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Helen Pluckrose is a political and cultural writer and commentator, addressing current affairs from a liberal humanist perspective. Her particular focus is current Critical Social Justice (woke) scholarship and activism. Helen took part in the Grievance Studies Affair (along with Peter Bogossian and James Lindsay) which submitted shoddy, ridiculous and ideologically biased papers to academic journals known for publishing Critical Social Justice scholarship. In 2020, she co-authored Cynical Theories with James Lindsay, which traced the evolution of postmodern thought into Critical Social Justice scholarship. In that same year, she co-founded Counterweight, an organization for helping individuals push back at authoritarian Critical Social Justice policies and training programs at their place of work, university or child's school. Helen continues to work with individuals and organizations to resist ideological capture. Helen really just wants you to value evidence-based epistemology and consistently liberal principles.

Alex Byrne is a professor of Philosophy at MIT. A few years ago he started working on philosophical issues relating to sex and gender. And he just published a book on the topic called “Trouble with Gender: Sex Facts, Gender Fictions”. Pick up your copy here: http://www.alexbyrne.org/trouble-with-gender.html

NJada is a detransitioned man who began social transition in 2013 at the age of 19, and HRT the following year. He ultimately detransitioned in 2015. Since then he has been gradually working through stages of self-acceptance. After taking a break from the whole topic of gender for a time, he began to get in touch with other detransitioners in late 2018. In 2022 he began to write and speak publicly about his experience on Twitter and Substack. He hopes to share what he's learned about the draw to identify as a woman and how he has come to accept and even love being a man.

Courtney Coulson is an Australian detransitioner and YouTuber exploring the real psychological and social motivations behind gender dysphoria. In this conversation, Courtney discusses a topic not nearly covered enough on this podcast, which is the role of online fandoms in Rapid Onset Gender Dysphoria and motivating adolescent females to transition. A note to listeners: Courtney is a quick thinker and this conversation takes a lot of interesting turns. So if you’re like me and often listen to podcasts with the speed increased, best to leave this one at 1. Courtney's video on Autoandrophilia: https://youtu.be/S1NjLzFszFs?si=YaYW7M1Td__wW3iE

Tamara Pietzke is a whistleblower from Washington State whose story was published by The Free Press last week. Tamara has a Masters in social work from the University of Washington. She's since worked with older adults, pregnant and postpartum women, the chronically mentally ill, those in inpatient centers, and she's spent the last six years doing outpatient community mental health. She told us that she never sought out to be a whistleblower but she believes whole-heartedly in having a voice when something is wrong, even when it seems like you’re standing alone. The Free Press article: https://www.thefp.com/p/i-refused-to-approve-all-teen-gender-transitions

Eliza Mondegreen researches online trans and detrans communities, where she explores the ways questions and doubts are handled. She also writes about gender medicine for Substack, UnHerd, and other outlets.  We had Eliza back on the pod to discuss Friday's New York Times article on detranistioners (featuring Aaron K! and others) as well as her latest WPATH conference experience.  The New York Times article discussed: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/02/opinion/transgender-children-gender-dysphoria.html WHO campaign by the LGBT Courage Coalition: https://www.lgbtcourage.org/who Video from the San Francisco Trans Health Summit in which Dan Karassic threw Aaron T under the bus : https://youtu.be/7IBOIEOFYJw?si=J2I-7dHBi5knXtoR Eliza’s article: https://unherd.com/2023/12/the-secret-life-of-gender-clinicians/

Ray Alex Williams is a detrans philosopher who wrote a book on trans feminism and philosophy when he was still identifying as trans. After detransition, however, he started a YouTube channel to share his experiences and educate people on gender issues suppressed in mainstream discourse. Ray's YouTube - youtube.com/@RayAlexWilliams Ray's Twitter - twitter.com/RayAlexWilliams

Helen Joyce is author of “TRANS: When Ideology Meets Reality”, (recently reissued as “Trans: Gender Identity and the New Battle for Women’s Rights”). TRANS was published in July 2021 by OneWorld and has been in paperback since May 2022.  A Times of London and Spectator book of the year, it is a UK and Amazon top ten bestseller. It received rave reviews in publications ranging from the Telegraph to the New York Times, and endorsements from, among others, Daniel Dennett (“A sane, humane book”), Lionel Shriver (“Utterly unintimidated by extremist orthodoxy”) and Richard Dawkins (“Thoroughly researched, passionate and very brave”). Until April 2022, Helen was The Economist’s Britain editor. She joined the paper in 2005 as education correspondent; subsequent jobs include Brazil correspondent (based in São Paulo), International editor, Finance editor and Executive editor for events. Before that she edited Plus, an online magazine about maths published by the University of Cambridge, and was founding editor for the Royal Statistical Society’s magazine, Significance. She has a bachelor’s degree from Trinity College Dublin, a Master’s from Cambridge and a PhD from University College London, all in mathematics. Helen now works as director of advocacy for Sex Matters, a human-rights organisation that campaigns for sex-based rights. Her independent journalism and subscription newsletter can be found on her website: thehelenjoyce.com. She has a regular column in the Critic magazine and tweets @hjoycegender. Helen's book: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/56897445   The Coddling of the American Mind https://www.thecoddling.com Crazy Like Us https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Crazy-Like-Us/Ethan-Watters/9781416587095 Edward Shorter: https://www.history.utoronto.ca/people/directories/all-faculty/edward-shorter   ************* Support our work: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/GDAlliance?country.x=CA&locale.x=en_US   For more information: https://www.genderdysphoriaalliance.com  

