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It's right there in front of us, yet, like the Great Wizard of Oz, we - the pillars of society (our President and Congress, our school systems and great universities, our entire medical establishment and, of course, given the chance for such large profits, all of our most successful corporate entities) - deny that this is happening. We act like it's normal, even laudable, that so many thousands of girls bind their breasts into non-existence (funny enough, at a time when it's quite trendy for the rest of the girls to wear bras out on the street), boys tuck their penises until it hurts, parents and teachers go along with 5-year-olds who inform them that they are no longer their biological sex, and, worst of all, we as a society support and encourage mass sterilization and chemical and surgical mutilation of thousands upon thousands of young people, ranging in age from 12 to 22!!! Why is this considered normal? Granted, it should have been surprising that stocks were so over-valued at certain points in time, but, let's face it, unless you study the subject, economics has always been a bit of a mystery. The "invisible hand" is all we really know about how economies work - and that's pretty mysterious. But what in the world is making people think it's normal or even wonderful for children to reject their healthy bodies and pretend they were born the opposite sex? Once the bubble bursts, this craziness will be studied by sociologists and psychologists for a long time. Until then, people like myself will just sit in shock and disgust. Thank you for writing this. It's a very compelling, if horrifying, account of what's happening to our children.

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Jul 10, 2022Liked by Shannon B Douglas

Thank you. Expanding the ways in which this issue is presented will hopefully expand the number of people able to grasp it. Quite frankly, from where I’m sitting, I can’t be bothered by whether it’s a hard or soft landing as long as it falls. Brick or feather, it just needs to hit the ground, although I’d like to think that for certain dangerous, virtue-signaling, willfully ignorant monsters (looking at you, surgeons and other clinicians, major medical associations, Biden administration members, activist teachers and blind school boards and districts, WaPo, NYT and other MSM outlets, YouTube pushers and other social media culprits, on and on…) we’re in the brick category.

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Jul 10, 2022Liked by Shannon B Douglas

Maybe you have some actual numbers to forward to Steve Paikin of TVO who seems to believe the numbers are so negligible that they need not deign to cover the issue. I don't know what bubble he's living in. EVERYBODY knows someone and many people know several. I know four personally and almost everyone I know knows someone. It's beyond infuriating!

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Jul 8, 2022Liked by Shannon B Douglas

what an excellent, terrifying article. Sad that it is human nature to deny the reality in front of them, and yet time and time again these events occur, and when they are over, THEN people will look back and say, "how did they not see this??? All the signs were there...."

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Jul 8, 2022Liked by Shannon B Douglas

thank you so very much for writing this fantastic essay!

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So well put. Thank you. I saw your podcast interview on Transparency first. So grateful for your work in this. I can tell you’re going to help. 🙏

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I hope it bursts. Thank you for your work. I wish you and your family well.

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I agree this bubble was always going to burst and the "market" would correct as soon as the real costs became known to policy makers and policy issuers. It is great to see an economist put it in their language, thanks.

As a historian, the animating elements of gender seem perfectly designed to fill the heuristic holes left in the liberal mind by the decline of American religion. "Trans kids" and "trans suicide" are myths loaded with salvific symbolism. The rapture of "trans boys" on their first topless beach or pool trip, the pronoun ceremonies at the Unitarian Universalist church, the TikTok videos where they seem to speak in tongues -- it all smacks of the all-American travelling tent revival and patent medicine show. Half religion, half woo. A New Age, a la carte religion perfect for raising a "progressive generation" of pre-programmed consumers. Yes, the whole thing is imbued with Marxist silliness, but also soul-silliness. I am not the first observer to note that the cult of gender shuns harder than the Amish and more vindictively than Scientology.

Having said all that, I should note that gender identity ideology has two main "denominations," one that believes in the "gender identity" as tabula rasa to which the body may or may not be conformed, and the other proposing that "gender identity" is fixed, and the body a tabula rasa that must be conformed to that inner self. (Right away, you see how this touches on powerful latent religiosity in the squishy liberal belief system.) Credit to Exulansic for making this observation. She calls them the Church of the Nonbinaries and Our Lady of Perpetual Hormone Therapy, respectively. I look forward to seeing how that dynamic plays out in the aftermath of the bubble.

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Brilliant article

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Fantastic post. Thank you so much for writing this.

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