So, I had a twitter conversation with Dave Silverman, who was once the President of American Atheists. It started because I called him out on retweeting Gays Against Groomers. Then I addressed one of the claims by GAG about “sterilizing kids” and a conversation started. So, here is my reply to his reply. His words are in italics.

So the issue is cutting kids who call themselves trans. If we are going to cut kids, I think we would both agree that we’d better be right. Nobody wants to deform a kid detrimentally. If I were to support cutting kids, I would need good data,

No, the issue is not “cutting kids who call themselves trans” nor is this about wanting to “deform” a kid. The fact that you are using emotive language to describe surgery and hormone therapy is a great rhetorical tactic if you want to inflame people who don’t know any better, but when you use it while pretending that you’re having a genuine serious discussion, you tell on yourself.

Also, we aren’t talking about surgery on any kid that “calls themselves trans”. We are talking about surgeries that are very seldom done on minors and generally only offered to minors with dysphoria concerning that part of the body. Some of these young people are so desperate for top surgery, for example, that not facilitating the surgery may result in self-injury. We are not remotely talking about any kid who calls themselves trans, and obviously so. Again, you’re letting me know that you are not serious nor genuine.

To get data on treatment, any treatment at all, we need to actually administer the treatment and analyze the results. If, for example, top surgery didn’t alleviate dysphoria, we would be less inclined to offer top surgery to young people – but it does.

Such as: What % of kids who say they are trans at 5, 10, and 15 years old stay trans for the next decade? That’s question 1 because its obvious and super basic. What % of kids change their minds?

Everything we do know points to low retranstition rates, very low desistance rates after the onset of puberty (around 10 to 13 years old before any medical intervention is generally offered), and consistently low regret rates for surgeries. (All of these are different groups by the way.) However, because we are talking about a very small population (as opposed to the population who smokes for example) our best data is necessarily going to have low sample sizes.

Do you suggest that anyone with a rare condition simply not be treated because we don’t have studies with N = several thousand? Of course not. That’s patently ridiculous, but for some reason, this standard is applied to trans related care. Why?

You can tell bullshit medical argument pretty easily – it’s exactly how anti-vaxxers operate. They will point to flaws in studies (or simply lack of perfect data) but never actually positively support their own position. Instead, they argue that since everything we currently know isn’t perfect – that THEY are magically correct. That’s not how reality works.

If we weren’t seeing the results that we are currently seeing, there would be a change of course. The vehement arguments against allowing gender related care are nearly always hypothetical – not real.

When I ask the question I am deluged by people sending stories from adult trans people who knew they were trans as children. This is bad data; it is anecdotal, and it does not predict. What percentage of the population do these people represent? 1%, 50%, or 99%? They seem to imply that their anecdotal evidence implies that 100% of kids develop like they did. That’s bogus.

I see what you did there. You mentioned that trans adults often say that they knew they were trans when they were younger and many of them who were denied transition and denied care talk about how traumatic that was.

But then you put words in their mouths, that they supposedly think everyone’s experience is the same – creating a strawman that you then easily argued against. Good show! You are good at this. Yes, a study about trans people who were denied care would be interesting. I know many people who would be likely interested in participating in such a study.  

What we need is long term quantitative data answering the direct question: what % of trans kids stay trans? Good data for this monumentally important question does not exist. It’s obtainable – we could design the study and implement it today and get some real insight where we need it, but that would be considered “Anti trans” and has never been published, ever. Ironically, cancel culture is preventing the research that would prove leftists right (or wrong) from being conducted. You will never ever find good data answering this vital question, so we have to err on not cutting kids.

This is bizarre. This is very much a studied question that involves many public papers that you could just google and find easily. For example, a study that recently came out, that found about 2.5% of youth that socially transitioned changed their treatment course. Or studies showing that youth who transition and are supported by family and friends have similar wellbeing as their cisgender peers and that trans people often suffer from minority stress.

If you are talking about desistance studies that were done a long time ago by conversion therapists that pathologized gender nonconformity generally and considered psychologically torturing boys until they hated their mothers and were violent as “success” – yes – most reasonable people don’t take those studies seriously and tend to refer to the more recently studies that have better methodology and were conducted under the current DSM.

