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LGBTQ+ studies Start‑class

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This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment in Fall 2018. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Tg242 (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Saharsolomon25.

Very glad to see this here

Thank you to whomever originated the article and worked on it. It needed to be said, and it says just enough. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.154.4.14 (talk) 16:49, 1 June 2018 (UTC)

NPOV discussion.

The thrust of this article is that detransition is widespread, and that the truth is being hidden. Doesn't seem NPOV to me. -- ArglebargleIV (talk) 12:42, 17 July 2018 (UTC)

I don't get that at all from the current state of the article. It's a small article that simply notes that some people detransition and why, and issues faced on the matter. If you want the article to state that detransitioning is rare, then that needs to be reliably sourced. I don't see a strong case for your Template:POV tag. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 14:30, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

My point was more on the 'truth being hidden' part -- but, I get your point, I'll remove the tag. -- ArglebargleIV (talk) 15:52, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, but I don't get a "truth being hidden" feel from the article either. Thanks for removing the tag. The article does need improvement, but I don't see that tag as needed. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 04:49, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

I think this is NPOV. First of all, the study cited is old and ignores more recent studies such as https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0092623X.2017.1326190 and https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4261554/

Second, the phrase "gender confusion" in the article is never used scientifically. It's a term used by opponents of transgender people to imply that they are mentally ill. In this case, the term is a direct quote from Walt Heyer and should be enclosed in quotation marks to make it clear that it is a quote. --Dskoll —Preceding undated comment added 00:12, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Dskoll, I think you meant to state that you feel that the article is not NPOV. Either way, the source you took issue with is just one tiny piece in the "Clinician experiences" section. It is enough to tag a section as non-neutral without tagging the whole article as such. But, either way, you added counter material to the section. And you edited the "gender confusion" part in the way you suggested. So what NPOV issue is left? Keep in mind that this article is about detransitioning, not transitioning. So the focus, including the sources, should generally be on/about detransitioning. Furthermore, WP:MEDRS-compliant sources for this topic are important, which is why the article is tagged with the medical template it's tagged with. So, regarding the sources you added and the content that was (and currently still is) in the article before your edits, the sourcing needs improvement. Read MEDRS for why. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 21:34, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Flyer 22 Reborn Yes, I meant not NPOV. I feel that with my edits, it's closer to NPOV but still not quite there as many of the references are decidedly non-neutral (Walt Heyer is basically a one-person detransitioner industry - see https://waltheyer.com/ - and The Federalist has a very conservative and anti-transgender bias - see http://thefederalist.com/tag/transgender/ for example.) Dianne Skoll (talk) 21:43, 4 September 2018 (UTC)

Yes, their bias has been discussed at RSN before. Mathglot (talk) 09:10, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Rates of suicidality following transition

Hi @Jadepraerie:! You've recently made a lot of BOLD changes to this article, including adding the sentence "A long-term study (spanning the years 1973-2003) published in the year 2011 of 324 post-transition patients in Sweden found that the rate of suicidality following sex-reassignment procedures was "considerably" higher than in a matched non-transsexual control group." It is not clear what connection this has to detransition; are you synthesizing one? It would be advisable for you not to continue re-adding it without consensus that it is relevant. -sche (talk) 22:32, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Why aren't you bringing your concern to the article's Talk page? Jadepraerie (talk) 22:33, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

The article talk page that we are currently on? -sche (talk) 22:36, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Apologies, this is indeed on the Article Talk page. I was linked here from my User Talk page. And thus far, you've only been leaving me notes in change logs and on my User Talk page. The Swedish study cites suicidality as increasing following transition, and it notes regret as a related cause. Jadepraerie (talk) 22:44, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

"The Swedish study cites suicidality as increasing following transition": no, it does not say that. That's false. Mathglot (talk) 10:09, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

@-sche: I had modified that statement to add "higher than in a matched non-transsexual control group" because the prior version before that was clearly a no-go and not supported by the source; don't have time for diffs now, but wanted to give you a heads-up. It may need further editing to be completely accurate, and in any case, this doesn't address your detransition question, but just wanted to be clear about that portion. More later, if you need it. Mathglot (talk) 01:32, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

So, back to the topic of suicidality; some thoughts in response:

• As noted above, the Swedish study did not claim it increases following transition. If that invalidates whatever reason it was placed there, we need go no further in this argument.
• The word itself maybe doesn't mean what you think it means; for starters, suicidality is not suicide. It includes attempts, and ideation (thoughts) as well.
• If we do include it in the article, to what end? To establish a baseline of suidality pre- and post-transition, and then compare suicidality after detransition? I don't know that a single study has done that, and we can't combine two, for SYNTH reasons.
• It's well-known that suicide and attempts are extremely high in pre-transition individuals. If we're going to talk about transition suicidality in the article at all, then the interesting comparison, would be pre- vs. post-transition. My guess is, that that figure would drop considerably post-transition, and still be considerably higher than a control group, but 1) we'd need a source for that, and 2) how is any of this relevant to this article, which was User:-sche's point to begin with.

One concrete suggestion: suicidality is jargony; if we're going to include a passage including the concept, I think we should either replace the term by its definition, or include the term with the definition immediately following in an appositive. Mathglot (talk) 11:32, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

I disagree "suicidality" is jargon, but I've made the edit now, replacing the word with "suicidal thoughts" and linking to the relevant Misplaced Pages article. Jadepraerie (talk) 17:25, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Summarization of WPATH study

IMO, this change serves to imply that detransition is common ("roughly half of the 46 responding surgeons from the United States and Europe had encountered a patient who regretted transition or sought detransition treatments with them"), when the actual finding is that it is exceedingly rare (occuring in 0.3% of patients). Is there consensus for such a rewording? If not, it should be undone, to restore the stable older wording. -sche (talk) 22:35, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

The statement "roughly half" is fair; it refers to (quoted from the study): "49% of respondents had never encountered a patient who regretted their gender transition or were seeking detransition care." The statistic of 0.3% as a rate of detransition in this article is misleading. The statistic actually refers to the number of patients in the survey who sought surgical detransition (and sought by patients seeing WPATH-registered surgeons only). Detransition can be sought through reverse-surgery, reverse-hormone therapy, and/or social detransition alone. Surgical detransition can also be sought by non-WPATH surgeons. Jadepraerie (talk) 22:41, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

My view is the inverse of yours: the 0.3% statistic is fair, and the 49% is highly misleading.

The "before" version mentions a specfic statistic (0.3%) that is relevant (because it deals with the prevalence of detransition, which is the subject of the article), well-defined (because it has a unique, unambiguous interpretation), and intuitive (you don't have to be a statistics guru, to draw the correct conclusion from the statistic). The "after" version, (half the responding surgeons had encountered a patient...) is irrelevant (it would be relevant if we were talking about the professional preparedness level of surgeons to deal with detransition, but this is about prevalence), not well-defined (the number could be 100% in hospital A, if the chief of surgery brings all the attendings and residents in to observe their one detransition operation that year, but 0% in hospital B, if the chief of surgery made it in despite the blizzard, but no one else did, so everyone missed the sole detransition patient that year), and counter-intuitive (non stats-savvy wiki reader: "So, roughly half the surgeons had a detransition patient, so about half of them detransition; wow!").

