Final Report Cass Review now published

[IwantToRetire]

Dr Hilary Cass has submitted her final report and recommendations to NHS England in her role as Chair of the Independent Review of gender identity services for children and young people.

Download from https://cass.independent-review.uk/home/publications/final-report/

Lesbian Labour https://lesbianlabour.com/our-thoughts-on-the-publication-of-the-cass-report

Wow, that response is very strong! Hadn’t realised there were any arms of the Labour party who had been shouting about this.

Strong is right. And powerful

Cass has said these two cohorta have nothing in common. So important.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/11/ban-on-childrens-puberty-blockers-to-be-enforced-in-private-sector-in-england

Well that's grit under the foreskin for the private sector.

I would actually argue that there are three discrete groups.

1. Birth registered males with childhood onset gender dysphoria.
2. Birth registered females with adolescent onset gender dysphoria.
3. Birth registered males who transition after age 25 or so when their brain has fully developed.

There may be some trans identifying people who do not fit into any of these categories, but I think the vast majority will be one of the above.

The Cass review concerns essentially the first two groups.

The Dutch protocol is based on a study with a small sample size, about 70 patients if I remember correctly, all from the first group. Essentially the entire evidence base for the use of puberty blockers comes from this study, and the protocol itself states that the use of puberty blockers is only indicated where the child has experienced persistent long-term gender dysphoria which does not resolve itself by puberty, and where the child does not have any other psychiatric comorbitities, such as autism.

The first point to note is that these criteria would exclude essentially all patients in the second group from being eligible for puberty blockers. There is absolutely no evidence to support their use in birth registered females with adolescent onset gender dysphoria. So people like Keira Bell have been absolutely let down. All birth registered females with gender dysphoria have been let down, because there is almost no research about the causes of or appropriate treatment for their dysphoria, so everyone in this group who has been prescribed puberty blockers, testosterone or had gender affirming surgery has been the subject of a medical experiment. What we need is research to find out why so many young people in this demographic are suddenly identifying as transgender. I imagine many women could have a good guess, but that is not the same as proper, high quality research.

The second point is that even for the first group, the evidence to support the use of puberty blockers is not great. I am not a doctor, not an expert, and I don't presume to know better than those who are. I do not trust the doctors who have been prescribing these treatments, but I do trust Dr Hilary Cass, who acknowledges that medical transition may be the right treatment for a small number of people. I think we also need more research to identify the potential causes of gender dysphoria in these very young children, which are likely to be different to the causes of gender dysphoria in the second group. Jackie Green may have been convinced that she was a girl from very early childhood, but we also know that Jackie's father is homophobic. Even if gender dysphoria manifests itself early and does not resolve, should we really be prescribing puberty blockers, cross sex hormones and surgery in cases where there is evidence to suggest the cause of the dysphoria may be environmental rather than innate?

Finally, the third group. Probably the most difficult of all to categorise. Perhaps it doesn't make sense to refer to them as one group, as it may include people who have always had gender dysphoria but did not acknowledge it until adulthood, as well as people with different reasons for identifying the way they do. I do not want to say anything to risk having this post deleted, but given that Stonewall and other LGBTQ+ organisations have lobbied for people without a diagnosis of gender dysphoria to be able to change their legal sex, I think we must acknowledge the possibility that not all of the people in the third group actually have dysphoria.

Either way, the people in the third group were allowed to go through puberty. In many cases they were able to have a healthy sex life and even have children of their own before deciding to transition. Their brains were fully developed when they chose to embark on any kind of medical transition. Many of them are only on female sex hormones, the effects of which on the male body are temporary, and do not intend to have any surgery. This means that they are more able to detransition without any permanent effects on their body, compared to people who have had surgery or birth registered females who have used testosterone. Some of them may feel that if they had had access to puberty blockers, they would have been better able to "pass" as women and may have avoided a lot of misery and pain. This is a valid point of view. At the same time, if they had had access to puberty blockers they may have ended up with serious physical health issues affecting their quality of life in other ways. They are not the right people to be criticising the Cass report. These are people who were spared the harm that has been done to children in the last ten years. They are not in the group of people Dr Cass is talking about, and the reasons behind their decision to transition are most likely completely different.

Let's hear from Ritchie Herron, let's hear from Sinead Watson, let's hear from Keira Bell. Let's also hear from children currently on the waiting list for gender identity clinics, and their parents, because I am very afraid that these people will be forgotten about.

But I could not be less interested in hearing India Willoughby, a 58 year old newsreader who has fathered a child with her own sperm, dismissing the findings of Dr Hilary Cass, an experienced consultant paediatrician who has been working on this for over four years.

Good to see this. Especially when the likes of Dr Webberley have been busy posting statements 'reassuring' young people that they will continue to offer a medical service privately.

There's still time for Helen Webberley to be definitively struck off.

That's a stonking response from lesbian labour. Brilliantly written and rightly, angry.

Webberley probably will be able to continue business. There are already workarounds involving being in another country and issuing prescriptions.

