Thread by @ErinInTheMorn

Cass has released a "FAQ/Clarification" today for the Cass Review where she gets some major things wrong. Chief among them is the idea that "most children will desist," which has been so thoroughly debunked that it should be discrediting.

This is misleading and a lie.

This comes from the DSM-4 criteria where any gender nonconforming kid was considered trans and counted under desistance.

Likewise, trans kids COULD NOT transition, were put through conversion therapy, and of course they “desisted."

The old criteria that these claims are based on literally do not require you to identify as "the other sex" in order to be diagnosed with "gender identity disorder," a "disorder" diagnosis that no longer even exists. See this:

The two most common sources for these claims are Ken Zucker's research from 1995 and Thomas Steensma's research from 2011-2013. Both of these research studies have this same flaw of using DSM-IV criteria.

Ken Zucker is where the 80% number originally comes from. He was a conversion therapist who did his study on only 45 youth. Half of the youth did not even meet the diagnostic criteria.

He practiced the following conversion therapy methods:

That's right. The origin of the 80% claim comes from a clinic that practiced conversion therapy. Zucker allegedly told parents to avoid toys of the other gender, avoid play with other gender kids, and asked probing sexual questions of 9 year olds.

Even without the conversion therapy, his methodological flaws were innumerous and the guidelines he used were, as mentioned before, no longer even in place and more stringent guidelines are now used.

I will also add that transition as a trans youth was nearly impossible until recent times. Standards of care for medical transition ranged from nonexistent in the vast majority of cases to arduous in others. It is no wonder people "gave up."

I did in 2003. I "desisted."

Important note. Many were not even trans. Back then, gay effiminate teen boys whose parents thought they were "sissies" were treated the same way as trans girls.

https://x.com/BrynnTannehill/status/1783841943354479102

A recent study from 2022, the largest of its kind in the prestigious journal pediatrics, focused on 300 trans youth over a 5 year period.

Even 5 years later, 97.5% of youth still identified as trans or nonbinary.

psychologytoday.com/us/blog/politi…

One claim Cass makes is that studies on desistance have high "loss to follow up," so one team in Australia just solved this in a paper that came out earlier this year (disregarded by the Cass review):

https://twitter.com/ErinInTheMorn/status/1765458492456939793

The Australia team managed to find detransition/desistance rates by looking at clinical notes as well as official discharges in a western Australia clinic that was the ONLY clinic where you could get care.

The Australia clinic were able to determine desistance rates for 548/552 patients years after starting puberty blockers.

Know what they found?

Only 2(!!!) people desisted who began blockers and HRT.

https://x.com/ErinInTheMorn/status/1765458501998952517

I wrote about that study here, you can catch a link here:

erininthemorning.com/p/groundbreaki…

You can also read more about the 80% desistance myth here. It has been an enduring falsehood and should be disqualifying for Cass.

erininthemorning.com/p/debunked-no-…

Lastly, you can subscribe to support my journalism at .erininthemorning.com/subscribe

Anti-trans activist and blogger Ben Ryan chimes in implying that Cass did not disregard the low desistance Australia study.

Except... The Cavve study is literally not found in either the Cass Review or the York Review.

Whoops.