Response to Book Review Essay “Trying to Pass off Transphobia as Psychoanalysis and Cruelty as ‘Clinical Logic.’” by Avgi Saketopolou. Psychoanal. Q., 91:177-190.

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Notes

1 The appeal court overturned this judgment in October 2021. But this judgement is often misinterpreted. The Court did not opine on whether children and young people can or cannot consent. Instead, it took the view that the Divisional Court (where the Judicial Review was heard) lacked the authority to reach such a judgment. A useful analogy would be to imagine a court finding that an official who had issued a traffic fine lacked the authority to do so: this would have no bearing on whether or not the offence had been committed. This judgment was restricted appropriately only to the issue of consent and thus the many very serious concerns as regards lack of ordinary governance raised in the Judicial Review still stand.

2 https://cass.independent-review.uk/publications/interim-report/.

3 https://www.gov.uk/employment-tribunal-decisions/mrs-s-appleby-v-the-tavistock-and-portman-nhs-foundation-trust-2204772-2019.

4 Avgi Saketopoulou (2022). On trying to pass off transphobia as psychoanalysis and cruelty as “clinical logic.” Psychoanal. Q., 91:177-190.

5 Bell, D. (2020) First do no harm. Int. J. Psychoanal., 101:1031-1038.

6 Blass, R. B., Bell, D. & Saketopoulou, A. (2021). Can we think psychoanalytically about transgenderism? An expanded live Zoom debate with David Bell and Avgi Saketopoulou, moderated by Rachel Blass. Int. J. Psychoanal., 102:968-1000.