Exposing The Reality of Transgender Science & Trans Activism | Debra Soh | ACADEMIA | Rubin Report

- This is a really fast, quickly growing movement among millennials, something like 10% identify as a third gender. So that's a lot of people and I would be totally on board with people identifying however they want, if it didn't also include things like medical interventions, like double mastectomies, taking testosterone, testosterone in a lot of cases. And in a lot of the cases, I think these are just young gay people who are struggling with that. (upbeat music) - I'm Dave Rubin, and this is t

he Rubin Report as always guys make sure you're subscribed to our YouTube channel and have clicked that pesky notification bell. And joining me today is a neuroscientist who specializes in gender sex and sexual orientation, as well as the author of the new book, "The End of Gender" debunking the myths about sex and identity in our society. Dr.Debra Soh welcome back to the Rubin Report. - Hi Dave, thank you for having me again. - So I was checking right before I sat down to see when I had you on

last and it's almost two years to the day, it's two years to the week. And we were talking about much of the stuff that you wrote about in this book, gender and the whole LGBT letter conglomeration and identity, and all of these things. And I remember when we sat down for the first time that a lot of people said, "Oh no, this trans stuff, this isn't real, nobody really cares about this stuff. All these things, these are just made up things that only academics and you YouTubers care about." Flash

forward two years to where we're at right now with your book coming out this week. And it's like, this is one of the biggest issues around. So I guess my first question is it must feel pretty good to not be crazy? - I guess so, but I've just so horrified by how everything has turned out. I mean, I was really hop... When I saw you two years ago, I remember things were just starting to pick up in the mainstream, and I was still hoping there's still a chance maybe this is gonna get caught, people

are gonna figure things out, we're gonna be able to cut this off before it gets too crazy, but it really has just gotten worse. And with "The End of Gender", I wrote that book really with the hope of trying to, again, bring more attention to these issues so that people might take them seriously and realize that we're not just a bunch of fringe, crazy people complaining about things, these have real implications for people's lives, especially for young people. And it's gonna be really, really unf

ortunate and ugly in a few years. - Yeah. All right. So the book is really spectacular and you dive into what are considered some of the most controversial topics of the day. So we're obviously gonna get to all of that, but for anyone watching this, that didn't see our first interview, can you just do like a quick two minute sort of recap of your bio, of your training that led you to write this book. - Right, so I, when I was in my PhD... So I have a PhD in Sexual Neuroscience Research, I now wo

rk as a journalist, I write predominantly about the science of sex and gender also about politics and how politicization of scientific research is really doing society a disservice. And I also write a lot about academic freedom because that's becoming another problem that we're seeing. And so for myself in the last few years of my PhD, I had noticed that the political climate of academia was shifting, and it was becoming very clear that there are certain topics that you were not allowed to resea

rch, that you're not allowed to talk about or discuss, even if you are a scientific expert in the field. And one topic in particular that I had been following was the issue of gender transition in children. And so at that time, every single mainstream newspaper, pretty much I could count them on maybe one or two fingers, the number of pieces that had come out, criticizing this at that time, said that the best way forward for children who are gender dysphoric, so they feel they're more like the o

pposite sex than the sex that they were born as, the best way forward for them was to socially transition at a young age, younger being better, and that once they detransition, they flourished, parents would say that they're doing so much better, but from a scientific perspective, all of the research literature suggests that it's actually better for these children to wait until they reach puberty, there's a very, very high chance that they're going to outgrow the way they feel, they're more like

ly to grow up to be gay and adulthood. And so I wrote an op-ed about this, and I waited about six months because I didn't know if I really wanted to publish it 'cause I knew it was going to be.. There was gonna be huge backlash. And I asked a number of my mentors and colleagues, what I should do, and I remember one of my mentors said to me, I asked him, should I wait until I have tenure? Because at the time I had planned to stay in academia and I had a whole plan in terms of what I was gonna do

in terms of my research, and he said that tenure would not protect me in this climate. So I decided to publish that piece. And it was a difficult time, I'm really glad I did it. And I write in the book about, what that process was like for me and what it was like being mobbed really badly for the first time. But once you get through your first mobbing, you're fine, and they can't stop me now. - Yeah, it's funny because I've been through my own version of the mob thing and I feel the same way. On

ce you get through it, you will survive. It's gonna hurt, it's gonna suck all of that stuff, but once you get through it and survive, you will be stronger on the other side. Could you just talk a little bit though about the reaction from your colleagues, because I'm still, I think a lot of people can't accept somehow that academia could be this corrupt, that when you write a paper using scientific evidence saying that when you transition this young, it doesn't necessarily lead to a happier life

and you use data and evidence to support that, that you still get hit from the other academics. Like I think people can't really... The average person who's not in academia, can't really understand how that happened to academia. - Well, I would say within sex research, which was my discipline, it really has been like a canary in the coal mine, because we saw these issues, especially left leaning science denial, this has been an issue for decades in sexology, which is the scientific study of sex

and gender. So most of us in sexology are liberals, I consider myself still to be a liberal. And I think my colleagues are just focused on doing good work as they should be. So I wouldn't say, not that you were saying this, but I wouldn't say sex research necessarily themselves are corrupt and why they stay silent, it's more that they know that they already have a target on their back. Usually sexologists are dealing from science now are coming from the right, 'cause usually not everyone on the

writers has an issue with sex researchers, but historically it's been more on the right. Now that it's coming from the left, it's like sex researchers don't know how to deal with it because in a lot of cases it's people in the same side as you, and you're you feel as though, well, is this really as important as calling out when the right comes after us? So I think that's one layer of it. You know it's very competitive in academia and to get a tenure position is almost unheard of nowadays. So you

