To nominate the principle authors of the CASS review for this..

[NameChangeCass]

“Advocates of evidence based medicine have criticised the adoption of interventions evaluated by using only observational data. We think that everyone might benefit if the most radical protagonists of evidence based medicine organised and participated in a double blind, randomised, placebo controlled, crossover trial of the parachute.”

https://www.bmj.com/content/327/7429/1459.short?fbclid=IwAR0hTt57o-yFS61aJE-IGCpKSPaDs--rdrPlbiby_wBCF1czpAWDaCcAEcM_aem_ATiWMtvZxiSzw8pj9CX271gyDByuMHTOKwQskBcCXx9aZOj1IPusHJ_z79olcRiFlhE

But again, if you think there are convincing studies that have been disregarded @NameChangeCass please post links to these specific studies, or an example, so we can read them.

We don't know any of those things however 🫠

Why, in the clear absence of evidence, are you saying that?

You might not, but those of us seeking to support children to access trans healthcare do.
A pp asked why there are adults supporting this. I was responding to that.

I really think you need to examine your relationship with the truth, op. I genuinely mean this. You seem to be someone who values evidence (or at least, identifies as such). Try to step outside of your preconceptions for a moment, and just think; “What if I am wrong?”

Just THINK.

You might not, but those of us seeking to support children to access trans healthcare do.

No, it's something you believe. It's an ideological position.

The issue is though, that puberty blockers were used to give children "time to think". But apparently, 99% ot them ended up thinking the same thing, which is logically improbable. Putting a child on a medicalised pathway and arresting their natural physiological and psychological development doesn't "freeze time", it just freezes the child's development while time moves on.

So, I know it's often argued that PBs are reversible, but it seems that the pathway they put the children onto is not reversible.

I think it's natural to feel discomfort when your body starts changing. I remember being quite freaked out about growing breasts (although I'm still a double A cup today so it turned out I didn't have too much to worry about). It doesn't necessarily equate to gender confusion. I hated my freckles as a teenager, it doesn't mean that the only appropriate action would have been to get them bleached off.

My position is based on what I know from evidence, from conducting research with trans children, their families, and professionals and service providers working directly with trans people.
it does not come from my own experience, from preconceived ideas (about gender and bodies), from fear of people different to me, from culture, from politics, from influencers or organisations, or from what I’ve read in the media. It is not an “ideology”, it is an observation of the empirical world.

This! Even on its own terms this suggests a more logical approach would be to go straight to cross-sex hormones in early puberty, given that the side-effect profile is much better than for puberty blockers.

I'm not saying I agree with doing that, but I wonder what OP thinks. Standard TRA line is that gender identity is well established by the age of seven or eight.

This is the standard which I have rigorously sought to apply in reaching my conclusions. If everyone would do the same in good faith , I really believe we could more forward in a more productive way.

Observations of the world around you are not research. Look at the history of humanity. Look at all the ridiculous things we have done because we thought they were good for us when they really, really weren’t. This is why we have science, why we have rigorous protocols to determine whether we’re seeing what is there, rather than what we want to be there.

Somewhere inside, you understand this to be true, and you feel the dissonance of your position.

That's what I always understood too. But if that is the case, then it also follows that all or most of the young people who present with gender confusion in their early teens are experiencing something different and blocking the thing which is making them uncomfortable isn't going to resolve that issue. So, talking therapies, considering differential diagnoses such as ASD profile, or simply watching and waiting, are more appropriate pathways - from that perspective, I agree with the report.

Oh, come on now!

This is quite a shocking statement.

You must know as a professional theat you absolutely DO have preconcieved ideas and bias. So do the families that you work with. It's normal and human to have these biases and isn't a deficiency.

BUT when you do research you confront, acknowledge and try to mitigate for bias, and where you can't mitigate then you report on how that effects the outcome of your research in terms of reliability and generalisability.

Otherwise you produce junk papers, waste scarce resources and let down those you suppose you are supporting. Very poor.

Even poorer potentially is the inclusion of low quality research in a systematic review where it can skew findings dramatically. Again you KNOW this because you say you carry out systematic reviews so you know about protocols and risk of bias assessment.

Trans people deserve better. Better research, better care. Do better.

Because we know that withholding vital health services from an extremely vulnerable group of children is only going to cause them immeasurable suffering.
Because we know that PBs are a safe and effective medicine that can help until children are ready for HRT. Because we know that the assault on transgender medicine is based on erroneous and flawed politically driven beliefs that being trans is not a real and legitimate thing and this is so so wrong.

Do you actually believe all of this? Does the lack of good quality research not worry you?

Personally, I'd want to see extraordinary evidence that chemically castrating children was absolutely necessary before allowing even a single child to go down that path.

I think they find advice online about how to present to HCPs (eg claiming to have had gender incongruence from a very early age).

You've conducted research? can we see it? Can you link us to papers you've published from your research?

Yes. To claim that one has no bias is a shockingly ignorant statement.

That is precisely how the scientific method gets compromised - by people assuming that they are unburdened by biases that other people have.

To suggest that your observations are of the 'empirical world' but that others' are coloured by 'preconceived ideas' and fear - how have you arrived at that utterly illogical point, OP?

Define 'some'

And why would you give such drugs to 'benefit socially'?
Why would you medicate for that?

My position is based on what I know from evidence, from conducting research with trans children, their families, and professionals and service providers working directly with trans people.
it does not come from my own experience, from preconceived ideas (about gender and bodies), from fear of people different to me, from culture, from politics, from influencers or organisations, or from what I’ve read in the media. It is not an “ideology”, it is an observation of the empirical world.

Sure.

I’d be more inclined to take your arguments seriously if you weren’t attempting to mislead. You posted screenshots highlighting “not blinded and randomised”. This strongly suggests, like your statement here, that these were the only reasons for “discarding”. Eventually, under pressure from PPs, you linked to the NICE evidence review that you said you were quoting. This does not say that these were the only shortcomings. Other reasons were “poor quality” (most of them, from my skim) and “high number of participants lost to follow up”. The latter is absolutely crucial. It would be highly incorrect to give weight to such studies.

You say you are a researcher, but you’re not writing in the way that an academically rigorous researcher with good knowledge of research methods does. And an academic researcher who used highlighted, cropped images the way you did, to mislead people into thinking that these comments on those studies were the only ones (not blind / randomised) would lose all their credibility instantly. Even the greenest first year PhD student would know not to do that.

That is precisely how the scientific method gets compromised - by people assuming that they are unburdened by biases that other people have.

To suggest that your observations are of the 'empirical world' but that others' are coloured by 'preconceived ideas' and fear - how have you arrived at that utterly illogical point, OP?

It's interesting, isn't it. And still no links to the specific disregarded studies the OP finds so convincing.

I think they find advice online about how to present to HCPs (eg claiming to have had gender incongruence from a very early age).

This. It's all over Reddit, Mermaids chat groups etc.

Sorry meant to quote @theilltemperedclavecinist

I think you're forgetting the magical incantation that allows anyone to be anything they so desire. The OP identifies as a researcher. There. Done.

Indeed.

I think we’ll find that this copious amount of research will be an undergrad dissertation in sociology that got a 2:2 and a lot of time on twitter.