Sunday, August 21, 2022
"Our research shows that GnRH agonists (puberty blockers) can negatively affect the skeleton, cardiovascular system, thyroid, brain, genitals, reproductive system, digestive system, urinary tract ..."
This day in Herstory: Dame Janet Abbott Baker CH, DBE, FRSA, born August 21, 1933, is an English mezzo-soprano best known as an opera, concert, and lieder singer. She was particularly closely associated with baroque and early Italian opera and the works of Benjamin Britten. During her career, which spanned the 1950s to the 1980s, she was considered an outstanding singing actress and widely admired for her dramatic intensity, perhaps best represented in her famous portrayal as Dido, the tragic heroine of Berlioz's magnum opus, Les Troyens. (more)
UK - How trans ideology hijacked the gay-rights movement
The ‘LGBTQIA+’ lobby has nothing in common with the liberation struggles of old.
From Spiked (UK)
By David Allen
August 21, 2022
So many veteran homosexual-rights campaigners, and gay men and lesbians in their 50s and 60s, are fed up with the so-called LGBTQIA+ movement. Some are starting to see it as a hostile takeover of a homosexual-rights movement by straight people. Worse still, many now think of it as among the most regressive social movements of the past century. The reason lies in the growth of that acronym, with the forced teaming-up of diverse groups which have divergent and even opposing interests.
Forty years ago, there was no acronym. There was a ‘gay community’, which implicitly covered both male and female homosexuals. Except lesbians rightly demanded some visibility, so that changed in the early 1980s to ‘lesbian and gay’. Then it became ‘lesbian, gay and bisexual’ (LGB) in the middle of that decade when we discovered bisexuals, too. And there we remained as LGB, happily (and exclusively) same-sex attracted. That is, until the ‘T’ for trans came along around 15 years later. … read full article
UK - Statement on Puberty Suppression
Lesbians United's review of the evidence on GnRH agonists, the class of drugs now commonly known as "puberty blockers," cites over 300 sources, most of which are peer-reviewed scientific studies. Download your free copy below.
From Lesbians United (UK)
August 21, 2022
Today Lesbians United released our review of the literature on puberty suppression. We cited over 300 sources, including clinical studies of adults who took GnRH agonists (the class of drugs also called “puberty blockers”) for prostate cancer, endometriosis, and other conditions.
Our research shows that GnRH agonists (“puberty blockers”) can negatively affect the skeleton, cardiovascular system, thyroid, brain, genitals, reproductive system, digestive system, urinary tract, muscles, eyes, and immune system. GnRH agonists may be harmful to mental health and may increase the risk of suicide.
Studies also show that the majority of adolescents who are prescribed GnRH agonists for so-called “gender dysphoria” are girls, and that a wildly disproportionate number of these girls are likely to grow up lesbian. … read full statement
Download a free copy of the review here: Puberty Suppression: Medicine or Malpractice? (PDF)
UK - Gender Identity in the ECtHR - Cossey v UK
Part VIII
From Gender Dissident (UK)
By Alessandra Asteriti
August 21, 2022
This case was decided by the ECtHR in 1990. On the facts it is very similar to the Rees case, with the important differences that this is a case involving a MtF transsexual and that the change of birth certificate was necessary for the purpose of marriage. One cannot help noticing the sexualisation of the male transsexual. The distance from the female transsexual who wanted to become a Minister of the Church of England could not be wider! … read full article
UK - Trans TikToker Revealed as Registered Sex Offender
From Reduxx (USA)
By Shay Woulahan
August 20, 2022
A UK-based transgender TikToker has been revealed as a violent criminal who was sentenced to 9 years in prison after being convicted of a vicious rape attempt on a vulnerable woman.
Jason Croker, of Oldbury Close, Redditch, was required to register as a sex offender for life after what was described as a “wicked” attempt to sexually abuse a woman.
In February of 2015, a Warwick County Court heard how Jason Croker, then 38, brutally attacked a woman in the back of his van in May of 2013 before strangling her and leaving her unconscious in a remote area. Croker had known the woman for several years as a friend. … read full article
UK - The dangerous narcissism of the trans lobby
Travis Alabanza’s new book shows how male self-pity is weaponised against women’s rights.
