Desistance is not a dirty word

In recent months, there has been a marked increase in the number of both trans-identified and detransitoned people speaking out on social media and YouTube about the harms they say they experienced from a variety of medical-transition procedures. It should be obvious that the testimonies of these regretters don’t somehow cancel out the positive transition experiences others report. In fact, many regretters who speak out do so not to deny others the right to access medical transition, but to provide information about possible unwanted side effects and/or sequelae of surgical and/or hormonal interventions.

Yet the typical response from trans activists can be summarized succinctly:

Regret and detransition are vanishingly rare. You’re an outlier, so don’t fearmonger.

As many detransitioners have pointed out, no one actually knows just how many regretters (some of whom continue to identify as transgender) and detransitioners there are. Regretters are not systematically tracked, and the few studies that have looked at regret rates typically report that many subjects have been lost to followup.

Most importantly, many regretters never return to their gender clinics once they’ve detransitioned (or discontinued further medical intervention). As Carey Callahan remarked in her recent interview with a detransitioner who did return to talk to her former gender doctor,

She’s exceptional for doing so- in my circle only a handful of detransitioners have gone back to inform their doctors about their detransition.

But regardless of how rare regret or detransition may ultimately be, why wouldn’t adult trans people and their supporters want others to learn everything possible about both the positive and negative impacts of medical transition–particularly when it comes to young people? Further, if a young person resolves their dysphoria and thus avoids the rigors of medical transition, how is that not a good outcome?

These questions (which we have posed many times in the past) inspired this recent tweet thread from the 4thWaveNow Twitter account.


You can also read this thread here.

 

 

 

11 thoughts on “Desistance is not a dirty word

  1. It always mystifies me when people say we shouldn’t worry about things that rarely happen. So climate change, nuclear war, and genocide are no big deal, I suppose? Sheesh.

    • It will become a big deal, in about 10-15 years time, when the waves of medical malpractice suits start to hit. Or when those who experimented on children and teens, who were not able to comprehend what is going on….start going to jail.

      • Why is it 10-15 years? Statute of limitations for the US is 2-6 years depending on a state.

        I wish I could share your optimism that it would be still possible to bring up those lawsuits in 10-15 years. Just recently:
        https://www.modernhealthcare.com/legal/catholic-hospitals-dealt-blow-transgender-discrimination-case
        Catholic hospitals dealt blow in transgender discrimination case

        How would you sue hospitals for causing damage removing uteruses if they are obliged to do it by law?

        In a few years the legal category of biological sex might completely cease to exist, reproductive system being some unnecessary parts on top of gender identity. Science tells you that sexuality and fertility have no connection to so called “reproductive” (transforbic word!) organs.

      • Julia,

        The reason why I said 10-15 is…sadly….most of the public is slow on the uptake about what is going on. What the brigade as done, via flooding different media streams with scientific BS [and trolling of anyone who calls them on this], is made it difficult to get the truth out, in re: the medical realities.

        As for the Catholic Hospitals/CMC’s , do not be surprised if one of two things happen:

        – an appeal of this ruling, in that they can argue about the basis that, while they are in the line of work of helping their fellow person with medical issues, they should not be forced into doing work, which is a hazardous, dangerous and injurious to the patient elective, in the name of political correctness

        or

        – several of the smaller hospitals could close down or curtail services for the general public. If they are forced to spend [increasingly] limited resources, on these issues, yet cut back on necessary medical services, this can cause them to go into the red. If that happens, they will close, in turn depriving some communities of the only doctors they have, as well as forcing patients to travel multiple distances, to ….let’s say…..have an annual physical.

        Remember too that 10-15 years also takes into account that the stonewalling by the medical profession or by attorneys, who have…under the radar…been able to get into places, to prevent objections to their deeds. BUT as momentum is growing [be that internists, endocrinologists, cardiologists or others] who see the madness for what it is, perhaps the time frame will be hastened.

      • rheapdx1 (last comment with no “Reply” button)

        It increasingly worries me that the translobby is going to take over the judiciary system or already did.

        What strikes me in the Catholic Hospitals case ruling (note, I’m a layperson) is that it doesn’t make any logical sense.

