Handcuffed Catholic priest was suffering from ‘stress-related self-bondage’ What does it really tell us about the views of society?

US: Handcuffed Catholic priest was suffering from ‘stress-related self-bondage’ says bishop

A Catholic priest in Illinois, who last year got stuck in a pair of handcuffs, was engaged in “non-sexual” conduct at the time, and the event was brought on by “stress” – according to a bishop.

The incident happened on 28 November when Father Tom Donovan of St Aloysius Church, Springfield, Illinois, called 911 from the rectory and told a dispatcher that he needed help getting out of handcuffs.

The Illinois Times quoted sources as suggesting the priest was also wearing some sort of gag – as his voice sounded garbled or muffled on the 911 audio recording.

Father Donovan has since taken a leave of absence from his church.

In a statement on Tuesday, Bishop Thomas John Paprocki of the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois said: “On December 8th, I met with Father Donovan and Monsignor Carl Kemme, my Vicar General, in my office at the Catholic Pastoral Center.

“Father Donovan said that he was mortified by what happened and acknowledged that the information that had been reported to me was basically accurate. He insisted that he had been alone the whole time of this incident and denied that there was any sexual component to this.”

The statement added that Father Donovan “is being treated by a clinical therapist and is receiving appropriate medical care” and that he is “suffering from a psychological condition that manifests itself in self-bondage as a response to stress.”

ARTICLE HERE

Bishop in charge of Illinois priest who called 911 after getting stuck in handcuffs defends him, releases statement:

 "The unfortunate result of such patterns of life—in no way limited to the experience of Catholic priests—is that persons often find themselves seeking patterns of 'self-medication' to soothe emotional turmoil. Alcoholism, the use of illicit drugs, compulsive gambling, sexual acting out and the use of pornography are some of the more common manifestations, none of which were present in this situation.

Instead, according to the clinical therapist, Father Donovan is suffering from a psychological condition that manifests itself in self-bondage as a response to stress.* The clinical therapist also confirms that the strict absence of illicit sexual behaviors, relationships, and patterns reveal that this self-bondage is to be understood as non-sexual in nature."

ARTICLE HERE

Bondage priest: Illinois incident raises some interesting questions

BY BARRY DUKE – JANUARY 14, 2013

WHEN police were called late last year to free father Thomas Donovan from a pair of handcuffs, they made haste to the St Aloysius Church rectory in Springfield, where they found him with his hands cuffed behind him, and a gag in his mouth.

Father Donovan and a pair of cuffs

Which begs the question: how did he manage to speak so clearly when he telephoned for help?  I can vouch for the fact that one can only issue muffled cries with a bit between your teeth.

But you can clearly hear a recording of his call for assistance on this link.

The Springfield Police Department report reveals that when officers arrived at the church at 4:45 am on November 28, they found the priest wearing an orange jumpsuit and:

A leather bondage type mask with bar in his mouth.

His hands were also cuffed BEHIND his back.

Donovan declined medical treatment after he was uncuffed by cops, who asked if anyone else was in the rectory. The priest, who said he was alone, told officers that he:

Put himself in this configuration and does this from time to time.

Donovan explained to police that:

This time he put the handcuffs on with the keyhole up instead of down.

This prevented him from freeing himself with a handcuff key (which he showed to officers). The cops left after Donovan apologised to them.

The priest, now on leave from his post with the Diocese of Springfield, did not further detail why he placed himself in such an unorthodox “configuration.”

The report opened up a floodgate of speculation from commenters:

Said one:

Begs the question as to who was there with him. If I had to take a guess: he either got double-crossed by the kid who tied him up or he met a hooker who decided to rob him instead.

Another said:

His faith was strong but he needed proof … and the summoner called in Brethren under the direction of the instrument that calleth 911 … and his chains and his bondage were cast aside …

A third said:

He certainly is not the Harry Houdini of the priesthood, but no doubt he will improve with practice.

I was rather surprised that no-one suggested that ALL priests should be bound and gagged.

FULL ARTICLE

SUMMARY BY ME......

So, Stress = Bondage = getting treated by a clinical therapist and then receiving appropriate medical care = because we are “suffering from a psychological condition.." =  which is an 'unfortunate result of such patterns of life' = so we need 'self-medication' to soothe our emotional turmoil = and choose bondage instead of Alcoholism, the use of illicit drugs, compulsive gambling, sexual acting out and the use of pornography, which are all listed in the same class.

