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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

"Top surgery" for 12 year olds.

120 replies

FOJN · 31/01/2022 11:16

New video from mrmenno on "top surgery" for minors. We already knew some of the gruesome details about what happens state side but the details about Scottish referrals for 16 and 17 year olds were new to me. I think it's important to emphasise the referrals part, I don't know if surgery was actually performed before the patients turned 18.

Note what happens to the rate of referrals for patients in their mid twenties, it's a trend I've noticed before. At what age is the brain fully developed?

I've also wondered about how young some of the patients are and what stage of puberty they are at when these decisions are made. Would a 12 year old, presumably sufficiently dysphoric enough to justify surgery not have been diagnosed before puberty and put on blockers or is this a rushed decision after puberty has started. Breast growth cannot be finished at 12 so what is being done to ensure the surgical results are permanent?

I'm trying to work out what the clinical logic is of performing such radical surgery on very young girls when you cannot reliably predict your ability to completely halt natural puberty. Are these children being given cross sex hormones at 12 and 13?

OP posts:
DisappearingGirl · 31/01/2022 20:32

No, the Freddie in the Newsbeat article isn't the Freddie who's had two babies

FOJN · 31/01/2022 20:33

Nobody under 18 is having top surgery in the UK.

I wonder why you offer this evidence free assertion when the information which contradicts you is readily available and also why you think it's only of interest if it's happening in the UK.

The video clearly shows girls as young as 13 have had their breasts removed as a result of gender ideology; do that not bother you? Children who are not considered old enough to consent to sex, drive a car, get a tattoo or buy alcohol or cigarettes are treated as if they have capacity to understand all of the implications of radical, medically unnecessary surgery.

One well known person who has given birth to two babies but prefers to be known as a man clearly didn't understand the mechanics and irreversible nature of the surgery.

The full Olson paper states they found a 41% failure rate for reattached nipples after breast removal. Even if Freddie had been taken the option of keeping their nipples attached during surgery (I believe this makes masculine chest contouring difficult to achieve) there is no guarantee they would produce enough milk to nourish a baby. The stats for women who have breast reduction show 50% are unable to breast feed (although there is limited data) presumably the success rate if you've had a radical mastectomy are even lower.

OP posts:
FannyCann · 31/01/2022 20:43

Because society (?biology?) is just so cis-normative @Motorina Hmm

Omicrone · 31/01/2022 20:45

I honestly think that Sidhbh Gallagher should be in prison - the way that she so flippantly just chops off the breasts of these vulnerable young women, and uses language like 'yeet the teets' as if its nothing.

And now Jazz Jennings is involved with her too, for an extra layer of fucked up. These poor young people, what will become of them all in 10, 20 years time?

DdraigGoch · 31/01/2022 21:11

@EishetChayil

If I knew that my donated breast milk had gone to a woman who identified out of womanhood and had her breasts & nipples removed, I'm not sure how I would feel.
Pity, I would hope. She has been failed by professionals.
FannyCann · 31/01/2022 21:57

The matter of Freddy's nipples are a mystery to me as I can clearly see their existence on Instagram posts.
My understanding of why breastfeeding is often unsuccessful after breast reduction is not only loss of milk producing tissue but also disruption of the connections and pathways of the milk ducts for milk to travel to the nipple.
In any case there is a difference between breast reduction and total removal of all breast tissue as in mastectomy. I think the mastectomy would have been performed negligently if there was still ability to produce milk - when performed for cancer treatment or prevention (eg for the BRCA gene) surely the whole point is to remove all breast tissue?

Omicrone · 31/01/2022 22:36

Yes, Freddy appears to have nipples in the photos on Instagram? Confused Trans men who have had mastectomies tend to keep their nipples from what I have seen, it's not like a mastectomy for breast cancer where the whole lot has to go? Plus Freddy must have known that getting their breasts removed completely would mean that they wouldn't be able to produce milk?

On a different note, Freddy appears to be shouting out on Instagram for women who have excess breastmilk for them to use? I know nothing about using donor milk, but you can't just take it off anyone can you, doesn't it need to come from a milk bank, doesn't it need to be screened etc?

FrancescaContini · 31/01/2022 22:45

@SevenWaystoLeave

Nobody under 18 is having top surgery in the UK.
You mean a double mastectomy.
FrancescaContini · 31/01/2022 22:50

@EishetChayil

Dr Sidhbh Gallagher seems to be spearheading this in the USA. She's very social media savvy, and uses terminology like "teet yeet" and "teetus deletus".
This “medic” disgusts me beyond belief.
nolongersurprised · 31/01/2022 22:51

The matter of Freddy's nipples are a mystery to me as I can clearly see their existence on Instagram posts

I think after “chest masculinisation” surgery they can be removed and then put back after the breast tissue has gone. Presumably if left they’d sit a bit differently? I dunno. So essentially just token, cosmetic nipples.

FrancescaContini · 31/01/2022 22:56

@FannyCann

The common goal of health care professionals is to assure that patients have the capacity to provide consent and are fully informed about the mechanics, recovery, and irreversible nature of the surgery.

