Psychology Gone Crazy: Time to Decertify the DSM-5

Rarely is there a discussion of under what authority a male can compete physically with females. World-class tennis champion Martina Navratilova says "transgender women" (men) are "cheating" if they compete in women's sports. What is the authority whereby a male can legally use the shower or restroom facilities or dressing rooms set aside for females? The problem is that there isn't a law or an authority, but rather the absence of terms used to describe mental disorders, specifically sexual disorders. For decades, transgenderism and gender identity disorder had been classified as mental disorders by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) in that organization's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). The DSM evolved from systems for collecting census and psychiatric hospital statistics and from a United States Army manual on mental illnesses. Revisions since its first publication in 1952 have incrementally added to the total number of mental disorders and removed those no longer considered mental illnesses.

In December 2012, the APA quietly announced changes to its DSM. In version 5, Transvestitism, Transgenderism, and Gender Identity Disorders were eliminated and replaced with a new term: "Gender Dysphoria." Dysphoria, apparently, is the distress a person experiences as a result of the sex and gender he was assigned at birth. With a stroke of a pen, transvestitism, transgenderism, and gender identity disorder were no longer considered mental disorders. In essence, the APA announced that the behaviors previously associated with transvestitism, transgenderism, and gender identity disorders are now considered "normal." Based on the DSM-5, if you are a male and identify as a female, this is now considered "normal." This new "normal" defies logic and common sense. One of the many unintended consequences of the APA's cowardly actions is that the new DSM is used as the authority for sports competitions — something the APA never envisioned and the DSM was never designed for. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders was supposed to offer a common language and standard criteria for the classification of mental disorders. It was not designed to be misused to give males the opportunity to capitalize on their athletic advantages over females. The most important aspect of the DSM is that it "serves as a universal authority for psychiatric diagnoses." There are few parts of America or the United Nations the DSM doesn't touch or influence. "It is used, or relied upon, by clinicians, researchers, psychiatric drug regulation agencies, health insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, the legal system, and policy makers." Athletic organizations are not listed. In previous versions of the DSM, where the behaviors associated with transvestitism, transgenderism, and gender identity disorders were considered a mental disorder, health insurance companies and hospitals would not authorize so-called sexual reassignment surgery for a mental illness. That "corrective" surgery was not warranted. Those seeking sexual reassignment had to pay for the surgery to approximate that effect themselves, either at a private clinic or overseas. Prior to the DSM-5, the appropriate treatment for gender identity disorders was therapy. With the new DSM-5, no longer is gender identity disorder considered a mental disorder. Those people with previous gender identity disorders argued that they no longer have a mental illness; rather, they have a medically correctable condition, just as surgery is needed to correct a physical birth defect such as cleft lip and palate. There were many members of the APA who saw that the aggressive lobbying efforts of LGBTQ and other sexual activists would result in a substantial body of APA member psychiatrists kowtowing to the activists' demands. In one of the most artful displays of a mental illness, Dr. Dana Beyer wrote of their successful lobbying of the APA in "The End of Transgender as a Mental Illness": "Our greatest accomplishment on the Working Group was reconceptualizing the state of 'being trans' from a mental illness to a normal human variant." What the hell is a "normal human variant"? This is scene by scene from the movie Gaslight. Normal human "variants" don't pretend to be girls and then race or wrestle real girls. Variants need therapy, not lessons on how to cheat in athletics. There was more interest in changing the DSM to correct a perceived social injustice than understanding and treating a longstanding mental disorder. One side caved to social injustice and agreed to eliminate sexual identity disorders from the DSM. The other side didn't have the votes to stop the madness. Dr. Paul R. McHugh, the former psychiatrist-in-chief for Johns Hopkins Hospital, reiterated that transgenderism is a "mental disorder" that merits treatment, that sex change is "biologically impossible," and "that people who promote sexual reassignment surgery are collaborating with and promoting a mental disorder." Dr. McHugh was one of the losing 49% of the over 9,000-strong APA, whose vote failed to retain the DSM-4 standard regarding sexual identity disorders. "'Sex change' is biologically impossible," said Dr. McHugh. "People who undergo sex-reassignment surgery do not change from men to women or vice versa. Rather, they become feminized men or masculinized women. Claiming that this is civil-rights matter and encouraging surgical intervention is in reality to collaborate with and promote a mental disorder." Feminized men, whatever they have had done to themselves surgically or medically, can dress up in sports bras and running shoes and play make-believe female athletes, but they are still males competing against females. Martina said it: "They are cheating." The DSM as the U.S. universal authority for psychiatric diagnoses has been corrupted by external pressures. "Various authorities criticized that many DSM-5 revisions or additions lack empirical support; inter-rater reliability is low for many disorders; several sections contain poorly written, confusing, or contradictory information; and the psychiatric drug industry unduly influenced the manual's content. Many of the members of work groups for the DSM-5 had conflicting interests, including ties to pharmaceutical companies. Various scientists have argued that the DSM-5 forces clinicians to make distinctions that are not supported by solid evidence, distinctions that have major treatment implications, including drug prescriptions and the availability of health insurance coverage. General criticism of the DSM-5 ultimately resulted in a petition, signed by many mental health organizations, which called for outside review of DSM-5." There's only so much accomplished APA members, like Dr. Paul R. McHugh, can do against a social justice steamroller. The APA and its DSM have been fully compromised and are now subject to social engineering, undue influence, and new definitions that are not supported by the evidence. If you thought you had problems with men in your daughter's locker room or men winning women's track events, wait until the LGBTQ activists are able to remove their next offending personality disorder, pedophilia, from the DSM. Without their parent's knowing, transgenders and transvestites in drag are reading to children across the country, in schools and libraries. According to Nicole Russell in her article, "Forget Mr. Rogers: Drag Queen Reading Hour coming to a library near you," "[i]t's one thing for drag queens or transsexuals to lobby for equality via marches and even legislation. It's quite another to show up at a taxpayer-funded facility and showcase a very abnormal lifestyle as healthy, common, and educational." Kids coming from these events suddenly tell their folks they identify as another sex. Where do you think they get that from? The Trump administration needs to take the APA to court and decertify the compromised DSM-5 as the universal authority for psychiatric diagnoses in the United States and reject the APA's guidance and the DSM-5 as the source reference for mental illnesses. Secretary of health and human services Alex Azar should suspend the DSM-5 and form a working group to determine the need for a system of cataloging and diagnosing mental disorders that are not subject to the whims of political activists. The federal government federalized airport security when it learned that it had been fully compromised by a hostile and aggressive force whose sole goal was to destroy American culture. The APA has been fully compromised by a rabid group of sexual activists, and the DSM needs to be federalized and managed as a "national standard." A national diagnostic and statistical manual should not be subject to social justice and party politics influence.