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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 2 months

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By: Beth Bourne

Published: Feb 27, 2024

Kaiser gender specialists were eager to approve hormones and surgeries, which would all be covered by insurance as “medically necessary.”

On September 6, 2022, I received mail from my Kaiser Permanente Davis Ob-Gyn reminding me of a routine cervical screening. The language of the reminder stood out to me: “Recommended for people with a cervix ages 21 to 65.” When I asked my Ob-Gyn about this strange wording, she told me the wording was chosen to be “inclusive” of their “transgender” and “gender fluid” patients.

Based on this response, several thoughts occurred to me. Could I expose the medical scandal of “gender-affirming care” by saying and doing everything my daughter and other trans-identifying kids are taught to do? Would there be the type of medical safeguarding and differential diagnosis we would expect in other fields of medicine, or would I simply be allowed to self-diagnose and be offered the tools (i.e. hormones and surgeries) to choose my own gender adventure and become my true authentic self?

If I could demonstrate that anyone suffering from delusions of their sex, self-hatred, or identity issues could qualify for and easily obtain body-altering hormones and surgeries, all covered by insurance as “medically necessary” and potentially “life-saving” care, then maybe people would finally wake up. I certainly had.

I was prepared for failure. I wasn’t prepared for how easy success would be.

* * *

I am a 53-year-old mom from Davis, CA. My daughter began identifying as a transgender boy (social transition) and using he/him pronouns at school during 8th grade. Like several of her peers who also identified as trans at her school, my daughter was a gifted student and intellectually mature but socially immature. This shift coincided with her school’s sudden commitment to, and celebration of, a now widespread set of radical beliefs about the biology of sex and gender identity.

She “came out” as trans to her father (my ex-husband) and me through a standard coming-out letter, expressing her wish to start puberty blockers. She said she knew they were safe, citing information she had read from Planned Parenthood and the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH). To say I was shocked would be an understatement. I was also confused because this announcement was sudden and unexpected. While others quickly accepted and affirmed my daughter’s new identity, I was apprehensive and felt the need to learn more about what was going on.

Events began escalating quickly.

During a routine doctor’s visit scheduled for dizziness my daughter said that she was experiencing, the Kaiser pediatrician overheard her father using “he/him” pronouns for our daughter. The pediatrician seemed thrilled, quickly asking my daughter about her “preferred pronouns” and updating her medical records to denote that my daughter was now, in fact, my son. The pediatrician then recommended we consult the Kaiser Permanente Oakland Proud pediatric gender clinic, where she could get further information and (gender affirming) “treatment.” Now I was the one feeling dizzy.

As I began educating myself on this issue, I discovered that this phenomenon—minors, most often teen girls, suddenly adopting trans identities—was becoming increasingly widespread. It even had a name: rapid onset gender dysphoria, or ROGD. Thankfully, after learning about the potential side-effects of blockers and hormones, my ex-husband and I managed to agree not to consent to any medical interventions for our daughter until she turned 18 and would then be able to make such decisions as an adult.

Over the past five years, my daughter’s identity has slowly evolved in ways that I see as positive. Our bond, however, has become strained, particularly since I began publicly voicing my concerns about what many term as “gender ideology.” Following my daughter’s 17th birthday family celebration, she sent me an email that evening stating she would be cutting off contact with me.

While this estrangement brought me sorrow, with my daughter living full-time with her father, it also gave me the space to be an advocate/activist in pushing back on gender identity ideology in the schools and the medical industry.

I decided to go undercover as a nonbinary patient to show my daughter what danger she might be putting herself in—by people who purport to have her health as their interest, but whose main interest is in medically “affirming” (i.e., transitioning) whoever walks through their door. I am at heart a mother protecting her child.

* * *

My daughter’s sudden decision to become a boy was heavily on my mind in early September of 2022, when mail from my Kaiser Permanente Davis Ob-Gyn reminded me of a routine cervical screening with “Recommended for people with a cervix ages 21 to 65.” I was told that the wording was chosen to be “inclusive” of transgender and “gender fluid” patients.

Throughout the whole 231-day process of my feigned gender transition, the Kaiser gender specialists were eager to serve me and give me what I wanted, which would all be covered by insurance as “medically necessary.” My emails were returned quickly, my appointments scheduled efficiently, and I never fell through the cracks. I was helped along every step of the way.

Despite gender activists and clinicians constantly claiming that obtaining hormones and surgeries is a long and complex process with plenty of safety checks in place, I was in full control at every checkpoint. I was able to self-diagnose, determine how strong a dose of testosterone I received and which surgeries I wanted to pursue, no matter how extreme and no matter how many glaring red flags I purposefully dropped. The medical workers I met repeatedly reminded me that they were not there to act as “gatekeepers.”

I was able to instantly change my medical records to reflect my new gender identity and pronouns. Despite never being diagnosed with gender dysphoria, I was able to obtain a prescription for testosterone and approval for a “gender-affirming” double mastectomy from my doctor. It took only three more months (90 days) to be approved for surgery to remove my uterus and have a fake penis constructed from the skin of my thigh or forearm. Therapy was never recommended.

Critics might dismiss my story as insignificant on the grounds that I am a 53-year-old woman with ample life experience who should be free to alter her body. However, this argument for adult bodily autonomy is a standard we apply to purely cosmetic procedures like breast implants, liposuction, and facelifts, not “medically necessary” and “lifesaving” treatments covered by health insurance. Or interventions that compromise health and introduce illness into an otherwise healthy body. And especially not for children.

My story, which I outline in much more detail below, should convince any half-rational person that gender medicine is not operating like any other field of medicine. Based on a radical concept of “gender identity,” this medical anomaly preys upon the body-image insecurities common among pubescent minors to bill health insurance companies for permanent cosmetic procedures that often leave their patients with permanently altered bodies, damaged endocrine systems, sexual dysfunction, and infertility.

* * *

Detailed Timeline of Events

On October 6, 2022, I responded to my Ob-Gyn’s email to tell her that, after some thought, I’d decided that maybe the label “cis woman” didn’t truly reflect who I was. After all, I did have some tomboyish tendencies. I told her I would like my records to be changed to reflect my newly realized “nonbinary” identity, and that my new pronouns were they/them. I also voiced my desire to be put in touch with an endocrinologist to discuss starting testosterone treatment.

Fifteen minutes later I received an email from another Kaiser doctor informing me that my medical records had been changed, and that once my primary doctor returned to the office, I’d be able to speak with her about hormone therapy.

I responded the following day (October 7, 2022), thanking her for changing my records, and asking if she could connect me with someone who could help me make an appointment for “top surgery” (i.e., a cosmetic double mastectomy) because my chest binder was rather “uncomfortable after long days and playing tennis.”

She told me to contact my primary care MD to “get things rolling,” and that there were likely to be “preliminary evaluations.”

Six days after contacting my primary care MD for a referral, I received an email from one of Kaiser’s gender specialists asking me to schedule a phone appointment so she could better understand my goals for surgery, so that I could get “connected to care.” This call to review my “gender affirming treatment options and services” would take 15-20 minutes, after which I would be “booked for intake,” allowing me to proceed with medical transition.

This wasn’t an evaluation of whether surgical transition was appropriate, it was simply a meeting for me to tell them what I wanted so that they could provide it.

On October 18, I had my one and only in-person appointment in preparation for top surgery. I met in Davis with my primary care physician, Dr. Hong-wen Xue. The assessment was a 10-minute routine physical exam that included blood tests. Everything came back normal. Notably, there was not a single question about why I wanted top surgery or cross-sex hormones. Nor was there any discussion of the risks involved with these medical treatments.

