By Isidora Sanger, paperback, 359 pages, ISBN 9798364867902, independently published, 2022, £11.99.
Isidora Sanger is the nom-de-plume of a retired medical doctor. In this splendid book she demolishes the case for gender identity ideology.
Both the Gender Recognition Act and the Equality Act have been systematically misrepresented to justify prioritising gender self-identification over biological sex. LGBT+ lobby groups persuaded institutions that it was 'illegal' to ask for evidence of a Gender Recognition Certificate (GRC) or to question the validity of gender self-identification.
This has resulted in the de facto disappearance of women's single-sex spaces and provisions. When the desires of trans-identifying males dominate discourse on both trans rights and women's rights, women's needs become subjugated to men's wants. "That's what gender self-identification means - any man can say he is a woman and automatically gain entry into women-only space."
It has become mandatory to affirm the self-declared 'female gender identity' of male criminals, even though over half of transgender prisoners in England and Wales are sex offenders, compared to less than a fifth in the ordinary male prison population, and the nature of their offences suggests that the vast majority are men.
Gender-reassigned males retain male-pattern criminality. As a result 'trans women' are far more likely to be perpetrators than victims of homicide.
Treatment cannot change your sex. It can change your appearance, but, as she patiently explains, "Doctors have never made a man's penis and testicles change into a vagina, uterus and ovaries, nor vice versa, and our sex chromosomes likewise cannot be changed. The latter is the most important because, apart from directing the development of the foetus in utero, gene expression differs between males and females and sex differences consequently reside in every cell of our body."
Medical efforts to 'change sex' have largely had poor outcomes. For adults, "The biggest long-term follow up study that examined outcomes in Sweden found substantially higher rates of suicide attempts, psychiatric hospitalisations, overall mortality and death from cardiovascular disease and suicide in sex-reassigned transsexual individuals compared to a healthy control population." Long-term mental health outcomes worsen after medical gender reassignment. Gender non-conforming people are turned into lifelong medical patients.
Gender dysphoric adolescents, after 'gender-affirming' medical interventions, experienced a greater need for mental healthcare for problems of adjustment, anxiety, mood, personality, psychotic disorders, and attempted suicide. The only beneficiary is the US healthcare business, which is profiteering from a growing gender reassignment industry.
In 2020, due to the High Court judgement against the Tavistock Centre's Gender Identity Development Service, the prescription of puberty blockers progressing to cross sex hormones for gender dysphoric children was halted. This was done amid concerns that the evidence-base for these treatments is lacking and that children cannot meaningfully consent to potentially serious and irreversible long-term side effects, such as sterility and loss of sexual function, which happens in 98% of puberty blocked gender dysphoric minors according to the Tavistock's own study. Systematic reviews of puberty blocker and cross-sex hormone treatments for children with gender dysphoria also urged caution due to the poor evidence-base.
Sporting bodies are supposed to safeguard female athletes and female sport. Instead, too many of them changed their rules to allow male athletes to self-identify into competing 'as women'. These males had the benefit of male puberty - which is irreversible. Men have 30-60 per cent more muscle strength.
Yet sporting bodies allowed these men to compete with elite women if they reduced their testosterone levels. Testosterone suppressants only reduce muscle strength by at most 9 per cent. So this treatment cannot remove male sporting advantage. We should support the organisation 'Fair Play for Women', which campaigns to keep men out of women's sports.
Transactivists use the acronym 'TERF' [trans-exclusionary radical feminist]. This is a misogynistic dogwhistle designed to punish women who refuse to accept the redefinition of the word 'woman' to include men. It is used to vilify women like J. K. Rowling who fight for sex-based rights and child safeguarding.
The gender identity movement likens itself to the Civil Rights Movement, which only makes sense if the enduring struggle for racial equality was all about white people in blackface claiming that they were 'trans black'. In sum, transactivism short-changes both women and transgender people.
