Stonewall change definition of transphobia - questioning gender identity ok now

[fromorbit]

Huge climb down. Looks like those pesky terf women were right all along AGAIN.

Saying that trans women are men is no longer "transphobic" according to Stonewall.

Dennis give good analysis and provides text:
1/ The gender borg have every right to be furious with @stonewalluk for sneakily ditching their belief in gender identity in their new definition of transphobia. Political transvestitism holds that men in dresses have soul-like female gender identities - Stonewall now denies this
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1885735444836388921.html

The reverse weasel move is an attempt to find a safe place to claim lost ground, but opens them up to attack from TA fanatics as well as looking more absurd to normal people. They staked everything on hating women and gay people and now want to retreat when it is unpopular.

However, continuing on, the wider societal issue needs to also be considered here. It absolutely is harmful to the needs of female people for people to use preferred language. Because we have seen a repetitive theme in activism from extreme transgender activists that runs along the lines of 'because society uses she/her and calls me a women, it is a cruel violation of my rights to be excluded in any provision that is meant for female people'.

In other words, because my work and all my well meaning friends used my demanded language changes, I am now telling you as policy makers that you are causing me untold mental harm in denying me access to female single sex provisions, even though I was born a male.

Here are just two examples of trans 'spokespeople' saying that people using pronouns and changing identity documents does mean that society views them as women and that therefore they should absolutely be treated as women.

F Wallace

https://twitter.com/Isla_macy/status/1706382987682554144 at around 2 hr 5 mins

Ivy/McKinnon

https://news.sky.com/story/trans-cyclist-rachel-mckinnon-defends-her-right-to-race-in-womens-competitions-11838131

And here

https://twitter.com/Isla_macy/status/1706382987682554144

I believe that somewhere in the transcripts for the court cases of Mridul Wadha (Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre) and the NHS Fife case where Dr Upton gives testimony, that they too have said this. Or maybe just inferred it.

Either way, this theme of because society treats me as a women it is cruel to deny my access to female single sex provisions is a common emotionally manipulative tactic that has been used.

Then comes the harm to society where due to using demanded language misinformation is spread. You only have to look at the BBC reporting of where male people with transgender identities are convicted of sex crimes. If you were not aware, you would think that female sex crimes are dramatically increasing. Last time I looked, due to the statistic collection at the time, it had doubled. Because it included male people. And I am not sure yet whether the CPS has rectified the issue.

The harm comes when people hear or read something like:

She has been excluded from using female single sex provisions, this is discrimination .

vs

He has been excluded from using female single sex provisions, this is discrimination .

So, no. I cannot agree with you that it is harmless and just polite.

You can choose to do whatever you want, of course. But your narrative that it is doesn't cost us anything. And that is a false claim when you consider the collective harm on society. I think people who try to dismiss the harm and the cost to society and to people either choose to ignore the impacts or they prioritise one small group of people knowing the wider impact to society.

Why do you think it doesn't cost anything to just be polite and use demanded language?

Here are some links to criticisms and the serious flaws of the 'Dutch Protocol' which Janine might find interesting. Sadly the NY Times, podcasts linked to above failed to give full context to the Dutch Protocol and didn't mention that significant studies that the Dutch used to support their model have been debunked.

The Dutch Model is falling apart

By Stella O'Malley / 2 January 2023

First, Stella O’Malley writes about an article in Nederlands that is throwing a great deal of light on the Dutch Protocol. It also seems that there will be a review of the patients that the Dutch team had not previously included in their papers.

