Our Duty was founded in 2018.
Keith Jordan, whose daughter had fallen into the transgender cult in 2016 had been desperately seeking answers and support. At the time, there were two sources of information that spoke to those who knew, instinctively, that opposite sex imitation treatments would be inappropriate for their child. In the USA the website 4th Wave Now and in the UK Transgender Trend.
In the Summer of 2018, Keith reached out to Stephanie Davies-Arai, founder of Transgender Trend to find out if her organisation did parent peer support. The idea was that parents who found themselves in the situation of having a child with transgender ideation could help each other with emotional support and information sharing. Stephanie said that Transgender Trend did not have the resources for such an undertaking, so Keith said he would set about building it himself.
At about this time, Lisa Littman released her paper documenting what was described as ‘Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria’ or ROGD. This gave confidence to those of us seeking sensible answers.
And so began UK’s first parent support group for gender dysphoria.
Social media, particularly Twitter, was the main recruitment medium, and eventually our first ‘real-life’ meeting took place, on 5th December 2018, at the Marquis of Cornwallis public house in Bloomsbury, London.
We did not know much then! The consensus was that our children’s mental condition was likely some variety of body dysmorphia. Our initial working name was The Posibody Trust until it was pointed out to us that we’d be more likely to recruit to our cause people who thought they were fat and ugly as distinct from families with a child thinking of themselves as the opposite sex!
Despite not having a name, our group grew rapidly, we networked and plotted using a Slack space called “Critical Critters”.
In September, we took a delegation to the governors’ meeting at The Tavistock Centre. As well as parents, two journalists – Joani Walsh, a freelancer, and Hannah Barnes, a BBC Newsnight producer, were there. Both subsequently made ground-breaking reports.
About the same time, we were starting to hear about Keira Bell, a detranstitioner, and a potential court case.
While a potentially useful management team was emerging, Keith was struggling to deal with the emotional fallout of his daughter having started to take testosterone. By the time of our biggest meeting yet, it had become clear that a few were taking advantage of his distraction, he was being undermined and pushed aside. This all came to a head.
“My position was that we should be unequivocally gender-critical, that opposite sex imitation treatments were always inappropriate, and that we should seek to make as much noise as we can. The biggest mistake that I made was allowing those who could not agree with my position keep and use the name we had chosen at that meeting but were still not happy with – Bayswater Support Group. Apart from that, I stand by the positions that I took.”
Keith Jordan
We pressed on, and our story was published in The Sunday Times.
The newspaper article prompted Paul Jenkins, CEO of The Tavistock and Portman NHS Trust to cancel his meeting with us.
The Newsnight programme aired on 26th November 2019
On 30th November 2019 twenty-two Our Duty parents attended the launch of The Detransition Advocacy Network in Manchester. This was a turning point in detransitioner representation, and although TDAN no longer exists, many more groups supporting and advocating for detransitioners have since appeared.
Our Duty meetings were being held in a church hall in Islington. One such meeting was reported on by a parent and published on the Transgender Trend website.
In March 2020 we were in talks with Stella O’Malley to bring her expertise to our parent meetings.
At about this time the Covid-19 coronavirus crisis started to dominate and inhibit much of what we did. In-person meetings in UK had to be suspended. Meetings shifted to Zoom, and the organisers of those meetings rebranded them ‘Gender Dysphoria Support Network’.
The original idea for Our Duty was to have a single rallying point and recognisable ‘brand’ for parents to get help, to protect their children, and to use their anger constructively. This idea did not survive the tendency for volunteer movements to fragment.
Nevertheless, we remained resolute, we remained the UK’s only support organisation wholly run by and for parents who reject ‘medical transition’ as a valid medical pathway for children, adolescents and young adults who identify as transgender.
One of the main determinants in our trajectory came in the Spring of 2020 when we found that an increasing number of parents coming to us for help were from outside of the United Kingdom.
Rather than turn away these parents in need of support, we welcomed them.
We established overseas ‘chapters’ in Australia and USA, first on the West coast and then on the East.
We continued to lobby The Tavistock, eventually getting our meeting reinstated. However, by the time we got agreement – thanks to pressure from the governors – face-to-face meetings were restricted because of the Coronavirus. It was becoming increasingly obvious that The Tavistock was completely captured by gender ideology and intransigent. The Care Quality Commission had announced an upcoming inspection. We chose not to pursue the meeting.
Our Duty parents demonstrated our objection to medical transition at the Keira Bell High Court judgment. The court ruled that those under sixteen could not give informed consent. A few months later this was partially overturned on appeal.
While we were hoping for the Care Quality Commission to surface the truth about The Tavistock, it failed. Its failure was attributable to it having fallen to the same capture by gender ideology as the rest of the National Health Service. Keith wrote an article exploring this for The Critic.
In America, our colleagues embarked on an ambitious public education project. This started with billboards promoting Abigail Shrier’s book. Soon, pressure from activists opposed to safeguarding adolescents resulted in our billboards being removed. A change of strategy was called for, so we employed a mobile billboard carrying the message “Who is Keira Bell?”.
This was picked up alternative media, however it has long been a struggle to get our point of view heard by the mainstream outlets.
Throughout 2020 new parent groups were springing up everywhere. The challenge of getting mainstream media coverage alongside the need to have such parent support bolstered by great evidence and great PR led to discussions with leaders of these groups aimed at pooling the necessary talent, this eventually led to the formation of Genspect.
The era of #NoDebate is truly over. And we all know that when real debate happens, the truth will eventually prevail. A sense of urgency is required, though. Everyday the madness of opposite sex treatments for adolescents continues, children are harmed.
Where are we now?
September 2023
Our Duty now has seven chapters – four in USA, and one each in UK, Canada, and Australia, and an affiliate ‘Trans Teens Sorge-Berechtigt’ in Germany. Other chapters in other countries are in the pipeline. We support and represent over 2,500 parents in over 30 countries.
International successes include:
Winning our demand that the America Association of Pediatrics conduct a review into the evidence for the gender affirming model.
The #1MillionMarchForChildren campaign in Canada