Whipping Girl

all the evidence against "transgender social contagion/ROGD" (plus an updated timeline)!

2025-11-23T20:52:00.000-08:00

Back in February 2019 on this blog, I published Origins of "Social Contagion" and "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria" – an investigation into where these (at the time) novel concepts suddenly appeared from. What I found was they originated on anti-trans parent websites then quickly spread throughout conservative and mainstream media, almost as if they were a “social contagion” unto themselves (as many people have joked).

For that investigation, I created a timeline of all the relevant events, which I've just updated with a load of new entries – you can read it at the link above!

The most recent entries include last month's Kaufmann report & a Wall Street Journal op-ed, which revived discussions about supposed "transgender social contagion." As I started writing a response to these developments, I realized that I needed to write a more general primer explaining why that theory isn't scientific (as proponents have ensured that it's unfalsifiable) and how bad actors often shoehorn any statistics (whether sound or specious, increases or decreases) into that narrative. Hence the title of my latest essay:

Lies, Damned Lies, and Transgender Statistics (plus over a dozen studies contradicting the “social contagion/rapid onset gender dysphoria”). That's a no-paywall link to Substack, but you can also read it via this friend link to Medium.

In addition to countering the aforementioned report and op-ed, this essay also gave me the opportunity to collect all of the studies that refute “social contagion/ROGD” in one place, so others can conveniently cite it and share it with others. So please check it out & share widely!

If you appreciate that I make this work freely available online, please consider supporting me on Patreon (for as little as $1/month)!

my latest julia update!

2025-09-24T17:08:00.000-07:00

I just released my latest email update, which includes links to all my best 2025 essays & videos so far – you can access all of them at the link! The update also has information about how you can book me for a talk or event.

Since this is Bisexual Awareness Week (and yesterday #BiVisibilityDay), I decided to share a chapter from my novel 99 Erics called “Bomb,” so-named because it humorously defuses many straight assumptions and bisexual stereotypes. You can read it by clicking that link or via the email update.

By all means, you can sign up for my email list if you wish. But the *best* way to follow my work is through Patreon, where I post about all my latest essays, videos, music, etc., as soon as they are released. Plus Patreon just added a "JOIN FOR FREE" button, so it won't cost you anything! Although if you become a full member (for as little as $1/month) you can access all my patron-only posts, which include rare & hard-to-find writings of mine (such as those listed at the end of this post).

a short essay & video about how we see gender & trans people

2025-07-18T10:42:00.000-07:00

Some of you may recall that last August I published an essay entitled Why Does “Transvestigation” Happen? On Gendering, Ungendering, and (Mis)Perceiving Trans People. It uses so-called “transvestigators” and the JK Rowling/Imane Khelif Olympics ordeal as a jumping-off point to ask more general questions about how we see gender, how trans and gender-nonconforming people “short-circuit” this unconscious process, how our perception changes as we become more cognizant of gender & sexual minorities, and why some people seem to get “stuck” in stage where they compulsively misperceive gender and sexual diversity in cis people as “transness.”

It is one of my favorite essays that I wrote in the last few years. And now it has been turned into a video essay! You can watch it here (or via this link: https://youtu.be/kC6lsvUKEQ0):

The YouTube show notes contain the following "chapters" of the video – you can use the time stamps there to skip ahead to particular sections if you wish:

0:00 Introduction
2:18 The Two Filing Cabinets Mindset
8:00 Ungendering and “The Look”
17:15 Delusions of “Gaydar” and “Transdar”
23:00 Dismantling the Two Filing Cabinets Mindset (for better or worse)
32:50 Believing Is Seeing
39:40 Other Perceptual Biases (or why trans women, gender non-conforming women, and women of color are especially fucked)
43:53 Conclusion

I also wrote a short companion essay for the video called How Do We See Gender and Trans People? You can read it on Substack at that link or else on Medium – both are no paywall. I thought I'd end this post with the last few paragraphs from the companion essay:

In addition to being intellectually interesting, I believe this issue is one of the most underappreciated obstacles that trans people face. The fact that most cis people naively presume that they see the world “normally” or “correctly” directly leads to them imagining us as “outliers” at best and “abominations” at worse. We can explain gender and sexual diversity to them until we’re blue in the face, but the real problem is they cannot see that diversity even though it’s all around them!

Encouraging the cis majority to dismantle their Two Filing Cabinets mindset in a “good way” (as I put it in the video) has the potential to help them see that there is no such thing as a “normal” or “correct” gender—we are all simply collections of sex characteristics that vary in all sorts of ways.

Dismantling the Two Filing Cabinets mindset can also help trans people, especially those still in the “questioning” phase. I spent years believing that I’d never be able to transition because there appeared to be an immense chasm separating male from female that seemed nearly impossible to transverse. But it turned out that chasm was entirely in my mind. As I explain in the video, as my gender perception shifted—as I began seeing gender and sexual diversity in all its varied forms—I gradually realized that it was possible for me. I had been stuck on the false notion that I could never be a “real” or “normal” girl, until I was finally able to see that there is no such thing as a “normal girl.”

Anyway, whatever your current state of gender perception is, I hope you appreciate the video—and if you do, please “like” it (which will help boost it in YouTube’s algorithm) and share widely!

If you appreciate that I make videos & essays like this freely available online, please consider supporting me on Patreon (for as little as $1/month)!

Trilogy of essays debunking “Rushing Kids into Transition”

2025-06-21T15:09:00.000-07:00

Please check out my LATEST ESSAY: What Covid “Lab Leak” and “Rushing Kids into Transition” Have in Common (and more general thoughts about conspiracy theories and negativity bias) (on both Substack & Medium). It is the third piece in an unintended trilogy of sorts, so I figured I’d briefly share my thought process on it.

In 2023, I published one of my most comprehensive essays ever: Gender-Affirming Care for Trans Youth Is Neither New nor Experimental: A Timeline and Compilation of Studies. In it, I provide a timeline of how the gender-affirmative model came to be, counter the most common misconceptions and talking points against it, and include well over 100 references (including position statements from major health professional organizations) in support of it. In other words, that essay is a science- and logic-based deep-dive into the subject.

But as we all know, some people won’t accept the science on this matter regardless of how many studies are done and how high quality they are. In fact, I’ve increasingly noticed that these opponents routinely fantasize about finding some kind of “smoking gun” (whether it be the “WPATH Files,” Jamie Reed, the Cass report, etc.) that would magically appear and somehow invalidate all the past research showing that gender-affirming care is efficacious, even though that’s not how science works. In other words, they seem to treat the issue like a conspiracy theory—I made this case in my 2024 essay The Cass Review, WPATH Files, and the Perpetual Debate over Gender-Affirming Care.

My latest essay expands upon this. Specifically, I show how a basic cognitive bias known as negativity bias—our tendency to dwell more on negative outcomes than positive or neutral ones, and to presume that negative events must have been caused by something or someone rather than occurring naturally or inexplicably—can explain the behaviors of opponents of gender-affirming care and their relentless belief that kids are being “rushed into transition” despite all evidence to the contrary. I also examine the striking parallels between how “rushing kids into transition” and the Covid “lab leak” theories have spread like wildfire in the mainstream media despite the scientific consensuses against them. You can read it at:

Medium (friend link that circumvents the paywall): https://juliaserano.medium.com/what-covid-lab-leak-and-rushing-kids-into-transition-have-in-common-2eb4e08ee3f4?sk=c866d22b9e29cc428fd73e02abba9881

or Substack (no paywall): https://juliaserano.substack.com/p/what-covid-lab-leak-and-rushing-kids

As always, please share widely and give it lots of claps and likes and such! And if you appreciate that I make essays like this freely available online, please consider supporting me on Patreon (for as little as $1/month)!

regarding Substack and writer-centric boycotts

2025-06-20T20:46:00.000-07:00

photo of the CEOs of Meta (Facebook/Instagram),
Amazon, Google (YouTube), & "X",
all of whom "platform Nazis",
prominently supporting Trump
at his 2025 inauguration

Hello and welcome to my blog! If this is your first time here, well, that’s likely because I hardly ever post here these days.

