Guardian just can't help itself, even on Cass Report day

[Fenlandia]

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/10/mother-criticises-agenda-from-above-cass-report-trans

(This may have been linked to in one of the Cass threads, but it needs calling out on its own thread)

The mother of an autistic 'birth-registered male' (if we must) complaining about “an agenda from up on high that things need to be more difficult”.

"“[I thought] do we really come across as the kind of parents who are absolutely delighted to have a transgender child? We might be the kind of parents who’d be absolutely willing to support our transgender child, but in an ideal world I would much rather my child was growing up in a way in which she wasn’t sticking out like a sore thumb and potentially going to end up dead.”

Always with the emotional manipulation, and seemingly no reflection that her child, and all others, deserve much better quality healthcare than they have been getting for years. If GIDS was capable of working it out for themselves, they would have done so by now.

It is interesting that people are unable to believe that possibly medicalisation is not the best option for their child. Surely there being a less damaging solution to their distress would be good news! Little Timmy doesn't need surgery and hormones any more! Why do people insist on clinging on to the narrative that they have been sold? Maybe being a parent of a trans child is an identity in itself.

"... potentially going to end up dead."
Sounds like she's had the 'would you rather have a dead son or a live daughter' strongarm put on her, and hasn't been able to see her way past it. Which she needs to. But I can see it's very difficult, when it's your own child, to step back far enough to be able to see the wood, not the trees.

Haven't read the article yet, will do later. But yes - the Guardian really can't help itself. <rolls eyes>

I long for the day when people realise there is no such thing as a transexual child. Just a child with their own unique personality....

Me too.
Too late for my family member now though unfortunately.

It's laughable really. The Guardian just cherry pick their stories to undermine facts. The Cass Report tells it how it is and then the Guardian will do anything in its power to not look ridiculous, undermine the Cass Report, but in a whiny underhand way, 'we are still Trans champions' way.

Poor mother. Her DC was 8 in 2015 so the poor autistic kid is not even 18 now. And goodness knows what health problems they're going to be living with in their 20s, 30s and later. Though luckily (on second reading!) at least the youngster was born male. AFAIK the long term physical health effects of puberty blockade and cross-sex hormones on girls are much worse.

And ours, MrsKeats. And those of (counts fingers) four of our friends. I hope the peak has now passed, but these young women (and one man) have a lifetime of consequences.

My sympathies. It's the elephant in the room at family meetups. (And I don't know who the youngster concerned would turn to if thinking of detransitioning, as we've all been so damn tactful about the transition once it was a done deal.)

I think if you've gone so far down the line with your own child, you have to believe that you were doing the right thing. Someone called this out before in a video, some of the loudest parental voices are driven by a huge and horrible cognitive dissonance. I have empathy for that, it is hard enough for me to acknowledge and work through my parenting errors and I haven't sterilised my children.

The Guardian is a disgrace to journalism. I read it faithfully for decades, and loved it. Even as its journalistic standards slipped, I still made excuses for it because I thought its heart was in the right place.

But since it shamelessly took up the cudgels against women, I despise it. Boldly speaking up for the rich and powerful — yes, we can see transgenderism’s multi-milionaire backers and influence on governments. I’m glad its founders and the great writers from its past are not here to see it.

Agreed dodo
So many now that will never have children etc.
it's a tragedy.

I take it that you either didn't hear or have chosen to ignore the point Cass made about a toxic culture that has arisen because each "side" of the trans debate is busy scoring points against each other. That, Cass said, gets in the way of children getting the help they need.

Hear hear

Yes, it would be absolutely devastating to come to terms with what you had condoned. Probably unbearably so, unless you could transfer some of the blame to the medical professionals.

They have to believe that, for all the downsides, the alternative would have been worse. They have to believe that their child might well have killed themselves if they hadn't gone along with it. Every parent's greatest nightmare, the worst possible outcome.

And they'll still be receiving a lot of validation of this viewpoint. Possibly their own child is still saying and believing that suicide was the only alternative.

It's toxic, but what parent wouldn't be terrified out of their wits if they thought there was a risk their child might commit suicide.

Or the other thing they say - that you can stop them while they're minors but as soon as they can they'll leave you, do it anyway, and your relationship with them will be over forever.

Emotional blackmail is very effective when we are talking about our children, the people we love and cherish most.

That just sparked a thought.

I've read doctors bemoaning the need some patients exhibit to leave their surgery clutching a prescription. 'Advice' doesn't qualify as treatment, only 'medicine'.

I wonder if there's a similar thought process involved, where only medical treatment counts as treatment, anything else and you're just being fobbed off?

They've got three factual and analytical articles on the Cass review all of which are on the front page - which you seem to have ignored. And this one human interest story providing a counter-argument. I don't see a problem with that.

The creeping medicalisation of distress, over the last two decades has not helped with the "trans debate". Students were homesick and adjusting to being responsible for themselves(and quite possibly using alcohol to socialise) they were then told that they may have depression and anxiety. If you have an illness, then services are sought to "cure" you. People expect instant cures, to societal problems. Services become overwhelmed and those people who do have illness are crowded out by those with a level of distress.

Nope. We were right about it all along. Nothing in this report comes as a surprise to anyone on this forum. We're not going to oblige you by shutting up now. Without the constant pressure from naysayers, this report would never have even been commissioned. You're not getting away with this. It has to stop.

@StephanieSuperpowers you've confirmed my view. That both "sides" prefer to be right and score points off each other than to have a reasoned debate that might help the children that are the subject of the Cass report.

Nope. I've always come at this from the point of view of real concern about the safety and welfare of children and women. I've been called every kind of offensive name and lived in fear of my job and reputation being attacked as a result. What I don't accept is being told to shut up again. Nothing has changed yet and I see no reason for women to abandon this and let if float away for the convenience of people who've pushed and pushed to make it happen and prevent proper discussion of the problems. I don't accept that the toxic debate is the responsibility of women for opposing this absolute madness.

I don't know. I just listened to a gender wider lense podcast with Scarlet and what he has been through in America has been horrific. He describes thinking he'd get some exploratory therapy but it was pressure all the way and even his questions and concerns were shut down.

Cass made a point about a toxic culture, yes. But I’m not sure she “both sides-ed” it as you appear to be doing. The toxicity has all come from one side. A side that absolutely needs to create a narrative of “trans kids” in order to validate the experience of middle aged males with a paraphilia, and has screamed abuse at people who do not believe that children need to be medicalised because of other mental health issues that have nothing to do with those experienced by middle aged males.

Yes, I was unfortunately unsurprised to see that Guardian article.
And yes to the 'both sides' - I don't think it was both sides that meant, as Cass said, practitioners were afraid to speak up. I really think only one side advocated affirmation all the way.

The other Guardian articles are covered in other Cass threads. This thread is about this one article.

The Cass report is human interest too - we who have been talking about this for years don't want to see any child unnecessarily medicalised and we want to see better evidence for those small number of people who might possibly benefit from wrong-sex hormones and invasive surgeries.

GIDS has done an appalling job working out which people should be put on the full medical pathway and which should be supported in other ways because of their co-morbidities. Why do you not want that to change for the better?

Cass is very carefully not pointing the finger but she's not saying "both sides" either. She was clear that there was a fear of being called "transphobic" and that practitioners were/are afraid to use the ordinary therapeutic practices that are relied on for other conditions.

CAN-SG must be pretty chuffed. And there are likely to be some implications for conversion practice legislation too.

(oops - sorry if that's off topic for this thread.)

The Guardian are going to have to start doing some interesting pivots.