You mentioned suicide. Nobody wants kids to kill themselves of course and the common presumption is that kids need to be transitioned as fast as possible to prevent teen suicide. The problem is there is no good data linking trans surgery with a reduction in suicide. Like the gray shirts, its assumption. In order to cut kids, we would need a study comparing the suicide rates of 1000 kids, ALL IN EQUALLY SUPPORTIVE SITUATIONS, only some get transitioned and some do not, and look at the suicide results. THIS would show the marginal cause and effect you all seem to think is absolute. In fact, we don’t know that transitioning kids reduces suicide AT ALL. Without that good data supporting the idea that transitioning kids reduces suicide by x%, we need to admit we are rushing to trans kids on assumption only, so don’t cut kids. Once again, good data for this monumentally important question does not exist.

What on god’s green earth are you talking about? Just in case you don’t bother clicking on any of my links here you go:

“In this prospective cohort of 104 TNB youths aged 13 to 20 years, receipt of gender-affirming care, including puberty blockers and gender-affirming hormones, was associated with 60% lower odds of moderate or severe depression and 73% lower odds of suicidality over a 12-month follow-up.”

It’s obtainable – we could design the study and implement it today and get some real insight where we need it, but that would be considered “Anti trans” and has never been published, ever. Ironically, cancel culture is preventing the research that would prove leftists right (or wrong) from being conducted. You will never ever find good data answering this vital question, so we have to err on not cutting kids.

Here you are again with the “cutting kids” and hypothetical cancel culture bullshit rhetoric – I know “ex woke” is your brand – but come the fuck on. You’re spouting conspiratorial crap.

But it’s true. There are studies that will not be done because it is unethical to do so. You sound exactly like anti-vaxxers who insisted that we do some sort of double-blind study where we randomize a sample of kids to NOT VACCINATE. Those studies will never be done because it is highly unethical to deny life-saving care to people in order to get “good data”. Even when you point to a study where their concerns are addressed in some way – they always respond – NOT GOOD ENOUGH.

Is there any study that we could actually conceivably perform that would convince you not to deny care to people in need of it? I mean, you just suggested we create a group of trans kids to deny care to and see how many of them kill themselves and you think you’re the reasonable one here. Because that is the ONLY way we could get the “good data” that you are insisting on.

You’re being ethically repulsive which I know isn’t actually a sin in your circles – but you are also being stupid and scientifically illiterate.

I know – you requested “no bluster” – but a spade is a spade.

While we are talking about assumptions, How can we tell the difference between a budding 13 year old butch lesbian from a trans man? Lesbians are women, of course, and at that age they look and indeed ARE identical to trans men. No psychologist, parent, or kid in the world can tell the difference. If we had some way to predict with a high degree of certainty which kids were future trans and which were bull dykes, I’d be more supportive of transitioning kids. But there is no data, anywhere, at all. Zero. So don’t cut kids.

They aren’t the same, at all. One refers to sexual orientation and one refers to gender identity. Those two things are not the same. Now, if you are referring to a “tomboy” and a trans boy. They are also different. One refers to things like clothes and interests, and one refers to gender identity.

Under previous versions of the DSM, gender nonconformity was confused with being trans because all types of gender nonconformity were pathologized and thought to require treatment – which, at the time, referred to conversion therapy.

This is no longer the case. And it’s been trans activists who have been often on the forefront of this change, insisting that their identities are not contingent on performing gendered stereotypes. It was once very common for trans women (for example) to glam-up for their doctor’s appointments to secure care. It was pretty ridiculous.

There is also this idea, historically, that all trans people should be on ONE medical path to a “successful” transition. This is also something trans activists have generally fought against, unlike your straw man earlier, most reasonable people realize that their experiences are not the same as everyone else’s. Not everyone is the same and therefore shouldn’t be pushed to make all the same personal decisions. For example, trans activists generally support “Self ID” which doesn’t place restrictions on gender marker changes – such as sterilization – which used to be a requirement in many countries and in some places, I suspect still is.