For years, this was where I routinely penned my essays. But by the mid-2010s, readers had tapered off from visiting blogs, even when I would share links to my posts on other platforms. Increasingly, people tended to stick to their preferred social media ecosystems. And for those interested in reading and/or writing articles and essays, Medium was the most popular ecosystem at the time. There, you could follow other writers and they could follow you back. And because so many people had created their own Medium accounts, they were more likely to click on and share your posts and potentially follow you. So naturally, I began publishing my essays there.

I am still on Medium. But gradually, most of those readers and writers have since migrated to Substack, which is why I began cross-posting my essays there a couple years ago. I explained my reasons for doing so in my first Substack post. Later on, amidst a new round of protests against the platform, I penned a 2,500 word essay on the matter, entitled On Being an Artist, Author, and Activist in a World Where All the Major Online Media Platforms Suck. Don’t worry, that link will take you to an archived version of the essay, so you don’t need to actually visit Substack to read it.

In that post, I made a few main points that I will quickly touch on here TL;DR-style:

I respect everyone’s right to boycott any company they choose to for whatever reasons that compel them. Having said that, it’s useful to make a distinction between boycotting a company as a customer (“I refuse to read anything on Substack!”) versus boycotting said company as an author, artist, or activist who is trying to generate interest in their work. If I were to remove my books from Amazon, or my music from Spotify, or my video essays from YouTube, or stopped promoting my work on Instagram, etc., people are way less likely to discover or access my work, because audiences are on those platforms, sometimes exclusively.
The most commonly stated reason for boycotting Substack is that they “platform Nazis” (e.g., white nationalists, anti-LGBTQ+ activists, and other bad actors) in addition to the many mainstream and progressive writers on the site. But many of these same white nationalists & anti-LGBTQ+ activists are also platformed on Amazon, YouTube, Spotify, Instagram, and so on. So are we going to boycott all of these other platforms as well? If not, why?
When posed this question, Substack protesters/boycotters will usually pivot to the CEO’s/founders’ presumed right-wing or far-right political leanings. But of course, I could make the exact same argument about those other companies—see photo above of the CEOs from Amazon, Google (who owns YouTube), and Meta (who owns Facebook & Instagram) prominently supporting Trump at his inauguration. Recently, I’ve seen people emphasize that Marc Andreessen is a main investor of Substack. While I agree that Andreessen is evil, he’s an investor in literally hundreds of companies, including Airbnb, Lyft, Pinterest, Slack, among others—so will we be boycotting these companies too?
I make clear in the article that I am *not* saying that said policies and politics don’t matter or aren’t protest/boycott worthy. Just saying that singling out Substack strikes me as a distinction without a difference.
Finally, I felt that the initial boycott against Substack (more on that in a moment) ended up disproportionately targeting transgender and other marginalized writers, while largely ignoring cisgender and majority/mainstream writers on the platform.

As I state in the essay, these are my opinions, you are free to disagree. If you want to quibble over any of these points, I encourage you to read the full essay first, as I explain it all more thoroughly there.

I decided to pen this follow up essay because I still periodically come across people (typically on Bluesky, the social media platform I use most these days) who will either politely suggest that writers should migrate off Substack, or more harshly condemn writers who remain on the platform. The people I see making these claims are, far more often than not, writers themselves (although this could be an artifact due to me disproportionately following other writers on Bluesky).

This can create some unfortunate dynamics. As an analogy, if I am a musician or podcaster who made the decision at some point along the way (whether for personal or political reasons) to not use Spotify, and I then publicly proclaim that musicians and podcasters who do use that platform are undermining musician royalties or putting money into the hands of Joe Rogan . . . well, I may have a point. But my protests are likely to lead listeners to boycott those artists (which may substantially hurt them), while having relatively little impact on Spotify itself.

This is why I’m referring to these current Substack boycotts as “writer-centric,” because they 1) primarily target writers who use the platform (rather than Substack readers or the company itself), and 2) seem substantially driven by writers who have made the decision (for personal or political reasons) to not use the platform.

With the rest of this essay, I will highlight two glaring problems that are obscured by the writer-centric nature of these boycotts, namely, 1) writers are all different and what works for some may not work for others, and 2) if one was serious about implementing an effective Substack boycott, they would target readers rather than writers.

Issue #1: Debunking the Substack writer monomyth

Whenever I see writers urging other writers to abandon Substack, they tend to make a series of assumptions that may apply to some writers, but certainly not all. I am calling this a “monomyth” partly as a writer in-joke, but also because it’s as if they are imagining a particular idealized writer that they are tailoring their pitch to.

Their first assumption is that you must already be an established writer who has an email list full of dedicated followers. They will then offer the names of alternative “newsletter” platforms that will allow you to readily transfer your Substack email list to the new site. In other words, their pitch is: See, it’s easy and relatively painless to migrate away from Substack!

A second common assumption is that your subscribers are willing to pay you money for your “newsletter.” They will then share figures showing that the cut Substack takes from authors’ paid subscriptions is significantly higher than the cut other platforms take. Which leads to their pitch: Why give evil Substack your money when you can make even more money using a less-morally-bankrupt platform?

Often they will do the combo-pitch: It’s easy to migrate *and* you’ll earn more, what on earth are you waiting for?!?

There is a third common assumption that is never explicitly stated—in fact, it is conspicuous by its absence. Specifically, I have never once heard any of these writers say: You should really switch to “newsletter-dot-com” because it’s great for growing your reader base! Or “newsletter-dot-com” is a better place for new readers to discover your work than Substack.

In other words, the unspoken assumption is that you don’t need to attract *new* readers with this alternative platform, either because you’re already established and/or you are growing your audience elsewhere (e.g., through a larger media outlet you write for, books you author, your podcast or YouTube channel, etc.). Indeed, it’s notable that many people refer to these types of platforms as “newsletters,” which has the connotation (in my mind, at least) that it is a side project of sorts, one that augments or supports your main endeavor (your books, podcast, etc.).

But what if none of this applies to you? What if you are a writer who is just starting out and has no following. Who is ever going to stumble upon your writings on “newsletter-dot-com”?

Or say you have just started to cultivate a small readership on Substack—they enjoy your work, but they are not necessarily “dedicated” fans, at least not yet. Will these less-than-dedicated readers make the jump with you to “newsletter-dot-com,” especially if it involves them having to set up a new account, or giving yet another website their credit card number? Isn’t it easier for said readers to just stay on Substack, especially if they follow other writers there anyway? (Note: I am not encouraging such decisions, but I understand why they happen.)

Of course, people who call for writer-centric boycotts of Substack don’t typically target these smaller or newer writers (although they don’t really address their concerns either). But they do sometimes target more established writers—perhaps someone like me. Indeed, I probably resemble the writer “monomyth” they have in mind: author of several books who has a somewhat dedicated following who may be willing to migrate to “newsletter-dot-com” with me and perhaps even pay for a subscription.