Imho, there can be only one reason to include the statistic about how many surgeons had seen such a patient, and that is to gauge how prepared doctors are to treat them. In a section of the article dedicated to prevalance, it has no place.

In my view, the old wording should be restored. I take the point about 0.3% being misleading if nothing is mentioned about this being strictly surgical detransition, but that has a simple solution: mention it. It's also fair to mention that when other forms of (non-surgical) detransition are included, measures of prevalence change accordingly, which is to be expected; those values can be given as well. Mathglot (talk) 11:24, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

I think the concern is moot. I've removed the Danker study per WP:MEDRS (avoid WP:Primary sources). Jadepraerie (talk) 18:14, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Assigned sex

An editor is changing the wording "assigned sex", which a number of other RfCs (e.g. here) have concluded is the usual language used to refer to the concept. Is there consensus for this change? -sche (talk) 22:55, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

"Sex assigned at birth" originally referred to doctor's manipulating newborns' genitals without consent to appear more masculine or feminine. The usage for transgender individuals is controversial. It's even more controversial for detrans folks. I would prefer simply "born sex", but I would advocate for the more neutral (quoted from the "assigned" article's explanatory lead) "sex determined at birth". Jadepraerie (talk) 23:01, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Stick with "assigned sex" for transgender topics. For transgender topics, that is the standard language. As for Jadepraerie's claims, anyone can look into that. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:27, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Is "determined" offensive? It's used in the linked article's lead, why not use it here? Detransition is a delicate and politically charged topic. I recommend being as delicate and unbiased as possible in our language choices, please. Jadepraerie (talk) 00:35, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Yes, the Sex assignment article states, "Sex assignment (sometimes known as gender assignment) is the determination of an infant's sex at birth." That's because that's what the topic is about. The determination obviously isn't always correct, which is what that article also addresses. The very next sentence is clear that it's usually all about genitalia. As for neutrality, read WP:Neutral for how being neutral works on Misplaced Pages. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:45, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Just wanted to comment on "Sex assigned at birth" originally referred to doctor's manipulating newborns' genitals without consent to appear more masculine or feminine.. It never meant that. It's strictly about observation, and declaration for administrative and legal purposes. In that sense, it is a performative utterance, just like, "I now pronounce you man and wife." If the birth sex assignment turns out to be wrong, legal or administrative adjustments are usually required after the fact, just like in cases of annulment or divorce. Mathglot (talk) 00:58, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Forgive me, I still don't see how "determined" is offensive. The "assigned" article uses "determined" neutrally as a synonym to explain the notion. "Sex assignment" was indeed originally a euphamism for intersex genital mutilation, before being adopted by transgender advocates. Both the intersex community and detrans community have complained about this usage, which is why I seek alternatives here. Jadepraerie (talk) 01:07, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Determined is not offensive, it's just not the best option, because it's not what reliable sources use. One could invent an endless series of non-offensive, equivalent expressions but since the literature has a standard term for this, none of the options we as editors could invent here are the best option. A lot of people have objected to "assignment" over the years, and maybe it's not most logical and they could've picked something better, but for better or worse, we're stuck with it now. The people who make up the names don't pick the terms to please us. Thank goodness for John Wheeler, otherwise we'd all still be saying, (or more likely, not saying), "gravitationally completely collapsed star". Mathglot (talk) 08:07, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

All professional dictionaries define sex based on gametes, not identity politics or social psychology (Oxford, American Heritage, Merriam–Webster). My position is we should simply say "male" here, but my suggestion was we meet in the middle with "born male", "natal male", "determined male", or anything similar. "Assigned male" is politically charged (offensive to gender critics, feminists, and many detransitioners), and therefore inappropriate for a subject that questions contemporary gender theory. This article has worse problems, however, so I'll not revert this detail of the article. Thanks again for clarifying your position. Jadepraerie (talk) 19:54, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

WP:MEDRS

Jadepraerie and others, detransitioning is a medical topic. Because of this, the article should be sticking to WP:MEDRS-compliant sources, except for society and culture/history matters. An aspect of WP:MEDRS means avoiding WP:Primary sources. That is why this edit by -sche, which included an edit summary that stated "this is sourced to a primary source," is a good edit. Jadepraerie, I notice that you also need to stop WP:Edit warring, which is policy. See WP:Bold, revert, discuss. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:23, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

It takes two to edit war, please don't call out one party solely. I don't object to your changes cited above. Thank you for explaining further the reasoning for the lead tag. Jadepraerie (talk) 00:26, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

It indeed takes two. But you are not the experienced editor. When an editor, especially an experienced editor, reverts you with a clear explanation about why are wrong, do not edit war. At first glance, it looked like you were also edit warring with Mathglot. So I focused on you. When it's one editor edit warring with two, that one editor will usually be the one who receives the WP:Block, especially if they are the newbie or appear to be a newbie. The article might also, or alternatively, be WP:Page protected. I also saw you edit warring here. So to summarize, you came across as the disruptive editor to me. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 00:36, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

On the other linked page (Genderism), I was accused of changing a link, when I was only removing a repeated word. I asked for conversation, and I was ignored. I've received a poor first impression of -sche, to be engaged in edit wars and refusal to dialog in one day. I'm requesting good faith. Jadepraerie (talk) 00:39, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Anyone who looks at the edit history of Genderism (disambiguation) can plainly see you did remove the link to Genderism, which is the main article the disambiguation page formerly linked to, but which you insisted should be replaced with a link to only Gender binary, which is currently a separate article, though you have proposed merging them. -sche (talk) 04:35, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

I appreciate your stepping in, Flyer. I do share blame here, as I should have moved to the talk page after the first revert and solicited more input, instead of participating in the back-and-forth. There's no rush, and I am confident that through discussion here, we should be able to reach consensus on how to change the article, and failing that the stable version can always be restored.
As to MEDRS... it is a double-edged sword and can cut out some useful content as well as bad content—as I think you have noted before on other articles, Flyer—but the guideline exists for an important reason, and yes, should be followed.
-sche (talk) 04:35, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

As I wrote in the changelog, "Remove unneeded repetition of disambig title. Also: Disagree with logic of previous edit, would prefer discussion on Talk page, but willing to accept link to either of two duplicate articles." It seems there's greater interest in being right than in having good faith. Jadepraerie (talk) 04:57, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

(This is clear to anyone who looks at the edit history, but) diff from before your first edit to that page, where the first link is to ], vs diff from your (latest) edit, where the body text (as opposed to the RM tag which would be removed when the RM is closed) no longer links to ], even though that article is the obvious main topic for a disambiguation page titled ] to contain a link to. QED. -sche (talk) 05:25, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

