Australian Family Court Allows Cross Sex Hormones for Teen

https://www.genderclinicnews.com/p/not-in-our-name?utm_campaign=post&showWelcomeOnShare=true

Lane covers this case in his write-up under the sub-title ‘common sense’. Click on the hyperlink ‘published’ in this section as it takes you to the case.

It is bizarre, isn't it? This is a girl who knows that she might want her body to be able to do the things women's bodies are able to (give birth), but she also wants her body to look like a man's body.

Surely the person who should be trying to unpick what's going on here and make decisions about whether any medical treatment is required is a psychiatrist, not a judge.

Why does Ash want to look like a man? Why does Ash want people to think she's a man?

Personally, I'm not convinced that any of this is based on anything other than regressive gender stereotypes.

What about other unnecessary medical treatment?

This medical treatment is just about changing the appearance of the body. It's cosmetic. It has no medical value. In fact, all the effects, other than the cosmetic changes, are negative. And as is increasingly being shown from the experience of detransitioners, even the cosmetic changes can turn out to be negative in the longer term.

What is the point of this treatment other than the cosmetic aspects?

@Sasskitty

I think it’s a fabulous country in many ways (outdoor life, healthy good food easily accessible, good health care etc). Certainly a physically healthier place to live than the uk.

At the same time - it’s racist, sexist and doesn’t give a fck about women’s rights. Also feels isolated, and lacking in culture but that’s a different discussion.

Well, that's rude. And wrong.

@Shortshriftandlethal

It even sounds as if his response is rooted in the tendency to rebel against anything British, and even more so against anything commissioned under the Tories. And in that way his judgment is itself a political one.

I'm sorry, but this is bizarre. Why would an Australian judge feel the need to do something like this?

As for breast feeding; I only gave it any thought when I attended my first Obstetrician consultation. WHO had a campaign, and the hospital were promoting its merits. I was asked had I though about breastfeeding the baby, and the advantages were outlined.

It even sounds as if his response is rooted in the tendency to rebel against anything British, and even more so against anything commissioned under the Tories. And in that way his judgment is itself a political one.

I was at an art exhibition on Saturday. I had an audio phone with some background on the pieces. Someone said the sentence ‘Some people look, but do not see’. I know that sounds quasi religious. However, I think it is very applicable in a situation like this.

A youngster may hear the words ‘you will be infertile, and never have your own children’. You cannot understand the reality of it though. Decisions made now that will remove choices years in the future. I had absolutely no desire to have children when I was a teenager, or even in my twenties. In fact, I may have said that I didn’t want that at all. Head, and life, full of getting on building a life. Getting on the property ladder - security. Then it dawned on me that I would rather like to become a mother, and have a baby.

27 year old Freddie only "understood reality" when actually giving birth, and when wanting to feed her child or when the child naturally rooted for the breast.

It is possible to 'understand' all sorts of things in a detached and intellectual way. Unfortunately doing irreparable damage to a healthy functioning body may well only occur to you when it no longer functions as it should or is showing signs of disease.

It is the responsibility of the adult to point this out. A 16 year old really doesn't appreciate the stark realities and consequences of many situations.

@AmaryllisNightAndDay I'd say the judge's views are typical for an Australian professional who is not socially conservative.
I had hoped Cass would provoke changes, but his attitude to it unfortunately is common.

@OldCrone you are so wrong about me.

I think anyone who has unnecessary surgery at any age has a negligent doctor.

@Harassedevictee thanks for your response.
I'm still not clear exactly what the "cross sex" hormones are supposed to be treating.
If men can get pregnant (which is what all this discussion of egg donation is about - Ash as an adult seeking to get pregnant) then why can't boys have oestrogen / progesterone based puberties?
What is "cross sex" about testosterone for Ash? Ash is already a boy, and as a man Ash hopes to carry a pregnancy to term.
Is this an aesthetic / cosmetic choice on Ash's part?
In which case, the tolerance for harms caused by treatment are much lower. Infertility is not something a medic could knowingly risk in the provision of cosmetic treatments and expect to keep their registration.
The judge seems to be agreeing with Ash that a suite of treatments are needed to make Ash look and sound like a cis man. Neither Ash nor the judge think that having a desire to gestate and birth a child weaken Ash's claims to actually be male.
To repeat, if Ash the boy -> man can give birth why can't Ash the boy -> man have a non-testosterone based puberty?
I'm not trying to get my head around whether or not Ash is competent to make this decision.
I'm trying to get my head around what Ash, and the judge in this case, think the treatment Ash is seeking is all about.

Hi, ok!

I was ref your ‘don’t listen to everything you see in the media’ comment.

You were implying I had been influenced by the media. I was correcting your implication.

I think it’s a fabulous country in many ways (outdoor life, healthy good food easily accessible, good health care etc). Certainly a physically healthier place to live than the uk.

At the same time - it’s racist, sexist and doesn’t give a fck about women’s rights. Also feels isolated, and lacking in culture but that’s a different discussion.

@Harassedevictee

Unlike most, if not all of us on this thread I have not spoken to Ash nor read all the evidence. The judge has.

The judge was clear about what Ash did and did not understand. What the judge and we disagree on is not anything specific to Ash that the judge knows and we don't. It's whether that level of understanding in a 16 year old is sufficient to make that decision (or set of decisions) and then be expected to live with consequences of getting it wrong. The judge thinks yes. We think no.

At 16 Ash appears to have a better understanding of reality than 27 year old Freddie.

