A Springer Nature journal has rescinded the acceptance of a paper criticizing the publishing giant’s controversial retraction last year of an article that surveyed parents of children with gender dysphoria, leading an associate editor to resign, Retraction Watch has learned.
According to emails we obtained, the blocked paper was slated to appear as a commentary in a special issue of Springer Nature’s Current Psychology that aimed “to stimulate discussion of all aspects of the ‘unpublication’ of scientific articles.”
“This is the only time I’ve had an accepted paper overruled in 4 years” as an associate editor at this journal, Christopher Ferguson of Stetson University in Florida, one of two guest editors of the special issue, told us by email.
Ferguson resigned from Current Psychology’s editorial board on August 29, a decision he said “pretty much sums up my feelings” about the publisher’s handling of the manuscript.
The aborted commentary, a draft of which Retraction Watch has seen, excoriated Springer Nature for pulling the article “Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria: Parent Reports on 1655 Possible Cases,” which was published in March 2023 in the Archives of Sexual Behavior.
As we explained last year in a story preceding the much-criticized paper’s retraction:
Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria (ROGD) is, the article stated, a “controversial theory” that “common cultural beliefs, values, and preoccupations cause some adolescents (especially female adolescents) to attribute their social problems, feelings, and mental health issues to gender dysphoria,” and that “youth with ROGD falsely believe that they are transgender,” in part due to social influences.
In the canceled commentary, which contained several instances of opinion and conjecture, Michael Bailey, a psychology professor at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., and a coauthor of the 2023 paper, argued that retractions are “increasingly a vehicle for scientific censorship.” He laid out the details of how his work was withdrawn and speculated about the publisher’s motivations.
“I was critical of Springer Nature, because I believed its decision to retract my 2023 article was made for ideological rather than ethical reasons,” Bailey told us by email. “Furthermore, I criticized other actions by Springer Nature and its journals, such as Nature Human Behaviour, which deemphasize scientific integrity for the sake of identity politics. This recent experience does nothing to dampen that criticism.”
Bailey described himself in the commentary as “tenured, thick-skinned, and annoyed by present trends in academia away from academic freedom and towards identity politics.” Other academics have made similar points in the past, highlighting the risks to democracy when activists attack scientists over research they find politically unacceptable.
According to the author, Ferguson had invited him to contribute to the special issue on retractions in Current Psychology in June 2023. Bailey submitted his paper two months later. In October, editor-in-chief of the journal Richard Ferraro told Bailey by email that two of three reviewers had recommended acceptance, but noted that “the Reject review aligns with my thoughts to an extent” and asked for a revision.
Bailey replied that he would not make the changes suggested by Ferraro, but was “willing to consider very specific modifications” that Ferguson had recommended. On December 18, Ferguson wrote to Bailey, in part:
This is a tricky issue and I know you (and I) want you to have your chance to get on the record with this. I also think this is an important message to get into the public. Although it’s true you could publish this in [the Journal of Open Inquiry in Behavioral Science, a title published by the Society for Open Inquiry in Behavioral Science, which Bailey co-founded in 2021], I think there are some advantages of you publishing this with Springer/Nature, not the least of which is that it weakens censorship efforts by tackling it directly at the source. Put bluntly, perhaps, I see value in publishing a criticism of Springer/Nature’s censorship in Springer/Nature.
(The retracted paper was since republished in the Journal of Open Inquiry in Behavioral Science, drawing flak from the LGBTQ community.)
Bailey said he submitted a revision of his manuscript on March 27 and that it was accepted on May 21. In July, however, the paper had still not been published, and Bailey asked Ferguson for an update.
“Well it’s done and scheduled for the special issue, so there’s no plan (that I know of) to squish it,” Ferguson responded, adding that the paper had been “switched to a ‘commentary.’”
Ferguson added: “Do I suspect they feel a bit embarrassed by your article…maybe…but they seem to have done the ‘right’ thing.”
Then, on August 29, Bailey received an email from Ferraro, one of the journal’s two editors-in-chief:
Dear author,
You have submitted a manuscript to a special issue in Current Psychology, Retractions and Their Discontents. The guest editors had in principle accepted your manuscript and based on their recommendation, we also provisionally accepted your manuscript. As the Editors-in-Chief of Current Psychology, the final responsibility for the content of the journal, including its special issues, lies with us.
