Yes! Thank you, Lisa, for tiredly fighting for this. Is the tide turning?? Finally?? I’m having a coffee with a neighbor tomorrow who can’t understand what I mean when I say the left has gone too far left. Wish me luck everyone.
"As someone writing a book about the youth gender culture war..." Somehow I missed earlier mentions of this project. It may be a good complement to Jesse Singal's book, which I expect to focus more on medicine than culture, though obviously it's impossible to separate those.
A few years ago a slew of gender books were published around the same time (2021 mostly): Trans, Material Girls, The End of Gender, Irreversible Damage. Reading them helped to clarify my thinking about the topic. Maybe 2025 will be the year of clarity around the medicalization of gender nonconformity.
Reading the reports denigrating the Cass report, its clear that no only politics but also liability is an issue with trans-activists (especially affirming gender clinics) supporting its conclusions.
A clinic and doctor who was operating under the affirmative model based on the Cass report could be sued for malpractice by those who later decide they did not have gender dysphoria. The vocal left and even states that have endorse the affirmation model are in legal liability for advocating a position that did not have a scientific basis.
It will be interesting to see how they mitigate the issue. The states that created "shield laws" could be sued for promoting affirmation gender care when the science starts proving it was not appropriate.
Fabulous piece. And SO NEEDED. Massachusetts is the state that took foster children away from a really highly regarded foster family because they wouldn't support transitioning tweens. And the LGBTQ Commission proposed that it should be illegal for parents not to hop aboard without question. So thank you, thank you, Lisa.
A great article, Lisa! And a wonderful achievement to have it published in a major newspaper. I had only one quibble, due to so-called "gender affirming care" having become my bête noire. Rather than saying some of the children are gay, I'd have said something like, "The great majority of the children mature into ordinary gay teens, so GAC amounts to irremediable "conversion therapy".
Also was reading Matt Osborne's latest "Dr. Hilary Cass Is Not Your Personal Army," and he linked to evidence of trans activists in the U.K. trying their best to prevent collection of that data: https://www.reddit.com/r/transgenderUK/comments/1c312z2/the_cass_review_intend_to_access_your/ (Reminds me of WWII stories I've heard about the brainwashed Japanese villagers, so terrorized by their country's official propaganda about evil Americans that they threw their children and themselves off cliffs to drown in the sea, rather than let U.S. soldiers get near them.)
Congratulations, Lisa. Your Boston Globe piece is superb from the first line to the last. You brought to bear, with lucidity and focus, everything you have worked on over so many years, and you made the case for a US Cass review brilliantly. I hope this is only the first of many pieces of yours the Boston Globe will feature. Brava, brava, brava!!! And hey, good luck with your book!
Trans activists are denigrating the Cass reports by talking about the number of studies it left out that supposedly should have been included.
The journalist Benjamin Ryan traces a major source of the massive disinformation to one person: Alejandra Caraballo, who some of you may be familiar with....this is much worth reading and it's not long. Caraballo tweeted out part of a 4 year old study as if it were from the Cass report. Little doubt it was done on purpose.
Thanks so much for persevering. The Globe has printed a few critical articles lately, and yours will help people understand things. One of the things that you might have mentioned is the current "conversion therapy" ban, which would make the type of therapy you propose illegal in Massachusetts. If a kid goes to a therapist and says "I think I'm trans" and the therapist says "Have you considered you might just be gay?" he is breaking the law and could lose his professional license.
It's not an accident that the paper famous for shining a light on the Catholic abuse scandal is resisting gender ideology. Just substitute lipstick and wigs and a pink flag for black robes and crosses and you'll see the same level of denial. However, drumbeat against this strange ideology is getting louder and all the media outlets (looking at you NPR) are going to have to explain why they fell for such obvious nonsense.
> they keep talking about trans kids, but they mean kids with gender distress, since many of the kids referenced hadn’t transitioned. But I’ll tend to that another day
⚠YES! thank you Lisa for that distinction. one is a smaller group than the other. They overlap but its not a circle yet the annoying conflation continues to be pushed. You can be dysphoric and not transition or disidentify. Arguably, you can also transition and/or disidentify from your sex without being trully clinical level dysphoric. They should not keep being treated as synonyms.
Its the same thing that bothers me when you read about HRT publications and it goes like "In transgender women blahblahblah" or "men of trans experience (afab) are at risk for blahhblahh" like No. Nooo just no. In endochrinology it's about sex not identities. The style guide should be like "(natal) males under an estrogen+Antiandrogen regime" and "females under an exogenous Testosterone regime" because that's the truth, if you dont indentify as trans (or used to but nor anymore) yet take CSHRT the general risks and side effects ARE the same, it goes for any. Just like you could identify as human vs amphibian, starfish or merfolk and the water still wont care and you will drown in it if you inhale and it fills ur lungs. Yet with this ideological play of words it makes it sound like its the transness that makes the regime special. It also ends up in some undesirable social effects such as some AGP (and some non-AGP plain pretenders) claiming the cramps and dizzyness and mood swings that comes as side effects of Spironolactone actually is a "trans/bloodless period" and obviosuly expected to be interpreted as further "proof of their womanhood and separation from cis men and cis manly bodies". Utterly insufferable.
