Urgent: banning gender identity conversion

Brain activity and structure in transgender adolescents more closely resembles the typical activation patterns of their desired gender,

Hilary the point I’m trying to get across is that the basic premise of this paper is built on a false statement. There ARE NO ‘typical patterns of activation’ for gender or sex

If you have a look at the thread I posted earlier, working neuroscientists critique the various MRI / fMRI papers in great detail.

floorplan I would agree with you - this study would not pass review in my field either.

A Guide to Gender (2nd Edition): The Social Justice Advocate's Handbook

Thanks @HilaryMGSDC I'll take a look at these tonight. No books then? There are shelves full of books that explain how gender develops socially

HilaryMGSDC
Just a short comment on the other paper you linked to
rcgd.isr.umich.edu/seminars/Winter2017/Olson.Key.Eaton.2015.pdf

The children being studied here are 5-12 years old and pre-pubescent, and
The participants in this study are transgender children who are allowed to live everyday life congruent with their gender identity.

I really do wonder what that means. Can you explain how a pre-pubescent child lives in an opposite sex 'gender identity'?

HilaryMGSDC

This link that you posted is just another version of the press release for the conference paper that you linked to previously.
www.giga.uliege.be/cms/c_277137/en/transgender-brains-are-more-like-their-desired-gender-from-an-early-age

Do you think this study is of particular importance? As far as I am aware, no studies have shown that male and female brains are distinguishable from each other, but I know that proving that they are is the holy grail for those who believe in 'lady brain'.

It's hard to make any comment on this study, since there is only an abstract available, but this bit hints at it being somewhat inconclusive:

Furthermore, we found intermediate patterns in WM microstructure in adolescent boys with GD, but only sex-typical ones in adolescent girls with GD. These results on brain structure are thus partially in line with a sex-atypical differentiation of the brain during early development in individuals with GD, but might also suggest that other mechanisms are involved.

HilaryMGSDC

You quoted some of the abstract from this paper

Olson, K.R., Durwood, L., DeMeules, M., & McLaughlin, K. A. (2016). Mental health of transgender children who are supported in their identities. Pediatrics, 137 (3), 1-8. (2016)

Including the part which says:
Especially striking is the comparison with reports of children with GID; socially transitioned transgender children have notably lower rates of internalizing psychopathology than previously reported among children with GID living as their natal sex.

When you read the whole paper, you get a different impression. Here are some extracts:

Comparisons between previous reports of children with GID and the current sample should be made cautiously, however, because the criteria for inclusion (transgender identities vs GID) and specific measures of internalizing psychopathology ... differ across studies.

... parents of transgender children could have biased reporting, reflecting a desire for their children to appear healthier than they are. We have no reasons to believe this was an issue but in the future aim to include other reporters (eg, teachers) to address this concern that others are likely to raise.

So the authors recognise that a comparison with other studies is open to errors, as is their method of compiling results simply from reports from parents, who they acknowledge may be biased in favour of reporting good mental health in their children.

It doesn't seem to be a very rigorous study.

do you really think that gender/sex dysphoria simply springs out of nowhere with no precipitating factors? What if the root cause of a child's gender/ sex/ body dysphoria is child abuse?

May 2018 Guardian article: 'Schools pulled into row over helping transgender children: As more teens come out as trans, experts clash over how schools should help'
(extract)
"[ Stephanie Davies-Arai Transgendertrand] says her broader concern is that by affirming students’ gender identity, schools may be nudging them down a route that can lead to cross-sex hormones and life-changing surgery without enough time to reflect. Teachers, she says, “are essentially being forced to collude in an experimental approach towards children with gender dysphoria”. She adds: “You can support children and accept them, without affirming their belief that their body is ‘wrong’.”

Adele Robinson (not her real name), a head of year at a secondary school, shares Davies-Arai’s worries. The school has had 12 children, all girls, come out as transgender in the past 18 months. The majority, she says, have autism, and some have experienced sexual abuse.

When they come out, she says, they have brought in information sourced from Tumblr blogs and YouTube videos. Although her team does its best to “support every child in a loving, kind and compassionate way”, she feels that staff are too frightened to challenge what she sees as harmful practices: “We have chest binders worn in school, which is horrible. If a child was cutting, they would be straight in with a counsellor. Yet damaging developing breast tissue goes unquestioned. It’s a gross failure in terms of child protection.”

[Susie Green Mermaids] disagrees, and argues for a biological underpinning to transgender identity: “If a child or young person consistently, insistently and persistently states their feelings, to ignore, punish or repress their gender identity would effectively be reparative therapy.”

