From the Archives IV

He used to be such a mensch

Look at that condescending asshole

October 15, 2022

I heard murmurings about Jon Stewart and his “brutal takedown” of those despicable “anti-trans talking points,” but I didn’t have the stomach to seek out the interview. After all, I used to watch Elmo-palooza with my daughter over and over when she was two, in 2008. I loved Jon Stewart. He was like a cuddly muppet in flesh form. A true sweetie. A mensch.

Now, over a decade later my little girl, who never once expressed any gender dysphoria, thinks she's a gay man.

Back in February my daughter pondered taking “just hormones and stuff.” Like any good mother I freaked out. I spent months rabbit-holing on the subject of gender ideology, queer theory and the medicalization and sterilization of children. That journey brought other public figures into my life—people who before this, I’d never in a jillion years give the time of day to—people like Matt Walsh and Tucker Carlson, Amala Ekpunobi, Michael Knowles and my favorite renegade outlier, Exulansic.

It was this last modern agitator and meticulous analyzer of pro-trans media, poor surgical outcomes and established medical guidelines who finally got me to actually watch Stewart’s interview.

I was struck immediately with how condescending Stewart acted at the outset. He sat sneering at Leslie Rutledge, nodding patronizingly whenever she spoke, impatiently talking over her and generally acting just like Trump did in any of his televised debates—something the left was horrified by, me included. Fun fact: After a lifetime as a Democrat, I have left the left, which isn’t unusual for those of us affected by the harms of gender identity policies.

Stewart’s attitude was a spectacular departure from the gentle, reasonable and mature adult I remembered. The mainstream media didn’t seem to pick up on any of his cynicism. In fact they called his approach “gentle pushback.” More fun things: I used to think fake news wasn’t a real thing. Life on the other side of the looking glass has surprised and enlightened me.

Poor Leslie Rutledge is not a seasoned debater. Matt Walsh surmised that was why she was chosen for Stewart’s hot seat. Seeing as his team never reached out to the creator of “What is a Woman,” I tend to agree. Also, I found his inability to intimate anything other than, “trust the mainstream medical professionals or you’re a piece of shit” lazy and weak.

Where things got heated for me, however, was when Jon personalized the argument. He said:

If my daughter or my son came to me, in agony, and I knew there was a program that I could get them into, that had positive effects on their mental health, I would swim across rivers, and climb mountains and tunnel through whatever I needed to get to, to save that child’s life.

The thing is, Jon, these kids are not always in agony. Sometimes they just don't want to identify into the straight white patriarchy because Critical Race Theory taught them that they are the evil oppressor. Sometimes they took a bunch of quizzes online to rationalize, justify and “prove” that they’re trans, because it’s subversive, rebellious and cool. Sometimes as a parent you KNOW your kid is not trans. You can see that she wishes desperately that she were, so she could be part of the glittery Pride party and speak from “lived experience.” But if you have eyes in your head, you look at your child's friends and see that the majority of them are trans too. And if you have independent thoughts you might wonder how that’s possible, since debilitating gender dysphoria struck only an infinitesimal portion of the population five minutes ago. And if you have solid parental intuition, you will question her new belief rather than “let her lead,” as the professionals preach. Finally, you will swim across those rivers, climb mountains and “tunnel through whatever” to SAVE your daughter from shrinks and surgeons whose guidelines advise them to fill your confused daughter with toxic hormones, amputate her breasts and ruin her life.

Clearly Stewart is just as brainwashed as any child who would announce that she’s trans. He questions nothing. He swallows all mainstream medical advice and would, in his estimation, heroically deliver his daughter or son to the gender clinic.

He goes on:

And my guess is you’d do the same…I truly hope you’re never faced with that decision, because I imagine it’s agonizing for the parent, and it’s agonizing for the child, but the fact that you’ve removed that option for people seems antithetical to the values you profess to espouse.

What Jon Stewart doesn’t seem to know is that a trip to the gender clinic is equivalent to leading the witness. When you’re asked to examine your gender identity daily, you can’t help but feel steered in the direction of first medical steps—either cross-sex hormones or puberty blockers, which are not and never have been reversible.

Even if puberty blockers were a “pause button,” time still marches on for these kids and their peers, who are developing in both body and mind. The chemically blocked child meanwhile is frozen in place, unable to participate in the communal aspects of their peer group: the pimples, periods, crushes… the shared wonder and horror of their own natural development alongside their friends. These kids are sidelined from normal life and any sort of productive future as soon as they get their first shot. What is not tragic about that?

Rutledge is clearly trying to save children from being physically harmed in the name of a shaky and contradictory belief system, and even shakier evidence that gender reassignment surgeries and HRT make anything better. She’s the protector here, and Jon’s got it woefully backwards because he hasn’t been challenged, via the trans identification of either of his children, to tug at the thread of gender identity ideology. If he had, he’d see it unravel like so many of us have.

When Rutledge responds that the child can proceed when they’re eighteen, Stewart implies they will likely commit suicide if they’re prohibited from receiving “gender affirmative care.”

But if anybody’s been paying attention like ROGD moms have, they would know that the 41% suicide rate has been roundly debunked, AND that suicide rates INCREASE after transition. And why wouldn’t they? Surgical complications are the norm, long-term use of cross-sex hormones threaten health and try as much as you like, you will never change your biological sex. Furthermore, if closeted trans kids were killing themselves prior to 2016, why are suicide rates rising? People may fall over themselves to be kind, but when you pretend to be something you’re not, you will catch them flinch. That will be your daily experience. How lonely is that?

This is why I agree with Rutledge’s position and with any politician who fights to ban so-called gender-affirmative care for children. It’s why I left the left, and why, after once thinking Jon Stewart was a lovable mensch, I now see him as a spineless shill.

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