Great job Lisa. Thank you for walking the rope in a sea of extremists and congratulations on the publication!! Fave line of the article: [[ Polarization, the stifling of debate, and invective-flinging have left many families ill informed, making decisions in the dark and often based on fears of suicide that are unsupported by evidence. How can there truly be informed consent when there is so little unambiguous information, when there are more unknowns than knowns? And what do we do in the face of uncertainty? Argue and legislate, or gather data? It doesn’t help when our federal government contributes to the faux certainty, declaring that gender-affirming care is “suicide prevention” or “well-established medical practice” — arguments the Cass Review eviscerates. ]]
Great piece, Lisa! Terrific that the Globe was willing to publish it. May other prominent publications follow suit. I am really excited to hear that you are writing another book (where do you find the time?) and that this one will focus on the youth gender culture war. The story that I really want someone to tell is the story of how gender got so embedded in schools so quickly. What really happened on the ground? I am particularly interested in the sweeping changes in Bay Area schools but I imagine similar scenarios played out all over the country. My kids' middle school made big changes in response to requests by just one family initially. "The Transgender Child" appeared on faculty bookshelves, Gender Spectrum (https://www.genderspectrum.org/) was brought in to recommend policy changes and provide training, curricula were updated, bathrooms relabeled gender neutral, etc. All without any discussion with the rest of the parent body.
When I approach people at my trans-ID'ed daughter's high school with concerns about GAC and information about what is happening in other countries, they say that all the school is doing is creating an inclusive and safe environment for trans kids and what's the harm in that? To get past this I need we need to help schools see that the efforts to promote "trans inclusion" are based on the same flawed ideas and assumptions as the medical model and are similarly un-evidenced. For example, is there evidence that key players like Stephanie Brill and Rachel Pepper were taking their cues from WPATH? Since schools generally outsourced the work of figuring out how to become trans inclusive, if we can demonstrate that the firms they innocently hired to provide those services are now discredited, it gives the schools a way to save face and walk back or at least re-examine the policies in the light of what is now known. If anyone has seen an article covering this territory please do share it!
Yes! Thank you, Lisa, for tiredly fighting for this. Is the tide turning?? Finally?? I’m having a coffee with a neighbor tomorrow who can’t understand what I mean when I say the left has gone too far left. Wish me luck everyone.
https://archive.is/20240415164607/https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/04/15/opinion/cass-review-gender-affirming-care/
"As someone writing a book about the youth gender culture war..." Somehow I missed earlier mentions of this project. It may be a good complement to Jesse Singal's book, which I expect to focus more on medicine than culture, though obviously it's impossible to separate those.
A few years ago a slew of gender books were published around the same time (2021 mostly): Trans, Material Girls, The End of Gender, Irreversible Damage. Reading them helped to clarify my thinking about the topic. Maybe 2025 will be the year of clarity around the medicalization of gender nonconformity.
Reading the reports denigrating the Cass report, its clear that no only politics but also liability is an issue with trans-activists (especially affirming gender clinics) supporting its conclusions.
A clinic and doctor who was operating under the affirmative model based on the Cass report could be sued for malpractice by those who later decide they did not have gender dysphoria. The vocal left and even states that have endorse the affirmation model are in legal liability for advocating a position that did not have a scientific basis.
It will be interesting to see how they mitigate the issue. The states that created "shield laws" could be sued for promoting affirmation gender care when the science starts proving it was not appropriate.
Congratulations for breaking through!
Fabulous piece. And SO NEEDED. Massachusetts is the state that took foster children away from a really highly regarded foster family because they wouldn't support transitioning tweens. And the LGBTQ Commission proposed that it should be illegal for parents not to hop aboard without question. So thank you, thank you, Lisa.
A great article, Lisa! And a wonderful achievement to have it published in a major newspaper. I had only one quibble, due to so-called "gender affirming care" having become my bête noire. Rather than saying some of the children are gay, I'd have said something like, "The great majority of the children mature into ordinary gay teens, so GAC amounts to irremediable "conversion therapy".
I was able to access an archived copy of your Boston Globe piece: https://archive.ph/J5Axd
Also was reading Matt Osborne's latest "Dr. Hilary Cass Is Not Your Personal Army," and he linked to evidence of trans activists in the U.K. trying their best to prevent collection of that data: https://www.reddit.com/r/transgenderUK/comments/1c312z2/the_cass_review_intend_to_access_your/ (Reminds me of WWII stories I've heard about the brainwashed Japanese villagers, so terrorized by their country's official propaganda about evil Americans that they threw their children and themselves off cliffs to drown in the sea, rather than let U.S. soldiers get near them.)
Congratulations, Lisa. Your Boston Globe piece is superb from the first line to the last. You brought to bear, with lucidity and focus, everything you have worked on over so many years, and you made the case for a US Cass review brilliantly. I hope this is only the first of many pieces of yours the Boston Globe will feature. Brava, brava, brava!!! And hey, good luck with your book!
