Meet the Other Phone. Flexible and made to last.

Meet the Other Phone.
Flexible and made to last.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Mermaids given £500,000 by National Lottery (Sunday Times)

465 replies

crsacre · 16/12/2018 00:51

A transgender charity that campaigns for children to be given prohibited sex-change treatment has been awarded £500,000 by the national lottery.

The payment to Mermaids has angered MPs, feminists and women’s organisations, who accuse the charity of bullying doctors, promoting falsehoods and using “emotional blackmail” to pressure parents to support life-changing medical interventions for their children. Mermaids will use the money to create a network of 45 groups nationwide.

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/child-sex-change-charity-handed-500-000-by-national-lottery-dvbt7t2kb?shareToken=cd8d6faad97cd9dd3fe3f16eb3810f45

OP posts:
Thread gallery
16
VickyEadie · 17/12/2018 15:12

It's not like we're handing them out to 10 year olds.

Of course not! Dr Helen Webberly, official Friend of Mermaids, waits till they're 12.

It should be noted that Mermaids still endorses Dr Webberly, despite her having been banned from running her illegal clinic.

Needmoresleep · 17/12/2018 15:12

Diet....

What on earth are you talking about.

DD was absolutely convinced she was a boy from age two. Probably as a result of parental laziness, plus the fact there was no transgender agenda 20 years ago, we did nothing. She went to after school football, the teacher put her on a boys table with her friends, she got in trouble for fighting in the playground, and was wearing boy swimming trunks age 8.

Then puberty started. By 10 her friends were exclusively female and boys were 'smelly'.

She is still a very good scientist and very sporty. But seemingly happy and comfortable within her own skin, thriving at University with lots of friends. The boy episode is a distant memory.

My DD and Jackie Green are around the same age. If Mermaids had been around when DD was younger, no doubt well meaning teachers and friends would have been pushing us towards Mermaids. That was a huge bullet to miss.

I hope this explains why I find the whole Mermaids thing so shocking, creepy and unacceptable. Susie Green may feel she did the right thing for her child. I certainly feel I did for mine. But the National Lottery are not offering me £500,000 to promote my 'accept, love and wait' approach. I wish they would.

DietCokeIsBae · 17/12/2018 15:12

Bowl I would need to see the safeguarding procedures to determine my opinion on them but I am aware that often there are limiting frameworks put in place that only facilitate for the 'norm' in our population so it wouldn't surprise me if they needed to push outside the lines in order to present effective education to schools. Schools don't currently teach about transgenderism, nor do they teach about anything LGBT particularly and that needs to change.

happydappy I also care about children and I'm very aware that the teenagers who identify as something other than their assigned gender at birth are at much higher risk of committing suicide due to the lack of support for them. I wish that the mindset of the general public was more supportive for those individuals that do need and want these facilities regardless of whether 'we' as the concerned party feel they need it or not. Ultimately it is not our body.

Bowlofbabelfish · 17/12/2018 15:14

It’s confidential disclosure diet - one of the most key parts of the framework.

You honestly think that

Pennydrew142 · 17/12/2018 15:15

but they aren't 'who they are' if they're not in the right body are they

Yes they are. They require support to accept this, just like anorexic children & transabled people who are just as convinced that what they believe is real, despite there being absolutely no credibility to the ‘born in the wrong body’ delusion.

You seem unfamiliar with exactly what it is mermaids and their friend Dr Webberley actually do. So I think you should return when you’ve informed yourself of the issues- such as Susie taking her son to Thailand to castrate him at 16. A move which saw Thailand change its laws. Do you think what she did is acceptable? Because it’s illegal, and insanely fucked up.

AngryAttackKittens · 17/12/2018 15:15

I can't help side-eyeing anyone who's super keen to talk about the need for children to have "agency" over what can be done with their bodies. PIE agreed with you, maybe you should stop and have a think about that.

RedToothBrush · 17/12/2018 15:16

Why is everyone fearing that their children may become trans?

Susie Green regards children who ARE NOT trans who transition through misdiagnosis (which will be higher in an affirmation only culture, precisely because you are not allowed to ask any questions) as more or less an 'acceptable collatoratorial damage' because the welfare of 'true trans' kids is more important.

This is utterly unacceptable. The wellbeing of ALL children is crucial and that CAN NOT happen in a culture where there is an affirmation only culture, which is being push through intimatidation and fear led by Stonewall and Mermaids.

This approach also does not necessarily produce more acceptance. It produces resentment and anger precisely because it is allowing and supporting a system which is harmful to other vulnerable children who Mermaids are effectively happy to right off as 'just unfortunate'. Their mental health isn't important.

Each and every child has the right to the best possible care and support for their individual needs and situation - but that relies on certain protocols being in place to protect them. That relies on openess and honesty and a culture where people are free to speak about their concerns.

If you think this is about fearing their child might become trans, you really need to take your head out from where it is firmly rammed and listen to what people are ACTUALLY saying rather than what you have got it into your head that you THINK they are saying. The two are wildly different.

LangCleg · 17/12/2018 15:16

Bowl I would need to see the safeguarding procedures to determine my opinion on them

Here you go:

assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/729914/Working_Together_to_Safeguard_Children-2018.pdf

Mermaids is not Working Together compliant.

there are limiting frameworks put in place that only facilitate for the 'norm' in our population

What on earth are you talking about? Safeguarding isn't for the norm in the bloody population. It's for the vulnerable - for example, gender-questioning children. It protects them from ideology, from neglectful or abusive parenting and from infiltrating abusers.

