Trans Children

I am so horrified as to how much ignorance and prejudice has been shown in this thread.
One of my grand children - born a girl - was always a very girly type of girl, loved pink and glitter, etc. As she grew up and moved in Secondary school she became very uptight, obviously unhappy and seemed to have few, if any, friends. When she went to Secondary school her bedroom was redecorated to her choice - fairies
At the age of 12 yrs she told her parents and the family that she thought she was Gay. Well, many of us had had our suspicions about this for some time.
Within nine months she stated that she did not think she was gay, just felt she was a boy born into a girls body. For years she had to prove to herself that she was a girl by going for all those very girly things.
Since then he has lived, extremely happily, as a boy. Has become a much happier person, plenty of friends, loads of activities and good GCSE results this summer.
Obviously at this young age, the only difference was he used a breast binder and took the mini pill.
As he moves into sixth form, he is now saying that he is Questioning, and is using the pronoun 'THEY' as opposed to 'HE'.
They are fortunate that they have an extremely supportive direct and extended family.
All I know is that this young person seems to have come out of that depression they had a few years back and is leading a good life.
I really do not care with they are a HE or a SHE or a THEY as long as they are content and happy.
At the moment they are fairly protected from some of the dreadful prejudice and misunderstand that has appeared on here. I do know that not all young people in their circumstances as are fortunate.

I am not bigoted or prejudiced.

I am concerned about the constant reinforcement of stereotypes, from all directions, which can cause children and young people to believe there is something wrong with them that needs to be corrected.

I am concerned about the harm that can be done to those children and young people, psychologically and physically, in their quest to conform to a stereotype.

Breast binding is not harmless. It can cause serious physical damage.

Here is an article about breast binding.
There are many more.

www.transgendertrend.com/breast-binders-in-uk-schools/

FarNorth what do you consider would be more damaging? Breast binding which makes someone feel better or serious mental health issues which may include suicide attempts?

trisher

If there are serious mental health issues, the person needs counselling. It is a documented fact that there are cases where people believed themselves to be transgender but eventually discovered that they were not. They are known as "desisters". Some of them have stated that they actually had underlying mental health issues that were not properly addressed because everyone was so focused on "supporting" their gender transition.

Keep in mind that serious mental health issues do not always lead to suicide attempts, that depression is not necessarily caused by someone being trans (it can be, but that isn't always the sole reason), and that permanently altering your body when you are that young can lead to lifelong health issues, not to mention that if you subsequently realize you are, in fact, NOT trans, it may be too late to undo the effects.

BUTAgnurse they aren't changing their bodies before they have had many many hours of counselling .At least the two young people I know transgendering aren't ..they are getting the support needed to see them through their journey..no pressure to make any final decisions until they decide that is what they want.The OP is a bit obsessed by trans gendering...maybe she needs to meet someone who is in the process of doing so to understand the reality

To me, the very fact that we have desisters tells me that these people AREN'T getting adequate counselling.

Franbern

I’m very pleased your grandson has had so much support and acceptance, if I were in your shoes I’d be very protective and very scathing of anyone who showed ignorance or unkindness.

But the fact is, not a lot of us will have had contact with a trans child, and probably know very little about it, just what we see in the media, and that’s usually sensationalised.

I think we just need time to catch up

I would find it hard calling any child ‘they’. Not that I’ve ever had to.

Is all this new - because of technological advances such as DNA testing? Is it our more liberal society?

I only ask because the whole shebang seems (to me) to be on the increase. Was it always there? Or are some über liberal parents subliminally encouraging all this?

Of course it's not new Urmstongran there are records of women living as men since early times. Fewer of women living as men but then records of women in general are fewer. The medical intervention is new of course but the actual concept isn't.
Pictured Jane Gomeldon from Newcastle who ran away from her husband dressed as a man and reputedly tried to elope with a nun. In the 1700s!

That should be "fewer of men living as women"

You don't think maybe Jane Gomeldon was a lesbian who saw that the only way out of compulsory heterosexuality was to pretend to be a man?

Girls who use breast binders are making changes to their bodies, although that's not their intention.

The very fact that Franbern quotes that her granddaughter turned grandson is now he moves into the sixth form he is questioning and using the term they instead of he suggest that this young person isn’t sure where he or she stands and really underlines what most people are saying leave it all until they are older, so thank goodness it was only breast binding and not anything more radical your young person will find their own level as they mature Franbern

I would happily go along with all the Tom boy activities, dress, etc or the pushing prams playing with dolls through school years and let the young person make more conscious decisions when they are older and know what life is about
A child of 4 may want to be a boy let her be a tomboy and dress boyishly without any prejudice and she or he will find out which is right for them as they mature but don’t change their name and school because you want to be trendy understanding parents that is taking over from the natural process they are living through children should lead in their play, chat and general happiness
Do not underestimate what influence media , friends, and social aspects can have on some

You don't think maybe Jane Gomeldon was a lesbian who saw that the only way out of compulsory heterosexuality was to pretend to be a man?