Hmm, seems I'm done for!

A study on Nerve Damage in Rope Bondage

I found this article on Nerve Damage caused by Rope Bondage. It is well worth a read and quite informative.

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Nerve Damage Study, Version II, Part I

Revision: 23 January 2013

I have made a number of revisions to my original nerve damage study in the light of experience, discussions with models, fellow riggers and my teachers in Japan, further study of how the top Japanese riggers tie and access to better medical modelling software. That said, we are all different and there will never be a guide that can say “Put the rope there like that and everything will be fine”. Furthermore, some of my theories are just that, so are not immutable or necessarily correct, my only qualification is experience with rope and an inquiring mind. If you know better or can add to the advice herein, I welcome your input. Please check the revision date above as changes will be added. This is will always be work in progress as our knowledge is constantly growing.

  

Analysis of upper body nerve injuries

The main focus of this study is injuries caused by upper body ties. In most cases these involve what might be generally referred to as a ‘box-tie’ in western terms. I have used the term box-tie to refer to ties, encompassing the arms and upper torso, often used for suspension. Similar ties are often referred to as ‘gote’ or ‘takate-kote’ within shibari circles. Japanese forms vary considerably in style and functionality.

Some, like those deriving from the Akechi Denki school, tend to be better suited to dynamic suspension whilst others are primarily only for use on the floor, e.g. Yukimura ryu, or for partial or static suspension. It is important to understand the limitations and use such ties appropriately. For example, you wouldn’t drive a F1 car across a ploughed field or enter a Landrover into an F1 race. The same differences can apply with these ties.

The purpose of this document is to examine the construction methods and possible implications for the nerves likely to be affected. We will examine the commons elements and the areas that might cause problems. However, these hazards are not unique to this tie and the information is relevant to upper body bondage in general.  Whilst suspension multiplies the forces and inherent risks, similar problems can occur during floor-work particularly if the person tied is lying on a binding or it is under load, e.g. floor-based or partial suspension.

TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE CLICK HERE FULL ARTICLE

Should BDSM become part of general sexual education?

Published November 9, 2012 | By Katrien Devolder  | LINK HERE

“BDSM [Bondage, Discipline, Sadism, Masochism] might be mainstream now, but it has a new PR problem. I blame Christian Grey.” writes ‘sexual submissive’ Sophie Morgan in an article in the Guardian.

I started reading E.L. James’ Fifty Shades of Grey but didn’t get very far. It’s very badly written (guess that’s no longer a secret) and, well, I found it incredibly boring (Pride and Prejudice is more exciting, I think). In any case, the book is just a starting point for something I began thinking about after a recent conversation with a friend who is part of the ‘BDSM  community’.

The legal status of BDSM varies from country to country. In the UK, it is illegal if it results in any injury which is more than “transient or trifling”. Possessing extreme pornography is a criminal offence, which, for obvious reasons, may be problematic for those who are into SM. Moreover, those who engage in any kind of BDSM are not legally protected against discrimination on the basis of their sexual preferences (for example, they can be, and have been, fired for that reason).

I haven’t studied the issue in depth, but it seems to me that BDSM should be legal, the main reason being that it concerns a consensual sexual act by adults that doesn’t cause harm to third parties. (There’s an interesting paper by Nafsika Athanassoulis arguing why SM can be considered a consensual sexual act). But I was thinking about a further question. Should we put more effort into breaking the BDSM taboo? For example, in countries where BDSM is legal, should it be part of general sexual education?

It seems that there are many misunderstandings and misconceptions about BDSM. In the Guardian article, Morgan mentions one of the most common ones: that ‘a submissive’ prefers to experience pain and degradation in her or his everyday life. (In Fifty Shades of Grey, a young woman has a 24/7 submissive relationship with Christian Grey, a rich dominant man.) Morgan writes that “being submissive is only one facet of the person I am – and not even the most important. I’m a 33-year-old girlfriend, daughter, sister, friend, journalist, Scrabble fiend, caffeine addict and dozens of other things besides…[...]… The sexual aspect of my relationship is completely separate from other aspects of it – I am in control of my finances, my reproductive health, my career, my social life and all the other things that feminism has fought for.”

