Lydia Bilton (nor her editor, for that matter) couldn’t even make it one article without contradicting herself.
An expert gets it wrong? Do tell.
Journalism pro-tip:
The mom
is not
an expert
And frankly, she’s blaming the doctors because she didn’t follow their orders. That’s bad enough, if she wasn’t trying to “warn” people about the fucking healthcare regime that she deliberately defied.
Fuck off, 9News, and fuck you, Ali.
-Shiv
“I gave my child chemotherapy at home and it didn’t turn out well, so oncology is full of shit.”
“I’ve been injecting my kid with steroids and he’s not breathing any better, so I don’t think asthma is real.”
“I’m sharing my insulin with my daughter and she’s getting pretty sick, so diabetes is a SJW lie.”
And of course, my transphobic ex, who harasses our daughter about her gender, immediately texted me to tell me to watch this.
As you said, this mother subverted the whole point of puberty blockers being given to allow the child to undergo therapy etc to help them make the longer term decisions that this child needed time to make. In Australia, you can’t even get oestrogen for under 18’s without an application to our Family Court, so she broke the law not only by prescribing medicine without a licence, but also by making a permanent change to her child’s body without the necessary legal approvals. (A very expensive court application should not be required for trans kids to get medical care, but that’s a whole other comment.)
Every transphobe in Australia will be pointing at this episode of our version of 60 minutes for the foreseeable future. They won’t be looking at it as a situation where normal medical care would have been appropriate for this kid, but will be arguing that no trans kid should get normal and appropriate care, because one kid desisted after inappropriate behaviour from his mother.
Poor work and shoddy journalism, Channel 9.
The story totally muddles between diagnosis, puberty blocking and hormone replacement (sorry if my terminology is incorrect). Then, towards the end there’s this:
@3 lumipuna
You nailed it. Part of the problem is the woo scaremongering about the word “hormones.” To most people it means testosterone and estrogen, rather than a class of biochemical molecules which happens to include testosterone and estrogen. So they see GnRH agonists are a “hormone” and then they’re spewing in the news about “injecting kids with hormones,” thinking we’re giving the average gender questioning 8 year-old sex hormones they wouldn’t even have for another 4-5 years. It’s science illiteracy colliding with trans-antagonism.
@2 Brisvegan
First, I’m sorry your ex is an asshole to you and your kid.
Second, gatekeeping at least vaguely made some kind of internal sense when it was in the hands of a medical professional, but a legal bureaucrat holding the keys is… I’m not sure I have adequate words. Is the court in the habit of contravening the recommendations of healthcare providers? o_O
@5 Siobhan
Thanks for your kind words. The ex is an ex for good reason!
The problem is that a case involving care for a trans child (Re Alex) applied an earlier case on general medical care called Re Marion. Re Marion involved the sterilisation of an intellectually disabled girl (mostly for the convenience of the parents). In Re Marion, the Court held that a non-therapeutic, permanent change to a child’s body when the child did not have capacity to consent had to be approved by the Family Court. In Re Alex, the Court held that hormonal medication for a trans kid involved a permanent, non-therapeutic change to the child’s body and therefore required either that the child was Gillick competent (ie had basically adult comprehension of medical consequences and could consent) or that the Court must review and consent to the care. For the child to make the decision, the Court must first rule that the child is Gillick competent. Either way, the child has to get a Court order to allow them to get medical care.
A later case, Re Jamie, decided that stage 1 care (ie puberty blockers) did not require Court approval, because there was no permanent change. However, unfortunately, they still think that stage 2 care (testosterone or oestrogen) requires court consent, because they make permanent changes to bodies. They formulate appropriate medical care for trans teens as “non-therapeutic.”
The Family Court has followed the recommendations of doctors in the approx 50 cases which have gone to the Court. However, even uncontested cases are expensive (AU$10,000 to $30,000) to bring. Even our Family Court judges have strongly criticised the current process.
Just yesterday, the Full Court of our Family Court heard a case stated, Re Kelvin, that may allow them to reconsider the rule. We probably won’t see a judgement for a few months.
Ironically, other hormone-based treatments for kids (relating to height or other matters) and surgical mutilation of intersex babies’ genitals to make them appear closer to a binary norm do not appear to require approval (or if they technically do, there have been no legal cases about it or failing to seek Court consent.) Trans kids’ care is targeted uniquely at this time.
TLDR: Judges always follow medical recommendations. It’s an expensive and unnecessary process based on assuming hormones are not therapeutic. Even the judges who apply the rule criticise it.