This article in the Nederlands points out the dangers on only using a nation’s own sources with no international input or even wide review.

genspect.org/the-dutch-model-is-falling-apart/

and

The Myth of “Reliable Research” in Pediatric Gender Medicine: A critical evaluation of the Dutch Studies—and research that has followed

E. Abbruzzese, Stephen B. Levine, Julia W. Mason

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0092623X.2022.2150346

Our analysis of the Dutch protocol has been written with three goals in mind. First, we wanted to definitively refute the claims that the foundational Dutch research represents “solid prospective research” that provides reliable evidence of net benefits of youth gender transition. In fact, it is much better described as case series—one of the lowest levels of evidence available (Dekkers et al., Citation2012, Mathes & Pieper, Citation2017). Second, we aimed to demonstrate that the type of non-comparative, short-term research that the gender medicine establishment continues to pursue is incapable of generating reliable information. And third and most importantly, we wanted to remind the medical community that medicine is a double-edged sword capable of both much good and much harm. The burden of proof—demonstrating that a treatment does more good than harm—is on those promoting the intervention, not on those concerned about the harms. Until gender medicine commits to conducting high quality research capable of reliably demonstrating the preponderance of benefits over harms of these invasive interventions, we must be skeptical of the enthusiasm generated by headlines claiming that yet another “gender study” proved benefits of transitioning youth. This time-honored concern about risk/benefit ratio is a sobering reminder that the history of medicine is replete with examples of “cures” which turned out to far more harmful than the “disease.”

And then the documentary and the researcher who worked on the one of the studies reworked the findings correctly....

A documentary on the Dutch Protocol

There are currently almost 3,000 young people on the waiting list for gender care in the Netherlands. They are vulnerable adolescents who are frequently subjected to discrimination. Many of them suffer severe mental distress. Doctors at the gender clinic in Amsterdam are pioneers in care for transgender young people. The treatment developed here years ago is now used worldwide. Now, criticism is growing. International experts are questioning the scientific evidence put forward by the clinicians in Amsterdam. Zembla investigates the Dutch transgender protocol.

What this covers is that no gender clinic has been able to replicate the results of the Dutch paper. One patient of the group died due to the surgery complications of gender surgery and even de Vries questioned why no one seemed interested in that patient while accepting the study. Dr Riittakerttu Kaltiala (Professor of Pschyiatry, Tampere and who set up gender clinics) and Mikael Landen (Professor of Pscyhiatry, Gotenberg) and Dr Angela Samfjord (Head of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the University of Gotenberg ) all are interviewed about the quality of the study behind the protocol and its flaws that became apparent later. Ie. The 55 patients is so small and de Vries acknowledges that they are not really similar to todays cohort of adolescent transitioners. That only 32 filled in the survey with positive results. The others were not chased up and one died.

Gerard van Breukelen, a professor of Methodology at Maastricht university goes on record to say that the methodology of that initial study was weak. There was no control group so the conclusions should not have been considered as strong as the gender clinicians claimed. Other academics declined to be interviewed due to fear for their employment as it is such a contentious issue. When talking to de Vries, she mentions that many more studies have been done by other countries now. And the doco makers mention that all those studies de Vries refer to have stated that the evidence is low quality. A Swedish team led by Landen was asked to do a full review by the Swedish government and he confirms that the evidence was just not there. Hence the Swedish government withdrew treatment.

The mention the Cass review and discussion ‘locking in’ of identities contradicts the ‘time to think’ narrative. They interview three transitioners. One detransitionered before surgery and one is happy with transition but not with the process the team followed. The one who detransitioned was put on hormones despite not even socially transitioning as he felt wearing a dress was ‘a man wearing a dress’. But was put on hormones but didn’t go through surgery after all. It also wraps up with Lucy who was stuck on the waiting list and who believes that if she was given PBs, she would not have ended up transitioning. She has obviously detransitioned now after double mastectomy and testosterone, then ovaries and uterus removal.

