Receipts: Pitch to NYT Science Section, March 10, 2022
Hi, XXX. I’m the author of the book TOMBOY, about the science, psychology and history of gender non-conforming girls, and have written about gender issues for NYT, Washington Post and many others. (Clips here.)
Just as Govenor Abbott and AG Paxton decided to terrorize parents in Texas who are trying to help their gender dysphoric kids with gender-affirming medical care, Sweden made an announcement that they’d largely be pulling back from the interventions Texas was criminalizing—for non-political reasons, and in a humane way. “Uncertain science and new knowledge mean that the National Board of Health and Welfare now recommends restraint when it comes to hormone treatment,” they reported, adding, “the risks of anti-puberty and sex-confirming hormone treatment for those under 18 currently outweigh the possible benefits for the group as a whole.” France issued new guidelines the same week, following in Finland’s footsteps last year. Today, the UK released a nonpartisan interim report that called into question the U.S. model of affirmative care, noting that the population of kids seeking help for gender dysphoria has grown and shifted, and they have complex mental health problems that aren’t being addressed. The 112-page report calls for an overhaul in the system of care.
I’d love to do a story for you about how several European countries are shifting their approach to treating trans kids, based not on politics but on scientific evidence that has largely been ignored here. Despite the imprimatur of groups like the American Academy of Pediatrics, and articles asserting that there is medical consensus, there remains a “paucity of quality evidence on the outcomes of those presenting with gender dysphoria,” per the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists. “No consensus exists whether to use these early medical interventions,” says an article in the Journal of Adolescent Health.
I’d be interviewing health officials from Sweden, France, Finland and the UK, who worked on the evidence reviews and policy shifts, looking at how countries treat trans kids when politics aren’t a problem.
Many thanks,
Lisa
This is a great idea. Following is a letter to the Yale Alum magazine that needless to say did not get printed:
As a clinical psychologist with over 35 years of working with adolescents and young adults, I eagerly yet also skeptically read Dr. Iarovici’s “Stressed: What’s Causing the Mental Health Crisis Among College Students?”
While I value her experience with this age group and embrace many of her ideas, my initial skepticism was validated by two facets of the piece — first, the assertion that “experiences of identity concealment or family rejection, and internalized LGBTQ+-phobia significantly affect psychological health in college,” and second, the mention of The Trevor Project as a beneficial LGBTQ resource.
Over the last decade, increasing numbers of college students have arrived on campus with transgender identities. The narrative is that these identities are inherent and immutable, and that parents who have not “affirmed” their children’s often sudden, post pubertal opposite or neither sex selves have “rejected” them and are bigoted and causing them harm.
The Trevor Project promotes the manipulatively false narrative that youth who are not affirmed in a transgender identity and who are prevented from medicalizing their inner gender identities are at high risk for completed suicide. Even the ACLU lawyer and activist, Chase Strangio, during recent oral arguments heard by the Supreme Court in United States v. Skrmetti, admitted that unaffirmed and unmedicalized trans identified children thankfully do not take their own lives at elevated rates. In fact, it is becoming more apparent that suicidal ideation and completed suicide increase after medical transition. But yet the narrative persists, and questioning, worried parents are vilified, new identities are medicalized, and underlying issues such as actual internalized homophobia (“trans the gay away”), sexual abuse, autism, eating disorders … go unexplored.
With the acceptance of gender ideology that permeates the article, seen in the mentions of “gender-fluidity” and college-aged people “of all genders,” the author misses an important source of some of their mental anguish— the “mass sociogenic illness” of trans identity (just like the infinitely more benign contagion of tic “disorders” the author cites). Vulnerable, identity-seeking youth, and also well-meaning “allies” determined not to repeat the horrors of homophobia, are not aware of the harmful repercussions of gender ideology, family estrangement, and hormonal and surgical interventions.
Lisa (Melnick) Duval ‘88
Charlottesville, VA
My letter to the ideologically captured Chicago Tribune, in the captured state of Illinois, unpublished:
"The Tribune has failed to report on two major stories concerning “gender-affirming care” for minors. In late January, a NY jury awarded $2 million to Fox Varian in the first major gender medicine malpractice decision, finding her psychologist and surgeon negligent in approving a double mastectomy when she was 16. On Feb 3, the American Society of Plastic Surgeons issued a position paper citing the poor evidence of benefit and emerging risk of harm involved not only in mastectomies and genital surgeries, but also in puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones, and recommending delaying surgery before age 19.
The largest newspaper in Illinois owes it to its readership to report on these stories. Under the claim of “consensus” sits activism rather than science. Poorly-designed and conducted studies are misleading. We lack quality long-term studies on “gender-affirming” treatments because this large cohort of “transitioners” is so recent. Lawsuits by detransitioners provide a peek at this affected population, and people need to see it, recognizing that the vast majority of patients suffering similarly will never get their day in court. The fact that a professional medical organization is now basing its recommendations on the lack of evidence of benefit and actual evidence of harm is an important story, as is the fact that the American Medical Association is also now advising caution relative to gender medicine for minors.
Anyone who has gone through puberty themselves or is watching adolescents pass through this phase of life knows that it is painful, confusing, often lonely and distressing - having your body change awkwardly while trying to figure out your identity distinct from your parents. Most of these gender distressed teens have confounding issues: autism, internalized homophobia, trauma from sexual abuse or porn exposure, anxiety and depression. They are told their REAL problem is being “born in the wrong body.” These kids are legitimately distressed, and adults want to help them. Adults know that their children’s futures are at stake, but that it is not possible to change sex, however strong the desire to do so.
The Tribune owes it to its readership to validate through honest reporting, not deny, what most adults instinctively know: adolescents are living through a turbulent time of their lives in a turbulent society, and whatever teens vehemently believe today should not lock them into a lifetime of sterility, medical dependency and compromised physical health."