Originally posted as a thread on Bluesky, this write-up documents a recording of a meeting between Hillary Cass and Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation, leaked by Trans Kids Deserve Better and available via Proton Drive and YouTube.
6:00 Cass: "there was a fair amount of noise [...] about the fact that I wasn't an expert in this field, but that was a deliberate selection that NHS England made because people who were working in the field were so polarised*" * read: support trans rights
Cass claims that criticisms of her for her lack of expertise are "disinformation".
6:40 Cass fearmongers about ratios of AGAB of youths being referred, claiming a shift from majority AMAB to majority AFAB.
Anyone with a brain might point out how the equal ratio between AGAB in adulthood shown in the Levy Review indicates not a change in demographics of trans people overall, but rather that gender exploration is so much more stigmatised in people assigned male at birth than assigned female, so AMAB folks will tend to come out a bit later in life. She also fearmongers about neurodiversity among trans people.
8:50 Cass lies about a study on mental health after going on PBs, claiming their not reducing mental health issues from prior levels is a fault. This intentionally ignores the purpose of PBs is to reduce worsening of dysphoria, not to make it all better. She also very intentionally ignores environmental factors affecting mental health, like bullying and the hostile atmosphere towards trans people in the UK.
11:34 A recent paper criticising the methodology of the York SRs is linked in the chat. This is ignored by Cass.
11:50 Cass admits that she was explicitly told to look for reasons why there was an increase in referrals to GIDS and changes to AGAB ratios. She once again fearmongers about AFAB and neurodivergent youths being referred, alongside trans people having mental health issues and trauma overall (y'know, maybe because of being subject to high levels of abuse specifically for being trans/queer and having dysphoria???)
12:40 Cass blames social media and porn for mental health (and implies that it also makes people trans) 13:30 Cass talks about how younger people have a more fluid and accepting perception of gender expression and identity than her generation
13:59 She brings out this godawful slide:
Cass claims that criticisms of her for her lack of expertise are "disinformation".
6:40 Cass fearmongers about ratios of AGAB of youths being referred, claiming a shift from majority AMAB to majority AFAB.
Anyone with a brain might point out how the equal ratio between AGAB in adulthood shown in the Levy Review indicates not a change in demographics of trans people overall, but rather that gender exploration is so much more stigmatised in people assigned male at birth than assigned female, so AMAB folks will tend to come out a bit later in life. She also fearmongers about neurodiversity among trans people.
8:50 Cass lies about a study on mental health after going on PBs, claiming their not reducing mental health issues from prior levels is a fault. This intentionally ignores the purpose of PBs is to reduce worsening of dysphoria, not to make it all better. She also very intentionally ignores environmental factors affecting mental health, like bullying and the hostile atmosphere towards trans people in the UK.
11:34 A recent paper criticising the methodology of the York SRs is linked in the chat. This is ignored by Cass.
11:50 Cass admits that she was explicitly told to look for reasons why there was an increase in referrals to GIDS and changes to AGAB ratios. She once again fearmongers about AFAB and neurodivergent youths being referred, alongside trans people having mental health issues and trauma overall (y'know, maybe because of being subject to high levels of abuse specifically for being trans/queer and having dysphoria???)
12:40 Cass blames social media and porn for mental health (and implies that it also makes people trans) 13:30 Cass talks about how younger people have a more fluid and accepting perception of gender expression and identity than her generation
13:59 She brings out this godawful slide:
14:35 Another horrible slide illustrating what Cass thinks is happening. It presents being trans as a result of external pressures impacting on an already vulnerable person and includes the claim of a "transgender narrative" making people trans.
15:33 Another dogshit slide:
This "complex presentations → Many possible pathways" slide claims that being trans is "transient", caused by sexual abuse, actually just questioning sexual orientation, autism, and finally gives some allowance for the longstanding transes. These are, of course, lies.
The righthand section is somehow even worse, with the claim that they can "resolve gender dysphoria without transition" (conversion therapy) and that a settled (cisgender) sexuality makes you stop being trans - the implication for this one being that gays and lesbians are being 'transed'.
15:55 Cass lies about the study "Development of Gender Non-Contentedness During Adolescence and Early Adulthood" and misuses a graph from the paper - lying about what it shows. I've talked about this part already. [Addendum 01]
16:46 Cass shows a table of various guidelines for trans healthcare and scores them on scope and purpose, stakeholder involvement, rigour of development, clarity of presentation, applicability, and editorial independence - supposedly scored with an unnamed "standard tool". She claims the information behind these scores are in the public domain and will be given later - it is not given at all in her presentation. She just so happens to score the ones with the highest amount of gatekeeping (Sweden and Finland) the highest.
17:40 Cass claims that "international guideline development has not followed standard evidence-based approaches", specifically complaining about most not using systematic reviews. Cass is very obviously not one to talk about actually following an evidence-based approach.
17:50 Cass complains about the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and claims they "influenced" most other international guidelines. It is of note that WPATH members have been critical of the anti-trans PB ban and highlighted how the ban is not based on any evidence of harm.
18:00 Cass claims there's a "changed population" of trans people being referred for treatment (spoilers: there isn't really), and that there's an "even weaker evidence base for this newer group".
18:06 Cass claims broader evidence is all "pretty poor", presumably regarding social transition - which she claims has "no evidence" of providing "either positive or negative effects on mental health in children and weak evidence in adolescents." She is lying and is just choosing to ignore the literal mountain of evidence that social transition is a life-saver. (Going off on one myself here: social transition, and subsequently medical transition, literally saved my life. I came out because it reached a breaking point where I either came out or finally followed though with an attempt. My story is far from unique.)
18:20 Cass claims that there's "some suggestive evidence that social transition mat change the trajectory of gender development in young children. This is both a lie, and framing being trans as inherently negative - advocates implicitly for a ban on social transition
Cass claims that the youths who were most distressed about waiting for PBs were living as stealth and anxious about being outed, while those who weren't stealth were supposedly more relaxed. Cass implies social transition and being stealth as causing dysphoria, and not the other way around.
I would highly recommend reading the peer-reviewed study, 'Harming children: the effects of the UK puberty blocker ban', if you have not done so already. It's a tough read, but important (especially for cis people) to be aware of the harms Cass has knowingly caused.
Notably, on this topic, children withdrawing from school and public life for fear of being outed and socially deemed to be their assigned sex. Prior to the ban, these socially transitioned youths were described as "happy, well-adjusted and little different from most cis children", these same kids are "now described as having become depressed, distressed, fearful, suicidal, despairing, traumatized, anxious and stressed, and suffering from a very sharp decline in mental health including becoming introverted, withdrawn and school refusing." Cass knew this would happen.
19:28 Cass recommends that families/carers consult a clinical professional before allowing their child to socially transition. This is just a clear attempt to restrict social transition and subject trans youths to conversion practices.
