This is worth a read:
— Dr P (@Psychgirl211) July 4, 2024
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An extract:
Psychological distress and aberrant behaviours are always conceptualised through the lens of culture, and in any society, at any given time, we create medical and psychological narratives to best understand aspects of human behaviour based on these prevailing norms. These then go on to shape further behaviours. This is known as the ‘symptom pool’.
Anorexia was almost unknown in Hong Kong until a public awareness campaign was launched by Western psychiatrists in the 1990s. Within a few years there was a 2,500% increase in cases. Girls diagnosed with anorexia were treated sympathetically, they were taken out of school and given positive reinforcement for their illness. Unsurprisingly, more girls began restricting their eating, thus causing a growing feedback loop of youngsters developing anorexia. The awareness campaign in Hong Kong, had in effect, created and spread a novel mental illness (and its behavioural sequalae) into a population of receptive and suggestible adolescents.
In the 1980s and 90s ‘False Memory Syndrome’ led to families being torn apart by accusations of supposed childhood sexual abuse, particularly incest. Through guided imagery, hypnosis and simple suggestion, psychologists encouraged clients (mainly women) to ‘recover’ entirely factitious ‘memories’ of sexual abuse, some supposedly occurring as early as three months old!…
Currently the West is in the grip of an unprecedented medical scandal arising from a new entrant to the symptom pool, namely Gender Dysphoria. Here is why from the perspective of being a nearly 30-year qualified clinical psychologist, I believe that Gender Dysphoria is a false construct. One that has caused, and if not stopped, will continue to cause immeasurable harm to innumerable numbers of people.
The addition of Gender Dysphoria to the symptom pool is fed by the concept of gender identity, an unprovable, metaphysical belief that we all have an innate sense of our ‘gender’. That our gender exists outside of our physical bodies.
Gender Dysphoria occurs when one’s gender identity does not match one’s sexed body.
Following from a diagnosis of Gender Dysphoria is the near inevitability of ‘gender affirming care’. This involves the highly unethical and entirely experimental use of synthetic cross-sex hormones and the surgical mutilation of physically healthy bodies in order to align with one’s supposed gender identity.
But Gender Dysphoria itself is not real. It has no clinical or evidentiary basis. It is a false construct, created ex nihilo and first published in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM), 5th edition, in October 2013. We psychologists should not be involved in any of it. […]
Gender Dysphoria is the only psychological construct wherein the client essentially diagnoses themselves and also determines their own severity, (the Humpty Dumpty effect). The therapist is simply expected to ‘affirm’ the client’s false belief. The clinical assessment, intervention, evaluation and reformulation that occurs with every other psychological condition is not allowed. It is often even illegal. In some countries such as Brazil, Taiwan, Ecuador, Argentina, Germany, New Zealand and Canada, a therapist attempting to work ethically, (ie carrying out exploratory psychotherapy such as simply asking a client why they think they are ‘trans’) can lose their practicing license, or even be convicted for practicing so-called ‘conversion therapy’.
This is what Labour has been threatening: a ban on gender "conversion therapy", ie instant affirmation of the child's fantasy, or else. We shall see.
And because there is no instrument to measure Gender Dysphoria, there is no way of assessing whether whatever the client is feeling has reached a clinical threshold, its severity, if and when it has reduced or been alleviated, or even if it exists. And yes, clients can lie or be deluded. This is why any assessment for Gender Dysphoria, such as it is, ought to be a systemic and lengthy process to eliminate and redirect individuals who are confabulating. (The UK’s Gender Recognition Act, even though very flawed, may have recognised this by imposing a minimum period of two years). And for children, any assessment of Gender Dysphoria should always involve their family, school and wider social systems. It should never be with the child alone…..
Mick Hartley 
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