We are exceedingly off-topic here. I attempted to discuss your revisions. I surrendered and attempted merely to remove a repeated word. Every click I attempted was interrupted by your immediately unclick. What is your purpose please in continuing this tangent? I repeat, please show good faith. Jadepraerie (talk) 05:30, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

To bring this section back to topic, if you mean detransition involves medical topics, I agree. Thanks for the meta link. Jadepraerie (talk) 08:06, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Primary sources have now been removed, except for those with accompanying secondary sources. Further secondary sources have also been added. Would this qualify for removal of the medref tag, or what more specifically would be desired, please? Jadepraerie (talk) 18:42, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Note: More on sourcing, such as WP:MEDPOP, is stated in the #Other primary OR non-medical sources section below. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 14:54, 4 February 2019 (UTC)

Detransition is rare

The lead section formerly had this: "Detransition is rare.<ref name="Danker"/>" which was removed in this edit, with the summary: Remove irrelevant and biased statement from article lead (transition itself is rare). Imho, this sentence should definitely be in the lead, but it might need to be expanded for clarity. To address the issues raised in the edit summary point by point:

• irrelevant – a comment about prevalence in the lead seems highly relevant to me. A generalized descriptor like frequent, common, occasional, uncommon, rare is perfectly appropriate in the lead. The actual numbers and statistics can (and should) follow in the body to back up the descriptor, but aren't necessary in the lead, which is merely a summary of the body.
• biased – in what way is this biased? The Danker reference calls it "a rare outcome" in the first sentence of the article. The conclusion calls it "exceedingly rare".
• transition itself is rare – while this is true, it is based on a different population, and the "rareness" of detransition is not comparable to the "rareness" of detransition, so it is a misleading comparison to say that "both are rare". Gender transition is rare among all individuals; detransition is rare (or, exceedingly rare) among those rare people who have transitioned, so a sliver of a sliver. When discussing detransition, we are talking about very, very few individuals indeed.

The lead needs a statement about prevalence, and if this statement is too short, maybe we can agree on one which is clearer. How about:

• Among individuals who have undergone gender transition, detransition is a rare event.<ref name="Danker"/>

Or, if there is disagreement whether the statement is even true, rather than rather than state it in Misplaced Pages's voice, we could attribute it:

• According to Danker (2018), Detransition is an "exceedingly rare event".<ref name="Danker"/>

Imho, this is uncontroversial and a clear majority opinion among reliable sources, and thus the first alternative would be fine. I plan to restore some version of this if there is no discussion, but would prefer feedback first. Mathglot (talk) 01:28, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Detransition is believed to be rare, but its rarity is unconfirmed (studies are very few), the exact numbers vary greatly (between 10 and 0.3 percent—is one in ten rare?), and new studies are censored.

The Danker study, which states the lowest (0.3%) figure, and which makes the "exceedingly rare" claim, only considered those seeking surgical detransition (it ignored hormonal and social-only detransition), and it only considered WPATH surgeons (WPATH being a biased org, and not a popular choice among detransitioners). My opinion would be to strike any reference to Danker here entirely.

Frequency is irrelevant/unnecessary for the lead. Frequency of occurrence isn't essential to the condition/phenomenon of detransition.

Our articles for transgender and transition don't even mention rarity of occurrence, let alone not being in their leads, despite their rarities.

Low frequency (rarity) is commonly stated by anti-detrans activists, who write blog posts claiming detransition is a "myth", which is why I argue it doesn't belong here to reduce the article's bias.

As a concession, I moved the "rarity" statement to later in the article, rather than striking it entirely.

Jadepraerie (talk) 01:40, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

• Both of your suggestions are good, Mathglot, though the first seems better because (as you note) rarity is referenced by many reliable sources, not just that one. I had not thought to include wording like "Among individuals who have undergone gender transition," because it seems obvious that one cannot detransition if one has not transitioned (and just a few sentences earlier, at the start of the lead, the article says as much), but it is apparently not obvious to all readers, and I suppose it's not bad to repeat it. -sche (talk) 05:15, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Studies are few and will remain few, because the total studiable population is a sliver of a sliver, we are talking about a very small number. Maybe you could elaborate on what you meant by "new studies are censored". I didn't realize that 0.3% was the lowest figure, but I believe you; if it only applies to detransition following surgical transition (or is it, "surgical detransition following surgical transition"?) then we can just be more specific. If that's the low figure, then we could give a range, like you do, and indicate why the numbers are so disparate (because of varying definitions and methodologies, afaict).

I don't know that the expression "WPATH surgeons" is proper; and "WPATH-registered surgeons" seems odd. The organization is just an association of surgeons of a particular subspecialty. For me, it would be just as odd to say, an "ASPS-registered surgeon" for someone who was a member of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons. Any surgeon meeting their minimum requirements for entry (even med students) and who can pay the fee, can join. Given your "WPATH bias" comment later, I'm wondering if by"WPATH-registered surgeon" you were trying to confer the bias of WPATH onto the surgeons in the Danker paper? Otherwise, what is the point of listing their fee-based memberships?

Prevalance might not be "necessary" for the lead, but it's hardly inappropriate. As I said earlier, there's no need to mention specific numbers, especially if there's a wide range, but one could say "uncommon" or "infrequent" in the lead, and then get to the actual numbers somewhere in the body. Or the numbers, if you prefer. See for example, how the relatively rare condition of "Pre-eclampsia" handles it. Nothing is mentioned in the definition, or in the WP:LEADPARAGRAPH, but a mention does occur further down. We could do something like this.

Transgender is an umbrella term, covering a multitude of different things, so it's a bit harder to give a meaningful figure for prevalence because of its multiplicity of meanings. That said, Transgender does reference a Williams Institute study reporting on a survey which gives a prevalence of 0.6% of U.S. adults, but it's largely self-selected and self-reported, so suffers from those aspects of non-optimal experiment design. Gender transition is more about various social aspects of transition, so Gender transition does not give figures; how would you even define what was included, or gather such statistics? An impossible, ill-defined task. Maybe the Sex reassignment surgery article should have some statistics, but the topic comprises dozens of different procedures, and I'm not sure how you'd collect the information about any of them. The articles on Appendectomy, Splenectomy, and Reduction mammoplasty, all very well-defined, common procedures, do not have statistics.

