The problem of minors in syscourse...
I think we need to acknowledge that people within a certain age group tend to lack both experience and skills necessary for discussions like these.
There are a few realities that I think need to be talked about. These are generalities, but the thing about generalities is they are often generally true.
Young people do not tend to have experience with higher education... and end up spreading misinformation about what sources are valid
One of the biggest and most harmful claims from sysmeds, usually used to dismiss sources provided supporting endogenic systems, is that ".com" sources aren't trustworthy and wouldn't be allowed in academic works.
This is because it's common for American elementary and middle schools to teach this to help children avoid untrustworthy sources.
This is NOT true for college level works, nor research papers. Even The Haunted Self, the book that created the theory of structural dissociation, used .com sources in some of its citations.
This particular misinformation really only exists in a group that does not have experience with higher education that has yet to unlearn shorthands they were taught as children without realizing the shorthand is only intended for children.
Young people are most susceptible to herd mentality, and blindly following perceived authority figures.
You're taught at home to trust and obey your parents. You're taught in school to trust and obey your teachers.
Most young people are not prepared to think for themselves.
Somebody on TikTok you formed a parasocial relationship with speaks with authority, and it sounds trustworthy, so let's go with that. It can also be friends or Discord mods who you're listening to, and rather than critically analyzing what they're saying, you trust blindly and want to follow them.
I think this is also a big part of why the previous misinformation about how sources work in higher education is so pervasive. One person you have formed a relationship with, even a parasocial relationship, makes the claim that .com sources are not trustworthy and would never be allowed in an academic paper.
The minor likes the person making this claim. They are looking for direction and this sounds like it's true even if it's not at all.
And this is a problem which will be even more exacerbated for children who are abuse victims. Because chances are, the abuse victim has lived a lot of your life having their self-esteem torn down, being punished for trying to think for themselves. So what they've learned is how to be a follower. In some ways, this mentality of being a follower is a survival mechanism for these people.
Young people tend to not be particularly well-read on psychology or psychiatry
Like I mentioned before, a lot of your information is going to be coming from TikTok or popular blogs you follow. And if you have this type of follower mentality, you are going to just believe what they say about the science without researching it for yourself.
Young people are less likely to have read material directly. They are less likely to have done their own research.
Syscourse, at its lowest level, is a bunch of petty drama and respectability politics within marginalized communities.
But at its highest level, it's a debate about psychology and psychiatry built on decades of research. And at this level, you do need to have a serious understanding of what you're talking about. You need to know what the theory of structural dissociation is, regardless of your opinion on it. You need to know about the research preceding that because I have seen quite a few sysmeds who confused the theory of structural dissociation with the trauma model, not realizing that the trauma model existed for decades before structural dissociation.
And I know, nobody enters the system community already knowing the names of Colin Ross or Richard Kluft or Kathy Steele. But if you want to be able to have this conversation at this higher level, you should start learning these names and their contributions.
And you should probably also be looking outside of dissociative disorder research. You should look at studies into mediumship and spiritual possession. You should look at studies into the autonomy of imagined companions. You should look at studies into nonpathological voice hearing.
Because without looking at the research yourself, you cannot be a source of information. You are just a parrot playing a game of telephone with other parrots.
Without ever looking at the research yourself, and I mean looking at it directly not looking at summaries by blogs you like, you cannot really engage in syscourse at this higher level.
Young people lack perspective... On plural history... On queer history... Because they didn't live through any of it...
Do you remember when gay marriage was legalized in the United States?
Do you remember the celebrations from queer people afterwards? Do you remember when some conservatives in the following months continued to refuse to give marriage licenses to gay people, arguing that being forced to give marriage licenses out, doing their job, infringed on their religious rights?
Do you remember the decade leading up to that where state after state legalized gay marriage one by one?
What about when Don't Ask, Don't Tell was repealed and gay people could finally serve in the military openly?
There is not a single minor involved in queer discourse today who actually can remember an America where you were not allowed to be in the military if you were openly gay. Most were too young to care about politics when gay marriage was legalized and weren't involved in that fight.
One problem with the youth is a view of our ever-changing world as something static. That because things are one way now, they will always be that same way. This is a perspective that will be torn down with time as you watch the world change around you. But you cannot comprehend the progress of the world when you have not lived it.
And I bring this up because a lot of young sysmeds appeal to the present as something static and unchanging.
But time does change. It pushes forward into a future that all of us are shaping as we go.
The DSM is brought up the same way, spoken of as something unchanging. Because it has been a while since it significantly changed. The last big edition, the DSM-5, was released back in 2013. And young people probably don't realize this was actually another milestone for queer rights.
2 years after queer people were allowed to serve openly in the military, 2 years before the Supreme Court of the United States legalized gay marriage nationwide, the DSM removed gender identity disorder (GID) and replaced it with gender dysphoria.
No longer would simply being transgender be viewed as a mental disorder by the American Psychiatric Association.
And I think if you are somebody with this view of the world as unchanging and static, if you have not watched how culture has shifted over time, you lack the ability to comprehend that you could be on the wrong side of history.
Because right now, sysmeds are in a culture where spreading hate against endogenic systems has been normalized in many parts of the internet. Especially, again, on TikTok which is great at promoting hate and pseudoscience and the stupidest of takes. They look at this culture and see it backing them up, backing up their bigotry, and their perception is that this will always be the same.
But if they were older, if they had this perspective on queer history that only comes from living through it, they would see how very easily it is to find themselves on the wrong side of history, just like the transmeds before them.
So what does all this mean?
In the end, I am not suggesting young people not be in syscourse.
Having said everything I have, I think that being part of these discussions is important to actually learning and growing.
But I do think you need to be aware of where certain deficiencies lie.
If you are involved in syscourse as a minor, You need to understand that you do not have the perspective or experience that you will gain as you get older. You need to be aware that you are not as knowledgeable about psychology or psychiatry as actual professionals just because you saw a video or read a blog post about it.
You need to understand that just because somebody speaks authoritatively on a subject, that doesn't actually make them an authority on it. Especially if they are another minor who does not have an education in that field.
If you see somebody making claims without sourcing them, it can be wise to ask where they got their information and research if that source is credible, or even if it actually says what they claim it says.
And if you are a sysmed... I think you should look around at the community around you, at how young it skews, and do some self-reflection about why that might be.
Why is it that there are so few sysmeds older than 30 in your community?
I'll give you a hint... it's not that they didn't exist before. It's also not, for the most part, that all of the sysmeds left.
Changing stances and moving away from being anti-endo is a natural thing that happens as systems gain experience and education and perspective.
I would bet that more than half of the young sysmeds reading this now will probably become pro-endo or endo-neutral within the next 3 years. That's another thing experience from being in the system community has taught me.
The real question for those future pro-endos and endo-neutrals is how many future regrets they plan on piling up before they get there.
2087
blakekathryn
jacobvanloon
jbbartram-illu
germansingergirl
stormborns
kaledo-art
