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News Flash: Hormone Blockers Also Block Sexuality - Sky Gilbert - MyGayToronto

News Flash: Hormone Blockers Also Block Sexuality
BY SKY GILBERT

7 Mar 2019.


The latest trend in child-rearing sees parents taking their children to gender clinics to deal with their children’s ‘gender issues.’ The CBC tells us “children's clinics across the country are seeing exponential growth in demand for treatment from teens who don't identify as the sex they were born with.”

What’s going on? Clinicians routinely say it all has to do with increasing awareness of transgender issues. But is that all that is happening?

It used to be that when boys were deemed ‘effeminate’  — that is, they liked to play with dolls — the psychological community used to think they were gay. Now boys who play with dolls (and girls who play with trucks) have moved from being labeled ‘gender dysphoric’ to the more politically correct label: ‘transgendered.’ We are told that their situation has nothing to do with sexuality, and everything to do with gender. But is it possible that these young people could be, in fact, gay and lesbian, and that they are are being told by well meaning but ill-informed clinicians and doctors ‘don’t worry, you are most likely transgendered?’

The likelihood of this scenario increases when you consider the effects of ‘hormone blockers’ which are the usual prescribed treatment for young people who come to ‘gender clinics.’ The effects have not been fully studied simply because hormone blockers have not been in wide use long enough to see the long term consequences. It is suspected, however, that they could effect bone development, fertility and brain function.

 But it is a much more significant and immediate side effect of hormone blockers — one that is being universally ignored — that has me worried.  

I discovered this information in the Porto Biomedical Journal (available online at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2444866417301101). PBJ is “an open-access journal devoted to the publication of top quality original research conducted in the biomedical fields.The journal only accepts articles that undergo a strict revision process in a double-blind refereeing system.”

According to PBJ, hormone blockers do not simply block the process of menstruation and the development secondary sexual characteristics in teens, they also block the natural progression of teen sexuality. The journal states “the impact on sexuality has not yet been studied, but the restriction of sexual appetite brought about by blockers may prevent the adolescent from having age-appropriate socio-sexual experiences”….and also “in light of this fact, early interventions may interfere with the patient's development of a free sexuality and may limit her or his exploration of sexual orientation.”

Wow. So hormone blockers not only effect the gender of the child, but ensure that as they grow to adolescence they will be wiped clear — it seems — of all that pesky little thing called sexual desire! This is really scary. When parents come to a clinic with a little boy who plays with dolls, they can be assured that the child will not only have their gender changed to one more appropriate for their activities, but that their sexual experimentation during adolescence will be reduced, due to the restriction of their sexual appetite that comes with hormone blockers.

We live a homophobic culture. It is also a sexually schizophrenic one that recommends abstinence to combat venereal disease for the same young people who can easily access porn online. In this contradictory, damaged sexual culture, parents can  — utilizing hormone blockers —not only change their children’s gender, but also rest assured that their children’s adolescent sexual shenanigans will be ‘under control.’

Brave New World, anyone?

Sky Gilbert is a Canadian writer, actor, academic and drag performer. https://skygilbert.blogspot.ca/

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