Upon further review and after careful consideration following conversations with the Springer Nature Research Integrity Group, we have decided not to proceed with the publication of your manuscript. What you have submitted appears to be an opinion piece, rather than an original research article and therefore not suitable for publication. We have therefore rescinded the accept decision.
Best regards,
F. Richard Ferraro
Lauren S. Seifert
Co-Editors-in-Chief of Current Psychology
Ferguson said he was informed of the decision to withdraw the acceptance of the commentary that same day.
“Apparently some kind of ‘Integrity Group’ at Springer got a hold of it, decided to squash it, and used the excuse that this was because it was an opinion piece (of course there are zillions of opinion pieces in all manner of psychology journals including, I am sure, many others Springer publishes),” he told us. “So I think it was this Integrity Group that [prompted the retraction], pretty much supervening all the actual scholars involved.”
Teresa Krauss, Publishing Director at Springer Nature, told us:
Springer Nature expects all submitted manuscripts – whether original research, commentaries, or editorials – to contain factual and accurate information as part of our commitment to maintaining the validity of the scientific record. Journal editors can contact the Springer Nature Research Integrity Group for advice on any manuscript under consideration. In this instance, RIG was consulted due to concerns about the accuracy of some statements in the manuscript.
After examination of these concerns, the Editors were advised that they may want to review the manuscript again. After further careful consideration, they took the editorial decision to rescind the initial acceptance decision.
Editor’s Note (1500 UTC, 9/5/24): We have edited the headline and first paragraph of this story to attribute opinions about what occurred in this case. We have asked Springer Nature for details of the exchanges between the RIG and the editors of the journal in order to better understand what happened, and will update with anything we learn.
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Springer Nature is seriously attempting to pollute science with ideologies, including communist, Marxist, socialist, and wokeist ideologies.
“ In the canceled commentary, which contained several instances of opinion and conjecture”
So in other words, a commentary.
It is disheartening to see a major publisher prioritize ideology over science. Are they aware of how they are undermining the essence of scientific inquiry, and the harm they are thereby causing to society?
They don’t care! Look at their recent email to our colleagues: “The research landscape was dominated by western researchers 20 years ago. Today, China produces some of the most impactful and the highest volume of research papers and India is third in volume. As can be seen in our first Editor Diversity report, our Editorial Boards still reflect the diversity seen in the research landscape 10 years ago and we are actively trying to change this. As well as supporting journals with recruitment needs, there are many resources to support Editors-in-Chief to recruit more diverse boards. We also strongly encourage all editors to use more diverse reviewers to support your peer reviewing.”
This type of current controversy over the “suitability” of research papers critical of concepts dear to the leftist/woke “guardians-of-truth” is what prompted me to leave academia years ago. At that point I had realized that psychology, political “science”, and all the other behavioral sciences had become compromised by political activists and “true believer” ideologues who passionately believed they already knew “the truth” about all the research topics in these fields. In other words, these truth gangsters were saying, “…. no research is necessary because we already know the true nature of these social and psychological processes.” I had studied to become a research psychologist to discover the underlying mechanisms of human psychological and social functioning, but the marketplace of ideas in the general public had changed in the intervening years and the “truths” I thought would better humanity apparently had losr their value. A significant swath of the population preferred “feel-good” beliefs over whatever science had to offer. The leftist/woke religion offered its adherents happiness, and to hell with what the behavioral scientist heredicts say. I have never regretted leaving the contentious environment of academia, for, as in a bad marriage, there comes a time where you realize the strife is not resolvable by appeals to rationality, truth, and logic because it is all raw, human, irrational passion. Unfortunately for science, it signals that humanity is now entering The Dark Ages 2.
You nailed it! Very sorry that talented people like you leave science just to be replaced by idiot woke ideologists.
As a clinical psychologist and researcher, Current Psychology was one of the last journals I had real respect for. They were open-minded and put scientific methodology above political ideology. My fellow researchers and I lament how the psychological research field is collapsing (when it comes to publishing anything that threatens the left-wing narrative).
Before jumping to conclusions, folks might want to do a web search for “J. Michael Bailey” or “Michael Bailey psychology” or “Michael Bailey Northwestern University” to obtain some context about his academic history and prior controversies.
At the very least, there are historical questions as to how rigorously he has followed proper research protocols and practices.
He was a department head who was removed from that position.
