NYT Article: Trump’s Attack on Trans Youth Research Is a Tragic Error

[UtopiaPlanitia]

This guest essay is written by Jesse Singal and his argument in this piece baffles me.

Why a knowledgeable journalist, who has done so much to expose incompetence and dangerous ideology in this area of medicine, would continue to argue that all that is needed to improve this area of medicine is the right research methodology into physical interventions is beyond me.

Why can Singal not realise that there is no safe way to give puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, or surgical procedures to anyone never mind giving them to adolescents?!

It frustrates me that he seems to think that there is safe, compromise middle-path for physical interventions. I don’t understand the mindset of someone who think that way.

Posting the article here to see what others think of his argument:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/27/opinion/trump-transgender-youth-research.html

https://archive.is/IfB9I

‘I’ve long been a critic of American youth gender medicine. Researchers in this field have often produced slipshod work and drawn premature conclusions about the benefits of blockers, hormones and surgery. There are serious unanswered questions about the safety and efficacy of these treatments, which have been banned or restricted in about half of American states and a number of European countries in the wake of several damninggovernment-sponsored reports.

But cutting back on research about these treatments would be a tragic error. What this field needs — and what gender-questioning youth deserve — is reform, oversight and higher methodological standards. To cripple this field in its infancy would be to leave countless families in intolerable limbo.’

Singal, mate, do you want "treatments" that turn males into females and vice versa? Because that's impossible.

Or would you accept "treatments" that make males look a bit like females and females look a bit like males? Because that's all that's possible.

And do you want these "treatments" to be safe? That's vanishingly unlikely. Or safer? How much risk is acceptable to you?

Let's face it, this nonsense will continue until almost everyone accepts that it is not possible to turn male humans into female humans nor vice versa.

So the "treatments" are pointless, even if made safer - and a degree safer than downright dangerous is still not actually safe.

Is this a plea for research (quality research) - thinking Cass review?
In which case that sounds fine to me. We do need research in order to place informed restrictions on gender affirming treatments. As we know research is often not long term enough, not rigorous, not trustworthy.

@UtopiaPlanitia surely this is the way to show that there is no safe way. Or to show that there are limits/balances/side-effects of what has previously been considered safe.

Is Trump attacking research in this area?

Very well put!!

I can’t figure out what his reasoning is other than perhaps he believes that there are genuinely children who are trans in some physiological way rather than being negatively psychologically influenced by society.

And given his research in this area, to write so many articles critical of gender medicine, he should know by now that there is no physiological basis to the phenomenon of children wanting to be the other sex. Except possibly in some way for children who typically (but not always) grow up to be same-sex attracted. And if that is a physiological factor, and thus the rationale for carrying out dangerous physical interventions, then that is horrifically homophobic.

I don’t know if Singal is so open-minded that he sees nothing wrong with giving everybody what they want if they ask for it or if he has some belief that better detection by medics is what is called for and is actually possible (like the rationale behind the new PB research project by NHS) 🤷‍♀️

My worry is that the proposed NHS study, and the research Singal is calling for, to assess efficacy and ‘prove’ whether there are harms is that the research itself will generate harms to children.

In my view, it would be better to assess the existing data and the long-term medical status of previous cohorts of patients who have taken puberty blockers for both precocious puberty and gender-related distress.

With regards to the other question - the Trump administration appears to be taking a bull in a china shop approach to reducing federal spending and their proposed targets for reduction and proposed alternatives change on a regular basis.

I think it depends on what he's envisioning as research.

If it's very broad brush, I think more research will confirm that these treatments are bogus, and even that the diagnosis is not really accurately defined.

I would also say, more insight into identity disorders might be a good thing.

I'm not sure research can be fruitful however so long as the researchers are attached to the idea that being trans is a discrete, definable, condition.

Surely what we really want is treatment to help people accept/come to terms with who they actually are, and greater acceptance in society of a wider range of ways to be male and to be female - because everybody is one or the other

All these "middle way" people seem a bit mad to me. It's like proposing a middle way between believing the earth is round and believing it's flat - let's all agree it's an oval, maybe?

The whole issue of children imagining they're the opposite sex is a textbook example of social contagion. All you need to do is stop the propaganda, stop the contagion, and you stop the problem. No medical research needed. End of.

There are two issues though.

One is safe gender affirming care.

The other is how anyone can be sure that a child isn't just confused/angry/upset/ being manipulated.

And no one can tell.

Any supposedly "safe" treatment isn't safe at all if given to children who later regret it.

But trans activists don't want to hear this. They are insistent that the trans child knows best. They want to trans children because it fits into their "wrong body at birth" belief and they want boys in particular to be able to "pass" better and stop girls from developing breasts.

They will never agree to anything other than hormones and surgery as the solution.

But cutting back on research about these treatments would be a tragic error. What this field needs and what gender-questioning youth deserve is reform, oversight and higher methodological standards.

To demonstrate conclusively that there is no safe way to harm children, and that physical intervention is not the solution to confusion or distress.