The following week, on October 24, I had a phone appointment with Rachaell Wood, MFT, a gender specialist with Kaiser Sacramento. The call lasted 15 minutes and consisted of standard questions about potential drug use, domestic violence, guns in the house, and whether I experienced any suicidal thoughts. There were no questions from the gender specialist about my reasons for requesting a mastectomy or cross-sex hormones, or why I suddenly, at 52, decided I was “nonbinary.”

After the call, Kaiser emailed me instructions about how to prepare for my pre-surgery intake video appointment to evaluate my mental health, scheduled to take place on November 15. The email stated that prior to my appointment, I should research hormone risks on the WPATH website, and to “research bilateral mastectomy and chest reconstruction surgery risks and recovery” on Kaiser’s website.

I decided to request a “gender-affirming” double mastectomy and phalloplasty. Kaiser sent me a sample timeline for gender transition surgery preparation (see below) that you can use as a reference for the process. I also asked for a prescription for cross-sex hormones (testosterone) as needed and recommended by Kaiser.

[ Source: Kaiser Permanente, Top Surgery - EXPLORING YOUR SURGICAL OPTIONS ]

Pre-Surgery Mental Health Video Appointment, Part I

This “Mental Health Visit” assessment was conducted over Zoom. The Kaiser gender specialist started with questions addressing my marital status, race, gender identity, and other demographics. She asked whether I was “thinking of any other surgeries, treatments in the future.” The list she read included “gender-affirming” hysterectomies, bottom surgeries such as metoidioplasty and phalloplasty, vocal coaching, support groups, and body contouring. “Anything else you might be interested in doing?” she asked. I said that I’d perhaps be interested in body contouring. I was also assured that all the procedures would be covered by insurance because they were considered “medically necessary.”

I dropped in several red flags regarding my mental health to see the reaction, but all were ignored. For instance, I revealed that I had PTSD. When the therapist asked me about whether I had experienced any “childhood trauma,” I explained that I grew up in Mexico City and had been groped several times and had also witnessed men masturbating in public and had been grabbed by men in subways and buses. “I was a young girl, so [I had] lots of experiences of sexual harassments, sexual assault, just the kind of stuff that happens when you are a girl growing up in a big city.” “So, you know,” I finished, “just the general feeling that you are unsafe, you know, in a female body.”

The therapist did not respond to my disclosure that trauma could be the cause of my dysphoria. Instead of viewing this trauma as potentially driving my desire to escape my female body through hormones and surgery, she asked whether there is anything “important that the surgery team should be aware of” regarding my “history of trauma,” such as whether I’d be comfortable with the surgeon examining and marking my chest prior to surgery.

When asked about whether I had had any “psychotic symptoms,” I told her that while I had had no such symptoms, my mother had a delusional nervous breakdown in her 50s because she had body dysmorphia and became convinced she had a growth on her neck that needed to be removed. I told her that my mother was then admitted to an inpatient hospital for severe depression. I asked her whether she ever sees patients with body dysmorphia and whether I could have potentially inherited that from my mother. She told me that psychosis was hereditary, but that it was “highly unlikely” that there was any connection between body dysmorphia and gender dysphoria.

I enthusiastically waved more mental health red flags, waiting to see if she would pick up on any of them.

I’m just wondering if my feelings, or perseverating, or feeling like these breasts make me really unhappy and I just don’t want them anymore!...I’m just not sure if that’s a similar feeling to body dysmorphia? How do you decide which one is gender dysphoria and general body dysmorphia, and just not liking something about your body? Feeling uncomfortable with your body? And I did have an eating disorder all through college. I was a distance runner in college so I had bulimia and anorexia, you know. So I don’t know if that’s related to gender dysphoria?

The therapist replied, “I completely appreciate your concerns, but I am going to ask you questions about your chest, about your expectations. And then I’ll be able to give you an assessment.” She also said the main difference between my mom’s situation and mine was that my mom didn’t really have a growth on her neck, whereas it’s “confirmed” that I actually have “chest tissue.” Furthermore, she said that while “historically there has been all this pressure on patients to be like ‘Are you really, really sure you want hormones? Are you 100% sure?’ We are a little more relaxed.” She continued, “As long as you are aware of the risks and the side-effects, you can put your toe in the water. You can stop ‘T’ [testosterone], you can go back and do it again later! You can stop it! You can stop it! You know what I mean?”

Because we ran out of time, I scheduled a follow-up phone meeting on December 27, 2022 with a different gender specialist to complete my mental health assessment for top surgery.

Pre-Surgery Mental Health Video Appointment, Part II

During this meeting, Guneet Kaur, LCSW, another Kaiser gender specialist (she/her/they/them pronouns) told me that she regretted the “gatekeeping vibe” of the meeting but assured me that since I have been “doing the work,” her questions are essentially just a form of “emotional support” before talking with the medical providers.

She asked me about what I’d been “looking into as far as hormones.” I told her that I’d be interested in taking small doses of testosterone to counterbalance my female feelings to achieve “a feeling that’s kind of neutral.”

When she asked me about me “not feeling like I match on the outside what I feel on the inside,” I dropped more red flags, mentioning my aversion to wearing dresses and skirts.

I don’t own a single dress or a skirt and haven't in 20 years. I think for me it’s been just dressing the way that’s comfortable for me, which is just wearing, jeans and sweatshirts and I have a lot of flannel shirts and, and I wear boots all the time instead of other kinds of shoes. So I think it’s been nice being able to dress, especially because I work from home now most of the time that just a feeling of clothing being one of the ways that I can feel more non-binary in my everyday life.

She responded, “Like having control over what you wear and yeah. Kind of that feeling of just, yeah, this is who I am today. That’s awesome. Yeah.”

She then asked me to describe my dysphoria, and I told her that I didn’t like the “feeling of the female form and being chesty,” and that because I am going through menopause, I wanted to start taking testosterone to avoid “that feeling of being like this apple-shaped older woman.” “Good. Okay, great,” she responded, reminding me that only “top surgery,” not testosterone, would be able to solve my chest dysphoria. (Perhaps it was because all these meetings were online, they didn’t notice I’m actually fit and relatively slender at 5’-5” and 130 pounds, and not apple-shaped at all.)

She told me that we had to get through a few more questions related to my medical history before “we can move on to the fun stuff, which is testosterone and top surgery.”

The “fun stuff” consisted of a discussion about the physical and mood changes I could expect, and her asking me about the dose of testosterone I wanted to take and the kind of “top surgery” technique I’d prefer to achieve my “chest goals.” She told me that all or most of my consultations for surgeries and hormones would be virtual.

The gender specialist told me after the appointment, she would submit my referral to the Multi-Specialty Transitions Clinic (MST) team that oversees “gender expansive care.” They would follow up to schedule a “nursing call” with me to review my medical history, after which they’d schedule my appointment with a surgeon for a consultation. Her instructions for this consultation were to “tell them what you’re wanting for surgery and then they share with you their game plan.”

[ Decision-making slide to help me identify my goals for top surgery–flat chest, nipple sensation, or minimal scarring. Source: Kaiser Permanente, Top Surgery - EXPLORING YOUR SURGICAL OPTIONS ]

She told me that Kaiser has a team of plastic surgeons who “only work with trans and nonbinary patients because there’s just so much need for them.” She asked about my priorities for chest surgery, such as whether I value flatness over nipple sensation. I learned about double incision top surgery with nipple grafts, as well as “keyhole,” “donut,” “buttonhole,” and “Inverted-T” top surgeries.