I think you can ignore anything "anti-detrans activists" say; it would have no place in this article, with the possible exception of documenting what the opinion of "anti-detrans activists" are, should that be judged relevant for inclusion. All the same, there is no "taint" on valid, reliable statistics just because a unreliable, activist, partisan source quotes them to bolster their PoV. Either the statements or statistics are reliable and can stand on their own and be used; or they aren't; just because the Flat Earth society agrees with somebody about something, doesn't make the data unusable. Mathglot (talk) 08:24, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

@-sche: Thanks for that link to WP:OBVIOUS; I do think that editors who live and breathe this stuff (*coughs*, looks around...) can forget how opaque it can be for someone encountering the topic for the first time. Let's also remember that en-wiki attracts many people whose native language is not English. Finally, en-wiki is used by schoolchildren, and I see nothing wrong with trying to make an article, and especially the lead, as clear as it can be. It's entirely possible that a middle school student will read something about detransition who has no idea what it means and will come here to look it up, and who may also have only a hazy notion of what transition or even transgender mean. If a few extra words will help them make this article clearer to them, I think they're words well spent. This is supported by MOS:LEADSENTENCE, which says: If its subject is definable, then the first sentence should give a concise definition: where possible, one that puts the article in context for the nonspecialist. Similarly, if the title is a specialised term, provide the context as early as possible. The rest of us experts and geniuses can gloss right over that stuff and on to the meat of the article, without even slowing down. Mathglot (talk) 08:42, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

I'd repeat my concern that if any one of us tried to mention rarity of occurrence in the lead for Transgender or Transitioning (transgender), we'd get quickly shouted down as perceived bigots. This proposal creates an air of asserting the "myth" of detransition (which has thankfully now evolved at least from "never happens" to "rarely happens"). Also, the Danker study is a primary source, not in keeping with WP:MEDRS. Jadepraerie (talk) 18:33, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Regarding "asserting the 'myth' of detransition": I had a look at the original version from 2017, and several, scattered versions since then, and to my knowledge this article has never made any claim about a "myth" and has always alluded to cases of people detransitioning. So I really don't know what you mean here.

I have several responses to your concern of what might happen at other articles:

• You don't have a crystal ball; you don't know what would happen at some other article.
• Other stuff happens: you might be right about what might happen on some other article, but that has no bearing on what should happen here. This article should be improved by adherence to policy. If there's something wrong with another article, go fix it.
• If anyone attacked you as a bigot, that would be a violation of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA, and if there's a pattern of it, it could result in a block.
• You shouldn't be concerned anyway; if you can find appropriate reliable sources about prevalence on the other articles, you should feel free to add them. Assume good faith; if you have good sources, other editors will support you. I think you'll find it harder find them for Transgender, simply because of the fact it's an umbrella term; nevertheless, if you can find the sources, go for it. To an extent, I think that's true of the Transitioning article as well, since there's a large social component, but again, go for it if you've got the sources.

Which brings us back to this article. Irrespective of what might or should or does happen at some other article, the only thing that affects this article is whether reliable sources support an assertion of "rarity" (or infrequent, uncommon or any of the other possibilities) or doesn't. If there's a range, we can state that. For example, here are two possibilities for the Lead:

• Sources differ in their estimation of prevalence of detransition, but figures of 0.3% to 8% have been reported. This should be backed up by more detail in the Prevalence section, along with citations.

or, if you want something vaguer in the lead:

• Detransition is uncommon. Ditto on back-up.

Note that it's not necessary to add references in the lead, because they must be backed up by more detail in the body of the article, and must be referenced in the body. That said, it's not wrong to have refs in the lead either, especially if it's sonething particularly controversial; if you believe this is the case here, the claim in the lead can be footnoted as well, duplicating the refs in the body. That's my proposal, and it's policy-based on WP:V and WP:RS. Can you accept one of them, or make a counterproposal? Mathglot (talk) 22:20, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

I mention the "myth" of detransition, because if you check Google, most reports of detransition prior to recent years were from biased (pro-transition) sources claiming detransition "never happens" and that to suggest otherwise would be "transphobic". Thankfully the media has begun to realize that detransitioners do exist, so the narrative of anti-detrans activists has turned to "rarely happens". They then cherry-pick the few studies that exist, and they refer to Misplaced Pages as if it were itself a reliable source.

I want to be clear that I don't accuse any editors here of being detransphobic themselves, but the act of focusing this article on the supposed rarity of detransition could arguably be seen as detransphobic. The tone of this article would benefit by shifting away from questioning whether detransitioners exist, questioning if detransitioners' experiences matter, predicating detransition on whether or how many detransitioners seek medical help, etc.

Frequency of occurrence is unknown. The studies that exist are few, their definitions of detransition differ, and their focus isn't even to determine rates/population of detransition/detransitioners, they're only tangentially related. Therefore we can't claim that detransition is "rare", much less put it at the top of the page. It is merely believed/supposed/assumed/conjectured/presumed/considered to be rare by some (such as Dr Graham, who predicates the characterization with reasonable doubt of its foundation), while others say otherwise (such as Dr Ettner, Dr Djordjevic, and Mr Caspian).

I'm removing the addition of "detransition is rare" from the lead at this time, as its absence was the formerly "stable" state prior to this week. Please, in the spirit of avoiding edit war, do not re-add without consensus here. Thank you.

Jadepraerie (talk) 19:02, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Per WP:V, articles are based on reliable sources, and detransition is found to be rare (or "exceedingly rare") by reliable sources. If you know of WP:RS-compliant sources that say it is not rare, please provide them so that the relative WP:WEIGHT of those sources among other RS on the issue, and hence the weight to give that view in the article, can be discussed. -sche (talk) 22:05, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

"Exceedingly rare" comes from a single primary source, which has limited data and poor methodology, and which refers to surgical detransition only (the rarest form of detransition), not to detransition. Repeating this misconstruction here is irrelevant and biased, and it increasingly seems detransphobic.

Why would editors from transgender articles be so set on editing the detransition article to claim the condition is rare? Is there a conflict of interest?

I've already cited three professionals who state the phenomenon isn't rare, and one who states it seems rare due to dubious data. Excuse me, but this seem like wiki-lawyering instead of responding to points.

Jadepraerie (talk) 01:55, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

WPATH and bias

An assertion was made above in passing that WPATH is biased, as if this were something that were common knowledge. I believe this was asserted in order to downgrade the Danker (2018) reference for possible use as a reliable source for estimating prevalence of detransition, but that's just a guess.

The World Professional Association for Transgender Health is a multidisciplinary professional organization that is concerned with all aspects of transgender care; it holds conferences, issues papers, and so on. It is most noted for having established the Transgender Standards of Care guideline and for keeping it updated. Calling WPATH biased seems bizarre to me, as it is the foremost organization in the world doing this kind of work, and one that other organizations look to. It is the successor organization to the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association, which pioneered professional standards of care in transgender health in the United States. I can't even conjure what kind of bias is being alleged, so I'm a bit of a loss how to respond. I consider it one of the most venerable, rock-solid sources for reliable, professional information about transgender health issues.

