669
Emails Reveal How a Hospital Bowed to Political Pressure to Stop Treating Trans Teens
(www.propublica.org)
this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2023
669 points (95.9% liked)
News
35749 readers
3457 users here now
Welcome to the News community!
Rules:
1. Be civil
Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.
2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.
Obvious biased sources will be removed at the mods’ discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted separately but not to the post body. Sources may be checked for reliability using Wikipedia, MBFC, AdFontes, GroundNews, etc.
3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.
Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.
4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source. Clickbait titles may be removed.
Posts which titles don’t match the source may be removed. If the site changed their headline, we may ask you to update the post title. Clickbait titles use hyperbolic language and do not accurately describe the article content. When necessary, post titles may be edited, clearly marked with [brackets], but may never be used to editorialize or comment on the content.
5. Only recent news is allowed.
Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.
6. All posts must be news articles.
No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials, videos, blogs, press releases, or celebrity gossip will be allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis. Mods may use discretion to pre-approve videos or press releases from highly credible sources that provide unique, newsworthy content not available or possible in another format.
7. No duplicate posts.
If an article has already been posted, it will be removed. Different articles reporting on the same subject are permitted. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.
8. Misinformation is prohibited.
Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.
9. No link shorteners or news aggregators.
All posts must link to original article sources. You may include archival links in the post description. News aggregators such as Yahoo, Google, Hacker News, etc. should be avoided in favor of the original source link. Newswire services such as AP, Reuters, or AFP, are frequently republished and may be shared from other credible sources.
10. Don't copy entire article in your post body
For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I wonder what the same people criticizing trans health care as "mutilation of children" think of intersex babies having genital surgery forced upon them to align their genitals with gender binary ideals.
And just before anyone has a chance to say it, trans healthcare for teens is okay despite them not being able to consent because if they don't choose quickly then one of the options is going to be forced upon them.
It's like a child standing on train tracks with a train speeding toward them and the child expressing that they'd like to get out of the way while people telling them "No! You're not old enough to make that decision!"
Or how about just circumcision? How is that ok?
It's not, but it happens to males, so no one cares. I certianly wasn't consulted about it, and have only been ridiculed when I've suggested it should have been my choice.
You're ridiculed because everyone knows that 99% of men wouldn't choose to be circumcised if they had to do it as an adult. Yet because we do it to babies it's fine.
Specious.
They were ridiculed because it is easier to make fun of the person causing ethical discomfort than it is to sincerely contemplate one's beliefs.
I would choose it. Chose it for my kids. So....
wow we found one in the wild (no offense). But seriously I would like to know, why not give your kids the chance to decide for themselves as well?
A number of reasons. The whole "well just wash" thing kind of presumes a certain quality of life and access to hygiene that isn't guaranteed--my doctor's opinion on this was informed by his experience in the jungle in Vietnam; it is more hygienic that washing, as obviously soap and water doesn't remove all bacteria and fungus that live on the skin, especially in folds or crevices; it's a surface that goes right over the top of an open orifice, so the risk of infection really isn't something to leave to chance as to whether or not you'll finish the day with a hot shower and soap; adult circumcision requires open wound care protocol, which carries its own risk of infection, in a very sensitive area, prone to healing complications, whereas babies have veritable superhuman healing powers and it heals in a few days with Vaseline; as a baby it's a basically an outpatient dermatological procedure, as an adult it's an actual surgery, with much greater risks of complications. It's a no brainer; it was recommended by every doctor we asked, who all considered it a no brainer. I know you can find anything online but the science and weighing of risks on this is makes the decision pretty clear.
E: Dumb, anti-acience people are downvoting this. Apparently they know more than doctors.
The scientific evidence supporting circumcision is actually fairly unconvincing. It's still invasive, medically unnecessary surgery, that kills ~100 babies every year. It's also proven that their brains are impacted by the procedure and show signs of PTSD.
Literally no other health board except American ones recommend circumcision. Canada, the Netherlands, the UK, Germany, all of these countries recommend strongly against circumcision as a therapeutic treatment, as far less invasive and much more effective options exist to achieve similar or far better health benefits. Even having basic hygiene and washing your penis erases any claimed health benefits from circumcision (which were already incredibly minor). It's literally only potentially beneficial if you don't observe basic hygiene.
It's also fairly unethical to make decisions regarding what is effectively mostly cosmetic surgery on a baby boy that can not consent to the procedure.
Literally almost every mammal evolved to have some kind of penile sheath. If it was truly detrimental to have a foreskin, it is highly unlikely that would have happened.
Not to mention, they don't live in a desert where the practice started, or a jungle per their doctor's experience
Trans women certainly care. We didn't ask for a lot of things, but circumcision still adds insult to injury.