By the end of the hour-long appointment, I had my surgery referral and was ready for my “nursing call” appointment.

Nursing call with Nurse Coordinator from the Transgender Surgery and Gender Pathways Clinic at Kaiser San Francisco

On January 19, 2023, I had my nursing call with the Nurse Coordinator. He first said that “the purpose of this call is just for us to go through your chart together and make sure everything’s as accurate as possible.” Once that was done, my referral would be sent to the surgeon for a consultation.

He asked me about potential allergies and recreational drug use, and verified that I was up to date on mammograms, pap smears, and colon cancer screenings, as well as vaccines for flu and COVID. I verified my surgical history as well as my current medications and dietary supplements.

He told me about a “top surgery class” available for patients where one of the Kaiser surgeons “presents and talks about surgical techniques and options within top surgery,” and includes a panel of patients who have had top surgery. I signed up for the February 8th class.

Within 10 minutes he told me that he had “sent a referral to the plastic surgery department at Kaiser Sacramento,” and that I should be hearing from them in the next week or two to schedule a consultation.

Appointment for Testosterone

On January 27, I had a 13-minute online appointment with a primary care doctor at Kaiser Davis to discuss testosterone. The doctor verified my name and preferred pronouns, and then directly asked: “So, what would you like to do? What kind of physical things are you looking for?”

I told her I wanted facial hair, a more muscular and less “curvy” physique, and to feel stronger and androgynous. She asked me when I wanted to start, and I told her in the next few months. She asked me if I was menopausal, whether I had ovaries and a uterus, although that information should have been on my chart.

The doctor said she wanted me to come in to get some labs so she could check my current estrogen, testosterone, and hemoglobin levels before starting hormones. Then “we'll set the ball in motion and you'll be going. We’ll see you full steam ahead in the direction you wanna go.”

That was it. I made an appointment and had my lab tests done on February 12. My labs came back on February 14, and the following day, after paying a $5 copay at the Kaiser pharmacy, I picked up my testosterone pump. That was easy!

Top Surgery Consultation

On the same day I received my labs, I had a Zoom surgery consultation with Karly Autumn-Kaplan, MD, Kaiser Sacramento plastic surgeon. This consultation was all about discussing my “goals” for surgery, not about whether surgery was needed or appropriate.

I told the surgeon that I wanted a “flatter, more androgynous appearance.” She asked me some questions to get a better idea of what that meant for me. She said that some patients want a “male chest,” but that others “want to look like nothing, like just straight up and down, sometimes not even nipples.” Others still wanted their chest to appear slightly feminine and only “slightly rounded.” I told her that I’d like my chest to have a “male appearance.”

“What are your thoughts about keeping your nipples?” she asked. “Are you interested in having nipples or would you like them removed?” I told her that I’d like to keep my nipples, but to make them “smaller in size.” She asked me if I’d like them moved to “the edge of the peck muscle” to achieve “a more male appearance.” I said yes.

I was asked to show my bare chest from the front and side, which I did. Then she asked me how important it was for me to keep my nipple sensation. I replied that it was important unless it would make recovery more difficult or there were other associated risks. She highlighted the problem with the free nipple graft, saying that removing the nipple to relocate it means “you're not gonna have sensation in that nipple and areola anymore.” However, some nipple sensation could be preserved by keeping it attached to “a little stalk of tissue” with “real nerves going to it,” but that would require leaving more tissue behind. I told her I’d go for the free nipple graft to achieve a flatter appearance. It was also suggested I could skip nipple reconstruction entirely and just get nipples “tattooed” directly onto my chest.

She told me I was “a good candidate for surgery,” and put me on the surgery wait list. She said that the wait time was between three and five months, but a cancellation could move me up to a sooner date. Also, if I wanted surgery as soon as possible, I could tell the surgery scheduler that I’d be willing to have any of the other three surgeons perform my mastectomy. Outpatient top surgery would cost me a copay of $100.

They contacted twice, in February and March, notifying me of cancellations. If I had accepted and shown up on those dates, they would have removed my breasts. This would have been less than five months from the time I first contacted Kaiser to inform them of my new “nonbinary” gender identity.

How Far Can I Go?

I decided to see how easy it would be for me to get approved for a phalloplasty. Known euphemistically as “bottom surgery,” phalloplasty is the surgical creation of an artificial penis, generally using tissue from the thigh or arm.

I sent an email on March 1, 2023, requesting to have a phalloplasty and concurrent hysterectomy scheduled alongside my mastectomy.

Two weeks later, on March 16th, I had a 16-minute phone call with a gender specialist to discuss my goals for bottom surgery and obtain my referral.

During the call, I explained to the specialist that I wasn’t sure about taking testosterone anymore because I was already quite athletic and muscular, and that taking testosterone didn’t make much sense to me. Instead, I wanted bottom surgery so that I wouldn’t feel like my “top” didn’t match my “bottom.” I told her:

But what I really wanted was to have bottom surgery. So this way when I have my top surgery, which sounds like it could be very soon, that I’ll be aligned, that I won’t have this sense of dysphoria with one part of my body and the other part feeling like it matched who I am. So yeah. So I just did a little bit more research into that. And I looked at the resources on the Kaiser page for the MST clinic and I think I know what I want, which is the hysterectomy and then at the same time or soon after to be able to have a phalloplasty.

I told her that I wanted to schedule the top and bottom surgery concurrently so that I wouldn’t have to take more time off work and it would save me trips to San Francisco or Oakland, or wherever I had to go for surgery.

None of this gave the gender specialist pause. After a brief conversation about some online resources to look over, she told me that she would “submit the referral now and we’ll get this ball rolling.”

Bottom surgery would cost me a copay of $200, which included a couple of days in the hospital for recovery.

Phalloplasty Surgical Consultation with Nurse Coordinator

On May 16, 2023, I had a short surgical consultation with a nurse coordinator to go through my medical history. This was similar to the consultation for top surgery but included information about hair removal procedures for the skin on my “donor site” that would be fashioned into a makeshift penis. They also went over the procedures for determining which donor site—forearm or thigh—was more viable.

After only 15 minutes, she submitted my referral to the surgeon for another surgical consultation.

On May 25 I received an email from my phalloplasty surgeon’s scheduler, informing me that they have received my referral and are actively working on scheduling, but that they are experiencing delays.

I ended my investigation here once I had the referral for the top and bottom surgery. I never used my testosterone pump.

Final Thoughts

In fewer than 300 days, based on a set of superficial and shifting thoughts about my gender and my “embodiment goals” triggered by the mere mention of “gender” in a form letter from my primary care physician, and driven by what could only be described as minor discomforts, Kaiser Permanente’s esteemed “multi-disciplinary team” of “gender specialists” was willing, with enthusiasm—while ignoring mental health concerns, history of sexual trauma, and rapidly escalating surgical requests—to prescribe life-altering medications and perform surgeries to remove my breasts, uterus, and vagina, close my vaginal opening, and attempt a complex surgery with high failure and complication rates to create a functionless representation of a penis that destroys the integrity of my arm or thigh in the process.

This describes the supposedly meticulous, lengthy, and safety-focused process that a Kaiser patient must undergo to embark on a journey to medically alter their body. No clinician questioned my motivations. No one showed concern that I might be addressing a mental health issue through radical and irreversible interventions that wouldn’t address my amorphous problems. There were no discussions about how these treatments would impact my long-term health, romantic relationships, family, or sex life. I charted the course. The clinicians followed my lead without question. The guiding issue was what I wanted to look like.