I addressed my particular situation in the previous essay (in the “Regarding Income” section), but I think it is useful to reiterate some of those details here, to provide an example of why an established author might find “newsletter-dot-com” insufficient for what they are trying to accomplish.

A main focus of my online writing over the past ten years has been countering all the propaganda and disinformation that is being churned out by the anti-trans/LGBTQ+ industrial complex. So when I write essays that debunk their talking points, I want them to reach as many people as possible in a format that readers can readily share with others. Which is why a paid subscription model to “newsletter-dot-com” won’t work for me at all. Plus, the readers who tend to be most excited about my essays are trans/LGBTQ+ people—a community where a significant number of people struggle financially.

So the model I came up with way back when is that I would publish my essays for free on Medium (which had the biggest readership at the time), then encourage people who wanted to financially support my work (so I could continue doing it) to do so on Patreon (which is sliding scale, so people can contribute as little as $1/month). This system has worked well for me, at least until Medium began moving more toward a membership model and readers increasingly migrated to Substack. Which is why I decided to cross-post my essays there too.

I’ve had people tell me that, by being on Substack, I’m “putting money into the hands of Nazis”—by which they seem to mean that the money Substack makes from their cut (10%, I believe) of my paid subscriptions helps them to platform white nationalists, anti-LGBTQ+ activists, etc. Of course, I can make this very same “indirectly supporting” argument to claim that we should all stop selling our books on Amazon, posting our videos on YouTube, and so on. But on top of that, one of the reasons why I’m using Substack is that they offer a free subscription option. More than 98% of my 4,800-ish Substack subscribers do so for free, and at the end of every essay I encourage them to support me on Patreon.

In other words, there is more than one way to use Substack. And many of us use it precisely because it allows us (for free) to disseminate writings that directly counter “the Nazis” and other far-right policies and politics. And since I know what some of you are likely to say next, let me end this section with a relevant quote from my previous essay:

Of course, there are limits to [what I would do to reach as many people as possible]. I certainly wouldn’t go on a dedicated white-nationalist or far-right outlet to spread the word. And there’s always a debate whenever someone on the left goes on Fox News in an attempt to reach their viewers. But then again, Fox News is a 100 percent conservative outlet. Whereas Substack (like Amazon, Facebook, Spotify, Twitter, and YouTube) hosts all sorts of voices, many of whom are on the left and some even happen to be trans.

Issue #2: Substack is where the readers are

A second oversight of the writer-centric boycott is that it fails to understand cause and effect: It presumes that readers are migrating to Substack because that’s where the writers are, when in actuality, writers are migrating to Substack because that’s where the readers are.

Now, there may have been a time (circa 2018–2020) when the former was true. In 2021, it became public that Substack recruited a number of high-profile writers to join the platform by promising them big advances. The fact that several of these writers expressed anti-trans views seems to be what initiated the original Substack boycott. I can understand why people felt that discouraging writers from using the platform might work at that time, since the platform was relatively new and actively recruiting writers. But that boycott didn’t work, for reasons that I delve into in the “Regarding the Original Substack Protest” section of my previous essay.

Today in 2025, things are significantly different. Substack—not unlike Amazon, or Spotify, or YouTube, or Instagram—has an established audience who spends their time specifically (and in some cases, exclusively) on that platform. I remember when I published my first few Substack posts, several readers commented saying they were glad I had joined the platform because they missed my work. Which struck me as odd at first, because I had been writing free and accessible essays on Medium the whole time! But in essence, what they were telling me is that they used to be on Medium, but now they did most of their reading on Substack.

When I’ve discussed this in the past, some Substack protesters/boycotters have acted surprised or even incredulous. So allow me to share some actual statistics. According to my Substack “Stats” page, this is where my current 4,800-ish subscribers come from:

Here is the breakdown, with accompanying definitions (in quotes) from “A guide to Substack metrics”:

More than half (52%) of my subscribers came from the Substack App: “Readers who directly subscribed from a Substack platform surface such as the Substack app, Notes, or the leaderboards.”
About a quarter (25%) of my subscribers came from Other Substack Network: “Readers who subscribed as a direct result of Substack network features such as Recommendations and promotions.”
A fifth (20%) of my subscribers came from Substack Existing Accounts: “Readers who could more easily subscribe to your publication because they already had a Substack account.”
A mere 3% of my subscribers are New Accounts: “Readers who came directly to your publication.”

In other words, only 3% of these readers “joined Substack” (read: entered their email address so they could receive my writings) because of me. The rest were already there. I am not drawing readers to Substack in any substantial way. The readers are already there and I am simply reaching them now.

I know some writers have successfully migrated away from Substack and I am sincerely glad that has worked out for them. But I’ve also seen several writers (who are smaller perhaps, or whose online articles are their entire gig rather than simply augmenting their primary job, books, podcast, etc.) say they tried to move to another platform but could not financially sustain it, so they had to move back to Substack. For such writers, migrating to “newsletter-dot-com” is akin to packing up the store you have on Main Street with lots of foot traffic, and moving it to the outskirts of town. If you’re a mega-store, or if you cater to a niche market, then sure, maybe some shoppers will go out of their way specifically for you. But the vast majority of the shoppers will have no idea your store even exists.

Finally, I can imagine that some protesters/boycotters who come across this post may accuse me of “promoting Substack” or “shilling for them.” If that was my intention in writing this, I would have simply published this essay *on Substack*—it probably would have gotten a bunch of “likes” and “restacks” and may have even become a featured post there.

But I didn’t. Instead, I have posted it here, on ye olde Blogspot—the proverbial outskirts of town—where no one will ever see it. Unless of course, I come across someone suggesting that I should abandon Substack, or more generally condemning writers who use the platform. In that case, I may share the link to this essay with them in the hopes that they will understand where some of us are coming from, and why a writer-centric boycott of Substack has failed to garner traction.

Conclusion

If your main goal is to disrupt or destroy Substack, then the most successful boycott you could organize would target readers. If you got 50% of readers to not use the Substack app or click on Substack links for one day, it would most certainly get the company’s attention. And if you could convince readers en masse to leave the platform, the writers would follow them. I can assure you of this, having moved to Medium, then to Substack, in the hopes of reaching readers myself.

Alternatively, you could continue to protest and boycott Substack without centering those efforts on the writers who use the platform. As an example, I made the decision a couple years ago to boycott the The New York Times due to the massive anti-trans turn they have taken. I am quite vocal about my stance. And if there is ever an article of theirs that I feel the need to read, I purposely seek out an archived version rather than clicking on their website. But because they are not a 100 percent conservative outlet, they have a few writers—Jamelle Bouie immediately comes to mind—whose work I really appreciate. As much as I dislike the higher-ups at The New York Times, I cannot fathom how convincing progressive writers like Bouie into leaving the paper would help my cause. Even if all the progressive and pro-trans writers exited, The New York Times would not collapse, because they have a huge built-in readership and they can always find more writers.

Substack also has a huge built-in readership (you can look up the statistics if you want). Even if you got me, or several dozen, or even over a hundred progressive writers to leave the platform, it would have a minimal impact on the company and their bottom line. But it would certainly reduce the number of progressive voices on the site.

Anyway, that’s my 2¢. Like I said, I completely understand why some people might want to avoid reading me on Substack, which is why I cross-post all my essays to Medium.

And if you decide to boycott me entirely as an author, artist, and activist because I use Substack (but not because I’m also on Amazon, YouTube, Spotify, Facebook, and other sites that “platform Nazis”), well, of course you are free to do so, although I personally don’t understand that reasoning.

