Independent: "What about the children who said they were transgender – and then changed their minds? "

[miri1985]

www.independent.co.uk/voices/john-lewis-gender-neutrality-trangender-children-medicalisation-lesbian-gay-education-a7946426.html

We liberal elite can all have a good laugh at Sally and Nigel Rowe, the Christian couple who withdrew their child from school after a male pupil turned up wearing a dress. Susie Green, the chair of transgender support group Mermaids, was the progressive voice of reason against narrow-minded bigots on Tuesday’s Today programme. You could almost hear the sympathetic head-tilt of interviewer, Sarah Montague, as Green told listeners that we all have a duty to educate ourselves to alleviate the suffering of transgender children.

Taking issue with a boy who wants to wear a dress is ridiculous. However, it is equally ridiculous to suggest a boy who chooses to wear a dress is therefore a girl. To present the arguments about gender non-conforming children as “regressive Christians” versus “enlightened progressives” is to do us all a disservice.

A woman who describes herself as a “proudly progressive parent”, Penny White, explained to me the situation she found herself in when her then 12-year-old daughter “diagnosed herself with gender dysphoria”.

Her daughter’s understanding of herself as transgender was based on the articles she’d read on Tumblr and the videos she’d watched on YouTube. Four years later, her daughter slowly but surely began to outgrow her belief that she “must” be a boy. By the time she was 17 she had reclaimed her name and her body. She also came out as a lesbian; gender non-conformity in childhood is often an indication of same-sex attraction in adolescence and adulthood. Perhaps this isn’t surprising, as loving someone of the same sex is about as gender non-conforming as it gets.

Penny explains her concerns about the approach taken by organisations such as Mermaids and GIRES: “I believed that I had to affirm my daughter’s identity or risk driving her to suicide. My fear is that there are many gender non-conforming kids being medicalised at young ages and set on a path of infertility, surgery, and lifelong hormone injections when, if given the time to grow up, would be health happy gay and lesbian adults. Or even straight adults who just don’t happen to be gender-conforming.”

“Being transgender is much more compatible with conservative Christian ideology than being gay or lesbian. It’s also more compatible with conservative Muslim ideology, which is why they execute gay people in Iran but pay for sex changes.”

The conservatism of transgender ideology is often absent from modern discussions about gender, and there is a lazy conflation of transgender issues with gender neutrality. The moves by John Lewis and some schools to introduce “gender neutral” clothing are to be welcomed, but it is baffling that they have been heralded across the liberal media as a victory for “transgender pupils”. It is worth remembering that if we did not live in such a grossly gendered and sexist society, there would be nothing for anyone to transition into.

Caroline, who asked for me to use a pseudonym, is a Child Protection Officer with over 20 years’ experience. She told me: “There is no way that professionals can possibly pass on concerns [about children who identify as transgender] without being considered transphobic or bigoted. Many of us share the same concerns [about children being pushed into medical solutions] including friends of mine who are GPs, educational psychiatrists, social workers: all great people who work tirelessly for the good of young people. I see children changing their name, turning against their family, rewriting their past.”

There is no one approved way to respond to a child who declares themselves to be transgender. For decades feminists have fought to liberate people from the gendered expectations of being born female or male, and have spread the message that we should seek to change society, not bodies. The opinion that no child’s body is wrong should not be controversial and it deserves to be heard.

At the moment, we’re used to hearing only one side of a nuanced and complex debate. The number of children identifying as transgender is increasing year on year, and there are many more girls who experience body dysmorphia and want to change sex than there are boys. There is compelling evidence to suggest that some of these children would, after puberty, actually come to feel secure and happy in the bodies they were born with, eradicating the need for serious medical intervention. It is irresponsible not to investigate this possibility – indeed, by not doing so we are in danger of failing children.

Brilliant.

My professional experience is that given acceptance and room to explore their thoughts and feelings children who present as transgender don't so much "change their minds" but come to accept themselves, their bodies and their minds. I get that parents struggle. There are few things more painful than a conflicted and suicidal child, but listening and getting help, instead of jumping to End Game permanent "solutions" does save lives, sanity and children's bodies.

and there are many more girls who experience body dysmorphia and want to change sex than there are boys.

Yet there won't be anywhere near the amount of trouble. Why? Because if they try and tell men to change they will simply be told to fuck off.

A lot of M to F get away with their bullying shite because there is little push back from women, many women actually support it.

I'm new enough to this acceptance of delusion but would it be a bad thing for women to reach out to men and let them know this shite will affect their mothers, sisters and daughter's? I know for me it was a rapist in a woman's prison that caught my eye.

Excellent article.

I can't believe people don't see it - by insisting humans go into little boxes of defined roles based on their biological sex is bound to lead to people who don't fit into those boxes thinking there's something "wrong" with them.

The more gendered society is the more of an issue it becomes.

This is brilliant. It articulates a lot of what I have been thinking in a measured and authoritative way. Thanks for sharing.

It's good to see this 'side' of the debate in a well known Lefty outlet.
The Guardian are hopeless and need to get with the times with a viewpoint other than "trans is best and there is no alternative".

Excellent article. I haven't always rated the Indy but well done to them for publishing it.