Perhaps if people knew more about BDSM, they might be less inclined to have and express negative attitudes towards those who engage in it. Perhaps it would become more difficult to fire (or not employ) people because they are into BDSM. It would definitely become easier for those who feel drawn to it to ‘come out’, or to feel comfortable with themselves. (A parallel can be drawn with the growing acceptance of homosexuality.) An obvious way to break the taboo would be to make BDSM part of general sexual education (just like pornography and homosexual sex became part of it – at least in progressive countries like Belgium).

So I was wondering: are there any good reasons against making BDSM part of general sexual education? Three potential reasons came to my mind.

(1) Including BDSM in general sexual education may open the door to unguided experimenting, which could result in (potentially permanent) physical and psychological damage to those involved. Apparently those who are interested in BDSM typically find their way to it via SM clubs. These clubs have rules that their visitors need to abide by (e.g., consent, safe words, not getting drunk so as to avoid losing control). Respect seems to be a central value within the SM scene. Newcomers are initiated – not only to techniques but also to safety measures and rules. So one concern might be that ‘popularizing’ BDSM may result in more people engaging in it without such initiation, or without the relatively safe context these clubs offer. On the other hand, sexual education could perhaps do an equally good job as BDSM clubs do now.

(2) By including BDSM in standard sexual education we may promote morally objectionable social norms, such as the objectification of women. This is the reason why some oppose (the legalisation of) prostitution. However, I believe that it is precisely a lack of information about BDSM that may lie at the heart of this concern. As Morgan points out in her article, feminism and BDSM are perfectly compatible. It’s consensual and, moreover, it is well known that it’s not necessarily the woman who is the submissive. But there’s a related concern that perhaps may not be so easily dismissed. Unlike other ‘genres’ of sexual activity, BDSM seems to involve ignoring, or dismissing important and deeply embedded social norms and values, such as autonomy, respect and ‘do no harm’. Of course, those engaging in BDSM do not really dismiss these norms and values (there may be exceptions), but they temporarily act as if they do (I assume that’s what it’s all about). Perhaps then, if BDSM were part of general sexual education, the strict line between playing a rapist and being a rapist could be blurred. I’m mainly thinking of people who are not really into kinky games, but who use the general acceptance of BDSM as an easy excuse for sexual acts that do involve disrespect for the other.

(3) Including BDSM in general sexual education may put soft pressure on young adolescents to engage with it. What I have in mind is the idea that ‘if you haven’t tried it all (or enjoy it all) you’re not a fully sexually developed individual’. While the same concern may apply to other sexual practices that are now included in sexual education, the physical and psychological consequences of engaging in BDSM under pressure may be more serious. On the other hand, we may wonder whether it is overly paternalistic to protect (young) people in this way. Also, good sexual education stresses the message that it’s fine if you like certain things, but it is equally fine if you don’t – preferences differ.

I do not have a conclusion. I think sexual education should be as inclusive as possible, but I also think that the above mentioned concerns are serious ones that need to be addressed.

References:

Athanassoulis Nafsika. The role of consent in sado-masochistic practices. Res Publica 2002;8(2): 141-55.

Morgan Sophie. ‘I like submissive sex but Fifty Shades is not about fun: it’s about abuse’. The Guardian 25 Aug 2012. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/aug/25/fifty-shades-submissive-sophie-morgan.

WATCH OUR TITILLATING TV SHOW!*

Courtesy of: DANNY BRODERICK LINK

*(But try not to enjoy it.)

As if it weren’t in enough trouble already over its decades-long sheltering of serial child molester Jimmy Savile (whom it also provided with opportunities for his one-sided pleasures), the BBC broadcast a simulation of a snuff movie on its main channel in its prime-time 9.00 pm slot on Sunday, leaving itself open to the charge of enabling illegal sexual activity across the nation.

In the first of a new series called Ripper Street, which trades on the mystique of the brutal murders of young women in East London in the late 1880s (a recurring motif in British crime drama – see, for example, ITV’s own recent prime-time drama series Whitechapel, about a modern day East End still absorbed in Jack The Ripper’s miasma), it centred on the activities of a fictitious aristocrat who hired young prostitutes in order to murder them during sex in various live tableau drawn from Grand Tour classical scenarios (Pharaoh strangles Egyptian nubile in front of pyramids, etc).

