188 - Why Do People Double Down in the Face of Contrary Evidence?

Gender: A Wider Lens

Sasha Ayad and Stella O'Malley

Health & Fitness, Society & Culture, Mental Health

4.6 • 961 Ratings

🗓️ 11 October 2024

⏱️ 61 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This conversation connects cognitive dissonance surrounding gender identity to cultural and institutional dynamics, including developments in gender medicine and resistance to emerging evidence that challenges prevailing medical practices — illustrating how deeply held beliefs become difficult to abandon even in the face of contradictory evidence.

The core idea is that just because something cannot be proven false doesn’t mean we should accept it as true. Stella and Sasha imply that trying to "research a way out" of this issue isn't the answer, as many are emotionally invested in their decisions regarding medicalization, especially parents of trans-identified children.

This episode underscores the value of self-forgiveness and cognitive flexibility, emphasizing the importance of remaining open to re-evaluating one's path and advocating that winning "hearts and minds" is key to changing perspectives rather than relying solely on evidence. While systemic changes and broader public awareness could help shift the conversation, ultimately, the cultural "war" over gender identity will not be resolved easily or quickly, with some people doubling down on their decisions for life.

For links and resources relevant to this episode, access the full show notes at https://www.widerlenspod.com/p/episode-188

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Stella O'Malley, a psychotherapist in Ireland.
0:04.4	And I'm Sasha Ayyad, an adolescent therapist in the United States.
0:08.6	And this is Gender, a wider lens, a podcast dedicated to the shifting concepts around gender in our contemporary culture.
0:16.0	Through in-depth interviews, personal stories, and psychological exploration, we seek to open up the discourse around this hot button issue.
0:25.0	Join us as we look at gender from a wider lens.
0:30.0	Hi Stella,
0:32.0	Hi, Cessia. We have a pretty remarkable thing to read to our listeners here today.
0:40.0	This is a post from Reddit, written by a young person who's thinking of
0:45.2	det transitioning and the parents are not happy about it. I'm just going to read to
0:50.7	you what she wrote. I posted a few days ago here and now I've talked to my
0:56.9	parents about it. My mom kept comparing me to my older sister who's super
1:01.8	girly.
1:03.0	She kept saying, you're nothing like her,
1:05.2	and she's obviously a girl.
1:07.2	And she was saying this, but like we can be different
1:10.4	and still be girls.
1:12.2	She also said she didn't think I should go off
1:14.3	blockers as they are there to give me time and going off of them would mean I get
1:19.3	boobs and I go through female puberty and she says that I've constantly said I'm a boy for nine years so it's wrong to go off of them now
1:28.3	which I guess makes sense. She also said she thinks it's because of all the transphobic stuff in the news, and she thinks I just don't want to be trans because of that.
1:38.0	She kept asking if there was transphobia at school.
1:41.0	My dad is kind of mad with me about it, and he accused me of attention-seeking
	...

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