HANNAH BARNES: We need to think through the transgender kids debate

Hannah Barnes (BBC journalist; exposed the “Tavistock Clinic” scandal) has become the somewhat reluctant global voice on the raging child transgender debate. In her award-winning BBC investigation, and in her new book, Time To Think: The Inside Story of the Collapse of the Tavistock’s Gender Service for Children, she investigates how the UK Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) at Tavistock Clinic in London referred more than 1200 kids, some as young 9 years old for treatment to block puberty, largely in the absence of data and research about its safety and efficacy. Her research highlighted a whole range of complex issues about the well-being of teens, trans people and our culture broadly.

In this chat, Hannah and I cover how 35 per cent of gender dysphoric teens are autistic, the massive uptick in kids identifying as trans worldwide (one study reports a 1000% increase in young people identifying as trans or nonbinary), and the important reasons why there are suddenly way more girls than boys wanting to transition.

SHOW NOTES

Get hold of Hannah's book Time To Think: The Inside Story of the Collapse of the Tavistock’s Gender Service for ChildrenThe Australian situation regarding the age of consent is outlined hereAnd here’s the information showing the number of teen girls coming out as transI mention Jess Singal’s work on the subject. Find Jesse over at Blocked and Reported (this link has a bunch of extra reads on the topic relating to Hannah’s work) and read his original article for The Atlantic "When Children Say They're Trans"Catch up on my Substack writing on it here and here

If you need to know a bit more about me… head to my "about" page For more such conversations subscribe to my Substack newsletter, it’s where I interact the most! Get your copy of my book, This One Wild and Precious Life Let’s connect on Instagram Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.