The disgraceful RCN and Nurse Jennifer Melle

I'm also continuing to find it offensive to the mentally unwell to compare using "preferred pronouns" to i.e. agreeing someone is superman and letting them jump of a roof.

Can you really not see the difference between a directly harmful delusion and someone who wants to present as a gender other than their birth sex?

I'm guessing you'd complain if someone compares not allowing transwomen in a women's changing room to not allowing a black person in as "using" racism. This is worse.

@Shedmistress r.e. "risk" am aware it happened I was generalising to add it to disadvantages as is standard risk management talk.

The medical profession needs to be aware both of the importance of biological sex and of the existence of transgender to effectively treat them. Whatever anyone's views on whether it is "okay" or not, someone with breasts and a female name may be actually male and that's relevant.

Equally as well it's going to cause some confusion if some staff are using "he" and some are using "she" to talk about a patient.

R.e. discouraging treatment yes I think that's a reasonable con so it's staying. I've had a look at transgender forums before and there's a lot of concerns and anxiety about how they will be treated in hospital. Many find "known" misgendering extremely distressing.

I am struggling to see how any compassionate healthcare professional could use "correct sex" pronouns when talking about a deceased patient to their next of kin. Even if their next of kin has asked them not to. I don't see how that makes me misogynist or anti women's rights.

You're being deliberately obtuse. It's not hard to change tack if you're clearly upsetting someone, or if they ask you politely not to do something. That doesn't require a survey.

I completely agree with the correct use of pronouns in a clinical context, as I've repeatedly said throughout the thread.

Solidarity with Jennifer. What utter useless, nasty 🤬the RCN are! Neither use nor ornament as my mother used to say ! And what support did she get after the horrendous racist abuse she was subjected to? Awful!

If someone is in hospital where medical treatments depend on your sex, and you want the medical treatment of the opposite sex then you are under a delusion.

Any medic who says 'Yes Superman, you can fly' to someone who thinks they are Superman and who wants to pop up to the roof should be removed from their position.

A male racist paedophile's right to be called a she is being held above a nurse's right to be gender critical.
Jesus wept. The world is officially f*cked now isn't it

The medical professional should not have to do a survey of all grieving relatives to work out what to call the person who just died, especially if it is as a result of them getting the treatment wrong for the person's sex. Medicine needs to recognise sex because so many treatments are completely different depending on which sex the person is.

1. You say “causing distress”, but the cause of the distress is dysphoria (or another condition or behaviour less flattering to the trans person), not the language used. Have you considered the distress to others caused by using pronouns that don’t match sex and common usage? In a hospital setting, many of those people will be sick, vulnerable, dying. Since the pronouns are used about the person, not to the person, those others are the people most likely to encounter the relevant pronouns.
2. Using factual language doesn’t prevent people from seeking medical care.
3. Persisting in the pretence that being “in” is a possibility for the majority of trans people is not grounded in reality and doesn’t help trans people.

Again, I'm uncomfortable with severe mental illness being brought in to justify the argument for medics using "correct sex" pronouns, having suffered several mental illness myself.

This isn't a good argument as it's "Slippery Slope". Someone using preferred sex pronouns is a mark of respect to a patient, is not the same as calling someone "scum" and one doesn't lead to the other...

So yes there's obviously a difference...r.e. the NMC code of conduct it's about "prioritise people, practise effectively, preserve safety and promote professionalism and trust."

Noone wants their ill relative to be described as "scum" even if they asked to be as it's directly harmful in the vast majority of contexts.

It's worth noting as well that mental health professionals generally don't go around self righteously "correcting" delusions as that doesn't necessarily work very well.

The error wasn't 'more likely' it actually happened.

You cannot override human instinct so when a man who says he is a woman comes in having a heart attack, female heart attacks do not have the same symptoms as male heart attacks so what do the medics do? React to the body or react to the clothes?