're very busy, it's stressful. And then you have these other academics and other disciplines who are not scientific, not to say that they all have bad intentions, but they're starting to take over, they're the most vocal. And they're getting a lot of support also, I would say by mainstream news outlets. So as time goes on, it feels, I think more and more like you have more to lose than to gain by speaking out, so why start speaking out now? And that's how we got to where we are. - So one of the

things that I'm really amazed by, and I've brought this up with a couple guests when I've talked about the trans issue, I've talked about this with Douglas Murray and with Rob Smith and a couple of other people is that in many ways the trans movement now seems almost perversely anti-gay, meaning that if you're in a feminine young boy, they would rather see you transitioned to be female, rather than accept that you actually are just a gay male. So I also think just for me personally, it's particu

larly weird because I played with "G.I. Joe and the Transformers". So no one thought I was gay per se, right? But if I... But I have friends that played that were boys that played with Barbies and people thought they were gay when they were five. And that if they now, even though they're maybe in their forties now, if they were growing up now and they were four years old, five years old doing that, they would have been put through transition. And that seems sort of anti-gay, doesn't it? - 100%,

100% and myself, as we talked last time I was with you, I grew up in the gay community. I find this very upsetting. I have countless friends who have reached out to me over the years saying, you know, "Deborah, if I were growing up now, I probably would have transitioned." Because this is such a common thing, when you are a young child who is likely going to grow up to be gay, you tend to be gender atypical and have interests that are gender atypical and friends of the opposite sex. So that's be

en a huge concern of mine, especially we talked also about how transitioning now, I consider it, and I think many in the field will agree, that it is like the new conversion therapy, where if you have healthy gay child, say you have a little boy, who's very feminine, I think some parents have a sense there's a chance that he's gonna grow up to be gay. So if he's attracted to men, when he's older, if he transitions to female as a child, when he grows up, he's going to be or appear to be a straigh

t woman. So that, I mean... And I think homophobia does play a role in terms of the parents who... Not for all of them, but for some of them who are so on board with this and who are championing this movement. And then there's another layer I think of anti-gay sentiments in that you have some individuals, some trans women, not all who are saying, if I'm a woman and I still have body parts that would be considered male, if you are attracted to women, you should be wanting to have sex with me. And

I don't think that's okay either. I think it's totally fine if people are open to having... I think trans people do deserve love and respect, but I also don't think it's right to impose on people. Just like some people might not be into Asians with blonde hair and that's perfectly their right. - Yeah. Do you think it's starting the sort of hysterical nature of this, of what you just described. Like you have to be attracted to me if this and all of those things, do you think it's starting to bac

kfire on them? Because I think most people, even conservatives that sort of, as you alluded to earlier, they don't sort of love talking about these topics. I don't know a lot of conservatives that don't want trans people. I don't know any conservatives actually that don't want trans people to be treated equally under the law or something or something like that, but I do sense that there's a real backlash now where the movement has gone so far, that people are just like, you know what, forget thi

s whole thing. Like the whole thing is evil. And that's what I'm worried about. Because when we group these letters together, I can sort of understand the people that are frustrated like that. - I could see that what we're really concerns me is where we are gonna be going, what the next step is gonna be in terms of what the outcome is gonna be. And so we're seeing also this growing trend of nonbinary people identifying as nonbinary. And again, that can be for some people, a way of coping the fac

t that they are gay or lesbian, and they are not yet able to accept that about themselves or because it is easier to not identify as gay in society because there is still homophobia. And so again- - Can you just explain what non-binary is, just for someone that might not know? - Yeah, so it's people who identify as third gender. So they may say they're both genders or neither. And so non-binary gender fluid, gender neutral, gender queer, even though queer is considered by some peoples to be a sl

ur against gay people, I don't tend to like to use the word queer. So yeah, so this is a really fast, quickly growing movement among millennials. Something like 10% identify as a third gender. So that's a lot of people and I would be totally on board people identifying however they want. If it didn't also include things like medical interventions, like double mastectomies, taking testosterone, testosterone, a lot of cases. And in a lot of the cases, I think these are just young gay people who ar

e struggling with that and we should offer them support instead of having them undergo these interventions. - Right? So that's what I think is so interesting about this, because I think the average person wants most people to live and let live. However you identify, that's fine, as long as you're not forcing someone to do something, I think what, what happens then is this next version where it's like you can say you're non-binary, and if you feel that way, then so be it. But what happens is then

they won't let you accept biology. So now it seems like this is now in direct conflict with biology. And I think a lot of people are sort of... They're like, no, that's the last line here that we're just not gonna give on. Do you think that's fair to say? - Right? And again, like you, I have no issue with people how they wanna identify, just don't tell me that, that's what the scientific research shows, because when you start denying science that doesn't help anyone and the truth is eventually