This essay was made possible by my Patreon supporters—if you appreciate it, please consider supporting me there.

why do straight people sexualize LGBTQ+ people? (a video & essay)

2025-06-04T18:30:00.000-07:00

Last month was the 3rd year anniversary of the release of Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back. And since this is Pride month, I figured I'd share this video of me reading from the “queer chapter” of Sexed Up! The video is called Why Do Straight People Sexualize Queer People? LGBTQ+ Stereotypes, Sexualization & (imagined) “Contagiousness” – please watch & like & subscribe & share widely!

The YouTube show notes contain the following "chapters" of the video – you can use the time stamps there to skip ahead to particular sections if you wish:

0:00 Introduction (defining sexualization & the Predator/Prey mindset)
3:07 Queer people are “marked by sex” and stereotyped as “fakes”
6:30 Sexualized stereotypes of gay men
7:00 Sexualized stereotypes of lesbians
8:45 Sexualized stereotypes of asexuals
10:10 Sexualized stereotypes of bisexuals
13:30 Trans people and the “worst of both worlds” & “sexual deceiver” tropes
16:40 Anti-queer stigma is viewed “contagious”
19:15 Recurring claims that LGBTQIA+ & people of color “prey on women & children”
23:50 Critiques of “respectability politics” and “contagiousness politics”
29:00 Sexualization-centric approaches to queer activism

As if that wasn't enough, I wrote a companion essay entitled The Worst of Both Worlds: How Straight People Sexualize Queer and Trans People that places my Stigma-Contamination model of sexualization (discussed in the book and video) in the context of other feminist perspectives on sexualization. It also shares a different excerpt from the chapter (on how trans & intersex people face "The Worst of Both Worlds") that is not covered in the video. You can read it on Substack (no paywall) at the above link, or via this friend link to Medium.

As always, please share widely and give it lots of claps and likes and such!

Julia for Hire!

2025-04-08T21:12:00.000-07:00

So last week, in the hopes of drumming up some more income, I posted “Julia for Hire!” on my Substack and Medium channels. I encourage you to read and share it! Rather than reiterating the entire post, here are the main points:

As always, if you appreciate my work, you can support me on Patreon (for as little as $1 per month)!
I routinely speak at colleges, conferences, companies, and Pride events. If your organization is interested in potentially hosting me (in person or virtually), please check out my booking webpage, which includes descriptions of my most frequently requested talks.
I am open to doing freelance or contractual work (e.g., writing, consulting, editing, reading, research, fact-checking, etc.) in fields or genres that I am knowledgeable about.
Finally, if you have or know about a part- or full-time job opening that I might be particularly suited for, here’s my CV and here’s my bibliography, feel free to reach out to me and we can discuss!

Once again, here’s the original post, please share widely!

what media coverage of online "transvestigators" & the Imane Khelif ordeal get wrong

2024-08-28T16:34:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone, I just published a brand new essay: Why Does "Transvestigation" Happen? On Gendering, Ungendering, and (Mis)Perceiving Trans People!

I have read and viewed numerous solid articles and videos about both the online "Transvestigator" communities that focus on ungendering celebrities, and the recent JK Rowling/Elon Musk/Fox News ungendering and harassment of Olympian Imane Khelif. But I worry that they set up a false dichotomy, where these groups are imagined to view gender “abnormally” or “incorrectly,” while the rest of us who are not in these groups (including the majority of cis people) supposedly perceive gender and trans people “normally” or “correctly.”

And frankly, nothing could be further from the truth!

So this essay is a deep-dive into how we (mis)perceive & (mis)interpret trans people and gender more generally. It draws from research I carried out and insights I forwarded in my books Whipping Girl and Sexed Up. It is a "long-read", but I believe it communicates many aspects and nuances of this story that most people are currently overlooking. You can read it at:

Medium (friend link): https://juliaserano.medium.com/why-does-transvestigation-happen-d2c19847afb9?sk=dfabc9bd0962eaab89b54d03097cee28

or Substack (no paywall): https://juliaserano.substack.com/p/why-does-transvestigation-happen

As always, please share widely and give it lots of claps and likes and such!

my Medium Day talk on Debates About Gender-Affirming Care and Trans Youth

2024-08-14T15:31:00.000-07:00

Happy to announce that I will be giving a virtual talk this Saturday, August 17, 2024, at 2–2:30pm Eastern time (11–11:30am Pacific) as part of Medium Day – you can register (for free) to watch it & the many other talks they have at mediumday.com.

My talk is entitled Making Sense of Debates About Gender-Affirming Care and Trans Youth. In it, I will highlight the unconscious biases, unstated presumptions, and the underlying forces and dynamics that are driving the ongoing moral panic about this issue. Hopefully, the talk will provide audiences who are relatively new to this subject with the necessary background to make sense of these debates.

Since there is far too much to say about this subject, I made the above Resource Page, which includes links to over a dozen essays I've written related to this issue over the last 8 years. You can read it (no paywall) on Medium (at the link above) or on Substack. Please share widely and give it lots of claps and likes and such!

I'm very proud of to have finally compiled all my writings on this important subject in one place, so that I (and perhaps you) can readily share it with others who have questions or concerns!

As always, this resource page was made possible by my Patreon supporters – if you appreciate that I make pieces like this freely available online, please consider supporting me there!

Maintenance Phase podcast on "Social Contagion" and "ROGD"

2024-05-09T09:01:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite podcasts, Maintenance Phase, just released an episode entitled "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria" (available on all major podcast platforms). In it, they draw upon my Origins of "Social Contagion" and "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria" timeline, originally posted here in February 2019.

While a lot of work went into constructing the timeline, what I did was basically simple: I searched for the earliest instances of "transgender social contagion" and "ROGD" on the internet. I discovered that these ideas originated in 2016 on three websites run by, and catering to, reluctant parents of trans youth who were looking for justifications to deny them gender-affirming care (this has since grown into a full-fledged anti-trans parent movement). My timeline also shows how these ideas were quickly taken up by conservative outlets, gender-disaffirming doctors, and other groups who now form the backbone of the current anti-trans moral panic.

Any journalist could have easily carried out the same investigation and uncovered what I had, but none did. Whether this was due to a lack of curiosity or intentional bias on their parts, I cannot say. While other people have cited this work, Maintenance Phase is the first to share the full narrative with the general public, so I'm excited that it will finally reach a larger audience!

Since Michael and Aubrey were kind enough to link to my "Origins" post and my Patreon in their show notes, some of you may be new here – welcome! I mostly write about gender, sexuality, science, and social justice, with an emphasis on trans, LGBTQIA+, and feminist issues. Lately, much of this work has been focused on countering anti-trans science-denial and disinformation (since there's so much of it lately). If you enjoyed this Maintenance Phase episode, here are a few recent related essays you may also appreciate:

No-paywall links to many many more essays can be found on my writings webpage. If you like what you read, please consider supporting me on Patreon for as little as $1 per month!

Whipping Girl 3rd Edition to Be Released in March!

2024-01-11T10:41:00.000-08:00

I'm happy to announce that a 3rd edition of my first book Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity will be coming out this March — you can pre-order it here!

I just published an announcement post for the book, which you can read on either Medium or Substack). It's only a 5 minute read, but here's a brief synopsis: It's basically the same book as before, but with a new Afterword on trans youth and moral panics (aka, responding to the current anti-trans backlash). It also has a new cover (as you can see to the right) — I describe the thinking process behind the cover in the announcement post as well.

In addition to the book's release in March, I have a series of essays and videos related to Whipping Girl planned for the coming months, including a transmisogyny explainer video and spoken word performances of some of the chapters. So be sure to follow me on YouTube, Medium, and/or Substack if you’re interested in those.