No other medical field operates with this level of carelessness and disregard for patient health and welfare. No other medical field addresses issues of self-perception with surgery and labels it “medically necessary.” No other medical field is this disconnected from the reality of the patients it serves.

Kaiser has traded medicine for ideology. It’s far beyond time we stop the ruse of considering “gender-affirming” interventions as anything approaching medical care.

This isn’t the first time Kaiser Permanente has been in the news for completely disregarding medical safeguards in the name of “gender-affirming care.” As girls, Chloe Cole and Layla Jane became convinced that they were born in the wrong body and were actually boys on the inside. Doctors at Kaiser ignored their underlying conditions and instead prescribed testosterone and removed their breasts. Both Cole and Jane have since detransitioned and are currently suing Kaiser.

The fact that children and vulnerable adults are being exploited in this massive ideological experiment is not just tragic; it’s deeply disturbing, especially considering it has evolved into a billion-dollar industry.

I hope that by sharing my story, I can bring more focused scrutiny to the medical scandal unfolding not just at Kaiser but also at medical centers and hospitals across the Western world. These institutions have completely abandoned medical safeguards for patients who claim to be confused about their “gender,” and I aim to awaken more parents and assist them in protecting their children.

This is completely insane.

Apologists online are running around saying, but she didn't mean it, she was lying, she was pretending...

It doesn't matter.

Any kind of security, penetration or integrity test is insincere too. When security researchers compromise Microsoft's operating system or Google's browser or whatever, "but they didn't mean it" is not a defence to a discovered security flaw. It doesn't matter that the security researchers didn't plan to steal data or money or identities. The flaw in the system is there regardless.

It doesn't matter that it was insincere. Because the workers didn't know that. They never checked, never asked questions, never tested. They had been taught and instructed to never ask any questions. They did what they were supposed to. And the system failed spectacularly. Because that's what "gender affirming care" means.

Additionally, the claim that Beth Bourne committed fraud is an outright lie. A patient cannot bill. They do not have the authority. The medical clinic is the only one that can bill, and they must supply a diagnosis and a medical necessity.

If they didn't diagnose her and just wrote down what she said, then they committed fraud. If they claim they did diagnose her, then they committed fraud, because the diagnosis they concocted was bogus. This, by the way, is actually going on. Clinics are reporting fake endocrine and other disorders to get blockers, hormones and other interventions. Jamie Reed and other whistleblowers have documented evidence of this. Beth Bourne is not responsible for what the clinic does. They have medical licenses and legal responsibility. Not her.

Additionally, anyone who actually read the article would know how she tested the system. She said things like, "I've always been not that feminine. So, maybe I get my boobs removed." And they said, "sure." Instead of saying, "wait, why do you think that?" Framing it as her lying is itself a lie. They violated their ethical obligations. That much is incontrovertible. And it's directly the result of "gender affirming care," where clinics and clinicians rubber-stamp anything deemed "trans" based entirely on ideological, not medical, grounds.

#Beth Bourne #undercover #undercover investigation #gender identity ideology #queer theory #nonbinary #non binary #top surgery #bottom surgery #double mastectomy #bilateral mastectomy #gender affirming care #gender affirming healthcare #gender affirmation #affirmation model #medical scandal #medical malpractice #medical corruption #religion is a mental illness

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annabelle--cane · 8 months

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say it with me everybody: personal health is completely immaterial to morality, including mental health. leading a mentally unhealthy lifestyle (or what you perceive as a mentally unhealthy lifestyle) does not a bad person make. no one has to socialize, exercise, have healthy coping mechanisms, or lead (what you perceive as) a fulfilling life with fulfilling hobbies in the same way that no one has to go to the doctor to get a broken bone reset. both of those types of management of personal health are likely to be beneficial to the individual, but they are in no way moral requirements or debts owed to society. they do not actually say anything about a person's principles, personality, or actions towards others. additionally, people know themselves and their own situations better than you do. maybe a person judges that the physical and financial toll of going to the doctor outweigh the benefit of getting their bone reset, maybe a person just does not have the capacity to develop healthy coping mechanisms at this point in their life, and yes, maybe a person feels like they are totally fulfilled by "media based" hobbies alone and would feel no difference in their life if they picked up a loom. just like. let people be sick without accusing them of being representative of the lazy, degenerated state of modern society.

#marina marvels at life #there's a way people on here have been talking about ai/tiktok/movies/anti intellectualism/media hobbies/self care that all jives together #that just. really icks me out.#sometimes it comes through pretty transparently with people claiming that you must have regular sex to be a healthy/good person #or conversely that people are more sex crazed now than they've ever been and it's destroying literacy or whatever #or that cheating at school is scandalously immoral and only 'soft brained' bad people would do it #or that collectivism means you have to dress the right way and feel the right way and talk the right way #because your actions affect Others and you might upset someone or give off bad messages if you wear a crop top or are too sad #but a lot of the time it's just this strange plausibly-deniable tone I keep encountering that crept up some time in like 2021 I think #like. am I going crazy here or has anyone else been feeling this?

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coochiequeens · 10 months

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Doctors and nurses who are not willing to listen to their patients should be replaced

BY VICTORIA SMITH

The third time I went into labour, I was determined to avoid getting told off. With both of my previous births, I had somehow managed to get things wrong. My errors the first time: going to hospital too early, then, when I returned three hours later, “leaving it so late”. The second time: ignoring assurances that I didn’t need to come in yet, then giving birth in the car park — an event I later discovered was being used in antenatal classes as an example of women “not planning ahead”.

“My previous births have been fast,” I said, when I went into labour with my third, “so I’d like to come in now.” I was speaking to the woman at the midwife-led unit that is the only option where I live. (If you need a caesarean section, you have to be transferred to next town.) “Third babies are notoriously difficult,” was her response.

What an odd thing to say to a woman already in labour. The “notoriously” suggested it wasn’t based on any actual evidence, but rather a kind of folk wisdom. It felt as though I was being warned not to tempt fate, not to assume that this baby would just pop out. I saw myself being categorised as one of those arrogant women who presumes to know her own body, only to be taught a harsh yet much-deserved lesson. “Third babies are notoriously difficult” sounded not unlike “third-time mothers shouldn’t get above themselves”.

In fact, I have never been particularly cocky about childbirth. When I was pregnant with my first child, back in the days when the Right-wing press were still obsessed with famous women being “too posh to push”, I wondered if I might be able to get an elective caesarean myself. I did not particularly care about childbirth being a wonderful experience, or about “doing it well”. I didn’t care if the Daily Mail thought I was a joke.

What I cared about was not having a child who would face the same difficulties as my brother, who was starved of oxygen at birth. This has had serious consequences for him, and for the rest of my family. Just how serious is hard to gauge. He was born traumatised; there has never been a before to compare the after with. What there has been instead is the hazy outline of an alternative life, one that runs parallel to the one he has now. It’s a life that began with the problem being identified sooner, with him being delivered quickly, perhaps by emergency caesarean. The difference between this and his actual life comes down to something small: mere moments, mere breaths.

I was born three years after my brother, in a larger hospital, where my mother was induced and monitored carefully. There is something very strange about being the sibling who had the safe birth. It feels as though I stole it. There is a constant sense of guilt, as if my life — my independence, my choices — constitutes a form of gloating. “This is what you could have had.” Everything I do feels like something owed to my brother (do it, because he can’t) but also something taken from him (you shouldn’t have done that, because he should have done it first).