One well known person who has given birth to two babies but prefers to be known as a man clearly didn't understand the mechanics and irreversible nature of the surgery.

There’s something so horrendously fucked up about readily undergoing a double mastectomy for aesthetic reasons and then needing to rely on donated breast milk to feed your baby.
nolongersurprised · 31/01/2022 22:57

My god, how I hate the term “chestfeed”. Also, Freddie seems insufferably stupid with that post. How can you not work out that removing all your breast tissue would mean that you couldn’t actually use that organ for it’s intended purpose?

And then calling out for donated milk from women who aren’t as special and interesting as Freddie and have, you know, left their lactating organs intact and are using them for their intended purpose.

nolongersurprised · 31/01/2022 23:24

*its, not it’s.

OperationDessertStorm · 01/02/2022 00:00

@nolongersurprised

My god, how I hate the term “chestfeed”. Also, Freddie seems insufferably stupid with that post. How can you not work out that removing all your breast tissue would mean that you couldn’t actually use that organ for it’s intended purpose?

And then calling out for donated milk from women who aren’t as special and interesting as Freddie and have, you know, left their lactating organs intact and are using them for their intended purpose.

Reliance on other women to change their language, to relinquish single sex spaces and sports, to provide validation, to provide breast milk, to provide surrogacy etc.

Yep. Noted.

Delphinium20 · 01/02/2022 00:54

@EishetChayil

If I knew that my donated breast milk had gone to a woman who identified out of womanhood and had her breasts & nipples removed, I'm not sure how I would feel.
I donated years ago when I breastfed but I had routine meet ups with the mom (she was on medication and couldn't use her milk). It's not the child's fault and the baby deserves breast milk but I'd feel very conflicted and not at all warm and friendly to the mom like the relationship I had in the past.
nolongersurprised · 01/02/2022 01:26

Freddie seems to have lost sight of the fact that to successfully breastfeed you need actually breasts, not just a chest and nipples.

Maybe the use of “chestfeeding” instead of breastfeeding has been confusing?

Do you think Freddie was actually told - “If you have your breasts removed you won’t be able to breastfeed? Or is information like that also too “cis-normative”.

SantaClawsServiette · 01/02/2022 02:32

@nolongersurprised

The matter of Freddy's nipples are a mystery to me as I can clearly see their existence on Instagram posts

I think after “chest masculinisation” surgery they can be removed and then put back after the breast tissue has gone. Presumably if left they’d sit a bit differently? I dunno. So essentially just token, cosmetic nipples.

I think this is the idea. When they do these surgeries they usually seem to actually cut off the nipples and then reattach them in the right spot, so they would be totally useless for breastfeeding.

If you left them attached or partly attached, maybe it might be possible to breastfeed, but it seems unlikely given the nature of the rest of the surgery. And it could mean it would look odd as the nipple placement would be strange.

Given that this person didn't care enough about breastfeeding to avoid getting a mastectomy it's hard to see how anyone saying "hey maybe you'd like to breastfeed later" would result in a different choice about nipples that might be less aesthetically pleasing.

nolongersurprised · 01/02/2022 03:55

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35077041/

…and a complete mastectomy with a free nipple-areola complex graft in 56 (50.9%). Complications included two hypertrophic scars, six hematomas requiring revision surgery, three wound dehiscences, and three cases of partial nipple necrosis

Different surgical approaches, from the looks of things, with the most common involving grafting of the nipple and areola.

Kanaloa · 01/02/2022 04:35

I would definitely have wanted something like this if it had been available when I was a teen.

That’s not me saying I agree with it but I developed really young and I felt so upset and hated having breasts/a more womanly shape even from age 11 or so, and getting sexualised attention which made me uncomfortable. I used to wear tight sports bras and hoodies to look more flat.

That’s why I find it so scary, it’s not beyond the realms of understanding. I can totally see how young girls and women are interested in this and end up getting sucked into it all. It’s scary.

Don’t really get the one who is shocked about not being able to produce breast milk. They would have been told this would be an issue pre surgery presumably. Every surgery I’ve ever had a consultant always sits you down and takes you through all the possible outcomes that could happen, so I think they would have mentioned that it would affect breast milk production.

NotBadConsidering · 01/02/2022 06:05

Freddy is an idiot. Freddy thinks that “old school gender clinicians” and “cis normative society” denied Freddy the knowledge that removing breast and nipple tissue would result in being unable to use that tissue for its primary purpose. Freddy is an idiot to think we will believe Freddy wasn’t told or consented for this. Any woman who has breast reduction surgery is consented around the potential impact on future breastfeeding. So I find it hard to believe a surgeon didn’t discuss it.

But say it’s true, Freddy is an idiot if Freddy wasn’t told directly but didn’t understand this, given it’s something nearly every human on the planet understands. No breasts, no breastfeeding.

Freddy was 28 in 2014, but didn’t understand the implications? And the clinicians in 2014 were “old school”? Come off if Freddy.