Why do you want to place gender-questioning children outside those protections?

AngryAttackKittens · 17/12/2018 15:16

And Green only took her child to Thailand because what she wanted to do was already illegal in the UK.

Bowlofbabelfish · 17/12/2018 15:17

Sorry pressed post too soon. wouldn't surprise me if they needed to push outside the lines in order to present effective education to schools.

Please can you clarify this? You’re saying it’s Ok to disregard the safeguarding framework to get trans education into schools?

I’m disturbed if you think that. How can you justify that POV? It’s not ok to ‘push outside the lines’ to validate a point of view - ANY point of view. ‘Pushing outside the lines’ puts children at risk.

This safeguarding framework was largely put in place after the soham killings. All the rules in it are a response to awful things that happened when people ‘pushed outside the lines.’

AngryAttackKittens · 17/12/2018 15:18

So if safeguarding is inconvenient it can be disregarded? That's certainly an interesting perspective, in a sinister sort of way.

Needmoresleep · 17/12/2018 15:18

So diet, are you a parent. What experience shaped your views. If nothing else I hope you can see that our experiences are all so different that no one parent has the magic solution.

Which is why Susie Greens approach is so dangers.Jackie Green may be a lovely young person, but without solid evidence her journey should not be used as a blue print for others. Especially given the health and infertility risks of the medical route.

papayasareyum · 17/12/2018 15:18

Linda Riley is being predictably wishy washy right now on Twitter in her support for Mermaids and dislike of anyone with different opinions to hers.
They support Mermaids, but can’t seem to pinpoint exactly why that is. They just keep repeating slogans like “mermaids does very important work” and “mermaids saves lives” whilst resolutely refusing to engage in any kind of meaningful discussion whatsoever. It’s “TWAW” and “TRANSPHOBIA TRANSPHOBIA TRANSPHOBIA” ad nauseum and in place of any substantial or even surface debate.

LangCleg · 17/12/2018 15:19

Christ on a bike. Invades the forum to screech at us and doesn't even know what safeguarding is. What a world we'd have if it were run by ignorant wazzocks. The vulnerable would be fucked over left, right and bloody centre.

Pennydrew142 · 17/12/2018 15:19

other than their assigned gender at birth

This is appropriation of a phrase used for what was done to intersex people- ‘sex assigned at birth’ not gender. If you’re not intersex, your SEX is observed at birth, not assigned

AngryAttackKittens · 17/12/2018 15:20

If someone can't explain why they support a thing, or believe a thing, it's because they don't actually know why, ime. That being the case why should anyone else give their unsupported and unexplained beliefs any weight at all?

LangCleg · 17/12/2018 15:22

I would need to see the safeguarding procedures to determine my opinion on them

I mean. Seriously. This is what we're dealing with.

Fuck off away from the children, you dangerous person.

Bowlofbabelfish · 17/12/2018 15:22

The suicide stats presented by mermaids are fake.

They are faked because the ONLY way an ethics decision to give a child blockers is the alternative being death. That’s how harmful these drugs are.

The true rate I think from the Tavistock clinic is under 1%.

The suicide stats are weaponised to quash debate. To blackmail medics into prescribing harmful drugs and to promote early medicalisation.

But only of children. Only children are to be neutered and kept prepubescent. The adult males are to be demedicalised and stay intact.

Nothing to see here, move along

LangCleg · 17/12/2018 15:22

(by dangerous, I mean dangerously ignorant)

Bowlofbabelfish · 17/12/2018 15:27

other than their assigned gender at birth

No one is assigned a gender at birth
No one is assigned a sex at birth.
Sex is observed at birth.
No child is ‘born in the wrong body.’
All children should be supported through periods of unhappiness with their body, gender questioning, sexuality questioning etc in an age appropriate way with adherence to all safeguarding guidelines and good clinical practice.

Anyone pushing practices which tell children their bodies are wrong, and to breach safeguarding should not be allowed within a solar system’s width of any child.

AngryAttackKittens · 17/12/2018 15:28

Well, you see, obviously all the many people with vast amounts of experience and training who created those safeguarding guidelines know nothing compared to some random on the internet who is now going to determine whether or not safeguarding is a good idea based on how good a job it does of facilitating transition in childhood.

Hmm
LangCleg · 17/12/2018 15:30

Well, you see, obviously all the many people with vast amounts of experience and training who created those safeguarding guidelines know nothing compared to some random on the internet who is now going to determine whether or not safeguarding is a good idea based on how good a job it does of facilitating transition in childhood.

My eyes are bleeding.

You're all a bunch of know nothing bigots. Call yourselves feminists? Pah.

Safeguarding, you say? What's that?

Dear Big Lottery Fund

Are you reading this? Well? Are you?

Best wishes

Lang

CaptainKirksSpookyghost · 17/12/2018 15:31

only of children. Only children are to be neutered and kept prepubescent. The adult males are to be demedicalised and stay intact.

This^
Does anybody really not see why this would be cause for concern.
And why if nothing wrong is happening any good charity dealing with children would welcome this as proof of correct procedure and safeguarding.

LordProfFekkoThePenguinPhD · 17/12/2018 15:32

All funding should be considered with a fine tooth comb. Just because an organisation asks for funding it doesn’t make them virtuous.

Just remember PIE (not that I’m saying anyone is remotely like this) but they were in the open, has famous faces/politician backing them up and a veneer of respectability. Absolutely gobsmacking and people would have questioned this at the time and been shouted down/threatened for being intolerant.