It's not implausible that people will source puberty blockers from an overseas clinic and have their cross-sex hormones from Gender Plus.

All of this needs to be criminalised.

Let's see if Helen Webberley finds it so easy to source puberty blockers for private patients from jail.

Amazingly powerful for a one page no holds bar summary. Hopefully Starmer et al will begin to listen to this group more than some of their hard of thinking MPs. One can only hope.

But also thank god the Cass report came ahead of the GE and gives Starmer time to pause and reflect about Labour’s unquestioning acceptance of SW’s influence ahead of when they’re in a position to change laws and write policy.

Dont forget Labour Women's Declaration who in think in fact were first in the Labour Party to challenge the trans narrative.

Somewhere up thread I think I posted the link to their statement.

Cant remember exactly but I would think it was a bit more politic!

Yes, good analysis.

I think we also need more research to identify the potential causes of gender dysphoria in these very young children, which are likely to be different to the causes of gender dysphoria in the second group.

^ this is what interests me. Where does it come from?

I can easily see homophobia, autism, wanting to escape the confines of your sex being a reason to develop gender dysphoria.

But I'd be interested to find out what else it could possibly be.

One of our team, a playwright said, “For me it was simple. I noticed the phenomenon and did what I always do when researching for a new play. I invite you to do the same. Pretend you are a 13 year old girl who is unsure how she feels about becoming a woman. Type a question into Google and go down the rabbit hole. I dare you. I know that from the moment I did that I have had no doubt about social contagion.”

A fantastic suggestion.

In fact, it should become like the Staniland question.

Have you gone online as a 13-year-old girl yet? Have you? How can you offer an opinion about our youth unless you have seen what happens?

Article about Keira Bell in the Times today, I hope it will be widely read:

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/93280ebb-13b3-49e3-8d4a-13f4b9971fbd?shareToken=d2986a4c905e996a51f0d8ba685a0a82

@Igneococcus thanks for sharing that article. I have so much respect for Keira. She is a courageous young woman, having suffered so much (unnecessary harm) and now trying to protect others from the same.

She really is @Crankywiddershins
I'm pleased to note that the comments are all very supportive. Under previous articles about Keira there used to be lots of "take some responsibility for your own actions, don't blame the NHS" comments. I haven't seen a single one of that kind yet. People have a much better understanding of the issue now.

Where does it come from? The two TWs I knew best both had mums who'd died of cancer when they they were under the age of 12. Both mothers were women who fitted a very traditionally female stereotype: pretty, there to support dad and the kids. Both these TWs idolised their mums and had had difficult lives being raised by their fathers. One of them talked a lot before transitioning about what an easy life his mum had had, cooking and cleaning and doing keep-fit and looking after her hair. At that time he was struggling with the responsibilities of being a traditional male. After transition he was desperate to find a sugar daddy who'd appreciate and look after him. I didn't think much of the fact that they'd both had this experience — assumed it was just a coincidence — until years ago, when he was running his marathons, Eddie Izzard talked about his mum dying when he was young. Armchair psychology, obviously, but it makes sense that a child who was close to his mother might want to become his mother if she's snatched from him before he's had the chance to grow up and separate off.

Ray Blanchard (IIRC) divides adult male transitioners into different groups. One is the repressed gay male — the kind of camp gay man — whose internalised homophobia means that it's necessary to transition before they can accept being gay. Can't remember what the other categories were off the top of my head.

From the BMJ article cited above:
"People who are gender non-conforming experience stigmatisation, marginalisation, and harassment in every society. They are vulnerable, particularly during childhood and adolescence."

As a society, we have to focus on reducing this stigmatisation and harassment and to protect children and adolescents from the rigidity of gender stereoptypes. If children and adolescents do not feel the pressure of conformity, perhaps they can ride the rollercoaster of puberty with the freedom to explore their identitties and sexuality and without the need to build their own labels and boxes from hormones and surgery, from which is becomes impossible to escape.

From Lesbian Labour's response:
"Also – can we look at why girls might genuinely want to escape from girlhood and womanhood? More resources to look at that, which underpins this whole ROGD. A porn-addled society where rape goes largely unpunished, where women are still treated as second-class citizens and sex-objects, paid less, expected to submit to patriarchal standards, where the phallus is king…is it any wonder that girls want to explore the option to become the dominant sex?"

Can we? That would be great!!!

If girls believed that women were treated with respect and equality and were not judged for their behaviours by a different standard to men, would they still believe that the answer lay in making their bodies appear more like male bodies? How can we make our future society fit for women and girls and not leave them feeling that the future can only accomodate them if they appear male.

The other one is AGP - autogynephile. A man who gets turned on by presenting as a women. A more charitable way of saying it is they are in love with the idea of themself as a woman.

Characteristically heterosexual, not homosexual, late transitioning, often married with children.

Might that describe the transwomen you know?

You also (not you personally, but this board generally) argued that entry to gender conferences should be denied to men wearing dresses, or at least blue ones.

There's a receipt.