going to come out. So with regards to gender, gender is binary because for 99% of us, our gender is our biological sex. Of course, they're intersex people and they're trans people for whom this doesn't necessarily apply, but that's not to say that gender is a spectrum or that it's however you want it. You don't, choose your gender. This is what they're teaching in education that, that people choose their gender. And I think it's really harmful to put all this misinformation out there, especially

in the case of someone who is identifying this way, for reasons that may come from their own internal struggles and maybe they have other mental health issues, and they're not... We're not being able to talk about that. I think if we could have the conversation and someone could say, "Yes, I've considered all these things, but I still feel I would like to have a double mastectomy." And that would be better for me, even though a lot of these individuals are really young when they're doing this,

then I wouldn't have so much of a problem, but we can't even have the conversation. If you've been tried to bring it up, it's considered hateful. Even to say that there are two genders is considered transphobic now. - Right, so what... So alright. Some people watching this are gonna clip it and show say that you're transphobic and I'm a self hating gay and all the usual stuff. So to counter that, and you write about this in the book, can you just sort of give me the roadmap, if there was a young

person, six years old, that really felt that, they were physically a boy, but they identified as a girl. What do you think a healthy roadmap would be as opposed to the unhealthy roadmap that you're talking about, that's just transitioning them at such a younger age? - I would say to the parents, especially just to love your child unconditionally, it doesn't matter what toys they wanna play with, what they wanna dress, how they wanna dress, who their friends are, anything like that. Let, if this

little boy wants to wear makeup and dresses and play with his girlfriends, and that should be totally fine. And conversely, if you have a little boy who is male typical, I think that's also fine. I think among, especially woke parents, they don't want their children to be gender typical nowadays, which is just so bizarre. So it's like the inverse of what it used to be that parents didn't want their kids playing with gender atypical toys, because they're afraid their kids are gonna grow up to be

gay, and now it's that they don't want them playing with gender typical toys because they think that's gonna limit their growth as an adult. So yeah, just leave him alone. And if he says he wants to be the opposite sex, see how he feels up puberty. - Right. So then what does that look like? So now, okay, so the child, they love them, they let them play with whatever they want, be friends with whoever they want, or wear whatever they want, et cetera. Now puberty comes along then where are you at

? - Well, what would normally happen, saving what's been documented in the research literature is children who are gender dysphoric, once they start having crushes on their peers, once they start growing into their bodies, a lot of them realize, this is actually pretty great, I like my body and I'm happy. The ones who remain dysphoric and persist, I would recommend seeing a mental health professional, or even prior to that point, if the child's gender dysphoria is quite severe and debilitating.

The issue though, is that nowadays the vast vast majority of mental health professionals who work with gender dysphoric children and even gender dysphoric adults are, I don't wanna say that they're compromised, but definitely ideology is playing a huge role in terms of how they practice, because they cannot by law say anything other than, yes, if you wanna transition, I'll help you, I'll help to facilitate this, because they're gonna be accused of commit of practicing conversion therapy. Even th

ough conversion therapy for gender identity does not exist, there's a difference between conversion therapy for sexual orientation, which as we talked about last time is not effective, it should not be done. There's no such thing as conversion therapy for gender identity because young children who identify as the opposite sex, again, their gender is, I don't use the word fluid, but it's more flexible because they haven't fully developed yet. So with development, they're more likely to feel diffe

rently. - All right. So just to completely clear that up, and we did go into the first part or the second part last time. So gender or conversion therapy for gay people, meaning to take a young gay boy and to do whatever version of conversion therapy there is, there's just no evidence that, that actually works. What you're saying here is if a therapist was dealing with a young person who identified as the other gender, that in essence, they sort of have to go with it because what is it that they

would lose their license or or is there... 'Cause it's not conversion at that point at some level, right? Like what... Or you think it's just the pressure of being a therapist that they'll be ostracized? - It's the climate, it's that other professionals will ostracize it's because they do run the risk of then losing their license because organizations will come after them and say, "You are not practicing according to what the standards are supposed to be." They'll also have activists coming aft

er them trying to ruin their reputation and their livelihood. And so what has happened is I know colleagues who have told me that anyone who does not feel right about this, they are leaving the field. They will not see patients with gender dysphoria period because they just, they don't feel right, and they can't do their job properly. - Yeah. All right. So I know you're a neuroscientist first and you'd talk a lot about the brain science behind some of this stuff. Can we do like a, like a sort of

simple version of what studying the brain would show you about say what a cisgendered heterosexual brain might look like versus the brain of a gay person versus a trans person? - Right. So there is a very strong research literature documenting differences in the brain associated with sexual orientation. So the gay people and straight people, when they're viewing pornography of their choice, that they prefer. So if you have a straight man, he'd be looking at women, if you have a gay man, he's lo

oking at men, the same network of brain regions activate in the brain. So it has to do with emotion, has to do with the visual system, has to do with regulating sexual drive. And so people often ask me about the neuro imaging research as it pertains to the transgender population in terms of, is this something biological? Is this something that we can see in the brain? Because I think regardless of what your political affiliation is, people are curious to know, is this something that is hardwired

or can it be changed? Most people on the left, I would say argue in favor of biological or brain-based explanations for gender dysphoria because in their minds that justifies a transitioning. And I have to be clear, I do think that adults should be supported in transitioning. I have no issue with that, and research does show that for adults, transition can be beneficial for them. So the issue I have is when people start taking again, the research and trying to bend it to fit their political nar

