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By Kinnon R. MacKinnon
Dr. MacKinnon is an assistant professor who studies transgender care at York University in Toronto.
In its campaign against transgender rights, the Trump administration has been spotlighting stories of people who have regretted transitioning. A recent Federal Trade Commission event, titled “The Dangers of ‘Gender-Affirming Care’ for Minors,” included testimony from six people who had come to believe their gender transition hurt them more than it helped. The Department of Education marked “Detrans Awareness Day” in March. The following month, the White House ordered the National Institutes of Health to conduct more research into transition regret (even though it has gutted $800 million in grant funding for L.G.B.T.Q. research).
I am a researcher who studies detransition — what happens when people who have undergone a gender transition decide to stop or reverse it, often halting medical treatments like hormones. I am also transgender, having begun my own medical transition with testosterone 15 years ago, when I was a 25-year-old graduate student. Under the guise of protecting children from medical harm, the Trump administration is oversimplifying detransition and using it as a political cudgel against transgender health care.
