Are sex change treatments losing legitimacy?
The Biden administration joins other governments' change of heart on trans medical procedures for minors, a trend that could indicate that gender ideology is losing power.
Trans flag made with chalk
Gender ideology faces a critical challenge on the issue of transgender treatments for minors based on self-identified gender.
The Biden administration's recent refusal to remove the existing age limit for undergoing transgender surgery puts this political ideology in a precarious position.
The proposal, introduced by Assistant Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Rachel Levine, who identifies as transgender, was quickly rejected by the government.
A White House spokesman said, in statements collected by Daily Wire, that "the administration does not support surgery for minors." He did not discuss other medical treatments, but did confirm that Levine's statements about surgeries on minors were not approved by the Oval Office:
Not only did Levine make these statements, but he also had the support of his entire team. They sent an e-mail to the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) proposing to remove the "specific ages" as Levine "was very concerned that having ages (mainly for surgeries) will affect access to care for trans youth and maybe adults, too."
"Apparently, the situation in the U.S.A. is terrible and she and the Biden administration worried that having ages in the document will make matters worse. She asked us to remove them."
But the Department of Health and Human Services has encountered several stumbling blocks to getting its proposals through as more and more organizations and even countries are refusing to perform transgender surgeries on minors.
'Doctors protecting children,' the American College of Pediatricians' statement against transgender surgeries on minors
Dozens of doctors, as well as many other health professionals who belong to the American College of Pediatricians, with the support of numerous professional organizations, signed the declaration "Doctors Protecting Children" almost a month ago.
They asked medical institutions to stop supporting and therefore performing sex change procedures on minors that suffer from gender dysphoria.
They did so by presenting this document in which they expressed their "serious concerns" about the various treatments undergone by minors who, theoretically, feel uncomfortable with their biological sex. These treatments include hormonal treatments and even genital mutilation.
Europe presents several scientific reports advising against gender reassignment procedures
In several European countries, gender ideology is also being dismantled. The Netherlands is a good example.
There, a small scientific experiment was conducted in which 2,700 children between the ages of 11 and 25 were studied. All of them were asked the same question about how they felt about their sex.
The results were revealing. At the start of the study, 1 in 10 children reported feeling "dissatisfaction with the gender corresponding to the sex they were assigned at birth." At the end of the study, 15 years later, only 1 of the 25 said they were "often" or "sometimes" dissatisfied with their biological sex.
After careful analysis of the data, the researchers found minors had the most doubt about their gender identity during adolescence and that this is "normal":
"The results of the present study might help adolescents realize that it is normal to have some doubts about one's identity and one's gender identity during this age period and that this is also relatively common."
The U.K. presented the Cass Report. Rishi Sunak's government was forced to ban transgender procedures, all because of a paper submitted by Dr. Hilary Cass in which she claimed that children should not be allowed to make clinical decisions about their bodies as there was no "reliable evidence base" that this was the best decision.
What was disproved in the Cass Report?
Moreover, Cass said that, on this issue, "The strengths and weaknesses of the evidence base on the care of children and young people are often misrepresented and overstated, both in scientific publications and social debate."
The paper also mentioned the use of masculinizing/feminizing hormones in children under the age of 18, claiming that there was insufficient scientific evidence that it was safe for one's health to take them as there was a huge lack of long-term follow-up data. Cass also did not recommend that young people undergo any medical treatment as, in her opinion, this is not the best way to "manage their gender-related distress" but rather, in such cases, "wider mental health and/or psychosocialy challenging problems" also need to be addressed.
France has a similar opinion. It also put together a report for scientists to present their findings. The report was presented to the French Senate and many senators changed their minds on this issue. Senator Jacqueline Eustache-Brinio, from the center-right Les Républicains party, called transgender procedures "one of the biggest ethical scandals in the history of medicine."
She did so after learning the findings presented by scientists who reported witnessing an unprecedented increase in requests for sex reassignment in the country, even among very young children.
Something interesting was mentioned again that could explain "gender dysphoria." According to psychologist Céline Masson and child psychiatrist Caroline Eliacheff, the minors who claimed to suffer from gender dysphoria tended to have other disorders as well. They proved their theory through a study in which they were able to corroborate their hypothesis. The study found that one out of four children who went to the Parisian hospital of the Pitié-Salpètrière for these reasons had dropped out of school; 42% were victims of bullying and 61% suffered from depression.
Along with this, 20% of the children who participated in the study attempted suicide. Interestingly enough, all of them were suggested to undergo a sex change as a solution to their problems. Both scientists claimed that this was suggested before, "trying to explore other ways to overcome their suffering."
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