woman loses residency of son she was raising as daughter

[BombadierFritz]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3859618/You-caused-son-great-harm-insisting-raising-girl-Boy-seven-sent-live-father-mother-raised-daughter.html

hmmm. ok so its daily mail reporting but I am conflicted
perhaps good if child was being pushed into something he wasnt
but wtf with the boringly stereotypical insistance on the type of toys played with

And they have succeeded, so far. The Commons Select Committee, the NHS, the NSPCC, all kinds of other august bodies, all now accepting their bullshit claims to any sort of expertise on this, with no-one looking too closely at all.

I think the NSPCC sort of bowed to it quite grumpily. I don't think they were that happy about their debate having to be cancelled. Which is nice chink to have in the amour when turning things back around. You want bodies to be harbouring resentment and a good dose of "Emperor's New Clothes at play here in my private, silenced, opinion" when shit hits fan. Cos it speeds up the 180° turn required.

It is notable who DIDN'T accept their bullshit claims. If the court system thinks you do not meet the standard required to make submissions, despite having one of the highest profiles in terms of contact with the mother/child in the case... it casts doubt on how experty your expertise actually is. And raises the spectre of "oh wait, did we check this lot out properly ? How come they were left out of people called to the hearing ? Fuck ! ARSE COVERING ALERT - DELETE DELETE DELETE ALL LINKS AND CONNECTIONS !" happening amoung other bodies/entities.

I'll leave room for a shedload of self importance colouring their reaction to not being invited to give evidence. But I reckon the spectre of being shoved back into the cold, now they are used to basking in the sunlight of expert status and media attention, is also providing fuel for the agitation and flapping.

Elsa, thank you so much for your perspective on this. You are not a hypocrite, you are dealing with an incredibly difficult situation and just want to do the best thing for your child. It shouldn't need to be all or nothing. Most critical people here don't hate transpeople or think that they shouldn't exist. They just have concerns about damaging elements of transactivism and how they are unthinkingly promoted by people in authority without considering the impact on women and children.

But I might be right, in which case it's another reason the amateur blundering of this organisation really needs to be checked

Certainly there appears to be a rather large (and growing) question mark over how well they adhere to an appropriate safeguarding process for vulnerable beneficiaries of their services.

After the Camila debacle, are entities that keep an eye on charities a bit more proactive in the face of red flags ?

I either missed this bit in the judgment, or it wasn't expressly stated in such bald terms. Did anybody else see it ?

From their own public facebook page (image)

Is it usual for a judge to expressly forbid a charity from having any contact with a former beneficiary ?

Or is this quite a notable expection to the way things usually work ?

It wasn't in the judgement. but the public judgement may not be the same as the one given in Court (made clear in red at the top).

Mermaids are unwilling to accept that they might have made a mistake in this case. Incredibly dogmatic, surprisingly (not)

It may be that the judgement made clear why Mermaids are not supposed to contact the child. If that part of the judgement is confidential, we will never know. It serves their purposes to portray themselves as victims of injustice.

There's a woman on their twitter who says she's a parent of a trans teenager who's saying 'think you might have got it wrong this time'
A couple of others as well basically saying 'look, have you read the judgment? It doesn't sound like transphobia'
I had to check the spelling of ageing/aging then aging! Apparently both are correct. Thought I'd got it wrong!

Yes ageing, me too

If I identified as a man I would have assumed you were wrong

Yet

Of course ! It would have been in the previous judgement.

So a judge orders them to stay away from the kid. And three years later they still believe that they know him better than all the professionals working with him recently. Well OK then. Maybe they should consider adding "we are omniscient" to their About Us page.

Although I think they should start adding surnames as a first priority. Hardly the most transparent way to provide information about who's who when you proffer your trustees' first names only.

may be that the judgement made clear why Mermaids are not supposed to contact the child. If that part of the judgement is confidential, we will never know. It serves their purposes to portray themselves as victims of injustice

In this case I think the well practiced leap to claim victim status may be ill judged. The information that they were court ordered to have no contact with a child in now in the public arena. Without the actual ruling being available, the rather obvious conclusion very many people will arrive at is that the judge perceived their continued presence in the kid's life to be somewhat negative for the child at best, and downright damaging at worst.

The entire reason for your charity's existence is focused on vulnerable children and its work requires contact with vulnerable children. Yet a judge feels the need to put a legal barrier between your entire organisation and a vulnerable kid.

That doesn't look good.

The trustees' full names are available on the Charity Commission web site. As they are for all registered charities. It's hardly confidential information.

Mermaid's "statement" from Facebook:

Thank you for your kind words

With regards to the statement that mermaids have made, I can't understand why this would bring fear to parents of trans children.

I have had social services called on me numerous times due to allowing my child to live as they wish.

My ex and my mother take great embarrassment at the situation and began a campaign against me.

Each time I was able to demonstrate that I had got my child gender counselling, family counselling and individual counselling and that I made sure there was a nominated person at school my child could talk to without my involvement if a private chat was needed without me, and when they spoke my child told them that they knew that if they wanted to return to the name given at birth etc that I was fully supportive of that too.

I have no worries at all about them removing my child from me, despite the fact that my ex would, if he knew where we were now, have me in court and use this judgement against me.

Those who have worries about their child being removed for this issue alone really do need to look at why they feel afraid.

That statement absolutely plays into the fear. So irresponsible. I cannot understand how anyone who has read the publicised judgement can think that the judge has done the wrong thing.
The child clearly identified himself as a boy when at school, away from anyone who could be pressuring him. To continue to refer to the child as "she" is bizarre, offensive and shows collusion with the abuse.

It's just awful isn't it, to call him a transgirl is misgendering him, what transactivists call literal violence! What gives them the right or the expertise to say that this child is a girl? This whole story is making me so angry towards Mermaids. They might think they are doing the right thing but leaving a child to decide for themselves, what the father is doing, is the best thing, surely?!

It's interesting isn't it? It has made me wonder more about medical/health support charities. Presumably they must have a %age of users who don't have/don't know someone who has the condition, but is using the site to fuel their own version of reality. I wonder if sites have a responsibility to such users/ try and screen them out?

This legal blog clearly explains both judgements in this case. How anybody can support the petition to return the child to his mother is a mystery to me.

That's a really interesting link - thanks :)

How anybody can support the petition to return the child to his mother is a mystery to me.

• People tend to assume a child is always best off with the mother

• People want to prove they are not transohobic

The Transparency Project are very good at cutting through the hysteria and presenting the clear facts.

Mermaids positioning themselves as some kind of expert is worrying. Surely they are a (misguided) support service, not an expert witness with the qualifications and credentials that requires?

Mermaids positioning themselves as some kind of expert

But they are expert by most peoples definition. They seem to be the go to charity in the UK for trans issues, it's a very niche area outside the MN bubble so I guess there's not that much choice, plus of course they had been "helping" the family for 2/3 yearsbso can claim an intimate knowledge of both the overall issues and this specific case.

Pretty scary really - another symptom of this post truth era we live in I suppose...

Yes I can see that but they are not experts are they? My understand is that they are essentially a peer support group?

Also with the reported element of Parental Alienation, there is a risk of professionals colluding with an alienating parent if they are the only parent involved in any "assessment".