rative. And so we had one study that came out, I think it was a year ago that was in children with gender dysphoria. So the research literature todate has been looking at gender dysphoria and the brain has been in adults. And so what it has shown is that adults with gender dysphoria, their brains are shifted in the direction of the sex they identify as, as opposed to their sex at birth. So if you have a trans woman, so she was born male, identifies as female, her brain has shifted in the directi

on of females. But the thing is, all these studies is that they are conflated with sexual orientation. So again, everyone in the study, so if you have a trans woman, she was born male, identifies as female, she's also attracted to men. So in all of these studies of trans people, they're attracted to people who shared their birth sex. So from a sexological perspective, 'cause it can get a little bit confusing, sexology we consider sexual orientation for someone who's trans is based on their birth

sex, as opposed to how they would be post-transition. So all this to say is what the kids, this study got so much media attention, people saying that gender dysphoria is see it's in the brain, cause they similarly showed that their brains are shifted in the direction of the sex they identify as, and this was taken to be support for early transitioning. But again, we don't know the sexual orientation was not reported, so we don't know. Maybe these children, when they hit puberty and get older, a

re going to be gay, and again, they don't need to transition. So it's a really... The sad thing is that researchers just don't wanna touch this now, so what you will find is all of the research coming out is compromised because the only people that are doing these studies are scientists who are totally on board with gender ideology, and they know that they're not gonna have any issue when the studies come out. Any studies that come out criticizing gender ideology or criticizing trans activism ar

e either gonna get put under review for a second time, which is completely ridiculous and unnecessary, or they're gonna be retracted, or the scientist is gonna be called names and smeared. So a lot of people just say, I'm gonna pick something else. - Yeah. Well, that's why I find what you do so fascinating, 'cause it's like sex is always controversial period in eternity, in human history, everything about sex is controversial. And then when you couple it with this new woke ideology, it's like, I

could see why someone like you would be worried, years ago about putting that paper out or why the average researcher now is just like, I don't need the headache and I'm not gonna do it. You mentioned before that there is evidence that when adults transition that they are happier on the other side. Is that overwhelming or is it 50/50 or do you know? - There was a meta analysis that showed that it can be beneficial, but I think what's important is that is taken on a case-by-case basis, and that

each individual is able to get the support they need and to go through a proper assessment with a mental health professional to determine is their gender dysphoria really about gender and is this something that can be solved through transitioning? Because in a lot of cases, there are other issues going on. There was one study that showed for people who present with gender dysphoria, as many as 60% have another psychiatric mental condition. And so that's something that needs to be taken into cons

ideration. But the thing is now people don't even wanna say that gender dysphoria has anything to do with the mind or the mental illness because mental illness is stigmatized. And I don't think mental illness or gender dysphoria or transitioning should be stigmatized, but there is no way we're going to remove the stigma if we are not able to talk about it openly. - Yeah, I don't remember if this happened to me before we last spoke on the show, but I was at an event at University of New Hampshire

, and I was talking about this topic and there was a woman who said she was trans and she was yelling that I'm a Nazi, I'm a racist and all the usual stuff, and I kept saying, "Listen, I want you to be treated equally under the law, I hope you have someone that loves you, I want you to be able to be employed and happy and have all the benefits of everybody else." And she just kept saying, I'm awful and all these things. You're not gonna believe this or maybe you will. It turns out that she was a

Gender Studies Professor at the university. I assume that's pretty consistent with what you're hearing at the university level too, right? Not just the research level, but just even at just the university, the teaching level. - I find it's usually the people who are always advocating for love and tolerance and acceptance, who are the most aggressive and nasty when they disagree with you. And so that's not to say that all gender scholars are like that definitely, but I do find I'm always amazed

because the whole purpose of being an academia is about debating ideas. I would think that's the reason you choose to be a professor is you want to share ideas, debate with your colleagues. It's about vigorously disagreeing, and that's how you get at the truth. And that's completely taken off the table nowadays. Now it's about very much, there's only one way to think about an issue, and if you think outside of that issue, yes, you're gonna be called a Nazi, you're gonna be deeply informed, you'r

e gonna be smeared publicly and they're gonna try and get you fired. So it's really absurd, but I think it's not just in academia anymore as we see everybody getting cancelled. Now this has spread to the mainstream. - Yeah, is it weird for you to be sort of in a political fight because that's not... Sex is political now, but like it's not really what your passion is. But just from following you on Twitter, like you're in the political fight as much as I am at this point. - I didn't ever think th

is is what I'd be doing, I really thought I would be a scientist. I've always loved to write, so I was hoping to maybe write one day, do a book one day. And the fact that I've gotten the chance to do one now is just been such a blessing and I feel so grateful. But for sure, I feel it's something... I feel very strongly and I've always felt very strongly about speaking my mind, and so I think it does make sense in a way that this is the direction I ended up going in, because I feel in this climat

e, you don't really have a choice, either you're gonna put your head down and stay quiet and just, it's not worth it. Or you're gonna say, you're gonna go through the multiple Mobbins and say, "Okay, keep it coming then." - Yeah. You obviously talk in the book and you've sort of mentioned it here about just the denial of what is actually presented in the research. Have you figured out any tricks beyond going on podcasts and talking about this stuff on YouTube and everything else to convince peop

