Another doctor threatening “transphobes”

[DryHeave]

Following the Harrop tribunal, I can’t quite believe another doctor on social media is threatening members of the public under the claim they are “transphobes”.

She was so pleased with her comment (insinuating a “transphobe” should get into a bath with a toaster - killing themselves) that she screenshotted it from one social media platform, reposted it on another and added the comment “get it” to make sure people got her ‘clever’ insinuation.

@daisyjgrey

Some of these threads/comments sail really close to the wind of defamation.

Oh don't be so silly. An adult woman, in prestigious, well thought of environment, is posting stupid comments, very publicly, implying someone should lull themselves.

I think it ill advised and inappropriate, and if it came to my attention as her supervisor I would initially probably be having a discussion and recommending refreshing her knowledge of the GMC guidance and social media policies, and reflecting on her posts in the context of these.

However it is not something I would report over or consider in the Harrop league at it stands now - there is no evidence of personal animosity, online stalking or doxxing, and it doesn't seem to be part of a targeted repeated and long term pattern of behavior, its a flippant comment to another flippant comment.

it's a flippant comment to another flippant comment

The "I identity as a toaster" comment and similar are tedious and unoriginal. The response was nasty and flippant but I can see why it was made.

I've noticed in general here that "young/very young" gets trotted out to excuse all sorts of behaviour from silly and inane to downright criminal if it's done by a woman. (Boys and young men tend to be "old enough to know what they were doing")

It's laughable that any who is a qualified can be described as "very young"

It's also (a)extremely patronising in a "oh those silly young women if only they were wise like the old crones on here" and (b) infantilising.

I see she has now deleted the post, which I think is a wise thing to do. Good to see some self reflection (vital in work as a doctor).

I don't think it's self-reflection as much as she has got pushback and realised that her tweet was ill-advised, to say the least.

I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. She’s also removed reference to her job, has read up on Harrop & presumably refreshed SM guidance.

@Lovelyricepudding

why would anyone be phobic about transgender people

Because they represent an ideology that is destroying women's rights, that threaten women with impunity, that has captured our democratic organisation's with an authoritarian and oppressive regime, that is seeking to force us to state things we know are a lie, that is causing huge medical harm to children, that is removing women's right to define ourselves, that is removing sex from data that shows where we are harmed....

In a nutshell. Well said. (I may borrow this, if that's ok...)

@Lovelyricepudding

I'm definitely gc and might be called a terf but really can't get worked up about this

I am seeing this frequently on posts along with some reason why we shouldn't be upset - they are only joking about killing yourself, they are only laces so you shouldn't get worked up about being forced to wear a political symbol, is only a club for children (to talk about sex)....

Meanwhile GCs on this board regularly dismiss the high suicide rate among trans people as being a form of manipulation and not to be believed or taken seriously. If it's bad to be flippant and dismissive of suicide, it's bad for both sides to do it. GCs could stand to look at their own behaviour and realise they are frequently no angels themselves. But this isn't actually about upholding decent standards of debate or behaviour, it's about feeling like your side is winning, which means it's good if your side does it, bad if the other side does it. It's just tribalism without nuance at this point and the GC side is absolutely as guilty of that as anyone else.

Meanwhile GCs on this board regularly dismiss the high suicide rate among trans people as being a form of manipulation and not to be believed or taken seriously.

The figures have been shown to be lies, which is why they are not taken seriously.

She did an interview with the telegraph earlier this year which states which hospital she was doing her foundation training at and she states her rough area elsewhere. So its publicly available info.

I won't post but there is a hospital named. It would put me off going to that hospital (which would be an option for me in certain situations)

Given that doctors are supposed to have public trust and confidence, the fact I feel like this that she thinks it appropriate to make 'jokes' or otherwise like this, visible to everyone, really smacks of a lack of understanding and maturity.

If you are practising its not appropriate to have a media career like this too. It compromises you and you run the real risk of upsetting your patients and employers.

The whole thing smacks of massive levels of naivity.

I just think silly woman who is more interested in her comedy career than patient wellbeing.

@BlueberryCheezecake
Link please to those statistics. I have not found any yet so would be good to see some accurate facts on this. Thanks!

Meanwhile GCs on this board regularly dismiss the high suicide rate among trans people as being a form of manipulation and not to be believed or taken seriously.

Suicide amongst teens with gender dyphoria is very rare. We do however accept that transitioning increases suicide risk nine-fold and have repeatedly raised the need to ensure adequate mental health care is necessary whereas TRAs deny any link between gender dysphoria and mental health.

Figures presentes for suicide ideation on the other hand have been found to be false or not generalusable beyond a specific subset of those accessing self-help websites for mental health.

We also know that figures for 'domestic abuse' presented by TRAs include where spouses have said they felt suicidal. Being suicidal counts as abuse towards your transgender partner. So you could do with making up your mind about these claims. Are you being abusive?

Meanwhile GCs on this board regularly dismiss the high suicide rate among trans people as being a form of manipulation and not to be believed or taken seriously. If it's bad to be flippant and dismissive of suicide, it's bad for both sides to do it. GCs could stand to look at their own behaviour and realise they are frequently no angels themselves. But this isn't actually about upholding decent standards of debate or behaviour, it's about feeling like your side is winning, which means it's good if your side does it, bad if the other side does it. It's just tribalism without nuance at this point and the GC side is absolutely as guilty of that as anyone else.

'GCs' deal in facts, statistics and evidence. Which is why we question lots of things around the suicide issue, particularly with regards to children.

