How satisfied are trans people with their transition? Here's part of an answer from a large-scale Washington Post poll of trans people:
Unfortunately, the poll doesn't dig down on this question. Of the trans people who are less satisfied, is this because they think they made a bad choice or because they didn't realize how much crap they'd have to put up with? It's a big difference.
I’m sure that, given the hysteria on this topic, no one involved really wants to undermine their community. But hey… I’m glad they are feeling better!
Uh oh… this is one dissatisfied customer.
Transgender flight attendant Kayleigh Scott — who gained fame after appearing in a United Airlines commercial — was found dead Monday in her Colorado home. She was 25. Scott, who shared her transition story for a 2020 Trans Day of Visibility video produced by United, declared in a 2:30 a.m. Instagram post that she was planning to end her life.
Taking advantage of someone's despair to hawk your bigotry is pretty cruel.
If folks like you and Mr. Drum are going to argue that transitioning makes people feel better, then it seems like the prevalence of suicidal ideation and actual successful suicide is a counter argument.
I hope that those who are suffering from this disorder are able to find relief. Perhaps the prevalence of suicide among transgender folks is an argument for letting them do this. I’m really ok with it either way. Live and let live.
People who take on an “unconventional” way of living in a hostile society are always going to be vulnerable. If your proposed solution doesn’t actually address the despair or makes it even worse, what have you accomplished? You will never find the broad acceptance and tolerance you seek. No one ever does.
It definitely made my daughter feel better; she's finishing a masters this semester and will earn a Phd in another 1.5 years. She was to depressed and disliked herself too much to have done this before.
But what I don't understand is how you can live with yourself, such a toxic, poisonous spirt lacking in grace and generosity. Pitiful.
When you say your daughter was she originally your son? I get confused.
How old were they when they sought medical intervention and how far did that medical intervention go?
Tell me, how is your gear working? Does it rise up when needed? Any prostate issues? Post-menopause dryness?
If you think that's rude, you're right. Asking people about their privates is always rude. Even if the person is transgender.
People who want to introduce radical hormone treatments and surgeries as the solution to gender dysphoria for children as young as eight have made it an issue. Radical transgender activist want me to call a biological male she and a biological female she because they believe they are the opposite sex. They are demanding that I lie to them. I will not do that. I am glad your daughter/son is content and happy with their interventions. Many are not.
Only ignorant people think children are having 'radical treatments.' Hormones aren't present for anyone until puberty, which - unless you're some kind on medical anomaly and WOULD warrant radical medical treatment - does not happen at eight years old. Further, surgeries don't happen until age of consent with parental approval after years of mental health screenings to make sure it's the correct course of action. Stop playing the tool to someone else's talking points and let people be.
You brought your child into the discussion. I would not have.
Any analysis of satisfaction / dissatisfaction with transgender surgery needs to take into account the substantial literature on other irreversible or mostly irreversible commitments.
For example, many gang members tattoo themselves in visible places. They are now irreversibly in the gang - they cannot undo this. The economic and psychological aspects of this are fascinating.
In the same way, once a transgender person has surgery their decision is irreversible. Admitting it was a mistake is very very difficult even if it was a mistake.
Disgusting. Absolutely disgusting. Gleefully commenting on a suicide as a side effect of a course of action that you apparently already have disdain for and mistakenly place emphasis on the procedure as the driving force for it, when it was her bravery that exposed her to the withering fire of certain segments of society that most likely drove her act.
Kudos for keeping her pronouns as she wanted though. I'll consider it progress.
You have no idea why this person took their life so your speculation just brands you as the clueless a$$hole that you are.
The counter argument to that is that the suicidal ideation goes DOWN for trans people who transition. The act of living more authentically INCREASES the life span for trans people, even in the parts of the country that are more hostile to trans people. Now granted, I'm glad I'm in a part of the country that is understanding and accepting, but even in the worst states I'd be better off being myself and my mental health is better off by not trying to live someone else's lie.
So. Kayleigh is a story that was reported to you...by someone.
As a counterweight to that anecdata, I am personally aware of more than one case where depression and suicidal ideation were stopped dead in their tracks by beginning transition - with family and medical support.