le that evidence actually matters, because in many ways I think what the left is throwing at us now is just sort of this anti-intellectual set of ideas. It's just, it doesn't matter, like the more evidence that you show in a certain way, it almost, they use that as proof that they are, right because you're part of the patriarchy or you're part of the machine that they're trying to dismantle. Have you figured out any tricks to actually break through in a way? - I generally don't try to change the

minds of people who are on either extreme or who are extremely ideological, 'cause I feel at that point, it is their are comparisons being made to people who are extremely ideological and people who are in a cult. And I do feel in some ways it's really difficult to break through to someone, especially on the internet, unless you're sitting down with them face-to-face. Maybe that can make a difference, but I try to speak to the people who aren't really sure what they think or they wanna learn mo

re, and I always appreciate when people go to the primary source. So I mean, I am sure, you know how this feels, I get accused of "saying things all the time when I've never said whatever it is, the person who is saying that I said" This will be reported in newspapers, this'll be all over social media. It's crazy to me. I don't know how someone can do that and feel okay about doing that, especially if you know this is something that other people are gonna see publicly. And I also think if they w

anted to actually end issues like discrimination against particular sexual and gender minority groups, that you would actually wanna go after people who are saying hateful things. If I'm just reporting what the research says, and you have a problem with me, then let's talk about the research and what your issues are with that. And some people do, and I appreciate that and I will engage with someone if it's in good faith. But if you are making things up and saying that I'm saying things, I did no

t say, how does that actually help your cause? And so it makes me feel like a lot of people in this fight don't really care about the issues they say they care about, they care about clout. So I just generally... And I would say to your audience also, if you are engaging with people and just trying to understand that's totally great, I think, you can only do so much. - Do you think the liberals have enough juice, have enough energy, have enough of a sort of intellectual, undergirding to stand up

to this woke thing? I think this is sort of the new split that the sort of 30 or 40 of us, that were loosely called the intellectual dark web, whatever it is now. We were sort of warning about all of this stuff and I see a real split occurring at this point where there's some of us that sort of think that liberalism can somehow fight the woke thing, even though I personally see no evidence of it. And then there's the ones that are, I think more in line with my thinking on this, which is that th

ere's a lot of bridges to be built to the right. It doesn't mean that those guys are perfect all the time. And as you said, you still identify as a liberal as I do as well, but do you think that liberalism in and of itself can withstand what seems to be happening right now? - I think so as more people start speaking up and I do see... I'm actually surprised because some of the people who said to me even two years ago, I'm not gonna get involved in this, this is not gonna benefit me, I don't have

a dog in this fight. So let's just hope it goes away on its own. They are now saying this is really bad, I didn't think it was gonna get this bad, and I need to speaking up about this. How can I speak up about this? What can I do? So I do think the tide is going to turn, I just think it's going to get much worse before we get there. And my concern is also with all of the science denial and all of the denial of information, how is that going to affect our society and our knowledge and our growth

, because nothing good can come from denying reality. - Yeah. Well, we're in a constant denial of reality at this point. You're in Toronto right now, is there any difference the way this is discussed maybe from a Canadian perspective than it is from an American perspective or has the internet just sort of leveled the playing field on that? - I think the biggest thing, like what I tell people, I know is just to try to stay off social media as much as you can, because that really exacerbates every

thing. It doesn't matter where in the world you are, I think social media is really polarizing us. In terms of differences between Canadians and Americans, I think we're just as bad or we're getting there. So don't worry, you're not alone. - Yeah, we export everything. So that the title, "The End of Gender," yeah I thought it was kinda interesting because it's like you're dealing with and unpacking all of these seriously complex issues related to identity and gender and everything else, but you'

re calling it the End of Gender. Do you think that what we're left with at the end of this conversation, if we can truly have it honestly, is that gender won't matter? Won't exist? What do you mean by the end? - Yeah, let me clarify, because when I announced this, when I noticed the announced the book on social media, people got upset at me because they thought I was saying that this is like the very super woke far left end of gender and that gender doesn't exist anymore, or that gender is compl

etely what you want it to be, and it's based in self identification and there was no tethering to biology or objectivity, and that's not at all what I'm saying. And I really wanna emphasize, I'm actually saying- - That's why I am asking you. That's why I'm asking you. - The complete opposite of that. I'm saying gender is very much biologically based and it is the misinformation and denial of science and denial of biology, and denial of evolutionary psychology, that is leading us to not have a pr

oper understanding of gender, and that's why I see it's demise. - Yeah, so paint the picture that turns some of this around, besides just some people getting braver, like the political part of this even. I mean, when you see at this point, all of these, the LGBT organizations that at this point, I think are just basically using gay people to now push the gender stuff. I mean, what has to happen to them? Are there nonprofits that are fighting this from a correct scientific perspective? Like what

has to happen now really? - What I see happening, and I actually have a line in the book where I say I'm appalled and I love the gay community and I have many gay men who've reached out to me over the years, complete strangers who say to me, "Thank you for saying what you did because I was one of these children." I actually had one individual reach out to me and tell me around the time my first op-ed came out, he said, "I was thinking of transitioning and I read your op-ed and I decided to wait.

