Why subscribe?
Subscribe to get full access to the newsletter and publication archives. I write about anything related to gender, ideally from a data analysis and empirical perspective.
Who Am I?
I’m Paul, a doctoral student in economics (nearly done) based in Mannheim, Southern Germany. My academic focus has typically been on the effects of taxation on economic behavior and how efficiently governments use taxpayers’ money. So, you might be wondering why I’m writing about gender issues.
The reason is twofold. First, I’ve long been an admirer of J.K. Rowling, and when I first read in 2020 that she had become public enemy number one, accused of bigotry, I felt disheartened—largely because I initially believed the claims. I couldn’t reconcile the person Rowling was being depicted as with the author I had long respected. This led me to dive deep into the controversy. After listening to her explain her thoughtful and compassionate views on “The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling” podcast, I started to research the broader issue. I learned that any movement that is trying to weaken necessary boundaries (i.e. single-sex spaces) will ultimately hurt those who need them the most. It’s the slightly outsider child that will get caught up in a maelstrom of bodily dissociation and, in the worst case, subject their body to irreversible harm through puberty blockers, hormones and surgery. It is also women who need single-sex spaces to undress, heal from sexual trauma, or simply gather with other women because they just wish so, often in response to the reality of male violence. That’s why today, I’m convinced that pediatric gender transitions represent one of the most significant medical scandals unfolding today, and that gender self-identification poses an existential threat to women’s rights. These issues should deeply concern anyone with a functioning moral compass.
Second, the research supporting gender identity ideology—and, by extension, gender medicine—is alarmingly weak. Yet it has been embraced by leading medical organizations like the Endocrine Society and the American Academy of Pediatrics. Research like this would not have been accepted as a first draft of a doctoral paper in any serious social science. Yet, the collateral damage of this abysmal research is not taxpayer money spent wastefully (as would be poor economic research) but irreversible harm on vulnerable people’s bodies and a severe limitation to womens’ ability to move freely and safely in this world. After this realization, I have yet to meet anyone who did not go off to invest considerable amount of time on this topic. Armed with strong data analysis and empirical research skills, I launched this Substack to critically explore gender issues, providing data-driven insights and commentary on current research in the field. I am a no one and most certainly aware of that, but this is not your typical policy discussion. It’s about the ethical conduct of policy and medicine and I think everybody is entitled to raise their voices about this.
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