19:45 Cass claims there's weak evidence for use of psychological interventions in gender dysphoria. She proceeds to claim that trans youths are being excluded from CAHMS and all the responsibility for treating depression and anxiety put on GIDS, something that takes years due to the obscenely long waiting list. (This certainly isn't what I experienced with CAHMS a decade ago, with the CAHMS waiting list being similar to the GIDS one at the time and GIDS not providing therapy/counselling, but my experiences are not universal and things may have changed over the years.)
She actually says something good here for once, which is that CAMHS should be providing timely care to trans youths to help with depression and anxiety. However, she creates a concerning comparison of "evidence-based" psychological therapies and trans healthcare as "lacking" in evidence - a comparison that is solely based on her lies about trans healthcare.
This then leads to 21:22, with her claiming psychological therapies are a means of treating gender dysphoria and that a trans adult supposedly told her "a few hormones did not deal with dysphoria you've had since you were small - you need a more - um - much better, y'know, psychological wraparound package". While as a holistic thing, counselling/therapy can help if used alongside medical transition, Cass is lying and claiming that HRT does nothing to reduce dysphoria while propping up therapy as "better".
21:38 Cass begins talking about puberty blockers. She starts off with "questions" about their effect on mental health, dysphoria, ability to pass in later life, and giving time to think. She says these are "hopefully positives". By posing it as a series of questions, she intentionally obscures the reality that they objectively do help in all those areas. She then claims no-one knows about their impact on physical health, frontal lobe development, psychosexual/gender development, or social development. These are just fearmongering lies. We know their impacts on physical and mental health so well that the NHS's own prior study on PBs found that "anticipated effects of withdrawal of sex hormones on symptoms were common and there were no unexpected adverse events." [Addendum 02]
22:33 Cass expresses "worry" about inadequate penile tissue for vaginoplasty causing "poor surgical outcomes later in life" (It should be noted that there are other means of performing vaginoplasty in colovaginoplasty and graft vaginoplasty, which are also used for cis women)
22:52 Cass claims they don't know if the positives of PBs outweigh the negatives. This is a lie and based on her viewing being trans as a negative. She says how she recommended the inhumane and quite literally impossible double blind research program that the NHS is undertaking.
23:10 Cass claims the evidence base for medical transition is weak (a lie), and accuses anyone critiquing how the Cass Review disregards anything that isn't a RCT as spreading "disinformation".
In the Cass Review, the terminology of the GRADE system is borrowed without using it for analysis, to call for "high quality" RCTs, while disparaging the majority of studies as "weak" or "poor" (unscientific terms not even from GRADE). Furthermore, on the York SR's synthesis and findings: "No method described, 48% of studies on puberty-pausing medications and 36% of studies on hormones excluded from consideration without justification" - McNamara et al. (2024)
23:40 More BS about "changed population". Complaining about lack of follow-up periods, but with the additional weirdness of also complaining about "conflation with other interventions" - i.e.: HRT, surgeries, etc. after taking PBs. That is to say, she's angry that trans people medically transition and don't give her data on what happens when you deny trans people access to medical transition after PBs.
41:10 Complaing about how adult gender clinics wouldn't cooperate with her, presumably bc her vibes are rancid and she had no right to that data. She then claims that this limits ability to obtain informed consent (it doesn't).
24:50 Cass presents recommendations that would be great in a vacuum (or rather, if she and every other transphobe were ejected into the vacuum of space), calling for more centres closer to home, based within broader healthcare services, alongside better training, data, and research and evidence.
25:36 Cass claims "the central aim is to help young people thrive and achieve their life goals" (doubt). She then declares that distress and barriers to participation in everyday life be addressed to create a "stable enough state" BEFORE allowing access to medical transition. This is dogshit.
26:24 Cass says she worked with a clinical expert group to develop a "holistic framework" to provide a starting point for assessing immediate risk and care needs of trans youths, which is being used nationwide. However, that framework apparently doesn't do shit to help clinicians "determine with any certainty which children and young people will go on to have an enduring trans identity." IMO this is both a skill issue and a direct result of not listening to or believing trans people when we say who we are.
27:00 Cass shows an overly complicated graphic that basically just boils down to centralising trans healthcare services under a national board, with regional and local services under it and explains it.
28:00 The PB trial... She claims evidence for "medical and non-medical interventions" needs improvement. On top of her wildly unethical PB trail, she wants a "full programme of research to be established", following participants into adulthood. In a vacuum, the follow up part would be good...
28:34 Cass shows this godawful slide of the pre-existing and intentionally engineered factors used to attack trans healthcare:
The righthand section is somehow even worse, with the claim that they can "resolve gender dysphoria without transition" (conversion therapy) and that a settled (cisgender) sexuality makes you stop being trans - the implication for this one being that gays and lesbians are being 'transed'.
15:55 Cass lies about the study "Development of Gender Non-Contentedness During Adolescence and Early Adulthood" and misuses a graph from the paper - lying about what it shows. I've talked about this part already. [Addendum 01]
16:46 Cass shows a table of various guidelines for trans healthcare and scores them on scope and purpose, stakeholder involvement, rigour of development, clarity of presentation, applicability, and editorial independence - supposedly scored with an unnamed "standard tool". She claims the information behind these scores are in the public domain and will be given later - it is not given at all in her presentation. She just so happens to score the ones with the highest amount of gatekeeping (Sweden and Finland) the highest.
17:40 Cass claims that "international guideline development has not followed standard evidence-based approaches", specifically complaining about most not using systematic reviews. Cass is very obviously not one to talk about actually following an evidence-based approach.
17:50 Cass complains about the World Professional Association for Transgender Health and claims they "influenced" most other international guidelines. It is of note that WPATH members have been critical of the anti-trans PB ban and highlighted how the ban is not based on any evidence of harm.
18:00 Cass claims there's a "changed population" of trans people being referred for treatment (spoilers: there isn't really), and that there's an "even weaker evidence base for this newer group".
18:06 Cass claims broader evidence is all "pretty poor", presumably regarding social transition - which she claims has "no evidence" of providing "either positive or negative effects on mental health in children and weak evidence in adolescents." She is lying and is just choosing to ignore the literal mountain of evidence that social transition is a life-saver. (Going off on one myself here: social transition, and subsequently medical transition, literally saved my life. I came out because it reached a breaking point where I either came out or finally followed though with an attempt. My story is far from unique.)
18:20 Cass claims that there's "some suggestive evidence that social transition mat change the trajectory of gender development in young children. This is both a lie, and framing being trans as inherently negative - advocates implicitly for a ban on social transition
Cass claims that the youths who were most distressed about waiting for PBs were living as stealth and anxious about being outed, while those who weren't stealth were supposedly more relaxed. Cass implies social transition and being stealth as causing dysphoria, and not the other way around.
I would highly recommend reading the peer-reviewed study, 'Harming children: the effects of the UK puberty blocker ban', if you have not done so already. It's a tough read, but important (especially for cis people) to be aware of the harms Cass has knowingly caused.
