The UK is leading the world in the fight to protect children with gender dysphoria. Thanks to the efforts of campaign groups, whistleblowing clinicians and prominent detransitioners, the UK government can no longer ignore the concerns raised over the increasing numbers of children adopting trans identities – but it’s a different picture in the United States, reports Jo Bartosch.
Across the pond the picture is more complicated, thanks to the private insurance system of medical care the grip of pharmaceutical companies on clinical practice is deeply entrenched. But recently, new groups, including LGB Fight Back and Parents of ROGD Kids (Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria), have begun to band together to challenge the medicalisation of children who experience psychological discomfort in their bodies. At the forefront of their concerns are the disproportionate numbers of same-sex attracted youth seeking to identify as transgender in order to pass as heterosexual.
Action started on Valentine’s Day when LGB Fight Back joined with parents across the US and Canada to protest outside clinics where children and young people are given powerful drugs to treat their mental distress. Brandishing signs and banners with slogans including “stop transing LGB kids” and “protect kids from big pharma” the protestors hope to raise awareness about the prescription of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to children. Given the tactics of anti-abortion campaigners in the US, the optics of protesting outside clinics are not ideal, but these drastic measures are evidence of how frustrated and worried LGB Fight Back and Parents of ROGD Kids are.
“Being gay is not a medical condition,” says Belissa Cohen of LGB Fight Back, “and it’s perfectly normal for LGB people not to conform to sex stereotypes. Targeting non-conforming young people for medical experimentation feels like gay eugenics all over again.”
Annie Maurice of Parents of ROGD Kids says that she’s protesting the gender clinic “because the general public has no idea what’s really going on. We just want to protect our healthy kids from becoming lifelong medical patients. We want them to grow up healthy, happy, and whole.”
“Being gay is not a medical condition,” says Belissa Cohen of LGB Fight Back, “and it’s perfectly normal for LGB people not to conform to sex stereotypes. Targeting non-conforming young people for medical experimentation feels like gay eugenics all over again.”
In the US gender transition is big business. The cost of ‘puberty blocking’ drugs such as Lupron ranges from $4000 to $25,000 per year; it is estimated this is covered by insurance in 72% percent of referrals. The use of Lupron to block puberty is experimental and off-label, it is licensed to treat prostate cancer in adult men and in rare cases, precocious puberty in girls and endometriosis. The list of side-effects include: the underdevelopment of the brain, liver damage, increased risk of heart-attacks, decreased bone density and a worsening of depression.
In 2007, there was one gender clinic in the US. Today, there are more than 50; many prescribe puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones with no referral or therapy required. Once a child starts on a course of hormone blocking medication there is little chance of desistance; genitals will be under-developed and adults left infertile, needing surgery and dependent upon cross-sex hormones for life. In essence, children who feel distress in their sexed bodies are given experimental drugs and made into life-long medical patients. The age at which children are referred to treatment is decreasing. Some campaigning psychologists in the US argue that even pre-verbal infants can indicate that they are transgender.
A 2020 report by Global Market Insights, Inc. estimates the global market valuation for sex reassignment surgery (SRS) will exceed US$ 1.5 billion by 2026. The growth of market can be attributed to the “increasing patient pool”; the number of patients seeking SRS has increased nearly four-fold in the past few years. Findings from the report note “Growing public awareness” of transgenderism has boosted demand.
Popular television shows in the US routinely feature ‘transgender children’, with reality shows such as ‘I am Jazz’ spawning a lucrative franchise. The idea that gender identity exists independently of sex is taught in US public schools, and the election of Joe Biden will undoubtedly see a further entrenchment of this position as the Democratic Party have committed to championing youth who identify as trans.
Outside of government, influential organisations such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Planned Parenthood and the Human Rights Campaign aggressively champion the idea that children can be born in the wrong body.
LGB Fightback and Parents of ROGD Kids are grassroots, and in squaring-up against pharmaceutical companies, government and the industry that has built up around gender identity they have taken on an epic battle. Undoubtedly, the mainstream liberal media in the US will portray the protests outside gender identity clinics as if they were the Westboro Baptist Church, and if these groups are fortunate enough to get coverage from the right-leaning press this will be used to discredit them with Democratic voters. Those fighting gender identity ideology in the US are in an impossible bind.
As LGB Fightback’s Carrie Hathorn astutely notes “Just when it seemed like the gay rights movement had gained ground, the medical establishment started transing the gay away. Transgenderism, transing LGB youth, is just the latest form of homophobia.”
"Targeting non-conforming young people for medical experimentation feels like gay eugenics all over again." This sums it up for me, it is like we've come full circle and we are having to fight the same battles all over again. Perhaps we always have to be on our guard?