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Alex a vulva, but over time, his mother, Raquel Sánchez, has realized that she always had a boy. From a very young age, she began to notice things that typically differentiate girls and boys, seeing him pull out pigtails, hair clips, dresses… “I bought him mostly unisex clothes, but even so, he would take them from his older brother,” she recalls.

This mother from Madrid's story is similar to that of most trans children who have been fortunate enough to be born into families sensitive to their reality. As these children grow older and begin to perceive gender markers, a process of exploration and adjustment begins, often leaning towards what is socially considered feminine or masculine. For child psychomotor therapist Cristina López, gender begins in other people: "It's already present in me when I speak to the children I work with, in the games I expect them to play, the personality I expect them to develop, the developmental milestones we specialists record... everything is marked by gender roles." When preferences or behavior don't align with these expectations, alarm bells can ring. "Some parents associate it with pathologies. They say things like: 'He plays like a girl, that's not normal.' But that's a social phenomenon, not a pathology," López continues.

In the case of little Alex, the process was explicit from the beginning. “One day we were talking, when he was five years old, and he said to me: Mom, I want to be a boy,” Sánchez recalls. “I responded by arguing that girls can also have short hair like he wanted, and that when they grow up they can also have girlfriends. He replied: I want to have a girlfriend, but as a boy,” she adds. Shortly after, the day he got his hair cut, he spent the whole afternoon looking at himself in the mirror and playing. “He said to me: Mom, don’t I look handsome? It was the first time he himself had changed his pronouns,” she remembers.

“We are not an ideology, we are people”

Those who watch morning television debates or read certain books will understand Álex's case as the triumph of a supposed "queer lobby. Trans people, and especially trans minors, are the target of books like * Nobody Is Born in the Wrong Body: Success and Misery of Gender Identity * (whose presentation in Barcelona in May 2022 was boycotted by LGBTQ+ activists who suffered police violence), which claim to dismantle the so-called "gender ideology" that, they argue, underlies demands such as gender self-determination, enshrined in the 'trans law' promoted by the Ministry of Equality in 2023.

“We are not an ideology, we are people,” reminds pioneering activist and former member of the Madrid Assembly, Carla Antonelli. “They slap a Star of David on our foreheads when they talk about the 'transgenderism' that is invading the country. They have dehumanized trans people so that it seems as if they are not talking about people,” laments Antonelli, who believes that “transphobia has become so normalized that there are those who dare to say things like the rape of a trans woman is less of a rape because she cannot get pregnant.”

"We can't even get them to brush their teeth, and we're going to get them to change their gender? How do they think anyone's identity can be changed from the outside?"

Powerful media outlets and influential figures are behind the rise of trans-exclusionary ideology, which has seduced former vice presidents and long-standing feminists. “If you think you’re a feminist and maintain a discourse that mirrors that of the far right, don’t forget that they’ll try to take you down too if they have the chance,” Antonelli warns.

Natalia Aventín, president of the trans-allied families association Euforia, recalls that “the TERF discourse [an acronym for trans-exclusionary reaction] was already there.” She points out that, for years, they have endured being called “trans-changing mothers,” as if they were behind their children’s identity, she denounces. “We can’t even get them to brush their teeth, and we’re going to get them to change their gender? How do they think anyone’s identity can be changed from the outside?” she asks.

Raquel Sánchez explains the same experience: “When I had the court hearing for Álex’s name change, the boy got nervous and wouldn’t speak, so I had to explain it myself. I told the judge that no matter how much you love having a child, no parent would go through all this on a whim. Do you think I need to go through this whole process? Not at all. I’m doing it because it makes my son happy. It’s in his nature; I’ve always seen it.”.

“Trans children have always existed, but they were repressed. The vast majority of us had to hide, to live in the closet.”

Debunking myths

In response to the trans-exclusionary reaction's obsession with judging the development of trans children as if it were a novel phenomenon, Carmen García de Merlo, states emphatically that "trans children have always existed, but they were repressed. The vast majority of us had to hide, live in the closet; of course, I was also a trans child."

The rumors about minors being 'hormonally manipulated' and 'mutilated' are a constant feature of hate speech. García de Merlo does indeed recall the case of an acquaintance, but in the opposite sense: “It was a trans man who once refused to wear his communion dress. They forced him to, and then took him to a psychiatrist.” The doctor pumped him full of pills and, “when they didn't do anything, they injected him with female hormones, under the pretext that he was deficient in them. That was indeed a case of a minor being hormonally manipulated and psychiatrized from a young age, but by the system,” he recalls.

Activists are tired of confronting these kinds of lies. Carla Antonelli points out that there isn't even a hormone specifically designed for trans people: “The treatments we use are the same ones that exist for other things. The estrogens that trans women take are menopausal patches, contraceptive treatments… things that are already on the market.” She also notes that hormone inhibitors—which delay the onset of puberty but don't contain hormones of the opposite sex—are frequently used in minors “who experience precocious puberty, especially in girls who start their periods very early, at eight or nine years old.” In this case, since they are cisgender children, “no one raises a point about whether it's right or wrong,” she laments.

