In a public webinar earlier this week, Kenton Miller of the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission also falsely claimed that the Cass review’s survey of the evidence for youth gender medicine was “based on a very limited number of studies only within the UK.”
He told the webinar audience that the Cass review was “not legitimate at all” and he put it in the context of a surge in “dangerous messaging” that it was “unnatural” to be transgender.
“Because we now live in a very global village, unfortunately, that means we get to inherit some of the village idiots from other places, which means that a lot of the disinformation that’s out there, such as the Cass report, makes its way into our headlines and our media, with very little information being shared,” Mr Miller said.
The 2020-24 Cass review was led by the distinguished British paediatrician Dr Hilary Cass, a former president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. Her 388-page report outlines the world’s most comprehensive study of how best to respond to the unprecedented surge in gender-distressed teenagers, chiefly girls, many of them with autism, mental health disorders, awkward same-sex attraction and family trauma.
After systematic reviews of the international scientific literature, the Cass report found there was “remarkably weak evidence” to support puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for gender-distressed minors. In England, blockers have been restricted to clinical trials and Dr Cass has urged “extreme caution” before any use of cross-sex hormones with minors.
The Victorian human rights commission did not answer GCN’s questions about Mr Miller’s commentary on the Cass review.
Victoria’s human rights commission, which has a role in reporting to the police, had until recently claimed on its website that a parent refusing to support a child’s request for puberty blocker drugs would be in breach of the law.