The peer reviewed reanalysis of the UK study. McPherson & Freedman both worked on the initial analysis of the patient clinical data.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0092623X.2023.2281986

Psychological Outcomes of 12–15-Year-Olds with Gender Dysphoria Receiving Pubertal Suppression in the UK: Assessing Reliable and Clinically Significant Change

Susan McPherson & David E. P. Freedman

Published online: 29 Nov 2023

Abstract

The evidence base for psychological benefits of GnRHA for adolescents with gender dysphoria (GD) was deemed “low quality” by the UK National Institute of Health and Care Excellence. Limitations identified include inattention to clinical importance of findings. This secondary analysis of UK clinical study data uses Reliable and Clinically Significant Change approaches to address this gap. The original uncontrolled study collected data within a specialist GD service. Participants were 44 12–15-year-olds with GD. Puberty was suppressed using “triptorelin”; participants were followed-up for 36 months. Secondary analysis used data from parent-report Child Behavior Checklists and Youth Self-Report forms. Reliable change results: 15–34% of participants reliably deteriorated depending on the subscale, time point and parent versus child report. Clinically significant change results: 27–58% were in the borderline (subclinical) or clinical range at baseline (depending on subscale and parent or child report). Rates of clinically significant change ranged from 0 to 35%, decreasing over time toward zero on both self-report and parent-report. The approach offers an established complementary method to analyze individual level change and to examine who might benefit or otherwise from treatment in a field where research designs have been challenged by lack of control groups and low sample sizes.

Regarding low quality evidence of the studies that are being used to support the WPATH treatment plan. Here are Canadian and NZ research teams also agreeing with Cass that there is little supporting evidence.

Canada finds low evidence

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/transgender-treatments-for-kids
https://archive.ph/fLMxA
"The Canadian team combed the available evidence, pooling the results of research on puberty blockers and gender affirming hormones for children and youth up to age 26. They graded the evidence using a scoring system co-developed by Dr. Gordon Guyatt, a celebrated McMaster scientist who coined the phrase evidence-based medicine.
Article content
After screening 6,736 titles and abstracts involving puberty blockers, only 10 studies were included in their review. While children who received puberty blockers compared to those who don’t score higher on “global function” — quality of life, and general physical and psychological wellbeing — the evidence was of “very low certainty.” Very low, meaning researchers have “very little confidence in the effect estimate” and that the true effect “is likely to be substantially different from the estimate of effect.”
The studies also provided low certainty of evidence on the impact of puberty blockers on depression. While they may decrease depression in “male-to-female participants,” they didn’t decrease depression scores in the female-to-male group. “We are very uncertain about the causal effect of the (drugs) on depression,” the researchers wrote.
“Most studies provided very low certainty of evidence about the outcomes of interest thus, we cannot exclude the possibility of benefit or harm,” they said."

Here are the studies referenced in the article from McMaster University
https://adc.bmj.com/content/archdischild/early/2025/01/24/archdischild-2024-327909.full.pdf
And
https://adc.bmj.com/content/archdischild/early/2025/01/24/archdischild-2024-327921.full.pdf

New Zealand

https://www.health.govt.nz/news/additional-safeguards-for-puberty-blockers

Publication date: 21 November 2024
The Ministry of Health is today releasing an evidence brief and position statement on the use of puberty blockers for gender identity issues and outlining a more cautious approach to their use.
The evidence brief shows a lack of good quality evidence to back the effectiveness and safety of puberty blockers when used for this purpose.

What this covers is that no gender clinic has been able to replicate the results of the Dutch paper.

Generally in science if no one can replicate the results of an earlier study or research there are questions asked about whether the original research was reliable or potentially falsified.

Or, if you prefer your facts to be accompanied by music, there's this:

And here are the WPATH leaked files. I would suggest readers should not simply take transgender organisations at face value when they double down on saying things that support the current treatment plans and that don't highlight the very significant issues with affirming only. There has been a great deal of concern that has been frequently dismissed by those very ideologically driven organisations.

Here is one link to the WPATH pdf
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/56a45d683b0be33df885def6/t/65e64b9e5cbd756da9fbbdfa/1709591479160/Final+WPATH+Report.pdf

and another
https://environmentalprogress.org/big-news/wpath-files

Here are some of the reactions:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13156695/Trans-healthcare-doctors-exposed-admitting-patients-young-mentally-ill-understand-consequences-treatment.html

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/03/05/wpath-tansgender-hormone-therapy-cancer-links-leaked-emails/

https://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/wpath-the-truth-about-gender-affirming-healthcare/

https://genspect.org/the-wpath-files-revealed/

Here is a summary from Michael Shellenberger.
https://x.com/shellenberger/status/1764800595473686865?s=20

And the first part. Much more of it requires images.

