- My name is Allan Mark Josephson.
And I'm a child and adolescence physiatrist.
That's a physician that practices the treatment
and diagnosis of mental disorders in children
and adolescence.
Gender dysphoria was not much
of an issue when I first started my career.
It was virtually non-existent.
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And it's only been in recent years that
this has become a prominent,
in our clinics and in our culture.
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But what's happened the last five to 10 years,
the astronomical increase in the numbers being reported,
the members coming to clinics, is just stunning.
This phenomenon of the increase
in transgender children and youth has
to be a phyco-social culturally mediated phenomenon.
It cannot be due to biology.
Because biological mechanisms don't change that quickly.
There's a lot of misinformation that leads
to the discussion of science of gender identity.
And this is a real problem.
There are statements being made by many clinician that
we determine male and female not by genetics,
or by physical observations, or by hormones, but by gender.
So we've replaced the facts of existence,
biological existence, with a feeling.
I feel like I'm male or female.
The dogma being pushed, not by science, but by activists,
is that this is being driven because of bias stigma
and if children were just treated fairly
they would not be suicidal.
The real fact is probably more something like this.
That there are a complex number of things lead,
leading to disturbed feelings that children have.
Confused feelings, lack of direction,
insecurities of one kind or another.
And these feelings give rise to the transgender phenomenon.
And it's these feelings that are really related
to the suicidal behavior.
The major problem with the science at this point
is how patients are selected.
The study groups are often selected from camps
for transgender children.
In other words a group of patients that are predisposed
to want to become transgender.
The raters of various behavioral scales often are
those with biases.
This includes those running the studies, as well as parents.
Major violations in protocols of academic excellence.
And that would not occur in any other form of work.
There's also something that's very concerning in that some
of the guidelines that professional organizations have.
Two recent guidelines that the American Academy
of Pediatrics proposed have been
influenced by activist groups.
This would be unheard of in any other area.
These are non-physician individuals who are on this study.
Panels that are writing the guidelines
for treatment of these patients.
So the inherent bias in many
of the people doing this work is more
of an activist nature rather than scientific nature.
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