Guardian article about the Tavistock GIDS yesterday

[AmaryllisNightAndDay]

www.theguardian.com/society/2023/jan/19/a-contentious-place-the-inside-story-of-tavistocks-nhs-gender-identity-clinic

Guardian interview with some staff and families from the Tavistock. Pretty balanced I'd say, with stuff from Cass and David Bell. Though not flagging up the institutional ethical failures around puberty blockers and no mention of the unhelpful influences from external organisations that both contributed to closure.

Their version of "Keira Bell's story" leaves out a lot. I didn't like the minimising "gaps in the way they track the progress of young people and in the research into the longer-term effects of the drugs". I expect things are better now but it took Keira Bell's court cases to bring out the failure to keep track, and then Cass to fix it by insisting puberty blockers could only be part of a formal clinical trial (which means a properly overseen ethical process and data gathering and reporting and monitoring). It was an institutional failure rather than a failure of the individual therapists, but still a massive one.

And I'm not sure whether to symnpathise or take issue with young Jay at the end who says "I don’t feel safe in either toilet any more." because neither do we. And then "I would love to be out and proud every day, but at the moment that’s just not possible." What is this "out and proud" thing? You can't have "out and proud" as a transitioned/ing male and have be accepted just as if you are a woman. You pays your money and takes your choice. How naive - or how egotistical - would you have to be to expect both?

I have always believed there are people with gender dysphoria and they should be able to access medical/specialist assistance and should not be discriminated against. The clinic does/did have practitioners who clearly helped children work through their feelings but the “creative/professional disagreements” obviously were not resolved with children at the centre of the debate. This and the lack of record keeping is where the service started to fail those it sought to help.

There are a number of issues which give me real cause concern:

• The broadening of the definition of trans
• Predominantly biological males with paraphillia’s such as AGP, voyeurism, exhibitionism etc. using the trans umbrella for self gratification
• The lack of accurate record keeping
• The wholesale buying into gender identity theory by tax payer funded organisations
• The lack of tracking medical intervention and long term out comes

I believe the stance taken by stonewall and mermaids has done untold harm to children and young people, as well as those with gender dysphoria, whilst assisting abusers to gain access to vulnerable women and girls and their traditionally safe spaces.

I am very concerned the toxic debate means that a reasoned approach which protects and supports children and respects women and girls as well as those with gender dysphoria will be hard to achieve.