As always, I will be spreading the word on social media — that link provides a comprehensive list of all that platforms I am currently on if you wish to follow me there too...

My Best Writings of 2023

2024-01-01T12:58:00.000-08:00

I thought I’d begin the new year with a quick recap of my writings from 2023. All these essays are on Medium and have been demonetized. If you appreciate them, please consider supporting my work on Patreon!

Several of the essays were my definitive responses to major anti-trans talking points: They are thoroughly researched (citing sources all along the way), comprehensive, and well-argued—so if you only read one or a few, I encourage you to make it these:

Here are the other essays I’ve written this year. I am proud of these too, but they were less intensive research-wise (and are often shorter as a result):

Finally, since years are an admittedly arbitrary time-frame, I will end with two essays that I wrote at the very end of 2022. Both distill some of the main take-home points of my recent book Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back and apply them to our current anti-trans moral panic and what drives transphobia and biphobia within queer and feminist circles:

I have lots of essays in the works for 2024, so stay tuned—they will all be cross-posted on both Medium and Substack, with alerts and links sent to my Patreon supporters. I am also working on a talk-length video entitled “Transgender People and Biological Sex: What the Science Says,” so subscribe to my YouTube channel if you want to be notified as soon as it comes out...

Kat Cataclysm and NaNoWriMo 2023

2023-11-02T15:58:00.003-07:00

Some of you who are newly following me may not know this, but in early 2020, I released my debut novel, 99 Erics: a Kat Cataclysm faux novel. The narrator/protagonist, Kat Cataclysm, is a polyamorous bisexual woman and absurdist short fiction writer. And 99 Erics is a humorous account of Kat’s experiences writing a book called 99 Erics, which is about her experiences dating ninety-nine different people named Eric. It is more surreal than slutty. Not that there is anything wrong with slutty.

Despite not being able to promote it as much as I would like due to the pandemic, 99 Erics is the only book I’ve written to date to have ever won a book award: It was the winner of the Publishing Triangle’s 2021 Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, an Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) 2021 silver medalist in LGBT+ Fiction, and one of Kirkus Reviews’ Best Indie Books of 2021.

The reason why I’m telling you all this now is because, after much deliberation, I think I’ve finally found a worthy premise for the next Kat Cataclysm novel. A few days ago, I sat down and started typing and the words just flew out of me! Unlike my nonfiction books and essays, which come together in a slow and methodical manner, I’ve found that my best fiction arises when I just let my unconscious mind loose and let improvisation take hold.

Given the good start so far, I’ve decided to take part in NaNoWriMo this month. For those unfamiliar, that acronym stands for National Novel Writing Month. The idea is that you try to write every day in November, hopefully coming out the other side with a fledgling first draft of a novel in hand. While I highly doubt that I’ll finish a whole first draft (especially since I have other commitments), I figured I’d give it a go and see how much progress I make!

In the meantime, rather than inundate y’all with those super-rough drafts, I thought I’d share all the publicly available excerpts of 99 Erics, to hopefully whet your appetite for an eventual second Kat installment.

My favorite chapter of 99 Erics—which I believe offers a great sense of both the character and the book—is “Posers.” A video of me reading from the entire chapter can be found on YouTube and a smaller excerpt of the first part of the chapter can be found on Medium.

Here are other excerpts from the book that I’ve published on Medium (all no-paywall):

Ethical Slut Vs. Confused Slut
Banana Slug of a Different Color
Hipsters in Queer Bars
Bomb (a bisexual coming out chapter)
The One & Only Writing Tip You Will Ever Need

Note: That last excerpt actually references NaNoWriMo—small world!

For my Patreon supporters, I have a few more patron-only chapter excerpts available:

“Eric Number One” (the very first chapter)
“Great Expectations” (my send-up of gender-swap stories)
“Shopping Carts, Part One” and “The Sex Which Is Not One” (a live reading of those two chapters).

More info and links to buy 99 Erics can be found on my 99 Erics webpage. I also sell signed copies of the book on my “buy stuff” webpage . . .

more evidence that Lisa Marchiano invented "transgender social contagion"

2023-03-26T12:33:00.006-07:00

cover image for my recent Medium post
about Lisa Marchiano

In February 2019, on this very blog, I published Origins of “Social Contagion” and “Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria,” which investigated the history of when these terms first appeared online and how they spread. The main finding of that piece was that the concept of “transgender social contagion” appears to have been invented by someone who went by the handle “skepticaltherapist” in a comment posted on February 20, 2016, on the anti-trans parent website 4thwavenow. I was not able to determine who exactly skepticaltherapist was, but I provided evidence that they went on to become one of the founders of the anti-trans website youthtranscriticalprofessionals.org (YTCP).

A couple days ago, I published a follow up piece on Medium entitled Did Lisa Marchiano Invent “Transgender Social Contagion” and “No Transition Before Age 25”? It was based on recent findings that Marchiano ran YTCP (which has since been confirmed; see also below) and that she possibly invented ROGD too. Based on this, I proposed that Marchiano was also likely skepticaltherapist — aka, the person who invented the notion that “social contagion” is turning kids transgender.

In this post, I provide further evidence that this is indeed the case.

The following evidence was provided to me by an anonymous researcher who emailed me last year (back when I didn't have the time to follow up). The incidents take place in a short period of time, on March 14th and 15th, 2016 – just a couple weeks after skepticaltherapist first proposed "transgender social contagion."

It begins with a generally pro-trans article posted on the website Psychotherapy Networker entitled The Great Escape: Welcome to the World of Gender Fluidity. If you scroll down to the comments section, you'll find that the first comment was posted on Monday, March 14, 2016 at 1:32:32 PM by someone named "Lisa" and the language is extremely Marchiano-esque. Particularly this passage: "[A] large number of young people -- especially teen age girls -- are coming out as trans after intense internet binges on sites such as reddit, tumblr, or YouTube." This phrasing is nearly identical to what YTCP (presumably Marchiano) said on TransgenderTrend on March 16, 2016 (two days later): "In many cases, these young people come to identify as trans after binges on social media sites such as tumblr, reddit, or YouTube."

On March 15, 2016 (the day after "Lisa" posts that comment), YTCP publishes its second blogpost, entitled What’s at Stake?, which is a lengthy critique of that same Psychotherapy Networker article. Once again, this is presumably Marchiano.

Also on March 15, 2016, at 6:07am (so very early in the day, likely before the aforementioned YTCP piece is published), skepticaltherapist posts her final comment on 4thwavenow before mysteriously disappearing. In a reply to someone named Starrymessenger, skepticaltherapist says: 'I wanted to mention that this month’s Psychotherapy Networker is focusing on trans youth issues, and the tone of each article is uncritically celebratory — lots of mentions of “courage,” and “bravery.” You may need a subscription or at least an account to comment, but I have so far.'

At the time of this comment, "Lisa" is the *only* person to have posted a comment on this particular Psychotherapy Networker article, as the 2nd comment doesn't appear until later that evening (7:30:15 PM on March 15th; both 4thwavenow & Psychotherapy Networker appear to be based in the U.S., so the should be only a few hours apart, if at all). Therefore, "Lisa" and skepticaltherapist must be the same person.

The fact that Psychotherapy Networker requires a subscription might explain why Marchiano went by her first name (e.g., if that's the name she originally used when she subscribed) rather than by one of her other internet handles (e.g., skepticaltherapist, timetodream).

