[We are relaying the press release from the board of directors of the Little Mermaid Observatory following the shameful conspiracy of which they were victims]
On May 17, 2022, Médiapart published an article entitled "Trans minors: conservative groups go on the offensive". Being explicitly designated as "conservative groups", our Observatory was the target of a wave of hostility on social networks and in particular on Twitter.
Our research and practice activities focus on medical and surgical transitions in minors, a highly vulnerable population, both due to adolescence and the multiple psychopathologies encountered in this population. In no case have we issued an opinion on the transition of adults. Throughout the world, renowned medical specialists such as K. Zucker, S. Roman, L. Littman, E. Anderson, many doctors from the famous Tavistock clinic in London, etc. have spoken out against medicalization, which has irreversible consequences for minors. Several countries, including the Nordic countries known for their progressive morality, have stopped practicing these treatments.
We strongly reject any accusations of transphobia, and on the contrary support the recognition of transgender people, their legal and social rights. As for the defense of children, it should mobilize the whole of society and all child protection institutions.
Our most active members are very attached to a humanist, secular and republican left that today deplores being prevented from accessing a traditionally left-wing press that it has read and supported for years. These newspapers now defend a limitless "progressivism" that contributes to the dissemination of ultra-liberal ideas (medical interests not devoid of financial interests).
This is a normative representation of sex that is supported while the demands of minors are extremely heterogeneous, as demonstrated by the detransitions of young people who then say that their problem was not gender. (10% of detransitioners in the British study of the famous GIC (Gender Identity Clinic), and their authors say that detransitions will increase a lot in the coming years, 20% of treatment discontinuation in the Boyd study).
The slanderous accusations of transphobia and the desire to label us as "reactionaries" are based on a desire not only to refuse any debate, but also to stifle extremely serious problems that many of us have raised (within the Observatory and outside it) and which continue to generate a great deal of interest elsewhere.
In this fight, conservatism is not on the side we think.
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