The cases I am speaking of have been reported to me by the trans person, or by their parents. Not something posted on an activist website. Personally known. I'm not going into more details for the sake of people's privacy, and because, like @Crissa says below, it's cruel (and also dehumanizing) to leverage someone's difficulties for political ends.
The poll Kevin cites has some very questionable wording and yet it still slants heavily toward trans people being happier for having transitioned.
You know what? The first stage of transition is dressing differently and using a different name and pronouns. If that doesn't immediately make the child happier, then stop. What parent and/or doctor wouldn't do that?
You're that close to making us out to be baby murderers again. Which kind of explains the hostility expressed toward you, doesn't it?
Suicide rate is much higher for vets than ti is for civilians. Ban the military?
Steve
I can tell you that the one trans person I know (non-binary) who had top surgery in their mid-20s is grateful every day for having found a doctor. And regrets waiting so long.
Just one story.
Mid-twenties is an adult.
And transitioning before the onset of puberty would have prevented the need for that surgery.
Zic! Long time no see.
It's amazing that you face a very similar parenting situation to me. I hope you and yours are doing well. We have weathered many storms but are still moving forward.
Hi Doc, how you doing?
We've weathered many storms, too.
And all those books they want to ban from school libraries would have been of tremendous benefit to us when our daughter was young.
I realize that it's important for me to speak loudly and clearly: our family suffered because nobody ever once brought up the notion of gender dysphoria despite our search for help for our withdrawn and depressed (and brilliant, she's earning a PhD in comp sci, helping to invent a new math with her research).
We are well, but I so many of her friends whom have been severely abused and mistreated by their families. It's a shame, and in no small part due to the lack of information on the topic.
Perhaps true. But what other side effects? There are no long-term studies blocking puberty from occurring naturally and for life. Yes, some children are prescribed medicine when puberty starts too early - they are taken off when it is time for the body to change.
It is true that if a male is put on puberty blockers to avoid puberty certain parts of the anatomy not be as large and will make it much more difficult to make a vagina.
So do you have a child with gender dysphoria? Are you yourself suffering from genderdysphoria?
No.
You're just grabbing onto the latest political stick to get the libs with and don't care an asscrack about those actual children.
get off my lawn.
You all need to start reading about lives that are ruined by the lie that a man can make himself into a woman and vice-versa. Clinics and activist groups do the studies to convince more people to embrace their ideology.
Counteroffer: go away.
My counter - offer: No. You can't use my child as grist in your mill. Come up with a differential diagnosis then we can talk.
Go away, bigot.
You want to torture your child? You lose the child.
Either they grow up and hate your guts or they don't make it. This is the future you're building by promoting discrimination against gender nonconformity.
That's quite the compelling argument.... Do what your child wants or they will hate your forever... or kill themselves... or become a homeless drug addict sex worker. Woohoo!
It's right there for everyone to read. This is the justification for giving in to a pre-pubescent kids desires. Wow.
This is why people don't like it. It's not because they dress funny... it's this threat. It demonstrates the immaturity and mental fragility all at the same time. Wow.
To simply say this is just a lark and a momentary whim of a child is the very deepest of vacuousness. None - NONE - of these children, or adults for that matter, and their parents take this lightly. If you think that any of these people are walking into clinic and making a selection off a menu just demonstrates your shallow thoughts and reasoning. I'm making assumptions about you here, but I have a feeling your maturity is what should be questioned.
Sorry, but my direct experience with my child contradicts yours. Doesn't mean your experience is fantastical, doesn't mean I'm making stuff up.
Further, in my state, Planned Parenthood will give minors above the age of 15 cross-sex hormones without parent notification on an "informed consent" model. Its not legal to tattoo a teen of that age because their decision making capacity is not close to being developed. And yeah, that's about as close as you can get to "walking into clinic and making a selection off a menu"
Another mistake. I've seen those protocols for hormones for children - it is not how you characterize. Nor is your poor analogy of worth. Tattoos aren't for health. Keep derping, I hope your child will be ok.
More names I see.
So ... please correct me on the protocols. How do they work? Policies vary by region ... and my local PP now states that they are only 18yrs +. My state still allows 15 year olds medical autonomy on this issue. The NCS region is very clear "Transgender hormone therapy is available through our expanded online care services. Planned Parenthood uses an informed consent model. This means we do not require a referral or therapy note to get this service. "
And to the extent that my analogy is poor, its in the exact opposite direction. Yes, a tattoo is superficial. Medical transition is not - and is likely to create permanent and non-reversible changes. Why can a 15 year old not get a tattoo but can have sexual bits removed? The requirements should be much higher for medical procedures, not lower.
