Woman's hour today (29 October) 10 am

[ScienceRoar]

There will be a discussion of gender dysphoria. The Twitter grapevine says that Transgender Trend will be represented.

Yes good overall and Jane Garvey didn't take too much shit from any of them.

Polly was very evasive.

I'm not generally a fan of Jane Garvey but that was excellent. How wonderful to hear female voices talking about this.
More please BBC.

Stephanie was really calm and stated the facts really well.
Polly had that edge of dismissal in her tone
JG was good, she pushed for answers.

Fabulous spam

Can you make the gender dysphoric children happy in their own bodies please aisha?

I was really put off by Polly laughing in the background.

Impressed with Jane G - she did well. Tried to stick to facts & I like what she said about co-existing mental health issues ringing alarm bells.

JG was good, she pushed for answers.

It was good to hear someone question statements instead of accepting everything hook, line and sinker.
And insist on statistics and data instead of feelz.

Anyone listening on catch-up: it starts at 21 minutes.

What I liked about the feature: everyone was female-born, and the conversation was civil.
Categorically no children under 16 are given cross sex hormones in the UK on the NHS.
Polly Carmichael's argument that the reason nearly all children on puberty blockers go on to take cross sex hormones is because they are so carefully selected. I thought that was persuasive, and reassuring that they aren't just putting kids on puberty blockers to hedge their bets.
Did we get a figure on the percentage of children who are sent home with no medical interventions? I would have liked to have learned that.

Why on earth would anyone want their ex back?

Do you think Dr Aisha has a PhD or an MD? Asking for a friend.

Yes, on a more serious note I'd like the stats.

The figures for the number of children on the autistic spectrum or those having other mental health disorders came from the Tavistock but PC didn't have the figures to hand.

And now R4 has a programme about the PhD industry; this may answer questions re Aisha’s qualifications...

Well that tweet from Transmasculine makes sense. . Going on the pill at 13 definitely damages a girls body in the same way as puberty blockers do girls and boys bodies 🙄. This in no way comparable. The penis will remain at prebuescent size and the gonads will remain undescended thus making the boy insterile and unable to reproduce. Ditto the uterus and ovaries. But tots comparable to a girl going on the pill. Yup!

This is what occured to me.
The roles offered to girls these days in terms of feminine identity are restrictive, unobtainable, intimidating or jsut don't make sense to them in reference to themselves and what they see themselves as.
The response to this is to reject the feminine and "feel" masculine which perhaps offers more opportunites to be oneself....
Apologies if this is garbled, but thats what was going through my mind as I listened. The transman did or didn't make clear whether they were attracted to me or women. I don't know if that was addressed.
If it is the case that the rise in transgender females is a reaction to the hyper feminine stereotype that pervades society it might explain things but perhaps not all.
Any help greatly appreciated.

Polly Carmichael is normally quite balanced in what she says, although I haven't heard her on any broadcast for about a year, and a lot has changed in coverage and perception of these issues since then. I do appreciate she and the Tavi are in a very difficult position - they don't want to alienate the families of children with GD, as it's better for them to be treated by the Tavi than private clinics, but quite rightly insist on being responsible clinicians too. They get attacked a fair bit for 'withholding' treatments. It's must be very hard to navigate.

Yes, the official policy is that the cross sex hormones are 16+. Now shall we reference Dr Webberley at this stage, or wait until later?

I've just listened again, carefully. What struck me was how dismissive PC is, and how unquestioning. She's supposed to be an expert, but doesn't seem interested.

It was heartening that the discussion was civilised and that Jane Garvey really upped her game.

The transman, Lewis Hancox, seemed to be saying that - while he was attracted to women - sexual attraction in itself does not make someone want to transition. This was in response to JG's question about whether he might have been happy being a lesbian rather than a transman.

The words Lewis used to describe his feelings about growing up with a female body did not entirely convince me.

Lewis speaks for himself of course and we can't do anything but take his words at face value - but I find it odd that the way he speaks about knowing he was not a female, despite being born one, is so similar to every other trans person who is linked to Stonewall. Call me old fashioned, but there does seem to be a bit of a pattern there.

Polly Carmichael's attitude worries me. Especially her lack of robust and critical thinking about the role mental health might play in gender dysphoric feelings.

Like a pp said, she doesn't seem to be able to - or want to - join up the dots.

Polly Carmichael was a bit patronising. She could have emphasised more the difficulty that rigid stereotypes cause - she said we need to be tolerant of diverse gender expression - this is NOT what is being preached in schools by Allsorts etc.

Good to hear Stephanie Davies-Arai. It is a pity that she has no academic or medical qualifications, or direct experience - but that is the nub of the problem - who else can speak out?

Any medical professional who is concerned about the huge rise in girls presenting with GD dare not speak out.
Parents of teenagers with GD dare not speak out.
Academics wanting to research the phenomenon are silenced.

Now WH need to explore the fate of young adults women (and men) being sterilised by adult gender clinics.

Now WH need to explore the fate of young adults women (and men) being sterilised by adult gender clinics.

Yes.

There was a study about puberty blockers linked to in the tweets - and it did seem to confirm that puberty blockers aren't the sterilising risk I've seen claimed on here. But the study did recommend stopping at age 12 for optimal adult height and bone density.
When used for trans kids - is the difference the age used, dosage or what?

Just listened on catch up.

Thought it was quite revealing tbh

Despite the very cautious phrasing and the constant "we must be careful" it still very obviously came down to stereo types. It almost sounded as if she was slowly figuring it out as she desperately tried to phrase things to avoid makimg them.sound based on stereo types but couldbt ...

She pretty much backed every thing up that Stephanie was discussing.

Lewis seemed unnecessary but did help the cause a bit really because he basically confessed to stereotyping himself even though he denied it originally