The episode depicted a scene being filmed by a nascent cinematographer, the resultant celluloid constituting a new art form that foreshadowed the current age of extreme internet porn. Not that a snuff movie acted out as a drama within the context of a detective fiction on TV is in any breach of the law in itself, or for that matter, good taste — if present day standards in cinema are a guide. But it provided plenty of opportunity for a breach of the law to take place. All that would be required is that a viewer copied the programme to their computer, isolated the particular segments that depicted a death taking place, and kept this for what could be considered sexual pleasure of their own (as opposed to the fictitious pleasure of the on-screen character).

The law is quite specific here. Such a segment of moving imagery contravenes Sections 63 and 64 of the Criminal Justice and Information Act 2008, which states that: “It is an offence for a person to be in possession of an extreme pornographic image … if it portrays, in an explicit and realistic way … an act which threatens a person’s life”, and “if it is of such a nature that it must reasonably be assumed to have been extracted (whether with or without other images) solely or principally for the purpose of sexual arousal”.

So, can the BBC be accused of enabling such pleasure in its depiction of such an image? Dramas like this play on the allure of so-called deviant sexual behaviours (quite how deviant they actually are is for another discussion), showing gratuitous acts of sexual violence while simultaneously presenting them as evil and in need of prevention by the heroic acts of decent guardians of public probity. Mostly it concerns the recurring figure of the Damsel in Distress, a young, attractive, innocently trusting woman led into danger and graphically disabled (usually involving bondage) while subjected to the rapacious attentions of a persecuting male.

Such scenes can be played overtly or covertly, often with no hint of the sexual connotations (Ripper Street plays it straight ahead kinky), though the fact such connotations exist is suggested by the wording of the law itself (“must reasonably be assumed”). Often though, a direct nod to audience tastes is explicit. The recent success of the 50 Shades Of Grey novel franchise testifies to a widespread public appetite for the explicit power and submission elements of sexual play, something that mainstream film-makers have always acknowledged, with the bottom line of audience attendance uppermost in their artistic minds.

Recently the heroine of Channel 4′s much praised Homeland series fell into the hands of her prey, the worlds’s leading terrorist, and was subjected to death threats as she knelt bound and gagged at his feet (he was also shown being tender towards her in other scenes, underlining the erotic potential): a scene the whole series was almost committed to enact at some point or another.

Rather like the tabloid newspapers with their exposures of orgies, they are presented in a way that invites us to view them as wrong whilst deriving vicarious pleasure from graphic description and imagery. All of which is a case of mainstream culture reflecting the current climate of taste among its core audience, which in the case of Ripper Street, is pretty general. Society is not, and may never, be ready to openly acknowledge that a significant body of viewers derive libidinous pleasure from dramatic depictions of transgressive sexual behaviour, but by presenting it in contexts that temper the otherwise aggressive consumption, programme makers like the BBC can present the murder of a young woman in an explicit sex scene and not break the law. And it can do this with an implicit understanding that the programme created has a sexual allure.

So what about that law and its wording? Doesn’t it amount to the most ridiculously outmoded philosophical standpoint? Isn’t the prurient control-freak meddling in the minds of the population symptomatic of so much political confusion? Many cases have been brought to court using the law, mostly when scenes of extreme internet porn have been found in raids conducted for other offences. But so far there does not appear to have been conviction brought for the possession of scenes extracted from legally sanctioned cinema or television releases.

But look at the clip below from the film Casino Royale, a scene that plays directly to a sadomasochistic male gay audience (though it is quite likely to appeal to straight women of certain tastes too), just as the scene in the original book by Ian Fleming was overtly placed to do. And consider this: the presence of this scene on your hard drive would constitute proof enough that you wanked over it, or used it to stimulate sex with a partner. And this is illegal under present law.

For more information and relevant sections of the law see www.spannertrust.org. Find the relevant sections of the Act here and the CPS guidelines here.

James Franco & Co. Discuss the BDSM-Porn Documentary ‘Kink’ at Sundance

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

A Candlelight Story: Part 3

This story was recommended by Twitter's gorgeous @MissDeviant1 and written by @no1slave: More at  http://no1slavetomissdeviant.blogspot.co.uk/

Mistress removed the cuffs from slave’s wrists, and slave collapsed on the floor exhausted.  “that’s right slave, you stay down there and lay on your back.  We have another fun activity in-store for you”, Mistress chuckled.  “you rest up, you will need your energy later.”  Slave was wondering what creative sadistic delights Mistress had in mind, but he took the opportunity to rest.

