The judgment in Keira Bell's case will be given tomorrow

[MaudTheInvincible]

The judgment of the Tavistock's appeal of the case will be given at 2pm.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/royal-courts-of-justice-cause-list/royal-courts-of-justice-daily-cause-list

Brave Keira. You have done so much to protect children from ideologically driven healthcare around the world. Your integrity and courage is inspiring and rare in this ridiculous day and age. 💚🤍💜

I think this was one of the things that led me to spending all day on FWR arguing the toss.

I saw someone saying puberty blockers were terrible on here and I rolled my eyes. I thought "nonsense, we prescribe them for precocious puberty all the time because precocious puberty causes x, y and z". Then I sat down at the computer, and started googling precocious puberty medication brand names and then their side-effects to own the TFs.

I'm not kidding here. I actually did that. Needless to say, the results of my websearch did not go the way I thought.

@CharlieParley

The more, the merrier PurgatoryOfPotholes.

The more I read up on this, the more hortified I am that this has been allowed. There will be a wave of lawsuits brought by these children and unfortunately for health care practitioners in the UK, there is no American-style "informed consent" model in use here to protect them. I just wish we could stop the damage now and not in a few years after more of these children have been damaged.

The NHS Trans Plus service seems a lot like the US informed consent model (or the Webberly model!)

Aimed at 17 yr olds upwards and you can be diagnosed with GD and given hormones by your 2nd appointment (within 2 to 4 weeks of your first).

wearetransplus.co.uk/faqs/

@MrsKeats

Yes like my stepchild :((

I'm genuinely grateful Purgatory and Charlie for sharing those links - as I've said upthread, I absolutely understand the reticence around medicalised treatment for gender dysphoria and the safety of it, for anyone of any age. There should absolutely be studies with reliable sources, good data, peer review and input from across the medical and pharmacological communities and that data should inform the medical model for treating gender dysphoria. No issue there whatsoever.

What I find worrying is lamenting this judgement today as a loss. This judgement was not about the safety of treatment - I assume that was the driving factor behind the warning to clinicians toward the end of the ruling about prescribing treatment.

If today's judgement had upheld that particular medical treatments could be excepted from Gillick competence, it opens a huge gaping hole in the right of children to make medical decisions for themselves where those with enough influence, money for legal power, and any agenda they wanted could begin to chip away at rights.

"Having a surgical abortion is irreversible and can cause PID and future infertility - children can't consent to something irreversible or that could cause infertility a long way down the line when they don't know if they'll want children one day, even if they know the risks", for example. Yes, it's different to puberty blockers, but in a country with the doctrine of precedent, it opens a door. And through that door lies fewer choices and reduced rights, particularly for female children who may desperately need them.

As I said - I have no qualms with concerns about puberty blockers. I am concerned that people are in such a rush to be upset at this ruling because of the specific context, when really we should be glad that something that upholds the right to access contraception and abortion for young women has not been chipped away at legally.

[quote joolzfromyork]@Awiltu

Why isn't it equally valid to change the mind so that it is congruent with the body?

Well in all fairness, People have tried to do exactly what you would like

We call it 'Conversion Therapy'

Not only does it not work / has never worked ... it has caused enormous damage to individuals over the years - Not just Transsexual People ... Lesbians ... Gay Men ...

Seriously ... do you want to return to that sort of abuse of the individual ?[/quote]
It is true that psychological interventions don't alter people's sexual orientation. But sexual orientation isn't dependent on how a person feels about themselves, it's about how they feel towards other people. You don't have to "feel" gay to be gay, you just have to be attracted to people of the same sex. Just like you don't have to "feel" like a woman to be one, you just have to be biologically female.

Gender dysphoria does relate to how a person feels about themselves. Psychological distress over perceptions about one's sexed body isn't magically different from psychological distress about perceptions of one's weight, or the appearance of body parts; gender dysphoria isn't sacrosanct.

Psychological intervention is effective in these other disorders, such as anorexia and body dysmorphia, that are characterised by a disconnect between the way an individual feels about their body and the physical reality of that body. And psychological intervention in these conditions is about helping people to accept and be comfortable with the physical reality of their body without the need to change it by starving themselves or lopping off a healthy limb.

Just like psychological intervention for gender dysphoria isn't about making people gender-conforming, it's about helping them to accept and be comfortable with the physical reality of their sexed body without needing to change it.

Gender identity refers to our sense of who we are and how we see and describe ourselves. For some, this can cause distress when sex doesn’t match up. and that’s gender dysphoria. No one should be told they have to be a certain way or look a certain way. But if they want to, then that’s down to them and being on something that stops that distress I’m all for.

Can you please spell out for me - what does 'our sense of who we are and how we see ourselves' etc relate to SEX as in sexed bodies?
Do you mean to say that people believe themselves to literally have the opposite sex body? So they are hallucinating or something?