Anastassis Spiliadis is a psychotherapist and psychologist based in London & Athens, working with individuals couples and families. He works clinically in private practice and as an Education Lead in the NHS. He has worked for many years with people of all ages affected by eating disorders, gender-related distress, relationship challenges and often enduring mental health difficulties. Anastassis worked in the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) at The Tavistock Clinic as a clinician and trainer between 2015 and 2019 where he also established and led a Family Therapy Clinic. There he witnessed and reported unethical clinical practices alongside some thoughtful work by other therapists. He disagreed openly with the service’s treatment model and in 2017 coined the term Gender Exploratory Therapy aiming to develop a therapeutic approach away from conversion and affirmative practices. Anastassis continues to work with gender-related distress alongside his generic practice and supervises and trains clinicians and  University students from different modalities. He is particularly interested in the development and evaluation of treatment approaches for eating disorders, gender-related distress and co-occurring difficulties holding on to a family-focused and developmental lens.  -------- Dr Anna Hutchinson is a London based clinical psychologist with twenty-five years of frontline experience. She is the co-director of an independent practice and employed by the NHS as an Education Lead. Clinically, she specializes in adolescent mental health, gender and physical health. Anna worked in the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) at The Tavistock Clinic at a senior level between 2013 and 2017 where she witnessed unprecedented changes in the patient demographics, referral numbers and an emerging evidence base that challenged practice. Her publications document a shift in her thinking as a result - in 2016 she was writing from a gender affirmative position, by 2019-2020 she was discussing rapid/late onset gender dysphoria and detransition/regret. Her testimony alongside those of many colleagues, formed a key part of the narrative in “Time to Think: The Inside Story of the Collapse of the Tavistock’s Gender Service for Children,’ by Hannah Barnes. Since leaving GIDS, Anna has been working with others to improve awareness of the complex needs of young people experiencing gender related distress. She continues to teach and write in the area, with a particular focus on the need for ethical psychotherapy for young people and families coping with issues related to gender. ------ Links: The Cass Review: https://cass.independent-review.uk Time to Think: The Inside Story of the Collapse of the Tavistock's Gender Service for Children by Hannah Barnes https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/time-to-think-hannah-barnes/1142106254 Keira Bell: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11065005/I-never-changed-gender-16-Brave-young-woman-reveals-story-Tavistock-clinic.html   Data from Tavistock GIDs regarding mental health benefits of puberty blockers: https://www.bbc.com/news/health-66842352 Gender Exploratory Therapy Model: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/334559847_Towards_a_Gender_Exploratory_Model_slowing_things_down_opening_things_up_and_exploring_identity_development In support of research into ROGD https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31317286/   Butch Identity Development: The Formation of an Authentic Gender: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0959353505049709   ************* Support our work: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/GDAlliance?country.x=CA&locale.x=en_US   For more information: https://www.genderdysphoriaalliance.com    

Amanda Kovattana is a biracial, tri-cultural writer who grew up in Bangkok, in a pre-industrialized Thailand before immigrating to California in 1968. She was born in England to an English mother and a Thai father and lived in England during their college years. As a gender non-conforming child, living in Thailand, she benefited from the “third gender” culture of her Thai heritage. Her coming of age in the San Francisco Bay Area, as a lesbian, introduced her to the gay community and the evolving gay liberation movement. Her skill set draws from her engineer father teaching her how to fix things, while her mother’s profession, as a child therapist and family counselor, gave her an understanding of child development and neurodivergent brain styles. She makes a living as a professional organizer specializing in the chronically disorganized and neurodivergent personalities. In this episode, we discuss her new book, The Unexpected Penis, which is lined in our liner notes.   Links: The Unexpected Penis: https://a.co/d/hHNyOaS Amanda’s Substack. https://amandakovattana.substack.com   ************* Support our work: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/GDAlliance?country.x=CA&locale.x=en_US   For more information: https://www.genderdysphoriaalliance.com