Notably, on this topic, children withdrawing from school and public life for fear of being outed and socially deemed to be their assigned sex. Prior to the ban, these socially transitioned youths were described as "happy, well-adjusted and little different from most cis children", these same kids are "now described as having become depressed, distressed, fearful, suicidal, despairing, traumatized, anxious and stressed, and suffering from a very sharp decline in mental health including becoming introverted, withdrawn and school refusing." Cass knew this would happen.
19:28 Cass recommends that families/carers consult a clinical professional before allowing their child to socially transition. This is just a clear attempt to restrict social transition and subject trans youths to conversion practices.
19:45 Cass claims there's weak evidence for use of psychological interventions in gender dysphoria. She proceeds to claim that trans youths are being excluded from CAHMS and all the responsibility for treating depression and anxiety put on GIDS, something that takes years due to the obscenely long waiting list. (This certainly isn't what I experienced with CAHMS a decade ago, with the CAHMS waiting list being similar to the GIDS one at the time and GIDS not providing therapy/counselling, but my experiences are not universal and things may have changed over the years.)
She actually says something good here for once, which is that CAMHS should be providing timely care to trans youths to help with depression and anxiety. However, she creates a concerning comparison of "evidence-based" psychological therapies and trans healthcare as "lacking" in evidence - a comparison that is solely based on her lies about trans healthcare.
This then leads to 21:22, with her claiming psychological therapies are a means of treating gender dysphoria and that a trans adult supposedly told her "a few hormones did not deal with dysphoria you've had since you were small - you need a more - um - much better, y'know, psychological wraparound package". While as a holistic thing, counselling/therapy can help if used alongside medical transition, Cass is lying and claiming that HRT does nothing to reduce dysphoria while propping up therapy as "better".
21:38 Cass begins talking about puberty blockers. She starts off with "questions" about their effect on mental health, dysphoria, ability to pass in later life, and giving time to think. She says these are "hopefully positives". By posing it as a series of questions, she intentionally obscures the reality that they objectively do help in all those areas. She then claims no-one knows about their impact on physical health, frontal lobe development, psychosexual/gender development, or social development. These are just fearmongering lies. We know their impacts on physical and mental health so well that the NHS's own prior study on PBs found that "anticipated effects of withdrawal of sex hormones on symptoms were common and there were no unexpected adverse events." [Addendum 02]
22:33 Cass expresses "worry" about inadequate penile tissue for vaginoplasty causing "poor surgical outcomes later in life" (It should be noted that there are other means of performing vaginoplasty in colovaginoplasty and graft vaginoplasty, which are also used for cis women)
22:52 Cass claims they don't know if the positives of PBs outweigh the negatives. This is a lie and based on her viewing being trans as a negative. She says how she recommended the inhumane and quite literally impossible double blind research program that the NHS is undertaking.
23:10 Cass claims the evidence base for medical transition is weak (a lie), and accuses anyone critiquing how the Cass Review disregards anything that isn't a RCT as spreading "disinformation".
In the Cass Review, the terminology of the GRADE system is borrowed without using it for analysis, to call for "high quality" RCTs, while disparaging the majority of studies as "weak" or "poor" (unscientific terms not even from GRADE). Furthermore, on the York SR's synthesis and findings: "No method described, 48% of studies on puberty-pausing medications and 36% of studies on hormones excluded from consideration without justification" - McNamara et al. (2024)
23:40 More BS about "changed population". Complaining about lack of follow-up periods, but with the additional weirdness of also complaining about "conflation with other interventions" - i.e.: HRT, surgeries, etc. after taking PBs. That is to say, she's angry that trans people medically transition and don't give her data on what happens when you deny trans people access to medical transition after PBs.
41:10 Complaing about how adult gender clinics wouldn't cooperate with her, presumably bc her vibes are rancid and she had no right to that data. She then claims that this limits ability to obtain informed consent (it doesn't).
24:50 Cass presents recommendations that would be great in a vacuum (or rather, if she and every other transphobe were ejected into the vacuum of space), calling for more centres closer to home, based within broader healthcare services, alongside better training, data, and research and evidence.
25:36 Cass claims "the central aim is to help young people thrive and achieve their life goals" (doubt). She then declares that distress and barriers to participation in everyday life be addressed to create a "stable enough state" BEFORE allowing access to medical transition. This is dogshit.
26:24 Cass says she worked with a clinical expert group to develop a "holistic framework" to provide a starting point for assessing immediate risk and care needs of trans youths, which is being used nationwide. However, that framework apparently doesn't do shit to help clinicians "determine with any certainty which children and young people will go on to have an enduring trans identity." IMO this is both a skill issue and a direct result of not listening to or believing trans people when we say who we are.
27:00 Cass shows an overly complicated graphic that basically just boils down to centralising trans healthcare services under a national board, with regional and local services under it and explains it.
28:00 The PB trial... She claims evidence for "medical and non-medical interventions" needs improvement. On top of her wildly unethical PB trail, she wants a "full programme of research to be established", following participants into adulthood. In a vacuum, the follow up part would be good...
28:34 Cass shows this godawful slide of the pre-existing and intentionally engineered factors used to attack trans healthcare:
29:17 Cass does a brief summary of the 'More in Common' report 2022.
Having read the report, it's so blatantly made by and for cis people and has "few approach these topics from rigidly political, binary, or ideological lenses. Instead, they see a series of practical issues requiring practical solutions."* (don't you love being a "practical issue" that needs a "solution"?! This is somehow framed as a positive!!!)
It's a gross series of contradictions and saying we should "compromise" about our human rights. It then calls attacks on trans rights, ignoring issues, "well-intentioned but un-strategic interventions which channel the concerns of activists, but which do not meet the public where they are – and often make things worse", and "recognising most Britons start from a position of good will and making considered, informed and strategic engagement to better navigate the debate and make progress" all paths in a "culture war".
It sorts the British public into seven "value-driven viewpoints" on the "trans debate". I hate it so much. It's just cis feelings over trans lives and calls for trans 'allies' (certainly not addressed to trans people) to find common ground with and compromise with transphobes in the "debate".
If I had to read it, so do you, now back to Cass:
She shows some points from its first section, including an acknowledgement that trans people face discrimination.
29:40 Another criticism of the Cass Review has hit the chat!!! (from the Australian Medical Journal)
30:14 Cass acknowledges events from the lifetime of the report: that attacks on trans people and our rights rose with the Tories (correctly calling it aggression against us); the murder of Brianna Ghey (grossly calling her a "young trans woman" instead of "16 year old trans girl"); how Labour are in line with the Tories on her review (that is to say, attacks on trans rights). She then brushes past the last two points on screen, of the "guidance for schools" (Section 28 2.0) and discussions of (not) banning conversion therapy as just other things in the background.
30:53 Another comment questioning the Cass Review's quality and Cass's behaviour: "Mine is to do with the general robustness of the scientific process used for the review & the response to criticism from experts"
31:17 "Key features of approach" Wanting "engagement" and "voices of all sides of debate - not not together in a room". The rest of the points on the slide are glossed over, but are "multimodal information sources, "iterative process", "value voice of younger team members", and "chair with no future career ambitions".