Thanks. Reading about him and his “controversies” actually confirmed my suspicion that Springer Nature censured Bailey because of their nasty ideologies. Alice Dreger: “These critics, rather than restrict themselves to the argument over the ideas, had charged Bailey with a whole host of serious crimes,” but that “what they claimed about Bailey simply wasn’t true.”
Dreger, Alice Domurat (2015). Galileo’s middle finger: heretics, activists, and the search for justice in science. New York: Penguin Press. ISBN 9781594206085. pp. 9-10.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Michael_Bailey
Michael Bailey was the subject of vilification and lies by transgender activists who did not like his publication on autogynephilia. This is a well-established condition whereby men gain sexual arousal through the thought of themself as a woman or by dressing as a woman. Transgender activists deny that this condition exists because it sullies and discredits their claims to actually be women. However there are support groups for sufferers of this condition and thorough academic work documenting it.
People who whistle-blow tend to be, as you say, controversial. That you question Bailey’s rigor, in the face of the absurd, nonsensical stuff being churned out by the for-profit, pro-transgender lobby, would make me laugh if it weren’t so sad. I’ve googled him, I’ve researched his work, and my conclusion is that he makes sense and his work is rigorous. Not perfect: rigorous. The same cannot be said for those pushing the insane idea that we can be born in the ‘wrong’ body and that modern medicine can correct that. There’s no research that supports this notion, and those pushing it are doing so for financial and political, not scientific, reasons.
Contrary to most of the comments lamenting the supposed “woke,” “leftist” culture supposedly taking over science, it’s clear from even a cursory look at the original author’s record that it’s he who is motivated by ideology and bias, not the publishers
How can evidence-based science be “motivated” by ideology and bias?! Was Galilei motivated by ideology when he said the earth orbits the sun?
Because people’s ideology or bias might knowingly or unknowingly select data that supports their beliefs. It’s why double-blind studies have the most trust. The format limits bias more than others.
Yes I know that (elementary school knowledge) but when I say “evidence-based science”, it inherently means that “selection bias” and some other forms of bias are already taken care of to a good degree using methods like randomization etc.
You’re arguing from your conclusion. Yes, if selection bias has been eliminated, then there is no selection bias.
The question is, was selection bias eliminated? Were other sources of error controlled for?
That Wikipedia article you link to explains that the “data” here are a long way from being objective or double-blinded. They interviewed, not the adolescents, but their parents. How many parents are objective about their adolescent children, on any subject? Never mind “my child isn’t really trans,” parents are famously biased about their children’s abilities.
The claim isn’t “many parents whose children say they’re trans don’t believe them,” or “many transgender people’s parents don’t believe that they’re trans”–those are both hypotheses about the parents, with different assumptions, for either of which it would make sense to interview the parents as well as the children. The claim is “many adolescents who identify as trans are wrong” with the crucial assumption–not fact–that parents are the best authority about their children.
@Vicki,
1. The selection bias is not supposed to be “eliminated”. Nor did I say it is “eliminated”. I said “it is taken care of to a good degree”.
2. I didn’t post any links. If you mean Galileo’s link, which Wikipedia article talks about the data being far from double-blind or objective? Couldn’t find them in that link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._Michael_Bailey
3. If you believe the study is wrong due to bad methodology, go conduct the perfect study and prove Bailey wrong. No room for any (political or ideological) irritation or retraction.
4. Vicki: “The claim is “many adolescents who identify as trans are wrong” with the crucial assumption–not fact–that parents are the best authority about their children.”
me: Can you answer these 2 important questions?
1. What’s wrong with that claim? That claim actually seems worth investigating. It may be true, and if it is true, the irreversible surgeries and hormone therapies will be a mass slaughter. So why do you think it is a bad claim?
2. If it isn’t a fact, then who else is the best authority about parents’ children?
If you bothered to read past your own biases, you’d change your mind about that.
It’s amazing to me that so many here can complain about the woes of a supposedly ‘censored’ author who still managed to publish his commentary, get an article in Retraction Watch and get covered by major media outlets. What a plight.
As for ROGD, a position statement from over 50 psychological associations, including America, Portugal and Puerto Rico, dismiss the concept due to a lack of empirical evidence and it’s potential for harm when used in clinical setting.
>dismiss the concept due to a lack of empirical evidence
Isn’t the issue here the fact that there is clearly a concerted effort on the part of various researchers and publishing staff to prevent the accumulation and publication of such evidence?