Here is the threadreader version:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1764799914918490287.html

THE WPATH FILES

Advocates of gender-affirming care say it’s evidence-based.

But now, newly released internal files from the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) prove that the practice of transgender medicine is neither scientific nor medical.

American Medical Association, The Endocrine Society, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and thousands of doctors worldwide rely on WPATH. It is considered the leading global authority on gender medicine.

And yet WPATH’s internal files, which include written discussions and a video, reveal that its members know they are creating victims and not getting “informed consent.”

Victims include a 10-year-old girl, a 13-year-old developmentally delayed adolescent, and individuals suffering from schizophrenia and other serious mental illnesses.

The injuries described in the WPATH Files include sterilization, loss of sexual function, liver tumors, and death.

WPATH members indicate repeatedly that they know that many children and their parents don’t understand the effects that puberty blockers, hormones, and surgeries will have on their bodies. And yet, they continue to perform and advocate for gender medicine.

The WPATH Files prove that gender medicine is comprised of unregulated and pseudoscientific experiments on children, adolescents, and vulnerable adults. It will go down as one of the worst medical scandals in history.

Why I Am Publishing WPATH Files And How I Got Them

The written WPATH Files come from WPATH’s member discussion forum, which runs on software provided by DocMatter.

Ninety seconds of the 82-minute video was made public last year. We are making the full video available for the first time.

One or more people gave me the WPATH Files, and my colleagues and I attempted to summarize them as a series of articles. We quickly realized the topic was too sensitive, complex, and large to be dealt with as a work of journalism, and we moved the project to the research institute I founded seven years ago, Environmental Progress (EP).

The Files are authentic. We redacted most names and left only those individuals who are leading gender medicine practitioners to whom we sent “right-of-reply” emails. We know WPATH members discussed our emails internally. No WPATH leader or member has denied that the Files are anything other than what they appear to be.

EP is publishing a 70-page report to provide context for the 170 pages of WPATH Files. Mia Hughes is the author of the report. It and accompanying summary materials can be downloaded at the link below. That link also provides a link to the full WPATH video.

Regarding detransition and regret rates and why I said that the link to HRC was really spreading misinformation.

HRC from where Janine got the quote: "Every single major medical organization, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, and the American Psychiatric Association, supports the provision of age-appropriate, gender-affirming care for transgender and non-binary people. These organizations represent millions of doctors, researchers, and mental health professionals in the United States. Gender-affirming care has always existed and isn’t a new phenomenon" from.

Says this about regret and detransition:

www.hrc.org/resources/get-the-facts-on-gender-affirming-care

What if someone transitions and then they change their mind about it?

"Previous studies have found that de-transitioning is quite rare —with some studies finding levels of de-transition and regret as low as 1% or 2%. Transgender youth who meet criteria for gender dysphoria and who undergo social or medical transition are actually the least likely to de-transition — and those vast majority of transgender youth remain consistent and persistent in their gender identity over time: One recent study, published in the academic journal Pediatrics, followed over 300 transgender youth after first initiating social transition, and found that over 92% remained consistent and persistent in their gender identity 5 years later. However, evidence-based standards of care exist to ensure that no one, regardless of their age, undergoes any permanent, irreversible changes without informed consent and careful consultation with medical and mental health care providers."

Here is Dr Az Hazeem saying he had about 26% of his patients regretted transitioning.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12623643/Being-trans-non-binary-new-sub-culture-risk-raising-nation-chemically-castrated-children-Doctor-spent-12-years-working-vulnerable-teens-Tavistock-warns-gender-ideology.html

He said 26 per cent of his patients at the Tavistock and Portman regretted transitioning.

Here is a study on a small sample of trans patients and the standard of care.

www.mdpi.com/2227-9032/10/1/121/htm

A few things stand out.
-the number of patients with underlying mental health issues. And how they are being completely let down by affirming only treatment.