Lording over trans healthcare has apparently "dominated [her] life"
31:56 Cass claims that post publication of her Review, there's been a "funded disinformation campaign" and that her critics haven't read the Review. (This is in spite of her most vocal critics being other medical professionals who carefully read and critiqued the Cass Review.) She claims that US politics are a major factor in people criticising her (claiming some sort of conspiracy against her???)
32:13 Cass lies about the UK Supreme Court anti-trans ruling, claiming it applies to all contexts of the Equality Act 2010, including toilets. Surprisingly, she opposes banning trans women from women's toilets, calling it "completely unconscionable" and "unacceptable" to force trans women to use the men's. She states how it puts trans women at risk and calls for "common sense on this"
She then glosses over the second point on screen of United Sates v. Skrmetti, upholding the lower court's ruling that Tennessee SB1 banning trans healthcare for minors does not violate the U.S. constitution's 14th amendment equal protection clause. She states that it has an impact over here though, saying "when America sneeses we all get a cold".
33:03 Cass talks about government and NHS to implement her recommendations in full, and support from all major medical bodies but BMA. 3 new centres, more later this year. Puberty blocker trial in development. "Training programme established for all new staff to ensure consistency of approach" Network set up between all new centres for co-ordinating approach, training, data collection, research and clinical approach. From hearing from both parents and youths via the study earlier in this thread on the harms of the PB ban, the approach is conversion therapy and threatening families who get healthcare for their kids in spite of the ban with social services
33:24 Cass says that she wants the entire NHS improved for all young people (good in a vacuum...), but then goes "if we can get it right for adolescents more broadly, we can get it right for this population of young people" (ominous) Cass stops her presentation there, but we're not done...
34:00 Jeff Perring is the most slimeball slimeball around and repeats how "complex" the report is. (At this point I have to reduce the playback speed from 2x to 1.5x bc he doesn't speak as painfully slowly as Cass) He says his main points are that "the evidence base is limited" (lie) and "which bits of the evidence base you use or don't use". Repeats a point Cass made earlier (while claiming anyone criticising the Review for discounting anything that isn't a RCT is spreading disinformation) that I didn't transcribe of there only being 3 papers that met her standards.
34:33 A link to the paper 'Gender medicine and the Cass Review: why medicine and the law make poor bedfellows' has been dropped in chat by Michelle Fearon (who seems to be a dedicated transphobe based on this). It's a dogshit article by a group of transphobic medical professionals, one of whom is with the Society for Evidence-based Gender Medicine (a SPLC designated anti-trans hate group that supports conversion therapy), claiming the Cass Review is being lied about by McNamara et al. to push a lawsuit.
While used in court to challenge anti-trans legislation, it (McNamara et al.) can only be used as such in response to and because of the Cass Review being used in legislation and court to attack trans healthcare. The article plays defence on and dismisses select points of criticism, while ignoring most.
It (the paper by SEGM) also makes the unsupported claim that the (internationally discredited) Cass Review "received widespread support from the clinical community". The SEGM has been described by medical institutions and individuals as "not a recognized scientific organisation" and a "fringe medical organization"
35:13 Someone online asks about how the service ensures that people providing the care are welcoming towards trans people and expresses concerns about 'gender criticals' being a safeguarding risk to children. Jeff Perring twists it to instead being about diversity of views.
Cass responds by talking about Patient and Public Involvement groups and ongoing qualitative research into young people's perspectives on how services should be designed and operated. She claims these informed her recommendations (doubt) and that poor training was the main thing young people found frustrating, alongside 'trans broken arm syndrome'. She claims there are discussions about cases to ensure people don't fall into "extreme views" and have a "proper shared and multidisciplinary view".
38:40 Perring asks Cass about concerns about conversion therapy from someone else, then spins it into being about comprehensive assessment.
Cass describes hollistic assessment, looking at all aspects of their development and relationships, then looking to design an assessment/formulation/plan (Cass just couldn't pick one word) of everything that needs managing. An actually positive example given of teaching safe chest binding. Then, in a quite frankly dark bit, talks about someone using (birth control) pills to suppress their period - given that they're being denied puberty blockers by the state.
Cass claims the psychoeducation program is not to convert anybody, but to have a "very broad and deep understanding of all the aspects of what a medical transition might involve and to make sure that if somebody does go down that pathway, they are as informed as they can be (bearing in mind that there's lots of things that we don't know, we can't tell them). But it's absolutely not a conversion therapy approach." (Patient testimony contradicts this statement.)
40:50 TKDB's inside person's question is asked next: "What do you think is the impact of extremist groups such as "Trans Kids Deserve Better" on the outcome of this report."
Cass says she thinks it is very worrying and references TKDB's die-in outside Wes Streeting's office. She says she thinks it's "unhelpful" and "frightening to other young people". Cass then claims she and her team have really been looking carefully into suicidality and that there's been "no increase in suicidality related to changes in prescribing [aka: the PB ban]". This is an explicit lie.
As TKDB have highlighted, the NHS is deliberately suppressing a report on trans youth suicides, and whistleblowers have also reported cover-ups of trans youth suicides within NHS England
Cass claims she spoke to some "fantastic" trans advocacy groups during the course of the Review who provide support for young people. According to Cass, these groups sometimes tell trans people to take their time and not rush decisions.
Cass abuses the words of a nb person that they wish there were more ways of being trans than just a binary medical transition and that they would advise their younger self to not rush, but that their younger self wouldn't have listened to that. It is disgusting how transphobes like Cass twist and abuse the testimonies of nonbinary people wanting to have options outside the binary to attack trans healthcare and provide cover for their conversion practices.
42:43 Perring clarifies with Cass that the Applebee report is around suicide in young people.
The report claims that there's been no increase in suicides at Tavistock, trying to refute whistleblower claims - however, it also acknowledges that it there's uncertainty around deaths recorded as "suicide not confirmed". Erin in the Morning has a good article on this exact topic that includes examples of this exact 'uncertainty'. It is unknown how many such cases there are, but likely far more than any official estimate.
In spite of this, the Applebee report claims that the unknown number of misrecorded suicides remains "too small" to affect his conclusions.
42:55 Anna Ramsbottom asks if (whilst she "appreciates" that the origins of GD are "complex") whether being trans might be caused by experiencing misogynistic violence and whether trauma support would "support some children to be more comfortable presenting however they want to, without the need to choose an even more restrictive box to occupy".
Ramsbottom is peddling the psuedoscientific idea that trauma is making cis girls transition to male or nonbinary escape misogyny and suggesting that they focus on "identifying and addressing" that trauma so they don't transition.
Cass responds "yes, but" and says that some people are going to be "gender dysphoric" from when they're little and will continue to be throughout adult life, and that for those specific trans people medical transition is "potentially" the only thing that makes them able to live comfortably. She claims they're not trying to prevent those perfect transes from transitioning.