If there's something I"m missing, please enlighten. Mathglot (talk) 10:07, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

WPATH's evolution has been gate-opening for transition rights. Each iteration of their SOC has lessened gate-keeping requirements (such as psychological assessment to catch co-morbidities prior to hormones or surgery). WPATH has also refused to acknowledge existence of detransition in their seven versions of SOC, let alone to provide guidelines for detection and handling, despite doctors' calls for otherwise. The only WPATH study I've seen (Danker) claimed detransition rate is less than one percent, but they only considered reverse-operative detransitioners (they ignored the vast majority of detransitioners who choose no surgery, or who can't afford surgery and are denied insurance coverage). WPATH is generally viewed with suspicion in the detrans world. Jadepraerie (talk) 17:19, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

You seem to have a strong point of view that WPATH is biased, but from the point of view of Misplaced Pages's verifiability requirements, that is merely your unsupported opinion. The key here, is recognizing the difference between a professional association and an advocacy group. WPATH is clearly the former. If there's an active "detrans world" pushing for better recognition of their point of view, that would be an example of the latter. Imho, it would be a very tough row to hoe to attempt to get WPATH declared an unreliable source. But there is a procedure for that, and you are welcome to try: you can start by raising a section at WP:RSN. For the time being, though, WPATH is cited or linked in numerous articles at Misplaced Pages and has been for a long time, and that makes it a community consensus, at least for the time being. Anything cited specifically to WPATH here, will be considered reliably sourced, and such references should not be removed just because you believe them to be biased. Please leave them in for now, until the community has declared it an unreliable source. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 22:57, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Section "Outcomes"

Section #Outcomes doesn't currently (as of rev 881053814) have material appropriate to a section by that name.

Per MOS:SECTIONS, section headings don't redundantly refer back to the subject of the article, and for the most part in the article, the content of most named sections all adhere to that just fine, except for section "Outcomes". For example: as one would expect, section "Prevalence and causes" means, "Prevalence and causes of detransition", and section "Cultural and political impact" means "Cultural and political impact of detransition", and for the most part, the content of those sections reflect those headings. So far, so good.

However, "Outcomes" is problematic. That section is intended for "Outcomes of detransition", but currently, the content is really more about "Outcomes of transition" or "Regrets after transition" or something like that. I think it's fine to have the stories or content that's in there currently, but not under the heading "Outcomes". Most of the material currently in that section could be moved into a new H3 subsection under "Causes", or perhaps, as a new H2 section named "Individual accounts".

There should still be an H2 "Outcomes" section in the article for sure, but we need to find completely different content for it, which addresses the question: "What are the outcomes of detransition?" and place that new content in this section. Mathglot (talk) 04:41, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

I've added a new header, "#Individual accounts" which better fits the content that is already there. "Outcomes" is an empty section for the moment, but needs real outcomes. Mathglot (talk) 10:34, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Why should there be an "Outcomes" section ("for sure"?). Shouldn't we just remove this now empty header? No obvious indication on tag's template for inclusion of tag here. Thanks. Jadepraerie (talk) 19:05, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Generally speaking, we shouldn't have "Empty sections" in articles for very long; it's mostly a placeholder for forthcoming content, and a kind of invitation to others to add material, too. If you look at the doc page, you'll see that it places the article in Category:Articles to be expanded. But I don't know exactly when I'll get to it, and if you feel like deleting it, go ahead. I can just add it back when there's content available for it. As far as why the "for sure", that's because it would be silly to have an entire article about the subject, and then say nothing at all about what happens after Detransition. Outcomes, in other words. Mathglot (talk) 06:39, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

It's not silly. You make it sound so simple. Detransition is still coming out. No pun intended. Jadepraerie (talk) 17:45, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Emergent and politically controversial

The phrase "emergent and politically controversial" was added to the lead in this edit (updated here), and I'm generally fine with it, as I think this is definitely part of the story that this article should be addressing. I don't think it needs to be footnoted, because it is (or should) be summarizing material in the body, namely in the #Cultural and political impact section, where it should go into more detail and be footnoted. It remains to be seen per due weight, how much of the article should be about that, by my guess before having really analyzed the material out there, that it maybe be anywhere from a quarter to a half of the material, but I could be wrong. Anyway, I think the sentence in the lead should become the genesis of it's own, new paragraph, and I'll start the ball rolling on that; expanding as needed, per due weight as the article body expands.

Oh, also: I would use "emerging" here, not "emergent", although they seem to be synonymous. A minor point, but does anyone feel strongly about it? Mathglot (talk) 05:02, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

As a grammarian, I prefer adjectives over present participles in descriptions of nouns, especially for encyclopedic prose. Jadepraerie (talk) 19:14, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

There's nothing in the ] that prefers one type of adjective over another. And as a grammarian, you'll recognize that emerging is a participial adjective, and functions perfectly well modifying nouns in that role. In addition, emerging controversy is about twenty times more common in English than the alternative. I'm not going to get into a long discussion over this because it's not a hill worth dying on, but there's no reason to prefer emergent here. My main point anyway was about the whole sentence, which should be the germ of a second lead paragraph, discussing the politically controversial nature of the topic. We don't have enough material about that in the body yet, so the lead needn't be expanded with a second paragraph just yet, but it's coming. Mathglot (talk) 00:40, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

If detransition is the treatment, what is the complaint?

If detransition is a reversal of transition, does that imply that there is a parallelism in causes and treatments with gender transition? Put another way: is there a syllogism such that we can fill in this blank?

Gender transition is to Gender dysphoria, as Detransition is to Name the condition

Is it just Gender dysphoria again, but a dysphoria with respect to the transitioned gender rather than the birth gender? Or something else?

Detransition is a newer subject than gender transition, so it may be that incompleteness in the article simply reflects something that hasn't been addressed in reliable sources yet. Some disorganization and lack of clarity in the article at the outset is probably to be expected. However the goal should be to move in the direction of resolving it, following (not leading) the sources that are available.

This came up, when I was considering adding sections on "Signs and symptoms", and "Classification" or "Diagnosis" to this article, as one might find in other med-related articles on conditions. But upon reflection, I realized these sections would be inappropriate in this article (at least, as long as it has the current title) for the same reason you wouldn't have those sections at Sex reassignment therapy or Appendectomy; namely they are treatments, and the proposed sections are not directly relevant for treatments, but rather for a disorder or condition of some sort.