At Wadebridge school, Miles’s former headteacher says: “You just have to put the child at the centre of everything to enable that child to feel comfortable and supported. The biggest message I’d want to get out is that this is not a transgender issue, this is a supporting young people issue.”

www.theguardian.com/education/2018/may/15/transgender-row-teachers-afraid-challenge-breast-binding

I have various issues with this particular paper. It does not withstand the levels of scrutiny with which I am familiar in my field of work (biochemistry), although I am prepared to accept fields differ.

OldCrone poster Bowlofbabelfish
Transgender brains are more like their desired gender from an early age

I did not see a review of this study on the link to the other thread, just a review of an earlier study.

www.giga.uliege.be/cms/c_277137/en/transgender-brains-are-more-like-their-desired-gender-from-an-early-age

Brain activity and structure in transgender adolescents more closely resembles the typical activation patterns of their desired gender, according to findings to be presented in Barcelona, at the European Society of Endocrinology annual meeting, ECE 2018. These findings suggest that differences in brain function may occur early in development and that brain imaging may be a useful tool for earlier identification of transgenderism in young people

Dr Bakker says, “Although more research is needed, we now have evidence that sexual differentiation of the brain differs in young people with GD, as they show functional brain characteristics that are typical of their desired gender.”

Dr Bakker’s research will now investigate the role of hormones during puberty on brain development and transgender differences, to help guide and improve future diagnosis and therapy for GD adolescents.

Dr Bakker comments, “We will then be better equipped to support these young people, instead of just sending them to a psychiatrist and hoping that their distress will disappear spontaneously.”

more Interesting research

Gender Cognition in Transgender Children
Abstract
A visible and growing cohort of transgender children in North America live according to their expressed gender rather than their natal sex, yet scientific research has largely ignored this population. In the current study, we adopted methodological advances from social-cognition research to investigate whether 5- to 12-year-old prepubescent transgender children (N = 32), who were presenting themselves according to their gender identity in everyday life, showed patterns of gender cognition more consistent with their expressed gender or their natal sex, or instead appeared to be confused about their gender identity. Using implicit and explicit measures, we found that transgender children showed a clear pattern: They viewed themselves in terms of their expressed gender and showed preferences for their expressed gender, with response patterns mirroring those of two cisgender (non-transgender) control groups. These results provide evidence that, early in development, transgender youth are statistically indistinguishable from cisgender children of the same gender identity.

Kristina Olson, Associate Professor Degree From: Harvard University My research focuses on the following topics within social cognitive development: gender nonconformity in childhood, prosocial behavior, understanding status and inequality, prejudice and discrimination.

Olson, K.R., Durwood, L., DeMeules, M., & McLaughlin, K. A. (2016). Mental health of transgender children who are supported in their identities. Pediatrics, 137 (3), 1-8. (2016)

OBJECTIVE: Transgender children who have socially transitioned, that is, who identify as abstract the gender “opposite” their natal sex and are supported to live openly as that gender, are increasingly visible in society, yet we know nothing about their mental health. Previous work with children with gender identity disorder (GID; now termed gender dysphoria) has found remarkably high rates of anxiety and depression in these children. Here we examine, for the first time, mental health in a sample of socially transitioned transgender children.

CONCLUSIONS: Socially transitioned transgender children who are supported in their gender identity have developmentally normative levels of depression and only minimal elevations in anxiety, suggesting that psychopathology is not inevitable within this group. Especially striking is the comparison with reports of children with GID; socially transitioned transgender children have notably lower rates of internalizing psychopathology than previously reported among children with GID living as their natal sex.

@HilaryMGSDC Can you recommend any books from psychologists or sociologists that argue solidly that gender identity is innate? As you may be aware there is a mass of well established research that suggests gender develops socially and is not innate. I would suggest for you Cordelia Fine and Judith Butler among many others. I'm not interested in pop science or suggestions that "this is all very complex no one really understands it more research is needed" but actual books please.

snappity you said If a child has severe gender dysphoria which brings on depression etc, they are not healthy and it is medically appropriate and ethical to treat the root cause of their acute distress.

Well yes, that is what we are suggesting. Snap and Hilary, do you really think that gender/sex dysphoria simply springs out of nowhere with no precipitating factors? What if the root cause of a child's gender/ sex/ body dysphoria is child abuse?

It may well have got lost in the recent pages of text but there was important & relevent discussion following the Victoria Derbyshire Show last week which focussed on children and young people and the role of Mermaids.

thread:
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3294478-Victoria-Derbyshire-show-today-transgender-children-buying-time-by-delaying-puberty

HilaryMGSDC
I am a believer of factual evidence and progressive change when it comes to treatment of people and the human rights of the individual to live their life
So am I but you haven't produced any. I don't understand why you consider turning the clock back to antique sex stereotypes progressive when we have made huge progress in understanding the plasticity of the brain and the influence of environment and culture. You don't seem to have any understanding of normal child development.
Lobotomies were hailed as a modern, progressive treatment once. Doctors received Nobel Prize. I knew someone who was given a lobotomy. It was anything but benign. What you are championing calls for the maximum amount of scrutiny and scepticism due to the huge irreversible impact it has.

