Guest Post by Harriet.
Transphobes or whistleblowers?
Two months before the closure of the Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) in the UK, registrations opened for a conference in Aotearoa, “Children, Adolescents and Gender, Impacts of Transgender Ideology”.
The announcement that a group of Child and Adolescent Therapists (CATA) was holding the conference caused an unprecedented outcry. I say unprecedented because psychotherapy conferences, without exception do not create controversy in the public domain.
Stuff published an article, largely condemning of the conference.
Dr David Sur Shalom, a GP who works with Rainbow Youth described the conference as “ outrageous”, “wrong’ and “mind-blowing”. Dr Brodie Frasier of the University of Otago Public Health Dept, stated in the article “Puberty Blockers are safe and that young people were not being put on irreversible forms of health care”
Twitter was abuzz with vitriol towards the conference organisers. One of the speakers who was scheduled to present on adolescent development and gender withdrew from the conference, after facing a backlash on social media.
An on-line petition was started requesting that the Rutherford Hotel cancel the conference booking. The conference registrations forms were spammed.
The conference organisers put out a statement in response to this:
CATA organised this conference because its therapist members have child and teenage clients confused about their gender……..No one, including therapists, wants children or teenagers to go down a medical or surgical transgender path when that is not the solution for their problems.
The move to close the Tavistock GIDS service due to safety concerns shouldn’t be under estimated, yet it has received virtually no mention in the NZ media. Dr Hilary Cass, a paediatrician, was charged with conducting an enquiry into the service after whistle blowers including staff, parents and former patients, made complaints and even took legal action against the clinic.
The interim report was released in March. From the Observer’s Editorial,
…children with gender identity issues are ill served by adults who shut down the debate.
Ideology has no place in medicine…….The report highlights a profound lack of evidence and medical consensus about the best approach to treating gender dysphoria in children. Yet the NHS’s specialist Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) takes a child’s expressed gender identity as the starting point for treatment.
And this in the Spectator on the closing of the clinic, quoting Hilary Cass,
“The most significant gaps are in relation to treatment with puberty blockers…..”
“…brain maturation may be temporarily or permanently disrupted by puberty blockers, which could have a significant impact on the ability to make complex risk-laden decisions”
Is it possible that Aotearoa has gone down the same track as The Tavistock in allowing ideology to influence treatment decisions in this highly vulnerable group of children?
Could it be that the CATA conference is an attempt to blow the whistle on inappropriate treatment for young gender dysphoric children and adolescents? Or is it a transphobic move by a group of clinicians who are uncomfortable with transpeople?
I decided to go along to the conference to find out……more to come.
Conference runs 8:45 am 4:30 pm, Friday, 5 August 2022
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