Dr David Bell

I could of course be wrong.

But you're not, Mrs. O. I too wonder at the zen-like calm of posters who are prepared to go through it all again, when all I am thinking is FOTTFSOFATFOSM.

But they’re not “transitioning”, they’re changing the way they present their sexed bodies by utilising gender stereotypes. No amount of surgery, drugs m, clothing or make up can chance a person’s sex. It’s all a performance.

I'm finding the hyperbole interesting here. Take this bit....

They've denied the kids who follow in my footsteps a future and are busy doing everything in their power to isolate themselves from the consequences.

... what consequences? Who's isolating themselves?

Dr Bell, Baroness Cass, Sue Evans, Marcus Evans and other paediatric experts who been on this journey aren't isolating themselves. They're stepping forwards to speak up about this medical scandal.

As for the consequences of advocating evidence-based care. Erm. Yes please.

I'd rather that than we all continue to watch the consequences of the "world leading" approach that WPATH set in motion across the NHS and other world health bodies. The approach where even WPATH are quietly saying to each other (on the leaked videos in the WPATH files) that children and their parents can't possibly give informed consent to this. Because they aren't being informed about what it is they're consenting to.

For anyone who hasn't seen the WPATH files, Andrew Doyle did some great coverage with some great guests on Free Speech Nation. Regardless of how you feel about GB News (personally I'm no fan, Andrew Doyle excepted), or indeed Andrew Doyle (he appears to have pissed off a few feminists) it's worth Googling.

Nah, what does he know? After all random dudes on random forums disagrees with him, especially if they're dressed in fetish gear! 'Anyone agreeing with the expert is just a hateful child murdering transphobic bigot and probably a nazi racist too!' etc etc.

That's a very accurate two pennuth @NewGreenDuck ! This will be the story for tens of thousands of young women once they mature and realise the damage that's been done to them.

There is very good article in the Daily Mail today ( sorry!). A young woman in the USA who is suing the health care provider who dealt with her transition.At 15 she had OCD, anxiety, anorexia and had suicidal thoughts. She thought she was fat and ugly. She started to think she would be better off as a boy, was referred to a gender therapist and, voila, she was given hormones and later had a mastectomy.
After a while she realised she still had the same problems and detransitioned. She has been left with so many health issues due to taking male hormones. She has given birth but can't breastfeed, her chest and back are painful, she has chest hair still. She has vaginal atrophy and could only give birth via a c section. The list is endless of the problems she has, all caused by others thinking she could be a boy. She actually says, it's clear to her that she had other issues that should have been addressed, and also that female bodies don't become male, because they aren't designed to be male.
I mean, come on, why was this poor young woman shunted down the route of 'gender affirming care'?
This is why very young people should not be able to alter their bodies. Dress how you want etc, but keep your body healthy.
That's my two pennuth.

This man is an expert on child mental health and has been working in the field for decades.

All very good points.

I guess what I'm seeing is an increasing desperation to be heard. If I put myself in the shoes of someone for whom gender dysphoria feels real, I "get it".

Obviously all we've got on MN is the written word. My empathy drops off a cliff when I see images and/or videos of people on X or YouTube etc who are clearly flying in from Málaga Airport to tell us all why children need to have their brains and bodies altered forever.

However, regardless of motivation or benefit of the doubt, there is no logic to anyone arguing for medical experimentation on children.

You're a much nicer person than I am @BonfireLady . What I've seen is a
poster spending countless hours on a site designed for parents & to offer them support who repeatedly challenges the need to safeguard children. On this thread they dismiss the research and evidence that's exposed the scandal of "gender affirming" medical treatment for children. They've repeatedly posted conspiracy theories about suicide and children that must cause great distress to many parents.

I'm sure Dr Bell could shed light on why they post so many offensive comments about women (bigots, ant trans etc) on a site where women speak. But I'd hazard a guess that someone "at peace with themselves" wouldn't spend so many hours on here throwing accusations at women and parents seeking to protect our and other people's children.

I could of course be wrong.

I really can't see how Dr. Bell has ruined the lives of thousands of British children. After all, he was an important cog in helping to stop the cynically abusive Tavistock mob, who laughed that most of their clients were gay and that they were transing away the gay.

Anybody who thinks that that is vital, life saving treatment probably needs a nice lie down in a rubber room.

It is food for thought isn't it? These children have really been abandoned by so many who should be centring their needs.

Here's the paper from the Tavistock with the 48% autism estimate:

https://repository.tavistockandportman.ac.uk/1910/

It's a small sample size, so probably not considered enough to draw statistically significant conclusions. However, it's enough to give food for thought when you consider that, according to the National Autism Society, only 1% of the population is autistic.

