Reverend Alexander Faludy is is a British Anglican priest who has written about trans issues in Hungary.
Background
Alexander “Alex” Faludy was born in 1983 and is grandchild of Hungarian poet György Faludy. Faludy is the youngest student admitted to Cambridge despite living with dyslexia. After earning a bachelor’s degree, Faludy did graduate studies at Oxford, then trained for the priesthood at Mirfield. Faludy served as parish priest in Newcastle from 2008 to 2018.
Trans coverage
Faludy has discussed the anti-LGBTQ policies enacted under Fidesz, Hungary’s right-wing populist party. They have rules prohibiting “promotion to minors” of subjects related to LGBTQ people. Faludi described in UnHerd how Hungary has also made legal change of gender impossible:
Ralph Leonard is a British-Nigerian writer who writes on international politics, religion, culture, and humanism.
2020 UnHerd article
Using a question India Willoughby posed on Big Brother about dating transgender people, Leonard wrote for anti-transgender publication UnHerd about the so-called “cotton ceiling” debate about cisgender women who won’t date trans women.
Unfortunately, two years on, the ethics of refusing transsexual people as dating partners remains a fraught subject: questions such as âIs it transphobic for lesbians not to date trans women?â are being discussed online. Again, they tend to arouse strong reactions. Some lesbians, for instance, have expressed concerns that raising the question of whether they âshouldâ be attracted to trans women is a surreptitious attempt to pressure, manipulate and guilt trip them into shifting their sexual boundaries into unwanted sex in the name of being more âopenâ.
Of course, there are lesbians who are reluctant to date trans women because they believe they are not actually women (or at least not women in the same way biologically born women are)â. But itâs worth remembering that lesbians have endured a long history of attempts to control their sexuality, whether through hideous practices such as religious indoctrination, conversion therapy or âcorrectiveâ rape to âmake them straightâ. And why focus the attack on lesbians, when many straight men would also reject trans women as a potential mate?
This obviously provokes a wider question: when does a preference become a convenient cover for bigotry and prejudice? On some level, as this tweet declares, âdating is discriminationâ. But the question provoked by that Big Brother episode was: when is discrimination acceptable, and when is it unacceptable?
References
Leonard, Ralph (October 7, 2020). Is dating discrimination? UnHerd https://unherd.com/2020/10/the-dangerous-politics-of-desire/
Naomi Salama on suomalainen rakennusinsinööri ja “autogynefilia”-aktivisti.
Background
Salama was born on July 7, 1998 and grew up in Espoo.
Under the name Janus Syndrome, Salama released an electronic dance music album titled MMXIV in 2014.
Salama attended Aalto University, earning a bachelor’s degree in 2020 before continuing on to a master’s degree. In May 2022, Salama began medical transition.
“Autogynephilia” activism
Like a few other neurodiverse trans people with poor social skills, Salama became fixated on an obscure disease model of gender identity and expression created in 1989 by Ray Blanchard. It classifies transgender women into two types: gay men (homosexual transsexuals) and paraphilic men (“autogynephilic” transsexuals). Salama claims to be the “autogynephilic” (AGP) type, which according to Blanchard means Naomi Salama is more likely to be sexually attracted to children, corpses, feces, animals, or have other “paraphilias.”
Most experts and trans people consider this fringe terminology to be scientifically biased and unfalsifiable, but a few isolated activists with personality problems embrace the idea.
âAutogynephiliaâ as a taxonomy appeals to a very specific type of person: neurodiverse, fixated on collecting and categorizing, socially isolated/eccentric, rigid thinking.
In June 2023 Salama sent me a message titled “add me to your stupid agp activist list you hack.”
hello!
I demand an explanation! why am I overlooked for your ridiculous agp activist list? after all, I seem to be an activist in this in the very literal word â very different to for example the researchers on the list.
I have repeatedly defended Blanchard, Bailey and Hsu and interact with all of them quite frequently. I am also friends with multiple other people on the list â such as Phil Illy or Naxela (why you would add him before me is beyond my comprehension, for example my twitter account @Naozymandias is way larger and I speak of agp way more and more publicly â even being retweetes by Blanchard occasionally)
as an academic myself, tho of different field of study, some of the researchers have urges me to do study into agp myself too, perhaps informally. I plan to do this after first finishing my thesis relating to urban economics.
I am also known to have created multiple “memes” relating to autogynephilia, folder of these has also been shared with multiple people on your list.
as you can clearly tell, I am invested in the subject and certainly should be considered an activist of sorts. this baffles me, why am I not on your list??? that feels rather insulting
thus, I demand to be added immediately regards undoubtedly in some sense of the word your enemy, autogynephilic transsexual, and student of urban planning and economics Naomi Salama
Salama spoke with romantic partner Alice Chizita about these bizarre beliefs, then sent a second message clarifying:
while *I* would be glad to be added, my girlfriend hopes I am not, as she would feel bad of that â because she is not in agreement with the typology and “Blanchardism” makes her feel bad and dysphoric.