I mean, a quick Google Scholar search on ROGD or kids awareness of their own gender dysphoria comes up with plenty of results, and there are extensive media ecosystems that exist to prop up ROGD supportive views.
As opposed to being some plot, this rather seems like something the scientific community has looked at and decided was unfounded.
I am the parent of a child who had NO early life confusion about her sex or “gender”, but started questioning “gender” in adolescence after sustained use of Tumblr platform and under influence of peers. I speak to hundreds of parents who tell the same story. This is ROGD, but I think it would be better termed ‘adolescent onset gender dysphoria’. We have seen other contagions such as TikTok Tourette’s syndrome. Why is it so unbelievable that this is a social contagion?
Dysphoria often arises as a result of the appearance of secondary sexual characteristics, as you admit yourself with the term ‘adolescent onset gender dysphoria’. A four year old female child is more similar physically to a four year old male child than those same two children would be a decade later. Additionally, puberty often leads to an increase in gendered treatment. I found once I grew breasts that I was no longer treated as a child but as a woman, with all the misogynistic baggage that entailed.
I do think that ROGD isn’t worth the time of day, but that’s because I see it as being bog-obvious stuff on the same level as how I didn’t realize I was gay until I found out lesbians existed as a 12 year old. And I got the same arguments at the time about how my parents understood me better than I did myself, that it was a phase, that I was confused and seeking attention but would eventually find a boy I liked and realize I was being silly.
Instead I got a wife.
I’m not saying all teenagers who say they’re trans will be trans in the long run, and I am against underage surgery. But I do think enough of them will, and they will remember this not as parental concern but as the time they got argued with about their own identity by someone who didn’t have to live in their brain.
You know the symptoms of gender dysphoria are mostly ones that can be kept to oneself. Wishing you were another gender but keeping it to yourself, because you have a feeling that others will see you as less or you’ll be punished, is very possible. Plus other signs can be recognized in hindsight when kids can do weird things and it’s just being kids.
That and what the lesbian said, puberty kind of makes the whole sex characteristic thing a lot more prevalent. Combined with the fact that being gay was described as a phase that was being spread to straight kids, there are pretty good reasons to think “hey maybe this is biased”
Lastly, I came out at 15 to my mom and she was confused but always tried to be supportive. Me and her are incredibly close today. She saw no signs either, and honestly I see comments like yours and am grateful that my mom didn’t try to claim I was a ROGD kid, because I know I fit the description. The trans “contagion” got to me because I thought that I could not and ever be another gender, and only needed to see others do so prove it. It was the same way with my sexuality, I denied that I felt anything until I was shown that others feel it too.
Littmans study, if you actually read it, barely had any statistically significant results, but one of them was the distance between kids and their parents. The information I just shared is not something my mom would think of because honestly? I wouldn’t want you make her feel upset about something she couldn’t control. I can only imagine the lack of information parents who have strained if not inexistent relationships with their children would have.
I’ve been trans for about a decade now and on hormones for five years. I think that’s good enough for most people when it comes to believing I’m transgender.
And what of the potential for harm in a clinical setting of amputating young girls’ breasts, putting them on puberty blockers, and watching as they develop osteoporsis, lose the ability to experience sexual pleasure, become infertile, and spend the rest of their lives as medical patients? You don’t mention Europe in your list of 50 psych associations that dismiss the concept of ROGD: could that be because European doctors have seen the light and dialed WAY back on the gender affirmation platform for children? And we’re the ones who are lagging behind the science? Could it be that the combination of profiteering and the explosion of social media have combined in a toxic way and young girls are a primary victim of this?
Any medical “professionals” who agree to, let alone promote, gender-transition operations should get life imprisonment for these catastrophic permanent damages.
Good riddance. Michael Bailey has done a lot to harm trans people by popularizing Blanchard’s typology. ROGD is pseudoscience based on a survey of queerphobic parents without talking to their kids or medical professionals.
You clearly don’t know the meaning of pseudoscience. How can something based on a survey be considered pseudoscience?
Queerphobic?! You attach “phobic” to anything to fight it.
Actually the correct form of survey is talking to the parents not medical professionals.
Medical professionals? “medical” professionals don’t find even one bit of physiological difference or anomaly in the body of transgender people. So if Bailey asked “medical” professionals, they would already tell him that there is no such thing as “trans” in the medical world. At least not known yet.
