R4 Today programme have an item on later about children and gender dysphoria.

[Iris65]

Looking forward to hearing this.

Although, it was interesting that they all assumed that the transwomen in question are gay.

Is that what they assume about jazz Jennings? That anal sex will be her thing, because she has prostate?

I thought Prof Butler was actually cautious in his views. He acknowledges the difference between gender identity difficulties which are extremely entrenched and the "new wave" of adolescents with "sudden onset dysphoria", and that they don't know the best way to treat them.

And yes a timely intervention by Prof Winston that freezing eggs and sperm is not very effective!

Just a pity they are both white middle (late) age men, being interviewed by another one. Not exactly going to appeal to the young activists we need to get active in social media to counter what teenagers are being bombarded with.

But it is a good start.

I guess it was a measured, sensible, productive debate because none of the TRA people were invited? How very telling.

Although, it was interesting that they all assumed that the transwomen in question are gay.

I got the impression those were some of the more aware voices from the trans community. Possibly because they had faced the harsh reality of what "being trans" really did mean for them on a personal level.

A different world entirely from screaming "bigot" or "die TERFs" at women while being standing comfortably in a mob.

As ever, it illustrates one of the key messages that people from outside the debate need to hear: the world of trans comprises different communities with some deserving more understanding than others.

Christ that Reddit thread is bonkers and horrifying in equal measure:

“From what I have read it is not scar tissue that is created, and somehow the neovagina once created will eventually convert some of the skin-tissue to mucus secreting vaginal lining through no extra surgical step. Almost as if the tissue inherently knows what its supposed to be somehow.

Google scholar has a case study from Latin America where this technique was used on a teenage cis-girl who lacked a vaginal opening from-birth and makes the claim that she gets wet when aroused and is capable of having satisfying sex with it.”

I cannot believe some of these blokes think there is any link between surgery on a woman’s body and surgery in a man’s and are drawing parallels. The lack of wilful understanding of basic physiology is shocking.

Just a pity they are both white middle (late) age men, being interviewed by another one. Not exactly going to appeal to the young activists we need to get active in social media to counter what teenagers are being bombarded with.

This seems to me another problem with identity politics. We’re teaching young people, and encouraging each other, to see other people in categories.

The ‘I can’t be what I can’t see’ idea is a nonsense (and flies in the face of the evidence all around us) and seems to extend on to ‘If someone who isn’t like me is saying it, it isn’t possible to take it on board’; it’s regressive thinking presented as progressive. Well meaning but badly thought through and often adopted entirely uncritically.

We need to be able to listen for what is being said.

You seemed to have changed your mind on this issue Iris65, mind if I ask what it was that changed it?

Fair enough hipster - I know that's a problem. The trouble is a 15 year old is not listening to the Today programme, they are getting all their news from "people like them". Until "people like them" are talking to them about failed neo-vaginas and gay eugenics, then the problem persists. I imagine the same conversation is being had over radicalisation.

Hipsterfun.

That is a great post. Agree with every word.

On the other hand, though, Stop, we know that middle-aged and older white men with lots of professional qualifications are taken more seriously by the media than other groups. If a feminist was on saying this stuff, she'd get a load of abuse. When professional men say these things, people stop and listen.

Sadly I think that's true hack.

True, hackmum.

I have just read that Reddit thread. Boggling!
But check out this post at the end - says it all really:

"But unfortunatly their may not be any solution. Giving puberty blockers to children is dangerous. I am a trans woman who was give the blockers and I have never regained any sexual function. I couldn’t get surgery and I still have a micropenis. My parents did what the activists and docs told them to do. But it’s dangerous.
Puberty happens for a reason. Trans kids should get therapy. But they should not be pumped full of hormones. More and more will end up like me. Sterilized unable to procreate and unable to get surgery. I am angry suicidal and have a broken relationship with my parents because of this.
I know this might be upsetting to read but I figured you should get at least one response that is honest that there may not be a solution. I am sorry, but you may have fucked your kid up.
It’s not entirely your fault though several therapists and docs have come out saying they get pressured by the activists to where they feel unable to say no to the blockers. Several have even left practicing because they were uncomfortable with what is happening.
Everyone else here is very optimistic for you and maybe it will all work out but this trans woman had to be honest. I got screwed over by my parents and doctors and the activists all or nothing approach. Looks like you did too.

Hackmum - if the older professional woman was talking as a fertility expert (as LRW was) and not simply with a feminist label - then, people would listen.

It’s their medical opinion that was taken seriously in that interview. Just some random middle aged man would not have been invited to speak.

You seemed to have changed your mind on this issue Iris65, mind if I ask what it was that changed it?

My original opinions were based on the education and experience that I had in the 1990s and early 2000s. The discussion and research at that point focused on what Professor Butler identified as the very early onset, entrenched group of trans people.

The more I read, the more I thought and my recent personal experience of gender fluid young people of my acquaintance led to rethinking of what is happening.

stopmakingsense That is a heartbreaking post.

