On Monday 8th March a ‘Westminster Hall Debate’ was had in the United Kingdom parliament in response to a petition calling for a ban on LGBT Conversion Therapy.
The full debate in Parliament is available on Parliament TV
The petition calls for the Government to make running conversion therapy for LGBT people a criminal offence. This is a statement which on the face of it almost no one would disagree with for ‘LGB’ people, however, the problem arises when the ‘T’ is included. Banning “conversion” therapy for children suffering from gender dysphoria (so called “trans” children) would give parents, therapists and other trusted adults no option other than to affirm the child’s gender identity. “Affirmation” therapies, which insist a child’s cross-sex identity should never be questioned, and puberty-blocking drugs, advertised as a way for children to “buy time” to sort out their identities, may only solidify feelings of dysphoria, setting them on a pathway to more invasive medical interventions and permanent infertility, as noted by in the recent Keira Bell Court Judgement.
https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Bell-v-Tavistock-Judgment.pdf
This pathologizing of sex-atypical behavior is extremely worrying and regressive. Ironically, it is similar to gay “conversion” therapy Parliament debated on Monday, except that it’s now bodies instead of minds that are being converted to bring children into “proper” alignment with themselves. Studies have shown the large majority of gender-dysphoric youths eventually outgrow their feelings of dysphoria during puberty (if not affirmed), and many end up identifying as homosexual adults.
Dr David Bell’s expert opinion on this is that this affirmation only approach prevents underlying issues being explored and oppresses the child’s sexual identity and prevents them from growing up to be a happy and healthy, non-medicalised gay adult. In other words, the gender affirming model of treatment is itself conversion therapy. When young people are taught that sex is grounded in identity instead of biology, sex categories can easily become conflated with regressive stereotypes of masculinity and femininity. Masculine girls and feminine boys may become confused about their own sex. The dramatic rise of “gender dysphoric” adolescents—especially young girls—in clinics likely reflects this new cultural confusion.
As far as this petition is concerned, it is important to be clear that gender identity is NOT in the same category as sexual orientation. Gender identity should be explored using psychotherapy however gay conversion therapy, including converting gay adolescents to transgender ones, should be banned. We need to protect our children from gay conversion therapy, however we must make sure that therapeutic pathways are available to those with gender dysphoria. The growing number of Detransitioners and the Tavistock- Bell case clearly highlights the tragedy of the affirmation only approach, promoted by Stonewall, Mermaids and other trans lobbying organisations, which is ruining the lives of young Gender non-conforming people who have been sold “gender transition” as a cure for the discomfort felt in adolescence or resistance against rigid gender roles.
https://thecritic.co.uk/issues/november-2020/transitioning-to-a-medical-scandal/
A strong indicator of how much work there remains to be done is that there were no Members of Parliament involved in the debate prepared to stand up for the health, welfare and safeguarding of young people being harmed or under threat of being harmed by the gender affirming model of treatment. Not one. On the other hand many MPs repeated the lies commonly trotted out by the activists promoting gender ideology. Take a look at the full transcript.
Elliott Colburn, Conservative MP for Carshalton said that the bans implemented in Madrid, Malta and Victoria in Australia were “highly praised”. This is disingenuous to say the least. In Victoria two MPs crossed the floor to vote against the Bill. One, Bernie Finn, pointed out that “If this bill was just what the government said it is, there wouldn’t be a problem. But it’s not, it’s a lot more than that.”
“This bill is an attack on basic freedoms, on freedoms of choice, free speech, freedom of assembly and an attack on freedom of religion,”
Bernie Finn
Back in the UK debate, cheerleader for the transgender lobby, Crispin Blunt, Conservative MP for Reigate launched into a passionate yet inevitably fact-free championing for gender identity to be included. For example he said, without any justification or evidence to support his view that “The law must include trans people, and not only because they are the group who need it the most.” This is plainly just grandstanding, gender identity must not be included in the law because those people who identify as transgender are in most need of good quality therapy and interventions which Mr Blunt would, no doubt, label as conversion therapy.
More vacuous posturing came in this statement:
“Trans people are a community under siege. Organisations whose principle raison d’être is to attack and challenge the very legitimacy of trans people have come into being, and they appear to trans people to be firmly in the ascendant.”
Crispin Blunt MP
This is, of course, baseless hyperbole. It is those who seek to question the ideology behind political transgenderism who are under siege as is evidenced by the concerted efforts by Academia and big technology companies to silence ‘gender critical’ views.
That he might perceive these new organisations to be in the ascendency is largely a result of such groups being recently established in response to the threats posed to the rights of women, to freedom of speech and the health and wellbeing of children and adolescents.
If we are ‘firmly in the ascendant’ then that is a good thing, there is very much more to do before we get close to parity with those seeking to curtail women’s rights, free speech and our kids’ health.
Alicia Kearns, Conservative MP for Rutland and Melton, seemed to be the only MP present to acknowledge that there was a legitimate need to help young people:
“Finally, some opponents claim that transgender individuals should be removed from the legislation. It is quite straightforward to introduce a safeguard for professionally accredited individuals who can assist persons considering undergoing a gender transition.”
Alicia Kearns MP
Our Duty supports parents in helping their children through a transgender identity crisis. Professionally accredited individuals have their part to play, as do all members of the family and wider community. Indeed, the whole nation has a duty to champion the scientific facts and the safeguarding principles which others would label conversion therapy. So, while it is heartening Ms Kearns has clearly given this more thought than all her colleagues at this debate put together, a small concession for the professionally accredited is not sufficient. The whole environment and atmosphere needs to change – and that can only happen with the removal of ‘gender identity’ entirely from not just any Conversion Therapy Bill which might arise but all statute.
Stella Creasy, Labour MP for Walthamstow makes a fundamental error in saying “It is not about whether being trans is a pathology, because it is not. It is a part of who someone is.” It is neither. It is a deeply held belief. Being ‘trans’ has more in common with being a Scientologist than it does with being mentally ill or with being gay.
Fundamentally, this is about truth and safeguarding:
The Government has a duty to protect our young people from being harmed by the gender affirming model of treatment and take a lead in child safeguarding, so as to prevent more detransitioners with issues of lifelong medicalisation, unknown long term harms, lack of sexual function and often sterility. In “reality”, no one can change sex – they can only hope to imitate the opposite sex.
Everyone needs to be free to explain these truths to young people and so protect them from harm.
Further reading:
The Danger of Conflating Ethical Psychotherapy with Conversion Therapy Clinicians from the Society for Evidence Based Gender Medicine (SEGM) examine a study purporting harms of psychotherapy
Revealed: the secret trans-rights lobbying operation in parliament Spectator article by James Kirkup