As I pointed out in my Did Lisa Marchiano Invent “Transgender Social Contagion” and “No Transition Before Age 25”? piece, if all this is true, then Marchiano has told the same story from three perspectives: 1) as the mother of a trans child, 2) the mother is her friend "B", 3) the mother was a client of hers. I cannot say whether she posed as a mother (via the persona of "skepticaltherapist"), or whether she is the mother of a trans child but later played that personal aspect down in order to come across as an "objective" therapist. I suppose either could be true.

Finally, I remember when writing my Origins timeline, I tried to figure out if "B" (her purported friend who had a trans child) was someone involved in this trans-skeptical parent scene, but I could not make any headway. But now knowing that Lisa Marchiano also often went by the name "Lisa Bell" online, I cannot help but wonder whether the "B" could possibly stand for "Bell" in a self-referential way?

POSTSCRIPT: The link above confirming that Marchiano ran YTCP points to a tweet from Zinnia Jones, where she uncovered one of the "Shupe emails" where Marchiano admits to this. But since Zinnia has recently made her Twitter account private, most people cannot access it, so I have grabbed those screenshots and inserted them below. In the first image (the beginning & bulk of the email to Shupe, dated May 23, 2017), Marchiano outright states: "So now you know I am the blogger for YTCP. I am not 'out' so I appreciate your keeping my secret. I have copied 4thwavenow on this email to keep her in the loop." The second image contains the end of that same message, including Marchiano's email signature.

Also of note, Zinnia Jones has compiled all the pertinent research from my "Origins of Social Contagion" timeline with recent findings from the Shupe emails and other online evidence to create this timeline of Lisa Marchiano's involvement in anti-trans activism.

[note: If you appreciate this piece and want to see more like it, please check out my Patreon page]

my latest email update

2022-12-06T13:37:00.000-08:00

My latest email update is out – you can read it here. Highlights include:

Signed Books for Sale! (for the holidays or otherwise)
Two new essays: Penises, Privilege, and Feminist & LGBTQ+ Purity Politics and Anti-Trans “Grooming” and “Social Contagion” Claims Explained (both no-paywall links)
More news about my latest book Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back, including a September book interview on the podcast Vox Conversations (now called The Gray Area)
A podcast interview about Whipping Girl for This Queer Book Saved My Life
New social media platforms I'm on (including Mastodon, Post.News, Tumblr, and TikTok).

If you want to receive my email updates directly into your inbox (never more than once every few months), you can sign up here: http://eepurl.com/CxWWf

Signed Books for Sale! (for the holidays or otherwise)

2022-11-19T18:19:00.007-08:00

photo of Julia with her two most
recent books: 99 Erics & Sexed Up

It's that time of the year again, when you may be considering presents to get your friends and family (and perhaps for yourself as well). Which means it's time for me to shamelessly peddle my wares!

If you know someone who appreciates my past books, I bet they'll like my latest (and IMHO best) book Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back. It is currently available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook — those links will take you to the Seal Press website, which offers a variety of outlets to choose from. Alternatively, you can (and should!) pick up a copy at your local independent bookstore — if they don't have it in stock, just ask them to order a copy for you!

While I'm not able to sell signed copies of Sexed Up at this time, it is possible to get signed copies of any of my other books — here's how:

I have two self-published books – 99 Erics & Outspoken – which you can purchase signed copies of directly from the "stuff to buy" page of my website for $25 (PayPal or credit card), shipping included (instructions via that link). The shipping will be through USPS Media Mail, which they say takes 2 to 8 business day to deliver – this means your mailing address must be in the U.S. to do this (if not, see alternatives below). Here's more about each of those books:

99 Erics: a Kat Cataclysm faux novel is a silly, surreal, sex-positive tale about a bisexual female absurdist short fiction writer who dates ninety-nine different people named Eric for literature’s sake. It was the winner of the Publishing Triangle’s 2021 Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, an Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) 2021 silver medalist in LGBT+ Fiction, and one of Kirkus Reviews’ Best Indie Books of 2021.

Outspoken: A Decade of Transgender Activism and Trans Feminism collects many of my trans-themed writings from 2002-2014, including my early slam poems, and numerous essays written contemporaneously with my books Whipping Girl and Excluded.

Julia holding her books, Whipping Girl,
Outspoken, & the Kat Cataclysm chapbook

My other two non-fiction books are Whipping Girl: A Transsexual Woman on Sexism and the Scapegoating of Femininity and Excluded: Making Feminist and Queer Movements More Inclusive. While I do not sell these directly from my website, I often give away signed copies of these books for my Patreon supporters. Specifically, for people who support me at the $20 level for three months, or people who support me at the $50 level (or higher) for one month.

(Note: these can be delivered internationally, and 99 Erics & Outspoken are signed book options as well.)

Everything you need to know about doing this can be found on my Patreon site. If you do decide to join, you will be charged right away, and there's nothing to stop you from quitting your subscription once you've qualified for a free signed book. Or you could simply reduce your pledge for future months (to as little as $1) and thereby continue to access behind the scenes updates and exclusive Patreon writings like the ones listed at the end of this post.

So to summarize: You can order signed copies of 99 Erics & Outspoken from my website so long as you're within the U.S., or can be gifted signed copies of either of those books, or Whipping Girl, or Excluded, by supporting me on Patreon at the aforementioned tiers.

If you get your orders in before December 9th, I should be able to get them in the mail & delivered to you before Christmas 2022 (although I can't 100% guarantee that, so the sooner you order the better). But these offers will continue to stand beyond the holiday season, so you can do this any time in the future you want.

Whatever you decide to do, thank you for supporting my work!

Penises, Privilege, & Purity: a new essay about LGBTQ+ intra-community debates

2022-11-17T16:35:00.006-08:00

So my latest Medium essay just dropped!

It's entitled Penises, Privilege, and Feminist & LGBTQ+ Purity Politics. It's a longer read, but worth it, as it explains many intra-community debates. This includes lesbian stereotypes about bisexual women (such as the myth that we are "perpetually heterosexual privileged"), how those relate to "gender critical"/TERF stereotypes of trans women, plus recent debates between trans male/masculine and trans female/feminine communities. Basically, I show how all these sentiments stem from sexual stigma and our culture's bizarre patriarchal and heteronormative beliefs about sex and penises.

I think this is the best thing I've written since... well, since my latest book Sexed Up, I suppose. In fact, it's the first piece I've written that really builds upon some of the ideas that I introduce and flesh out in the book, including the Predator/Prey mindset and how sexual stigma shapes many popular stereotypes about queer people.

Here is the no paywall link, so you can readily share it with others: https://juliaserano.medium.com/penises-privilege-and-feminist-lgbtq-purity-politics-bafd1f25fe3e?sk=5098f46767404745b65d298b79aa8066

If you're on Twitter, here's a whole thread about it.

And if you like it, please give it lots of "claps" (up to 50, I think) so that other Medium users will see it.

This essay was made possible by my Patreon supporters. If you appreciate that I make writings like this available for free online, please consider supporting me there.

new book readings, talks, interviews & debunking pseudoscience

2022-09-16T07:46:00.006-07:00

I just published my latest email update, chock-full of new news. you can read it online here: https://mailchi.mp/64d1973d6b99/new-book-readings-talks-interviews-debunking-pseudoscience

and if you want to receive my email updates directly to your inbox, you can sign up here.

It is a fairly long update, so I won't reiterate it all here. But highlights include:

1) links to several recent interviews (in print, podcast, and YouTube forms) with me about my new book Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back – this includes two of the book events I did back in July. These interviews, as well as all the book excerpts, reviews, etc., can also be found on the Sexed Up webpage I just linked to.