You sound like one of the parents that cause dysphoric kids to opt for homelessness.
My daughter trusts me. We love and respect each other. I wish that kind of love and trust for you and your child. But if your child doesn't trust you, that's on you.
I know a lot of adults who, after transitioning, can't and won't have anything to do with their parents because they had reason not to trust -- the parents actions.
Have your actions caused your child to distrust you, and place trust in their school, instead? If so, I'm so happy to hear the system is working properly.
+10
There are more and more parents reporting that they resisted a trans diagnosis for their child (typically a child who announced a trans identity around age 11-14) and after a period of anger, the child moved on.
This combined with the growing numbers of detransitioners, suggests that gender identity is not immutable. In fact, many people assert that gender is fluid, except when it comes to kids.
For some reason, if a child says they are trans, all exploration of identity stops, and medicalization begins.
You need to go away and stop being a vulture over trans people.
Hi Crissa! So glad we get to have these meaningful conversations.
I'm not at all opposed to gender nonconformity. I'm opposed to experimentation on children. I'm opposed to activists forcing others to think and act. I'm opposed to lack of evidence. I'm opposed to needless, life-altering surgery. Why do you have problems with these positions?
So you're opposed to cosmetic surgeries, bariatric surgery, etc.? Those all have people who undergo those procedures and later regret them as well. What about tattoos, you think those should be illegal as well? Or do you just think that parents shouldn't have the right to make medical decisions for their children in conjunction with their children's doctors? Who is better positioned to make medical decisions for their children, in your opinion? Their parents in conjunction with the children's doctors, or the government?
Depends on the child and the type of cosmetic surgery. In general, in the United States, a person must be 18 to get ink or body piercing in places other than the ear. That is a good rule.
See - i thought Liberals were the party of science. At least that is what you say. There is no science to back up the notion that someone can have biological sex differently from the genitals they were born with. A small percentage of people are born with indistinct genitalia, which is entirely different.
Because those 'positions' are not real things. You're not a 'concerned citizen protecting kids,' you're dogwhistling anti-trans bullshit to push your hateful, bigoted agenda.Stop being a lackey for disgusting people and grow up.
Bigots and jerks become keyboard warriors to convince other people to embrace cruelty.
Pathetic little souls.
There's no surgery that will make you into a decent human being that's for sure.
You need to start reading about the lives that are ruined by non-transitioning trans people and their unsupportive families. There's a lot of them. A LOT of them.
There is no evidence to support medical transition as a suicide prevention strategy. The only hard numbers come from an evaluation of 15,000 patients referred to the Tavistock (the largest gender clinic in the world) over 10 years. There were 4 suicides. Two were of patients receiving affirming treatment, two were of patients on the waitlist.
Thankfully, completed suicides are rare. All of the claims about transition being "lifesaving care" stem from surveys about suicidality.
As with the general population, I'm sure there are accompanied, undiagnosed issues aside from gender dysphoria, and some will encounter additional issues that one did not foresee nor were they prepared for them.
Having said that, if you ask 100 people if they're satisfied with life, at least a quarter will say they are not.
When my daughter transitioned, she had to go through two years of mental-health therapy and get her therapist to approve the transition to an endocrinologist who wrote her first prescription and a testosterone blocker. Wishing two weeks of beginning these, she felt better and wanted to spend time with people again.
Repeated experiences like this are why the protocols were dropped -- yeah, some folk probably don't like the results. But as this study shows, most do.
From the people I've met who've transitioned, most of the severe mental health problems they experience are rooted in their family relationships, and abuse and rejection from intolerant family members. We can see a lot of that abuse reflected in some of the comments on this thread, too. Those folk are the cause of much anguish for anyone with gender dysphoria.
Your experience is VERY different from mine. I'm curious about when this happened and where. Our experience was much closer to that described by Jamie Reed, formerly of Washington University: Endocrinology lied or was at least "untruthful" in their description of the process, a counselor was willing to give us a letter after 5 minutes (I'm not kidding) ... and none of that passed the most basic of sniff tests. Finding a counselor who would actually commit to the long process proved impossible in our area.
