Talk:John Money/Archive 2

Conversion Therapy
From the cited article

Turning to the history of conversion therapy and its relation to trans youth, it should rapidly become clear that gender affirmation is incompat- ible with the charge of conversion therapy. Instead, it is its opposite of opposing gender affirmation and access to transition that can reasonably be considered a form of conversion therapy. My overview will be articulated around seminal texts on clinical approaches to gender non-conforming youth by Green and Money, Rekers and Lovaas, and Zucker and Bradley....

One of the early influential papers in the history of conversion therapy was written by Richard Green and John Money in Pediatrics (Green & Money, 1961). The paper, titled “Effeminacy in Prepubertal Boys”, looked at eleven cases of youth assigned male at birth who were referred to the Johns Hopkins clinic for their “excessive and persistent attempts to dress in the clothes of the opposite gender, constant display of gestures and man- nerisms of the opposite sex, preference for play and other activities of the opposite sex, or a stated desire to be a member of the opposite sex” (p. 286)....

Brought together under the normative umbrella of gender role, Green and Money view the children’s effeminacy as a problem to be fixed as it may augur future challenges to normative gender roles in the form of adult “homosexuality and transvestism” (p. 286). No clear distinction is made between gender identity, gender expression, and sexual orientation in the treatment plan, as failing to comport with socially dominant models of any of the three is cast as a problem to be prevented and corrected. Their conception of masculinity includes sexual orientation.

From the Wikipedia article Conversion Therapy:

Conversion therapy is the pseudoscientific practice of attempting to change an LGBT individual's sexual orientation to heterosexual, or their gender identity to cisgender, using psychological, physical, or spiritual interventions.

conversion therapy—efforts to change an individual's sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression—is a practice that is not supported by credible evidence and has been disavowed by behavioral health experts and associations. Conversion therapy perpetuates outdated views of gender roles and identities as well as the negative stereotype that being a sexual or gender minority or identifying as LGBTQ is an abnormal aspect of human development.

In short, what he did was conversion therapy. Per the definition of conversion therapy, and other people making the obvious connection.

TheTranarchist ⚧ Ⓐ (talk) 19:16, 22 June 2022 (UTC)TheTranarchist


 * As Wikipedia editors, we do not get to make the call that "what he did was conversion therapy. Per the definition of conversion therapy" as that would be original research. We don't even get to put two and two together, connecting reliable source A with a definition of conversion therapy with source B that describes Dr. XYZ as performing a procedure using exactly the definition in source A, and then call it conversion therapy, as that would be WP:SYNTH, also prohibited. (You didn't do that, afaict; just forewarning you about an additional trap that can bite the unwary.) What we do as editors is find what the majority of reliable sources have to say about a topic, and summarize that.  If you can find that the preponderance of sources call Money's approach as "conversion therapy", then by all means, add it back in. Take care not to cherrypick your sources while performing your research, as that could tend to bias your analysis and elicit the very result you are trying to find.  For example: if you search Google scholar for , the number one result is Florence Ashley (2020), "Homophobia, conversion therapy, and care models for trans youth", which is the one source that comes closest to lending credence to the proposition that Money endorses or performs conversion therapy (viz., on p. 376), without actually doing so, and thus fails WP:Verifiability. It also happens to be the same article you linked above. This looks like a WP:CHERRYPICKed result, and fails WP:DUEWEIGHT. Mathglot (talk) 22:24, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
 * As a postscript, it's particularly useless to quote what a Wikipedia article has to say about conversion therapy (or about anything else) as one half of a SYNTH equation, since Wikipedia is self-published and therefore by definition is an unreliable source. Rule of thumb: never cite anything in Wikipedia as proof of some fact to support your argument, because it doesn't. Mathglot (talk) 22:32, 22 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Agree with, well said. DayTime99 (talk) 20:04, 23 June 2022 (UTC)
 * This discussion with TheTranarchist is similar to two other recent ones, here and here, except Mathglot is a long-term editor, appears to be respected, and expresses themself better than a new editor. So no one would say Mathglot is showing poor behavior for saying "as Wikipedia editors, we do not get to make the call" unless sources say it directly about the subject. Good work, Mathglot. SangdXurWan (talk). I have really red hair. 04:51, 24 June 2022 (UTC)
 * @Mathglot I'll try and find some more sources that get better into it. However, I do not believe I was cherrypicking as the gist of that peer-reviewed article was that John Money advocated conversion therapy, and it made the connection between the modern definition and his actions. I wasn't misrepresenting a small segment of the article against it's main direction, nor ignoring a large body of work to the contrary, rather citing a recent scholarly work re-interpreting his work in light of the modern definition of conversion therapy. So as to not run the risk of mis-representing the source or giving undue weight while still giving due weight, would it be acceptable to state something along the lines of: In a paper authored by Florence Ashley, Money's paper "Effeminacy in pre-pubertal boys" was described as an early paper in conversion therapy due to viewing children's effeminacy as a problem to be fixed since it may lead to "homosexuality or transvestism" in adulthood? I don't think MEDR fully applies, since that would apply to the definition of conversion therapy. Whether a peer reviewed source analyzing the history of conversion therapy by that definition said he practiced that is another issue.
 * Also, I only quoted the sections from the conversion therapy article since I already fought the uphill struggle of getting conversion therapy for trans people recognized there and knew the information to currently be reliable and up to date, not to mention the definition I quoted was also cited in Ashley's paper. TheTranarchist ⚧ Ⓐ (talk) 06:08, 24 June 2022 (UTC)

