Anti-trans media outlets and figures including Fox News’ Tucker Carlson and The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh misled about best practice health care for trans youth by highlighting a May 23 episode of CBS’ 60 Minutes that covered the rare occurrence of “detransitioning,” in which “people who begin a gender transition ultimately decide it’s not for them.” (Research suggests that only 1% to 3% of trans people do so).
The episode featured several doctors who highlighted the necessity of affirming health care, but it also included interviews with people who had “detransitioned” and suggested that young people are being rushed to transition. Advocates called the segment “shameful,” described it as “fearmongering,” and said it was “dangerous.”
Detransitioning narratives have been used in the past by right-wing media, including anti-trans outlet The Daily Wire, to fuel misinformation about best practice health care for trans people, especially trans youth.
In reality, this care is widely supported by medical professionals and yields long-term mental health benefits. Furthermore, young trans and gender-diverse children are not undergoing surgery until they are older and have received other types of care such as therapy -- rather, as social work professor Katherine Kuvalanka told The Washington Post, “the only interventions for young children is affirmation and acceptance for who they are.” Furthermore, the 60 Minutes segment noted that medical guidelines for trans youth, which will be updated in 2021, say that people under 18 must get parental consent for gender-affirming surgery and should have “seen a therapist,” while “those over 18 can sign an informed consent form after an initial assessment but for surgery they too need to have seen a therapist.”
Research and personal narratives have demonstrated that affirming trans people’s gender identities -- and those of youth in particular -- is critical to their well-being. The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a policy statement in 2018 encouraging parents and medical providers to affirm the gender identities of trans and nonbinary youth, which has been shown to reduce their risk of experiencing depression; homelessness and suicidal behavior are also linked to rejection of gender identity.
In fact, a recent national study from the Trevor Project found that “42% of LGBTQ youth seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year, including more than half of transgender and nonbinary youth.” The report also found that suicidality greatly decreased in youth who were affirmed in their gender identity.
Anti-trans media and figures used the 60 Minutes segment to deceive about best practice health care
The 60 Minutes episode did not appear in a vacuum; it aired after right-wing media and anti-LGBTQ figures have spent years obsessively fearmongering and spreading disinformation about best practice medical care for trans youth. In a familiar pattern, they leveraged the May 23 episode of 60 Minutes to reinforce their lies.
On the May 25 edition of his show, Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, a repeat misinformer on the subject, aired a clip of the interviews with detransitioners and lied that “therapists will steer those children to doctors who will almost immediately give them powerful sex hormones, drugs whose long-term effects we cannot know. In some cases, those kids will then be referred to surgeons who will mutilate or remove their sex organs permanently.”
He also called affirming care “reckless, and cruel, and totally unethical” and lied that “gender reassignment surgery and chemical castration cause depression and exacerbate mental illness. This is known.” Once again, minors are not generally undergoing surgeries, and older people who do undergo gender confirmation surgery report long-term mental health benefits. One of the detransitioners who received surgery featured in 60 Minutes said she was in her early 20s, and the other did not specify his age.