But if we are talking about 'sides', then I do believe that the only person that I have seen joking and being 'flippant' about trans people and suicide is the fragrant Damien Barr, who I believe is on your 'side'

@BlueberryCheezecake
Oddly I go looking for the data when people talk about statistics.
Lies, damned lies, and statistics and all that, I may not always find it but I look.

I concluded that the likelihood of a dead person having access to a computer to fill in a survey had a very low probability of being factual.
When political policy is being formulated using false (by accident or design) data that it wrong.

The biggest scandal of treating children as medical guinea pigs is that the service in making no apparent effort to evaluate the outcomes.
The Tavi's data, if and when, available disproves the suicide data but it continues to fail to support clinical research, which is just wrong.

Bristol hospital would still have an unacceptable number of unnecessary child deaths if an accidental whistle blower has not done the research on the heart surgery. Why is it that, the treatment of children who are so vulnerable is not being critically assessed within the service? Why is there no focus to see what combination of treatments provide the support the children need to grow into adulthood?

Clinicians and attempts to become social media personalities aren't a good combination. We all saw how badly the Clemmie Hooper thing went.

[quote Pixiedust1234]@BlueberryCheezecake
Link please to those statistics. I have not found any yet so would be good to see some accurate facts on this. Thanks![/quote]
I found this paper about suicides in transgender people:
Trends in suicide death risk in transgender people: results from the Amsterdam Cohort of Gender Dysphoria study (1972–2017)

According to this study, it appears that the suicide rate is higher in trans people: about 3-4 times higher than in the general population. It says that the suicide rate has decreased over time for transwomen, which is good news, although for transmen it has remained about the same.

But they do mention some limitations of the study, for example "we did not have information about psychological comorbidities or other psychological information". And it's not clear how this elevated rate compared to the general population compares to any other marginalised groups.

They also mention that the suicide rate is similar at all stages of transition, including those who have undergone full physical transition.

And they also point out that suicidal behaviour should not be attributed to a single cause:

Suicidal behaviour is a complex phenomenon that is a result of many individual (age, male sex assigned at birth, previous suicide attempts, mental health history, substance abuse) as well as more distant environmental factors.

Oh, perhaps not so reflective after all.

I think she's posting her latest IG story out of a place of quite significant panic - someone has clearly had a word about the trouble Harrop has got himself into and she's trying to say 'I'm only having a laugh! I didn't mean anything by my joke.'

I think she's probably a fundamentally decent human being who is trying to stand up for what she considers to be a marginalised community. That's fine, it's just incredibly annoying to watch as she tries to 'educate' people on how it's just cis men who are a threat (there are several videos on trans issues on her tik Tok) and every trans person is just a lovely, vulnerable human who is just trying to be their authentic self. She could really really do with stepping away from being cocky for five minutes and doing some basic reading. She could hang out here in particular. There's no excuse now for not understanding the gc position - there's lots of excellent reading material she could get stuck into compared to a few years ago.

She's bisexual I believe, so I can see where this is all coming from and I suppose she's a fascinating example of how really clever people can get sucked in by religion.

If this means she's remembered that she needs to be complying with a social media policy and as a result doesn't escalate into becoming abusive towards those having a different set of views, then that's a win.

ACovidofWitches she is trained and claims to work in A&E.
There is no way she has gone through her training without understanding that the "nicest" people can do terrible things. She is trained not to take things at face value in her professional life.

I don't think that society should ever accept that because she is X protected class she is "allowed" Y level of aggressive behaviour.

But I agree with nauticant hopefully someone has pointed out that engaging in obnoxious SM behaviour is not the appropriate way to present her position.

Twitter has a widespread and bizarre way of people. Including those who really should know better eg docs as above, politicians local council members, journalists, academics with a level of public recognition etc.

Posting things presumably with zero reflection on what saying. That are extremely contraversial and especially when aimed at individuals. Using extreme language about those they disagree with. Alluding to violence/ that they think someone should die. Veiled or overt direct threats. Assertions about actually being extreme right wing/ Nazi etc when it's obvious nonsense. Accusations of lies even though plenty evidence things said true. Etc etc.

What the fuck are they doing they've all lost their marbles.

How can anyone forget that Twitter is public, that once written it can't be unwritten, that if in public type role that should be forefront of mind when commenting publicly. And that even if some do see things like DIAF, get in the sea, X people need to be taken care of one way or another etc etc etc etc as not literal, just phrases don't mean anything on twitter. When Twitter and real life collide then OBVIOUSLY the general reaction is not. Well so what those things said no problem obviously. The general response is. Bloody hell that's terrible!

What the hell is going through their minds?!

@FOJN

Nobody could possibly take this off colour joke to mean that she is going to come round and electrocute the person who made the toaster joke.

No I don't think anyone thinks that. The issue is that she has identified herself as a doctor on her social media profile and therefore off colour jokes about electrocution are inappropriate as is making your feelings on a political issue known. Patients should never know your political views.

She would be free to be as inappropriate as she likes if she didn't have doctor in her profile, she would then have to hope that no one who was treated by her in real life was aware of her account.

There are doctors who are sitting MPs.

Doctors should not convey their political views while treating patients. Doctors are free to express their political views outside of work, just like every other profession, except civil servants and those who work in the judicial system.

I'm not defending this woman, let alone Harrop, but some posters' expectations of doctors are unrealistic. We are allowed to express opinions like anyone else, as long as outside of work, and as long as they do not bring the profession into disrepute. I don't think she should have said this. I do think she would be perfectly entitled to express political views, if she wished.

Expressing your political views (the NHS is under funded/poorly managed/doctors should be paid more/we should renationalise the power supply) is very different to joking about electicution.