“Those who insist on biology seem to ignore the existence of intersex people.”

The most common fear raised against hormone treatments is that of reversal. What happens, the trans-exclusionary reaction asks, if the child regrets it? In the case of hormone blockers, nothing. Puberty will run its course once the treatment ends. And in the case of cross-sex hormones (estrogens for trans girls and testosterone for trans boys), these are only started at 15 or 16 years old. “By then, the minor may have already been expressing their gender identity for a decade. It’s something they’re clear about,” Antonelli points out. “Are there people who ‘detransition’?” García de Merlo asks. “Well, yes, but it’s a very small percentage. Are we going to focus on those cases and not the majority?” she answers. Some studies, such as 'Detransition rates in a national UK Gender Identity Clinic' (2019) and 'An Analysis of All Applications for Sex Reassignment Surgery in Sweden' (2014), place this percentage between 0.47 percent and 2 percent. When cross-sex hormones are discontinued, the body eventually recovers the hormones it produces naturally.

Those who question the decisions of transgender children are “infantilizing their self-perception,” explains Cristina López. This child development specialist believes that when people say it’s just a game or “kids being kids,” they’re ignoring the fact that “children are always playing, and identity is built through play. Of course, we shouldn’t accept Juan’s desire to be called Violeta one day. We should accept it, just as he might want to be Batman another day,” she shares. But if this behavior persists, “if the child insists on maintaining their identity over time, we need to listen to them and observe them,” she advises.

López also points to one of the biological bases that underpins the trans-exclusionary reaction. “Those who insist on biology seem to ignore the existence of intersex. They haven't determined what to do with them,” she argues. The existence of these people, who demonstrate the diversity of the sex/gender system, does not, however, translate into a more open-minded approach. “Biology is the queen of diversity; it is not something stable, static, or that provides answers to everything,” concludes Natalia Aventín.

“We have been turned into human targets. If this were happening to another group… it simply wouldn’t be allowed.”

Hormone therapy and surgery are often the only options offered by the medical community for transitioning, although there are growing voices questioning these possibilities. Hormones and surgery are not a walk in the park, but Raquel Sánchez would like people to listen to her son. “He’s six years old and he already tells me he doesn’t want breasts, he wants hair. And that he wants a man’s voice. He asks me: ‘What can I put in my mouth to have a man’s voice?’” she says. She insists that no parent wants their child to be on medication for life, “but their happiness depends on it.”.

Fixation on trans issues

Supposedly scientific books, heated debates that give free rein to hatred, opinion pieces in supposedly progressive newspapers… “It’s regrettable to admit it, but transphobia is in vogue,” laments Carla Antonelli. “Some people have gained media attention solely for their attacks on trans people. It’s scandalous that such reactionary and false ideas, like the one about rapists in restrooms, have taken root,” she points out, referring to the oft-debunked myth of supposed trans women transitioning to use women’s restrooms for criminal purposes. These debates revolve around a trans community that, the activist reminds us, is estimated at only 50,000 people in Spain: “We’ve been turned into human targets. If this were happening to another group… it simply wouldn’t be allowed.”.

Faced with the notion of being trans as a fad—widespread by the trans-exclusionary reaction on platforms like TikTok and YouTube, where teenagers abound sharing their transitions—Carmen García de Merlo believes in the importance of the human dimension to help people understand their experiences. “The point isn’t to give a lecture full of academic theories, but to talk to society about our lives. To talk about the rejection from our families, about how hard the journey is. Are they really going to continue believing that we go through all this on a whim?” she explains.

Being a girl or a boy “isn’t like wanting to go to Disneyland Paris,” Raquel Sánchez states emphatically. “My son Álex can’t feel any other way. Anyone who gets close to him, even those who had doubts, sees what’s there: he’s a boy. This is natural. In nature, there are boys with vulvas and girls with penises, and they have to understand that,” she continues. However, she recalls the case of her pediatrician, who asked her and her partner if, as parents, they weren’t going to put a stop to this: “I immediately filed a complaint at the school and changed pediatricians.”.

Natalia Aventín's wish is that everyone "approach trans children, even with all their prejudices, because reality will give them a rude awakening. When people see reality, their perception changes." She includes "people who are allies by intuition," but who haven't delved deep enough to refer to these children accurately. "They think they're helping and say things like 'the child who wanted to be a girl.' This happens because there are always many cis people talking about trans people in the media. If trans people were at the center of public conversations about themselves, the outcome would be very different," she points out.

Fortunately, cases like Alex's and his mother's demonstrate that a new normal is taking hold among trans children. “The day after we told the other mothers at school about the name change, everyone was calling him Alex. It's incredible how beautiful the transition has been. We adults are the ones who create the problems; the children take everything in stride,” she recalls, and proudly recounts how one of those mothers told her that her daughter had said Alex was proud to have a mom who didn't force him to be a girl. “Where is my son going to get that from? Where is he going to learn it? What he did learn is that because he has a vulva, he was obligated to be a girl. That's something he definitely saw around him,” she concludes. Luckily, his family, his community, and he himself have proven her wrong.