2) On September 22nd, in honor of, Bisexual Visibility Day, I will be reading a few bi+ specific passages from Sexed Up at Fabulosa Books (489 Castro St, San Francisco, CA). The event begins at 7pm; masks are recommended but not required. Here is the Facebook invite for the event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1091569688453976 – please come out if you can!

3) Just in time for the 2022-23 academic year, I've updated my booking webpage to include a bunch of new presentations, some Sexed Up-themed, others covering trans, bisexual, LGBTQIA+, and feminist issues I often write about. If you are part of a conference or college organization that's looking for speakers, definitely check it out!

4) Debunking anti-trans pseudoscience, in two parts:

First, J. Michael Bailey and his protégé Kevin Hsu recently published a study in Archives of Sexual Behavior that attempts to refute the existence of “autogynephilia in women.” Jaimie Veale and I wrote a response that the journal just published: Autogynephilia Is a Flawed Framework for Understanding Female Embodiment Fantasies: A Response to Bailey and Hsu (2022) [PDF link]. In it, we point out numerous methodological and interpretive flaws with their study—including how their results are incompatible with Blanchard's original taxonomy—and make the case that “autogynephilia” is a flawed framework for considering both trans and cis women's sexual fantasies and desires.

Second, some of you may recall my 2019 Origins of "Social Contagion" and "Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria" post, which is essentially a timeline of all the major events regarding the invention and dissemination of these ideas within anti-trans activism. I just updated the timeline with a newer entries, many of which are recent studies that undermine or outright disprove the basic tenets of these theories. All those new entries can be found in the Post-Publication Note toward the beginning of that post.

So that's what's in the update – please check it out!

newly added Sexed Up book event and interview!

2022-07-20T10:02:00.003-07:00

Hello everyone! I've already mentioned that tomorrow (Thursday July 21st), California Institute of Integral Studies is hosting an online conversation between me and Abeni Jones entitled On Sexualization and Society. We will be talking about my latest book Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back. It will take place at 7pm PDT (10pm EDT), suggested price of $10 but pay what you can. Info about registering for the event and accessibility accommodations can be found via the link. Please come out!

But if you can't make it, I'm happy to announce that one more Sexed Up book event has just been added: On Thursday, July 28th, I will be doing a Conversation with Carol Queen in which we will talk about Sexed Up. The event is FREE and will take place at the Berkeley Good Vibrations store (2504 San Pablo Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94702) from 5:30 - 6:30pm PDT—there is very limited seating, so you must pre-register via the link if you wish to attend in person (masking required). But you can also watch it online (and for FREE) on Good Vibes’ Instagram Live.

Whether you can make it to these events or not, you should definitely check out the latest Sexed Up interview (by Marcie Bianco) that just came out in The Advocate: Author Julia Serano Separates Sex From Stigma in Sexed Up. It discusses how the book came to be, some of the topics it covers, how me being a biologist influenced my writing, and more!

virtual book events! plus a new book excerpt!

2022-07-06T17:17:00.006-07:00

Hi folks, lots of news to share!

First, I just published a new excerpt from my latest book Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back – it's from a section of the last chapter entitled Sexual Dystopias and Utopias. While not explicitly discussed in the piece, it grew out of my concerns with “no kink at Pride” discourses, but it’s also pertinent to recent “don’t say gay” bills and claims that LGBTQIA+ people “groom”/“sexualize” children by merely existing. Here is the no paywall link. And if you like it, please give it lots of "claps" (up to 50, I think) so that other Medium users will see it!

For even more Sexed Up-related excerpts and writings, please check out my just-released July 2022 email update.

Second, I have two Sexed Up virtual book events coming up in the next couple weeks. Both will have ASL interpretation and require pre-registration – here are the details:

On Thursday July 14th, I'll be reading from Sexed Up and engaging in conversation about the book with Jude Doyle at a virtual event hosted by the NYC bookstore Bluestockings. The event is from 7 - 8:30pm EDT (4 - 5:30pm PDT), tickets are $0 - $15, and you can register for the event here.

Then on Thursday July 21st is On Sexualization and Society, a live online conversation about Sexed Up between me and Abeni Jones, hosted by California Institute of Integral Studies. It will take place at 7pm PDT (10pm EDT), suggested price of $10 but pay what you can. Info about registering for the event and accessibility accommodations can be found via the link.

As always, you can learn more about the book – including praise, reviews, excerpts, interviews, plus links to purchase it – at the Sexed Up webpage.

reviews & an excerpt from my new book Sexed Up!

2022-05-24T17:28:00.001-07:00

My latest email update just came out. If you want to receive these sorts of updates directly into your inbox, you can sign up here. Since it's chock-full of reviews, excerpts, and info about my new book Sexed Up, I have transcribed it here in its entirety...

In last month's update, I announced my new book, Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back (Seal Press), and encouraged y'all to pre-order it. It officially came out a week ago, so hopefully many of you have your copies by now and are diving in!

If you haven't picked up the book already, no worries, you can do so today! It’s available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook – those links will take you to the Seal Press website, which offers a variety of outlets to choose from. You can also go to your local bookstore or library and ask them to order a copy for you.

If you are hesitant, this email should have what you need to convince you to pick up a copy of Sexed Up!

For starters, last week I published Sexed Up: a chapter-by-chapter preview of my new book on Medium. As the name suggests, it describes all the sex, sexuality, and sexualization topics that are covered in the book, and which chapter(s) you'll find them in.

The Guardian image that accompanied my excerpt

Also last week, The Guardian published an excerpt from Chapter 3, "Unwanted Attention." Their version is entitled What I learned about street harassment after I transitioned. While most people who have navigated the world being perceived as female will likely relate to some of the experiences I describe, my interpretation differs somewhat from that standard feminist "sexual objectification" explanation, and provides insight into forms of street harassment faced by other marginalized groups.

In my last email update, I shared praise the book has received from other authors. Here, I will share a few of the early book reviews that have come in so far:

“Serano succeeds in explicating a wide range of complex ideas about gender, sexuality, and identity, and offers incisive new frameworks for reckoning with some of the most discussed issues in contemporary feminism and queer culture. The result is a nuanced and approachable guide to ‘making sex more equitable’.”
—Publishers Weekly (full review via link)

“Sexed Up doesn’t just identify a common problem; it identifies a common ground for solidarity and resistance. ”
—NBC News (full review via link)

“A feminist argument about sexism and patriarchy from a fully trans- and queer-inclusive point of view... When Serano introduces a concept ... I expect the idea to pervade and permeate feminist thought.”
—Liber: a Feminist Review (full review via link)

“Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back gives every bit of [Julia’s] usual rigor as it interrogates the ways that people who hold stigmatized identities are desexualized, hypersexualized, sex-shamed or sex-policed. ”
—Xtra (full review via link)

“An engaging and thoughtful addition for any library’s popular human sexuality collection.”
—Library Journal (full review via link)

I will be adding new reviews, excerpts, and interviews to the Sexed Up webpage as they arise. There, you will also find links to order the book in hardcover, ebook, or audiobook formats. And if you enjoy the book, please spread the news far and wide, and leave it a good review on Goodreads, Amazon, and elsewhere!

Pre-order my new book: “Sexed Up”!

2022-04-26T13:50:00.004-07:00

My latest book, Sexed Up: How Society Sexualizes Us, and How We Can Fight Back, will be published by Seal Press on May 17, 2022 – three weeks from today! I believe that it is my best and most important book (fwiw, I have not claimed this about any of my other post-Whipping Girl books).

