Bad news, folks. The Tories have proven yet again that they’re complete and utter wankers.
How can you say they are proven safe when, to start with, there is a lack of evidence on long term safety? Happy to be shown otherwise if the article posted is incorrect.
To quote Julia Serrano’s excellent writeup on GAC for adolescents:
The “experimental” label is most regularly levied against puberty blockers, probably because the average person isn’t familiar with them. However, they’ve been used to treat precocious puberty since the 1980s (Comite et al., 1981; Mancuso et al., 1989) and to stave off unwanted endogenous puberties in trans youth since the mid-to-late-1990s (Cohen-Kettenis & van Goozen, 1998; van der Loos et al., 2023). For anyone interested in learning more about them, I’d recommend Giordano & Holm’s 2020 accessibly written scientific review “Is puberty delaying treatment ‘experimental treatment’?” as it answers the most commonly asked questions about the method, its efficacy, potential side effects, and so on.
Giordano & Holm’s review also addresses another common claim levied against gender-affirming care, namely, that there aren’t any “high quality studies.” In actuality, there are many high-quality studies: sound methodologies, significant sample sizes, published in well-respected journals, etcetera. When trans-skeptical people argue this, what they really mean is that there aren’t any randomized controlled studies — where neither the doctor nor patient know whether they’ve received the medicine in question or whether they’ve received a placebo. While this certainly is the “gold standard” for medical trials, it is not logistically possible in cases such as this, as both doctors and patients would quickly surmise which group they were assigned to based upon the changes (or lack thereof) in their bodies. The review also delves into ethical issues regarding withholding this treatment that make controlled studies impossible.
The second paragraph delves into the claim that there are no quality studies on the effects of delayed puberty. We actually have a good number of high quality studies, what we don’t have are double blind, randomized controlled studies because of the practical and ethical difficulties of doing so. This, of course, gets twisted into labeling puberty blockers as having no evidence or for being “experimental”.
Nothing is ever enough for these types. You could have millions of cases spanning hundreds of years of medical practice and have the instructions for the procedure written in the Bible and it still wouldn’t be enough. This one person on Facebook saying their kid did it without their consent and got a tummy ache would still be enough to ban it forever for anyone for them.
The government said it welcomed the “landmark decision”, adding it would help ensure care is based on evidence and is in the “best interests of the child”.
It’s truly insulting that they even dare suggest that this is in the best interests of trans kids, or that it’s based on any evidence. Puberty blockers save lives.
It follows a public consultation on the issue
Since when is public opinion relevant for the availability of healthcare? Can we have expert opinions, please?
The review followed a sharp rise in referrals to the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS)
“More people need this treatment than ever before! Better completely cut off access to it!” is such a malicious position to take. I actually don’t understand how these transphobic fucks can be so callous and insensitive.
TERF island still living up to its name.
The whole Anti-LGBT campaign blowing over from the US to Europe. In the Netherlands I see more and more of the same 😭
Why are people so quick to hate what they don’t understand? It’s infuriating and exhausting. I really hope they will move on from this after the US election, but I worry that it will only continue to get worse.
It’s because the extreme-right campaigns are fuelled by hate and discontent. And it helps them by chanelling it towards minority groups by blaming them for everything (obviously a majority won’t work because they would alienate too much of their own userbase). So the narrative is ‘the brown people’ cause all the problems, the LGBT community etc etc. Hate unites people more easily than love 😢
What worries me the most is that formerly normal sane ‘friends’ actually buy into this BS and have become rabiate trans-haters practically overnight. 😢
The trans minority specifically seems to be the ultimate scapegoat for them, since it’s such a tiny minority. I’m really not liking the “First they came for…” vibes. Actually terrifying.
I’m sorry about your ‘friends’ and hope you’re safe from them. Sending you love ❤️
Unfortunately, the UK has their own anti-trans movement independent of the US. Any official ‘Harry Potter’ products directly fund it (thanks, Rowling).
Rowling overplayed her hand recently, I think. There’s a podcast I listen to every day, whose host I enjoy a lot, and most of his regular guests I like as well. One of them I’m not a fan of because she’s pretty transphobic… until Rowling attacked India Willoughby. That, it seems, was a step too far, because this previously rather transphobic lady was like “hang on a second, India Willoughby is a woman though”, and has settled into a new position of “there’s conversations that need to be had about prisons and sports, but otherwise trans people are not a threat and we need to be more tolerant”. This is someone who has, on occasions, induced such rage in me that I ended up yelling at the podcast, and her change of tack caught me completely by surprise. When Rowling has started frothing at the mouth so much that even other transphobes are rethinking their views, things feel a little less hopeless.
That’s torture and irreparable harm.
Yeah. I heard about this on the radio, and my first thought was, “Oh shit, those suicide rates are going to skyrocket.”
My second thought was “Should I throw a bucket of gravy over whoever’s responsible, or should I come at them with a cricket bat?”
“Oh shit, those suicide rates are going to skyrocket.”
Oh nah, people are absolutely going to die as a direct result of this decision. More many will have scars.
It’s still murder—still assault—if the weapon you form against a person is their own beleaguered hand.
I weep for needless death.
I vote cricket bat, then throw a bucket of gravy on them as they lay on the ground. Then spit on them. Then kick them… A lot!