Please consider that my position on this matter may be wildly different from yours not because of ideology or character, but because of experience.
It sounds like you had a case of medical malpractice.
But I remain skeptical because you want to make the decision for other folks, not improve medical care for people suffering from gender dysphoria.
It's easily treatable, believe it or not. My daughter felt almost immediately relief with hormone therapy; but she already had passed through puberty. Her experiences are why I think the kid gets the say here; secondary sex characteristics are painful and costly to alter, when hormone therapy while they develop solves the issue. And it's pretty easy to postpone puberty a few years for the extra maturity to make that decision.
We're raised to think that all humans are either male or female, and generally unprepared to consider the variety of differences that actually occur. A small but significant number of people are born with sexually ambiguous or anomalous organs. Because so many genes are involved in sexual expression, there are many more variations than are visible, some biochemical and some cognitive or psychological.
People who feel that their gender is different than their body appears is not a new phenomenon and has led many cultures to recognize a third or sometimes fourth sex.
I can imagine that it would be very painful to live like a man if you feel like a woman or visa versa. For some the discontinuity may be very strong while for others more ambivalent. And surgery may not provide the relief sought if others treat you as something else (not normal, a freak).
I understand the need to be protective of children. It must be so hard to be a parent and face decisions on how best to support a child who is struggling with their identity or suffering because of it. We could use a little more sympathy and humility on this subject all around.
Well said.
Please elaborate on "many cultures to recognize a third or sometimes fourth sex."
I think you are conflating social roles with sex.
In other words, GENDER.
There is literally no evidence that people with chromosomal anomalies (DSDs) that result in ambiguous sex traits are a significant component among the population identifying as transgender.
This poll doesn't differentiate between people who have socially transitioned with people who have actually had reassignment surgery (the data on the latter suggest they are overwhelmingly satisfied with the surgery). As such, it's not particularly interesting in terms of the current policy discourse about trans people.
Even if we grant that a quarter of people who have socially transitioned regret the choice to do so (as opposed to being unhappy simply because society makes trans people's lives miserable), that's fine! They can simply detransition if they want. Where in "a minority of trans people voluntarily detransition because they realized they weren't really trans" does a matter of any public concern enter the picture?
I think there is more nuance here than you see. Yes, I agree in general that lawmakers should tread extremely carefully in these matters, and should be guided purely by evidence, and should preserve the rights and choices of individuals and those providing their care to the greatest extent possible. The blanket outlawing of gender-affirming care is clearly being driven by religiosity and ideology and cannot at this time be justified by facts. On the other hand, I believe the laws against gay-‘conversion therapy’ are based on the best available knowledge and are preventing harm to many.
By "that"s fine" I mean "the fact that a minority of trans people have become more dissatifsfied as a result of transitioning is not, by itself, a situation begging for a policy remedy", not "everything is hunky-dory and nobody should ever look into the causes of why trans people might be unhappy, as there's no chance that some of those causes do have potential policy remedies."
Ah, agree.
I'm not convinced. Looking at the data (which has giant holes in it ... way too many questions withheld "for future release") I can make a different story: Adults identifying as trans had, on the whole, worse childhoods with more isolation, less guidance, etc. They don't do a proper ACES eval so we can't infer too much here. Yet as adults they still are less socially connected, in poorer physical and mental health, etc. They may be happy they've transitioned, but they aren't necessarily "doing better" - and sorry, this makes it all too easy to suggest a strong alternative hypothesis that they are engaged in some deep cognitive dissonance (aka "fooling themselves").
Its right in WaPo's write up as well ... Alyssa's story of "Her mother had been arrested for drug use, and Rogers was sent to live in an orphanage." is one of early trauma. One of the most common stories from detransitioners is "I was abused/traumatized and I realized that being trans didn't solve my problems." It doesn't take much to think that these identities emerge from trauma and that maybe some treatment of that would resolve the issues of connection, satisfaction, etc. So alternate hypothesis: Trans identity is an adaptation to adverse experiences.
Why do you insist on promoting bullying and bigotry?
What does it advance you to torture kids and adults who do not conform to your gender stereotypes?
