Draft:Jesse Singal

Jesse Singal is a reactionary pseudo-progressive journalist, podcaster, and Substack grifter who specializes in concern trolling anyone with left of center views on controversial social issues, particularly by criticizing the methodology of any piece of scientific evidence or data that seems to support such positions. This is epitomized in his well-known 2018 article in the Atlantic "When Children Say They're Trans", in which he portrays the largest problem for transgender children in the United States as the excessive, rampant availability of gender-affirming care like hormones and surgery, such that these children too often receive such care only to change their minds about their gender later and wish they had not received hormones and/or surgery. The article was roundly debunked and criticized by many trans people and advocates for the trans community, some of whom noted that even at the time, Singal had a long history of transphobic and misleading articles taking a similar fearmongering and concern trolling position. Since this article was published, Singal has positioned himself as, in the words of M.K. Anderson (writing four years later in 2022), "a cisgender, self-appointed expert on all things trans". He has also teamed up with Katie Herzog, another "journalist" who wrote a controversial article about "detransitioning" children, to co-host the podcast "Blocked and Reported".