Mistress brought out the ankle cuffs and attached them to slave’s ankles and the suspending chain dangling from the ceiling.

Mistress stood over slave, “Are you ready to please your Mistress slave?”

“Yes Mistress, I’m always ready to please you Mistress!” he replied, nervous about what will happen next but anxious to perform well for his Mistress.

Mistress then hoisted slave by his ankles off the floor.  Slowly he was lifted with the sounds of the chain links ringing throughout the room until slave was fully off the floor suspended upside-down by his feet.  Slave could feel the blood slowly rush to his head as he saw his Mistress approach him.  It was a strange sensation seeing his Mistress and Sebastian upside-down and he felt completely vulnerable.

Mistress slowly walked around her slave circling his suspended body.  The sound of her stiletto heels on the wooden floor rang in his ears. Mistress’s hands circled his waist and caressed the rising welts of his arse.  The oil on his skin gave the welts a beautiful sheen accentuated by the candles lit throughout the room. There were varying shades of purple and red that seem to change colour right before her eyes.

“How does that arse feel slave?” Mistress looked down as she gave several hard slaps on his bottom.  Slave winced at each slap but tried to hold himself still not to disappoint Mistress.  “These are some beautiful marks, but I think we can do better, don’t you slave?  Are you ready to take some more pain for your Mistress?” she purred knowing her slave was excited to please her more.

“Yes Mistress!  PLEASE let me take more pain for you!” he replied sensing the blood rushing to his head.

“Good boy!  I think a game of noughts-and-crosses is in order.  Sebastian, please fetch me my special cane.”  Sebastian returned with thin acrylic cane and presented it to Mistress on his knees.  “Thank you Sebastian, now stand in front of slave.”

Mistress circled her slave slowly stopping in front of slave’s well-marked arse.  The raised welts ran across both arse cheeks, perfectly parallel from each other.  Mistress studied the marks and positioned herself for slave’s next round of torture.  “Are you ready slave?” Mistress asked as she raised the cane.

“Yes Mistress, and thank you Mistress” he replied.

With steady aim, the cane came down on his arse making a vertical line across the raised welts.  Mistress concentrated and delivered five more stokes on the same spot.  The vertical mark ran perfectly across existing horizontal welts on his left cheek.  The mark quickly turned into a raised crimson welt.  Mistress was very pleased and positioned herself for the next round.  Mistress applied five more vertical strokes next to the previous one, taking her time to ensure accuracy.  Slave let out a yelp on each stroke trying desperately to take the pain for his Mistress.

Sebastian was mesmerized by his Mistress.  Mistress was getting very excited, her eyes lit up with each stroke, smiling as she continued to satisfy her sadistic pleasure.  Sebastian was getting very aroused seeing his Mistress sadistically turned-on.  “Oh my Sebastian!” Mistress stopped momentarily, “are we getting excited?”

“Slave, you are making way too much noise.  It is time to keep you a little busy”  Mistress raised slave several inches higher off the floor to that his mouth was perfectly aligned with Sebastian’s growing hard-on.  “you know what to do slave.  You make sure you keep that cock hard for your Mistress”

Slave held the base of Sebastian’s cock watching the shaft swell with ridges more pronounced.  Slave then eagerly used his tongue to circle Sebastian’s cock, running his tongue up and down the raging hard-on.  “good boy!  Mistress has trained you very well.” she purred as she positioned herself for his right cheek.

Whack! Mistress delivered the first stroke running perfectly across the existing welts.  Slave let out a yell in pain.  “You keep still slave and deep throat that cock.  It has been a long time for Sebastian.  Before I am through, I want you to make him cum.” Mistress ordered.  “yes Mistress, thank you Mistress”

Mistress was truly excited now.  She was ready to finish her masterpiece, torturing her slave while he was satisfying a huge black cock.  She was light-headed at the thought, but now she concentrated.  Whack…Whack…Whack… she came down on accurately on the same spot with a perfect welt forming.  Slave grimaced in pain but still eagerly deep-throating Sebastian’s cock.  Sebastian was groaning watching his Mistress’s sadistic smile while slave was devouring his cock.  Whack….Whack…Whack…Mistress formed a new vertical line, smiling and breathing heavily.  Slave continued to deep-throat Sebastian’s cock, his head bobbing up-and-down on his 8” shaft.  Slave could taste a bit of pre-cum as he eagerly continued.   Mistress prepared for the final welt, Whack….whack….whack….whack… as the 3rd welt was forming.  Slave’s eyes were watering from the strokes and the huge cock pushing down his throat.  As Mistress delivered the final stroke….WHACK…Sebastian let out a loud groan as he exploded into slave’s mouth.  Turned on and breathing heavily, Mistress commanded, “you cock-sucking whore!  you take all of that cum slave, every drop!”  Slave eagerly complied, licking up and down his shaft, savouring every drop for his Mistress.  “Good boy! Good boy…my, we are a little cum bucket aren't we.”