She then says she's "worried" about the impact of social media on young people and that she's lobbying (presumably to ban youths from social media) in Parliament, and that she thinks she's been "deemed to be a nuisance" by the science and technology ministers bc she keeps pestering them about it. Cass claims there's a disconnect between the science and tech department about AI and such, and the downstream effects of that on health and education, negatively affecting young people - one of those "negative effects" being "thinking that transition is the the problems of being scared about your puberty and all that". (Cass is just peddling ROGD here)
She then claims homophobia is making gay and lesbian youths come out as trans and then detransition and that she's spoken with some who had just that experience.
This is just more TERF conspiracy shit, claiming gay and lesbian people are being 'transed' to make them straight.
She claims that social media is making puberty an even more confusing time, acknowledges that it's hard to prove cause and effect between social media and mental health, but then says there's "no doubt" young people are in MH clinics, out of school: with gaming addictions; facing cyberbullying; having PTSD from seeing gore videos online; suffering from sextortion. She says they had a meeting of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges and that there was an alarming level of concern from all medical Royal Colleges (about social media and mental health issues). Cass is setting out "concerns" for her crusade against youths accessing social media, many of which are not caused specifically by social media, but are larger issues that involve it.
46:25 Perring mentions criticisms of the Cass Review and asks how Cass "work[s] with those" and "understand[s] the criticisms that are there". This is half of this prior message in the chat (for some reason, Perring chooses to leave out the part about the robustness of the scientific process).
Cass says that any report or view should be open to criticism, but that people are lying about her Review. She claims people said she ignored 98% of the evidence - which is a misleading claim on her part and one addressed prior).
She then admits she disgarded all the studies she personally deemed to be of "really poor quality" (no elaboration given on what that means or how she determined it). She mentions the criticism of how the Cass Review doesn't reveal the names of all its authors, then declares that she's "responsible for everything that's written in that, for [her] sins." (That latter point isn't a claim I've read at all in any critique, issues are instead raised with the lack of transparency regarding the other contributors to the Cass Review and inability to check for biases in them.)
Cass claims people accuse her of not speaking to any trans people. (While some randos online may have said this, the overwhelming concensus is that she didn't properly consider or include the input of trans people in her, instead prioritising her own bigotry.)
Cass claims "a lot of the criticisms [of her work] are not well founded" and that "a number of papers have been written that rebutt the criticisms" (like the one linked in the chat prior by a SPLC designated hate group?)
She mentions critiques of the methodology of the York SRs and claims they've been replicated by McMaster with the same outcomes - a replication commissioned by the aformentioned SPLC-designated anti-trans hate group, SEGM (something not originally disclosed until a correction).
Cass says how despite articles (by SEGM) 'rebutting' criticisms of the Cass Review, they just get repeated in the next paper (independently and from all around the world, I should note)
She says it's really hard to move forward, but that she spoke to one of the centres in the US (she won't say which), which "has a quite affirmative approach" and wanted to speak to her about hers. Apparently they were surprised to find that they have a "shared understanding of things" and want to work with her. Cass says that if they could just "dispel some of those myths about the services that would be a real blow for freedom."
In other words: she's exporting her bigotry and lies to attack trans healthcare worldwide.
48:55 Perring relays another question from the chat about 'weak' evidence and whether "some young people could still reasonably choose themselves to proceed with more medical interventions, even though the risk is effectly unknown" (it's not, but that's not stopping these shitheads from lying)
Cass says yes, some young people could reasonably consent to medical transition and says how the National MDT will be approving people to go through the (unethical) PB trial (which, being the only way to for trans youths to legally access PBs in the UK has coerced consent for participants)
She says she knows the trans community were worried that she wanted to speak to detransitioners to undermine "the choice to have medical transition" (the trans community were right). She then compares trans healthcare to cardiac surgery risk factors, and talk about bringing up detransitioners to patients as they "make [their] choice" about medical transition. This is apparently not to stop anybody, but "tell people what [they] know about the risks" and tell them to wait a bit longer before starting medical transition.
She claims they just want to give "better clinical advice based on better evidence, same as [they] would for any other intervention where the outcomes are not always 100% known" (lie)
50:45 Another question from the chat: "what role do you see for pediatric endocrinologists in a gender service?"
Cass says it would be great to have each centre having their own local endo bc it's better for the patients and communication. (good in a vacuum, but...)
She says she hopes endos will be more encouraged to participate bc they'd be doing so "under the protection of a research protocol, really tight decision making about who's going into the study and support from endocrinologists who've been in this game over a longer period."
Cass says that if she were an endo being asked to prescribe in isolation, she'd feel really exposed. She claims the GICs and endo teams have a "strange dynamic" between them, where the GID service and endos based at UCLH, where the GID team don't "put children on drugs", while the endos don't diagnose GD. (This is just called referral with a recommendation to prescribe a medication. It's not "strange", just not the best possible dynamic.)
Cass claims that now it's a proper multidiscipinary team.
She says she sees it like safeguarding was in pediatrics back in her day, where they apparently "wouldn't be able to recruit pediatricians" bc you were damned if you do, damned if you don't and a "mistake in either direction was a disaster". She claims there was "very little evidence, very little training, very little support", then got a "better evidence base", "clear training and clear guidelines and safeguarding networks".
She's apparently stayed engaged so long bc she can "still keep in touch with [her] old buddies".
53:10 Question from chat about neurodiversity and asking "did you ever find a link between increased presentations of functional neurological disorder and gender identity?"
Cass claims that "yeah, there definitely are people [who] have written about that".
Cass claims a link between tic disorders and gender dysphoria, and that there might be others as well.
She says that "in terms of young people with neurodiversity, they would say that just because you're neurodiverse doesn't mean you can't also be trans ", but that it's "also quite hard for someone who is neurodiverse to live with uncertainty" and that "it is important to try and make sure they don't foreclose on their options too early". (aka: 'exploratory therapy targeting neurodivergent people)
Cass claims they "didn't have experts in neurodiversity working in the [gender identity] service, whereas the new centres do."
54:57 Question about NICE guidelines, saying there aren't a lot ATM. Asking if that's something that's likely to be developed over time.
Cass says yes, then claims there's another 'misunderstanding' about her report, of people saying she didn't follow proper guideline approaches. She claims it "wasn't actually a guideline, so that's why."
Says we do need NICE guidelines, but that they're not able to do them quickly bc "the evidence base is, y'know, we'll need to wait til we get a bit more ev-, y'know, a bit more, uhhh development in the research" (waffling lies)
Last minute call for questions with no response. Chief slimeball Jeff Perring thanks Cass and praises her "wisdom and expertise in this area" and taking them through a "complex subject" and make it "understandable" for them.
He says that Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust, as an organisation, is looking to build a business case with Cass and is looking froward to seeing her another time.
Cass offers to come up for a visit some other time.
Perring says they'd love a visit.