Trans activists are denigrating the Cass reports by talking about the number of studies it left out that supposedly should have been included.
The journalist Benjamin Ryan traces a major source of the massive disinformation to one person: Alejandra Caraballo, who some of you may be familiar with....this is much worth reading and it's not long. Caraballo tweeted out part of a 4 year old study as if it were from the Cass report. Little doubt it was done on purpose.
Yes, he has the receipts:
https://twitter.com/benryanwriter/status/1779671152148857212
Thanks so much for persevering. The Globe has printed a few critical articles lately, and yours will help people understand things. One of the things that you might have mentioned is the current "conversion therapy" ban, which would make the type of therapy you propose illegal in Massachusetts. If a kid goes to a therapist and says "I think I'm trans" and the therapist says "Have you considered you might just be gay?" he is breaking the law and could lose his professional license.
https://www.pittparents.com/p/why-i-cant-tell-you-my-sons-therapists?utm_source=publication-search
It's not an accident that the paper famous for shining a light on the Catholic abuse scandal is resisting gender ideology. Just substitute lipstick and wigs and a pink flag for black robes and crosses and you'll see the same level of denial. However, drumbeat against this strange ideology is getting louder and all the media outlets (looking at you NPR) are going to have to explain why they fell for such obvious nonsense.
SO GRATEFUL!
Thank you, Lisa!
> they keep talking about trans kids, but they mean kids with gender distress, since many of the kids referenced hadn’t transitioned. But I’ll tend to that another day
⚠YES! thank you Lisa for that distinction. one is a smaller group than the other. They overlap but its not a circle yet the annoying conflation continues to be pushed. You can be dysphoric and not transition or disidentify. Arguably, you can also transition and/or disidentify from your sex without being trully clinical level dysphoric. They should not keep being treated as synonyms.
Its the same thing that bothers me when you read about HRT publications and it goes like "In transgender women blahblahblah" or "men of trans experience (afab) are at risk for blahhblahh" like No. Nooo just no. In endochrinology it's about sex not identities. The style guide should be like "(natal) males under an estrogen+Antiandrogen regime" and "females under an exogenous Testosterone regime" because that's the truth, if you dont indentify as trans (or used to but nor anymore) yet take CSHRT the general risks and side effects ARE the same, it goes for any. Just like you could identify as human vs amphibian, starfish or merfolk and the water still wont care and you will drown in it if you inhale and it fills ur lungs. Yet with this ideological play of words it makes it sound like its the transness that makes the regime special. It also ends up in some undesirable social effects such as some AGP (and some non-AGP plain pretenders) claiming the cramps and dizzyness and mood swings that comes as side effects of Spironolactone actually is a "trans/bloodless period" and obviosuly expected to be interpreted as further "proof of their womanhood and separation from cis men and cis manly bodies". Utterly insufferable.
Great job Lisa. Thank you for walking the rope in a sea of extremists and congratulations on the publication!! Fave line of the article: [[ Polarization, the stifling of debate, and invective-flinging have left many families ill informed, making decisions in the dark and often based on fears of suicide that are unsupported by evidence. How can there truly be informed consent when there is so little unambiguous information, when there are more unknowns than knowns? And what do we do in the face of uncertainty? Argue and legislate, or gather data? It doesn’t help when our federal government contributes to the faux certainty, declaring that gender-affirming care is “suicide prevention” or “well-established medical practice” — arguments the Cass Review eviscerates. ]]
Chef kiss 💗 on point. Thank you very much
Great piece, Lisa! Terrific that the Globe was willing to publish it. May other prominent publications follow suit. I am really excited to hear that you are writing another book (where do you find the time?) and that this one will focus on the youth gender culture war. The story that I really want someone to tell is the story of how gender got so embedded in schools so quickly. What really happened on the ground? I am particularly interested in the sweeping changes in Bay Area schools but I imagine similar scenarios played out all over the country. My kids' middle school made big changes in response to requests by just one family initially. "The Transgender Child" appeared on faculty bookshelves, Gender Spectrum (https://www.genderspectrum.org/) was brought in to recommend policy changes and provide training, curricula were updated, bathrooms relabeled gender neutral, etc. All without any discussion with the rest of the parent body.
When I approach people at my trans-ID'ed daughter's high school with concerns about GAC and information about what is happening in other countries, they say that all the school is doing is creating an inclusive and safe environment for trans kids and what's the harm in that? To get past this I need we need to help schools see that the efforts to promote "trans inclusion" are based on the same flawed ideas and assumptions as the medical model and are similarly un-evidenced. For example, is there evidence that key players like Stephanie Brill and Rachel Pepper were taking their cues from WPATH? Since schools generally outsourced the work of figuring out how to become trans inclusive, if we can demonstrate that the firms they innocently hired to provide those services are now discredited, it gives the schools a way to save face and walk back or at least re-examine the policies in the light of what is now known. If anyone has seen an article covering this territory please do share it!