To cripple this field in its infancy would be to leave countless families in intolerable limbo.

Being pulled one way by the interventionists while common sense and safeguarding pulls them the other way.

I've never understood why anyone thinks there is or ever will be a guaranteed safe way to fill people with wrong-sex hormones that their bodies were not really designed to process. Yes I know women produce a little testosterone but not in the volumes you get from 'affirming' treatment.

And I've seen enough gruesome pictures of surgeries to fill my nightmares for years to come.

For someone who's been relentlessly attacked over this, Jesse is still addicted to nuance.

I think there are two things at play here. The less interesting one is that Jesse, as a good Murican liberal, lives in permanent fear of being called right wing. He can't just say "on this one issue I agree with the administration" - he has to take his distance somehow.

But also I think this is consistent with Jesse's long term position. He's never been absolutely opposed to childhood transitioning, he's only ever said that the evidence base is really thin. I think, with his nuance addiction, he doesn't want to rule out the possibility that somewhere there's some kid who's "true trans" and who might benefit from these treatments.

It's useful having him out there, because he can appeal to people still on the fence, but good grief he can be aggravating sometimes.

@SionnachRuadh
You really nailed it! I had the same thoughts but more vague, thank you for the clarity.

I'm also in the camp that we do need the research and I don't think this order is a good thing.
By saying that, I'm absolutely not advocating for healthy children to be treated like guinea pigs. They should absolutely not be subjected to dodgy experiments.
Sadly, there are almost certainly huge numbers of children who have already been subjected to this to be able to show evidence either way. Just like the Cass Review did, we need to have proper, evidenced based information.
As Cass showed, there are a lot of poor quality papers out there that activists are using to 'prove' they are right to transition children. Those activists are going to keep using that 'research' as a gotcha.
We need to ensure that there is actual, robust research in place so that the very real consequences of this so-called treatment are out there and undeniable.
I do think it is possible to do this without subjecting more children to experimentation.

The ethical problem for any research in this field as with the proposed UK puberty trial is that it's impossible for the patient or the parents to give informed consent. A significant proportion of those who 'trans' come to regret it & there is no evidence that 'even if they do 'trans' that the outcome is any better than if they don't. There are also other potentially serious harms apart from buyers remorse e.g. surgical complications,

If it were any other field of medicine we would be looking for animal models & testing drugs etc on animals before we ever start experimenting on children. It seems that because it's this unverifiable gender woo that all sense of what is ethical research goes out the window.

What needs to happen is proper follow up for all the patients who have already been through the process. The Tavistock treated thousands of patients. The data belongs to the NHS & should be used to try & identify who if anyone can benefit from puberty blockers & cross sex hormones.

Singal is unhappy with the characterisation of his NYT article by by a Guardian writer (screenshots of her tweets about him are in the thread linked below):

https://x.com/jessesingal/status/1905266012850655661

“I find this to be a pretty dishonest post from Julia Carrie Wong, a senior reporter at The Guardian. I've never called for anything remotely in the ballpark of banning youth gender medicine OR research on it. I hope she corrects this but am not hopeful.

2/ Not ideal, but Julia is dropping chum into an online community that has completely normalized political violence against targets who 'deserve' it, so I think this was foreseeable

3/ That being said, I was (apparently) asking for it”

A thoughtful response to Singal’s call for more research, and his refusal to call for a ban on gender medicine for children, from a gay man living in the UK:

https://x.com/DuncanHenry78/status/1905590952489521556

“Although - you ought to. Science ought to. Clinicians ought to. Reasonable rational people ought to call for the banning of “youth gender medicine” and recognise that any “research” into it is complete snake oil motivated by prejudice (and $).

There is no “trans youth”.

The information for young people is as follows:

If you’re male you’re a boy and will be a man.
If you’re female you’re a girl and will be a woman.

If the above causes you distress first we need to find out who made you feel that way, while telling you a) there’s no point fighting reality, 2) you cannot change sex, 3) disguising yourself as the opposite sex is wrong (and absurd) 4) it will get better. It does get better

Could the “moderates” please realise that it’s gay ppl who will be disproportionately harmed by your continued irrational belief that there is anything other than societal/environmental based trauma going on here.

There is nothing medically wrong with any of these kids. They’ve been traumatised one way or another.”

https://x.com/DuncanHenry78/status/1905591296518955175

”Moderate centre ground genderism is moderate homophobia and sexism”

It depends on the research. Cass was instrumental in proving that harms of 'gender care' for vulnerable children. If he just means more use of experimental and dangerous drugs on children in distress then absolutely not.

I think that this is a good piece and that there's a misunderstanding on here that research always means an intervention study or giving drugs and surgery. Observational studies are also incredibly valuable.

He clearly says that it's a waste, as it's these treatments are still legal and happening, to not get the data from it. How can anyone not agree?

The examples he gives are all showing that the evidence is likely to show these treatments do more harm than good but that there needs to get a compelling case when you are up against parents being told their child needs them.

Also, treatment can also be things like mental health support rather than affirmation.