Hillary Cass at Scottish parliamet - live

[ArabellaScott]

This started at 9am.

https://www.scottishparliament.tv/meeting/health-social-care-and-sport-committee-may-7-2024

80% is the lower end, other studies found over 95% or cases resolved after puberty.

If a kid turns up at a UK doctor who is using PBs bought from outside UK, the data on that kid's experience should be used to increase medical knowledge,

In what way do you think their biased anecdotes would contribute to “proper evidence based research following the scientific method”?

If you are promoting giving puberty blockers to children as part of a trial then you are advocating harm to children.

You could only know that PBs would have potentially been useful after puberty.

And we come back to what is meant by ‘useful’?

@Sloejelly and @AlisonDonut
It feels to me very much like because no gender borg can debate why they think all the current gender woowoo is great, that for you I'm going to have to do as an outlet. I don't support gender ideology, or whats being done to kids.

example
OK lets start with this... You take all the kids who self report as transgender

Can we define 'transgender' first?

What is it?

I am not advocating for transgenderism. When I use the words "self report as transgender" I'm trying to convey that kids believe something about gender trumping sex. It's a big pile of all sorts of muddled gobbledygook. The kids identifies as some element(s) of that muddled pile. My language is "self reports" as having some element of the shitshow. Clearly I'm not validating it when I say "self reports as". If I said ( regluarly ) "transgender kids" then you'd have a point, but I don't. If you have a better phrase to describe those kids then I'm all ears.

If you want to have a crack a defining transgender, have at it. I have no such desire because I don't believe it, but i still need to be able to use language to describe who I'm referring to.

I think Cass erred on the side of diplomacy when she said puberty blockers should only be assessed as part of a rigorous research trial because I highly suspect Cass knows damn well that such a trial would never get past any proper ethics committee because of the harm that would result, not to mention the very real problem as OldCrone points out of there being no clear indication as to what is being treated.

She knew if she said “not now, not ever” it would be a stick to beat her report with. Saying what she said doesn’t mean there’s a valid option of doing just that.

There were many reports of people claiming benefit from their lobotomy. It doesn’t matter how many that was or what the percentage was. It was clear you could not identify which patients would.

There is no such thing as a trans child. It’s not possible to be born in the wrong body. Even if adults think their lives are better because of PBs, they are saying that while existing with the harm they have inflicted.

It would be like testing a vaccine for ingrowing toenails that only works on people who've had both feet cut off.

Yes. If puberty solves almost all cases of dysphoria it would be insane highly illogical to treat all cases of dysphoria by blocking puberty.

If you want to have a crack a defining transgender, have at it. I have no such desire because I don't believe it, but i still need to be able to use language to describe who I'm referring to.

Do you though?

Nobody can define 'transgender' or 'gender' or 'gender whatever' and those that have, basically include all women who own a chainsaw or a drill, or guys who like to do the washing.

It is all bobbins. The whole rotten lot of it.

That's the point. Once you use the term you are moving them from 'normal human who likes a range of things or people' to 'potential human for therapeutic or medical intervention'.

For x condition there are two treatment options, only one can be followed:

• Treatment A - 95% complete cure rate, no adverse effects, no ongoing treatment necessary
• Treatment B - anecdote suggests possible benefit to 0.00001%, serious adverse effects, lifetime dependency on medication, requires ongoing surgeries, and high risk of suicide following treatment.

Dear ethics committee, we intend to run a trial comparing these treatments. Half the children will get treatment A and half will get treatment B….

Having watched the committee session I’m pensive: the MSPs in this committee seemed to largely have a good grasp of what Cass was saying in her report and largely seemed non-hostile to Cass herself. Should we anticipate future statements or voting behaviour to reflect this new understanding they’ve reached post-Cass Review? Or is that too much to hope for?

@Sloejelly
No.
What you do is push 100% of patients through treatment A that has a 95% sucess rate. You check to see if it's working for each patient. For 95% it will work.
For the remaining 5% you then explore other options. Try and figure out why option A doesn't work for them. What's different?

50/50 A B is strawmanning. Making up something ridiculous and then holding it up as ridiculous. Absurdity is not a rational argument.

@lechiffre55
If you want to have a crack a defining transgender, have at it. I have no such desire because I don't believe it, but i still need to be able to use language to describe who I'm referring to.

It's not any of us who need to define this. It's anyone who is proposing a scientific study on the benefits of giving puberty blocking medication to physically healthy children.

You have suggested that some (a tiny proportion) might benefit. So you must believe that it is possible that some condition might exist which would make this treatment beneficial for this tiny minority of children. We need to define what the condition is and be able to accurately diagnose this condition and accurately predict which children with this condition (if any) would benefit from the treatment. And also weigh the benefits against the harms.

But you can't devise a study without defining what the condition is which is being treated and what would constitute a positive outcome. To my knowledge these have not yet been defined. Dr Cass mentioned the possibility of a study, but I don't think she gave any such definitions.

So it amounts to devising a study of an undefined condition, with no accurate diagnostic criteria, where the positive outcomes of treatment have also not been defined. We need definitions.