Still, my family were fortunate, insofar as my brother didn’t die. Current reports on the Nottingham maternity scandal reference 1,700 cases, with an estimated 201 mothers and babies who might have survived had they received better care. What strikes me, reading them, is the enormous gulf between the cost of a disastrous birth and the trivial, opportunistic way in which childbirth is so often politicised — with mothers themselves viewed as morally, if not practically, to blame if anything goes wrong.

As a feminist who concerns herself with how the female body is demonised, my interest in debates about birthing choices is more than personal. I have read books railing against the over-medicalisation of childbirth, aligning it with a patriarchal need to appropriate female reproductive power. I have also read books protesting the fetishisation of “natural” birth, suggesting that it infantilises women, that it implies women deserve pain. To be honest, I find both arguments persuasive and dismaying. Both are right about the way in which misogyny and professional arrogance can shift the focus away from meeting the needs of women and babies. I feel a kind of rage that we are told to pick a side.

Representations of the labouring woman are so often negative: the naïve idealist, the “birthzilla“, the birth-plan obsessive, the woman who is “too posh to push”. This latter stereotype has gone hand-in-hand with a veneration of vaginal births, and stigmatisation of caesareans, that has had sometimes disastrous consequences. Midwives at the centre of the Furness General Hospital scandal were reported to have “pursued natural birth ‘at any cost’”, referring to one another as “the musketeers”; at least 11 babies and one mother died. But their approach was sanctioned by their employer: the 2006 NHS document “Pathways to Success: a self-improvement toolkit” explicitly suggested that “maternity units applying best practice to the management of pregnancy, labour and birth will achieve a [caesarean section] rate consistently below 20% and will have aspirations to reduce that rate to 15%”. Proposed benefits to this included “a sense of pride in units”.

Responses to maternity scandals now express horror that such an anti-intervention culture ever arose — responses in the same press that denigrated women such as Victoria Beckham and Kate Winslet for not giving birth vaginally. Instead, newspapers now stoke outrage over “natural” treatments during NHS births, such as burning herbs. Women have been shamed for having caesareans, but they have also been shamed for wanting births with minimum intervention — as though they are selfish and spoilt for seeking control over such an extreme situation.

In his memoir This Is Going To Hurt, former doctor Adam Kay writes disparagingly of women who arrive at the delivery suite with birth plans:

“‘Having a birth plan’ always strikes me as akin to having a ‘what I want the weather to be’ plan or a ‘winning the lottery’ plan. Two centuries of obstetricians have found no way of predicting the course of a labour, but a certain denomination of floaty-dressed mother seems to think she can manage it easily.”

Wanting to have some control over your experience of labour — which will hurt you and could kill you or your baby — is not akin to some messianic aspiration to control the weather. And in his mockery of the woman who wants whale song and aromatherapy oils, ironically, Kay deploys the same silencing techniques that might intimidate a woman out of seeking the very interventions he so prizes. What he and others do not seem to grasp is that their arrogance is a problem, regardless of which course of action they champion. It makes women feel they can’t speak, for fear of inviting hostility at their most vulnerable moments. It’s true that none of us knows our body well enough to know how we will give birth. But, looking back, I find it utterly insane, not least given my own family history, that one of my biggest worries during labour was “please don’t let anyone get cross with me”. Then again, I don’t think that fear is unrelated to the desire to remain safe.

Birth is not a joke. It is not a place for professional dick-swinging or political one-upmanship. I cannot describe — and, as I am not my mother, cannot fully understand — the shame of feeling that you “let down” your child before they drew their first breath, that they will forever suffer because of it. You watch an entire life unfolding and that feeling is there, every single day. This is the fear of the women in labour who are characterised as either idiots mesmerised by fantasy homebirths or cold-hearted posh ladies who can’t take the pain. If things go wrong, they are the ones who will bear the consequences, reflecting every day on what might have been, if they’d only done more.

When people discuss their siblings, my mind does wander to the one I don’t have, the one who was born safely. Perhaps he would have a job he loved, or one he hated, but in any case a job. Perhaps he would have a partner. Perhaps he would have children, and I would be their aunt. Perhaps we wouldn’t get on, wouldn’t even speak, but he’d have a life of his own. I know he thinks about this too. I wonder if the professionals who presided over his birth have thought about him since.

My third labour was not, by the way, “notoriously difficult”. My third son arrived into the world safe and well. No one can say why him or me, and not my brother. Mothers may long for control over birth, for which we are mocked; but we do not have it, for which we are blamed. Politics still takes precedence over our needs, and the needs of our babies.

#Traumatic births #Doctors not listening to women #There's no such thing as a birthzilla #Women aren't too posh to push #Doctors are so posh they schedule cesareans to accommodate their schedules not the mothers #Furness General Hospital Scandal #This is going to hurt #Keep Adam Kay away from women #Women wanting a say in their births are not acting like they want to control the weather #Nottingham maternity scandal #If the baby suffers during a traumatic birth it's the mother who will providing the care after they come home from the hospital

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leeenuu · 8 months

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#fck it this is my new pinned #baltics #estonia #latvia #lithuania #basically r*ssians are pissed that they cannot enter into our countries with their cars #and one girlie went further and qrt our minister of foreign affairs #whining abt how we are hurting regular r*ssians and not ppl close to putin #and she brought our pm’s husband into the mess as well #we can take care of our shameful scandals ok?#we dont need ur fckn input #shut tf up #u aint doing shit in ur own country #and now u come lecture us how we should run our country #get fucked

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crowleychild · 22 days

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I just realize, by watching sherlock for the 6th time, that when The Woman "dies", Mycroft remembers Sherlock that "caring is not an advantage", because he doesn't want his little brother to get hurt, but he also knows that is a night in which Sherlock is more likely to have a relapse.

So, when John and Mary are gonna get married, he also tells Sherlock not to get involved, remembering him that sentiments will hurt him, trying his best to help Sherlock not to miss John and get over him.

So we can deduce two things about this:

One: the same way we know Mycroft thinks Sherlock loves the Woman, we know that he thinks he loves John the same way (or even more, because he has known John for years). So if you think Sherlock fall in love with Irene YOU MUST ADMIT HE LOVES JOHN TOO.

And two: the night Sherlocks leaves the wedding early, he probably tried taking drugs again. Whether if Mycroft was waiting for him and stopped him or not, it's up to your imagination.

#sherlock #sherlock bbc #johnlock #scandal in belgravia #sing of three #sherlock s2 ep1 #sherlock s3 ep 2 #irene adler #john watson #mycroft holmes #caring is not an advantage sherlock #sherlock being emotional

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sarnie-for-varney · 8 months

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They're such boyfriends

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stellaluna33 · 6 days

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The way the phrase "Pick-Me Girl" has set us back DECADES, I'm not even kidding... Like, REALLY? We're deciding that if a "girl" doesn't conform enough to what "normal girls" do or like, the explanation is that she's doing it (or faking it, even!) to impress GUYS??? Wow, ok.

#Pick me girl #I cannot express how much I DESPISE this term #🙃#Tangentially related but did you know that pre-sex-scandal Oscar Wilde was popularly suspected #Of faking being 'not like other guys' to IMPRESS WOMEN?#Turns out he couldn't care less about impressing women! 🤪

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cephalog0d · 7 months

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For fuck's sake, it's not enough for you to disrespect the Batfam characters I love to further your stupid fucking plot, now you're dragging Scandal into this trash fire? She's barely appeared in reboot and this is what you're giving me? Making her work for her father (that thing that she was definitively not about in preboot) because...who knows. I would say "you better have a good reason" but they won't. Something something filial obligation apparently. Fuck you.