Detransitioners represent less than five percent of those who've medically transitioned. And more than half of those detransitioned for monetary or family reasons. Not regret.
You're here preying upon their broken hearts and it's disgusting.
Hi again!
Its basic public health - the corpse in the river problem. You have to understand root causes. You have a solution and don't want to consider other causes.
I do. That doesn't make me a monster.
We can quibble about detransition rates - I don't believe the old 1% or this new 5% number. Why? Because the data is crap. But the general problem is that medical transition without evidence, without a diagnostic differential, means that some number of people will be mistakenly medicalized. In short, you've created your own version of the trolley problem ... how many innocent people will have their lives ruined in the name of treating a condition that, until recently, most children simply outgrew?
The "data is crap" point is really essential. The Cass Review of England's Tavistock GIDS (Gender Identity) clinic discovered that there was really no data being collected. Similar results in Sweden and other countries have led to a serious rethinking about protocols, and moving away from the "affirmation only" so called therapy that doesn't assess patients for underlying issues, which often are legion. It is not bigotry or hate to bring this up, nor is it hate to note that the clinical evidence for most of the medical procedures is weak, at best. The trans activist community seeks to shut down serious discussions about any of this and have largely succeeded in the US - sadly excepting red states. Conservatives have found a golden wedge issue here. Makes me furious that liberals like me are shouted down for trying to engage seriously..
Yes. In every country that has done a systematic review of the evidence (this is a defined term, you have to publish to PROSPERO the inclusion criteria prior to doing the literature search, and then take all papers that meet criteria into your evaluation, versus picking out several papers you like) the conclusion has been that the benefits have not been shown to outweigh the risks.
After conducting systematic reviews, Sweden and Finland have decided puberty blockers can only be given in extreme circumstances as part of an IRB approved experimental protocol. England has announced that even social transition needs to be considered a serious intervention and is breaking up their single gender clinic into multiple regional clinics incorporated with other mental health support. Norway's advisory body for medicine has announced that they consider pediatric medical transition to be experimental and they will be reviewing the practice.
Nicola Sturgeon, First Minister of Scotland, was recently run out of office when her full throated push for trans "self-ID" ran into the very real problem of violent male sexual criminals self-IDing to get into women's prisons. Everyone promoting self-id said "that will never happen" and then case after case of it happening became public and the shocked public threw her out on her ear. JK Rowling recently funded a private female only shelter for abused women because all public shelters in Scotland require them to accept transwomen, who are and always will be male and women who have been abused by men were frightened of them. There are actual frequent problems with transwomen in female sex specific spaces and those problems are not due to bigotry, they are due to men acting up. Most Transwomen retain their male genitals (>90%), and a large subset gets a thrill by invading women's spaces and exposing themselves to a population that is not allowed to complain. One might note that transmen are rarely discussed in these conversations, because transmen are still female and are not pushing men out of the way in private or public spaces, nor in sport... because they are female.
Why are you conflating those that seek treatment, acceptance, equality with criminal behavior?
I seriously doubt any of the commenters here believe that individuals who have gone through gender dysphoria and transitioned are doing so for criminal purposes. However, when a rapist suddenly has a jail house conversion or "Prison Onset Gender Dysphoria", the "self id" policy runs into a real-world conflict.
Or, not all trans people are criminals ... but some criminals are transgender. And because of that possibility, policies need to recognize some checks.
Again, the shallowness of thinking here is staggering. Is your contention that those transitioning are doing this on a whim, as of selecting an appetizer from a menu?
And you've switched the argument. From one of transitioning to one of gender preference. You're angry that you might have to change your behavior when dealing with another person instead of them conforming to your obviously correct and true interpretation of reality.
It's really shallow and dare I say, primitive. Not all men are criminals, but some criminals are men. And because this possibility exists, policies need to recognize some checks.
Yes! You're getting it now ..
".. some criminals are men. And because this possibility exists, policies need to recognize some checks." like separate spaces for girls and women! Like a bunch of laws that disproportionally affect men. Like the world we live in.
And yes, in the case of Scottish Prisons it is nearly a whim. https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/news/scottish-news/anger-trans-inmates-revert-males-25840252.
I'll quote: "...men who changed their gender to female in jail are switching back to their birth gender after release. A study, published in the British Journal of Criminology, also revealed that some of these prisoners may only have identified as women in order to have sex with female inmates." So yeah, their transition is totally serious and their identity as a transwoman is "deep."