-The number of visits before receiving hormones was 2.7 appointments.
-67 patients average age 27.8 years -range was 12- 54
-42 females, 22 males, four NB (3 f / 1 m)
-Female mean age is 18 years, male 23 years.
-Out of the 67, only 9 (13%) had NO mental health diagnosis. 10 (15%) had diagnosed ASD, 4 with ADHD (6%), 3 (4%) with OCD, 1 with Bipolar, 7 (10%) with a Personality Disorder. 13 (19%) had documented childhood abuse, neglect or violence.

The rate of "detransition" amongst those who had received at least hormones was 9.8%. This is in line with the European study below which showed a long term detransition rate of medicalised transitioners of males 8.8% and females 8.3%.

However from this study

Nine patients had stopped hormone therapy; one related to practice policy because they had not attended any GIC follow-up (the patient has restarted since the audit). Thus, eight patients had stopped hormones voluntarily (20% stopping rate; six trans men, two trans women).

This is another study with the figures 8.8% & 8.3%:*

//www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5580378/

135 natal males (119 living in the female role, 12 in the male role, 4 did not report their current gender role) and 66 natal females (60 living in the male role, 5 in the female role, 1 did not report a current gender role)

So... 8.88% of males and 8.33% of the females (this does not include those who did not answer the question which if the answer was to detransition would make these figures higher). And in Figure 3. 22.2% of those who socially transitioned, detransitioned.

IMPORTANT NOTE: MOST OF THE ABOVE RELATES TO EARLIER TRANSITIONERS AND DON'T REFLECT THE CURRENT COHORT WHICH DROVE TRANSITIONING NUMBERS EXPONENTIALLY AFTER AROUND 2017. There are no figures for current detransitioners however, they are quickly becoming vocal like never before and there seems to be a great many of them. All unmeasured!

Those figures of 1% or 2% look pretty much false in the light of just these reviews, testimonies and studies. But... apparently.... the HRC is a reputable source of information according to heavily invested transgender activist groups.

By the way, SEGM has a page with links to studies. This is a great archive.

It covers treatment, and side effects, mental health, suicide, even social transitioning.

https://segm.org/studies

Here are more organisations making the same statement about low evidence supporting treatment plans as Cass did.

In January 2024, the WHO has become the latest to declare that there is a significant lack of evidence that the current treatment for children and adolescents around gender.

"the evidence base for children and adolescents is limited and variable regarding the longer-term outcomes of gender affirming care for children and adolescents"

tgdfaq16012024.pdf (who.int)

This update came less than a month after the WHO released what was supposedly their guidelines that were supposedly, at the time, very well evidenced and supposedly balanced.

Plus Finland

https://www.thefp.com/p/gender-affirming-care-dangerous-finland-doctor

Here are the recommendations Dr Kaltiala refers to in Finnish

https://palveluvalikoima.fi/documents/1237350/22895008/Alaikäiset_suositus.pdf/c987a74c-dfac-d82f-2142-684f8ddead64/Alaikäiset_suositus.pdf?t=1592317701000

An English version has not been posted to the site. But it is available on SEGM.

https://segm.org/sites/default/files/Finnish_Guidelines_2020_Minors_Unofficial%20Translation.pdf

This is from the article above.

In June of 2020 a major event happened in my field. Finland’s national medical body, COHERE, released its findings and recommendations regarding youth gender transition. It concluded that the studies touting the success of the “gender-affirming” model were biased and unreliable—systematically so in some cases.

The authors wrote: “In light of available evidence, gender reassignment of minors is an experimental practice.” The report stated that young patients seeking gender transition should be instructed about “the reality of a lifelong commitment to medical therapy, the permanence of the effects, and the possible physical and mental adverse effects of the treatments.” The report warned that young people, whose brains were still maturing, lacked the ability to properly “assess the consequences” of making decisions they would have to live with for the “rest of their lives.”

