A persons who been diagnosed with GID is stigmatized and discriminated against for the rest of their lives. At the same time that homosexuality was removed from the DSM, GID was added to it. Just as homosexuality is no longer considered a mental illness so should GID. I believe that you should only be diagnosed with GID if you have a problem with being transgendered not because you are transgendered. I recall a line from the move “Transanerica” where Bree Osborne at one point tells her psychiatrist, "Isn't it funny how plastic surgery can cure mental illness," and I feel that is the point, it is not a mental illness but medical and it should be treated as such.
However, for many gender variant people they will not be able to get proper medical treatment (hormones surgery, etc.) with out a diagnoses, therefore I believe that GID should be taken out of the DSM and added to the list of medical diseases. As I mentioned this has already been done in France…
Le Provence:
Transsexualism will no longer be classified as a mental illness in France
Published on Saturday 16 May 2009
Translated by Curtis E. Hinkle, Founder of the Organisation Intersex International
Transsexualism will no longer be classified in France as a mental illness, a government decision hailed Saturday as "historic" by the associations concerned, on the eve of the International Day Against Homophobia and transphobia.
The Minister of Health, Roselyne Bachelot, has appealed "in recent days" to the High Authority of Health in order to make a decree that transsexualism be removed from the category of psychiatric disorders, a spokesman for the department stated.
In America, those calling for reform have said…
Human Rights Campaign (HRC):
“In 1973 the APA wisely voted to remove homosexuality from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. The result was a very real decrease in bias and prejudice faced by lesbian, gay, and bisexual people in our society. Today, America’s psychiatric professionals are considering changing the way diversity of gender identity and expression are classified in this important document. This work has far-reaching implications not only for the health and well-being of transgender people, but for the civil rights of the transgender community and of all people
PBS “In The Life:”
…Because GID pathologizes the identity of those diagnosed, many gender nonconforming children are subject to so-called “reparative” therapies by parents and mental health professionals. Such therapies regard adult transexuality or homosexuality as a “bad outcome.” Because the American healthcare system requires a GID diagnosis before a doctor can prescribe hormones or perform sex-reassignment-surgery, transgender adults are caught in a Catch-22. They are as reliant on GID as they are stigmatized by it.
The vision of GID Reform:The activists yesterday were calling for…
It is time for the medical professions to affirm that difference is not disease, nonconformity is not pathology, and uniqueness is not illness
It is time for culturally competent psychiatric policies that recognize the legitimacy of cross-gender identity and yet distinguish gender dysphoria as a serious condition, treatable with medical procedures.
It is time for diagnostic criteria that serve a clear therapeutic purpose, are appropriately inclusive, and define disorder on the basis of distress or impairment and not upon social nonconformity.
It is time for medical policies which, above all, do no harm to those they are intended to help.
1. A more representative Work Group
The APA Work Group on Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders is currently compromised by some members who have clear conflicts of interest in retaining and expanding specific diagnoses they have been involved in creating or promoting.
We urge the APA to expand the Work Group to represent more diverse views from behavioral science, bioethics, and philosophy of science.
2. A published position statement from APA
APA has often shifted public policy and perception through the publication of approved position statements. We urge the APA to state that diagnosing normal variants of human gender identity and expression as psychiatric disorders encourages an adversarial relationship between psychiatry and sex and gender minorities. We also urge the APA to state that these diagnoses are misused by some people outside of psychiatry who wish to deny civil rights to trans and gender-variant people.
This is an eleven minute video from “In The Life” it is a little long but it does show the struggle that we are facing.
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