#I have not remotely been following Catwoman so I don't know if this was a super obvious reveal #But I hate it #It's like this arc is custom designed to piss me off personally #As one of the four people who care about Scandal Savage #scandal savage #dc comics #Gotham War bullshit #Can't wait for this to not pay off in any way and just throw away her character for Bat/Cat plot furthering #The more I think about this the angrier I get

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gutz-radio · 7 months

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the more izzy antis say izzy hands isn't some sweet babygirl or whatever the more i'm gonna treat him like one yeah so what if he's mean. he's my sweet innocent babygirl it's just him being quirky and funny. grow up.

#like babe he isn't real why the hell are you so pressed #if you don't like him then fair enough #i don't care #but stop bitching online as if people saying some fictional grumpy old man is their babygirl is some violation of the geneva convention #like heaven forbid i call mr meanie bobeanie my skrunkly! oh the scandal! the utter horror!#izzy hands #ofmd izzy hands #like it's so dumb how everyone acts like izzy hands is the most problematic character in all of history

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wtfforged · 2 months

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we should all just kill eachother

#cropped because i was trying to play wth perspective/make the pose more interesting to look at and i failed. it sucked. giggles #(gritting my teeth so hard you hear teeth cracking)#i dont care anymore this has been sitting in my folder for eons and i spent way too long on the pose just to crop it. get away from me #nicky the type of guy who will just draw a character blushing and go oh dear goodness... this so scandalous....#wtf... art #roronoa zoro #one piece fanart #zoro one piece

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 9 months

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By: Chloe Cole

Published: July 28, 2023

On Thursday, her 19th birthday, Chloe Cole testified to Congress with a “final warning” that medical treatments to change the gender of confused children is horrific. Cole, who was given surgery as a teenager to become male and soon regretted it, said what she needed most was therapy, not a scalpel. Here is what she told lawmakers:

My name is Chloe Cole and I am a de-transitioner.

Another way to put that would be: I used to believe that I was born in the wrong body and the adults in my life, whom I trusted, affirmed my belief, and this caused me lifelong, irreversible harm.

I speak to you today as a victim of one of the biggest medical scandals in the history of the United States of America.

I speak to you in the hope that you will have the courage to bring the scandal to an end, and ensure that other vulnerable teenagers, children and young adults don’t go through what I went through.

Deceit & coercion

At the age of 12, I began to experience what my medical team would later diagnose as gender dysphoria.

I was well into an early puberty, and I was very uncomfortable with the changes that were happening to my body. I was intimidated by male attention.

And when I told my parents that I felt like a boy, in retrospect, all I meant was that I hated puberty, that I wanted this newfound sexual tension to go away.

I looked up to my brothers a little bit more than I did to my sisters.

I came out as transgender in a letter I sent on the dining room table.

My parents were immediately concerned.

They felt like they needed to get outside help from medical professionals.

But this proved to be a mistake.

It immediately set our entire family down a path of ideologically motivated deceit and coercion.

The general specialist I was taken to see told my parents that I needed to be put on puberty-blocking drugs right away.

They asked my parents a simple question: Would you rather have a dead daughter or a living transgender son?

The choice was enough for my parents to let their guard down, and in retrospect, I can’t blame them.

This is the moment that we all became victims of so-called gender-affirming care.

I was fast-tracked onto puberty blockers and then testosterone.

The resulting menopausal-like hot flashes made focusing on school impossible.

I still get joint pains and weird pops in my back.

But they were far worse when I was on the blockers.

Forever changed

A month later, when I was 13, I had my first testosterone injection.

It has caused permanent changes in my body: My voice will forever be deeper, my jawline sharper, my nose longer, my bone structure permanently masculinized, my Adam’s apple more prominent, my fertility unknown.

I look in the mirror sometimes, and I feel like a monster.

I had a double mastectomy at 15.

They tested my amputated breasts for cancer.

That was cancer-free, of course; I was perfectly healthy.

There is nothing wrong with my still-developing body, or my breasts other than that, as an insecure teenage girl, I felt awkward about it.

After my breasts were taken away from me, the tissue was incinerated — before I was able to legally drive.

I had a huge part of my future womanhood taken from me.

I will never be able to breastfeed.

I struggle to look at myself in the mirror at times.

I still struggle to this day with sexual dysfunction.

And I have massive scars across my chest and the skin grafts that they used, that they took of my nipples, are weeping fluid today, and they’re grafted into a more masculine positioning, they said.

After surgery, my grades in school plummeted.

Everything that I went through did nothing to address the underlying mental health issues that I had.

And my doctors with their theories on gender that all my problems would go away as soon as I was surgically transformed into something that vaguely resembled a boy — their theories were wrong.

The drugs and surgeries changed my body, but they did not and could not change the basic reality that I am, and forever will be, a female.

Depths of despair

When my specialists first told my parents they could have a dead daughter or a live transgender son, I wasn’t suicidal.

I was a happy child who struggled because she was different.

However at 16, after my surgery, I did become suicidal.

I’m doing better now, but my parents almost got the dead daughter promised to them by my doctors.

My doctor had almost created the very nightmare they said they were trying to avoid.

So what message do I want to bring to American teenagers and their families?

I didn’t need to be lied to.

I needed compassion.

I needed to be loved.

I needed to be given therapy that helped me work through my issues, not affirmed my delusion that by transforming into a boy, it would solve all my problems.

We need to stop telling 12-year-olds that they were born wrong, that they are right to reject their own bodies and feel uncomfortable with their own skin.

We need to stop telling children that puberty is an option, that they can choose what kind of puberty they will go through, just like they can choose what clothes to wear or what music to listen to.

Pseudoscience

Puberty is a rite of passage to adulthood, not a disease to be mitigated.

Today, I should be at home with my family celebrating my 19th birthday.

Instead, I’m making a desperate plea to my elected representatives.

Learn the lessons from other medical scandals, like the opioid crisis.

Recognize that doctors are human, too, and sometimes they are wrong.

My childhood was ruined along with thousands of de-transitioners that I know through our networks.

This needs to stop. You alone can stop it.

Enough children have already been victimized by this barbaric pseudoscience.

Please let me be your final warning.

Thank you.

Might as well call her a murtad and kufr.

"The medical industry mutilated me, maybe don't mutilate other kids," shouldn't require bravery or renouncing an ideology.

Reminder: A minor under the age of 18 is too young to agree to a cellphone contract. 🤦‍♀️

#Chloe Cole #detrans #detransition #gender ideology #queer theory #medical malpractice #medical scandal #medical mutilation #gender affirming #gender affirming care #affirmation model #double mastectomy #gender cult #sex trait modification #genderwang #religion is a mental illness

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ageofgeek · 10 months

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i really don’t care that much about the oceangate incident, but if y’all could stop just using the tragic loss of hundreds of refugees in Greece as whataboutism, that would be great

it’s gross and you clearly don’t give a shit about them outside of the excuse that it gives you to make fun of billionaires

#this is what is really pissing me off #check out people on this website who have never talked about europe's intense hatred and violence towards refugees #suddenly caring *so much*!!!#bc it's a convenient comparison to the fucking billionaire submarine scandal #fucking gross #mine #oceangate #submarine #titanic #refugees #equality

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fluffypotatey · 9 months

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*smashes in like the Kool-Aid man*

PENDRAGON SIBLINGS YOU SAY????

I have. So many Feels. About Themst™

The complexity?? The layers?? The angst?? Hello??????