Mistress stood back to admire the masterpiece she created on slave’s arse.  Both cheeks were beet red with perfect lines forming two sets of naughts-and-crosses.  Mistress had mixed emotions of sexual arousal and pride at her work, made with such sadistic precision.  She stood admiring the mixed colours on the perfectly formed welts dancing with the flickering shadows cast by the candlelights.  It took her breath away.

Mistress instructed Sebastian to stand back as she retrieved his chastity.  “Now Sebastian, I hope you enjoyed your little treat today.  We will need to keep this on you for the next 3 months.  If you are very good, we will see if you deserve another treat.  I am sure slave will be very eager, won’t you slave?”

“Yes Mistress, very eager, thank you”

Mistress instructed Sebastian to kneel in the corner as she approached her slave.  “You were very good tonight slave.  I think you deserve a treat too.”  Staring at his Mistress upside-down, slave was anxiously waiting for his Mistress’s next instructions.  “Slave, I see my cock is very hard. Stroke my cock for your Mistress.”  Slave slowly stroked his cock getting harder in his hands.  “let’s see if you can take more pain for your Mistress,” she purred as she grabbed the chain attached to his nipple clamps.  She pulled on the chain causing slave to swing back-and-forth.  Mistress smiled down upon her slave taking sadistic pleasure in torturing him.  Slave was stroking his cock faster as he continued to swing back-and-forth with Mistress tugging on his tortured nipples.  “Now slave, are ready for your treat?” she smiled.  “Yes Mistress, oh god yes!”

As slave swung back toward Mistress, Mistress then held the nipple clamp chain taught, holding slave in a suspended position.  Mistress was holding part of slave’s weight with the nipple chain, and slave was almost blind with pain.  “You love your Mistress slave?  Will you take this pain for your Mistress?”  “oh god!…yes!…yes!… Mistress!  I do love you!” he replied in agony but with undying love for his Mistress.  “very good slave!  Now on the count of five, I want you to make my cock cum all over you.  One….Two….Three…”  Slave was in excruciating pain but incredibly turned on seeing the sadistic smile on his Mistress’s face.  “Four….” Slave continued to stroke his Mistress’s cock, faster and faster…..”FIVE”  After a few seconds, slave let out a groan that echoed throughout the whole building.  A geyser of cum shot out a couple of feet and landed on his neck and face….the chains were rattling violently…

 A phone ring awakened Mistress from her nap.  “hello”, slave answered the phone, “no thank you”, he continued. It was telemarketing call.  Breathless, she looked up a slave, confused and still collecting her thoughts.  “is everything okay Mistress?” he asked.

Taking an additional moment, she realized she had the most intense dream, but it seemed so real.  “oh I am okay slave, thank you.”  Mistress got up and realised it was twilight and it was getting dark outside. 

With the dream still fresh on her mind, “Slave, I need for you to go to the store for me”

“What do you need Mistress?”

“We will start with candles”

The transgender taboo is a threat to academic freedom

www.stoppingthehate.com

The Sunday Times over the weekend had a feature about six children suffering from Gender Identity Disorder who are being given drugs to delay the onset of puberty, giving them more time to decide whether they wish to change sex later in life.

The operations are being paid for by the taxpayers, although I don't think that's the issue. If the state can pay several thousands to save a person from a life of misery and eventual suicide then I for one think that is money well-spent. And yet the strange thing is that, taking aside the fact that “blockers” may affect cognitive ability and bone density, there's actually no accepted medical proof or consensus that sex change operations actually help someone's mental health; we may one day find that it does, but we simply don’t know enough at the moment.