If you don’t believe psychiatrists and psychologists are medical professionals, I can’t argue with that. You’re approaching the argument from a different set of initial assumptions than the person you are arguing with, because they are the ones whose wheelhouse gender dysphoria belongs to so the argument against it based on physical realism is completely antithetical to even an argument on this paper because it is not about physical realism, it is about psychology and belief and about perception from someone outside of the actual issue. Asking the parents about it is like asking husbands what it is like to be someone’s wife. You might be able to get some interesting information, but you cannot make the conclusion from the husband’s perspective about what is going on with the wife, especially if they are not trained to accurately gather data or draw conclusions. This is literally a paper entirely about feelings and emotions drawing a hard line conclusion based on that, so if you are arguing against gender dysphoria because of its basis in human psychology and emotion in the first place then it is entirely hypocritical to argue for the conclusion of this paper based on the emotional reaction of the parents. To the parents it may appear to be “rapid onset” but for parents of someone who is gay, when they come out of the closet it would equally seem just as rapid onset like they woke up one day and decided to be gay, even if it was something developing over time that they couldn’t or wouldn’t identify and vocalize.
The argument against physical realism of gender dysphoria completely ignores the actual existence of intersex people, and the progressive deterioration of the Y genome. XX/XY formalism is simply probably inaccurate because those are not the only genetic combinations, and if you actually kept up on research papers in the field you would know that it is entirely possible that the Y chromosome will entirely disappear or mutate so we cannot rely strictly on this as a basis for our gender norms. Moreover, external genitalia is an extremely weak indicator as, pretty obviously, there are several issues a person could encounter with their external body not connecting with their internalized self image. Especially in a society that traumatizes most males at birth by literally cutting off part of their sex organ through circumcision, is there really any wonder why people would have significant body image issues, even men? They are literally scarred from birth for the crime of being born a man, and for some this non-consensual act becomes a literal penectomy and unwanted reassignment surgery. But instead people are lobbying against the person’s own wishes for their own body, but when it is their parents decision society in America has no issue with genital surgery unless it is done to a female baby, in which it is considered genital mutilation and highly illegal. What about if a religiously devout 13 year old decides he wants to be circumcised at confirmation for his beliefs? Should that be allowed or disallowed because he is too young? Or is it only okay if someone else makes that decision for him? It’s a ridiculous hypocrisy and a testament to just how pathetically misaligned people’s morals and priorities our in the political landscape of modern day America.
Pseudoscience is by definition, like science. A survey could easily be pseudoscience, like polling, which you would know if you knew anything about psychology, because the wording and presentation of questions, the order they are made in, and even the identity of the interviewer or the potential of the answers being seen by others can be highly influential on the answers that people give. Not to mention that poor sampling can lead to massive statistical errors with extrapolation, including where it is done and who it is done with.
Of course the biggest issue that would pretty much invalidate any argument like this is the issue of education and social climate. It is easy to say, gender dysphoria didn’t exist in the past like it does now, because we never heard about it, and these kids didn’t believe they were another gender until someone else put that idea into their head. They also didn’t know what water was until they learn about it, but that doesn’t stop them from being thirsty or feeling better when they drink it. Without knowledge it is impossible to put a name to what you are experiencing. Plenty of people, especially in the autism spectrum on the Asperger’s side, experience strong emotions without realizing what is going on because they lack the social development to understand what they are feeling and be able to place a name to it. Likewise, people with gender dysphoria or homosexual attraction can end up in the same position where they are fighting against what they are feeling because they have been indoctrinated against believing in its existence, or against allowing themselves to feel that way. I don’t think it is any coincidence that gender dysphoria and same sex attraction seems to be unusually represented in the autistic population, but no matter what people do they cannot prevent the proliferation of knowledge and these people will eventually realize what they are feeling and either choose to or not to act upon it. But that is their decision and trying to influence it in any way will almost always backfire.
Where an argument could be made, to play devil’s advocate as is my burden, is that autism seems to have some sort of relation to the mirror neurons and an over-excitation, so it would be worth doing research into the effect of this in the sense that perhaps there is some sort of interpersonal feedback loop leading to the perpetuation of one person’s emotions developing in another like a virus. However most of this stuff seems to propagate over the internet which I would think could make this generally impossible, but that is something for qualified people to research.
