NYTimes: A Vagina Won't Make Me Happy - But It's My Right to Get One Anyway

[Vegilante]

New opinion piece by "essayist & critic" Andrea Long Chu that says drastic medical interventions such as hormones & genital surgeries should be given on demand to trans people - even when they're so deeply unhappy they feel suicidal, & they're convinced the treatments they're demanding will only make them more miserable.

Why? 1) Because the "true purpose" of medicine's "first do no harm" maxim "is not to shield patients from injury but to install the medical professional as a little king of someone else’s body." And 2) because "the negative passions — grief, self-loathing, shame, regret — are as much a human right as universal health care, or food."

www.nytimes.com/2018/11/24/opinion/sunday/vaginoplasty-transgender-medicine.html

Since many people won't be able to access the article, I'll copy & paste it, with apologies to copyright holder(s).

The lizard man’s mods aren’t done by a doctor, silly!

This thread is about something entirely demented and of no relevance whatsoever to most people’s humdrum lives except that the activists have to bother us with it.

I agree with Bowlofbabelfish.

And quite often, you actually can choose. My Dad (continental Europe) had severe heart problems, and they let him choose between Stents and Triple Bypass (and no intervntion, obviously), with all positives and negatives layed out.

Doesn't mean, he could have chosen it, if the condition had not called for it according to data (just to be sure), or that he could have opted for a Double Bypass and a Stent or whatever. You will often have options in medicine, where it very much depends on a patient's priorities, what is the right way to go.

(My Dad loves sports, so he went for the way more invasive, riskier 3x-bypass with longer recovery times, knowing that this was the only option that he could get back to quasi old form. People with different priorities will make a different choice. Obviously, in a money strapped system, these types of choices get taken away).

If I want a unicorn horn installed on my forehead then I'm entitled to one, damn it! For free, obvs.

AAK as long as you don’t expect a doctor to do it, I think that’s kewl!

Surely decent, moral doctors will just start eschewing all disciplines that leave them vulnerable to demanding activists like Chu, pushing the prices even higher in the private sector and the wait times ever longer in socialised systems?

Melanippe

So do patients going to have cosmetic surgery privately in the UK under go counselling?

I worked at a large private hospital that did cosmetic surgery I never saw this happening. Is it the law?

I agree that there should be much more counselling available for any patient undergoing a surgery that isn't medically necessary but that doesn't happen in lots of areas.

Even for something as potentially traumatic as a TOP counselling is almost seen as a tick box exercise. Time and again I here stories where the counselling was just a quick chat, sometimes just over the phone.

You would hope that for any hugely life changing procedure the patient would be well supported and given every opportunity to investigate what it entails, alternatives, risks vs benefits.

I'm still of the opinion that if the patient together with their dr decides on a treatment then that is up to them.

When people start demanding that doctors just do whatever someone asks them to do I always find myself wondering if they actually understand what a doctor is. I mean granted some of them are a bit shit, but in principle they're not meant to be service providers who just give you what you ask for in the same way that say Starbucks does. The idea of "non-binary surgery" does seem to be built on the Starbucks ordering model.

deepwatersolo

But often the choices given are based on what that dr is able to do, or what the hospital can do, or what the NHS will provide, not what is available elsewhere.

My dad had an aortic aneurysm that needed repairing electively. His surgeon told him that he needed an operation (big operation very high risk especially considering his cardiac history). I knew that AAA could be treated using a stent. We asked the surgeon about it and he said no it couldn't be done so I showed him the research and we asked to be referred to the hospital where it was done. So that wasn't a real choice was it?

When he developed cancer he was given the option of a large surgery or radiotherapy. Both had lots of risks. We asked about alternatives but they said there were none. Some research discovered cyberknife which he paid for and recovered with no side effects.

To my mind those drs were paternalistic. They made choices on a patient's behalf by limiting the options that they presented.

Are we talking about this person who regularly ‘mindkills’ theirself to ‘purge’ themselves of ‘impure thoughts?’

When people start demanding that doctors just do whatever someone asks them to do I always find myself wondering if they actually understand what a doctor is.

they're not meant to be service providers who just give you what you ask for in the same way that say Starbucks does.

As long as we apply it to all surgeries then fine. I personally wouldn't be sad to see cosmetic surgery banned, on the basis that it's people demanding doctors do what the patient wants.

A bit dramatic, isn't he? Time was when people with those sorts of tendencies would have just sat down with friends for a game of Dungeons and Dragons...

Well exactly, AAK

If I wear a lot of black clothes and am agile and able to move quietly can I be a Social Justice Ninja?

From what I've seen the TRAs aren't happy about this article.

Hardly surprising Ereshkigal given that it suggests that not all is rosy post or even pre transition. I find it very strange that neither the post-op complications nor the post-op dissatisfaction rates are ever discussed, despite the evidence for them. The TRA unhappiness with this article suggests that that might be a deliberate thing.

To my mind those drs were paternalistic. They made choices on a patient's behalf by limiting the options that they presented.

I agree with you on that, Weetabixandshreddies. Drs clearly need to give a full overview about what is possible regarding the condition in question, what they can do and what can be done only elsewhere (where?) and who pays for it. I know it isn't always done like that, but a professional doctor will do that.

A friend of mine, MD, had a well paid job at an equivalent to the NHS in continental Europe. She had to decide, who is eligible for some procedure and who is not. And the decisions were clearly based on 'who needs it most' and 'how much money in total can we spend'. She quit, because she found it very taxing to deny treatment to people, who would clearly need it - just not badly enough.

I still think that, even if she had been able to grant every procedure she found useful for the patients, this is very different from SRS 'on demand', as regarding SRS, clearly, you need very thorough psychotherapy beforehand, to weed out self-harmers, get to the bottom of the motivation, manage expectations, in order for there to be a condition where it can be secured that a transition process will indeen increase the wellbing for the patient.

(Personally, I believe, in cases where these conditions of thorough therapy are fulfilled, NHS&Co should pay for SRS. Heck, Dr. Ken Zucker is a sance specialist in the field and he thinks SRS can make sense in some cases, and he should know. But obviously he is not on board with 'on demand').

Zucker is sane not sance, obviously.

deepwatersolo

I completely agree.

Echoes of the action for trans health manifesto here ... give me what I want immediately or I will ...

You have no idea of my views on SRS weetabix

None at all

But you were making very silly comparisons

If you made one for plastic surgery such as boob reduction then i think most people woukd be happy arguing the point

If they can all do that then why should other choices not be allowed?

Other choices should absolutely and completely and utterly be fine...if its paid for privately

Sorry i thought we were talking about it being on the NHS

If you are paying for it then fill your boots

I say we...i mean you

I just got confused with the whole c section bit

I say we...i mean you grin

Cos, what I can't be a woman and disagree with you?

Yeah. Gender stereotypes alive and well here huh?

How in earth have you reached that weetabix

I mean that i thought you and the other posters (who are grammatically you as well) were talking about surgery in the NHS and then I just leapt in without understanding the argument

I at no point have ever ever said on mumsnet or in RL that anyone who disagrees with me is a man

Where in any of my posts have i said you are a man

And what gender stereotypes?

Dont make stuff up and attribute it to me

Apologies if I've misunderstood but your post is very odd then.

You say this
If you are paying for it then fill your boots

And then this

I say we...i mean you grin

I just got confused with the whole c section bit

Seems like you are implying that I would be having SRS.

Apologies for misunderstanding. No idea what you meant then.