And I'm so glad I did." So there is a line in the book where I say, "I'm appalled that the number of gay men who are in support of transitioning children, because this is leading to the extermination of gay kids." And what I really think is gonna happen, and this is so unfortunate, it makes me so sad is that these kids are gonna be changing their minds in a few years, I say five to 10 years, so we're... What is this? This is gonna be August, 2020 when this comes out, so give it five to 10 years

, there are gonna be so many kids who are saying, "Why did my parents let me do this? Why did medical professionals let me do this?" They are going to have issues from being on hormonal treatments, from surgery. I'm already seeing all of these young people, these detransitioners and it really breaks my heart. And no one is listening to them and no one is taking them seriously. And there are gonna be tons of class action lawsuits. And I already see good clinicians in the field who are concerned b

ecause they know it's coming and they feel out a loss because we've been trying to raise attention and get people to take us seriously, but they just call us transphobic. - Right, and by the way, it's not just the personal issues and the medical issues and everything else, there's gonna be an insane amount of legal issues that pop up there. I think there's gonna be kids, they'll be young adults at the time that are gonna start suing their parents. I think they're going to start suing the doctors

and probably everybody else involved. I'm sure there were lawyers looking at that right now. There's got to be, right? - And I would say to your audience too, because I'm sure they have been following these issues as well, pay attention to the people who are most loudly and proudly embracing this and saying, this is great for the kids, because when this time comes, they're gonna turn around and say, "We had no idea this was gonna happen." And they're gonna pretend that they had no idea when the

y are coming after those of us who are speaking out about it. - I know it's a little weird to be ahead of the curve, isn't it? 'Cause you kind of feel like you're behind it sometimes as the things start to come true. - I feel the odd thing when I was writing this book, I felt the whole time, it was a very emotional process for me because it felt very much like those of us who see it, it's like we're able to see the future and we're just trying to scream as loud as possible to get people to pay a

ttention. - Don't I know it, I know it. You just mentioned the detransitioning part of this, is there a lot of literature, is there a lot of research on that as far as how many people have done it, are they happier after? Are they suicidal after? I mean, what do the numbers look like on that? - There was one study in Sweden that looked at people who had transitioned and then... So change the marker on their legal documentation and then changed it back. And they found that about 2% of people who

had transitioned changed back. But the thing is not everyone who detransitions, does it illegally and also the data collected for that study it finished around 2011, I think it was. So that was before this huge influx we see of young people, especially young women identifying as male, and I've written quite a bit. And in the book I talk about rapid onset gender dysphoria, which is this phenomenon of young women who are very quickly identifying as male, wanting to transition to male, taking testo

sterone, again, getting double mastectomy. When they were very gender typical as children, it's usually very out of the blue, usually they have other mental health issues like autism, for a lot of them, they have sexual trauma, that's not being talked about. And so we don't yet have the data for that, we don't know what that's going to look like. Although there is one County in the UK where hundreds of detransitioners are coming out and saying, I'm I have autism, I'm lesbian and why didn't peopl

e, why didn't professionals, do what they should have done, which is ask me questions? - Yeah, I can't imagine discussing anything almost more controversial than that. You couple this sort of rapid transition with autism, and then you get people to try to talk about that. It's like, no, one's gonna... You could see why the average researcher would just be like, no way I'm not doing this. - No, and it's difficult enough to get a study published. You have to get funding for your... I mean, in the

book, I talk about a number of situations where researchers have gotten approval and they've gotten money to do their study and still they have to deal with all these extra roadblocks that pop up where people coming after them and threatening them. So at the end of the day, the science is taking a very unfortunate turn. I think we're gonna look back on this period with a lot of horror and disappointment, but I'm hoping that the outcome is not going to be that terrible if we start speaking out ab

out it. - Yeah, have they done real research on the social pressures related to all of this? So like when you mentioned the rapid onset where suddenly a whole bunch of girls that otherwise, like, it sort of appears out of nowhere in essence, that could it be from a peer group and then they're really doing these things that are just really just crazily extreme to fit in, in essence? - Yeah, so the one study that's been done on rapid onset gender dysphoria to date was published in 2018 by Lisa Lit

tman. And she did... The research did suggest that there's a peer contagion aspect to it and that these girls, so for 40% of the girls in the study who had come out as trans very quickly, they had at least half of their friend group also identify as transgender, which is 70 times the rate of what you would see in the general population in terms of people who identify as transgender. So that in itself should raise a red flag in most people's minds. But people are saying, this is due to greater so

cial acceptance. But if that's the case, why is it you don't see the same thing among boys? You don't see the same thing among people different ages? It's very specific to teenage girls and young adults, young women. - Yeah, so what do you make of that? Because young boys, young boys can be susceptible to peer pressure and all that kind of stuff too. So what is that about then? - I think for these young women in particular, from the conversations I've had with them, it's very much about being di

scomfort, feeling discomfort with their body, for a lot of them going through puberty and suddenly getting male attention and not really appreciating attention from certain people. And also the messages that they're getting from the media is that if you are gender nonconforming at all as a woman, then you are probably transgender or you are probably another gender. And if you look at celebrities, a lot of celebrities who are born female, who are gender atypical, identify as a third gender. So I