While that's the end of the meeting, I'm going to include some more points here:
1) The York SR on which the Cass Review relies had their methodology designed by a member of SEGM, and the Cass Review itself cites a rabidly anti-trans Youtube channel, 'Thoughts about Things and Stuff', which has had anti-trans hate group 'Gays Against Groomers' as a contributor. This is something I found out about via a discussion with @bahbahbiker.bsky.social about The 98% figure Cass gives regarding criticisms of the Review. @bahbahbiker also linked me a speech on the Cass Review by Dr Ruth Pearce, which includes in its footnotes how the Cass Review cites said Youtube channel. (Note: this is something I originally misread and saying in my original thread that Cass cited GAG directly - this is false and there is a difference between the two- albeit of little substantial difference, given how she cited an anti-trans YouTube channel of no academic standing or legitimacy that has direct ties to the hate group. I apologise for this mistake.)
2) Notably particularly obvious transphobes within Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust (from this meeting) are: Jeff Perring, Michelle Fearon and Anna Ramsbottom. They are a threat to transgender youths and should not be allowed to work anywhere near them.
This is a bit of a one-off endeavour for me, and I hope it's helpful. The fight against dehumanisation is ceaseless, but we will keep fighting.
Having read the report, it's so blatantly made by and for cis people and has "few approach these topics from rigidly political, binary, or ideological lenses. Instead, they see a series of practical issues requiring practical solutions."* (don't you love being a "practical issue" that needs a "solution"?! This is somehow framed as a positive!!!)
It's a gross series of contradictions and saying we should "compromise" about our human rights. It then calls attacks on trans rights, ignoring issues, "well-intentioned but un-strategic interventions which channel the concerns of activists, but which do not meet the public where they are – and often make things worse", and "recognising most Britons start from a position of good will and making considered, informed and strategic engagement to better navigate the debate and make progress" all paths in a "culture war".
It sorts the British public into seven "value-driven viewpoints" on the "trans debate". I hate it so much. It's just cis feelings over trans lives and calls for trans 'allies' (certainly not addressed to trans people) to find common ground with and compromise with transphobes in the "debate".
If I had to read it, so do you, now back to Cass:
She shows some points from its first section, including an acknowledgement that trans people face discrimination.
29:40 Another criticism of the Cass Review has hit the chat!!! (from the Australian Medical Journal)
30:14 Cass acknowledges events from the lifetime of the report: that attacks on trans people and our rights rose with the Tories (correctly calling it aggression against us); the murder of Brianna Ghey (grossly calling her a "young trans woman" instead of "16 year old trans girl"); how Labour are in line with the Tories on her review (that is to say, attacks on trans rights). She then brushes past the last two points on screen, of the "guidance for schools" (Section 28 2.0) and discussions of (not) banning conversion therapy as just other things in the background.
30:53 Another comment questioning the Cass Review's quality and Cass's behaviour: "Mine is to do with the general robustness of the scientific process used for the review & the response to criticism from experts"
31:17 "Key features of approach" Wanting "engagement" and "voices of all sides of debate - not not together in a room". The rest of the points on the slide are glossed over, but are "multimodal information sources, "iterative process", "value voice of younger team members", and "chair with no future career ambitions".
Lording over trans healthcare has apparently "dominated [her] life"
31:56 Cass claims that post publication of her Review, there's been a "funded disinformation campaign" and that her critics haven't read the Review. (This is in spite of her most vocal critics being other medical professionals who carefully read and critiqued the Cass Review.) She claims that US politics are a major factor in people criticising her (claiming some sort of conspiracy against her???)
32:13 Cass lies about the UK Supreme Court anti-trans ruling, claiming it applies to all contexts of the Equality Act 2010, including toilets. Surprisingly, she opposes banning trans women from women's toilets, calling it "completely unconscionable" and "unacceptable" to force trans women to use the men's. She states how it puts trans women at risk and calls for "common sense on this"
She then glosses over the second point on screen of United Sates v. Skrmetti, upholding the lower court's ruling that Tennessee SB1 banning trans healthcare for minors does not violate the U.S. constitution's 14th amendment equal protection clause. She states that it has an impact over here though, saying "when America sneeses we all get a cold".
33:03 Cass talks about government and NHS to implement her recommendations in full, and support from all major medical bodies but BMA. 3 new centres, more later this year. Puberty blocker trial in development. "Training programme established for all new staff to ensure consistency of approach" Network set up between all new centres for co-ordinating approach, training, data collection, research and clinical approach. From hearing from both parents and youths via the study earlier in this thread on the harms of the PB ban, the approach is conversion therapy and threatening families who get healthcare for their kids in spite of the ban with social services
33:24 Cass says that she wants the entire NHS improved for all young people (good in a vacuum...), but then goes "if we can get it right for adolescents more broadly, we can get it right for this population of young people" (ominous) Cass stops her presentation there, but we're not done...
34:00 Jeff Perring is the most slimeball slimeball around and repeats how "complex" the report is. (At this point I have to reduce the playback speed from 2x to 1.5x bc he doesn't speak as painfully slowly as Cass) He says his main points are that "the evidence base is limited" (lie) and "which bits of the evidence base you use or don't use". Repeats a point Cass made earlier (while claiming anyone criticising the Review for discounting anything that isn't a RCT is spreading disinformation) that I didn't transcribe of there only being 3 papers that met her standards.
34:33 A link to the paper 'Gender medicine and the Cass Review: why medicine and the law make poor bedfellows' has been dropped in chat by Michelle Fearon (who seems to be a dedicated transphobe based on this). It's a dogshit article by a group of transphobic medical professionals, one of whom is with the Society for Evidence-based Gender Medicine (a SPLC designated anti-trans hate group that supports conversion therapy), claiming the Cass Review is being lied about by McNamara et al. to push a lawsuit.
While used in court to challenge anti-trans legislation, it (McNamara et al.) can only be used as such in response to and because of the Cass Review being used in legislation and court to attack trans healthcare. The article plays defence on and dismisses select points of criticism, while ignoring most.
It (the paper by SEGM) also makes the unsupported claim that the (internationally discredited) Cass Review "received widespread support from the clinical community". The SEGM has been described by medical institutions and individuals as "not a recognized scientific organisation" and a "fringe medical organization"
35:13 Someone online asks about how the service ensures that people providing the care are welcoming towards trans people and expresses concerns about 'gender criticals' being a safeguarding risk to children. Jeff Perring twists it to instead being about diversity of views.
Cass responds by talking about Patient and Public Involvement groups and ongoing qualitative research into young people's perspectives on how services should be designed and operated. She claims these informed her recommendations (doubt) and that poor training was the main thing young people found frustrating, alongside 'trans broken arm syndrome'. She claims there are discussions about cases to ensure people don't fall into "extreme views" and have a "proper shared and multidisciplinary view".
38:40 Perring asks Cass about concerns about conversion therapy from someone else, then spins it into being about comprehensive assessment.