There is no way to be a woman (or a man) that isn't based in our sexed bodies. There is no magic essence of womanhood that is separate from the physical.

No male can know what it feels like to be female, any more than I can feel like a horse. Because being a woman depends on the body and on our life experiences as women. I don't feel like a woman. I just am one.

Being a woman is not a costume or an identity. It's also not a club that someone can join because they fancy the idea.

From my reading it seems that what many transwomen actually experience is a sense of being a non man. They feel distress about their male bodies, or about masculinity and interpret this as meaning that if they don't fit the male box they're therefore female. This is a misconception.

You're talking about transsexuals, I believe, Hilary. But there is much larger group of transwomen who are entirely sexually motivated. They identify as woman because it arouses them. The misogyny of this group is revolting.

As for wrong side of history? Don't make me laugh. Big advances in science tend to be science based, oddly enough.

I'm guessing you may be American, as Brits rarely use the word "profanity". You clearly aren't aware that Mumsnetters are notoriously sweary. We even have abbreviations for swearing.

One example is ODFOD. I wonder if you can work that one out.

I dont believe there IS an innate sense of gender that's universal though. I do t have one, many people here have said they don’t have one. I see it as a faith based position, akin to belief in a soul.

It is not measurable, or observable. So what are we to define it as? I’ve never heard a decent definition of what ‘a female gender identity’ actually IS. I know I’m female. I know this because of the biology of my body. I’m pregnant, I’m not terribly well due to it - that’s how I know I am female. Otherwise, my identity is just me. I have a body, and a personality.

What IS a gender identity? You might say that it’s a feeling that one is, for example a woman, but how can you know how that feels? There’s no definition that’s not a circular argument.

Transsexuals are not delusional believing their body primary and secondary sex characteristics are that of the opposite sex/gender to that assigned at birth.

Now my next sentence is not to be read as perjorative. I mean delusional in the medical sense. A delusional belief is a sincerely held belief that is demonstrably incorrect. You’ve just said that you dont believe people can change sex but now you say that someone who believes they are the opposite sex is literally correct these two statements are contradictory- the second one is demonstrably wrong.

They therefor associate themselves with the sex/gender they are, that being the opposite of the sex assigned at birth.

No one is assigned a sex at birth. Sex is observed at birth.

They may associate with/as (although these are two different things) the sex they are not. However that belief does not alter reality. Belief and objective reality are two different things.

It is possible that this is an unconscious development caused by chromosomal / hormonal influence on core identity development.

Statement on chromosomes: word salad I’m afraid.

There is no evidence for the ‘hormone wash’ theory either.

Transsexuals are not delusional believing their body primary and secondary sex characteristics are that of the opposite sex/gender to that assigned at birth. They therefor associate themselves with the sex/gender they are, that being the opposite of the sex assigned at birth.

Is this an argument for the existence of the female penis, Hilary?

Bowlofbabelfish
But this is contradictory - being transgender means that you associate with the sex you are not, no?
Being transgender covers a wide range of gender identities within a binary gender model or outside it as in binary & non-binary identities.

Transsexuals belief their sense of self their sense of sex/gender is the opposite of the sex assigned at birth. This is no less a part of their core identity that sexual attraction is. If you conclude that sexual orientation is innate and not a choice you must consider that our own sense of sex/gender be it the same as assigned sex or different to assigned gender could also be innate. Transsexuals are not delusional believing their body primary and secondary sex characteristics are that of the opposite sex/gender to that assigned at birth. They therefor associate themselves with the sex/gender they are, that being the opposite of the sex assigned at birth.

If our sense of sex and gender is innate it has developed in a typical or atypical way. It is possible that this is an unconscious development caused by chromosomal / hormonal influence on core identity development. As I wrote earlier the jury is still out but research is ongoing so eventually compelling evidence may be found one way or the other.

The fact is their is more we don't know about development of the brain and how it affects our sense of self than we do. Yes there is a lot to prove or disprove regarding causality of gender incongruity, but the fact remains that transgender and transsexual people exist and they exist from birth. Resolving the problems caused by this cannot be a conversion therapy approach. It has been tried and failed

HilaryMGSDC
I asked you this earlier this morning, but perhaps you missed it. When you talk about sex and gender are you using the two terms synonymously?

I am using the term SEX as biological sex as determined by sex chromosomes, genes, primary and secondary sex characteristics.