I would refer to what you describe as 'personality' or something, a set of characteristics that are probably rather subjective and changeable (e.g. 'I'm an honest person' 'I like dubstep').

How can your character match or not match your physical sex?

As I asked before, is it broadly how masculine or feminine you feel? Which has some loose basis in sexed bodies but isn't a direct correlation by all means?

Sorry that was for @Conniethesensible who is at least trying to help me understand!

Article in The Times

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/8f088298-17bb-11ec-8aba-5ab737a99668?shareToken=92beefe8387474c48304e88970d4c45a

I would like to know how much money the NHS is spending on puberty blockers. Also whether the major PB drugs companies have backed the appeal financially.

Since when did puberty become optional?

Watch this space. The next stage in this shit show is “ongoing puberty suppression” for non-binary individuals who don’t want to develop either male or female sex characteristics. I can imagine it could also end up being a treatment for anorexia.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7656150/

@PurgatoryOfPotholes

I think this was one of the things that led me to spending all day on FWR arguing the toss.

I saw someone saying puberty blockers were terrible on here and I rolled my eyes. I thought "nonsense, we prescribe them for precocious puberty all the time because precocious puberty causes x, y and z". Then I sat down at the computer, and started googling precocious puberty medication brand names and then their side-effects to own the TFs.

I'm not kidding here. I actually did that. Needless to say, the results of my websearch did not go the way I thought.

Ah, you 'educated yourself'. Happens a lot.

@MondayYogurt

I would like to know how much money the NHS is spending on puberty blockers. Also whether the major PB drugs companies have backed the appeal financially.

Don't know whether they backed the appeal, but Ferrings Pharmaceutical donated to the Lib Dems which may or may not have anything to so with Ed Davey's comments today www.thetimes.co.uk/article/puberty-blocker-drug-firm-donated-cash-to-lib-dems-cf3x77nh3 and www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4177304-Ferring?msgid=105759274

OnTheWomanQuestion also tweeting about the role the covid jab competence situation may have played in this.

@PurgatoryOfPotholes

I think this was one of the things that led me to spending all day on FWR arguing the toss.

I saw someone saying puberty blockers were terrible on here and I rolled my eyes. I thought "nonsense, we prescribe them for precocious puberty all the time because precocious puberty causes x, y and z". Then I sat down at the computer, and started googling precocious puberty medication brand names and then their side-effects to own the TFs.

I'm not kidding here. I actually did that. Needless to say, the results of my websearch did not go the way I thought.

I am in support.
I feel that many young peope are seeing the national situation where being a young woman is not valued and not respected. And drawing conclusions, which in their way are logical.

And trying to escape the patriarchy.
Headline news this morning, violence against women is an epidemic.

So no surprises that no young person wants to be a young (or older) woman.

That is the wrong way round for everything.

Women's liberation has a meaning.

And there it is.

Keira Bell's lawyer, who has worked on a number of anti-abortion cases (including those where it was argued under-16s should have to tell their parents if they got an abortion, which could amount to blocking access to abortion in some cases, and the campaign against late term abortion for certain medical conditions - i.e., women, you'll give birth if we tell you to and fuck your personal choice), is now saying they'll take this ruling to the Supreme Court and that Gillick competence is no longer fit for purpose.

That's why I'm glad about today's ruling. Blow a hole in Gillick for this, and other things - like abortion - follow, and what a fucking terrifying rollback of women and girls' rights that would be.

[quote Signalbox]Since when did puberty become optional?

Watch this space. The next stage in this shit show is “ongoing puberty suppression” for non-binary individuals who don’t want to develop either male or female sex characteristics. I can imagine it could also end up being a treatment for anorexia.

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7656150/[/quote]
I have seen multiple activists say that blockers should be the default for all and children going through the pubertal lifestage, without having specifically agreed to, is "violence".

The scary thing is the amount of Likes these people get.

And also. who is looking after mother's rights to have a sexuality.

A great many of us are too knackered, too exhausted and don't have the cash to do self care adequately.

For clarity my was stepdaughter says she's a gay man now.
We are expected to go along with this.
I don't see how gay men would be attracted to what is essentially a female body pumped full of testosterone.
And why should they?

I can imagine some people are ecstatic at this news. And for the life of me, I will never understand why. Here's to hundreds more buckets of breast tissue heading to the incinerator. Yipee!

Yeah the whole 'accept this devastating issue for women and girls because if you fight it things will get worse for you' -

no.

Really not swallowing that either.

Well said @RoyalCorgi

You couldn't make it up

Well someone gave it a jolly good try

The thing that bothers me is, the idea that blocking puberty gives the child time to think through their options. But puberty isn't just about growing breasts, wet dreams, deepening voices etc. It's also about developing mental, emotional maturity and the development and maturation of the prefrontal cortex. If we block or delay puberty then that won't happen, so of course these children go straight to CSH they haven't developed enough to have the maturity to move on from their dysphoria.