Horizon programme on transgender

Here's the "Plain Language Summary" from the NHS document that I linked to in my previous post
www.engage.england.nhs.uk/consultation/specialised-services-consultation/user_uploads/gendr-ident-policy.pdf:

Gender dysphoria refers to discomfort or distress that is caused by a discrepancy between a person’s gender identity (how they see themselves with respect to gender) and that person’s sex assigned at birth (and the associated gender role, and/or primary and secondary sex characteristic).
This encompasses both binary gender (male or female) and non-
binary gender (pan-gender, poly-gender, a-gender, and others).
It is not a lifestyle choice and can best be described as a neuro-developmental disorder.
It is a debilitating condition that has a profound effect on almost every aspect of the sufferer’s life, leading in many cases to high levels of contact with primary care and mental health services, and disengagement with the wider society and from ordinary activities of life such as employment, education and meaningful activity. Suicide rates for sufferers are significantly higher than the national average.
Many people who experience gender dysphoria desire to live and be accepted as a person of the gender congruent with their gender identity, usually with congruent physical sex characteristics. Some people will make a social role transition only; others will require physical transition, through hormonal, physical and surgical interventions.
Gender Identity Services offer a pathway of care, treatment and support through psychological, social and physical transition, co- ordinating interventions provided directly by the service with interventions offered by other providers.
Efficacy of this care pathway is high, with several studies reporting extremely high levels of transgender patient satisfaction with surgical reconstruction and subsequently a significantly higher quality of life. Once discharged from specialised services, most patients go on to lead full and productive lives under the care of their GP.

Wow! I looked in on this thread quite late, expecting it to be the usual succession of anti-trans rants. But it wasn't!

Shame the only link anyone has provided was to a US-based forum that is primarily for cross-dressers (= cis-men who dress up as women) rather than UK transsexuals. Amongst TS, the overall feeling seems to be that the documentary was better than most, but that it rather sugar-coated the issues: it showed people sailing effortlessly from one high point in their transition process to the next , with plenty of support from loving family and friends. It did not accurately reflect the years spent hanging around on waiting lists or going through the "Real Life Test".

From some of the comments here, there seems to be an assumption that the few seconds that dealt with the science of transsexuality covered all there was to be known, rather than being a tiny snapshot of a growing mass of solid science investigating the structure and functioning of transgendered brains compared with cisgendered brains. If you read the papers (google them -- I've been bitten before for posting links on Mumsnet) you'll see that issues such as plasticity and the effect of cross-sex HRT are discussed.

As for the "does it work" question, the answers are that about 90% are happy with the surgical outcome, with many of the other 10% going back for subsequent surgery to put things right (we're not talking "designer vaginas" here this is things like not being able to pee). A small proportion something like 2% regret having surgery.

Pre-surgery suicide rates vary enormously depending on which part of the population you look at, but the most widely-accepted figures are that about 40% for untreated TS, falling to about 4% post op. Suicide rates amongst post-op TS are certainly higher than in the general population, but this is most likely due to social factors -- difficulty getting a job or housing, alienation from family and former friends, or violence and abuse in general.

In terms of cost-benefit analysis, Gender Realignment Surgery is regarded as one of the most effective treatments available on the NHS. It costs about the same as a hip replacement, but it saves lives and lasts a lifetime.

There is a dispassionate discussion of the clinical and scientific evidence published by the NHS here:
www.engage.england.nhs.uk/consultation/specialised-services-consultation/user_uploads/gendr-ident-policy.pdf

Suicide statistics relating to teenagers, so not post op transsexuals. But it is fairly shocking how headline grabbing may have created a self fulfilling prophecy.. and is influencing a school inclusion policy near you....

www.transgendertrend.com/stonewall-school-report-4thwavenow.com/2017/09/08/suicide-or-transition-the-only-options-for-gender-dysphoric-kids/what-does-suicide-rate-mean/

www.transgendertrend.com/a-scientist-reviews-transgender-suicide-stats/

4thwavenow.com/2017/09/08/suicide-or-transition-the-only-options-for-gender-dysphoric-kids/

That's interesting. Thank you. I'll see if I can find more detail on that.

(Worrying if a centre of excellence like that have capitulated to a wave of ideology and ignored their own evidence-based conclusions.)

SerfTerf

The only study I know was from John Hopkins University. They pioneered gender reassignment. But then stopped.

They said that although it helps with gender dysphoria, it did not make any difference to happiness levels or rates of suicide. In fact suicide spikes 10 years after surgery.

They maintained it was pointless doing an invasive and expensive surgery when it made little difference to people's peace of mind.

However, I think they have started it again. I haven't kept up with it, but I imagine they have caved in to the ideology.

I'm not sure how you can say it's pointless on the one hand, and then keep doing it on the other, though.

Has anyone statistically qualified ever interrogated the death records to find the thousands of deaths in decades prior to the trans revolution that are reasonably attributable to gender identity issues?

It would be interesting to know whether the new trans agenda IS preventing any suicides and if so, how many.

Just watched this and found it very informative. I look forward to the 'revisit' programme in 5 years, 10 years. The family sitting round the table with their Trans son swigging a beer and their back to front baseball cap and their lovely, sweet parents being so supportive and accommodating because it was the only way they could keep their child ALIVE (they had previously self-harmed at 14 and overdosed a couple of times). And the young American child who was told by their Mum that they could take something to stop them having periods - I would have bitten my Mum's hand off! The op was interesting 'we're now going to dig out the vaginal tunnel'. Interesting to hear first hand the thoughts and reasoning of the adult participants but still so uncomfortable hearing the children speak.