think no one is saying to them, it's okay if you are a young woman and you are different or you feel like you don't fit in, it's okay, that's normal. Another thing is a lot of young women are being told if they don't like getting a period, that that means that, that they shouldn't be a man. And I'm thinking no woman likes getting her period. That's just part of being a woman, and it's a me, I love being a woman. I take a lot of pride in being a woman. So I just wish that we could have this conve

rsation or there was more of this happening, 'cause they're not receiving this information, they're only receiving one message. - Yeah, so I'm gonna sort of give you a theory that I've been trying to put together through some of my own interactions. So this is not scientific in any way, but I think there's probably something to it that what I find on Twitter is that the angriest and most hostile and an awful saying the worst things possible to me, whenever that happens from one of these anonymou

s accounts, I go to the account and almost without exception, they have their gender profile, their pronouns in there, he him, she, her, Z the whole thing. And I do think there's a sort of connection between... I wanna be very clean about what I'm saying here, that there's sort of a connection between knowing who you are and knowing reality as it is, and then being happy or functional or something. Can you clean this one up for me? 'Cause I haven't fully pieced it together, but I do think it's q

uite bizarre that the people who are constantly preaching about tolerance and diversity and everything else are in many cases, the ones that act completely the reverse of that. - I think part of that could be because gender is so trendy nowadays, and it's because people are given attention and praise for identifying in a way that is different from male and female, I think for some people, and this is not to say that everyone who identifies as something other than male or female or anyone who doe

sn't identify as their birth sex has mental psychopathology. But I do think for some people who have preexisting psychopathology, they're latching on to gender and this movement as a way to bring about meaning in their life or as a way of feeling good about themselves. And so anyone who questions that, they take that very, very personally and very deeply, and I think that's part of why they lash out in such a horrible way. - Yeah, what do you make of the intersectional piece of this whole thing,

that even related to everything going on right now, with the protests and the riots and Black Lives matter. We had the initial Black Lives Matter movement, and then about 10 days in, there was this massive rally I think it was in Brooklyn, for Black Trans Lives, and I never heard anyone that had a problem with black trans people. I mean, these things have all become something that's not quite what they are. Can you explain sort of the intersectional piece of this, how they all kind of linked to

gether? - I'm not a fan of intersectionality, as you probably know. So I just see it as a way for people to further promote their own personal agenda. I have nothing against wanting to protest for trans lives or black trans lives or anyone's life for black lives, I'm all for it. But it's when you start being authoritarian and starting to shut down scientists, right? They had a day where this was not about black trans lives, but they shut down STEM for a day, in the name of fighting racism, which

makes absolutely no sense to me. So I think like identity politics, it's just about creating increasingly smaller factions to further divide us and for particular people to get their chance at having some power. - Are you worried that because we're injecting race into every conversation, we're injecting gender into every conversation and sexuality and all of these things into everything. And now it's in sports and messages are just everywhere, every TV show that you watch, that we're gonna sort

of raise a generation of bigots, not because they're actually bigoted, but they'll just be sick of all of these issues, and then they're going to view the world through that lens where everything is about your race and your gender and your sexuality and everything else. - Yeah, that definitely concerns me because for me, and maybe I have an old school view of things, but to me to assume that the way someone looks or that their race says anything about the kind of person they are or the way they

think, or their capabilities, that to me is racist. But I find that in woke land, it's racist to assume that someone's race, doesn't play in those things. And I'll never forget, I remember very early on when I started writing, I went to this events and I spoke with one of the organizers and she said to me... She looked at my eyes and she said, "I think it's great that you write, We need more women, who look like you, writing." And I thought to me, that sounds a bit racist. But then I realized a

fter that, what she thought this was a good thing, like that she was praising me because she was saying, I guess there aren't many Asian women who are journalists, but I don't want to be considered good journalist because I'm Asian or because I'm a woman, I want it to be because my work is good. And I think that's what it shouldn't be about. Your value as a human being should be about who you are as a person, not ticking off certain boxes. So it does disturb me quite a bit because I feel, especi

ally for white people, they feel like they can't speak up about it because they're gonna get called racist. - Yeah. But Debra, you know that Asians are the new white people, right? I mean, we now know, I mean, we know this, right? Like by the woke ideology, Asian people are now in effect white because Asian people, regardless of the ethnicity or nationality in most cases have succeeded. So now we just gotta throw them in with the white people. - When I saw that pamphlet that was circulating a co

uple weeks ago and it was something like "Hard work is whiteness." I just thought, okay, I guess we are white then. - Yeah. Well, you're right. You're talking about the thing that was put out by the a was it at the black museum in DC? The African American Museum in DC, I think they put up so much. - I'm not sure, there's been so much. - Yeah, there's so many of them, but in effect, if you believe in the individual and you believe in hard work and you believe in family that these are all tools of

white supremacy, I thought anyone could work hard or care about the nuclear family or anything else. What else should we, what else should we hit on here? How about that for an open question? What are the other things that you were hitting on in the book that you think the average person needs to know about? - Well, what I can do is I can maybe just summarize what the different myths are, because that will give your audience a sense of what we cover. So I took a science based approach to debunk

ing some of the most prominent myths in our society. So there are nine of them. So I talk about how biological sex and gender are both not social constructs, they are not spectrums. I talk about how sexual orientation is related to gender identity, even though many activists and many even educational organizations say they're unrelated. That's not true, they are related. I talk about gender transitioning in children, I talk about the issue of trans women and women's spaces and sports and prisons