Hopefully Alice can explain why this ideology is an unhealthy fixation and get Salama professional help. Perhaps Alice can also guide this person toward a better understanding of science. If that is not possible, perhaps Alice can get far away from this toxic person.
“Layla Jane” is the stage name of Kayla Lovdahl, an American ex-transgender activist. Lovdahl gets money and attention by making it more difficult for others to get trans healthcare.
Background
Kayla Michelle Lovdahl was born August 20, 2004. Lovdahl’s parents are Desiree M. Baggett Lovdahl (born July 11, 1984) and Kevin Allen Lovdahl (born September 30, 1976). Desiree got pregnant at age 19, and they married during the pregnancy on January 28, 2004.
Kayla Lovdahl grew up in the Lodi, California area, and has these problems according to a lawsuit filed by Lovdahl’s lawyers against Kaiser Permanente:
recurrent intense anxiety and panic
extreme mood fluctuations
self-harm
problems at school resulting in suspensions
oppositional behavior
defiant behavior
interpersonal peer relationship problems
anger
depression
crying spells
significant appetite changes
irritability
agitation
decreased energy
panic with hyperventilation
confusion
nausea
nightmares
explosive temper outbursts
poor concentration
gender dysphoria
symptoms “compatible with undiagnosed and untreated bipolar disorder”
“erroneous belief that she was transgender”
mood swings
sadness
lack of known triggers
would write sad notes at age 6-7
does not get much sleep
sleep has been irregular since being a baby
sees figures or things passing on the side when she doesnât get enough sleep
strange reoccurring nightmares
symptoms of depression
mania
abuse from peers
obesity
poor social skills
few friends
2023 lawsuit
The same conservative activists representing Chloe Cole/Brockman are also representing Lovdahl.
Defendants:
Lisa Kristine Taylor, MD, pediatric endocrinologist
Winnie Mao Yiu Tong, MD, plastic surgeon
Susanne E. Watson, PhD, gender therapist
Mirna Escalante, MD, pediatric endocrinologist
The lawyers claim Lovdahl “now has deep physical and emotional wounds and severe regrets” and “has suffered physically, socially, neurologically, and psychologically.” They describe it as:
“mutilation to her body”
“fertility risks”
“health risks”
“lost opportunities for social and physical development along with her peers, and at key developmental milestones that can never be regained”
The complaint alleges in part:
When Kayla was 11, on or around April 26, 2016, Dr. Meridee Loomer saw Kayla and reviewed her file. Dr. Loomer noted that Kaylaâs mother had been requesting mental health services beginning in 2011, when Kayla was around 6 years old, due to school issues and because Kayla had written on her papers about wanting to die. Dr. Loomer also noted that there had not been any consistent psychotherapy services for Kayla. She informed Dr. Loomer privately at her April 26, 2016, visit that she was a boy and that she preferred to be named âKyle.â
Around September 14, 2016, Kayla had a visit with Dr. Doreen Samelson, who counseled them that since Kayla was past Tanner Stage II (the first stage of puberty), she was not a candidate for puberty blockers and was not ready for cross-sex hormones. Kayla received a contraceptive shortly thereafter to reduce her periods.
The lawsuit cites treatment notes from Lovdahl’s doctor:
[Patient] is currently at maternal grandmother’s home, and Mom intends to pick him up to bring him directly into the Stk Cpy office to be seen today. When asked about concerns re: self/other harm, she states that he has made statements such as âwhat’s the point,â or âI should just drink bleachâ recently but not today.
âPatient presented to urgent services after his mother called Kaiser Psychiatry Triage yesterday and today reporting concerns over her son’s agitation/labile behavior, mood fluctuations, and potential for self-harm/harming others. Patient’s reported that her son has been having unprovoked anger outbursts where he’s been lashing out (i.e. cursing) at her mostly and others.
Lovdahl then had counseling and the doctors got signed parental consent:
On July 11, 2017, Kayla had counseling regarding fertility. On September 22, 2017, after Kayla just turned age 13, Dr. Tong performed a double mastectomy on her.
Kayla stopped injecting testosterone around the middle of 2021, while beginning a period of detransition. Thereafter, she stopped all contact and services with the Kaiser Proud Clinic where she had been receiving ongoing evaluation for her transition.
In 2022 Kayla was diagnosed with Social Anxiety Disorder and Mood Disorder with depressive features.
Ex-transgender activism
Lovdahl heard Chloe Cole’s lawyers filed a lawsuit against Kaiser and decided to get in on the action.
