Article in The Times - Royal College of Psychiatrists to draw up guidelines for children with gender identity issues

[ineedaknittedhat]

Just reading an article on my app saying that further research needs to be carried out and the Royal College of Psychiatrists are to draw up guidelines.

It looks as though the assessment, recommendations and decision making process is going to be firmly in the hands of clinicians.

I think there is a significant chance that mermads might find themselves well and truly sidelined with a bit of luck.

Here's to the future.

That sounds like a very positive step. Any shrinkage of Mermaids' role is to be welcomed.

Thank God.

It was enlightening to see advice from Mermaids old webpage (from when it was formed as a tavi parent support group). That advice reminded parents most children grew out of gender incongruence. Mermaids changed that without any conclusive evidence. I can't believe the power they had.

You tube and social media have had a terrible part to play in this safeguarding scandal. I think for every search on transitioning, a detransitioning video should have to appear. I've seen some heartwrenching things.

Anyone have a share token?

Found ShareToken links on other thread:
www.thetimes.co.uk/article/the-times-view-on-the-treatment-of-gender-dysphoria-in-children-identity-check-pjfwhc6ck?shareToken=c88b21f7d4239de67a9d6ec43f84e946

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/psychiatrists-to-draw-up-new-rules-for-child-transgender-treatment-knl3b0g7c?shareToken=e0f0fd1ac1104e483412a61a08411353

Hmm! I wonder how objective any group of psychiatrists working on this will be and what sources of expertise they will use. For example, if they refer to WPATH as a primary source of information that will be disastrous. WPATH is not a medical association but merely a collection of people with an interest in transgender ideology.

I would volunteer for interview and assessment if they want views from an older generation who Never had trans as an option

About time - but this will only be effective if clinicians are allowed to make the decisions without the trans lobby groups accusing them of conversion therapy at every stage.

There needs to be comprehensive pushback around the narrative of child suicide that the T lobby groups have been allowed to perpetuate with impunity.

Combined with the blanket affirmation it is this that will have scared many parents into choosing a medical pathway for gender non conformity.

It's wicked manipulation and would not be allowed to stand in any other sector.

The key thing I saw was it said that currently it was more of less being pushed that there was only one course of treatment, but this is wholly inappropriate and there are in fact a range of issues and problems. My beef has always been that things have been treated in a monolithic way when just about every other of health had a range of care pathways which were tailored for individual circumstance.

When attempts to close down options in maternity have been made, in various ways, for financial and ideological reasons this has resulted in harm.

It becomes about a targeted goal oriented outcome rather than a process where the root causes are examined, tackled where necessary and preparations and coping strategies for life are developed. Facing reality rather than being perpetually offended by it, is a pretty big keystone to that.

WPATH is not a medical association but merely a collection of people with an interest in transgender ideology.

Isn't it linked to the professional society of Endocrinologists?

I hope this is a positive step. It's not going to do much good, though, unless the funding for mental health services is massively increased, especially for child and adolescent services.

Guidelines like this are more likely to institutionalise the drugging and sterilisation of children rather than stopping it though. They're not going to take the position that it's not possible to change sex. Psychiatrists were at the vanguard of pushing trans long before it entered the mainstream.

Yes, mental health funding for youngsters is dire.

I hope some properly conducted research is carried out into all aspects of this problem and that the lobbyists are held at arms length. The Dunning Kruger effect is strong with most of them.

Young people’s gender identity could be “fluid” and each child needed thorough assessment by senior clinicians, she said.

In a sense this is true but only in terms of the ever-tricky "gender identity" being the tendency of children to adhere to gender stereotypes, the fact that much of this falls within children's normal development of learning about the world and developing a personality, and whether any of this in itself is actually a problem for the vast majority of children.

I am continually struck by diagnosing faulty children being a proxy for diagnosing a sick society.

Is there are thread anywhere on how evidence based WPATH is?

I am continually struck by diagnosing faulty children being a proxy for diagnosing a sick society.

Agreed. And hence feminism.

Advised by whom? Under what pressure from whom, considering it's fully in the public domain that the political trans lobby has brought extreme pressure to bear on multiple agencies and bodies to the detriment of pretty much everyone.

Until it's frankly acknowledged that the political lobbies are compromised due to their behaviour, their strategizing and use of funding to intentionally policy/regulatory capture, their powerful personal interests/conflicts of interest, and aims based on intentionally overcoming safeguarding and equality law protections for women and children to their personal benefit, this is not over.

That is being mooted now. It has to be clearly stated and such groups must excluded from involvement in formation of policy. Plus all agencies identifying which policies have been influenced by them, and which staff have been trained by them, and that these policies and staff also have to be regarded as compromised and action taken to address and repair this.

Plus strong due diligence being carried out to ensure any person advising on policy is fully qualified and experienced to advise on the subject as whole and not just represent their own interests, has a background and history of professional/appropriate behaviour that cannot be questioned in terms of their being in a position of trust, and that all given advice is thoroughly checked for bias and for compliance with law.

ALL this should have been done. All of this should have been expected from any reasonably competent LA working party, never mind national government. This is a whopping governmental failure.

Is there are thread anywhere on how evidence based WPATH is?

There is some information about the history of WPATH [formerly the Henry Benjamin Society] in this video talk:

Not Henry Benjamin but Harry Benjamin ... sorry.

I am continually struck by diagnosing faulty children being a proxy for diagnosing a sick society

This. As is labelling a child (easy), as a substitute for treating the family as a whole (hard). This is absolutely not to say that mental health problems in children are the 'fault' of their families, but to recognise that there are often factors in the family environment that need to be addressed, in order to help the child. Failing to address them is failing the child.

Transgenderism is an obvious example: it's so much easier to treat the child's gender dysphoria than to ask why that child finds their biological sex unacceptable, which will involve complex family and societal dynamics.

Well let's hope it's the GC psychiatrists at the helm - and not like one I spoke to about the issue who started talking about "complex lady-brains"...

The psychiatric establishment need to be taking this seriously. At my lowest when I believed I had cameras in my walls and that I was being watched via the plug-sockets my team worked hard to get me back, they didn't bloody well tell me there was CCTV in my house!

And they need to listen very carefully to psychiatrists who are experts in self-harm, anorexia, OCD and most of all autism.