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Source: https://www.sfexaminer.com/opinion/a...ial-contagion/
Opinion: When it comes to trans youth, we’re in danger of losing our way
Fueled by isolation and social media, some youth rush toward gender identity as answer to distress
By Erica Anderson Special to The Examiner • January 3, 2022 8:30 am - Updated January 4, 2022 11:38 am
By Erica Anderson
Special to The Examiner
Through a grant from the San Francisco Department of Public Health, UCSF’s Child and Adolescent Gender Center has for the past five years provided training and consultation on transgender kids to all youth-serving agencies and professionals in The City, including its public schools. The vision has been to make San Francisco a model in caring for its gender creative youth.
I was part of that effort, and for years worked at UCSF’s Gender Center as one of its two psychologists. I provided consultation, taught in the professional schools and wrote about the work. It is well documented that LGBTQ youth are subject to minority stress and higher rates of almost every potential psychological and social problem.
As a trans woman and therapist to trans and gender creative people, I’ve worked hard to advance acceptance of trans identities, including those of trans youth. But increasingly I’m worried that in our zeal to identify and protect these special children and adolescents, we may have strayed from some core principles and we are in danger of losing our way.
In this extraordinary time during a global pandemic, we have all been subject to extra stress to stay vigilant and avoid COVID and all its variants. Young people have pivoted to remote learning and stayed at home for in many cases more than an entire academic year, depriving them of ordinary social experiences. As a result, most adolescents have also depended upon social media and the internet to an extent never before seen.
We are learning some worrisome things about this massive, unplanned social experiment. Even the tech giants have conceded in their own research that there is a new kind of addiction/attraction to certain content and a kind of contagion among select groups, especially adolescent girls. Increased rates of depression and suicide, declines in dating and sexual activity, more reported loneliness and feelings of being left out, lower rates of involvement in extracurricular activities and surprisingly less sleep all characterize the current generation of adolescents. These trends seem to be accelerating in the era of the smartphone.
There is little question that reliance on screens and devices has isolated adolescents who may be most vulnerable and susceptible to peer and other influences, intensifying their usage of and reliance on whatever messages and images they see. I am concerned that our computer-mediated, always online environment is creating isolated echo chambers that can work on adolescents in an insidious way. And I believe that it’s been worse during COVID.
For example, some content on YouTube and TikTok includes “influencers,” who themselves are barely out of puberty. They dispense advice to other young people, specifically encouraging them to explore their gender identity freely.
On the one hand, I’m glad our society has evolved toward greater acceptance of all LGBTQ identities. On the other hand, some of the messaging has landed on vulnerable youth searching not just for keys to their own identity but solutions to other psychological and emotional problems, including serious psychiatric problems.
Here is where things may have gone wrong...
Opinion: When it comes to trans youth, we’re in danger of losing our way
Fueled by isolation and social media, some youth rush toward gender identity as answer to distress
By Erica Anderson Special to The Examiner • January 3, 2022 8:30 am - Updated January 4, 2022 11:38 am
By Erica Anderson
Special to The Examiner
Through a grant from the San Francisco Department of Public Health, UCSF’s Child and Adolescent Gender Center has for the past five years provided training and consultation on transgender kids to all youth-serving agencies and professionals in The City, including its public schools. The vision has been to make San Francisco a model in caring for its gender creative youth.
I was part of that effort, and for years worked at UCSF’s Gender Center as one of its two psychologists. I provided consultation, taught in the professional schools and wrote about the work. It is well documented that LGBTQ youth are subject to minority stress and higher rates of almost every potential psychological and social problem.
As a trans woman and therapist to trans and gender creative people, I’ve worked hard to advance acceptance of trans identities, including those of trans youth. But increasingly I’m worried that in our zeal to identify and protect these special children and adolescents, we may have strayed from some core principles and we are in danger of losing our way.
In this extraordinary time during a global pandemic, we have all been subject to extra stress to stay vigilant and avoid COVID and all its variants. Young people have pivoted to remote learning and stayed at home for in many cases more than an entire academic year, depriving them of ordinary social experiences. As a result, most adolescents have also depended upon social media and the internet to an extent never before seen.
We are learning some worrisome things about this massive, unplanned social experiment. Even the tech giants have conceded in their own research that there is a new kind of addiction/attraction to certain content and a kind of contagion among select groups, especially adolescent girls. Increased rates of depression and suicide, declines in dating and sexual activity, more reported loneliness and feelings of being left out, lower rates of involvement in extracurricular activities and surprisingly less sleep all characterize the current generation of adolescents. These trends seem to be accelerating in the era of the smartphone.
There is little question that reliance on screens and devices has isolated adolescents who may be most vulnerable and susceptible to peer and other influences, intensifying their usage of and reliance on whatever messages and images they see. I am concerned that our computer-mediated, always online environment is creating isolated echo chambers that can work on adolescents in an insidious way. And I believe that it’s been worse during COVID.
For example, some content on YouTube and TikTok includes “influencers,” who themselves are barely out of puberty. They dispense advice to other young people, specifically encouraging them to explore their gender identity freely.
On the one hand, I’m glad our society has evolved toward greater acceptance of all LGBTQ identities. On the other hand, some of the messaging has landed on vulnerable youth searching not just for keys to their own identity but solutions to other psychological and emotional problems, including serious psychiatric problems.
Here is where things may have gone wrong...
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