Since some people are undergoing detransition, which in this context can be viewed as a course of treatment to relieve or improve an undesirable condition, then what is the condition that one is seeking to relieve, how is this condition identified and by whom, and who decides or confirms that a given patient or subject has it, would or might benefit from detransition, and what are the criteria to do so? I could be wrong, but I suspect that the situation is very fluid and that these questions may not have well-defined answers right now. Imho, as the field and the article mature, these are the questions we should be considering and attempting to seek answers to in the literature. Mathglot (talk) 07:31, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Please remember detransition is not just medical; it is also/instead personal, social, legal, and/or political. It is therefore not merely or always a treatment. Jadepraerie (talk) 19:17, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Yes, of course; and naturally all of those aspects should be dealt with, to the extent we can find sources about them. What I was trying to address here, is what I see as a large, "missing section" involving the treatment aspect of it, as in, what actually happens? I mean, you can read the whole article in its current state, and not know if people are talking about plastic reconstructive surgery, HRT, breast or chest reconstruction, genital reconstruction, or what exactly. And I realize that for some, no surgical intervention is involved whatever; the point is, the whole narrative is missing; who undergoes what kind of procedure, whether socal, surgical, pharmacological, psychological, stylistic/vestimental, or legal/administrative, and under what kind of professional assistance or supervision, if any. Mathglot (talk) 22:58, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

The complaint, pretty much, has to be transition regret, doesn't it? In a way, that seems to be the elephant in the room in this article. I wonder if the whole article should be reentitled, Transition regret and detransition. It seems to me, it's either that, or else create a new article called Transition regret and leave this article title as is. I think it would be okay to combine the two concepts in one article for now, until it gets larger and more mature. Ultimately, it should be two, though, roughly paralleling Gender dysphoria, and Gender transition. What do others think? Mathglot (talk) 01:58, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Trans regret is often related to detransition, it commonly occurs beforehand, but it's not required. For some, it's an evolution of identity. We wouldn't re-title our article "transgender" to be "gender identity disorder and transgenderism". This suggestion appears to be another attempt to pathologize detransition, to make it appear to be a disorder/disease. If you insist on seeking a "cause", many argue it's the misguidance and malpractice of gender clinics/doctors, activists, and legislators. Detransition is bigger than some "treatment". It's a phenomenon. Some of the section headings and editors' statements on this talk page are frankly detransphobic and offensive. Jadepraerie (talk) 17:59, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Thank you for your explanation. Please assume good faith in what other editors contribute to the article, and what they discuss here. Your bolded statement is the very antithesis of WP:AGF: nobody is pathologizing anything here, and the word "causes", for goodness' sake, is not restricted to pathology, but to just about everything involving cause and effect: you can look up history articles about many topics, and find a discussion about what were the causes of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, the causes of World War II, the causes of the spread of agriculture, the causes of the Little Ice Age, and so on. Everything has a cause, even if we don't know what it is (see Big Bang).

Regarding your comment, We wouldn't re-title our article "transgender" to be "gender identity disorder and transgenderism", no, at this point we wouldn't, but that's mostly because they are mature articles that have been around for sixteen years and thousands of edits. If you look at some early versions of them however, e.g., Transgender (2002), you'll see that in fact, it did cover both of those topics, and also included transsexual, transvestite and drag, for good measure. This Detransition article is just starting out, just like those were, back then, and until the article expands a certain amount, to the point where it needs to be split, it's pretty common for two or more related topics to be included in one article, in early versions.

Your second bolded phrase, actually points out something I was going to say in a new section, but since you bring it up here, might as well respond here: the WP:LEAD, and in particular the first sentence are inadequate, in my opinion. After reading just the definition, I don't think most people could give any kind of explanation of what detransition actually is, other than parroting the words that are there already. But what does "reversal of gender transition" actually mean? From reading that sentence, we don't know. One could easily assume it's maybe a treatment (whether it is in reality or not; that's the point: it doesn't say, and let's you imagine stuff); we don't say that it is a treatment, and we don't say that it isn't. Here, you say it's a "phenomenon", so maybe we're heading towards something better than what the first sentence says now, but "phenomenon" by itself, is still kind of vague. When I get to the end of the first sentence of an article, I want to have enough of an idea what it is, to be able to restate it in my own words, even if I'm unable to go into any detail about it, until I read further.

Regarding offensive section headers, I don't think anyone here is intending to cause offense; I can only speak for myself, but I created numerous sections here on the Talk page, and that was certainly not my intention. When I write a section header, I try to make it clear what the intended topic of the discussion is, and distinguish it from other discussions. Please make a list below (or in a new section) of the section headings on this Talk page that you find phobic or offensive, and for each, give an explanation why. If you can do that dispassionately, informatively, while maintaining good faith and neutral tone, that might help me (and others?) understand your PoV, and also aid this and other discussions. Thanks. Mathglot (talk) 10:24, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

Mathglot, I think the issue might be you are trying to fit a certain mold to this article that isn't supported by RS. I am not familiar with sources talking about signs, symptoms or etc with regards to detransition or that talk about detransition primarily as a course of treatment. This is a contentious topic, we should take care to base our discussions on current RS and not speculate as to what we believe it will say in the future. Second, transition regret and detransition don't necessarily always co-occur. People may detransition for reasons other than regret and people may have regrets but have no interest in detransition. As is, this article and the RS it cites seem primarily about detransition so I would not be in favor of renaming the article in its current state. Rab V (talk) 11:51, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

You misread what I said, I believe. If you reread it, I said that a section of signs and symptoms "would be inappropriate in this article". You can't have signs or symptoms on something that isn't a condition, and detransition is not a condition. Mathglot (talk) 12:07, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

I saw you came to the conclusion symptoms and some other terms would be inappropriate since detransition is not a condition. My argument is the more relevant reason it is inappropriate is RS don't support it. You went on to argue for seeing transition as a course of treatment which is also something I don't know that RS supports currently. If I'm wrong or misunderstanding, sorry for my mistake. Rab V (talk) 13:12, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

What WPATH didn't say

In these edits Jadepraerie added the following:

"WPATH's Standards of Care offer no mention of detransition."

followed by a reference to WPATH's SOC. I find that an odd sort of use of a primary source, to document what it doesn't say. One might request, with the same sort of negative, evidence of absence logic, a page number so we know "what page doesn't have it." The edit summary for the first edit said in part: Add WPATH denial of detransition. But not everything absent in the SOC is "denied" by SOC, it's maybe just not included yet, or was never even considered. More worrisome was t

More to the point: we cannot, as Misplaced Pages editors, decide which concepts that are not mentioned by an existing document, speech, book, article, or other records should be included in a Misplaced Pages article as a notable "failure to mention" by such-and-such a document. That would be original research, which is prohibited. One could, of course, include such a "missing mention" assertion if it referenced a secondary source which specfically pointed out such a lacuna. Until that happens, we cannot include this "no-mention" sentence, so I've removed it. Mathglot (talk) 10:16, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Hmm, my initial inclination was to think that, if anything, we should in fact add "WPATH does not mention {{PAGENAME}}" to more pages — ]! ]! ]! ;) — but you make good points. -sche (talk) 18:22, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

WPATH has ignored detransition in its seven versions of SOC. That's worth mentioning (despite the sarcasm from another editor above), as it's a common complaint among patients and doctors, though I haven't looked for a secondary source on that.

The statement you quote (and which I see now has been removed) was originally also sourced to the Danker survey, but that was removed due to it also being a primary source. Yet I see now the Danker survey has been re-added, despite it being a primary source.