COHERE also recognized the dangers of giving hormone treatments to young people with serious mental illness. The authors concluded that for all these reasons, gender transition should be postponed “until adulthood.”

I am not going to continue to look for the Norway and Danish national health researchers findings. I think there are enough 'Western European' countries here that have indicated that they recognise that they are significant issues around treatments for children with gender dysphoria just like Hilary Cass did.

You've far more patient than I have Hellofabore.

You know Red, I had an hour spare. And it was interesting to see the subterfuge that the US agencies are pulling at the moment.

I think that they have worded their policies on gender care very carefully now compared to what they used to be. I think people who read them without understanding the back history probably do think that when they talk about 'appropriate gender treatment' that those agencies actually do give very careful diagnosis and long term counselling etc.

But, there are far too many anecdotes from patients and clinicians to show that what these agencies support is very poor quality care in the USA indeed.

Potentially Janine has not really thought as deeply as they think they have about the issues. It is always worth providing links to counter misinformation.

It is very disheartening when you realise just how much misinformation is out there and just how much emotionally manipulative 'be kind' pleas have actually led to significant harm, isn't it?

And it serves a nice reminder to even regular posters on where to find the information they want to read.

Given the amount of work Helle's put in to provide all these links and evidence, you'd hope that poster doesn't do a 'evidence is sooo mean!!' and actually considers them properly.

One small addition to @Helleofabore 's great set of posts: as well as the direct unfairness to women of opening up female single sex supports to male people, validating transgender identities is at heart a validation that the meaningful differences between men and women are mental not physical. That harms each and every one of us because it relegitimises all those discredited sexist ideas about women that men used to exclude us from having social, political and economic power.

Not directly related to gender care but I came across this talk on The Origins of the DSM by Dr James Davies. Its about how the DSM was compiled by a very small task force and not particularly based on good medical evidence.

(DSM - US psychiatric diagnostic manual)

Thank you for all the research and links - quite a few are new to me so I will endeavour to do some reading over the next couple of days. I was aware that the Dutch protocol had been held out as questionable due to it not being replicable however lots of other research to get through.

Well, sorry then, the notion of 'evidence' rattled me. I was not expecting a day in court so to say ;-)

That said, I got a lot of useful links to other sources (SEGM), but to be frank, and this is in relation to my reaction on (deliberate) misgendering, it seems that everyone everywhere agrees to be very careful when it comes to transgender care for minors, but (in Europe at least) the existence of transgenders, thus trans men and trans women is not put into question.

On the other hand on media in general, it is much- much more coloured than that. Also here. When I mentioned Vince, now Vanessa, that I she was kind-of talked into that, my kids not visiting theirs. I don't get that.

The advice to explain to my children that it they should think about themselves, how they are and not just copying (I also heard stories no teachers where the majority of the class apparently was), that is good

My thanks for your efforts !

:-) I just did that !

"the existence of transgenders, thus trans men and trans women is not put into question."

But what are 'trans men' and 'trans women'?

There are no neurological or biological markers for being 'transgender'. I think we have established this fact.

Therefore they are people with a philosophical belief that doesn't reflect material reality.

No one says those people don't exist.

But people are pointing out to you that just because someone has a philosophical belief about themselves, when it doesn't reflect material reality why does society comply to

linguistic demands

health care demands
and for inclusion demands when sex matters?

If you cannot answer this without resorting to an emotional reason, doesn't this concern you?

What other groups in society do we give priority to, and additional privileges to above everyone else's rights, based on a philosophical belief that doesn't reflect material reality?

Why do you think any society should be doing this?

I'm not aiming this at anyone in particular (honestly!), I'm just musing - but it's not a bad thing to be asked 'you say you know, or believe, XYZ - why? What has led you to believe this?' - so much in life we have to just take things at face value or think 'that sounds like the sort of thing people with my values would believe' (immigrants good/bad, etc) without actually analysing 'how would I find out if this is actually the case? What if it's more complex than a black & white issue - what if I come to a conclusion that something is good in some circumstances and harmful in others?'