From Spiked (UK)
By Brendan O’Neill
August 21, 2022
Remember when oppression meant the government brutally denying you the rights and freedoms enjoyed by everyone else? Now it means blokes agonising over whether or not to paint their nails. Seriously. In his new book None of the Above: Reflections on Life Beyond the Binary, nonbinary writer Travis Alabanza cites this dilemma as proof of the ‘oppression [of] the gender binary’. He introduces us to Steve, a man who had ‘wanted to paint his nails for years’. But he didn’t because, like the rest of us cis squares, he’d been conditioned into ‘upholding the gender binary’ which says men don’t do that. One day, though, after seeing one of Alabanza’s theatre shows, Steve plucks up the courage to paint his nails neon yellow. Alabanza is moved by this brave strike against the forces of oppression. ‘My urge was to hug him’, he writes. Free at last! Thank God Almighty, free at last! … read full article
UK - Cathy Boardman: Lecturer in trans row sues over ‘sacking’
From The Times (UK)
By Mario Ledwith
August 22, 2022
A lecturer is suing a music academy over claims that she was forced out of her job because of her stance on trans issues, which included asking students to consider whether drag acts could be seen as sexist.
Cathy Boardman, 43, was allegedly described as transphobic by students at Brighton Institute of Modern Music (Bimm) who opposed her comments about a leading transgender woman athlete. The cultural studies lecturer had said in a Facebook post found by students that it was not fair that a New Zealand weightlifter, Laurel Hubbard, could compete in the women’s field. Hubbard became the first openly transgender athlete to compete in the Olympics when she was selected for the 2020 Games in Tokyo. … read full article
UK - Parents launch legal fight over gender classes for three-year-olds as campaigners say they are 'inappropriate' for primary school pupils
Compulsory 'sexuality and gender' classes are due to start in schools in Wales
The Labour-run Cardiff government will embed it into day-to-day teaching
Campaigners say the Relationships and Sex Education topics are inappropriate
The guidance has no mentions of the words 'boy', 'girl', 'man' or 'woman'
From Daily Mail (UK)
By SAM GREENHILL
August 21, 2022
Parents have launched emergency legal action against compulsory 'sexuality and gender' classes for pupils as young as three.
They asked the High Court last Friday to intervene to block lessons due to start in schools in Wales after the summer holidays. … read full article
US - Dr. Colin Wright suspended from Twitter for cartoon criticizing trans activism
"The cartoon was not promoting hate or violence to any community, but merely highlighting the harmful excesses of trans activism that denies biological reality and infringes upon the rights and safety of other groups."
From The Post Millennial (Canada)
By Christina Buttons
August 21, 2022
Evolutionary biologist Dr. Colin Wright was suspended from Twitter on Sunday morning for a cartoon depicting a famous philosophical thought experiment called the "trolley problem." Wright received notice from Twitter describing the offending tweet as "hateful conduct" that he must acknowledge he violated their rules of conduct if he wishes to regain access to his account after a 12 hour time-out.
When Wright shared the cartoon by itself on Friday with the caption, "Trans activism in a nutshell," it went viral and drew the attention of trans activists who reported the cartoon to Twitter. … read full article
US - A Twitter thread from Leor Sapir: the bandwagon of misinformation surrounding pediatric gender medicine
From Twitter (USA)
By Leor Sapir
August 19, 2022
@benkesslen (@techreview) is the latest journalist to jump on the bandwagon of misinformation surrounding pediatric gender medicine.
How the idea of a “transgender contagion” went viral—and caused untold harm
Considering how easy it is to fact-check these articles into the ground, you have to wonder how much editorial oversight is being exercised here. Kesslen claims that ROGD is a fiction and that @LisaLittman1 2018 paper in PLOS One is responsible for a spread of misinformation.
First, Littman has always recognized the limitations of her study. Her goal was to describe what appeared at the time to be a newly emerging clinical cohort of transition-seekers. She called for more research to corroborate the ROGD hypothesis.
PLOS One's decision to temporarily take down Littman's paper was driven by pressure from activists. The real story here is not that the paper was taken down, but that it was republished after a second round of peer review (and not, as Kesslen writes, with a "large correction")!
Since 2018, three types of evidence have made Littman's findings more credible. (1) Data from gender clinics around the world, most notably the U.K., showed that the underlying demographic characteristics of ROGD were very much behind the huge surge in referrals. (Cass Review)
(2) Clinicians working in this specific field noted in peer-reviewed articles that Littman's descriptions align with what they were seeing in their day-to-day work and called for more research on ROGD. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10508-019-01517-9… See also @ZUCKERKJ on this:
Adolescents with Gender Dysphoria: Reflections on Some Contemporary Clinical and Research Issues
Even the Dutch experts who developed pediatric transition have said the same. https://publications.aap.org/pediatrics/article/146/4/e2020010611/79688/Challenges-in-Timing-Puberty-Suppression-for… Thomas Steensma has said that other countries are "blindly adopting" the Dutch approach (2021)--"blindly," b/c it was not developed for the predominant presentation (ROGD).
Challenges in Timing Puberty Suppression for Gender-Nonconforming Adolescents
(3) A study by Littman in 2021 on detransitioners revealed that some had come to their trans identity through social influences.
Individuals Treated for Gender Dysphoria with Medical and/or Surgical Transition Who Subsequently...
