Have you damaged the life of a child?

I find myself coming back to Tickle vs Giggle. Georgina Costello's line of pushing that Tickle has become a women because Tickle grew their hair, shops in the women's clothes department, plays women's sport, and has all the people who care about Tickle using pronouns and using Tickle's chosen feminine name really is stark to me. That someone even thought this was in any way a legitimate way to force society to treat people as they identify rather than their material reality , and that this was in any way positive for society is concerning.

I keep coming back to those people who have had extreme body modifications to emulate lizards, or snakes, or vampires, the way Georgina Costello positioned this for the Supreme Court in Sydney means that these people's identities should be given exactly the same respect. That by making these changes to their bodies, and living as if they were what they say they are, then they ARE what they identify as.

Rather than what they materially are. In Tickle's case, Tickle is just a male person living their life as they envision a female person's life is like. But not a female despite having their cock chopped off. And no one in society should be forced to treat this male as if they miraculously became a female.

All my DCs (mid 20s) would see themselves as 'trans allies'. The messaging around how trans people are the most victimised has been strong.

Every generation wants a cause and preferably not the same one as their parents. For a long time I have had to keep my GC mouth shut.

I'm not expecting them to suddenly throw off their views but I think the Cass report is giving them pause for thought. The idea that maybe they have been lied to is going to be a hard one to swallow.

That article is the personal opinion of a self interested trans man determined to dismiss the evidence about mental health co morbidities in these vulnerable children and disappointed that his personal views weren't centred over evidenced facts about the lack of research and evidence. This is a regular feature where trans activists insist that their lived experiences must trump medical ethics and research into child health care.

In contrast the BMJ (British Medical Journal) have produced a very clear warning to their colleagues about what Cass has shown from extensive research:

"....studies in gender medicine fall woefully short in terms of methodological rigour; the methodological bar for gender medicine studies was set too low, generating research findings that are therefore hard to interpret. The methodological quality of research matters because a drug efficacy study in humans with an inappropriate or no control group is a potential breach of research ethics. Offering treatments without an adequate understanding of benefits and harms is unethical. All of this matters even more when the treatments are not trivial; puberty blockers and hormone therapies are major, life altering interventions. Yet this inconclusive and unacceptable evidence base was used to inform influential clinical guidelines, such as those of the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH), which themselves were cascaded into the development of subsequent guidelines internationally"

The full article is linked below. Make no mistake, Cass found that the NHS has been using experimental drugs on children with no clear evidence of benefit and significant evidence of harm. Doctors reported a climate of fear and intimidation that often halted research with lobby groups wielding excessive power. That's why the new facilities for children are now in Children's hospitals - because the rest of child health care operates to the highest of standards in terms of ethics and evidence while this vulnerable group were subject to the political whims and demands of adult transactivists:

https:www.bmj.com/content/385/bmj.q837

You must see more nuance than that, surely.

Oh good another Mumsnet teacher bash. It’s been a hot minute

I presume he was not the only one in the gourp and more of them were saying the same thing.
I suppose when oy make a report, you should include all the data available. Not just the one that proves a point.

This is an anecdotal report, though, which is designed to manipulate through emotion. More "Oh, but it's different when it's trans" desperate scrabbling tactics. It isn't different and shouldn't be - that's the point. The review omitted data which did not meet the standards required by ALL studies involving medical treatment.

I'm unclear why the trans lobby and its allies seem to think that those standards of evidence aren't required by them. Especially as they are recommending treatments which send children and young people down IRREVERSIBLE medical pathways and cause known side effects, some of which have already been mentioned on this thread. You'd think that they'd be busting to provide solid evidence, wouldn't you? But strangely, they often seem reluctant to provide it, do research which meets known standards, or even bother keeping the data of patients they've treated, or follow up. That's extremely negligent. And it isn't standard practice. Why should this be different for them?

The joke with GD is her dad had long hair as a teenager, she will say boys can't have long hair, I say is daddy a boy and she says yes, I show her a photo of him with shoulder length hair and say who is this and she says daddy. I say yes daddy is a boy and daddy had long hair. She laughs and says boys can't have long hair. I'm hoping she grows out of it.

