The lawsuits are starting – and it’s about time. In the last couple of days, law firms in both the US and the UK have put out a call for claimants wishing to take legal action as a result of harm done to them or their family members by trans drug treatments and surgeries.
Parents of gender questioning kids who are considering, or have already pursued, medical or surgical interventions have been crying out for this for years now. Hopefully these calls for clients will trigger just the first of an avalanche of legal actions which might just have some hope of stopping the avalanche of harm.
The evidence base for the “affirmative approach” – blocking puberty in young children, followed by opposite sex hormones and surgeries in an attempt to mimic the appearance of the opposite sex – is very poor. As I understand it, the evidence base for affirmation approaches in adults – opposite sex hormones and surgeries – is not much better. Underpinning all this is the initial step of society affirming the person’s belief that they are “trans” – that they have been born in the wrong body. Parents in our support groups are seeing multiple harms being done to our kids by affirmation – just read a few of the stories on the PITT Substack.
The number of detransitioners in the Reddit detransition group speaking about the harm done to them is growing by the day, and is now at over twenty five thousand. Individual detransitioners are now speaking out publicly, and forming groups to advocate for their needs.
Many of these people (both male and female) have permanent bodily changes which they deeply regret.
Females have deep voices, scarred chests from mastectomy, and male pattern baldness. Males have unwanted breast growth or implants, and lost genital organs. Both may have sexual dysfunction and permanent infertility.
There are too many other known side effects to list (and possibly many which are as yet unknown).
Yet the affirmation train rolls on – indeed, the situation seems to become more surreal by the week. Young female adolescents are posting photos and videos of their scarred post-mastectomy chests on TikTok, often posing with their surgeons. Those same surgeons freely advertise their services on this site, which is popular with younger teens and even preteens. Surgeons are providing “nullification surgeries”, completely removing the genitals of boys as young as 17.
The pathway of puberty blockers and hormones is promoted by hospital gender clinics in cartoon graphics designed to appeal to the younger set. We are told that sterilizing gender nonconforming children with drugs is analogous to cancer treatment, as they will otherwise commit suicide (this is of course untrue). Gender clinicians are now proposing blocking the puberty of “nonbinary” children on an ongoing basis, claiming that their concerns about pubertal changes (which are of course very common and entirely normal emotions) in fact relate to some sort of mystical “gender identity”, and that “remaining in an androgynous, peripubertal state is the only way that their body can truly reflect their non-binary gender identity”.
The harm has got to stop.
Honestly, nothing can compensate many of the people damaged by trans for what they have lost. Many of the stories now coming out are heart-rending. For example, no amount of money will make up for regret about a hysterectomy, or an orchidectomy that deprives a young person of the chance to ever have children. But at least we can try and stop the harm to protect the next generation of kids.
There have recently been hopeful signs of legal actions being initiated to hold schools and social media companies to account for the harm being done to our children’s mental health, both in general terms, and in particular with regard to the pushing of gender ideology.
Bridge McFarland, one of the firms referred to above, advises that they “have worked on many gender affirmation cases in the past”. One assumes they have been kept confidential, but I find this hopeful. How many have there been? Presumably many are successful if law firms are seeking clients for more actions. Who knows which one will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back; wakes surgeons up to the harm they are doing, makes insurance companies refuse coverage, causes hospitals to close gender clinics, and prompts policymakers and governments to change tack? These things have a way of snowballing, and social change can come quickly once the tide begins to turn.
So if you or your child have been harmed by gender medicine, please consider your options for legal action. If the firms calling for clients are not suitable, why not approach a local firm to see if you have a case? As well as helping yourself, you may just help save some other young people from the harms that you have sadly suffered.
As far as we parents are concerned the whole affirmation model is fundamentally flawed. We hope that the lawsuits will go further than recovering financial damages for individuals who have been harmed – although that is important too. We hope that they will contribute to the whole obscene edifice of “affirmation”, which is causing harm to so many children and young people, being dismantled. We hope that what is left behind will be real, compassionate care for suffering people – care which addresses their true underlying issues and allows them to feel comfortable in their natural healthy bodies.
Gender ideology is a many headed hydra, and will take some beating. Let’s utilize every tool at our disposal to bring it down – including legal action.
Originally published at https://pitt.substack.com/p/damaged-by-trans-the-lawsuits-are reproduced by kind permission.
