Scrutable

The Cass report came out last week, a thorough and detailed review of gender identify services for children and young people. It includes reviews of the evidence on the treatments that were/are being offered and makes a number of decent recommendations. It's been welcomed by many, but as expected there are critics. Some of these critics are attacking the report on utterly nonsensical grounds, essentially making stuff up about it. These myths about it are getting traction.

Andy Lewis (formerly of this parish) wrote a decent blogpost debunking the 4 most prominent myths about it. It's worth a read: https://www.quackometer.net/blog/2024/0 ... -know.html

Andy tweeted a link to this open letter:

https://feministgenderequality.network/ ... ss-review/

which at the time he shared it had a list of signatories including none other than Dr Andrew Wakefield. That version has disappeared from the original link but can still be viewed here:

https://archive.fo/2024.04.14-173725/ht ... t.html?m=1

Finally the current version of that page - http://uncommon-scents.blogspot.com/202 ... about.html - seems to be an updated one where the AW’s name is missing. Curious!

Anyway, hoping that the Cass review is the starting point for a discussion that’s more focused on evidence than it has been to date.

I'd noticed the Andrew Wakefield thing, although I think it's possible for anyone to sign without verification, so there's always a possibility someone else added him. That's why I didn't mention it above, though I wouldn't be surprised if he had.

And here we have David Gorski who runs the Science Based Medicine blog promoting twitter rumour and accusing someone by name of doing something she simply didn't do.

The behaviour of a lot of so called "skeptics" on this topic is really poor.

TBH, I was pleasantly surprised by the reaction.

Most normal trans activists welcomed the report and were pleased it brought evidence into the discussion.

There is always going the lunatic fringe who reject scientific approaches and scream their slogans, but I don't think it's worth highlighting their rants.

The report is coming in for criticism on Twitter because some of the images using to illustrate it are AI generated. Not sure how relevant that is (and I can understand why one wouldn't want to use real people's faces).

snoozeofreason wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 12:53 pm

The report is coming in for criticism on Twitter because some of the images using to illustrate it are AI generated. Not sure how relevant that is (and I can understand why one wouldn't want to use real people's faces).

I fail to see what relevance it could possibly have.

lpm wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 12:39 pm

TBH, I was pleasantly surprised by the reaction.

Most normal trans activists welcomed the report and were pleased it brought evidence into the discussion.

There is always going the lunatic fringe who reject scientific approaches and scream their slogans, but I don't think it's worth highlighting their rants.

I think it certainly could have been worse. For example, Stonewall’s response was better than I’d have expected.

But as we can see with the likes of Gorski, misrepresentation of it can easily gain traction.

Tristan wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 1:00 pm

snoozeofreason wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 12:53 pm

The report is coming in for criticism on Twitter because some of the images using to illustrate it are AI generated. Not sure how relevant that is (and I can understand why one wouldn't want to use real people's faces).

I fail to see what relevance it could possibly have.

Me neither. It was a silly thing to do though, given the way that debate on this subject tends to play out, and the willingness of all sides to reach for any available stick to beat the other side with. Of course using real people's faces would have been even sillier, but they could have just not used anyone's face at all. I imagine that the decision to use the images was made by some graphic designer rather than any one involved in the research itself.

So, do you think that there are valid criticisms of the Cass report; and what would you say they are?

Tristan wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 1:00 pm

snoozeofreason wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 12:53 pm

The report is coming in for criticism on Twitter because some of the images using to illustrate it are AI generated. Not sure how relevant that is (and I can understand why one wouldn't want to use real people's faces).

I fail to see what relevance it could possibly have.

A serious report would not be illustrated with irrelevant imagery. If you don't have a relevant real image, then there shouldn't be an image there at all.

dyqik wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 1:21 pm

Tristan wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 1:00 pm

snoozeofreason wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 12:53 pm

The report is coming in for criticism on Twitter because some of the images using to illustrate it are AI generated. Not sure how relevant that is (and I can understand why one wouldn't want to use real people's faces).

I fail to see what relevance it could possibly have.

A serious report would not be illustrated with irrelevant imagery. If you don't have a relevant real image, then there shouldn't be an image there at all.

A serious criticism would not raise irrelevant points about imagery. If you don't have relevant real criticism, then there shouldn't be a post there at all.

But perhaps you intended to write "This is great, finally an evidence-based report that calls for individualised care and treatment for all young people seeking support from NHS gender services, let's all pressure MPs to read it."

I have a horrible suspicion that the imagery is an academic equivalent of dad dancing. In other words that somewhere along the line someone decided that it would make the report more engaging to the age group most affected by it.

dyqik wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 1:21 pm

Tristan wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 1:00 pm

snoozeofreason wrote: ↑

Tue Apr 16, 2024 12:53 pm

The report is coming in for criticism on Twitter because some of the images using to illustrate it are AI generated. Not sure how relevant that is (and I can understand why one wouldn't want to use real people's faces).

I fail to see what relevance it could possibly have.

A serious report would not be illustrated with irrelevant imagery. If you don't have a relevant real image, then there shouldn't be an image there at all.

This is just nonsensical. Stock images are a thing and are used regularly in all sorts of "serious" documents. We're going to be seeing AI generated ones replacing photographed ones more and more. By all means start a discussion on whether this is a good thing or not for the design and photography industries, but it's utterly irrelevant to this thread.

I haven't read the report but I've skimmed through looking at the pictures (but not AlL tEh pIXeLs) and they are exactly what I would expect in a report of this sort -- a selection of images of people between chapters. Apart from the usual glossy relief from the wall-of-text, pictures are useful to remind ourselves that the report is about real people and not abstract concepts. The only thing that struck me was that all the pictures of people from behind got a bit creepy after a while, and it would have been nice to actually see some more faces (tying in to my previous sentence)-- but we all know why that is difficult.

How to win hearts and minds

This is so disingenuous of Stonewall. The information about the methodology used was in the report all along. Why are they pretending it’s new information?

https://x.com/stonewalluk/status/178246 ... iksLglQFYQ