And Freddy is also an idiot for posting something like that and not realising it demonstrates Freddy’s horrific hypocrisy.

Firstly, Freddy is a hypocrite by demonstrating how irreversible procedures can lead to future regret while AT THE SAME TIME campaigning for CHILDREN to undergo irreversible treatment that won’t even allow a female to get to the breastfeeding stage (because Freddy thinks children should get puberty blockers and testosterone which will mean these females are infertile.)

And second, Freddy is a hypocrite for blaming the lack of information about the implications of such irreversible procedures on “old school gender clinicians” and “cis normative society” while failing to acknowledge it is TRAs all around Freddy who are completely denying the implications of affirmative treatments, pretending with a hand wave it’s something that be fixed later, while it is everyone gender critical who is screaming this from rooftops, desperately trying to prevent young females from making the same irreversible decisions Freddy is now regretting and blaming on others.

28 year old Freddy wasn’t adequately consented for surgery, apparently. 28 year old Freddy wanted to be told specifically that even though 28 year old Freddy couldn’t even “conceive [the idea] of parenthood”, Freddy wanted to be specifically told that the surgery to remove the organs used for breastfeeding would impact possible future breastfeeding. Is Freddy arguing that had that mystical information that was withheld by “old school gender clinicians” been more freely given then 28 year old “couldn’t conceive of parenthood” Freddy would have given a different answer? Hmm

Let’s say, for argument’s sake, the answer is that Freddy would have declined the mastectomy technique as offered. The solution argued is that more information is the key to better choices.

But let’s look at children. A key part of the Keira Bell judgment was that it doesn’t matter how much information you give to children, it still doesn’t change their capacity to truly understand it. 28 year old Freddy went ahead with surgery and without the most basics of human physiology being spelled out in intimate detail, Freddy feels now that had that information been available Freddy would have made a different decision.

But here’s the clincher: look at the Instagram post again. Freddy thinks that if Freddy had the time all over again, Freddy would have asked for the nipples to remain intact. Freddy thinks that if the breast tissue had been removed and nipples had been left, then all of Freddy’s current breastfeeding woes and lack of supply wouldn’t be an issue. Freddy still wondered if some milk might have been produced.

So Freddy has had 7 years to think about the implications after it has happened, has thought about the information given prior to surgery, has given birth, but still seemingly has NO FUCKING CLUE that once the breasts were removed that there was never going to be any milk! Freddy couldn’t even adequately consent now to this procedure because Freddy still doesn’t understand.

Seven years! Still no understanding! Despite it happening to Freddy’s own body!

How the HELL can children understand?!

FrancescaContini · 01/02/2022 06:32

@NotBadConsidering Excellent post. Star

FannyCann · 01/02/2022 06:48

Great post @NotBadConsidering

I can believe the future inability to breastfeed wasn't explained. Possibly the surgeon treating Freddy might have assumed that Freddy wanted to live as a man and therefore babies and breastfeeding wouldn't be a future desire. I know they should go through it all but it's conceivable that they made assumptions or didn't want to be accused of being cis normative and triggering dysphoria or patronisingly treating Freddy like a woman!

Also whilst I have no idea where Freddy has the procedure I do know that one of the private surgeons who performs these procedures had a run in with the GMC over shoddy consent (lack of) process. He wasn't struck off, I think it must have been a warning and of course I've no idea what type of procedures were concerned but it's a possibility.

nolongersurprised · 01/02/2022 07:05

but still seemingly has NO FUCKING CLUE that once the breasts were removed that there was never going to be any milk!

Ironic really, we’re told that the science of sex/gender is sooo much more complicated than taught in high school.

Yet a promoter of said ideology hasn’t worked out that if you remove your breasts, you can’t make breast milk Hmm

Omicrone · 01/02/2022 07:21

Reliance on other women to change their language, to relinquish single sex spaces and sports, to provide validation, to provide breast milk, to provide surrogacy etc.

Yep. Noted.

Yes so for transwomen, women are required to give up their single sex spaces, their sports, their awards, their language, to fawn and cheer on.

For trans men, women are required to donate their breast milk, provide bodies for surrogacy, change their language, to fawn and cheer on.

What exactly are men required to do in all this? Because from where I'm standing it looks like fuck all.

NotBadConsidering · 01/02/2022 07:25

FannyCann

Yes I can conceive of both of those possibilities, fair enough.

But if you hypothetically put the mind of 35 year old Freddy, into the body of 28 year old Freddy in 2014, with Freddy’s conceived idea of parenthood there instead of absent, with “well informed” doctors, not an “old school” gender clinician/surgeon believing that ”living as a man” means not doing the most woman thing possible, and everything in black and white on a consent form, it seems Freddy would still ask, just before signing, “But I can still chest feed with my own milk, right?”

At which point, in my hypothetical scenario, I imagine the surgeon slowly retracting the pen and paper from Freddy’s reach and starting again, with a Father Ted and Dougal small cow/far away cow type explanation.

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