I found this interesting, seems the report ommitted a lot of data too, unsurprisingly
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cv20l497xvjo.amp

Not really! The only links I have to nonconforming people are far away or we aren't very close. We don't know many people with secondary age kids. I completely agree that she'd find it normal if she were around it more - for instance she doesn't bat an eyelid at gay couples - but I'm not sure it would impact her own desire for pink, glitter and unicorns, and my point is that it's sad that people who don't conform are now called nonconformists. I worry in a way it's forcing people to conform more rather than allowing for more fluidity. But anyway. This has somewhat hijacked the conversation.

This issue seems to have led many people to abandon their critical faculties. I have no explanation of why so many otherwise rational people fell for it, other than its cult like appeal.
I feel fortunate that my circumstances were such that I wasn’t professionally involved in any situations that might have put me in a difficult position. I’m well aware of the problems it caused for others.

Does she know any gender non conforming children or adults?

I find children accept what they know from their own experience.

for example my Dneices and nephew totally accept that boys can have long hair, wear makeup and nail varnish because their cousin (my ds10) does. Same with girls having short hair, wearing ties etc (my DW is butch). It’s just normal for them.

I just want to add, why did no-one think ever that prescribing Lupron, a drug that is used for CHEMICALLY CASTRATING SEX OFFENDERS , was a suitable treatment for confused teenagers??? It's still mind boggling to me that anyone could ever have thought that this was appropriate, and not severely harmful!

Totally agree with your OP. I've been involved in this fight since 2016 and yesterday felt like a watershed moment. This ideology wouldn't have got so far without so much support from individuals in all these different professions, and there needs to be some reckoning, as so many women, children, and a few right thinking men ( Graham Linehan being one shining example of a man who saw what was happening and spoke out about it to great personal cost ) have suffered as a result.

I just wanted to address the point about the difference in how easily dangerous and untested PBs and wrong sex hormones have been dished out to distressed teens compared to normal healthcare ( or possible gatekeep ing )

I am currently trying to get HRT for menopause. My Dr, on a phone consultation, spent a LOT of time talking to me about the possible negative side effects of HRT. Demanded I had a blood test and asked I see her in person to get a blood pressure test, before she would even consider prescribing HRT. Contrast this with prescribing life altering drugs to confused teenagers who have never had sex, don't know what an orgasm is and have no idea whether they may want children in the future. The contrast couldn't be more stark.

OMG, my daughter is the same. The unicorns!!! I keep trying to tell her that boys and girls are equal, they can wear whatever they want and have long hair, but no no no. Girls are better. Girls should wear rainbow tutus and bows. None of her toys can be boys. Even her lion with it's great big mane. I really really don't want to make her think that feminine stuff is bad, but I'm worried she thinks all masculine stuff is bad! She concedes that some boys are nice, and her best friend is a boy, but still...

What we are seeing with the Cass report as with the Post Office enquiry are further examples of the old saying:

A lie gets halfway round the world while the truth is still pulling on its boots

Logically, we know that taking PBs, opposite sex hormones, performing major surgery will have far reaching and long-term consequences.

Logically, we knew that whole swathes of sub-postmasters didn't suddenly become corrupt at the point at which a new computer system got implemented.

But we were all told black was white by people we were told were authorities in the subject.

What we can see now is that those 'authorities' had a vested interest in keeping the lies alive. Lives have been ruined so we can look forward to seeing yet more of these 'authorities' generally arse covering and pointing the finger at each other.

Maybe you can't just be a tomboy now. I find it strange with my granddaughters who are absolutely rigid about things like girls must have long hair, boys must have short hair, boys can't wear pink or play with dolls and certain toys e.g. cars are for boys and never played with by girls. I wonder where that comes from, I always had short hair as a child and so did the majority of other girls I knew, I think the only rigid thing was girls couldn't play football, cricket was OK but it was a rare girl who would be allowed to join in with football.

The OP made something up, if she didn't show us the evidence that school counsellors think they are Rosa Parks. Why are you hell bent on denying that?

Yeah, I wonder how tomboys feel today, even without questioning gender. To me it feels like people aren't allowed to just be different. If they don't conform to the gender norm, they must be the opposite of their biology or something else altogether.

