“That’s what conversion therapy does. It does not offer love. It does not offer healing. It offers conditional acceptance at the very price of your existence.”

“...it’s important to know that this is not therapy. Therapists are always permitted to provide a space for young people to explore their sexual orientation or gender identity. But under these laws, they cannot pressure young people toward a specific outcome." -Casey Pick @trevorproject.bsky.social

“What does it mean if people who are licensed can just behave in a way that is completely inconsistent with their professional training, and any attempts to call them on that are then circumvented by the First Amendment?” --Cathryn Oakley @hrc.org

I think APA issued a great response to the letter. "Gender-affirming care, in its many forms, is a treatment option that has been shown to help patients with gender dysphoria."

Read the letter and APA's response here: psychiatryonline.org/doi/10.1176/...

The study found that most breast reduction surgeries among minors were performed on cisgender males.

This makes me wonder what the issue is really about - are we really worried about youth getting surgeries? Seems the concerns are misplaced, if so.

A Harvard news release issued with that study noted that, "The study also found that cisgender minors and adults had substantially higher utilization of analogous gender-affirming surgeries than their TGD counterparts."

hsph.harvard.edu/news/gender-...

Let's add context instead of using raw numbers. A 2024 study found that, in 2019, the rate of youth who had gender-affirming surgery was 2.1 per 100,000 minors aged 15 to 17; 0.1 per 100,000 minors aged 13 to 14; and 0 among minors aged 12 or younger. jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

The author takes issue with my claim in the story that “surgeries are very rare among youth," claiming the reader should be the judge. The letter cites a 2023 study that 3,678 minors (aged 12 to 18) had gender-affirming care surgeries between 2016 and 2020.