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APA modifies Gender Identity Disorder diagnosis

Replaces ‘Gender Identity Disorder’ with ‘Gender Dysphoria’

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Dana Beyer, Maryland
Dana Beyer, Maryland, gay news, Washington Blade

Dana Beyer (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

Advocates welcomed the American Psychiatric Association’s decision on Saturday to remove Gender Identity Disorder from its list of mental disorders.

The APA specifically removed GID from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manuel (DSM) of Mental Disorders and replaced it with Gender Dysphoria.

The organization, which represents more than 36,000 psychiatrists from around the world, has revised the DSM five times since it was founded in 1844. The latest revision process began 15 years ago.

Transgender activist Dana Beyer, who worked on the task force that wrote the new language the APA adopted with the Washington Psychiatric Society, said the removal of GID from the DSM is comparable to the organization’s declassification of homosexuality as a mental illness in 1973.

ā€œWhat we did in that workgroup and what other activists have been pushing for is reconceptionalizing the state of being trans from a mental illness,ā€ she told the Washington Blade. Beyer added this change will have implications for children who see a therapist for GID to trans activists fighting against what she described as ā€œfundamental oppositionā€ in state legislatures. ā€œWe are no longer mentally ill and that has huge implications just as it did for homosexuality in 1973. It’s absolutely game-changing.ā€

Michael Silverman, executive director of the New York-based Transgender Legal Defense and Education Fund, said opponents of trans rights often used the term ā€œdisorderā€ as a ā€œweapon to deny transgender individuals equal rights and equal treatment.ā€ Doctor Jillian Weiss of Ramapo University in New Jersey agreed as she described the DSM revisions as a ā€œstep in the right direction.ā€

Psychiatrists and other medical providers had begun to commonly diagnose trans patients with GID by the early 1990s — the APA added it to the DSM when it revised it for the third time in 1987. The diagnoses, however, remain controversial among some trans advocates.

Kelley Winters of the group GID Reform Advocates told the Blade the change in title from Gender Identity Disorder to Gender Dysphoria signifies the ā€œproblem to be treated is not the person’s identity,ā€ but rather ā€œthe distress that is often experienced by those who need access to medical transition care.ā€ She further noted the new terminology remains within what she described as a ā€œmanual of disorder.ā€

She also criticized the APA for not removing the ā€œTransvestic Disorderā€ category she asserts remains defamatory to cross-dressers and transsexuals in a post on the Bilerico Project on Wednesday.

Winters welcomed, however, the move to change GID to Gender Dysphoria in the DSM.

ā€œThis change in title is significant because it actually signals a change of attitude within the APA that our gender identities are no longer considered the focus of pathology,ā€ she told the Blade. ā€œThat change is not insignificant. It carries a message. Despite this forward progress, the sad fact remains that trans and especially transsexual folks needing hormonal or surgical transition care are still classified as mentally disordered.ā€

Advocates remain hopeful the proposed revisions will allow trans people to have increased access to quality health care.

ā€œIt is imperative that transgender people who experience dysphoria have access to medical care to treat it. Unfortunately, that has rarely been the case,ā€ Silverman said. ā€œAs the American Medical Association has stated, the denial of medical care for patients with Gender Dysphoria is discriminatory and must be stopped.”

Weiss agreed.

ā€œThe term ā€˜disorder’ gave the impression that people with this condition had an illness that made them dangerous or incompetent,ā€ she said. ā€œOf course, there is much to say about this, and whether the change will impact medical and social practices remains to be seen.ā€

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The White House

Biden, Harris, deliver remarks for White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention

Pulse survivor Brandon Wolf among those who spoke

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President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris listen as U.S. Rep. Maxwell Alejandro Frost (D-Fla.) addresses an audience in the Rose Garden including federal, state and local officials, survivors and family members, and gun violence prevention advocates on Sept. 22, 2023. (Photo courtesy of Brandon Wolf)

President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) addressed an audience from the Rose Garden of the White House on Friday to honor the establishment of a first-ever White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention.

In a press release Thursday announcing the move, the administration said its aim is to implement and expand the provisions of last year’s Bipartisan Safer Communities Act along with those contained in the president’s executive orders targeting issues of gun violence.

Additionally, Biden explained in his remarks, the office will coordinate more support for survivors, families and communities, including mental health services and financial aid; identify new avenues for executive action; and “expand our coalition of partners in states and cities across America” given the need for legislative solutions on the local and state level.

Harris, who will oversee the office, pledged to “use the full power of the federal government to strengthen the coalition of survivors and advocates and students and teachers and elected leaders to save lives and fight for the right of all people to be safe from fear and to be able to live a life where they understand that they are supported in that desire and that right.”

The vice president noted her close experiences with the devastating consequences of gun violence in her work as a federal prosecutor, San Francisco district attorney, California attorney general and in her current role.

Biden’s comments also included highlights of his administration’s accomplishments combatting gun violence and a call to action for Congress to do more. “It’s time again to ban assault weapons and high capacity magazines,” he told lawmakers.