In March 2023, Lovdahl was among the handful of ex-trans activists at what was billed as their biggest event ever:
Detransitioner @LJDetrans makes her first public appearance at Detrans Awareness Day in Sacramento last week.
Layla Jane had her breasts removed at 13 years old and is now suing some of the same "doctors" that I am suing.
“I was a mentally ill child, and I was able to consent to removing my breasts permanently. And I also heard more â or less… I heard more people telling me I would regret this tattoo than I would regret getting my breasts permanently removed at such a young age. So that is why I felt necessary to speak. Thank you for hearing me out.”
“Overall, I really want to say that I don’t think I should have been allowed to change my sex before I could legally consent to have sex. Overall, I don’t think I’m better off for the experience, and I think that transition just completely added fuel to the fire that was my preexisting conditions.
I was given no information on rates of desistance or anything like that. Really, the surgery and the treatments were kind of pushed as the only way forward.
Between the age I was at and the headspace I was in, I don’t feel like I should have been any place to make those kinds of decisions. And I think proper information and all the side effects, it was really glossed over for my parents.”
Media
In June 2023, producers arranged a meeting with ex-trans activist Chloe Cole:
Joel Koss is an American game developer who took medical gender transition steps as an adult for a few months. After deciding that path was not bringing fulfillment, Koss made additional changes back toward an earlier identity.
Koss appears in the 2023 anti-trans film No Way Back, about the ex-transgender movement. Koss has apologized, saying “I didn’t know what I was a part of. Informed consent saves lives.”
Background
Koss has stated “horrible things” happened as a child, adding: “Around the time I was 11 or 12 I developed anorexia nervosa. And then years later, it led me to develop a body dysmorphia, which I falsely, wrongly attributed to being gender dysphoria.” According to Koss:
Ever since I was young, since I could remember, I have had an issue with my identity, mostly the way that I looked, talked, dressed. I think I got into my head growing up I would be happier if I was a woman, Iâd be more satisfied with myself if I was a woman, I would love myself more if I was a different person.
I just know like how truly easy it is for you to go and get treatment if you live in an area with informed consent treatment. I literally made an appointment with the doctors office in Chicago. I live in Indiana. So I drove up to Chicago. I went to the doctor’s appointment that I had set up for two weeks prior. It was very quick. And then that day I received estrogen. There was definitely a honeymoon phase. In the beginning of hormone therapy, everything felt great. My body felt great. My mind felt clear. I was also becoming an Internet influencer pretty quickly.
Koss documented the transition on social media.
I am five months on hormones… about 5 1/2 months. And since my last update, there have been a lot of changes. So as many of you know, I take estrogen shots. But this one is particularly important. As I put this into my body., I will be six months on estrogen. Sometimes you never think that the things that you in life that you want are going to happen fully.
Three months later, Koss felt differently:
It turned out to make me more dysphoric. It turned out to make me uncomfortable. The more it happened to my body, the scareder I got. And I came to the realization that I donât feel like Iâm actually transgender. Itâs a hell of a realization to have.
Koss soon gave additional updates:
Whatâs up my beautiful people? How are we doing today? If youâve been around my channel for a minute, than you know that I am male to female to male. So I went through transition, and then, after about nine months, I came to the realization that, I am not transgender.
In July 2020 I started realizing that hormone therapy was no longer having a satisfactory effect on my mental health and my physical health. But now at this point in time, I had a lot of social media followers, people that looked up to me and made me feel like I was important to them. And I felt like I couldnât go back. And that the only option was to just keep pushing forward, which led me to spiral into a state of depression and being admitted to a psychiatric hospital.
Response to No Way Back
Koss appears in the 2023 anti-trans film No Way Back and is credited as “Joel Kass” in some promotional materials. In April 2023, Koss posted:
I was interviewed for this documentary. I was actually used quite a bit for the documentary. I was told that it would shine a positive light on informed consent. And it did not. […] The full interview and testimony of my experiences that I gave was chopped up into little bits and sprinkled throughout the documentary, not fully reflecting my actual views and thoughts on transgender healthcare. I apologize, and I hope that it did no damage. I would hate to think that something I was a part of could be viewed by a legislator and impractically influence thought-making, decision-making processes, or just scare the shit out of parents of trans kids that come out to them. As always, every single one of you has my love and my support.
Koss later added:
I am an advocate for trans rights, trans healthcare, everything to do with basic equality. I was approached by the director about April of last year. And when I asked about the scope of and the impact of the film, I was told it was going to be a positive film about informed consent. I was told that it was going to take an ethical and responsible perspective of getting proper mental healthcare before informed consent in terms of trans teens and not full-grown adults. I don’t know if I can take legal action because I signed a release. I gave very thoughtful, ethical, correct responses to interview questions, and every single thing I said was taken out of context, cut all apart, piecemealed into something that served the agenda of another party entirely. So I apologize. I didn’t know what I was a part of. I didn’t know what was being done. Informed consent saves lives. That’s it. […] I hope I did nothing damaging, and I that I can be forgiven.