        1. The Unruh Act they refer to doesn’t even provide protections based on gender identity/transgender status.
        2. Where is discrimination here, compared to who? They would’ve refused to provide this service to any woman with a healthy uterus.
        3. The woman already got the procedure, does she insist she has a second uterus they have to remove? She didn’t suffer any monetary damages either. It rings frivolous charges and extreme vindictiveness but the court didn’t toss the case.

        They pulled this “trans discrimination” out of the thin air. It’s already Court of Appeals; I don’t know if the hospital can challenge it in a federal court, but some politicians in Congress and presidential candidates are hell bent to pass the [so called] Equality Act which might take much shorter than 10 years. Then we’re officially screwed.

        As per hospitals closing, there will be other ones who would happily make money removing healthy body parts instead of providing necessary services. When “gender spectrum kids” are adults, doctors may just start treating all diseases with hormones, sterilization, holy gender water and chanting pronouns.

        And, frankly, momentums need money, business skills, political and media power. Patting each other’s back in this corner of the digital universe has very little influence on outsiders.

  2. Could it be that part of the reason the “trans lobby” has to deny the reality or existence of detransitioners is because it cuts at the heart of the assumptions underlying the theory? In other words, TG theory holds that, first, people “always know” their innate “gender identity,” even at an extremely young age. Second, and this is most important, “people are never wrong” when it comes to their “gender identity.” Because “people are never wrong,” never make mistakes, are never under the influence of any confounding factors such as social contagion or other mental illness, people (again very young people) can always be trusted to make the correct decisions for themselves. Those correct decisions can entail irreversible medical decisions but that’s fine, because by definition the decision always was and always will be right and will never change.

    When a detransitioner says, in essence, I WAS wrong, I believed this with all my heart but now I don’t believe it any more, it opens the possibility that others can be mistaken as well. In fact, it also leads to the natural inquiry as to how anyone might tell the difference between someone who is correct, and will remain so, and someone who might change his or her mind in the future. As we saw from the furious blow-back around ROGD, even asking or thinking about the question (how one might tell people apart) is considered unforgivably bigoted, because it assumes that there might be people who aren’t correct.

  3. The vast majority of gender transitioners are of the opinion that regret is rare due to the fact that transitioners ostracize their peers who discontinue a gender transition. In fact the majority of transitioners reach a stage in the behavioral addiction life cycle where they are no longer interested, called Exhaustion. [1]

    In the sixties Milton Diamond exposed John Money as a fraud in propagating his theories that gender was mutable with the famous John / Joan case. The individual was known as David Reimer. Reimer had a genuine gender identity disorder. Unlike contemporary gender transitioners, Reimer’s transition lasted only two months in private. Further Reimer had no interest in the trans community whatsoever. Further Reimer had no comorbid addictions, again unlike gender transitioners.

    If you want to see what will become of the hundreds of thousands of children on hormone blockers and cross-sex hormones at some 83 gender clinics in North America, look no farther than the fall out from the John / Joan case. Both Reimer twins died. David Reimer committed suicide from the therapy by fraudster, John Money. Now there are hundreds of John Money’s who enable the gender transition industry, making enormous money from the behavioral addiction, autoerotic addiction.
    [1] Autogynephilic Behavioral Addiction, What is it?
    http://www.transgression.com/Books/TheTranssexualDelusion/OnlineMaterial/BehavioralAddiction.aspx?CountryISONumericCode=124&LanguageISOAlpha2Code=en

  4. If detransitioners are unimportant, why are there all those attempts to suppress their voices? Isn’t it because they are not just customers who didn’t like the service but whistleblowers and a living proof of transition harm whose message can cause more desistance and detransisions? Money and support lost, hmmm. What other groups grow support by literary converting people and their bodies?

    The endless discussion about numbers of de-transitioners feels like a distraction. Do those numbers matter when discussing health risks? Popularity of smoking with low giving up rates didn’t mean that smoking was safe. But raising public awareness of the health risks brought the number of smokers down. We don’t tell adults not to smoke or quit other unhealthy routines but it doesn’t mean they should be popularised without any restrictions and warnings, especially among kids.

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