Is it ridiculous? What proportion were put on option B by GIDS?

THIS ^
It was a genius move insisting that PBs for children can only be part of a research trial. This puts medics - including all the dangerous ones who've been sterilising children for so long - in the position of having to openly advocate for chemical castration, bodily mutilation, reduced mental / brain functioning, increased risk of osteoperosis and all the other associated harms it's believed these drugs do to children.
They won't get it past an ethics committees and they open themselves up to massive litigation when they prioritise a mental delusion over the right to evidenced base health care for children.

So you agree it would be unethical to give any child puberty blockers?

I can see where @lechiffre55 is coming from. Observational data can still be useful if it is collected in a systematic manner.

So, in this scenario, if a patient turned up that had been self medicating, then the doctor would have to hand a script/questionnaire of the information to be collected, and a defined follow up period. The key is that the same information is collected from each patient in order to be able to analyse it. To be honest they should already be doing this for all ex-Tavistock patients as they deserve proper follow up.

It’s not as good as a controlled clinical trial from a statistical point of view, but it’s about as ethical as you can get under the circumstances. And of course, each patient must consent to their data being gathered and used.

As far as I can tell 100% were put on the PB pathway by GIDS, but I am not supporting or defending that. I seem to remember reports that there was only one that got turned down?
Cass has thankfully had a massive effect on the gender woowoo religion. I am assuming and hoping that the priests of gender will get no say medical research of this topic going forwards. If you want to argue we shouldn't give them carte blanche, and keep an eye on them going forwards then I would agree.
What I don't agree with is a completly close minded approach to the subject that it just a mirror image of the TRA position.
Let's say after Cass that medical research is done. Say all NHS puberty blockers are put on indefinite hold. And the researchers study all the kids who have taken or are taking PBs from abroad. That data is useful, and it may even evidentially show that there are no cases or situations where PBs result in a better outcome for these kids. Then we will have actual research that says "PBs are bad in all cases and should never be used".
I am literally saying science might and I stress that might heavily, say under these circumstances it can be of benefit. I'm not saying they are of benefit, I'm saying research might find so. I'm not a scientist or in the medical field. I am assuming that research will now be conducted in good faith where it hasn't been previously. In practice they are going have to change from the virtue feelz school of pseudo-science to actual evidence based science, and that's going to take time, and need the removal of some gender champions from the field.

This is anecdotal data not an observational study. You have no idea how these children would have responded without treatment, let alone with appropriate psychotherapy. It is highly biased and subjective. It tells you nothing about the appropriateness or success of the treatment. You have participates who are hugely invested in their private treatment and have fallen for a sales pitch. You are also asking patients whose brain development has been impacted by the drugs. You do not have a complete cohort - you know nothing about the missing patients…

As her performance at the Scottish parliament evidences, Dr Cass has dealt with this magnificently. Although many of us who've been battling these incomprehensible levels of child abuse for years were a bit shocked at her perceived pandering to the trans lobby, she was right. As someone said upthread, in ensuring that she listened, included and referenced trans groups and individuals, all the normal wails that emerge whenever anything is said that fails to 100% agree with their demands, can now be ignored.

The evidence along with her patience and ability to respond to every challenge are a joy to see. The medical abuse of children is all unraveling faster than we dared hope.

⬆️⬆️ THIS Well said MrsOvertonsWindow

Oh I do hope so, I really do. My trust of Scottish politicians has gone and apart from a tiny number who have tried to push back against this (such as Joanna Cherry, Neal Hanvey and Ash Regan), the rest, to me, are contemptible. Actively shouting down concerns about child harm to further their batshit agenda. No more. Stop.

As an aside I'm still really annoyed that despite Dr Cass shining a light on this I can't be honest about it at my work. Everyone in my wider team has a pronoun declared on their email (not me, thankfully not mandatory yet, but I'm the odd one out!) we work with Stonewall, some colleagues have their logo on their email signatures (even though it is not the official marketing signature). During women's history month in March the internal internet had a story about a transwoman's achievement(!). On international women's day there was nothing mentioned at all, it was not even marked as a day. Yet LGBT history month in Feb was full of internet stories and already they have 3 news headlines promoting June and what they are going to talk about for equality week in June (to mark Pride etc). No mention of women or even men with health problems, it's literally just about trans joy. It's just a constant drip drip of this and it means that despite proof of child harm and the light Dr Cass has shone on this, I can't say anything (even casually) at my work. Ugh. I feel like I'm in some sort of dystopian novel!

Jeez some of the questions they asked Dr Cass?!?!? 🙈🙈🙈

x.com/markthehibby/status/1787794011878539548?s=46&t=AjtjSItRj-kgZwRzL-pdyQ

Basically "some random on Twitter said it was dubious science, is that true?" 🙈🙈

Strewth.

Does anyone have Cass's answer to that?

That sounds bloody awful. INeedAPensieve.

Hopefully, as the ripples from this report spread outwards, things at your work will reflect that.

https://www.scottishparliament.tv/meeting/health-social-care-and-sport-committee-may-7-2024?clip_start=09:21:37&clip_end=09:23:26