Scientific American on puberty blockers.

30 replies

ArabeIIaScott · 04/05/2023 21:36

Garbled propaganda piece presents blockers as a way to avoid suicide, via thinly veiled ominous threat.

'...patients and their families have to weigh the risk of having lower bone density versus a gender issue that’s not properly treated'

Actually, it's not even veiled.

'Caregivers must weigh any concerns against the lifelong risks of not receiving the care, such as depression and suicidality, and the need for future surgeries, she says.'

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-are-puberty-blockers-and-how-do-they-work/

This sentence below, in particular, doesn't cite any references or evidence to support the assertion. Does anyone know what they mean? :

'Teens who had access to puberty blockers and hormone therapy require fewer gender-affirming surgeries as adults'

Finally, it's not going down well on Twitter.

https://twitter.com/sciam/status/1653775493550813184?cxt=HHwWgMC99ZODsvMtAAAA

OP posts:

BonfireLady · 04/05/2023 23:18

Sorry, slight hyperbole... "The parents who have gender incongruent children" is better than "lots of people with gender incongruent children ".

Yes, it's on the increase but "lots" is a poor choice of word.

BonfireLady · 04/05/2023 23:13

Yes, it's definitely being challenged on Twitter! Good to see.

Hopefully lots of people with gender incongruent children are now looking more widely for more information before they start their children on a medical pathway.

Hannah Barnes' book Time to Think was a really balanced and in depth review of all of this. It's pretty telling that so many of the staff working in the gender clinic started to doubt the "medicate or they will commit suicide" message.

Also there was a very memorable section in the Swedish documentary Trans Train where the national gender clinic was asked how many children had committed suicide while they were on the waiting list for gender affirming care.... after a bit of a pause the answer was a sheepish "none ".

zibzibara · 04/05/2023 22:34

They always cite these few surveys about suicidality. Yet where is the evidence that young people were killing themselves because they wanted to be the opposite sex, prior to the medical construction of trans identity and trans healthcare? This is a very modern cultural malady.

Original poster

ArabeIIaScott · 04/05/2023 22:29

Ah, I see. Thanks.

OP posts:

BinturongsSmellOfPopcorn · 04/05/2023 22:25

Does anyone know what they mean? :

'Teens who had access to puberty blockers and hormone therapy require fewer gender-affirming surgeries as adults'

Gender affirming surgery covers a very wide range of things - not just the genital surgeries. So I assume they mean things like boys taking puberty blockers very early not having as much facial feminisation surgery when older. (Of course it can also mean genital surgery in those cases is much more difficult and needs more operations - but many operations to achieve a single thing can be counted as '1 surgery').

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