On the Childhood Gender-Identity Diagnosis

Sheila Jeffreys’s book, Gender Hurts: A Feminist Analysis of the Politics of Transgenderism, provides the history of the construction of the transgenderism narrative, a discussion of the political relationship of transgenderism and feminism, and details of the psychological and physical harm that transgenderism inflicts on transgender-identified individuals and those in relationship with them. Chapter 1 lays out the thesis of transgenderism as a social construct, and Chapter 2 evaluates the key interactions between transgenderism and feminism. Chapters 3–6 review the harm of transgenderism from different perspectives and for diverse populations. Chapters 7–8 close the book with a more detailed analysis of transgenderism from a feminist perspective. The book is accessible to a wide audience and should be of interest to all who want to broaden their understanding of the development of transgenderism within a sociopolitical context as well as learn of the psychological and physiological risks associated with its medicalization.