British Columbia College of Nurses and Midwives (BCCNM) initiated a disciplinary hearing against Hamm:
Between approximately July 2018 and March 2021, you made discriminatory and derogatory statements regarding transgender people, while identifying yourself as a nurse or nurse educator. These statements were made across various online platforms, including but not limited to, podcasts, videos, published writings and social media.
Hamm reportedly rejected a proposed settlement from the college that would have included a two-week license suspension and social media training.
Hamm was represented by Lisa Bildy and Karen Bastow of Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF). JCCF brought in anti-trans activists James Cantor, Kathleen Stock, and Linda Blade to testify on Hamm’s behalf in 2023.
On March 13, 2025, the College found that Hamm, while identifying herself as a member of the medical profession, made statements that were âuntruthful and unfair as they challenge the existence of transgender women, argue for less constitutional protection for transgender women, and are designed, in part, to elicit fear, contempt and outrage against members of the transgender community.â
Tabs 4, 24, 28 and S3 of the Extract were found to be violative:
Tab 4: Responded stated âtrans activists determined to infiltrate or destroy women-only spaces.â Respondent also stated that Vancouver Womenâs Shelter [VRR] will âsurely (and maddeningly) face continued backlash from trans activists determined to infiltrate or destroy women-only spaces. The women of VRR, however, are clearly up to the taskâ. […] The suggestion that trans activists are seeking to âinfiltrate or destroyâ women-only spaces strongly connotes illegal, aggressive, and improper conduct and mischaracterizes transgender women seeking access to support services available to cisgender women in crisis situations as dangerous individuals. The Panel finds that the statement is not true nor is it fair to transgender women.
Tab 24: in her article entitled âOn feeling like a womanâ. The Respondent states âthere is no abscondingâ from female bodies, the feeling of being a woman does not exist, and there is no âincantation or initiation that can transcend bodily reality.â The Panel finds that these statements are untrue and unfair to transgender women as they deny the possibility that that an individual born into a male body can feel like a woman and effectively deny the existence of transgender women.
Tab 28: In a book review entitled âReview: âLove Lives Here â A Story of Thriving in a Transgender Family,â Respondent refers to the âfalsehood that babies can be âborn in the wrong bodyâ or that humans can change their sexâ. She asserts that everyone âwho believes in wrong bodies or innate gendersâ would rather devastate a child than acknowledge that men cannot become transgender women, that gender identity ideology is akin to a Satanic Panic craze, that lesbians do not have penises, that a gender soul does not exist, and that men cannot literally become women. […] These statements, which appear to be designed to elicit fear, contempt and hostility towards the transgender community, particularly transgender women
S3 of the Extract: Respondent makes several statements in the context of the YouTube interview entitled, âThe Same Drugs Live with Amy Hamm on I heart JK Rowlingâ. As the Respondent is asked in the interview about the background to the billboard, those comments must be considered in conjunction with the billboard itself and J.K. Rowlingâs essay. The billboard message must be assessed from the perspective of a âreasonable person in the claimantâs circumstancesâ […] From the perspective of a transgender person, the essay contains some references that could be interpreted as portraying them as a risk to cisgender women and girls and predatory. Such characterizations unquestionably elicit fear and hostility towards transgender people.
On March 27, 2025, Hamm reported being fired without severance from Vancouver Coastal Health.
Grace Lidinsky-Smith is an “ex-transgender” activist. Lidinsky-Smith’s work has been cited by conservative psychologist Erica Anderson and others seeking to restrict access to healthcare for gender diverse youth and young adults.
Background
Lidinsky-Smith “detransitioned” after making a gender transition as an adult that included hormones and top surgery.