. And then I talk about sex differences. - Let's stop on that. Let's stop on that one for a second, because I'm amazed by this, I mean, this thing where we're watching males transitioned to female and then play in women's sports and break every record in weightlifting and racing and all of these other things. And it's like, man, one day, there's gonna be a washed up NBA player who is going to transition to female and be the MVP and the WMBA. And then what are the feminists gonna say? But I belie

ve that will happen in the next couple of years. What will the feminists say at this point? - I think it depends on what kind of feminist. So a liberal feminists will probably say, what's the problem. I don't think most athletes who are identifying as female or coming out as female are necessarily doing it to get an advantage, but it's not to say that it's never gonna happen. But whereas radical feminists who are critical of gender and are critical of this whole thing, they've been the most outs

poken about this. And I would still... I mean I identified as a feminist up until a couple of years ago, I still want gender equality for many women, I think we do for the most part have that. But feminism, I've been critical of feminism just because I think it has lost sight of its main goals. And so radical feminists have joined hands with conservatives, which would have been completely unprecedented to say, this is not fair. And to consider again, I think I have no issue referring to a trans

woman as she, you know, referring to her, using the pronoun she like, and give her respect and legal protections, but in something like sports or say mixed martial arts, which is one of my favorite sports, you cannot pretend that there are no differences at all between trans women, even after transitioning and women who are born women, because someone can get very badly hurt or even killed in a fight. - Is the irony then that I guess the radical feminist, would they argue that there should just

be no women's sports at that point? If gender is just a social construct, I mean, wouldn't, they just say, okay, well then there shouldn't be any women's sports, but then unfortunately, what they would end up with is that there would be no women in sports, or very few women in sports. Wouldn't that be the end outcome? - My sense... So again, I'm not a radical feminist, so I don't want to speak for the community, but my sense would be because they don't deny biological sex being real, so they wou

ld say women deserve to have equal opportunities and trans women are... They don't consider trans women to be women because they were born male and they've been in their eyes socialized as men. So there's no way that they can understand what it's like to be a woman. But from my understanding, radical feminists are in favor of sex segregation in terms of sports, because that's the only way that women have a fair choice chance. It's not that women are less capable, it's just, that's the reality wi

th biology and reality. - Yeah, and reality. Well, speaking of reality, did you see the video Joe Biden was at the LGBT equality forum and he said that it's not what prison, it's not what gender your birth certificate says, that should decide what prison you go to, it's what gender you identify as, meaning that you could just say, "Okay, I'm a woman." You could be a male murderer, say, "I identify as woman." And then they'll put you in a female prison. I mean, stuff like that must make your head

explode. - Well, I did see that and I remember thinking, I wish that they had someone who worked with forensic populations to speak to this, because that's definitely not a good idea. And I have worked with sex offenders in the past, both in a research and clinical capacity. And we used to have a saying, how do you know a sex offender's lying? His lips are moving. So I think as with anything in these issues, they have to be on a case-by-case basis. But, I detailed in the book a little bit more

about what I specifically think should be done and how we should approach these issues. But it's just... It's really become a question of, are you on the left or right, and you and people basically state what they think their side wants them to say on these issues. - Yeah, are there any other myths we should hit on? - In the book, so the last few words, sex differences in sex and dating, because there's so much misinformation, young people are totally confused and have no idea how to go about da

ting nowadays, so I offer some advice. I talk about gender neutral parenting and then also social justice and in academia. And I have to say, so I announced this book as of today, what we're taping. I announced it only a couple of days ago, One very prominent columnists in Canada, Barbara Kay, she wrote a review about my book and the publication. So she'd been at the national post for 20 years, they refuse to run her review because it was a positive review, and so she subsequently resigned. And

this is after a number of... I think this was the straw that broke the camel's back, but I'm just amazed at... Already there's a lot of pushback to this book and it's just science. Why is that seen as threatening? And this is something I just cannot grasp. I understand why people see it as threatening, but we need to talk about why, and at the end of the day, scientists need to be able to do their job. - Yeah. Barbara Kay she's one of the... I know, you know this, but I mean, she's one of the gr

eat journalists of Canada. I actually saw the tweet about her resignation, I had, no... I didn't click it. You know, I was doing a couple of other things, I had no idea it had to do with your book. That that is an believable, absolute, well, unbelievable. Everything's unbelievable now, so I guess it's totally believable. - She did a long Facebook post explaining why she was leaving and then the other half of it was the review of my book. And then so both of those pieces were run by the post-mill

ennials. So if your audience wants to look into that a bit more, they can check that out. - Yeah, absolutely. Well, Debra, good luck with the book. We're gonna put the link to "The End of Gender" right down below. And I hope we can do this in person at some point or I'll come to Toronto or you'll come here, we'll figure something out. Well, good luck with the book. - It's awesome to se you Dave. - Yeah, it's great to see you too. If you're looking for more honest and thoughtful conversations abo

ut academia, instead of nonstop yelling, check out our academia playlist. And if you want to watch full interviews on a variety of topics, check out our full episode playlist, they're all right over here. And to get notified of all future videos, be sure to subscribe and click the notification bell.