Family First has renewed its calls for a ban on transitioning children’s gender.
This comes as 100 prominent Australians, including medical doctors, have written to the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and State Health Ministers calling for a public inquiry into the practice.
While this is a worthy initiative, there is no need for more investigation.
As one of the letter’s signatories, Dr Andrew Amos told Sky News, the international evidence of harm to children from gender-bending chemicals that cause sterilisation and mutilating surgery is in.
“It doesn't help their health, it doesn't help their mental health, and it does cause significant physical and mental side effects, particularly things like broken bones, infertility, sexual dysfunction and the breakdown of social relationships,” Dr Amos said.
The open letter was signed by former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, former deputy Prime Minister John Anderson, 40 doctors, around 20 members of Parliament and other campaigners.
The letter states that "such an inquiry will need to consider how this (harm to children) was allowed to happen."
Family First agrees and notes that the answer to that question lies in large part with LGBTIQA+ political activists like Anna Brown from Equality Australia, Rodney Croome and NSW MP Alex Greenwich, all prominent leaders of the 2017 campaign to redefine marriage.
They are virtually the last standing in defence of child gender transitioning, having lied their way through the marriage campaign by saying that same-sex marriage would not have consequences for children.
Weak politicians and an incurious media captured by LGBTIQA+ ideology are also a major reason behind the "how” question.
With gender diversity made a non-relevant criterion for marriage in law, activists set about making children's gender fluid with a government-funded indoctrination program called "Safe Schools".
While "Safe Schools" started before the marriage law was changed, the play for children's gender was turbocharged by the success of the Yes campaign in the 2017 marriage plebiscite.
Concerns raised by the No campaign about a looming move (as a consequence of redefining marriage) to indoctrinate children into the LGBTIQA+ activists’ lie that gender was fluid, were ignored or suppressed.
Redefining marriage and redefining gender were always a package deal.
This has been a long fight. This letter is a major development but Family First suspects there will now be a fierce battle for it's request to be heeded.
The Australian newspaper’s reporting of the letter today was good, except the journalists used the pejorative "so-called" when referring to detransitioners such as Mel Jefferies who as an 18 year old had both her breasts removed so she could present as a male.
She bitterly regrets this decision which ideologically motivated medical practitioners pushed her in to.
Calling her a "so-called" detransitioner is akin to calling a victim of sexual abuse a "so-called" survivor.
Again, it is evidence of the ideological capture that was completed when our marriage law changed.
Below is a full copy of the letter:
Dear Prime Minister,
cc: Opposition Leader The Hon Peter Dutton MP, Federal Health Minister the Hon Mark Butler MP, Shadow Health Minister Senator the Hon Anne Ruston MP, all State and Territory Health Ministers and Shadow Health Ministers
RE: Urgent Call for Public Inquiry into Youth Gender Medicine
We are writing as concerned citizens to call for an immediate public inquiry into youth gender medicine in Australia and a pause on all medical gender transitions for children and young people until this inquiry is complete.
Worldwide concerns about ‘gender-affirming’ treatment
Recent developments globally have exposed serious concerns about the ‘gender-affirming’ approach to treating gender-confused youth and there is now a bipartisan consensus in many countries that major changes to practice in this area are needed.
The UK's comprehensive Cass Review (April 2024) found no reliable evidence base for gender transition interventions in young people.
The review found:
- No clear evidence supporting ‘gender-affirming’ interventions for children
- Poor quality evidence for puberty suppression and cross-sex hormones
- No reliable support for claims that these treatments reduce suicide risk
- Social transition may significantly affect psychological functioning
- Treatment should not be based on the ‘gender-affirming’ model currently used in Australia
Medical interventions including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries can cause irreversible harm, including physiological damage (bone density loss, infertility, sexual dysfunction), issues concerning brain development and social and relational difficulties.
While lifelong impacts are yet to be fully understood, regret is real, and a growing number of detransitioners believe their gender distress masked other co-morbidities, including autism, untreated sexual trauma, and discomfort with their sexuality.
UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, Reem Alsalem, noted the Cass Review's global implications, citing its demonstration of "devastating consequences that policies on gender treatments have had on human rights of children."
Responses from governments
As a consequence, the National Health Service has halted the use of puberty blockers outside clinical trials. The issue transcends politics. The Cass review has bipartisan support and the new Labour Health Secretary Wes Streeting has imposed an indefinite ban on private or offshore prescribing of blockers.
He said it was “a scandal that [puberty blocking] medicine was given to vulnerable young children without the proof that it is safe or effective or [without going] through the rigorous safeguards of a clinical trial.”
Numerous US states and Scandinavian countries have restricted or banned these practices as well, following careful reviews of the available evidence showing a lack of benefit to children’s and young people’s mental health.
The situation in Australia
Despite these developments, Australian politicians, clinicians and relevant institutions have been slow to act. Worse, some have sought to undermine the significance of these developments and their direct relevance to Australia.
The Cass Review specifically evaluated Australia's current treatment guidelines and gave them a poor rating for quality overall. These standards are based on guidelines from the now discredited World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH).
On 2 November 2024, two leading Australian clinicians along with over 20 international authors released a paper demonstrating just how inadequate Australia’s response has been compared to the international community in relation to the mounting evidence against the ’gender-affirming’ model of care. They also express strong concern that ‘conversion therapy’ laws – which five out of eight Australian states and territories have adopted – impede neutral exploratory psychotherapy for gender-confused children and young people.
The need for a public inquiry
If this issue were just about a dispute between medical professionals, it might be considered inappropriate for governments to get involved. However, leaked documents from WPATH reveal that clinicians privately acknowledge the harmful impacts of this treatment protocol on youth and the lack of evidence for benefit but continue to publicly recommend it.3 Evidence has also emerged of political interference in the work of WPATH in revising its guidelines and making recommendations.
This is a potential public health disaster of generational significance demanding an independent public inquiry. Until an inquiry is complete, all ‘gender-affirmation’ interventions for children and young people (including puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgeries) must be paused to prevent further harm.
Scope of the inquiry
An independent public inquiry needs to be carried out at the federal level with the cooperation of the states and territories, involving an expert, or panel of distinguished experts, independent from the practice of gender medicine.
Such an inquiry will need to consider how this was allowed to happen, the impact on the children and their families, and make recommendations as to how to protect other children from harm.
Such an inquiry does not need to ‘reinvent’ the wheel in terms of the medical and scientific evidence, for this has been systematically reviewed multiple times by different expert bodies, with the same conclusion. What the inquiry needs to do is to consider whether, in the light of the evidence, current ‘gender-affirming’ practices should continue, and, if so, to what extent.
The safety and wellbeing of Australian children depend on a swift response to this public health crisis.
Yours sincerely,
Dr Jillian Spencer MB.BS BmedSci FRANZCP Cert. Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Cert. Forensic Psychiatry Grad Dip For Beh Sci
Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist
Dr Andrew Amos MB.BS FRANZCP
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Detransitioner
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