Cass describes hollistic assessment, looking at all aspects of their development and relationships, then looking to design an assessment/formulation/plan (Cass just couldn't pick one word) of everything that needs managing. An actually positive example given of teaching safe chest binding. Then, in a quite frankly dark bit, talks about someone using (birth control) pills to suppress their period - given that they're being denied puberty blockers by the state.
Cass claims the psychoeducation program is not to convert anybody, but to have a "very broad and deep understanding of all the aspects of what a medical transition might involve and to make sure that if somebody does go down that pathway, they are as informed as they can be (bearing in mind that there's lots of things that we don't know, we can't tell them). But it's absolutely not a conversion therapy approach." (Patient testimony contradicts this statement.)
40:50 TKDB's inside person's question is asked next: "What do you think is the impact of extremist groups such as "Trans Kids Deserve Better" on the outcome of this report."
Cass says she thinks it is very worrying and references TKDB's die-in outside Wes Streeting's office. She says she thinks it's "unhelpful" and "frightening to other young people". Cass then claims she and her team have really been looking carefully into suicidality and that there's been "no increase in suicidality related to changes in prescribing [aka: the PB ban]". This is an explicit lie.
As TKDB have highlighted, the NHS is deliberately suppressing a report on trans youth suicides, and whistleblowers have also reported cover-ups of trans youth suicides within NHS England
Cass claims she spoke to some "fantastic" trans advocacy groups during the course of the Review who provide support for young people. According to Cass, these groups sometimes tell trans people to take their time and not rush decisions.
Cass abuses the words of a nb person that they wish there were more ways of being trans than just a binary medical transition and that they would advise their younger self to not rush, but that their younger self wouldn't have listened to that. It is disgusting how transphobes like Cass twist and abuse the testimonies of nonbinary people wanting to have options outside the binary to attack trans healthcare and provide cover for their conversion practices.
42:43 Perring clarifies with Cass that the Applebee report is around suicide in young people.
The report claims that there's been no increase in suicides at Tavistock, trying to refute whistleblower claims - however, it also acknowledges that it there's uncertainty around deaths recorded as "suicide not confirmed". Erin in the Morning has a good article on this exact topic that includes examples of this exact 'uncertainty'. It is unknown how many such cases there are, but likely far more than any official estimate.
In spite of this, the Applebee report claims that the unknown number of misrecorded suicides remains "too small" to affect his conclusions.
42:55 Anna Ramsbottom asks if (whilst she "appreciates" that the origins of GD are "complex") whether being trans might be caused by experiencing misogynistic violence and whether trauma support would "support some children to be more comfortable presenting however they want to, without the need to choose an even more restrictive box to occupy".
Ramsbottom is peddling the psuedoscientific idea that trauma is making cis girls transition to male or nonbinary escape misogyny and suggesting that they focus on "identifying and addressing" that trauma so they don't transition.
Cass responds "yes, but" and says that some people are going to be "gender dysphoric" from when they're little and will continue to be throughout adult life, and that for those specific trans people medical transition is "potentially" the only thing that makes them able to live comfortably. She claims they're not trying to prevent those perfect transes from transitioning.
She then says she's "worried" about the impact of social media on young people and that she's lobbying (presumably to ban youths from social media) in Parliament, and that she thinks she's been "deemed to be a nuisance" by the science and technology ministers bc she keeps pestering them about it. Cass claims there's a disconnect between the science and tech department about AI and such, and the downstream effects of that on health and education, negatively affecting young people - one of those "negative effects" being "thinking that transition is the the problems of being scared about your puberty and all that". (Cass is just peddling ROGD here)
She then claims homophobia is making gay and lesbian youths come out as trans and then detransition and that she's spoken with some who had just that experience.
This is just more TERF conspiracy shit, claiming gay and lesbian people are being 'transed' to make them straight.
She claims that social media is making puberty an even more confusing time, acknowledges that it's hard to prove cause and effect between social media and mental health, but then says there's "no doubt" young people are in MH clinics, out of school: with gaming addictions; facing cyberbullying; having PTSD from seeing gore videos online; suffering from sextortion. She says they had a meeting of the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges and that there was an alarming level of concern from all medical Royal Colleges (about social media and mental health issues). Cass is setting out "concerns" for her crusade against youths accessing social media, many of which are not caused specifically by social media, but are larger issues that involve it.
46:25 Perring mentions criticisms of the Cass Review and asks how Cass "work[s] with those" and "understand[s] the criticisms that are there". This is half of this prior message in the chat (for some reason, Perring chooses to leave out the part about the robustness of the scientific process).
Cass says that any report or view should be open to criticism, but that people are lying about her Review. She claims people said she ignored 98% of the evidence - which is a misleading claim on her part and one addressed prior).
She then admits she disgarded all the studies she personally deemed to be of "really poor quality" (no elaboration given on what that means or how she determined it). She mentions the criticism of how the Cass Review doesn't reveal the names of all its authors, then declares that she's "responsible for everything that's written in that, for [her] sins." (That latter point isn't a claim I've read at all in any critique, issues are instead raised with the lack of transparency regarding the other contributors to the Cass Review and inability to check for biases in them.)
Cass claims people accuse her of not speaking to any trans people. (While some randos online may have said this, the overwhelming concensus is that she didn't properly consider or include the input of trans people in her, instead prioritising her own bigotry.)
Cass claims "a lot of the criticisms [of her work] are not well founded" and that "a number of papers have been written that rebutt the criticisms" (like the one linked in the chat prior by a SPLC designated hate group?)
She mentions critiques of the methodology of the York SRs and claims they've been replicated by McMaster with the same outcomes - a replication commissioned by the aformentioned SPLC-designated anti-trans hate group, SEGM (something not originally disclosed until a correction).
Cass says how despite articles (by SEGM) 'rebutting' criticisms of the Cass Review, they just get repeated in the next paper (independently and from all around the world, I should note)
She says it's really hard to move forward, but that she spoke to one of the centres in the US (she won't say which), which "has a quite affirmative approach" and wanted to speak to her about hers. Apparently they were surprised to find that they have a "shared understanding of things" and want to work with her. Cass says that if they could just "dispel some of those myths about the services that would be a real blow for freedom."
In other words: she's exporting her bigotry and lies to attack trans healthcare worldwide.
48:55 Perring relays another question from the chat about 'weak' evidence and whether "some young people could still reasonably choose themselves to proceed with more medical interventions, even though the risk is effectly unknown" (it's not, but that's not stopping these shitheads from lying)
Cass says yes, some young people could reasonably consent to medical transition and says how the National MDT will be approving people to go through the (unethical) PB trial (which, being the only way to for trans youths to legally access PBs in the UK has coerced consent for participants)
She says she knows the trans community were worried that she wanted to speak to detransitioners to undermine "the choice to have medical transition" (the trans community were right). She then compares trans healthcare to cardiac surgery risk factors, and talk about bringing up detransitioners to patients as they "make [their] choice" about medical transition. This is apparently not to stop anybody, but "tell people what [they] know about the risks" and tell them to wait a bit longer before starting medical transition.