Their relationship is just So Much, because you are right, it's all tangled up in miscommunication and missed opportunities, and so many problems that can be sourced back to Uther "War Crimes" Pendragon, who wouldn't know a healthy relationship if it bit him on the ass.

If Merlin and Arthur are two sides of the same coin, then Arthur and Morgana are edges of the same blade.

Because it's the lonely childhoods, the shared grief, the friendship, the vulnerability, the fondness, the teasing, the envy, the jealousy, the almost romance, the protectiveness, the betrayal, the loss, the hurt, the refusal to let go and the desperate hanging on, and the love, the love, the love.

Indifference is the true opposite of love.

Hate is love that's gone rotten.

“If Merlin and Arthur are two sides of the same coin, then Arthur and Morgana are edges of the same blade.” oh fuck….

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH FUCK

WAIT HOLD ON WAIT LEMME PIGGYBACK ON THAT BESTIE @0hheytherebigbadwolf (tagging you bc it will be a couple days after you sent this ask)

(Also, for anyone wanting background context on what me and bestie are bouncing off on: voilà)

OK OK SO

we are all familiar with King Uther being the greatest (worst) dad of all time, correct? places such high expectations on his “only son and heir” whilst never officially acknowledging Morgana as his daughter until the very end?

F+ father of the year :)

he is not above sending his children into the dungeon if they disobey him as seen here:

(Jfc he even put Morgana in chains like wtf)

also, he is not above using emotional guilt towards them when he deems it necessary (aka one of the only times he actually acknowledges them as his children)

UTHER (1x02 Valiant) I trust you will make me proud.

UTHER (1x08 The Beginning of the End) I’ve treated you like a daughter. Is this how you repay me?

UTHER (1x12 To Kill the King) You are the daughter I never had.

UTHER (2x08 Sins of the Father) You would believe a sorcerer’s lies over the word of your father?

not to mention that when Arthur or Morgana try to reason with him or argue with him since they are the only ones with the status to do so, he pulls rank

UTHER (1x12 To Kill the King) May I remind you that you are speaking to your King [...] Take care, child, or I’ll have you restrained.

UTHER (2x08 Sins of the Father) I am your king and your father. You will show me some respect!

UTHER (2x06 Beauty and the Beast) We live in dangerous times, I cannot allow you to undermine my authority.

UTHER (3x10 Queen of Hearts) You have caused this to happen, Arthur. My decision is final.

ngl i could include more but i have already spent hours searching for shit (YOUTUBE WILL DIE BY MY HAND THAT STINGY BITC—) but y’all get what i mean: Uther is an abusive fucker and it has messed up the conditions of Arthur and Morgana

now, about the double edged blade…..

as previously established, Uther is a fucking dick and wants his children to obey him but also adore him. with this behavior, the Pendragon siblings react in two ways: with anger & contempt or submission and remorse

way #1

i’m gonna start with Morgana because anger is the easiest to pick out throughout the show. in the first episode of the first season, our introduction to Morgana’s character is her lecturing Uther about executing the man Merlin witnessed upon entering Camelot (such a warm welcome for Emrys, mh?)

MORGANA I just don't think chopping someone's head off is cause for a celebration. That poor mother. UTHER It was simple justice for what he'd done. MORGANA To whom? He practiced some magic, he didn't hurt anyone. UTHER You were not around twenty years ago, you have no idea what it was like. MORGANA How long are you going to keep punishing people for what happened then?

early on, it is easy to pick up on Morgana’s resentment and anger at Uther, who she believes is blinded by his fear of magic and his need for control (which she isn’t wrong about). also, we find that she isn’t one to back off when poking the bear (Uther). she does it constantly in seasons 1 & 2

MORGANA (1x03 Mark of Nimueh) Why would she kneel on a cold stone floor morning after morning when she could make these things happen with a snap of her fingers? Like an idle king!

MORGANA (1x08 The Beginning of the End) How can this child be your enemy? He's just a boy. UTHER He is a Druid. MORGANA Is that such a crime?…What have these people done to you? Why are you so full of hate?

UTHER (2x04 Lancelot and Guinevere) How many men would you have me sacrifice to save a servant? MORGANA As many as it takes!

to be honest, i wouldn’t be surprised if screaming, arguing and berating Uther about his morals and ethics is her way of proving that she is not weak or submissive to his actions. i mean, Morgana grew up in a household the complete opposite from her time in Camelot. Gorlois, the man whom Morgana considers to be her father and one and only family member, was said to be “just” and “kind” and someone that Uther even considered a good friend who openly kept him in check. Morgana, until the age of ten, understood parental love and empathy unlike Arthur, who spent his whole life without any good or healthy substance of it.

the culture of Camelot and Uther’s wrath is not something Morgana was ever able to fully acclimate to as Uther himself pointed out in 1x12. She “was at odds with [him] since the beginning” and could never picture herself as a Pendragon (point further proven in 4x05: she looked revolted when Queen Annis compared her to Uther) because she didn’t share in their idea of magic = evil and a king = absolute control.

ironic in terms of future plot events, isn’t it :’)

way #2

compare that to Arthur: man’s respressed af. keeps all his emotions under lock and key if they are anything but haughty and serious. y’all, Arthur even says it himself how he “[can't] disagree with Father [Uther] in public.” whenever Arthur finds himself at odds with Uther, he holds his tongue and waits until he can disobey secretly (2x05 when he leaves to rescue Gwen, 1x08 when he helps Morgana sneak out Mordred in the dark of the night, 2x08 when he sneaks out to meet Morgause for more info about his mom, etc). it is only the rare moments when Arthur feels impassioned enough to speak up without fearing any retribution does Arthur talk back at him (so satisfying 👌)

ARTHUR (1x03 Mark of Nimueh) [Morgana’s] right, Father. You hear the word magic, you no longer listen.

ARTHUR (2x08 Sins of the Father) This is what fuels your hatred for those who practice magic. Rather than blame yourself for what you did, you blame them….You hunted her kind like animals! How many hundreds have you condemned to death to ease your guilt?!….You speak of honour and nobility! You're nothing but a hypocrite and a liar!

ARTHUR (3x10 Queen of Hearts) You can't forbid my feelings any more than I can. I won't deny them any longer, I love her. I love Guinevere.

we can even compare how the two react to Uther’s violence towards them

(ahahahahahaaaaa what a wonderful dad)

on the left, you see Arthur’s face right when Uther crushes the morteus flower needed to heal Merlin (his manservant/friend/????) and on the right, is Morgana after Uther discovers she was harboring a Druid child in her chambers and she refuses to listen to his reason.

notice how both faces are remarkably similar 👀

however, Arthur’s look of shock and dismay come from his hope that Uther would do the right thing. that he would help save Merlin’s life from dying of poison. that he wouldn’t use this as a method to teach Arthur “what it means to disobey and cross the king.” he truly did hope, just like he always does with the people he holds close. Arthur cannot help but hope and trust that those close to him will not betray him and yet so many do. hence the remorse

looking at Morgana, her shock comes from the fact that this might be the first time Uther reacted to her words and actions in a physical manner. my suspicion is that most of the time, all Morgana previously got was Uther reprimanding her and yelling at her to stop questioning his methods (bc, let’s be real, she was the favorite child.) never has he lifted a finder on her like Arthur and i have proof (cue transcript!)

AND! and, Arthur is constantly warning Morgana about not angering Uther any further because of the consequences she might face (consequences this boy is very familiar with) when Uther deems it necessary to “teach” his children obedience.