Yet that hasn't stopped the growth of a political orthodoxy that boys and girls are sometimes born into the wrong bodies – their gender does not match their physical sex – and that this is best fixed by hormone treatment and/or surgery later in life; and that anyone who finds this uncomfortable suffers themselves from a psychological condition, apparently, called transphobia.

This is the only explanation acceptable to the media and, indeed, the state, which spends a fair deal of money (which we don’t have) combating transphobia. Yet at the moment science is still quite confused about Gender Identity Disorder, and what is acceptable to say about it is constrained by taboo and threats, and academics who argue against the standard political narrative tend to get persecuted. A few years back Prof Michael Bailey wrote a book about the subject, The Man Who Would Be Queen, detailing a theory which suggested that there were two kinds of transsexualism - "homosexual transsexuals", who are attracted to men, and "non-homosexual transsexuals", who are aroused by the image of themselves as a woman. The controversy arose over the implication that transsexuals were men, rather than women in men's bodies.

Despite the book being widely praised by the likes of Steven Pinker and neuroscientist Simon LeVay, and various gay writers, Prof Bailey was effectively hounded out of academia; a petition organised by a transgender protest group ensured that the Lambda Literary Foundation withdrew the book from its shortlist, while one campaigner constructed a website with pictures of Bailey’s children with sexually explicit captions.

It’s one thing to use such outrage against newspaper columnists, shock jocks or religious leaders who argue their views based on faith (although many who attack the religious demand their beliefs are treated with respect and reverence), but to do so against academics seems contrary to the scientific method. An academic should not be attacked for hate-think, only for being proven wrong. I have no idea whether Bailey is right or wrong, but the subject should not be politically restricted at any rate.

Certainly the political orthodoxy is influenced by the concept of “gender” as something almost unrelated to biology, an idea that really should be given its one-way ticket to Switzerland, yet which is still believed by many intelligent people. There was a story the other day about a boy, aged five, whose “gender” had been kept secret until now.

Yesterday Miss Laxton, a web editor, said that she thought gender stereotyping was "fundamentally stupid".

"I wanted to avoid all that stereotyping," she said.

"Stereotypes seem fundamentally stupid. Why would you want to slot people into boxes?”

I’m sure she’s an excellent mother, and I doubt he’ll be troubled by this slight experiment when in years to come he’s a commander in the Parachute Regiment, but it sounds like the sort of thing people of the 22nd century will laugh at as typical of our crazy age. Stereotyping is not only not fundamentally stupid, but it’s fundamentally necessary, as Norman Dennis wrote in this essential account of the Salem-like events that followed the Stephen Lawrence murder: “In any interaction where there are consequences for the individual, responding to the self-chosen stereotype presented by the other person is indispensable. To ask for anybody to deal with everybody in all circumstances on the basis of what the other person is ‘really’ like is to ask the impossible.”

So stereotyping males is a necessary social shorthand, and while of course men display a range of temperaments in their propensity to violence, emotional sensitivity, physical strength or anything else, and many men are closer to the female average in many areas, to suggest that gender is separate from sex is a sort of flat-earth feminism.

And what's the orthodoxy in one generation can quickly become laughable in the next. There was a New York Time piece the other about how autism in France is still treated using Freud: “Le Mur,” or “The Wall,” a small documentary film about autism released online last year, might normally not have attracted much attention.

But an effort by French psychoanalysts to keep it from public eyes has helped to make it into a minor cause and shone a spotlight on the way children in France are treated for mental health problems.

The documentary, the first film by Sophie Robert, follows two autistic boys: Guillaume, who has been treated with the behavioral, or “American,” approach; and Julien, who has been kept in an asylum for six years and treated with psychoanalysis. Guillaume, though challenged, is functioning at a high level in school. Julien is essentially silent, locked out of society…

Ms. Robert said the version of psychoanalysis that is most prevalent in France, particularly the post-Freudian school championed by Jacques Lacan, takes it as a given that autism and other mental health problems are caused by children’s relationship with their mothers, or by “maternal madness.”

A generation ago Freud's ideas were the all-powerful in the English-speaking world; now to American and British readers the idea that autism is being treated using psychoanalysis seems positively medieval. The same may well turn out true for Gender Identity Disorder, especially when one considers that most children who suffer from it later come to realise that they were born in the right body after all.

Anyway. I hope children given the blockers grow up to be healthy, happy people as a result; but I for one would like to see more evidence, one way or the other.

By Ed West / the Telegraph