Clinicians and parents are trying to make sense of it
So the Guardian is starting to allow its journalists to talk about it, occasionally, with much caution and hesitation.
Earlier this year, a team of NHS researchers was asked to investigate why there has been such a huge rise in the number of adolescent biological girls seeking referrals to gender clinics.
I have to interrupt for just a second to point out that that’s a bit like asking why there was such a huge rise in the number of people talking about Harry Potter in 1997. One reason there’s been such a huge rise in the number of adolescent girls joining the trans bandwagon is the fact that it’s a bandwagon. It hasn’t always been a bandwagon; now it is; that’s one reason for the rise. Capeesh?
According to a study commissioned by NHS England, 10 years ago there were just under 250 referrals, most of them boys, to the Gender Identity Development Service (Gids), run by the Tavistock and Portman NHS foundation trust in London. Last year, there were more than 5,000, which was twice the number in the previous year. And the largest group, about two-thirds, now consisted of “birth-registered females first presenting in adolescence with gender-related distress”, the report said.
So I’ll interrupt to tell myself that the “why more girls” question isn’t a bandwagon question, although the “why the huge rise in referrals” is.
Meanwhile, clinicians and parents are trying to make sense of it themselves.
…
Their testimony reflects the lack of consensus within the medical profession about how best to proceed if a child experiences gender dysphoria – and, in turn, how this confusion contributes to the central dilemma faced by concerned parents: how should they support their child during what may be the most challenging period of their lives?
Do they accept them changing their name, gender and pronouns at home and at school and investigating medical options, or should they try to help their child to accept their natal sex?
This is radical stuff. The Guardian is openly saying it’s not just obvious and beyond question that the only guide is how their child identifies. The Guardian is admitting that helping girls accept their sex is an option.
Several parents said they had been relaxed when their daughters initially began identifying as non-binary, but became uneasy when they said they wanted to take puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones and began binding their breasts.
Gee I wonder why. Could it be because the first set is entirely reversable, and not much different from what many daughters have been doing for generations? And the second set is a drastic attack on the body for a very flimsy reason?
The uncertainty parents felt was compounded by the highly polarised debate – within the NHS, politics and the media – about how parents and professionals should respond to children who express distress about their gender.
“We were terrified of being accused of being bigoted,” said the woman, who asked to remain anonymous to protect her child’s privacy.
All the more so given that one consequence of that could easily be a permanently estranged child. This stuff isn’t just social media, it isn’t just chitchat, it’s relationships between parents and children, which if you think about it is pretty significant. Understatement intended.
To be continued.
Which, of course should be “GIDS” not “Gids.” But anyway…
I always thought the name GIDS was a bit of a giveaway that their position wasn’t really neutral at all. Why call it that if the concept of “gender identity” is at all in doubt? How do you “develop” something that doesn’t exist? If your service presumes the existence of a “gender identity,” then by God they’re going to find one. It’s like asking a barber if you need a haircut; it’s not in their interest to say “no.”
If the institution is already invested in the concept of “gender identity” then of course they’re going to see everything through that lens. With a name like that on the door, it’s clear they’ve already reached their diagnosis before you’ve crossed the threshold. It’s like jumping to the the conclusion that all “questioning” children are “trans kids,” rather than simply children with dysphoria. The latter is more tentative, and suggestive of a phase that might be grown out of; the former is an “Identity,” a mark of honour and distinction, a State Of Grace and Being that is touted as some Divine Mark of Specialness. How does a young, immature, uncertain, impressionable child resist such an implied invitation? Who doesn’t want their troubles to be reframed as an indicator of Special Status? Like eager, young men running to enlist at the outbreak of war, these children are too young to understand the consequences of what they’re sign up for, and the so-called “professional” adults in the room who should know better have already brainwashed themselves into believing in the worthiness of their cause. They are no longer the people to ask for a straight answer or an unbiased evaluation. Given the resulting injury and scandal, it’s likely they never were.
Girls aren’t distressed about their gender. They are distressed about their sex. And why wouldn’t they be? Society teaches girls, from birth, that they are less-than, second class, subservient, and essentially worthless non-entities. Their only value is in their fuckability.
Being a sex object — not a person — for boys and men becomes more critical for girls at puberty, when the consequences of being female — the body’s ability to become pregnant — become acute. No wonder girls don’t want to be girls. Boys have freedom; girls are imprisoned. No wonder girls hate their breasts: palpable objects of sexualization and subjugation.
At puberty, the members of both sexes develop into adults capable of sexual reproduction. Girls suffer life-changing consequences of sex in a way that boys do not. No wonder girls would like to opt out.
Gender ideology purports to offer girls a chance to opt out of their subservient status. Unfortunately, the promise is hollow. There is no such thing as changing sex. It’s simply not on offer. Instead, what girls get is mutilation and permanent medicalization, and a lost opportunity to become a fully developed adult. It’s a fraud, false advertising.
But it’s utterly unsurprising that large numbers of girls fall for the false promises. They want to escape the chains of non-personhood. They want the freedom that is denied to girls and women. No shocker there.
I have no idea where to start looking, but is there a possibility that the rise of girls with GD has also seen a decline in girls with anorexia? Both are a form of social contagion.
And won’t somebody please think of the genocide of all those Indigo children? Are they all locked in the basement of a pizza shop?
[…] a comment by maddog on Clinicians and parents are trying to make sense of […]
They bill this as the most challenging period in their lives. I will agree, having been through it, that puberty is challenging. For most people, puberty is not the most challenging period in their lives (though it will be challenging for most; I found it challenging, though even at the time, as a victim of child abuse, I had many other things to think about). Most of us who go through puberty find our way through, and proceed to face the multiple challenges of our life.
Gender ideology takes this challenging period and makes it more challenging. When you are a boy or a girl, and it’s clear which you are and you can’t choose, you can figure out how to ride out puberty and exit the other side a more mature individual ready to face a world that isn’t all about you. When you are given a zillion different choices, and the only ones that don’t make you special are being what you are, it becomes challenging to decide which one you fit. And there are a lot of warm kisses and puppies for those who decide they are something they really are not.