You are incorrigible. Dense. And most probably deplorable. Again I wish your child luck.
Whatever. My goal is an objective, demonstrable truth. You seem more interested in Right, whatever that is.
The Right you think I'm looking for is seated right next to your objective, demonstrable truth. Neither of us will find either. It just seems to me that you want to restrain and I want to let loose treatments. Considering more deeply some of your positions, treatments could hurt. I should be more considerate of that position. You should consider that restraining treatments could hurt as well. And since all these treatments are relatively speaking new, it would seem restraint wishes to continue the suffering that others have felt that needed these treatments all through the history of human medicine. You want suffering, because that's what has gone before. I want at least the chance to reduce suffering which is the ultimate goal of all medicine.
I tried to get closer to Truth.
Did I succeed?←rhetorical
Still wishing your child luck.
This is a common fallacy, isn't it?
We have to keep transgender women out of girls bathroom because bad men will pretend to be trans in order to assault.
blame the transgender women, not the bad men who goes to a restroom under false pretenses to sexually assault someone.
For scores of years, woman have been afforded safe places away from men to change clothes and use the toilet. Not because ALL men are dangerous criminals, but because SOME men are, and you can't tell which ones by looking at them.
Suddenly a bunch of people have decided that if a man decides that he's actually a woman, this means that he could never, ever, be a threat.
It's nonsense. Predators used to go through years of seminary to become priests, what makes you think they wouldn't work through another set of hoops to gain access to what they want?
Maybe it was seminary that made them monsters...
Here we are, arguing against laws that are intended to prevent parents from seeking treatment for their children with gender identity issues, and you go bringing up fraudulent claims by adult criminals. This has only the weakest of connections to the topic at hand, and as such, seems like an attempt to derail the conversation.
Do you want a different standard applied to criminals in prison seeking a gender change? Sure. Granted. Can we get back to stuff that's more relevant? Funnily enough, the laws we're seeing enacted don't have much to do with criminals or prisons.
(By the way, if those prisoners were to even socially transition and stick to it, it would very likely make them miserable. Because that's what happens to someone who lives a gender ID that's different from their internal signal. The problem is to prevent them from making a whole bunch of other people miserable while they are at it.)
Ok - so this post is supposed to be about the happiness of USA transgender adults. What do laws for pediatric transition have to do with it?
I have a problem with polls that ask about happiness, because people may feel shame over unhappiness and thus deny it. Like the World Happiness Index wherein the happiest countries are always antidepressant-gobbling ones like Denmark where unhappiness can't be blamed on externalities like the system, so it's perceived to be your own fault.
Also, most trans people were unhappy before they transitioned, so whether they're a bit happier now is a pretty low bar to clear.
Polls don't weigh up against personal encounters and experiences, and mine for what it's worth are that trans women are seldom happy and trans men generally are.
Interesting, because testosterone has antidepressant properties, and estrogen seems to actually increase the risk of depression.
Passing for trans men is an order of magnitude easier than it is for trans women, which I think will have a lot to do with it.
Just a reminder ... Kevin's post on "The progressive trans war is reaching a fever pitch" (Feb 18) includes this :
"Activists attack the non-activists with absolutely no holds barred: they are murderers, liars, zealots, and pawns of the right. Non-activists hit back with charges that the trans community has no interest in the truth."
How well he predicted how these comment sections would play out!
Yeah, you're right. I am not going to stand quiet when you attack my daughter.
I'm a mamma bear that way.
I am in no way attacking your child. You however seem to want my child to replicate your experience in order to validate your decisions. Now who is assaulting a child?
oh, you are.
No honey, I don't care what your child decides is best for them.
But from your posts here, it's really obvious you are not amongst the things they consider good for their own well-being, and feel attacked by you.
Again, you're your kids own worst problem, and you're trying to deflect that. I pity you, for you probably won't have a relationship with that child going forward, at least based on what I've seen and heard from others with parents as intolerant as you.
But since you think your experience should be the policy for all trans children, it is an attack on mine.
And I'm still a mamma bear, only explaining to you why I'm not going to be passive about your trollery, since you brought up one of Kevin's posts that indicate the things Liberals should view with pride.