I am using the term GENDER to mean Men, Male or Women, Female or Non-Binary Gender.

This implies that you are using 'gender' to mean the same as 'sex', since men, male, women and female are sex categories.

In which case, when you say:
I am using the term GENDER IDENTITY to mean a persons internal sense of gender.

Do you mean that a person is aware that they are male or female (due to their sex characteristics)? This is what is meant by 'gender identity' in the paper that you posted a link to yesterday, in which they use sex and gender synonymously.

If I have got that wrong, please could you explain in more detail exactly what you mean by 'gender' and 'gender identity'?

Plenty of people who were proven to be on the right side of history with regard to evolution and progress were laughed at.

I’m sure they were. If they had a solid, reproducible evidence base, they tended to win out.

So far I’m not seeing that in your arguments though. Your position is not evidence based.

Can you support your claim that some research into brain function is pointing to a similarity in transsexual brains that align with brain functions of those with a matching gender identity with some peer-reviewed studies?

Breaking this down further, can you provide evidence for gender aligned brain functions in the first place? From what I’ve seen, they don’t seem to exist. There is no functional ‘Male brain’ or ‘female brain.’ You cannot scan a brain and determine what sex it is. You certainly can’t scan one and determine anything about gender

We’ve had a couple of very good threads on the MRI studies actually - thank you to the working neuroscientists who contributed to them

HilaryMGSDC
Can you support your claim that some research into brain function is pointing to a similarity in transsexual brains that align with brain functions of those with a matching gender identity with some peer-reviewed studies? A press release for a conference presentation is fairly insubstantial evidence for your position.

Prawnofthepatriarchy
Hilary, do you seriously think you can produce that pile of waffle to an audience of mature women on a fucking parenting site and not have us laugh at you?

Profanity! signs of losing an argument and not very mature...
Plenty of people who were proven to be on the right side of history with regard to evolution and progress were laughed at.

Transsesxual people do not change sex, they are the sex matching their gender identity so, No they do not change sex.

But this is contradictory - being transgender means that you associate with the sex you are not, no?
Can you explain this to me? Are you saying that someone who is transsexual has always been the sex they transition to? If so what are they transitioning from? How can they be the sex that matches their ‘gender identity’ if that is different from their sex? Because that is not physically possible. Perhaps I have misunderstood your phrasing? if so then perhaps you could explain this to me.

Sex is complex and not binary

This is incorrect. Sex is binary. If sex is non binary then where are the other gametes? Everyone is Male or female. We know in molecular detail how a foetus develops from conception to become either Male or female.

they are not 100% male or female but a combination of both sexes which develop dependent on chromosomal and hormonal influences.

No. They are Male or female. Surgery and hormones do not change this. The outwards appearance of the corporeal body can be surgically altered, but cross sex hormones, surgery etc do not change the sex of the organism involved.
Many surgical procedures such as hysterectomy are done for medical reasons. Many hormonal treatments are also done for medical reasons - for example hormone blockers in prostate cancer treatment. None of these treatments changes the sex of the person being treated.

I have read that MRI paper, and I think if im up to date the similar papers too. It does not show that there is any such thing as a ‘transgender’ or even a ‘gender’ signal in the brain.

My area of expertise is the genetics and biochemistry of human development, but on this thread you can read a full critique of that MRI paper and several others by working neuroscientists who are experts in that field: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3196135-Scientists-please-gather-round

The MRI discussions are further down but the take home message is that the transwomens brain’s were more like the male cohort, with some potential signals associated with mental ill heath.

Prawnofthepatriarchy
You're no scientist, Hilary. Your position is faith based. It's unsupported by reality.

What makes you believe that my position is faith based or that I am a person of faith?

Where in my explanation of my position or belief do I mention faith?

Your position seems to be based on ideology and your belief is holding you back from seeing other points of view. I am not trying to change you view you are perfectly entitled to believe what you believe. I am trying to explain a counter view with evidence and facts.

Sex/Gender and Gender Identity are complex and Yes / No answers do not give a useful response. We see where that leads with Brexit means Brexit.

You need to enhance your response beyond opposition to clarify you own position giving the reader / audience a chance to accept or reject your belief/position. This is how science and understanding evolves, we hold a position based on available facts, Some facts may be questioned in the future and if new facts are found that enhance or disprove the old consensus of understanding a new consensus and understanding will prevail which eventually may become the norm.

Hilary, do you seriously think you can produce that pile of waffle to an audience of mature women on a fucking parenting site and not have us laugh at you?

Of course sex is a binary. There's no third sex.

Bowl may post some actual science in response to your comment, but I'm just mildly astonished that you expect us to take it seriously.