honestly kind of amazed it took Persuasion this long to publish transphobic talking points https://twitter.com/HadleyFreeman/status/1379738608299556869

No one denies the existence of detransitioners. However, the "just asking questions" crowd is trying to put them at the center of the debate over trans rights. "Some kids think they're trans but it turns out they're not!" Articles like this are key to entrenching that narrative.

When we say there's a direct line from polite centrist concern-trolling to the odious anti-trans laws sweeping the country, this is what we mean. How could a law banning puberty blockers for children *not* be the obvious recommendation to come from a paragraph like this?

Pure moral panic stuff. It is wildly more dangerous to be trans than it is to be transphobic.

Unbelievably irresponsible to publish this without proper context.

Persuasion has been around for nearly a year. This is, as far as I can tell, the first thing they've ever published on trans rights. Nothing about the legal threats, no mention of the challenges trans people actually face. Just a first-person essay full of TERF talking points.

When the Harper's letter came out last year, trans people noted that it felt like a personal attack because the "let's debate provocative ideas" crowd always ended up platforming transphobia. The signatories called them hysterical and yet here we are.