A side note: I am repulsed by the way the Left treats detransitioners, who are the direct victims of the Left’s use of bad data. These people are maligned and dismissed, where they should be comforted and supported and YES – paraded in front of would be transitioners as a cautionary tale to stem future regret! Duh? But instead, detransitioners are hidden and never shown to prospects. Why not? Is the intent here to help trans kids, or to trans as many kids as possible, irrelevant of their best interests?

For a long time, the only ex-trans speaker or writer anyone could find was Walt Heyer. His work was everywhere and if someone mentioned an article by an ex-trans person I would joke – is it Walt Heyer? Now there are about half a dozen or so folks who are on the same political circuit. The problem folks have with these particular individuals is not that they detransitioned or that they are discussing their detransition, but due to the political machine that they have decided to become a part of.

I am personal friends with a detransitioner and someone who has surgery regret. Neither of them is remotely against access to transition related care. The machine that has politicized those types of experiences has done extreme harm, not just to trans people in need of care and acceptance, but to detransitioners and people who have surgery regret or complications associated with surgery or hormones; because their experiences (even very much against their will) are latched onto by the anti-trans political machine and weaponized against their community.

What is also ironic and sad, is that some detransitioners require gender affirming care. They are fighting against their own interests in a very real visceral way, and in the process hurting a great many people, the vast majority, who benefit greatly from transition and transition related care being accessible.

I am not going to imply intention, but IF that were the case – IF there was some kind of mass conspiracy to trans kids irrelevant of what’s good for them, then the oppression of good data, the use of bad data instead (all of which supports immediate transitioning), and the hiding of detransitioners would all obviously be a part of that. This is what such a wild conspiracy or mass delusion would look like. The fact is, and I can’t state this plainly enough, that you don’t have the data you think you have. You have 100% bad data masquerading as predictive good data which supports transitioning. You have literally zero data on the important issues: What % of kids who say they are trans actually become trans adults? What % of trans adults are happy 10 years after transitioning as kids? What is the difference between a butch lesbain and a trans man at 13 years old? By what percentage will transitioning kids reduce suicide? You have zero good data. Literally zero.

You frankly sound unhinged. I’m the one linking studies and sources, you have insinuations, strawman arguments, and JAQing off.

Please feel free to prove me wrong. You won’t. So you MUST NOT cut kids! Which brings me, finally, back to the question at hand. I’m well versed in statistics. Most are not. But doctors ARE! They read reports every day regarding quantitative research on procedures and new medicines. They know and understand well that everything I have written here is true. And they are cutting children anyway, for money. All the pain suffered by detransitioners, everywhere, past, present and future, rests in the hands of those who operate on kids knowing there is no good data supporting the idea that they are not harming them. Doctors know they are potentially doing harm to kids for money. Prison. For a very long time. Thanks

You’re suggesting we get “good data” about the efficacy of a treatment by putting people in jail for administering that treatment. Very logical.

There is also one more thing I want to address. The idea that somehow there is this push to rush young people into treatment. There is a rush – but that rush is to administer blockers. Blockers stop unwanted changes in puberty and give the young person more time to consider their options for the future. The whole point of blockers is to give young people time – it is the opposite of “rush”.

Denying this care in a timely way often has lasting effects for the rest of their life. You talk about “cutting kids” but would deny them the chance to not require top surgery in the future. You would deny a young boy to be tall and have a deep voice and force him to grow breasts. You would impose facial hair and a deep voice on a girl.

That’s where your implied naturalistic fallacy comes in. You are assuming that forcing those changes on someone is neutral. It’s not.

I see the compassion for the few people who regret transition related care, but somehow, in “gender critical” circles, that compassion is never extended to trans kids that are denied care.

Why? Because their pain is considered correct, natural, better, imposed by God – they just have to suffer because someone else might make a mistake.

They have to suffer because their suffering hasn’t been “adequately studied”.

Dave. I get it. You were doing quite well in your career until things went to shit and the only way to continue was to buy-in to the whole IDW “I’ve been canceled” wave of nonsense. But for fuck’s sake, you’re constantly retweeting GAG – who is a virulently anti-LGBTQ hate group. They often forward information that is incorrect and incendiary and created specifically to harm others – my community.

And you’re using the same anti-science rhetorical tactics as anti-vaxxers and YEC – you do know what you’re doing. Right? Or are you so far gone that you aren’t even aware?