A really good point FarNorth

Once again someone is bringing sexuality into the argument to challenge something.She may well have been a lesbian. But there were and are lesbians who do not dress as men. The question that was asked was if this was a new phenomena and she illustrates it isn't. For someone who was a lesbian, dressed in a masculine fashion, but not as a man, we have Anne Lister.

I can't help wondering if the parents wished for a child of the opposite sex and the child picked up on it and started acting like the opposite gender in order to be more accepted at home. I find it very strange that over last 10 years the number of so called trans children has exploded.

trisher I don't expect that all lesbians, throughout history, have chosen to behave in the same way.
Whatever Anne Lister or Jane Gomeldon or anyone else did, they were always female.

They had no choice FarNorth they hadn't the medical advances available today. You are trying to create argument about something that is simply irrelevant. Why they chose to dress or behave as they did is no longer debatable. The fact is there have always been people who chose to live as the opposite gender whatever their sexiuality.

Totally agree with Magdalen Berns.

People can live as they like. They can never change sex.
trisher you brought Jane Gomeldon into this thread, not I.
The thread is actually about children, so choices by adults are not relevant to it.

paddyann, some people on GN might think you are obsessed by Scottish politics and independence because you post often and vehemently about them.
I don't think that and I know you post about them because you believe they are very important.
Likewise, I post about transgender topics because I believe that it is very important to think about the way our society is being changed by this ideology.

I also think these topics are important.

If we look to history there have always been people who were trans and there have always been people who we would label as homosexual, although that term didn't exist until the end of the 19th century.

In the 18th century there were molly boys. Whether we see them now as gay or trans, I don't know. Radcliffe Hall's 'Well of Loneliness' arguably describes a transman (1928). In her novel, a thinly disguised autobiography, she describes a child (female) who is so masculine/pulls so against the constructs of femininity, that even her parents call her Stephen. If Hall had experienced this, at the turn of the 19th century, it is a clear historical example, that shows that this is not a new thing and that children DO know and ARE able to know their assigned gender is wrong (for them).

It is very difficult to put a modern reading on a historical event / text. But either way, there were people who lived as a different gender long long before the 20th century. If they had access to hormones/surgery, in all likelihood, they would have accessed them.

Gender is the most rigidly conscripted social rule we have. No wonder so many refuse to believe it is not a 'natural' thing and that those that feel that way are not normal OR that they have been 'persuaded' in some way.

Here is a link to a petition to keep the trans lobby group Mermaids out of primary schools.

Recently a secret recording was made of one of Mermaids’ training sessions in a UK primary school in which a member of Mermaids’ staff demonstrated a disturbing lack of knowledge, peddling fake facts, an incorrect understanding of the law and junk science to teachers and bullying one of the school governors when they attempted to challenge the inaccuracies being presented as fact. The trainer displayed an alarming disregard for child safeguarding procedures, advising teachers to withhold important information from parents.

www.citizengo.org/en-gb/signit/171050/view?fbclid=IwAR1mla5bL0POVkNblYDz-iTbDTYWzL5MZEe5fyXavZXpsVN4RtZETUvRqPI&utm_source=em&utm_medium=e-mail&utm_content=em_link2&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWkdRMFpUWTRPREpqTnpZNSIsInQiOiJUUkRHR3Nva2lwNG9qVHlyR3lTOGFlVjIydlppTWZNdjduQW1WOHdRM0pXSXlvU2NIbVhXZ3JCcDdsZDVpNjcwWTlEZ1BDZWZBeUZ2XC9QQjVTWFg0ckRGS0VmRnNxZVJcL1Rmbzgzc2IwTWtMSG5OZ2ZmbldlcVZoQ1pcL2d5elkzNiJ9

The gender rules are what should change, Gagajo, not the people and their bodies.

If it was simply a case of 'believe you are a boy/girl and proceed happily for the rest of your life' it might be fine, but that's not the case.

A young child is told by adults 'You can be a boy/girl from now on' and they believe the adults without having any idea of the implications.

They then go through 6/7/8 years of having that gender identity reinforced by everyone and arrive at puberty to realise that they can't continue in that identity without medical alteration to the natural sexual development of their body.