You're arguing with people who were making the very point that they shouldn't have been bringing Rosa Parks into it. I don't know why you're now hell bent on continuing to argue with people who made the same point you did; I guess you find that easier than accepting that you misread something yesterday.

Cass and her team are the experts in this investigation. There is no one on that editorial team who has more expertise in this space.

The cherry picking of data has been the tactic of choice to justify the use of unproven or downright dangerous treatments in previous medical scandals.

Yes I read their comments on the Sewell report, I had plenty of issues with that report- I failed to see the overwhelmingly middle class, white editorial board's follow on addressing racism and classism in medical professions. Funny that.

Black women continue to die in childbirth at a higher rate than white women, black patients continue to be diagnosed as having a mental health condition when they have physical conditions. My personal highlights include "black women don't feel pain in labour as much as white women do" and being told that endometriosis was only usually found in white women, being told "its probably depression" when seeking a gynae referral for long term and classic endometriosis symptoms.

So forgive me for being less trusting than you in the opinions of white MC professionals who think they know what is best for working class minority men and women.

That sounds tough. It is a shame you didn't get to confide in your mum. I suppose in many ways my experience wasn't that different except I was definitely a girl and never quesioned that. I have an older sister and mum was told I was to be the last baby or she might die so I was supposed to be a boy, given my father's name which fortunately is fine for male or female and was a tomboy. Not sure if I was encouraged to fill the son gap or if I just was a tomboy. It was all unremarkable and fortunately no abuse and then like you I found boys and didn't want to be a tomboy anymore. That introduced a whole new set of problems.

I'm sorry to disappoint, but my parents didn't deal with the issue. They weren't approachable, and I believe played a big part in my gender confusion by dressing me exclusively in boys clothing and only having respect for typically male traits and achievements. I started questioning my gender at 5/6, and continued to feel uncertain till I was about 12. I told two friends about it when I was about 6. It was the start of the 90s, and no one was around to jump on what I'd said to them, if they even told anyone. I was a tomboy. No one cared.

From the age of 7, my father became steadily more abusive (as he lost his mind), and while I would return to my uncertainty sometimes, I was more concerned with basic survival than my gender. And then I started really liking boys and realised I liked my body.

It was only in my early twenties that it became clear to me that I had been unconsciously manipulated into rejecting my femininity and into seeing females as inferior. I hadn't even realised I thought that.

I think that as a victim of abuse, a traumatised outsider, and an incredibly stubborn child with total faith in my own ability to think logically and make good decisions without being swayed by outside influence, I would have been ripe for being sucked in by people telling me I should really trust myself and explore my uncertainty. I can imagine latching onto this thing that could help me stand out, take some control, and give me a clear identity. Even before my dad went off the deep end, if anyone had told me I was just a child who didn't know what I wanted, I could have explained in great detail how I felt about the idea of coming puberty and the physical changes that would bring. I would have been very convincing. It would have taken a lot of therapy and medical interrogation to disabuse me, and I'm not sure the NHS provides that level of investigation. And if it were today, I'd know what to say to get what I wanted because it would've been all around me. Although I suppose at 6 no one would have given me blockers. Although once you're in the system as having these issues... And if they'd got me at 10-12...?

And if instead they'd taken me seriously, as they would today, I'm pretty sure I would have lapped up the approval because adult approval and attention is what I desperately craved.

Who knows? Nothing happened. I've no idea really how I would have reacted to different approaches and in the end I'm known amongst friends as always having been sensible to the point of absurdity, but I'm guessing that those feelings in this climate could have led to bad decisions. Abuse victims with no one to talk to are vulnerable, and children especially are highly impressionable and good at assimilating ideas as their own.

I actually think that my mum would've handled it beautifully if I'd told her. Maybe I should ask her. I think she would have said something about hating bows and bras and make-up too and reminded me that one of her gifts to me is a fear of needles. I don't think she'd have dismissed my feelings, but she wouldn't have made a big deal of it. She already dressed me and had my hair cut like a boy, so I'm not sure it would have changed much. I doubt she'd ever have raised it again. But would she have been able to have that kind of response in today's world? It seems unlikely, and in today's world, I would have bucked against it.

And this is why there isn't really an article to write. Just a bunch of hypotheticals.