Written by Patience Griswold

Amid growing international pushback on the transgender movement’s so-called “gender affirmative” approach to gender dysphoria and the rush to give minors experimental treatments including puberty-blockers, cross-sex hormones, and irreversible surgeries, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) has released new draft guidelines recommending a less radical approach than they have held to in the past.

Rather than immediately rushing adolescents into a lifetime of hormone “treatments” and surgeries, the draft guidelines recommend mental health evaluation and several years of monitoring for adolescents with gender dysphoria, although they continue to encourage harmful and irreversible procedures after that.

WPATH, an international organization headquartered in Minnesota, plays an extremely influential role in the use of so-called “treatments” such as cross-sex hormones and “gender transition” surgery. Throughout the rest of the draft guidelines, WPATH continues to recommend so-called “gender affirmative treatments” that have caused permanent harm to young people and adults, yet the proposed draft offers slightly more protection to adolescents struggling with gender dysphoria than recommendations from major medical associations in the U.S. WPATH’s shift, slight though it is, also shows that on an international level, the transgender movement is recognizing that they may be held accountable for the damage they have caused.

WPATH’s draft guidelines added a chapter on adolescents requiring a full mental health evaluation and several years of monitoring before receiving cross-sex hormones or surgery. The guidelines continue to recommend irreversible surgeries for minors, including mastectomies for girls as young as 15 and “bottom surgery” for 17-year-old girls, although they do not recommend similar surgery for boys under 18. The guidelines also removed requirements that adults receive mental health evaluation, despite the fact that many adults who have detransitioned have spoken up about how the mental health struggles that were driving their gender dysphoria were not adequately addressed when they sought help.

At the same time, if WPATH adopts these guidelines, multiple major medical associations in the U.S., including the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Psychological Association, and the Endocrine Society will be out of step with international standards, advocating an even more radical approach than WPATH. These associations encourage a so-called “gender affirmative” approach known as the “Dutch protocol,” originated by a doctor in the Netherlands who has since cautioned against his own approach. This protocol encourages medically “transitioning” children, disregarding the fact that puberty-blockers and cross-sex hormones can lead to dangerous complications including stunted bone growth, pulmonary embolisms, increased risk of heart attacks, and permanent loss of fertility.

Attempting to live in denial of biological reality is always harmful. No amount of surgery or cross-sex hormones can ever change the fact that a man is a man, and a woman is a woman, down to every single cell. People struggling with gender dysphoria deserve compassion, and true compassion never reinforces lies.

The New York Times’ coverage of WPATH’s new guidelines claims that “transition” improves mental health outcomes. However, the best studies show that this is not the case, and the studies that have been used to prop up this narrative are riddled with methodological flaws. One study claiming to show that “transition” improved mental health actually showed the opposite, a fact that the authors of the study eventually acknowledged.

Sadly, the LGBT lobby is actively working to penalize counselors and mental health professionals who would offer compassionate support to minors struggling with gender dysphoria. 20 states have implemented so-called “conversion therapy” bans and, and the five largest cities here in Minnesota have adopted them. These counseling bans interfere with the client-patient relationship and deny help to kids who are struggling with gender dysphoria, insisting that the only option that should be available to them is to be rushed to “transition,” even as a growing number of young people and adults who have detransitioned speaking out about how they have been harmed by transgender ideology.

Children and teens with gender dysphoria deserve better than to be treated as guinea pigs for the sake of advancing radical gender ideology. WPATH’s guidelines, while they offer slightly more protection than they have in the past, are dangerous and recommendations from the AAP, APA, and ES are even more so.

This article was originally published by the Minnesota Family Council.