UTHER (1x04 The Poisoned Chalice) You have to learn there's a right and a wrong way of doing things. I'll see you're let out in a week. Then you can find yourself another servant.

UTHER (3x10 Queen of Hearts) You have caused this to happen, Arthur. My decision is final [...] This is for your own good. - UTHER She will die. The enchantment will be broken. You'll see I was right.

UTHER (2x08 Sins of the Father) I am protecting you from your own foolishness!

so educational 🥰 but see, because Uther presents his punishments as lessons, Arthur himself views them as just a fucked up but meaningful way of his father’s concern because “yeah, I am the first born son and only heir to the throne. of course I need to learn not to do silly things like disobey, talk back to him, be my own person.” <- I’m paraphrasing here

Arthur does and has never seen a way out of the life thrust upon him by Uther (see 3x06). succeeding Uther as king, marrying a noblewoman of high standing for heirs and alliance strength was always expected of him. Arthur never saw a way out of this. even when he and Gwen were in their secret relationship phase, Arthur had to remind himself that this would never last. he loved her and knew she loved him, but there was always that reminder (that sounded a lot like Uther) in the back of his head telling him that it would never last so long as he was prince. he had a duty (constructed by Uther) to serve Camelot and going against his father would mean (in his eyes) that he is going against Camelot (as Uther always presented it to be).

so unlike Morgana, he did not kick and scream but stood firm because that was what he believed was stronger. if he stayed in his lane and did his part, then he would be a good king, maybe even a better one than his father, for Camelot. however, the show proves that differentiating himself from Uther actually made him the better king and more respected, but this is not the meta for that. I am getting side tracked.

OK: so we’ve established parental issues between the two siblings. now onto their very complex, complicated yet beloved dynamic

sO, as i mentioned in this post (because i am lazy and too tired to copy/paste the evidence from there), these siblings do care for one another. they just go about it in the most hilarious and repressed and in-denial way (hilarious to me 😤)

when we meet them, it’s established that these two have known each other for some time. enough for them to bicker and have banter, you know, as you do with a Pendragon. also, should add, neither character are ever aware they are blood-related until s3 (because of some weak-ass bitch named Uther), so you have that very, uh, interesting subplot in s1 that everybody forgets about until you rewatch it. (honestly, I have so many questions. number 1: why???? number 2: it’s only in s1—was it scrapped??? is it like it never existed???? what was its purpose to the plot??? bbc explain yourself—)

however, despite how much it is shown that they do care for one another, they’re relationship in s1 is still undefined and vague as if they also don’t know how to accurately define what the other means to them. it’s very similar to the whole “i really love this person so much but is what i’m feeling platonic, familial, or romantic?” because….you know, guy and girl besties who are close are typically expected to grow romantic feelings for each other, so tbh i would not be surprised if both mistook their love as romantically inclined in the beginning bc, reminder, neither of them were aware they were siblings until much later.

[and this is ALL i am saying on this subplot. i do not want to cause any negative discourse, so if anyone has a few choice words about it, either keep it to yourself or feel free to talk about it with people you know. personally? not a fan of the ship and never will be, but i am not here to post about that.]

anyway, have some featured receipts showing Arthur and Morgana slipping up and showing how much they care for each other.

SEE!!!! LOOK AT HOW THE CARE!!!! SEE HOW THEY WORRY FOR THE OTHER AND WISH TO PROTECT THEM FROM HARM!!! (and see how even when they’re on opposite sides there is still that same love. just more warped and corrupted T^T)

^worried/protective Morgana

^Arthur’s face after Merlin informs him that there’s an intruder heading to Morgana’s chambers

Morgana is very aware of Arthur’s trusting nature. Arthur is very aware of Morgana’s empathy and righteous nature. they understand each other so well which is why Morgana knew just how to harm Arthur in later seasons and why Morgana’s betrayal hit Arthur so hard. it’s also why he never stopped trying to reach out to her in s4 & s5. as @merlinemrys said in this lovely post, the show’s driving force is love. love of all kinds. whatever conflict it is, love is there at the center of it all and, in Arthur and Morgana’s case, it does not save them (just like how love does not save Merlin or Arthur from what lies ahead, as the op of the post pointed out).

that is what makes their relationship/love be like a double edged sword!! that is why they are edges of the same blade!!! they protect and fight for what they believe in and for the people they love, but the same blades cut deep and twist their wounds into a lasting scar.

it is because of Arthur’s love for Morgana that he cannot help but hope and mourn the woman he once knew. it is because of Morgana’s love for Arthur that her feelings of hatred are so strong and ugly.

like honestly,

look at them T^T compared to before

their relationship is so tragic T^T because we knew them before it all went wrong. we knew they cared and understood each other. we knew that for some time, they only had each other to rely on for a friend, a crutch, a breather for when the royal life was too much. both of them were fighters and strive to honor their values. both of them had once leaned on the other for support, had wanted nothing but happiness for each other.

fuck, they didn’t even get the chance to really be siblings because they found out too late, and by then Morgana was on a war path and Arthur only found out at the last minute.

like fuck, man

two sides of the same blade: forged with love, yet used for blood

screencaps brought to you by me, @sourdough-morbread, and farfarawaysite

#i will spare you the gorey details of me trying to fine decent screencaps & screenshots for this fucking post or else i’ll get pissed again #(i am considering whether it is worth it to go to war with youtube)#special thanks to my bestie mor for being there for me at the gorey times and helping me find more screenshots #fucking love you bestie 💕💕💕💕#also only including s1-2 bc i am tired and they are the ones where we get pendragon siblings not trying to kill each other #forgive me for always bringing up uther and the pendragon sibs’ upbringing with him it will happen again #also after hours of rereading transcripts and rewatching clips of bbc merlin: it is so obvious that uther cared and treated Morgana like hi #own child more than Arthur. like jfc he let’s her get away with so much stuff he is way for gentle with his words towards her #when he realizes that he was too cruel or rude like bro…..where tf was that for arthur #it just adds to the complicated sibling dynamic because there is the added jealousy and resentment of knowing a parent loved another more #literally most of Morgana’s time with Uther was her at odds with him and yet he views her as his child more #well no ducking dur that Arthur ‘i-would-do-anything-to-receive-my-father’s-love-attention-and-pride’ Pendragon resents Morgana for #always being the one Uther goes easier on and finds ways to turn a blind eye for like wtf #also during my research i was reminded of how done dirty Gwen’s story was by bbc #loses her father to a king fearful of magic barely gets to mourn him bc she now has to keep up the smithy and her maid job; reunites #with her brother who’s been AWOL for some years and still they don’t get a moment to talk about their dad and mourn TOGETHER #her storyline is pushed aside by s4 bc now she’s fulfilling the role of Arthur’s love interest and oh yeah they still need to incorporate #the lanceot/guinevere scandal and then banish her for some episodes without even letting her brother be mad about it like ?????#anyway #continued saga of fluffy rereading transcripts -> uther: ‘it’s been a long time since Ygraine…since anyone’ me: ducking liar >:(#[sir leon begins the slow clap] king you dropped this 👑IT IS 1AM HELP 😂#place your bets on where my laziness for evidence came in! (I honestly don’t know lol scavenging evidence is all a blur)#spent 2 days on this post lol #me: ok i think that’s enough evidence for this argument…………ok maybe ONE more won’t hur—#me after day 2: ….am i done???? am i free????#pendragon siblings coming behind me with a steel chair: nah mate!#me: FUCK THERE’S MORE #bbc merlin #merlin meta #pendragon sibs

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