16 year olds change fast. 16 year olds can't visualise themselves as older people with very different priorities from ones they have now. They think short term. They make decisions now and assume later consequences will take care of themselves or that they will manage somehow but with only the haziest and least realistic ideas of how. The judge cannot have determined that Ash is the exception because there is no way for the judge (or anyone) to know that, there is no special secret information or insight.

A 16 year old may know all the facts that you stated but cannot visualise the impact of those facts in future on Ash's body, mind and relationships. Ash's suggestion that their sister might donate eggs only demonstrates how little Ash truly understands about adult bodies, adult emotions and adult relationships.

It's not possible to predict what they a 16 year old will want even in a few years' time. There is no way to predict whether a 16 year old will want to breast feed in their twenties or thirties. All you can know for sure is that they are more likely to change their mind about it than a 30 year old - but even a 30 year old can change their mind. You can choose not to breast feed, or to stop breast feeding if you hate it, but you can't grow new breasts.

The most common direction of travel with age is from "not wanting children" to "wanting children" and usually towards "wanting my own children". The other way round is much rarer. Ash already wants to have children at some point, or that conversation with Ash's sister would not have happened. Sterilising a healthy youngster who wants (or knows they might want might want) to have children later on is not ethical.

Children have - or should have - a right to an open future. Not to have to live with decisions whose full effects they couldn't be expected to conceptualise. Waiting even a couple of years to formal adulthood makes it just that bit safer.

I don't know enough about Australia to know if this judge is an extremist or has typical views for typical for the area they live in. Or something in between.

It’s interesting how differently we all view the same information.
We know it’s impossible to change sex. However, with hormones and surgery we can change our physical appearance just look at the plastic surgery instagrammer’s have.

It's interesting how you seem to think that it could be appropriate for a 16-year-old child to have this sort of extreme cosmetic surgery. I'm assuming you think it's appropriate, because otherwise why mention it on a thread about a child?

At 16 Ash appears to have a better understanding of reality than 27 year old Freddie.

Why does Ash want to be a boy (which she obviously can't be)? Why does she think that going through life as an infertile woman pretending to be a man will be better or easier than being a (probably) fertile woman?

This doesn't seem to me to be based on a very firm understanding of reality.

@Sasskitty

? I lived there

? I live there.

It’s interesting how differently we all view the same information.

We know it’s impossible to change sex. However, with hormones and surgery we can change our physical appearance just look at the plastic surgery instagrammer’s have.

We know not all trans people take hormones or have surgery.

There are views on whether or not gender dysphoria is real, a mental health condition etc.

We know that Freddy McConnell at the age of 27 had a double mastectomy which they deeply regretted when they chose to become a mother and couldn’t breastfeed.

One aspect a judge will be looking for is, if Ash at 16, really understands what they are requesting and understands the impacts both positive (from Ash’s perspective) and negative.

From the article it appears Ash understands:

• they are not changing sex, and will still have a female reproductive system.
• cross sex hormones may render them sterile. Along with other complications.
• they might want children
• one solution is egg donation (but not from their sister)

At 16 Ash appears to have a better understanding of reality than 27 year old Freddie.

Unlike most, if not all of us on this thread I have not spoken to Ash nor read all the evidence. The judge has.

? I lived there

If men can be the kind of people who contribute eggs to reproduction, and carry pregnancy to term, what is un-male about Ash's endogenous hormones?
What exactly is treatment about?

I'm struggling to get my head around this.
Infertile men don't need sisters to donate them eggs. They need brothers to donate sperm.
So Ash is having medical treatment to go through male puberty. But Ash's infertility, if it results from said treatment, will be of the type requiring large gamete and site of gestation?
I know I'm not saying anything posters here haven't been saying for years, but this isn't wacky blue haired youth saying this stuff, this is a judge in a court of law.
Ruling on whether the risk of harm from treatment is warranted given treatment outcomes.

But noone is pretending those treatment outcomes are actual, successful male puberty. At the same time as saying, treatment is to enable this trans boy to go through male puberty.
I think it's so hard to combat because it's bullshit. In the technical sense. Total bullshit.

I appreciate this is technical but the Department for Health & Social Care is the overarching department for NHS England. Whilst NHS England commissioned the review the Minister responsible for DHSC would have been involved and approved the review.

This is confirmed by Hansard “^That is why in 2020, with the support of my predecessors, my right hon. Friends the Members for West Suffolk (Matt Hancock) and for Bromsgrove (Sir Sajid Javid), NHS England commissioned Dr Hilary Cass to examine the state of services for children questioning their gender. ” https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2024-04-15/debates/AFE3A39A-3333-4790-AE30-776A474188C4/CassReview^

Sajid Javid as Minister for Dept Health & Social Care was highly supportive of the review. He even introduced a SI to assist Baroness Cass to get the data.

https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/23080/documents/169060/default/

This is why the review itself was not subject to political interference but was supported by parliament and therefore seen as political. I appreciate it is nuanced.

It's certainly worked well for them so far, as this case so bitterly shows.

Well said.

This article on WPATH and "citation cartels" looks at how established it is too:

https://www.realityslaststand.com/p/gender-medicines-citation-cartel

If you mean, 'established' in the sense of an infestation, then I'd agree.

At this point, the Australian standards of care are the ones the Justice would be guided by. It is too early for the Cass report to filter down into such standards, if it ever does. Australia may produce its own informed by Baroness Cass' report, perhaps.

*And yes, I'm aware that the Australian standards are currently informed by WPATH - WPATH is somewhat more established, though.