Oops try again
www.crossdressers.com/forums/showthread.php?252873-So-who-s-getting-it-wrong

Interesting to see how the TG/CD men see this programme. It boils down to them being upset that the stereotypes of Trans Men and Women have been enforced (ironically not seeing they love the playing up to stereotypes). Anyway, always interested to read another perspective
CD discussion

I watched this last night and found it very insubstantial on the science element for a programme on the Horizon strand. If it was just a documentary about the experiences of transgender people then it might not have been so bad. However, I think it was poor for Horizon to present this as if the science was cut and dried. I knew it would be poor when it immediately started talking about gender assigned at birth rather than sex being noted at birth with no definitions of sex and gender.

The sperm banking was presented as if that was an easy solution to infertility. Also no discussion of the other biological consequences of taking cross sex hormones. Lots of talk about playing with the wrong toys when lots of young children play with a wide variety of toys - my 3 yr old plays as much with her Brio trains as she does with her dolls and she doesn't yet have any concept of girls/ boys toys.

And I'm another one who is quite good at those rotating shape puzzles!

.

Albadross yes I thought brain plasticity!

I just tried to watch. Had to stop - it was just infuriating. Charlotte's male colleague asked whether they'd be female once the transition was complete, and Charlotte said 'yes'

The research in Amsterdam was clearly flawed because they made no mention of controlling for socialisation or brain plasticity.

Re fertility, they did have the bit where the two young trans men talked about how they had to think about whether they wanted children and how difficult a decision that was to make at 18. I'd have liked more time to be given to that, but they then cut to the trans woman saying she'd frozen sperm. No discussion then of how that might come into play later on.

This article is interesting.

www.marieclaire.com/health-fitness/news/a15344/transgender-egg-freezing/

In as much as it contains the words, ""The desire to raise a family has nothing to do with one's gender identity, or transgender status," Stark notes, "and is a right that should be afforded to all people." If anything, it's just wonderfully mature of an 18-year-old to be so sure of his hopes for the future."

I just wonder how the future generations will think they can 'afford' fertility to all people. As a recipient of donor eggs (sadly unsuccessful) and mum to a birth and adopted child, I think having children is wonderful, and I totally understand people's desire to parent.

I think this may be the area where the desire to see beyond biology (if one could put it that way) could cause some friction.

Pokemon yes, the nuts comment was odd. I actually skipped most of the surgery. I am not normally squeamish but I could not look!

I wonder why it is (am I being sexist) that I feel more sad for the females who want to transition as trans men.

Perhaps it is that the only child featured was female (trans boy) and I just felt so sorry and sad for a child having such feelings of not being happy as being a girl. I totally agree with you, what little girl wants to get periods!

I cannot imagine how all this feels and I feel so sad that only one option is being presented. The progamme only featured three females who were trans, and one was a friend of one of the main featured people.

Where as there were twice as many trans women (with one being a friend of a 'main character' and one a doctor). So the presentation made it seem trans women were more common then trans men, but my understanding is that trans men make up quite an amount of those who are trans.

Plus all the trans men were quite young, 11 to about 18, where as the trans women varied in age from about 25 up to (I'm guessing) 40s.

Italiang Ah OK, I obviously missed that bit. In general I agree it did gloss over fertility issues though.

The bit where the surgeon marvelled at the size of her patient's "nuts" while she was removing them was a bit surreal.

Pokemon "Infertility wasn't even mentioned as far as I could tell." Charlotte mentioned banking sperm.

It did indeed gloss over any issues to do with fertility, or anything like puberty blockers being dangerous at all.

I find it very interesting that people want to go through the processes like that voice treatment (just looked awful) and yet will openly appear on a programme effectively 'outing' them as trans.

Just finished watching it at
www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b096k5dm/horizon-2017-being-transgender

Richelieu "The first person featured categorises themselves as trans but 'will be a woman' when the process is complete." they said 'Yes, yes, pretty much." But they were slightly put on the spot by the co-workers asking a lot of what looked like totally unstagedconversations.

BMack Yeah I'm feeling the rant too. I just don't know. Like, it was good that it focused on trans people talking about their own lives - that is absolutely valid and important - but the contributions from the surgeon, the researcher and the parent all made these sweeping generalisations based only on narrow personal experience or, in the case of the researcher, one flawed study.

The surgeon was interesting and it was good to have input from a medical professional, but the coverage of surgical transition was really lacking in psychological content or consideration about medical side-effects or of people who choose not to have surgery. After the MtF person had her surgery there was lots of "you have a vagina and clitoris now!" congratulating, but no information about what that actually meant.

The person getting voice surgery in Korea struck me as sad. She seemed quite overwhelmed by it all. What an invasive and painful process, and so far from home, just so her voice can sound a little higher.

Catching up. The first person featured categorises themselves as trans but 'will be a woman' when the process is complete.

Hmm.

pokemon Thanks for that. Why why Why not? Why isn't the BBC being impartial about this, as they are SUPPOSED to be?

I dont expect an answer from anyone I'm just ranting.

Gotcha ... I'm drying my long fair hair and wearing pink pyjamas.

Errol I can feel your masculinity oozing through the internet

I'm great at rotating shapes and I do rotatey/translatey stuff using maths, by writing code. (I haven't watched the program but couldn't resist joining in the imaginary big swinging dick competition which seemed to have started)