It simply doesn't make sense.

It makes even less sense when we already know that at least 80% of children who feel this type of distress grow out of it without this life-altering medicalised pathway, that they are too young to comprehend anyway.

I made a couple of edits in my post above for typos/clarity.

I wanted to pick up on this point separately too. I added an "at least" in here because this figure is based on the previous cohort of children and young people who entered this medicalised pathway. At that time almost all were boys who identified as girls, having done so from a relatively young age. Since this time, the demographic has shifted significantly. It's now mostly girls, most of whom experience this distress at adolescence. It's also notable that anywhere between 35% (Cass Report) and 48% (research within the Tavistock, published by two clinicians there) are autistic. The previous cohort didn't have anything like this pattern. The desistance rate would likely be much higher if these girls can have their distress unpicked and addressed in a neutral therapeutic way.

Just caught up on this thread.

@ButterflyHatched I'm sorry you feel so angry at the "transphobes" who want children to have access to good therapeutic support that helps them understand and address why they might be feeling distressed about their bodies.

Perhaps they are autistic girls experiencing breast development and periods as difficult sensory issues. Perhaps they are girls who have experienced sexual abuse, who are identifying out of their "weak" bodies so that they won't experience this again. Perhaps they are boys or girls who have heard children mocking gay and lesbian people, who are concerned at emerging feelings of same-sex attraction, sadly disgusted and/or scared at thoughts of themselves as gay. Preferring instead to see themselves as "straight", but "trapped in the wrong body".

Watching you dismiss all this, dismiss Dr Bell and others who are putting children's mental and physical health first is as concerning as it is frustrating.

Hopefully anyone new to MN, or still lurking while getting their head around it all, can see the glaringly obvious flaw here: it makes no sense whatsoever for anyone to advocate for children to have their puberty stopped. Forever. There is no puberty of the opposite sex, there's just puberty or no puberty. Brains that have been fully developed through adolescence, or brains whose development has been impacted. Forever. Children growing into adulthood with permanently altered brains, bones and endocrine systems.

It makes even less sense when we already know that at least 80% of children who feel this type of distress grow out of it without this life-altering medicalised pathway, that they are too young to comprehend anyway.

I truly hope that you are at peace with the decisions you made about your own body. From everything you've said, it sounds like you are. But that doesn't mean it makes any sense at all for you to dismiss the concerns of medical professionals like Dr Bell. Please stop.

I think she's been very clear.

What part are you struggling with?

Amen to that

Come on Datun, don't mince words. Say what you really mean.

You can't discredit us any other way so I suppose this is all you have left.

There appear to be many people with such a massively deep sunk cost in either transitioning, or transitioning their children, they are incapable of acknowledging the ideology that drives it.

What's notable, however, is the effort many will go to garner sympathy on the one hand, about what an awful life they've had, with the complete denial that their 'treatment' has had any part in it.

Which leads to the other thing I try to keep in mind. And that is if people have taken puberty blockers, it's not just their physicality that's been arrested. It's highly likely that their emotional and mental maturity will not have been unaffected.

Crushing silence and isolation in congruence, never being able to talk about your past vs a lifetime of inescapable daily transphobic abuse

What a choice!

"You should not transition because of how we will treat you if you do."

"How dare you find a way to transition that means we can't find you."

We are so desperate for this treatment because a. It is the second-best route we have to lifelong congruence and b. It lets us escape from you

Very wise, thoughtful and compassionate words

Also this!

and if only we had a bit of wholesome conversion therapy then we'd soon be making our bodies available to the LGB dating

Like lesbian women should be making their bodies available to 'lesbian' transwmen?

Agreed!

Butterfly appears to have hatched into a parallel universe.

Meanwhile in the real world, his actions are helping to ensure that children's futures are safeguarded from immense physical and psychological harms.

People - children and adults - with psychological and emotional problems need psychological and emotional therapies. Not dishonesty, gaslighting, empty promises only backed up by strong, untested, inappropriate drugs that cause irreversible harm to them.

Yeah, well, butters, when you are a world leading psychoanalyst and and psychiatrist, authoring umpteen highly rated books and receiving numerous awards, or have taken four years out to gather evidence that no one can refute about the harm of puberty blockers, maybe people will listen to you.

As it is, your description of your life spent in 'crushing isolation' due to your transition and having the sword of Damocles hanging over you for your numerous trans health issues doesn't really inspire much confidence in your opinion of wanting lots of children to 'follow in your footsteps.'