So what do you want, life saving or gender affirming?

That's a good point. I presume there is training around how to deal with relatives grief. The point I'm making still stands though- the medical professional should be centering the needs of the grieving not their own needs or beliefs.

So I'd be equally critical of a TRA nurse who insisted on wrong pronouns in your scenario.

I think having to pretend people are the opposite sex takes its own mental toll on people.

@Shedmistress I would agree that these cases are a disadvantage of using "preferred pronouns" that these errors are more likely so goes on my mental list, thanks.

The counterargument would be that this calls for better medical records of transgender individuals rather than always using "correct sex" pronouns. And in some cases people using what they think are "correct sex" pronouns aren't and need to be better aware of trans "Jane Does".

There are broader issues with inaccurate recording of sex/gender that need addressing btw.

As well transgender individuals may argue that they prefer to accept this risk. Going back to last rites example, a patient may want to see a priest before a life saving procedure even if a delay may raise risks slightly.

That said, that obviously doesn't apply to a case mentioned where a transgender individual is dead.

I also do believe medical staff should be able to opt out of performing abortions on conscientious objection grounds too, despite being pro choice myself, as that was mentioned.

I agree, it's a really important case to support. Without knowing the full circumstances yet it is still clear that the nurse was not supported by her employer or her union. This nurse had an exemplary record of 12 years. Where were her human and employment rights in all this? Has the racial abuse even been investigated yet?

How do you think a wife and child or children would feel after the trauma of their husband/father 'transitioning' to be gaslight again by the medical staff continually lying to them even when he is dead?

Where does it end? I bet you have a limit, however traumatising the person might feel it was to not have their identity affirmed. How about if hypothetically a person with mental health issues wanted to be called something dehumanising like “it” or “scum” or “fucktoy”. Would you go along with it?

If the nurse had used 'she' when telling the doctor, then the doctor would have been within their rights to arrange a transfer to a female urinary issues ward and this may or may not have resulted in further issues to the man with the penis who is wanting people to pretend he is a woman.

@ArabellaScott No it isn't, but you had just said a nurse should never be taken to task for calling someone a he, however distressing others find it.

I'm only following the logic of your own words, and saying that I disagree with them- and giving you an example of why.

Hard cases make bad law. No one should be coerced to lie about people’s sex or other material reality.

@ArabellaScott right now we are onto "ad hominem" attacks on me because you can't discuss reasonably the advantages and disadvantages of the use of "preferred pronouns" or "correct sex" pronouns in a medical setting...

Which includes women who identify as men or non-binary.

A woman who was pregnant and was having stomach pains went into a hospital and was immediately treated as if she was pregnant and the baby was saved.

Another woman who was 'transgender' also went into hospital with the same pains, but as her record had been changed to 'male' the staff were obliged to carry on treating her as if she was a man, and the baby died. Had they been allowed to see the factual records the baby may have been saved.

I absolutely disagree that we shouldn’t support this case. This nurse has been treated appallingly. And if it makes me an “absolutist” to believe that no one should be able to lie about their sex and have others dance round them in a power trip denying reality, so be it.

R.e. the patient confidentiality allegations, I agree these should be shared with the nurse as should all allegations as a matter of proper process.

Even if she didn't name the patient (which for all we know she might have done) it may still be in breach of patient confidentiality rules if she released enough private information to the press that this patient and their medical details could be identified. It seems quite detailed, i.e. what prison, when, what exactly their crime was, what their medical issues are.

R.e. ethics the current NHS codes of conduct do require nurses to use "preferred pronouns". There's no exemption on religious grounds. I'm not sure telling transgender patients you disagree with this because of your faith is right. There's other ways to oppose. I'm not convinced it's generally a Christian thing to do either. It's not the same as i.e. refusing to do abortions.

I'm not convinced this is a case we should be supporting on GC, in other words. I don't think supporting all and any GC case is the best way forward in terms of priorities.