Melanie Anne Phillips is an American artist, author, musician, filmmaker, software developer, and activist. Phillips is one of the most important historical figures in online transgender resources.
Background
Melanie Anne Phillips was born on February 20, 1953 and grew up in Burbank, California. After attending film school at University of Southern California, Phillips worked in film and television, including directing a horror feature in 1985. Phillips married, and they had two children.
Phillips, Chris Huntley, and Stephen Greenfield began a narrative software project called Write Brothers, which evolved into Dramatica interactive story engine. In 1997, Phillips founded Storymind to develop additional narrative development products.
Transgender activism
In 1989, Phillips began a gender transition and kept a detailed journal of the process. Over time, Phillips published the journal online, gathered an extensive collection of transition resources, and produced instructional videos that were available on physical media.
Phillips was an important community leader at America Online (AOL) and helped build out the transgender resources available there. Phillips moved these resources to a standalone site called Heart Corps in 1997.
Phillips has lived in several communities on the West Coast and continues to create music, photography, writing, and art. Outside of this public online persona, Phillips is a very private person in real life.
References
For a full bibliography of all 86 books published to date, see the Amazon author page for Melanie Anne Phillips: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Melanie-Anne-Phillips/author/B0744CGDLV
Phillips, Melanie Anne; Huntley Chris (2004). Dramatica: A New Theory of Story. ISBN 9780918973047
Phillips, Melanie Anne (2013). Be a Story Weaver – NOT a Story Mechanic! ISBN 9781489503541
Phillips, Melanie Anne (2014). Images and Visions: The Photography of Melanie Anne Phillips. ISBN 9781495283321
Phillips, Melanie Anne (2017). Raised by Wolves: Volume One in the Transcendental Trilogies Nine-Volume Set. ISBN 9781521859551
Esocoff, Sarah (). “Melanie Speaks.” Sounds Gay https://pod.link/1686975383/episode/27d697cd2d82b16116eb641e4da9f681
Keira Bell is a British ex-transgender activist. Bell gets money and attention by making it harder for others to get trans healthcare.
Background
Bell was born in 1997. At 15, Bell was referred to the Gender Identity Development Service, at the Tavistock and Portman clinic in London. At 16, Bell was prescribed puberty blockers, and at 17, Bell began taking hormones. Bell chose the name Quincy.
As an adult, Bell chose to get top surgery. Bell later had regret and made additional changes in identity and expression.
Bell brought a lawsuit against the Tavistock which ultimately helped lead to its closure in favor of the decentralized approach used in other countries.
Watson was born in ~1991 and reports being repeatedly sexually assaulted as a teen.
made a gender transition as an adult. Watson socially transitioned at age 20 and began medical transition at age 24. Watson had top surgery at age 26. In October 2019, at age 28, Watson made additional changes in identity and expression.
Ex-trans activism
Rather than taking personal responsibility for medical decisions made as an adult, Watson blames “the trans lobby.” According to anti-trans activist Julie Bindel:
Watson self-referred to the Sandyford in 2014, having spent time in a psychiatric unit following a severe mental breakdown. âI burned my house down while trying to kill myself,â she says, âand made out to the doctor it was because I was really a trans man and needed to transition. That was bullshit.â Watson was suffering from depression, dependent on alcohol, and struggling to accept that she was a lesbian.
Daisy Strongin is an American ex-transgender activist. Strongin gets money and attention by making it harder for other people to get trans healthcare.
Background
Daisy Marie Chadra was born in April 1998. Chadra came out as trans on May 29, 2015 at age 17, using the name Oliver “Ollie” Chadra. As an adult, Chadra obtained hormones at Planned Parenthood. At age 20, Chadra had top surgery.
After graduating York Community High School, Chadra earned an associate’s degree from College of DuPage in 2019. Chadra then attended North Central College.
Chadra made additional changes in identity and expression in October 2020, at age 22.
Jason Strongin and Daisy Strongin were married on December 12, 2021. They had a baby named Gabriel in 2022.
Daisy Strongin converted to Catholicism in 2023.
Ex-trans activism
Stongin appears in the 2023 anti-trans media piece DETRANS by PragerU and has also appeared on shows by anti-trans activists Benjamin Boyce and Preston Sprinkle.
Terrell was born in ~1984 and grew up in a conservative Evangelical Christian environment.
Terrell self-identifies as having a controversial disease called “autoandrophilia”: “I found gay men most attractive, and fantasized about being one.” Terrell transitioned in ~2011 and lives in the Pacific Northwest.
Activism
In 2021 Terrell was reportedly radicalized by J.K. Rowling.
Terrell co-founded the Gender Dysphoria Alliance website in 2020.