How to account for the upsurge in the number of teens showing up for transition, the flip in sex and age ratios since the Dutch studies of the 1990's, increasing regret/detransition, and the high degree of psych co-morbidities? Social contagion is the most plausible hypothesis.
There's a difference between saying "we've proven ROGD" and saying "ROGD is very likely, and given the risks of medicalizing we should refrain from doing so pending further research." Few are saying the former, and so Kesslen is essentially setting up a straw man.
Second, Kesslen's own citations are deeply misleading. Kesslen, e.g., cites this collection of studies. But some of the studies explicitly warned that no conclusions about causal links could be drawn from their findings.
whatweknow.inequality.cornell.edu
What does the scholarly research say about the effect of gender transition on transgender well-be...
More importantly, I looked at 15 at random, and not one was actually about minors. Further, virtually all were done before 2016, when ROGD emerged as a clinical category of concern. Seems like a problem for an article on CONTEMPORARY PEDIATRIC gender medicine, no?
Another example: Kesslen cites a study by Kristina Olson from this year showing that 94% children who were "affirmed" in the gender identity persisted in that identity five years later.
But as I've explained, the best and maybe only way to square Olson's findings with all past research on persistence/desistence rates in children is by assuming that social transition is iatrogenic. Olson's paper is evidence AGAINST "affirming" care.
New Study Casts Doubt on "Gender-Affirming" Therapy
In short, Kesslen cherry-picks studies that (he thinks) help his case and ignores those that weaken it. Third, Kesslen never once mentions developments in Sweden, Finland, and the U.K., where health authorities have drastically scaled down "affirming" care.
US - The future of pediatric medicine: Chemical castration and surgical mutilation
From Washington Examiner (USA)
By Kaylee McGhee White
August 21, 2022
To understand gender ideology and its motivations, one must first recognize that this cultural battle is only happening because trans activists have successfully waged a war on our language, hijacking basic concepts and definitions to normalize an ideology that is anything but. This includes things like preferred pronouns but can also be traced to the very words used to describe the movement, such as “transgender” and “gender identity,” both of which presuppose that it is possible to be a gender different than one’s sex.
The problem for gender ideologues, of course, is that it is not possible for a man to become a woman and vice versa. But the point of the new terms and euphemisms they have created and mainstreamed is to confuse everyone so much that we all eventually accept as fact something that is not true. … read full article
US - A New York teacher exposes our state school-system sham — where guessing gets you a pass
From New York Post (USA)
By Karol Markowicz
August 21, 2022
What is the point of an end-of-school-year exam? New York state seems unsure.
A teacher has put out a detailed exposé proving a child can pass New York’s algebra Regents exam by simply guessing all Cs.
Ed Knight weaves on Medium a great tale of a student named River who finds himself in legal trouble and ends up missing most of the school year. Knight admits he has a soft spot for River, a child of a single father who lives in a trailer, and when River comes to him for advice on taking an exam for which he has zero knowledge, Knight suggests the “Cs” trick. … read full article
US - The Left’s Opt-In Totalitarianism
Pressuring your opponents into silence doesn’t make their views disappear.
From National Review (USA)
By Kevin D. Williamson
August 21, 2022
Here’s a remarkable — stupid, awful, ghastly — document of our times: A group calling itself Physicians for Reproductive Health has published an open letter to the nation’s reporters and news editors, demanding that they pretend anti-abortion activists do not exist. … read full article
Australia - The ‘progressive’ Holy Trinity is far from divine
From Spectator | Australia
By Katherine Deves
August 22, 2022
The Manly Sea Eagles rainbow jersey saga represents the new ‘progressive’ Holy Trinity of diversity, inclusion, and equality with a steep social penalty for failing to toe the line.
Anyone declining to affirm this new godhead, even if remaining neutral, find themselves denounced as heretics and subjected to public shaming. Progressives claim to promote tolerance but hypocritically exclude those with different views or beliefs, including those who do not actively demonstrate allegiance to progressive orthodoxy. … read full article
Australia - Aussie Parents Risk Criminalization If They Don’t “Affirm” Child’s Gender Identity
From Reduxx (Australia)
By Katherine Deves
August 21, 2022
The enactment of the Change or Suppression (Conversion) Practices Prohibition Act 2021 makes it unlawful for anyone to fail to affirm the declared gender identity of another person under threat of criminal sanctions, including fines and incarceration, in the Australian state of Victoria.
The bill was sold to the public as a measure to prevent the trauma that can be caused caused to same sex-attracted people through harmful and abusive practices intended to change or suppress their orientation. The evidence relied on for these practices was largely historical, from overseas jurisdictions and could be dealt with under existing laws. … read full article
Thanks for the tip re Dame Janet Abbott Baker. I checked out some youtube audio. nice. kudos to all the writers represented.