Loobylou

Open Letter to Scrub Nurses Assisting in Gender-Affirming Surgeries in the United Kingdom. This letter is intended for scrub nurses and medical professionals. It contains graphic descriptions of highly controversial surgeries currently performed by some surgeons in the UK. It is not intended for members of the public or health care professionals who may find such content distressing. You will find it hard reading, sometimes we must face reality. If facing the truth about what is happening is difficult, consider that your discomfort pales next to the plight of the victims who are misled into giving consent for these operations. Spare a thought also for their families and next of kin, who must witness the consequences of this pseudoscience. "All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent." Dear Nursing Colleagues, I am writing to you as a fellow healthcare professional with deep respect for the critical work you do in the operating theatre. You have the hands that pass the instruments, the eyes that watch every move, and the presence that helps keep surgery safe. But in the context of gender-affirming surgeries—procedures such as vaginoplasty, phalloplasty, penectomy, bilateral orchiectomy, vulvoplasty, and bilateral mastectomy—your role goes beyond technical support. You are a key participant in these ethically troubling procedures that demand urgent scrutiny. Considering the recent UK Supreme Court ruling confirming that sex is a biological reality, the very foundation on which these surgeries are justified appears to be collapsing. The belief that sex can be reassigned by surgery is a medical fiction. There are three widespread deceptions involved in these procedures: 1.That sex can be changed or reassigned using hormones and surgery. 2.Those procedures such as vaginoplasty, vulvoplasty, and phalloplasty create vaginas, vulvas, or penises. 3.That removing the healthy breasts of a young woman somehow makes her chest a “male chest.” None of these claims are medically or biologically true. Two commonly held misconceptions — even within the medical profession — are that sex is assigned at birth and that a person can be born in the wrong body. These unfounded beliefs have given rise to a branch of pseudo medicine that underpins so-called gender reassignment surgeries. Biological sex is determined at conception and becomes clearly identifiable by the seventh week of intrauterine development. There is no scientific evidence to support the notion that anyone can be born in the "wrong" body. At birth, sex is simply registered, not assigned. Despite this reality, the language used during the consent process, in patient information leaflets, and even within the operating theatre often continues to imply otherwise. If patients are not fully informed—particularly about what these surgeries can and cannot achieve—then their consent cannot be considered truly informed and will be legally and ethically invalid. Terms like "vaginoplasty," "phalloplasty," and "vulvoplasty" suggest that a vagina, penis, or vulva is being created. In truth, this is profoundly misleading. You are expected to support these operations without question—even when they involve the removal of healthy breasts from adolescent girls, the amputation of normal penises and testicles from young men, or the construction of skin and fat flaps that are misleadingly labelled as “vaginas” or “penises.” You are expected to pass the scalpel into the hands of a surgeon who will first strip and de-skin the penis from the tip to the base, then proceed to disassemble the cylindrical structures of the hapless penis and then proceed to incise and amputate at the base of a perfectly normal penis. They then incise the scrotum, gain access to both the testicles (they have no escape now), transfix, ligate and cut through the cord structures and remove both the testicles from the physically normal adult young Man. Witnessing this in silence, you are to receive the severed organs into a kidney dish—alongside the bloodied blade. Afterward, you may be expected to dispose of them— discarding normal penises, testicles, and breasts from physically healthy individuals who are suffering from psychological or psychosocial distress (every human being goes through some form of distress in their lifetime which needs just psychological support). Your professional instincts may be screaming that something is profoundly wrong. You may be told this is "gender-affirming care." You may be instructed not to question. But medicine is not a ritual of obedience. It is a practice of ethics, science, and humanity. If your training, your conscience, or your professional experience is troubled by what is being done—listen to that voice. You are not alone. These surgeries are irreversible. They remove organs that are not diseased. They mutilate bodies that are anatomically and functionally normal. You are not just a pair of gloved hands. You are a thinking, feeling professional with the right—and the responsibility—to question what you are being asked to do. Silence does not equal consent. And history has not been kind to those who said, “I was just doing my job,” when the job involved harm to patients. I urge you: do not turn away from your discomfort. Reflect on it. Speak about it. Document it. You may be the only voice in the operating room who still sees the patient as a human being, rather than a set of parts to be rearranged or removed. Your voice matters. Use it. Let me be clear: Gender dysphoria is a psychological condition, listed in the DSM-5 psychiatric manual. It is not listed in any reputable surgical textbook as an indication for radical, irreversible surgery. The amputation of healthy organs like penis and/or testicles in response to a psychological diagnosis would not be accepted in any other context in modern medicine. The Medical Director of my health board in Wales—a respected senior physician—has noted that the primary risk of not proceeding with surgery is psychological distress. Traditionally, and always, such distress is managed by mental health professionals and general practitioners, rather than through irreversible surgical procedures. Furthermore, the Cass Review highlights that many of these interventions lack a robust evidence base and have not been subject to long-term, high-quality research. I know that scrub nurses are not the decision-makers in theatre. But you are not without power. You can raise questions, escalate concerns, and refuse to participate in procedures that violate your ethical judgement. Silence and complicity, even with good intentions, can no longer be defended as professionalism. I urge you to reflect on the following: These surgeries permanently destroy fertility, sexual function, and normal anatomy in otherwise healthy young people. You are helping to remove normal organs—organs that are later incinerated. With growing awareness, public scrutiny, and court rulings upholding biological reality, these procedures may soon face legal challenges, possibly under grievous bodily harm (GBH) statutes. If it is later determined that the psychological evaluations were inadequate, or that consent was based on distortion, omission, or deception then your participation in these procedures—however well-intentioned—may be reevaluated in a very different light. Therefore, I urge scrub nurses to: Seek guidance from your professional bodies and ask whether it is ethical and legal to assist in operations that rely on misinformation to secure consent. Escalate your concerns through hospital safeguarding teams or whistleblowing procedures, especially when young adults or vulnerable patients are involved. Request formal clarification from the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) regarding your ethical obligations in surgeries where the consent may be deemed invalid due to the deception involved. None of us entered medicine or nursing to harm healthy human beings. Yet these surgeries, I believe, cause harm—lifelong, irreversible harm—under a veil of affirmation and false hope. In this situation, ethical courage begins not with confrontation, but with asking honest questions. You are not alone in your doubts. Many professionals— surgeons, anaesthetists, nurses, GPs—are beginning to speak out. I invite you to join them. With respect and urgency, Dr Joseph Chrysostom MBBS, MS (Gen Surg), FRCSEd ATLS Instructor, Royal College of Surgeons of England GMC-5199143.

Brilliant article on why the "conversion practices bill" could become Labour's section 28.

1/ The 2012 Tavistock patient survey showed 80-90% of the teenagers there were same sex attracted. Something like 30% were on the autism spectrum. Staff at the Tavistock had a dark joke "soon there will be no gay people left". Senior leadership resigned because Mermaids ran riot