Jadepraerie (talk) 19:24, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

Um, you were the one that re-added it, in this edit, weren't you? Except now, you are using Danker to support a statement that "a former WPATH president and a majority of WPATH surgeons have expressed desire for detransition guidelines to be included." However, I read the Danker paper, and I don't see that it says that at all, so I've tagged this statement, {{failed verification}}, which basically means, "this reference does not support the assertion(s) it claims to support." You added a second source, Coleman-2017, which is a 30-slide powerpoint presentation which doesn't support the assertions either, and I've tagged that one as well. The word "detransition" appears in slide 29 as a bullet point by itself, and it the only slide in which the word appears at all.

You say, again, that WPATH "ignores detransition", but it's already been pointed out to you, that you need a reliable source to support that, and you haven't provided one. You found -sche's comments about Jaguars, and so on sarcastic, but you see the serious point behind it, don't you? Your claim about what a source does not say is your observation; by WP:NOR we cannot include your observations in an article on Misplaced Pages.

Do you not see some irony in the fact that you have argued vigorously and repeatedly to ensure that the term "extremely rare" or "rare" describing detransition not be included in the lead, removing the both the term and the source that supports it (diff, diff) while you later add an unsupported statement about WPATH and detransition to another section of the article, using the same source (diff) even though your assertion is not supported by that source? You have it exactly backward: Danker-2018 does support the term "rare" (quote:"extremely rare"); it does not support your claims about WPATH regarding detransition. Mathglot (talk) 09:20, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

This paragraph makes assertions that are not supported by solid evidence and should be immediately removed.We can not and not assume stuff that is not there ~ BOD ~ 11:20, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

No, I did not re-add the Danker survey. It was re-added by user "-sche" (https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Detransition&diff=prev&oldid=881138930). I added its citation to another statement in the diff you cite after that. Per the top of this page, please be polite (don't start with flippant "um, you were the one"). The Danker study says "88% of respondents feel that WPATH SOC 8 should include a chapter on detransition". The Coleman presentation on the upcoming WPATH SOC lists detransition among his "miscellaneous suggestions" for inclusion. Jadepraerie (talk) 17:31, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Danker study.

The Danker (WPATH surgeons) survey (https://journals.lww.com/prsgo/Fulltext/2018/08001/Abstract___A_Survey_Study_of_Surgeons__Experience.266.aspx) was removed and re-added. I advocate its re-removal.

• It's a primary source, supported only by a direct link to the publication of the survey.
• Its weight is undue.

1. Its response rate was very low, only 30%.
2. Its pool included WPATH surgeons only (whom detransitioners may distrust, and who themselves may refuse detransitioners, for both for personal or political reason).
3. Its focus was on surgical detransition only, which isn't pursued by most detransitioners—because surgery isn't always necessary, surgery isn't affordable, surgery isn't always covered by insurance/governments, individuals may have trauma from previous surgery, and surgery isn't always even a viable option (in some cases, no reversal surgery exists).

Jadepraerie (talk) 20:31, 31 January 2019 (UTC)

For clarity, when you say, "Danker survey", you are talking about the one footnoted here.

• Primary: I'm not a MEDRS guru, so I don't have an opinion about whether it should be present or not, but afaik it's WP:PRIMARY and thus should not be used for assertions requiring MEDRS compliance. That doesn't mean it couldn't be used elsewhere, and I suspect it might be relevant in an expanded "Politicization" section, since I believe it has been cited by trans activists, and if secondary sources note that fact, then it could be added as additional support, although the secondary source reference might make that unnecessary.
• Undue: I think you misunderstand what WP:UNDUE means. A footnote on its own has no particular weight; the question one should ask, is whether the content containing the assertion which the footnote claims to verify, has due weight or not. So that's a separate kind of question. I'm actually not at all sure what you meant there.
• 30%: all sorts of biases may be found in survey results, and low response is just one of them. If and when we get around to using it to footnote politicized claims, it's possible to add text into a footnote referring to the response rate; it would be better if this came from some other source assessing Danker, as simply adding "very low response rate" to a footnote on our own initiative would be considered WP:OR. You could say "30%", because that is documented.
• Survey pool: You use the expression "WPATH surgeons" and then say that "detransitioners may distrust" them and make other claims about them, as if it's some sort of cabal, but it's just a professional association, that anyone can join. The survey pool was made up of all surgeons who registered for two conferences in 2016 and 2017. Anybody can go to WPATH conferences; the surgeons who attended might have been members of WPATH, or not.
• Survey focus: Much of what you say about surgery mirrors the situation for trans individuals, who likewise may, or may not, choose surgery for various reasons, including all the ones you list here. That the Danker survey focused on surgical detransition only is not some kind of black mark or bias at all; surveys can focus on all sorts of things, and usually it's good to constrain as many variables as possible, so when you get result data, you can attempt to reach a valid, statistically significant conclusion, if there is one. If the scope of the population is too broad, it may be harder to do that. Other studies may study other aspects of detransition; this one studied surgical detransition; that's most certainly a valid avenue of scientific inquiry. Any results, of course, would apply only to those seeking surgical detransition; but the paper is very clear about that.

Afaic, you can remove it from the Prevalence section (which is misnamed; that's another issue) but would rather hear from Flyer22 Reborn or other MEDRS-knowledgeable folks. Mathglot (talk) 01:40, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Yes, the survey conducted by Sara Danker.

I cite WP:UNDUE because this survey is small, its response rate is poor, its focus is only tangentially related, and it seems to be included only to push the "never/rarely happens" narrative (see above, https://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Detransition#Detransition_is_rare). Frequency/population of detrans is simply unknowable and barely relevant. Not to mention again WP:PRIMARY.

Detransitioners often feel harmed by WPATH, so are less likely to see a WPATH surgeon for surgical reversal (if they desire and can afford such procedures). WPATH surgeons often refuse detransitioners for liability. This isn't a "cabal", it's simply how human psychology and capitalism work.

Thank you, Jadepraerie (talk) 02:07, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

You said,

• I cite WP:UNDUE because this survey is small, its response rate is poor,...

I can only state what I said before: I think you have a fundamental misunderstanding what WP:UNDUE is about. It is not a system for evaluating sources as "due" or "undue". It has nothing to do with that at all. Whether sources are admissible, is governed primarily by the Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources guideline. Due and undue weight, is part of the WP:NPOV guideline, and specifies how much material to include about some subtopic within an article, compared to other subtopics within the same article.

If Detransitioners feel harmed by WPATH and you want to add that to the article, find a reliable source for it, and add it. Ditto claims about refusal to deal with detransitioners: if you have a source, please add it. Mathglot (talk) 09:45, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Other primary OR non-medical sources

Related to the above: the sentences beginning "A 30-year Swedish study" and "A 50-year Swedish study" are also sourced to primary sources, aren't they? The paragraph about Miroslav Djordjevic is sourced entirely to news sources which, I recall from many past discussions about MEDRS, don't meet that standard. So is the paragraph which begins "Individuals who have detransitioned". If we take the most strict/conservative approach to MEDRS, the entire section may need to be removed... -sche (talk) 02:00, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

The two Swedish studies were cited with primary and secondary sources (The Atlantic and Newsweek). The secondary sources were removed with claims of being too "pop-culture-y", with which I disagree.

