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Comment by pseudalopex | Hacker News Reader

> I don't consider it gatekeeping, rather prevention of making an irreversible choice while the frontal lobe is still far from knowing even what path it wants for itself for the rest of its life.

To control access is gate keeping.

Puberty blockers' effects are reversible generally. Puberty's effects are not.

Gender affirming care regret rates are very low.

> I know that might be seen as unfair to a lot of people, but given the persistence with which gender affirmation is being pushed, I feel that cases like me are simply considered collateral damage.

Access to gender affirming care is pushed persistently because denial of gender affirming care was and is pushed persistently. And the benefits are significant. And regret rates are very low.

Do you understand that no regretted treatment would require no treatment? What ratio of regretted treatment and regretted non treatment would you consider fair?

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I guess things like these are one of the pillars of the division on the topic.

You're trying to figure out a decent ratio, and I'd like the total number of regretted treatments to become a permanent flat zero.

A child brought into this world learns from those who have walked on it for much much longer. It puts TRUST into them. The moment you have a single regretted treatment, that moment you have a human life who got failed by everyone around them. The social system, the government system, the family system. Systematically encouraging things where a regretted treatment can very well mean a life destroyed is not something I can ever support.

One's perception that life dealt them inadequate set of cards should never result in a borderline-militant push for a systemic change that reduces regretted treatments to a ratio number.

Studies about this show that regret among teens who've received puberty blockers is around 1%. The other 99% are extremely happy with it in the very long term.

Suicide attempts and successful suicides among teens denied puberty blockers when diagnosed as needing them are three times higher than among the general teen population. This was measured after the UK prohibited them.

Puberty blockers' effects are not permanent. Stopping to take them reverses their effects and allows normal puberty to proceed, a bit delayed compared to other teens. Had you been actually diagnosed with gender dysphoria at that age (were you an exceptionally skilled actor at 12? were you able to keep acting for six months before a team of professionals without ever breaking the act?), and had you changed your mind at 15, you'd have by now reached normal adulthood at your birth gender normally.

So, please tell us: how many children suiciding are a price worth paying for the non-permanent, temporary, reversible regrets of those 0.01% (1% of regret from the 1% of transgender individuals) of the teen population?

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