I think society would be far more harmonious if people were curious enough to ask themselves how to establish an evidence base for their beliefs (or just be open to thinking critically about it and not necessarily having to have an opinion on something!)

The advice to explain to my children that it they should think about themselves, how they are and not just copying (I also heard stories no teachers where the majority of the class apparently was), that is good

I would say, ask them to think about what it is THEY think differentiates men from women. If you're a boy and you think/feel a certain way, how do you know 'only girls think/are like that' if you're an example of a boy who thinks/feels that way too?

Hi,

I was over at Vanessa's place this weekend, with my kids.

Thing is, in some reactions when I mentioned her, I noticed people jumping to conclusions, also about my son, that he's manipulative or angry. What to say, obviously people here don't know him, else they'd know they'd got it all wrong. But also, despite some good information for which I am grateful, the reactions show that it may come with a bias.

Vanessa's parents are nice people, they're not pushing her, they're confronted with, in today's climate, a difficult situation. They feel being ostracized, and the stress it causes, to them to Vanessa.

It is that what makes my son angry, because it is unfair to her, and if he is aware of unfairness he comes up for those who are treaded unfair. That's why I mention he'd be angry with me, not because of opinion, but because he'd expect better of me. That's what he expects, that I would treat Vanessa as she is without prejudice and that is unrelated to the debate on 'spaces'

My daughter has also thought about it. For her, well if Vanessa is a girl, then that's who she is, but she's aware of the degrees of, as she called, 'perceiving as a girl'. She was clear that if Vanessa would transition all the way, of course she'd be welcome in the same spaces, but before that ... ... After some thinking she volunteered as a solution that the space did not matter so much as an agreement in respect, thus not together, after one another, literally 'leaving space for each other' and not 'forcing Vanessa out of a space'. I found it impressive how she came to that.

After talking to Vanessa's parents it was clear that the whole problem is theoretical, Vanessa's doesn't want to be seen by anyone, stress caused by dysphoria.

After some thinking she volunteered as a solution that the space did not matter so much as an agreement in respect, thus not together, after one another, literally 'leaving space for each other' and not 'forcing Vanessa out of a space'. I found it impressive how she came to that.

Is this paragraph saying that your daughter would be happy for Vanessa to use female single sex spaces as long as its not at the same time as her.

To me it appears that when talking about 'man' vs. 'woman' differences, as they play out and how we act and react to it are religious before cultural before biology, before genetics. The impression I get is that when the emphasis is totally on genetics (DNA, sex as born) it comes from the US and voiced by the descendants of the protestant people that didn't like the 'age of enlightenment' in Europe and shipped themselves to the new world. For the UK perhaps 'queen Victoria' and the empire, and the law and cultural habits that were of that age. For many African countries those colonial laws are the basis of their current ones. Practically Sharia, everything that is not heterosexual women subject to man is forbidden and transgender as a consequence totally outlawed.

Culture also as in Cultural Feminism, maybe not literally as such, but the recognition that there is something as female values, and where does that come from if not from 'being' and thus the mind.

After that, biology in the medical sense, the brain is responsive to sex hormones, so it is equally possible that certain brains work better with hormones of a certain sex, thus testosteron for a trans men, and estrogen for a trans woman. I think that is plausible. Also how hormones affect the body growth in puberty (from which the notion of puberty blockers for trans children come, to not expose them to the body their minds do not agree with), so that part of transgender care for minors makes sense, provided it is applied to a transgender minor obviously

So as a whole I recognize transgender as something that is real, and that gender and being a 'man', or 'woman' in that sense is not only defined by genetics. Or in popular culture terms, I agree more with Emma Watson than with Mrs. Rowling

It is dizzying, and to be honest, it truly feels like a culture war, blown out of proportion. For the sake of more references, I found a reaction on the Cass report. I had seen other reports, a mix of both confirmations and question marks, here's another of such a one

law.yale.edu/sites/default/files/documents/integrity-project_cass-response.pdf