"If transgender identity were an innate trait, like left-handedness, we would expect identification rates to rise at first when it became socially acceptable..."

"... then plateau and remain stable at a fixed level. If the phenomenon were instead driven by social contagion, we might expect a boom-and-bust pattern: a spike followed by a rapid decline once the social forces driving it weaken. Recent data offer a mixed picture.... The overwhelming majority of those driving the trans craze fall into the 'nonbinary' category -- adopting identities which are said to be neither, both, or somewhere between male and female. These include labels such as 'demiboy,' 'genderfluid' or 'two-spirit.' These are social identities, not biological ones. Unlike left- or right-handedness, which describe objectively measurable traits, 'nonbinary' identities have no anatomical or physiological referent. They are conceptual, political and responsive to cultural trends.... The social-contagion hypothesis was never hateful. It was purely descriptive: a recognition that social and cultural factors shape human behavior...."

I'm reading "Evidence Backs the Transgender Social-Contagion Hypothesis" by Colin Wright, an evolutionary biologist, in The Wall Street Journal.

"I checked in on BlueSky to see how people there are reacting to the release of the Israeli hostages, and it’s the eeriest thing."

"It’s not trending. There’s no mention of it on the 'Explore' tab. I started scrolling the feed and went through hundreds of posts without seeing a single one that mentioned it. Instead, it’s all posts about Mamdani, John Oliver’s new episode criticizing Bari Weiss and Jamie Reed, the “No Kings” protest apparently happening this weekend, Taylor Swift, the Epstein Files, complaints about anti-vaxxers, and snarky takes insisting that Antifa doesn’t exist. That's it. It’s honestly blowing my mind...."

Writes Colin Wright, at X — via Instapundit.

I signed up for BlueSky so I could do a search over there. My search word, "hostages." This was the main thing that came up:

 

I also saw things like "Now release the Epstein file hostages" and "How about the US releasing all the hostages that ICE has recently taken?"

Colin Wright has drawn the perfect political cartoon.

And he's writing about it — here — in The Wall Street Journal:

Excerpt: