The Cass Review - Manufacturing Anti-trans Policy

The Cass Review is a dangerous and deeply flawed study into how the illusion of academic respectability can be weaponised against a vulnerable minority group.
As its issues grow more public, and its fallout impacts more trans people, I've collated together some of the most egregious problems discovered so far.
With apologies for the shifting aspect ratio.
#cassreview #cass #cassreport #trans #transrightsarehumanrights #transrights #lgbt #lgbtq #academic #medicine #uk #politics #media #lgbtrights #queer

[@Celeste-hl1kw]

Thanks for covering this! You’ve highlighted so many key problems here. It’s such an annoying discourse right now, because not only is the entire report junk-science, but the worst people eating it up are also grossly misrepresenting its conclusions. So we’re constantly having to both criticize the deliberate political agenda, flawed methodology, and invalid conclusions, and also correct misinformation among the public. It’s exhausting, and seeing allies stepping up and calling it out is so crucial.

[@andriypredmyrskyy7791]

The intentional neglect of gender affirming healthcare by the UK government can literally be measured in terms of additional deaths on the waiting lists. The Cass review is being wielded in an attempt to overlook their lives. Even Cass says mental healthcare is woefully inadequate, and yet, Tavistock was still closed and there are no replacements. More people will die off the back of this decision, and that's a sacrifice Cass is willing to make.

[@lauriestewart2044]

Good lord this is a toxic comment section. I do applaud Tristan for engaging with criticism in good faith though.

[@scrumps101]

You make the analogy here 1:08 that trans people are recommended #4) to receive help by a clinical professional and “imagine if a gay person said that to a parent”-
That’s not even a close comparison. It’s been widely established that there is a statistically significant increase in mental health diagnoses in trans people that includes mood and anxiety disorders, PTSD, schizophrenia, personality disorders, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, autism, and substance use disorders. Why wouldn’t it make sense to see a professional to rule those diagnoses out OR to help that person obtain mental health therapy to assist in a healthy transition? Those diagnoses aren’t reported in such high numbers in gay people so the need isn’t as dire. Also, the massive amount of invasive medical treatments and surgeries and side effects if one goes on to physically transition can affect one’s mental health. Seeing professional help to consolidate all of these issues would benefit a vast amount of individuals.
Recommendation #4 makes great sense. I haven’t watched past this but that’s my 2 cents.

[@tgraywrites]

If you watch past this it may make more sense for a couple of reasons.
Firstly that comorbidities are common across entirely benign issues and for entirely benign reasons, like left handedness. They don't mean, automatically, that this is an alternative explanation for why someone is feeling this way.
No one asks "are they left handed, or are they just autistic?" despite people being more likely to be autistic if they're left handed.
It's a display of looking for things that might be "wrong" with someone that can be "fixed" as if being trans is a problem in need of a solution instead of a natural part of who some people are.

[@testinginging-wp6di]

​Also to add to @@tgraywritesresponse, it's worth noting that 1) transgender people are more likely to be diagnosed BECAUSE of the intense screening process to access hormones. It may well be - and has actually been suggested by a number of leading psychological organisations - that if every cis person had to go through such screening, they too would find that many more people have these disorders than are diagnosed.
And 2) a lot of the disorders found to be more prevalently diagnosed in transgender people are also heavily linked to external factors, including trauma that is regularly linked to societal transphobia. This is a minority of which ~90% have experienced hate crimes (uk statistics) of which 40% involved physical violence, which the media and politicians regularly compare to sexual predators and made law changes specifically to make their lives worse, and of which over 1/4 of under 18s are kicked out and made homeless when they come out to their families, it's no wonder they're more likely to have mental illnesses.
In addition, the increased prevalence of mental health diagnoses doesn't stop the other statistics on transition from being relevant. The largest study of transition impact to date is the 2022 US Transgender Study, with over 90,000 participants. It examined a wide variety of factors in transition, including post-transition satisfaction. The results found that transition improved people's quality of life in over 94% of cases for social transition (name/pronoun change), and that hormonal treatments led to a higher quality of life in 98% of cases. There isn't another medical procedure on the planet with this level of post-treatment satisfaction.
Even if you consider gender dysphoria to be an 'illness', these results - combined with others - state we've essentially found the cure. This was the largest study and is therefore incredibly relevant, but its results echo those of all the thousands of smaller studies going back decades and decades: transition improves quality of life for those seeking it.​
(Edited for some typos)

[@xmaseveeve5259]

Well said.