I am very grateful gender ideology wasn't a thing when I was a kid - think classic trans boy. Now a happy healthy bisexual adult female.

Oh thank goodness to see some sane journalism on this topic. I have been slowly going off the Indy but this has pushed them up in my estimation.

Well done independent! Voicing the opinion that we've been waiting for in the mainstream media.

What a good article. Young children must be be allowed to explore, role play and fantasise - that's how they develop their identity and roles in life and the idea that parents (and others) are manipulating this to decide that little children are transgender is simply abusive.
Professionals working with children are all trained in spotting 'fabricated illness' or 'Munchausen's syndrome by proxy' which is a complicated mental illness where a parent presents their child as being ill in order to gain attention for themselves (v simplistic explanation for speed). How has the transgender ideology managed to persuade professionals to abandon solid evidenced professional knowledge in favour of allowing a parent to mess with their child's mind and development like this?
Obviously with teenagers, the issue is very different and this may not apply but transgender 3 -6 year olds. Really?

This is EXACTLY what I was saying. That the Christian couple are ridiculous and bigoted but that the child is just a child in a dress. A boy in a dress. Who probably would be a lot happier if he could just wear a dress without making a gender statement. Not a "transgender" person.

Thank goodness for that! Let's hope we see a lot more articles like this.

Excellent article

Brilliant, well written piece.

Well done Indy, for actually having the balls to print this.

It articulates perfectly and without emotion all the things I feel about transing children.

The Indy has published several gender critical articles over the last year. Comments are always overwhelmingly supportive. Just goes to show that the public have more sense than policy-makers.

I wanted to be a boy as a child. Boys had better toys and were allowed to do more stuff. It didn't occur to me that the world was unfair, I was clearly just wrong. I also really wanted to be a mum, so, ignorant of modern science (I'd been told lesbian couples can't have babies and believed it) I made a choice to date men only. I think my preferences were bisexual but my behaviour was heterosexual.
I wish I had realised I could date both ways. But I'm really really pleased that no one told me I was in the wrong body. I switched between boys clothes and girls clothes, played with any toys except dolls and weapons (weapons were banned in our house for anyone). Grew up to become a woman. The thing that helped was actually going to an all girls school, it felt more acceptable to display unfeminine behaviour there (like being gone at maths and sport).

Another one here who wanted to be a boy as a child for the same reasons as Love51. I always wore trousers and had a short haircut and used to be chuffed when I was mistaken for a boy.

As I got to 9 or 10 I realised I did not want to be a boy at all - I just wanted the same chances in life, to do exciting stuff, play rough, be free etc. (even though this was a 50s childhood when children were generally much freer - even girls - than children today).

It doesn't even mean that you are going to be a lesbian. I grew up 100% hetero, married and had children. I even scrubbed up OK and liked to dress up on occasions.

I just wanted to be me, not some caricature of what girls are supposed to be. I dread to think what might have happened to be if I had been a 7 year old today - probably fallen into the clutches of Mermaids or some other types and had my future ruined for ever.

The article is very good, but the comments are very disappointingly critical of the author's stance. The old chestnut about puberty blockers being harmless and reversible is very much in evidence and there are comments from a transgender person who knew they were female at the age of 3 (how? how?)

I always read these kind of articles thinking ' this is good, don't read the comments' 'don't read the comments' 'DON'T read the comments, and then I read the comments and my heart sinks to my boots.

Thank goodness sanity seems to be emerging!

I am very grateful gender ideology wasn't a thing when I was a kid - think classic trans boy. Now a happy healthy bisexual adult female

@SporadicSpartacus same, except I'm totally straight. I just didn't like wearing dresses, I loved climbing trees and rough and tumble and didn't act nice and quietly like good little girls should.

I think I even said at age 6 or something that I wanted to be a boy - because all the boys clothes and games were much more fun!!!!

Thank fucking god I was just allowed to be a 'Tom boy' without any suggestion that I actually wanted to take hormones, have surgery and transition.

I'm a beautiful women, love my body but still happen to love 'manly' sports and don't conform to typical female stereotypes.

The thing that helped was actually going to an all girls school, it felt more acceptable to display unfeminine behaviour there (like being gone at maths and sport).

Same! Same!

It was most confusing when I went to a mixed sex school and found that the way I acted didn't fit in - the girls sat at the edge of the playground and the boys played football. At my all girls most girls played games and only some sat on the side lines.

I joined in with the boys. It was far more fun.

I was a classic tom boy too, said many many times that I wanted to be a boy but thank fuck nobody thought that actually meant I wanted to change my body - I just wanted to be treated like boys usually were.

I was always called a "tomboy" and I thought that was wrong - no, I'm just a girl who doesn't like dolls or makeup and does like science - but how much worse for someone to groom you into thinking that if you don't conform you need to be an actual boy. I never wanted to be a boy, was always happy that I was female and wanted children eventually. I was never and never will be "feminine". I own no makeup. It is frightening how this ideology about rigid gender roles has gained ground. I almost feel (tin foil hat) that there must be some woman hating millionaire pulling strings and laughing at how easily the progressives have been manipulated.

I was also a tomboy and remember wishing I was a boy!
With hindsight I just didn't want to wear dresses or play hockey!
Now a happy straight female adult who has long hair and wears dresses but still hates hockey