[silveroriole]

There’s no therapy that helps, at least as far as I know. At best you could learn coping mechanisms, but I don’t think anyone has ever been successfully convinced out of trans-ness by therapy, similar to how gay conversion therapy didn’t actually work. So we’d be left with telling trans people “there is no treatment at all, go deal with it somehow.” Anecdotal of course, but there are a fair number of trans people on social media who seem happy with their surgery - why deny them that because someone else is convinced that according to statistics it shouldn’t have made them any happier?

[mhaymo]

Desistance, i.e. "being convinced out of transness" is perfectly common, as mentioned in the article. I'm not aware of any studies on how therapy can affect this, but even if the therapy was merely helping the patient cope with their dysphoria for a period before exploring other options, that seems a far cry from saying "just deal with it".

[linuxftw]

The OP article is raising the claim that most of the (recent young) people probably aren't 'trans' at all, but there's a one-way affirmation pipeline backed by no science whatsoever.

> there are a fair number of trans people on social media who seem happy with their surgery

Are the people that are unhappy embraced by the community, or are they deplatformed? Are they happy with the surgery itself, or that they're now 100% part of a community of some kind?

Once someone has surgery, do they in their mind feel completely the new gender, and go about their lives as such, or are they now some elevated status within the trans community itself?

I don't have a problem with how people decide to live their lives, and while I'm generally against unnecessary surgery, adults are free to do what they want. I am against quack science and unethical behavior that might be exploiting the mentally unwell and even just confused children. I also am against using the power of the state to levy the quack science in the case of custody battles.

[howinteresting]

What exactly are your qualifications? How much of the scientific literature have you read?