She claims they just want to give "better clinical advice based on better evidence, same as [they] would for any other intervention where the outcomes are not always 100% known" (lie)
50:45 Another question from the chat: "what role do you see for pediatric endocrinologists in a gender service?"
Cass says it would be great to have each centre having their own local endo bc it's better for the patients and communication. (good in a vacuum, but...)
She says she hopes endos will be more encouraged to participate bc they'd be doing so "under the protection of a research protocol, really tight decision making about who's going into the study and support from endocrinologists who've been in this game over a longer period."
Cass says that if she were an endo being asked to prescribe in isolation, she'd feel really exposed. She claims the GICs and endo teams have a "strange dynamic" between them, where the GID service and endos based at UCLH, where the GID team don't "put children on drugs", while the endos don't diagnose GD. (This is just called referral with a recommendation to prescribe a medication. It's not "strange", just not the best possible dynamic.)
Cass claims that now it's a proper multidiscipinary team.
She says she sees it like safeguarding was in pediatrics back in her day, where they apparently "wouldn't be able to recruit pediatricians" bc you were damned if you do, damned if you don't and a "mistake in either direction was a disaster". She claims there was "very little evidence, very little training, very little support", then got a "better evidence base", "clear training and clear guidelines and safeguarding networks".
She's apparently stayed engaged so long bc she can "still keep in touch with [her] old buddies".
53:10 Question from chat about neurodiversity and asking "did you ever find a link between increased presentations of functional neurological disorder and gender identity?"
Cass claims that "yeah, there definitely are people [who] have written about that".
Cass claims a link between tic disorders and gender dysphoria, and that there might be others as well.
She says that "in terms of young people with neurodiversity, they would say that just because you're neurodiverse doesn't mean you can't also be trans ", but that it's "also quite hard for someone who is neurodiverse to live with uncertainty" and that "it is important to try and make sure they don't foreclose on their options too early". (aka: 'exploratory therapy targeting neurodivergent people)
Cass claims they "didn't have experts in neurodiversity working in the [gender identity] service, whereas the new centres do."
54:57 Question about NICE guidelines, saying there aren't a lot ATM. Asking if that's something that's likely to be developed over time.
Cass says yes, then claims there's another 'misunderstanding' about her report, of people saying she didn't follow proper guideline approaches. She claims it "wasn't actually a guideline, so that's why."
Says we do need NICE guidelines, but that they're not able to do them quickly bc "the evidence base is, y'know, we'll need to wait til we get a bit more ev-, y'know, a bit more, uhhh development in the research" (waffling lies)
Last minute call for questions with no response. Chief slimeball Jeff Perring thanks Cass and praises her "wisdom and expertise in this area" and taking them through a "complex subject" and make it "understandable" for them.
He says that Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust, as an organisation, is looking to build a business case with Cass and is looking froward to seeing her another time.
Cass offers to come up for a visit some other time.
Perring says they'd love a visit.
While that's the end of the meeting, I'm going to include some more points here:
1) The York SR on which the Cass Review relies had their methodology designed by a member of SEGM, and the Cass Review itself cites a rabidly anti-trans Youtube channel, 'Thoughts about Things and Stuff', which has had anti-trans hate group 'Gays Against Groomers' as a contributor. This is something I found out about via a discussion with @bahbahbiker.bsky.social about The 98% figure Cass gives regarding criticisms of the Review. @bahbahbiker also linked me a speech on the Cass Review by Dr Ruth Pearce, which includes in its footnotes how the Cass Review cites said Youtube channel. (Note: this is something I originally misread and saying in my original thread that Cass cited GAG directly - this is false and there is a difference between the two- albeit of little substantial difference, given how she cited an anti-trans YouTube channel of no academic standing or legitimacy that has direct ties to the hate group. I apologise for this mistake.)
2) Notably particularly obvious transphobes within Sheffield Children's NHS Foundation Trust (from this meeting) are: Jeff Perring, Michelle Fearon and Anna Ramsbottom. They are a threat to transgender youths and should not be allowed to work anywhere near them.
This is a bit of a one-off endeavour for me, and I hope it's helpful. The fight against dehumanisation is ceaseless, but we will keep fighting.
• • •
[Addendum 01:] The "stability of gender identity" graph is an interesting one and intentionally mistitled and stripped of context from the study it's taken from. The graph is actually "trajectory groups of gender non-contentedness" and the study itself recognises the flaw of using the question "I wish to be of the opposite sex", as it's entirely binary, and (this point's not in the study) does not express actual intent or desire to transition, but rather an abstract idea. Cass is taking it out of context to spin for her own transphobic aims. Other graphics are just straight up made up.
I will say that the study does have a gross as hell conclusion, where they intentionally conflate "intense gender dysphoric feelings" with the abstract idea of sometimes wishing they could be the opposite sex, and state that they want to give trans kids a "more comprehensive view on the range of developmental patterns of gender identity in the general population" - which reeks of 'exploratory/conversion therapy' practices already used within the NHS (i.e.: forcing trans people to 'explore' options other than being trans).
I will say that the study does have a gross as hell conclusion, where they intentionally conflate "intense gender dysphoric feelings" with the abstract idea of sometimes wishing they could be the opposite sex, and state that they want to give trans kids a "more comprehensive view on the range of developmental patterns of gender identity in the general population" - which reeks of 'exploratory/conversion therapy' practices already used within the NHS (i.e.: forcing trans people to 'explore' options other than being trans).
[Addendum 02:] Foxdie.bsky.social has replied to the post talking about 8:50 to provide more information on the study in question, saying: "If it's the one I think it is. The same study also uses faulty measures to rate dysphoria, so that even if the people on PBs woke up randomly in a completely cis body of their gender they'd be rating as no improvement bc it's Qs like "I feel bad if I am treated as birth assigned gender"
This prompted me to look at the study more closely, responding: "Yep. It uses the Utrecht Gender Dysphoria Scale, which includes the question "Every time someone treats me like my assigned sex I feel hurt."
There are more questions, in mental health more generally and it "found no evidence of change in psychological function with GnRHa treatment, as indicated by parent report (CBCL) or self-report (YSR) of overall problems, internalising or externalising problems or self-harm."
The study outright states on this that "[t]his is consonant with the action of GnRHa, which only stops further pubertal development and does not change the body to be more congruent with a young person’s gender identity." It overall finds PBs to be effective and to not have any unexpected adverse effects.
This prompted me to look at the study more closely, responding: "Yep. It uses the Utrecht Gender Dysphoria Scale, which includes the question "Every time someone treats me like my assigned sex I feel hurt."
There are more questions, in mental health more generally and it "found no evidence of change in psychological function with GnRHa treatment, as indicated by parent report (CBCL) or self-report (YSR) of overall problems, internalising or externalising problems or self-harm."
The study outright states on this that "[t]his is consonant with the action of GnRHa, which only stops further pubertal development and does not change the body to be more congruent with a young person’s gender identity." It overall finds PBs to be effective and to not have any unexpected adverse effects.