Detransitioners Tell Their Stories

Transgender, ,

A recent video from the Heritage Foundation highlights the regret that people often feel as a result of using puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries to transition from one gender to the other.

Some years ago, medical experts at Johns Hopkins stopped performing gender-reassignment procedures after discovering they did not help individuals who identify as transgender. Since 2021, we have seen growing concerns about children and young adults rushed through the transition process without adequate mental health evaluations and without proper informed consent.

The Heritage Foundation recently interviewed three people who used surgery and hormones to try to change genders before ultimately detransitioning and accepting their biological sex.

Stories like these remind us why it is so important to protect people from the harmful lies that transgender ideology promotes.

Public health officials in the U.S. and the U.K. have released stunning rebukes of the so-called “gender affirming care” Planned Parenthood and others offer.

Last year The British Medical Journal wrote that ”the advocacy and clinical practice for medical treatment of gender dysphoria [through puberty blockers, hormones, and surgery] had moved ahead of the evidence—a recipe for harm.”

These procedures can leave children sterilized and scarred for life, and doctors don’t know the long-term consequences they may have for children. That is why to date about half the states in the U.S. have passed laws protecting children from sex-change surgeries.

In 2021, Arkansas lawmakers overwhelmingly passed the Save Adolescents From Experimentation (SAFE) Act.

The SAFE Act is a good law that prevents doctors in Arkansas from performing sex-change surgeries on children or giving them puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.

Unfortunately, the SAFE Act is tied up in court, and a federal judge in Little Rock has blocked the state from enforcing it for now. However, we believe our courts ultimately will recognize that the SAFE Act is a good law and uphold it as constitutional.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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HHS Issues 409-Page Reality Check Regarding Sex-Change Procedures for Kids

Transgender, ,

A new report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services challenges the idea that children with gender dysphoria should be subjected to puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and sex-change surgeries.

Over the past few years, it has become clear that the medical “consensus” regarding transgender procedures on children has been largely manufactured by pro-LGBT groups like WPATH.

Recently, medical professionals in different countries have begun reversing course by adopting policies that protect children from these drugs and surgeries.

For example, the U.K.’s National Health Service reportedly will start advising clinics to assess children who identify as transgender for mental health problems and other conditions. The new guidelines come in the wake of the U.K.’s decision to shutter its transgender clinic and stop giving puberty blockers to children.

In 2021, a major hospital in Sweden announced that it would no longer give puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to kids. The hospital noted that giving puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones to children “should be regarded as experimental.”

Finland’s Council for Choices in Health Care has reached the same conclusion, writing, “In light of available evidence, gender reassignment of minors is an experimental practice.” In a comprehensive study published last year, Finnish researchers found transgender surgeries did not appear to resolve the underlying emotional and mental issues that youth with gender dysphoria faced.

The 409-page report the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services released on May 1 further challenges the idea that children who disagree with their biological sex ought to be subjected to hormones and sex-change surgeries.

The HHS “Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria” report reviewed the evidence and best practices surrounding the treatment of children who struggle with their gender identity. In particular, the report focuses on issues like:  

  • Social transition  
  • Puberty-blocking drugs  
  • Cross-sex hormones
  • Transgender surgeries

The report highlights how puberty blockers are physically disruptive for children and can impact fertility, bone density, and neurological development. It also points out that long-term use of cross-sex hormones is linked to increased risk of heart attack and stroke. The report also discusses ethical problems with the way doctors subject children to these drugs and procedures.

In response to the report, the editors at The Wall Street Journal called it “a rebuke of the political and medical conformity that has developed around gender identity, including radical treatments that are opposed by parents.” The Gospel Coalition’s Joe Carter writes, “Knowing that these medical interventions lack a solid evidentiary foundation and carry serious dangers should embolden us to lovingly question the rush to put children on the path to ‘transitioning.'”

All of this underscores why Arkansas was right to pass the Save Adolescents From Experimentation (SAFE) Act in 2021.

This good law prevents doctors in Arkansas from performing sex-change surgeries on children or giving them puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.

Reports show that since 2019, doctors in Arkansas have given dozens of children puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. Some children even have undergone sex-change surgeries. Arkansas — and other states — need to protect these children.

Unfortunately, the SAFE Act is currently tied up in court. However, given how medical evidence continues to show these procedures hurt kids, we believe our courts ultimately will uphold the SAFE Act as constitutional.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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U.K. to Perform Mental Health Evaluations on Children with Gender Dysphoria

Transgender, ,

The U.K.’s National Health Services reportedly will start advising clinics to assess children who identify as transgender for mental health problems and other conditions.

The new guidelines come in the wake of the U.K.’s decision to shutter its transgender clinic in 2022 and stop giving puberty blockers to children last year.

A government investigation revealed healthcare professionals at the NHS’s Tavistock gender clinic pressured families into subjecting their children to puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones despite an obvious lack of scientific evidence and inadequate mental health screenings for children with gender dysphoria.

Since then, medical professionals have written extensively about the harm that these gender-reassignment procedures caused.

Under the new NHS guidelines, children in the U.K. with gender dysphoria would be assessed for ADHD, autism, learning disabilities, or mental health problems. These assessments could help identify underlying causes of a child’s gender dysphoria.

All of this underscores why it is so important that lawmakers in Arkansas overwhelmingly passed the Save Adolescents From Experimentation (SAFE) Act in 2021.

The SAFE Act is a good law that prevents doctors in Arkansas from performing sex-change surgeries on children or giving them puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.

Since then, reports from Europe and elsewhere have shown time and again that Arkansas was right to pass the SAFE Act.

Unfortunately, the SAFE Act has been tied up in court since 2021. However, we believe our courts ultimately will recognize that the SAFE Act is a good law and uphold it as constitutional.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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