The awful truth is that few people want to address fucked up shit. Almost everyone suffers from something forced upon us for no good reason, so if anything we need to support one another and work to end this crap.
Washing cleans genitalia, not surgery.
Uh, speaking as an European, your comment is completely ridiculous. It's genital mutilation as it's done without consent, as simple as that.
It should never be acceptable.
"bent out of shape over something you can't even remember"
I'm pretty sure he probably remembers he's been circumcised whenever he goes to the bathroom, takes a shower, changes his underwear...
If a person is drugged or blackout drunk is it ok to rape them if they don't remember?
Is it ok for a parent to put tattoos on their child if they get it done while the baby is young enough not to remember?
Someone can come to terms with a situation and still be allowed to be angry about it.
Or you could just wash it. Like normal people.
Do you also support scalping for wanting a clean head?
Yeah, what did humans do before weird crazy religious folks in the desert decided we need to cut (or even bite, 🤮) the foreskin off of a new born child? How did we survive??
This is why I don't fuck Americans. They honestly think their unwashed mutilated dicks are clean. Circumcised dicks are fine if that's what you got, but you still have to clean them just like any other dick.
Do people really just not clean their dicks? What the fuck?
Do you believe this to be an American stereotype?
I mean, I've met Americans that don't clean their dicks, so it's not wrong, but it's not really the norm. Sure, most people clean their dick, but if you honestly think cutting your dick up makes it cleaner, then I'm going to assume you just don't get near it with soap and water because any dick can be cleaned with soap and water.
Yeah I'm sorry this just makes no sense.
First of all, the overwhelming number of circumcisions occur long before a person is capable of consenting to such a procedure. So I don't think people are walking around thinking, "hey, if I cut up my dick, I won't have to clean it anymore!"
This shit happened when I was born, I had zero choice in it. It's absurd to make assumptions like that as if it's a personal choice.
Second, the assumption doesn't even make sense. Nobody has ever said or implied that circumcision is an alternative to washing your dick. That's insane. What are your even fucking talking about??
Sounds like maybe you had one or two bad experiences with some gross, unhygienic losers, and are assuming everyone is the same. You're dead wrong.
Listen, my highly-offended dude, the comment I am replying to said "but don't shame others for wanting a clean dick."
If you think that means something other than "mutilated dick = clean dick", then maybe we're not even speaking the same language, and you're gonna have an aneurysm trying to defend ol' dirty dick upthread.
Huh?
This all read to me as if you're the highly offended one and you're projecting your own shit.
You made good arguments to the comment you replied to, but as the person above you pointed out, the arguments you are making don't make any sense. You picked up the rope.
You're a boring troll.
Slinging facts you can't handle, kid. Grow up.
Is your username supposed to be misosophist?
no. I'd interpret "misosophist" as somebody who HATES wisdom/teaching/thought. I'm just playing at being a sophist who is probably more often wrong than right (including possibly with the dubious etymology of my own handle). I really didn't put much thought into it when signing up for lemmy, though.
Do I remember it? No, but I was born very premature and required surgery, so was not circumcised at birth. Why my father told me this story over breakfast when I was like 10, and why he thought how I screamed and cried when I finally, as he put it, "Got my pencil sharpened" was funny, I'll never know. Do I need therapy over it? No. Is it something I wish hadn't happened? Yes.
Fucking hell 🤮 I can smell you from over the Internet
It isn't. We should stop that too.
It's only ok if it's done without consent, don't you know? /s
Intersex genital surgery and circumcision should not occur on children. Adults should be free to choose what they want done to their bodies.
Well they usually include exceptions or mandates for intersex “correction” surgeries in those laws so yeah that’s that.
And besides, the Hospital in the article doesn’t even do surgeries on minors, only hormone treatment. There is no mutilation involved whatsoever.
And still circumcision is ok
Obviously, that’s got the approval from God™
Awful analogy, even if your point is sound. We should focus on the topic at hand, instead of trying to pivot to literal life-or-death analogies. It's a tactic people use to derail discussion instead of engage in it. Now instead of focusing on the topic at hand, we need to focus on how accurate your analogy is. It's more fruitful to just leave the analogy at home and try to have your relevant arguments stand on their own.
Lots of people on these forums will disagree, though.
It is, in many cases, a life or death situation; maybe not as abrupt as a train hitting someone, but suicide among trans youth who are being prevented from transitioning, essentially being told that they are to stupid to know what they want, is terrifyingly high.
I feel like you didn't pay attention to anything I said and decided to double-down on exactly what I called out on.
Oh well.
The child would have to wake up and stand before the shit slide every morning.