Would a re-titling of this section help?

Jadepraerie (talk) 02:15, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @-sche: I'm very uncertain about MEDRS standards as well. I thought that secondary sources were better, and non-medical ones like Newsweek acceptable, for sourcing opinions or quotations by someone, such as Djordjevic. I.e., "X said in an interview that 'detransitions are way up.'<ref>Newsweek.</ref>" are okay. I think they're even more okay, if confined to a section that isn't medical in nature, which is why I'm planning to expand the "Politicization" section, where activists on both sides can be quoted. At least, I think so. I plan to ask Doc James some of these questions, but rather than wear out my welcome asking him to come here ten different times, I'm kind of waiting for the article to expand and stabilize a bit, so we can bunch the questions. Wish Jytdog was around (sigh). @Flyer22 Reborn: is pretty good at this stuff though, and might weigh in. Mathglot (talk) 02:41, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

(replying to both of you) News media about the Danker study can also be found — the issue (with citing news media for either the Swedish or the Danker studies) is that news media are generally not suitable for citing medical claims, AFAIK. This isn't intuitive to everyone, but the archives of Talk:MEDRS are pretty consistent about it, in my experience, and I can understand why — non-medical/scientific media do tend to sensationalize and misunderstand or misrepresent things. It doesn't matter what the section is titled, or even what article it's in, the guideline covers all "medical content in any Misplaced Pages article", emphasis in the original. This can indeed mean a dearth of content :/ for better or worse. Djordjevic asserting a "taboo" is probably "non-medical" content that news sources could be used to cite. Djordjevic asserting an increase in surgeries seems borderline (also because it's just one person giving an anecdote, not a robust study). We should probably post a neutral request on WT:MEDRS for some more people to weigh in on everything in this article. -sche (talk) 02:49, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Mathglot, yeah, it might take hours or a day before I weigh in on a matter here or elsewhere on Misplaced Pages because I'm catching up on my watchlist and/or am simultaneously busy with matters off Misplaced Pages, or am taking a break from Misplaced Pages, but there's no need to ping me to this talk page. Something like "The two Swedish studies" are single study matters that we should try to avoid per WP:MEDRS and WP:SCHOLARSHIP. It's true that, per WP:MEDDATE, if a topic is not getting many reviews, it may need to use more primary sources than other topics, but we should still take care not to unnecessarily use primary sources. As for popular culture or other media sources reporting on medical matters, the WP:MEDPOP section of WP:MEDRS states, "News articles also tend neither to report adequately on the scientific methodology and the experimental error, nor to express risk in meaningful terms. For Misplaced Pages's purposes, articles in the popular press are generally considered independent, primary sources. A news article should therefore not be used as a sole source for a medical fact or figure. Editors are encouraged to seek out the scholarly research behind the news story. One possibility is to cite a higher-quality source along with a more-accessible popular source, for example, with the |laysummary= parameter of {{cite journal}}." Similarly, WP:BREAKING states that "early coverage may lack perspective and be subject to factual errors." If it's just the opinion of a doctor or similar, WP:Due weight needs to be considered and WP:In-text attribution should definitely be used; also, for this article, such content is likely best placed in the "Background and terminology" section or the "Cultural and political impact" section. Otherwise, generally avoid including the personal opinions of any one person. If you look at our medical articles, they are usually summarizing the literature, not including quotes from so and so (unless it's an authoritative organization like the World Health Organization or the material is in the "History" section or "Society and culture" section). I miss Jytdog as well. He would cut a significant portion of the material in the current version of this article, though. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 03:08, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, Flyer! I'm going to mull over everything you've said here, follow all the links, and try to ramp up my MEDRS game to Adanced Beginner, and then maybe take another look at this article in the light of what I've learned. In the meantime, I'll continue with non-MED guidelines I understand better, and try to keep things ship-shape until then. I understand from what you're saying that much of the sources included or formerly included here might simply not cut it, and that's just the way it goes for recent phenomena with not much research and even less retrospective or other secondary, summary- or survey-type sources that are MED qualified. I think that leaves a topic like this, which is smack on one of the newest battlefields of the culture wars, an open target for sniping by people on all sides.

One thing that might be helpful to me, is if you happen to know of a couple of articles you could link to here, that are topics on fairly recent phenomena thus subject to WP:MEDDATE or WP:BREAKING, and even better if they are controversial, that you believe are MED standard-compliant in their current state, I'd love to take a look at them and their Talk pages, to see how editors there dealt with a similar situation to the one we have here, to see what I can learn from them. Thanks again for popping in! Mathglot (talk) 10:07, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Coleman statement

Eli Coleman—PhD, professor of family medicine and community health at the University of Minnesota, director of program in human sexuality, chair in sexual health, former president of WPATH, and longtime chair of WPATH's SOC revision team—presented in 2017 a lecture at the annual "Opportunity Conference" (an LGBT healthcare symposium in St Paul), in which he included detransition among his list of topics he's working to include in the currently discussed and upcoming eighth edition of the SOC. This citation has been twice tagged as "failed verification". Is this a technical case of not completing the citation tags properly, of not wording the article content to reflect the source properly, or is the source in question, please? Jadepraerie (talk) 18:50, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

The source. He may have said actually said that, but this source is a slide presentation, and looking at the bullet item, which in this case consists of just a single word on a line by itself, it's hard to know exactly what he meant. I think your analysis is probably right, and I think he probably did mean that, but it seems like extrapolating to use that as source to say he did mean that. Mathglot (talk) 19:23, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

His presentation was about his work in the next (eighth) version of SOC as the chair of SOC revisions. The cited section of his talk was his "miscellaneous suggestions" for this next version, and among these he listed detransition. I don't see how the source might otherwise be reasonably interpreted. Should his talk be cited instead of his slideshow? I've reworded the summation in the article now, hopefully to help. Jadepraerie (talk) 21:02, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

If you have his actual words from the talk, then absolutely. Is it audio? There's a guideline someplace that explains how to link to audio, including the timestamp and transcription somewhere; if you can't find it, I probably can locate it. Mathglot (talk) 11:48, 5 February 2019 (UTC)

I don't have an audio recording. If you've means to find one, that would be appreciated. Again, I don't see how this could be reasonably interpreted differently: the WPATH chair of SOC revisions gave a talk on upcoming SOC changes, and he included detransition among his miscellaneous suggestions. Jadepraerie (talk) 19:49, 5 February 2019 (UTC)

Detransition is not rare.

Citations show little to no research has been done on how frequent detransition is, and that existing research is tangential and of debatable quality. Surgical detransition is "rare" (0–5%). Social/psychological/legal/hormonal detransition is "not uncommon" (55–95%). Please stop adding the claim that transition is "rare", especially to the lead paragraph. Jadepraerie (talk) 00:42, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

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