Widely spread views block real people from care
Dr Helen Webberley on Robby Starbuck: transition and children, Robby Starbuck
Opinions about trans people are just opinions. They exist in the realm of debate, and debate doesn't hurt anyone. You can say what you believe, loudly and often, and the worst that happens is that someone disagrees with you.
What I was pressing on in that moment is the gap between believing something and the real-world cost of spreading it. When views that are loud enough and repeated widely enough shape how services are run, how clinicians are trained, how politicians vote, the people who pay the price are trans people trying to access care they need. That is not abstract. I sit with the consequences of that every day, in the stories people share with me about being turned away, delayed, dismissed. The question I keep asking is a simple one: does it matter to you that what you say causes that harm? Because it should.
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