I actually know a young person under 21 who is biologically female and suffers from anxiety and depression. They have become involved in the trans movement and now identify as a 'pretty boy'. They take testosterone which was prescribed for someone else who no longer needs it.
They are very defensive and passive aggressive, I don't know them well enough to really tackle them about what they are doing to themselves as we only see each other in public spaces. They have no one protecting them.
I am going to have to find a time and a place to speak to them aren't I?

it is child abuse what has happened to Jazz and various others. whether doctors agree or not, it is simply abuse.
if you cannot trust the state to protect you and advise in these circumstances, then terrible mistakes will be made.

so much evidence based medicine and research is required to prescribe drugs, how are 'puberty blockers' and testosterone and oestrogen prescribed outside their license. none of these are particularly expensive nor money makers. i think the regulatory bodies should be involved.

I agree hipster, it's another way of discrediting experts in an area because the haven't had the Authentic True Self Lived Experience(TM). Again, I don't expect an oncologist to have had cancer, yet in improving cancer care we need to hear their expert authority as well as the patient voices that receive that healthcare (amongst a myriad of other groups involved in healthcare provision). It's not one or the other

On an aside: I think this type of identity politics has a wider, negative impact on the progress made in improving diversity and representation. These paradoxically very rigid and entirely loose categories of self ID are all around this notion of inner essence and I've begun to see this in my field (STEM) being reflected in diversity policies.

The types of conversations about improving diversity are reminiscent of pink lab coats and the softness of science as a way to increase STEM participation by girls and women. It was ridiculed (mostly - but yet echoes of it still prevail) to be the condescending atrocity it was, but conversations going on now, seem to be talking about what these minority and/or maligned groups can bring. Diversity was never about bringing a particular lived experience to the role; rather an individual should have access to the role/sector/opportunity immaterial of the institutional barriers they've encountered through their lived experience.

That's encouraging Iris65, if someone previously as vehemently pro self ID as yourself can change their mind then there's hope for perhaps even Maria Miller...

"Almost as if the tissue inherently knows what its supposed to be somehow."
This sounds like a very garbled version of the actual science. Which (I think it was reported in New Scientist?) is that females who are born without a vaginal canal, scientists have grown tissue from their own cells, then implanted these as vaginal canals. And they work because (put your science head on here!), these are actual females with the genes for this specialist type of tissue! Plus for females this seems to be an advantage compared to the older method of using part of the colon. But for transwomen, since they are genetically male, they don't have the genes for it, so hoping that your chunk of transplanted colon with suddenly 'learn' how to be a 'real' vagina if you keep taking enough hormones is just nonsense.

Ah, here is the report:
www.newscientist.com/article/dn25399-engineered-vaginas-grown-in-women-for-the-first-time/

It's like the trans reporting of the uterus transplant attempts. A transwoman died from the first attempt (1931?), and later successful attempts have been to women with functioning ovaries but no uterus, and either a donor or a close family member seems to be a good choice. Whatever you think about the political or ethical issues, the simple biological fact (gosh, TRAs really don't like those do they!), is that a male hasn't either the anatomy to accommodate such a transplant, or the genetic material (i.e. ovaries and eggs) to utilize the organ even if it was inserted. Which beings me back again to our old friend Monty Python and 'The Life of Brain':
" Where's the fetus gonna gestate? In a box?"
We know where BTW, in the uterus of a poorer woman (India surrogacy etc etc), or in a relative (Jazz Jennings trying to appropriate their sisters uterus and eggs), and TRA dreamers think this could be either in situ, or in a transplant. And you just thought surrogacy was enough of an appropriation of womens organs!

"I’m interested in where the figure of one in 20,000 came from. Is that just the figure for children seeking treatment, because it feels to me that the figure is much higher than that right now.
"

One figure I saw was 1.4%, i.e. 1 in 70, for teenagers in schools. I believe that somewhere in the region of 1% is more likely to be accurate for teens claiming to be trans.

I’m interested in where the figure of one in 20,000

Say the UK population is 60,000,000. 1 in 20,000 gives 3000 people.

If you look in uktrans.info/grc-stats you'll find this:

As of the end of June 2015, since the Gender Recognition Act 2004 came into force (April 2005):
- 4,631 applications have been received
- 3,999 full Gender Recognition Certificates have been issued by the GRP

The 1 in 20,000 figure will be something like that. My immediate thought on hearing "1 in 20,000" was "hmmm, you are thinking about what's going on in your immediate scientific realm rather than actually seeing what's happening in the real world".

Scientists can provide useful knowledge but they can be very blinkered when there's a political dimension.

One of the saddest and most troubling parts of that reddit thread is the headlong encouragement to embrace no sexual function as just 'normal' asexuality.

'Remember, there's nothing wrong, it's just another identity!' But in the same paragraph the mention of living with being suicidal, unfulfilled and unhappy.

Given your astounding volte face, Iris65, maybe you could grace us with your revised definition of what a woman is.

Bucketsandspoons

Yes I thought that.

“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with being asexual”.

They’re not asexual, ffs. They’ve had their libido removed by drugs.