Are we finally allowed to talk about hormone blockers?

Research about the lasting, negative effects of puberty blockers on young teens has finally begun to surface and even the New York Times is reporting on the risks. In a comprehensive story this week, the Times relayed some of the greatest concerns stemming from new data, including lifelong loss of bone density, most pronounced in young women.

With around 300,000 teens under 18 identifying as transgender in the United States, and a rabid movement supporting rapid transition using hormone therapy, it’s vital that the public take this emerging research seriously. With no centralized tracking of the effects of the drugs, there has been little opportunity to calculate the risks—until now. 

We’re playing Russian Roulette with the entirety of kids’ lives when we don’t count the cost. One study has found that the number of people ages 13-24 who identify as transgender has doubled in the United States in just five years. Another reported a 180 percent increase in children ages 6-17 identifying as such.

Something is wrong. Yet, everyone from the American Academy of Pediatrics to International Endocrine Society has quickly endorsed hormone therapy for teens, despite the lack of research to fully understand its effects. What is the mad rush to affirm them and send confused teens straight toward unnatural bodily “solutions” that will alter their adult lives?

Part of it is Godlessness. The transgender contagion is a natural result of seeking self-validation rather than recognizing a Creator that made us male and female. We inflict damage on body, psyche, and spirit when we tell children they can choose their gender (or not have one at all.)

Children aren’t to blame for thinking this will meet their emotional needs. The activist adults in the room have told them it will. Some of these agenda-driven adults are even trying to wrestle away the influence of loving parents. 

The Bible says it would be better to be “drowned in the depths of the sea” than to harm children. It’s unlikely that most trans activists are tracking scripture, but the verse is one they should know—as well as the history the movement they support.

Historically, “gender dysphoria” almost entirely affected young males and 70 percent of cases were resolved into adulthood, according to the International Journal of Transgenderism. As Abigail Shrier writes in “Irreversible Damage,” prior to 2012, there wasn’t even data on girls ages 11-21 ever having developed gender dysphoria at all.

Today, this demographic is the most likely to claim the condition. They are also far more likely to be depressed or suicidal. With the simultaneous rise of social media and loss of faith community, we’ve seen the worst mental health crisis in history. Rather than work to address the core issues at hand for teens who say they are trans, adults have capitulated to their demands and injected them with unstudied brain and body altering drugs.

Studies featured in the Times report show that women are more heavily affected long-term by puberty blockers and that brain development can be damaged. Psychologist and neuroscientists want more research on this, yet these calls often go unanswered in the United States thanks to a rabid transgender activist movement.

To question the transgender narrative is to affix a sign of “transphobia” to your name. Chris Elson, known as “Billboard Chris,” knows this name-calling well from the hours he stands outside of gender treatment centers on public sidewalks wearing a sign that reads “Children cannot consent to puberty blockers.” The harassment, which he regularly captures on video, is constant.

But perhaps now there is a light at the end of this tunnel, as countries like Sweden and Finland begin to take the effects of puberty blockers more seriously. Furthermore, a vocal “detransition” community is emerging from the shadows. The arguments against aggressive transition techniques are growing louder.

Women like Chloe Cole, who describes her teen years being given hormone therapy as “the culmination of excruciating pain, regret and … injustice,” are now suing for what they lost. 

The Times article notes that over two dozen doctors declined to be interviewed and several that did consent asked not to be named. Despite the fact that this conversation is about medical research and serious side effects on children, doctors fear public contributions may harm their reputations. 

The question is, do we care about the truth? Do we care about the lives of children? Or do we care about not offending the LGBTQ lobby? It’s time for more people, especially Christians, to choose the truth and deny the lies.