I highly encourage you to pre-order it now if you can, as this really helps to convince bookstores to carry it. It’s available in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook – those links will take you to the Seal Press website, which offers a variety of outlets to choose from. You can also go to your local bookstore or library and ask them to order a copy for you.

While Sexed Up covers a lot of ground (see description below), it is especially timely given the recent conservative/GOP onslaught of accusations claiming that everything they oppose (e.g., LGTBQIA+ people, critical race theory) is tantamount to “grooming” or “pornography.” Sexed Up explains why these sorts of sexualizing charges resonate with so many people, and how we can effectively challenge them.

Praise for Sexed Up:

“Julia Serano continues to be one of the most remarkable feminists writing today. Sexed Up is a must-read for anyone who cares about feminism, misogyny, and how we talk about sex.”
—Jessica Valenti, New York Times-bestselling author of Sex Object

“A brilliant tour de force on an under-theorized topic – sexualization – and the havoc it wreaks on so many lives, especially the most marginalized. I can't wait to discuss this book: it's essential reading.”
—Kate Manne, author of Down Girl

“Julia Serano brings us the incisive, clear-eyed analysis of today’s culture wars that we so desperately need. Thoughtful and deeply researched, Sexed Up provides a more compassionate way of dealing with our cultural programming around sexuality.”
—Annalee Newitz, Lambda Award-winning author of Four Lost Cities

“How lucky we are to have Julia Serano – a writer who brings razor-sharp analysis to the most challenging issues we face today. Sexed Up is another worthy addition to the canon, brimming with the unique patience, care, and clarity Serano brings to untangling our sexual preconceptions.”
—Jude Ellison S. Doyle, author of Trainwreck

Book description:

Feminists have long challenged the ways in which men tend to sexualize women. But pioneering activist, biologist, and trans woman Julia Serano argues that sexualization is a far more pervasive problem: it’s something that we all do to other people, often without being aware of it.

Why do we perceive men as sexual predators and women as sexual objects? Why are LGBTQ+ people stereotyped as being sexually indiscriminate and deceptive? Why are people of color still being hypersexualized? Serano confronts these presumptions head-on, showing us how they arise from unconscious biases rather than reflecting reality. While many view sexualization as a mere component of sexism, racism, or queerphobia, Serano persuasively argues that liberation from sexual violence comes through collectively confronting sexualization itself. She then reveals powerful new ways to resist, providing numerous strategies designed to foster sexual equity without sacrificing sexual diversity in the process.

Lively and provocative, Sexed Up provides a breath of fresh air for seasoned activists and newcomers alike. Once again, Julia Serano proves that she is an unmatched voice leading us toward necessary change.

More praise, plus early book reviews:

“Fascinating, comprehensive, and clearly explained, Sexed Up leads the reader through a radically sensible analysis of what sexualization is and how it happens. (Hint: You're soaking in it!) As we work to create a sex-positive culture, we'll reference this vitally important book again and again.”
—Carol Queen, PhD, Author of Exhibitionism for the Shy and co-founder of the Center for Sex & Culture

“Julia Serano acutely speaks to many nuances in gender and sexuality that unjustly dictate the safety, value, and autonomy of marginalized genders. Immersive and precise, she traces enduring stigmas to their illogical roots.”
—Koa Beck, author of White Feminism

“Julia Serano has done it again, taking an idea you thought you understood and unfolding depths to it you never knew were there. Sexed Up is the sexualization rethink you didn't know you needed.”
—Jaclyn Friedman, author of What You Really Really Want

“Julia Serano is a razor-sharp observer and a generous, compassionate, and liberatory thinker. Sexed Up is a wise, nuanced, and unapologetic guide to understanding what goes on under the hood of sexualization in American culture.”
—Dr. Hanne Blank Boyd, historian and author of Straight

“An engaging and thoughtful addition for any library’ s popular human sexuality collection.”
—Library Journal (full review via link)

More information about the book (including the Table of Contents) can be found at my Sexed Up webpage. And once again, here are the links to pre-order it in either hardcover, ebook, or audiobook formats.

crowdfunding for Japanese translation of Whipping Girl

2022-02-26T11:07:00.001-08:00

Some good news to share: The Tokyo-based publisher Thousands of Books has made an arrangement with my publisher (Seal Press) to translate my first book Whipping Girl into Japanese!

The translation is dependent on their ability to raise money for this effort via crowdfunding. So if you (or someone you know) are excited about this prospect, here are the links where you can contribute. They also share further information about the publisher, project leader, and translator for the book.

This is the main crowdfunding link; it is in Japanese, but many browsers can translate the page for you:

https://greenfunding.jp/thousandsofbooks/projects/5658

And here is a supplemental crowdfunding page on Indiegogo, which is in English and in USD currency:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/japanese-translation-of-whipping-girl#/

Like I said, please feel free to share these links, as they have until mid-April to raise the necessary funds for the translation.

99 Erics on Kirkus Reviews' Best Indie Books of 2021!

2021-12-20T22:35:00.002-08:00

Earlier this year, I was happy to announce that my first foray into fiction, 99 Erics: a Kat Cataclysm faux novel, was the winner of the Publishing Triangle’s 2021 Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, and an Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) 2021 silver medalist in LGBT+ Fiction.

On top of all that, Kirkus Reviews just released their "Best Books of 2021" issue, and they included 99 Erics on their Best Indie Books of 2021 list! The entire list can be found via that link (you'll have to scroll down for 99 Erics, as the list is alphabetical by author last name).

The full Kirkus review of 99 Erics is available online; here is an excerpt:

“Serano has written about gender identity and feminism in her nonfiction books Whipping Girl (2007) and Excluded (2013); she explores many of the same ideas in her debut work of fiction. The writing is conversational in style, and though Kat claims to be uninterested in banal descriptions, the scene-setting in various California locales works well. Kat recalls the Manic Pixie Dream Girls so often used in male-oriented stories, but she’s decidedly more warts and all in her presentation, almost too quirky to function, and enthusiastic about her role as ruler of all the Erics. The result is a lovable composite of Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1966) and a less murder-y version of Marvel’s Deadpool, using absurdism and humor to break down the fourth wall and the very idea of ‘normal,’ with all its silly little boxes and prejudices. If that makes the book sound serious, it isn’t — and that might be the most effective way it makes its readers think about identity. Knocks down literary conventions, sexual stereotypes, the fourth wall, and more in enthusiastic defense of the weird.”

As always, for more reviews, excerpts, details, virtual book readings, and where to purchase the book, please check out the 99 Erics webpage!

end of year update, plus signed books for sale!

2021-12-11T10:12:00.002-08:00

Last week, I published my latest email update, you can read it via that link. (If you want to receive these email updates directly into your inbox, you can sign up here.)

The update includes links to all my writings from the past year! On top of that, it includes a special deal that I will reiterate here:

I am once again offering signed copies of two of my books – 99 Erics & Outspoken – for sale! (for $25, shipping included, provided that the address is within the U.S.)

99 Erics: a Kat Cataclysm faux novel is silly, surreal, and sex-positive — click that link for book reviews, praise, and excerpts. 99 Erics is the winner of the Publishing Triangle’s 2021 Edmund White Award for Debut Fiction, and an Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY) 2021 silver medalist in LGBT+ Fiction.

All of the book-purchasing details (including signing instructions) can be found on the STUFF TO BUY page of my website. That page also has links to purchase my other books and music too. While I cannot sell signed copies of Whipping Girl or Excluded online, I do sometimes offer them as gifts on Patreon, so please consider supporting me there...