[@xmaseveeve5259]

I see a conflict of interest.

[@testinginging-wp6di]

What's the conflict?

[@xmaseveeve5259]

@@testinginging-wp6di I prefer not to say. You need to do your own research, always.

[@testinginging-wp6di]

@@xmaseveeve5259 oh, so you don't actually know if there's a conflict, fair enough

[@tgraywrites]

@testinginging-wp6di generally these kind of comments really *want* to say a slur but won't because it would reveal their "reasonable concerns" for what they truly are

[@testinginging-wp6di]

@@tgraywrites yeahhhh "I prefer not to say" I'll bet mate, probably coz if they did it'd be telling on themselves

[@Pozzoy]

Let me just say that truth always finds a way, and no amount of censorship will ever change that. You can label anything you disagree with as "hate speech", but you will lose in the end, as you're fighting for a lost cause because your primary premises are false. Good luck.

[@tgraywrites]

The definition of a cultural "lost cause" is when the only reason it hasn't progressed is due to opposition by older generations against overwhelming support by younger ones. Opposition to trans rights could not fall more clearly into this category.

[@Pozzoy]

Okay, well, the first and the main difference between being a gay kid and being a trans kid is the fact that gay kids don't get prescribed extremely dangerous drugs just for being gay. That's why a kid's outing as gay doesn't need a psychological evaluation, and an outing as trans does. Just one of the reasons, there's also the notion that someone believes they are "born in the wrong body", which in itself is a reason for a psychiatric evaluation. It's not normal behaviour, you know. It could just as well be a form of internalized homophobia, which is why some see this whole gender dysphoria craze as a new gay conversion therapy.
But I believe you're not that stupid, and you know that, so, what could be behind this? Bias?

[@tgraywrites]

"It's not normal behaviour, you know" - Which of course is not a statement that has ever been made about gay people.
"Extremely dangerous drugs" - puberty blockers have been used since the 1980s and are still used frequently now for kids outside their use for trans youth. No concerns have been raised about their safety in the decades they've been used. Hormone therapy, also, is frequently used for cis people and is well understood and has been used for decades. These are not new medications, they are well understood, and not considered "extremely dangerous" even by the Cass Review.
"A new gay conversion therapy" - Hi, fun fact, I am one of the founders and lead organisers of the End Conversion Therapy Scotland campaign. I've been working on delivering a ban for years, and the bill is due to come forwards this year. You can literally look me up speaking in the Scottish Parliament about it. Would you like to know how much evidence there is of the "trans the gay away" myth? Literally none.

[@Pozzoy]

@@tgraywrites "... puberty blockers have been used since the 1980s and are still used frequently now for kids outside their use for trans youth..."
Awesome sentence right there, and here is why this is misleading and dangerous speculation:
Puberty blockers are used today for people with precocious puberty, and sex hormones are prescribed freely today, probably everywhere, to people with hormonal disorders, which is also one of the causes of precocious puberty. Now there are a few things about both of those conditions which separates them from "gender dysphoria": they are physical, can be diagnosed with prety much mechanical methods by measuring certain chemical disbalances and without any reasonable doubt, and both can be measured.
There's this thing called insulin; I know you've heard of it and, coincidentally, it’s also a hormone. Now, for people with diabetes, it's a cure. For people who have no diabetes, it's a poison and can be fatal. See how thin of a line that is? The old Greeks used one word for both the poison and the cure: Pharmakon.

[@tgraywrites]

The idea the brain isn't a physical part of you is a myth, and nothing you said here contradicts anything I did.
Sex hormones are not "poisons", be serious, or just admit you don't think trans people should exist.

[@Pozzoy]

@@tgraywrites "...Sex hormones are not "poisons", be serious..."
They are not a cure either; they are exactly that: hormones, chemical compounds that the body naturally produces under certain conditions and with a certain purpose. You can't just prescribe hormones to someone without confirming that something isn't working as it should with their glands, that's pseudo-medicine, quackery if you will.

[@tgraywrites]

@Pozzoy they are exactly that, hormones. Something we *already* prescribe widely without any glandular issues. For example - for people going through menopause, a perfectly natural process. "Pseudo-medicine" is what you're doing, making up medical rules as you go along without any understanding of medicine to back you up.