The president also credited the the work of advocates including those who were gathered at the White House on Friday: “all of you here today, all across the country, survivors, families, advocates — especially young people who demand our nation do better to protect all; who protested, organized, voted, and ran for office, and, yes, marched for their lives.”

Taking the stage before introducing Biden, Frost noted that “Right before I was elected to Congress, I served as the national organizing director for March for Our Lives, a movement that inspired young people across the nation to demand safe communities.”

“The president understands that this issue especially for young people, especially for marginalized communities, is a matter of survival,” the congressman said. And the formation of this office, “comes from Pulse to Parkland,” he said, adding, “we fight because we love.”

Human Rights Campaign National Press Secretary Brandon Wolf, a survivor of the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting, which was America’s second deadliest mass shooting and the deadliest against the LGBTQ community, shared a comment with the Washington Blade after Friday’s ceremony:

ā€œSeven years ago, when my best friends and 47 others were murdered at our safe place — Pulse Nightclub — we promised to honor them with action. This is what that looks like. This deep investment in the fight to end gun violence matters, and I cannot wait to see Vice President Harris lead these efforts. We can blaze the path toward a future free of gun violence. And today marked an important step in that direction.ā€

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U.S. Federal Courts

Federal judge: drag is ‘vulgar and lewd,’ ‘sexualized conduct’

Ruling ‘bristles with hostility toward LGBTQ people’

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J. Marvin Jones Federal Building, U.S. Courthouse in Amarillo, Texas (Photo: Library of Congress)

Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas issued a ruling Thursday denying relief to a group of university students who sought to host a drag show over the objections of their school’s president.

A Trump appointed jurist with deep ties to anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion conservative legal activists, Kacsmaryk argued that drag performances probably do not constitute speech protected by the First Amendment.

As Slate Senior Writer Mark Joseph Stern wrote on X, this conclusion ā€œconflicts with decisions from Texas, Florida, Tennessee and Montana which held that drag is constitutionally protected expression.ā€

ā€œIt also bristles with undisguised hostility toward LGBTQ people,ā€ he added.

Kacsmaryk’s 26-page decision describes drag performances as lewd and licentious, obscene and sexually prurient, despite arguments the plaintiffs had presented about the social, political, and artistic merit of this art form.

As the Human Rights Campaign recently wrote, ā€œdrag artists and the spaces that host their performances have long served as a communal environment for queer expression.ā€

The group added, ā€œIt is a form of art and entertainment, but, historically, the performances haven’t only served to entertain, but also to truly advance the empowerment and visibility of LGBTQ+ people.ā€

Nevertheless, anti-LGBTQ conservative activists and organizations have perpetuated conspiracy theories about members of the community targeting children for sexual abuse including by bringing them to drag performances.

Among these is a group with ties to the Proud Boys that was cited by Kacsmaryk in his ruling: Gays Against Groomers, an anti-LGBTQ and anti-transgender extremist group, according to the Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center.

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The White House

Harris to oversee White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention

Goal is to implement and expand upon legislation, executive actions

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U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, September 2023. (Official White House photograph by Lawrence Jackson)

The White House announced Thursday evening that President Joe Biden on Friday will establish the first-ever White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, to be overseen by Vice President Kamala Harris.

The office will focus on implementing and expanding upon executive and legislative actions, including the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, “to reduce gun violence, which has ravaged communities across the country.”

Serving under Harris will be Stefanie Feldman, “a longtime policy advisor to President Biden on gun violence prevention,” and “leading gun violence prevention advocates Greg Jackson and Rob Wilcox.”

ā€œEvery time I’ve met with families impacted by gun violence as they mourn their loved ones, and I’ve met with so many throughout the country, they all have the same message for their elected officials: ā€˜do something,'” Biden said in a statement.

The president noted his signing of last year’s bipartisan gun violence prevention law, a flagship legislative accomplishment for the administration, along with his issuance of more executive actions than any president in history to address this problem.

Calling these “just the first steps,” Biden said the establishment of the White House Office on Gun Violence Prevention will “build upon these measures and keep Americans safe.”

He also urged Congress to do more by passing legislation requiring universal background checks, and baning assault weapons and high capacity magazines.

In a statement, Harris said, “This epidemic of gun violence requires urgent leadership to end the fear and trauma that Americans experience every day.”

“The new Office of Gun Violence Prevention will play a critical role in implementing President Biden’s and my efforts to reduce violence to the fullest extent under the law,” she said, “while also engaging and encouraging Congressional leaders, state and local leaders, and advocates to come together to build upon the meaningful progress that we have made to save lives.”

“Our promise to the American people is this: we will not stop working to end the epidemic of gun violence in every community, because we do not have a moment, nor a life to spare,” the vice president said.

Then Vice President Biden hugs Brandon J. Wolf as he talks with family members of the victims and survivors in the June 12th mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, at the Amway Center in Orlando, Florida, June 16, 2016.
Wolf, a Pulse survivor, was recently appointed National Press Secretary of the Human Rights Campaign.
(Official White House Photo by David Lienemann)
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