To begin my conclusion, the best argument I have seen against it is that gender affirming surgeries should never be completed before someone is 18. I genuinely think it’s irresponsible to allow anyone to make these decisions for children, even themselves, and I personally don’t think it should really matter because children shouldn’t be seeing each other naked or engaging in sexual activity because it is basically guaranteed to be regretful for one or both parties and originates from a biological imperative that we no longer need to rely upon as a society. However I understand the viewpoint of a child, because I was one before, and at that age interpersonal relationships, especially romantic or sexual ones, seem to have an outsized importance because you have literally nothing else going for you in life as you are basically a slave until you are 18, and you think you will be free after that even though you are just looking forward to another kind of servitude. THIS is why “non-binary” is celebrated, because it doesn’t force a person with gender dysphoria to choose. The gender binary inherently creates a system whereby someone who feels gender dysphoria must choose one or the other, leading to a system where gender affirming surgery is required for a person with gender dysphoria to feel “right.” It is actually ironic, because the cultural rallying against the gender non-binary and transgender beliefs has created a system whereby someone suffering from gender dysphoria MUST have genitals that match their identity of either male or female, instead of being more accepting of a world where a man with a vagina or a woman with a penis can exist and feel okay about who they are. The other ironic conclusion of this is that for parents who desperately don’t want their children to be gay, they are essentially forcing them to choose one or the other, whereas someone attracted to male bodies could conceivably date a man with a vagina and even have babies, or vice versa with a female and female with a penis, instead they are forced to pick one or the other based on outward presentation so it will almost always just end up being the traditional gay relationship, because that is actually more acceptable than transgender or non binary. Of course the biggest thing I have to say, is who cares? You shouldn’t. Their lives don’t effect you. You want to argue against something? Argue against gender surgery before 18 and that’s it. Don’t argue against the institution of transgenderism because you are just arguing against something that actually exists. But if you are going to do that, you need to be willing to argue against circumcision and gender affirming surgery at birth, because these are all decisions that no one should be making for another person. The unintentional consequence of course will be creating more legitimately intersex people because they were not gender chosen at birth to fix an intersex characteristic, but we will also have a lot less baby boys having their penises chopped off for literally no reason.
Of course all this is to say I do ultimately disagree with retraction of the article. I think the article argues against its own conclusions well enough, and only people who are not very critical thinking would be swayed by the conclusion drawn, and they will be swayed by anything so it doesn’t matter. These ideas will spread regardless, but at least if they are exposed to the open they can face the criticism of critical thinking rather than being censored like a thought crime or like it’s an idea too dangerous to get out. I mean he’s literally just saying what we already know. Anecdotal evidence says parents don’t believe that their children are transgender, and people will use that as evidence against gender dysphoria until the end of time. Nothing even controversial there except the belief that random people surveyed know anything about anything.
@Please gag me, I read the rest of your comment and found it good. I don’t agree with most of it, but I liked your way of reasoning. That’s a point to start discussion. 🙂 Sorry I called you woke community. I take my word back. You do have a good critical thinking.
Your comment was very eloquent and reasonable up until the point where you claimed that sexual relationships between minors always have “regretful” consequences, as well as any decision regarding sex and/or gender apparently. That part needs a big “citation needed” asterisk. I’m always surprised at how otherwise rational people seem to believe so strongly in that. What do you believe happens at 18, that it suddenly changes one’s maturity?
Hah! If ROGD is pseudo-science, then what gender clinics are pushing is anti-science. Medical professionals pushing it are also pushing up their bank balances: they are not dispassionate or objective.
The underlying basis for the ROGD model is nothing more, or less, than that a person’s psychology can be influenced by their social environment. In many times and places, it would be commonplace to believe in the intercession of Saints. Today, not as common.
In the modern world, the social environment of adolescents consists in large part of social media.
Therefore, any thoughtful person (without need for double-blind, randomized, controlled studies) should know to a certainty a social media environment that heavily promotes a model of “gender spectrum,” that celebrates “non binary” as a very special and wonderful thing, etc. must by definition be having significant influence on many young girls.
Straightforward and gold. Nailed it.
ps. Besides common sense, there are also several studies showing that media have the greatest influence on people’s attitudes.
Depressing that this keeps happening. But kudos to the editor for resigning in protest.