John money
Why doesn’t the opening paragraph of this article acknowledge that John Money was known as a sexual predator and conducted heinous sexual experiments on children? It’s very important that be One of the first things that appears when searched. As it is now when he is googled it simply looks like he was a scientist or psychologist which is grossly inaccurate. 107.185.144.229 (talk) 18:23, 9 September 2022 (UTC)
 * See above. And you need sources for the accusation of predatory behavior. Otherwise, please propose an alternate lead paragraph.  Acroterion   (talk)   23:32, 9 September 2022 (UTC)

On David Reimer’s death
Mathglot points out that I neglected to respond to him on my talk page, but as one may see via the link he provided, I was turned off at his belligerent opening. In any case, my case for keeping my change to the passage concerning Mr. Reimer’s suicide is fairly simple, and I think quoting the justification given in the edit summary is sufficient for now:

"1) increased specificity in an encyclopedia article is desirable, and 2) relying on only the referenced article to get a more accurate picture will likely mean that less than 0.1% of readers will obtain it, given the extremely low click-through rate for each given link."

The latter point was added in response to Mathglot’s argument that one could view the more precise rendition of the lead up to Mr. Reimer’s death via the link given in the reference note, even if Wikipedia’s text — as I argued — gave a misleading impression.

At core, I understand this dispute to be relevant to the question of how much Dr. Money’s unethical conduct in using David Reimer as a case study contributed to his tragic decision to take his own life. I believe a straightforward reading of the quoted source indicates that acute grief over his separation from his spouse played the largest role: "His mother said he had recently become depressed after losing his job and separating from his wife. He was also still grieving over the death of his twin brother two years earlier, she said."

An addendum: the LA Times article, which is used as a source in the page for Reimer himself, should probably be added as a second reference to the section of Dr. Money’s page concerning Mr. Reimer. It contains the following passage:

"His life began to unravel with the suicide of his brother two years ago. Brian Reimer had been treated for schizophrenia and took his life by overdosing on drugs. David visited his brother's grave every day. He lost his job, separated from his wife and was deeply in debt after a failed investment."

Encyclopedia Lu (talk) 18:30, 9 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks for raising this here. Your bold edit mostly plays up details of the Reimer parents' opinions of what caused their sons' deaths (i.e., Money's methodology). The main problem with this, as I pointed out in the edit summary when I first removed it, is that your content "seems more appropriate for the Reimer article than here". The point is mostly that it is WP:UNDUE: we have an entire article on David Reimer where that information would be more appropriate; it's just out of proportion here.
 * When you have two articles related by WP:Summary style as these two articles are, with John Money as parent article connected to David Reimer as the child article via subsection, it's typical to have a paragraph or so in the parent, summarizing the main points of the child, with all of the detail in the child article. Here, we have eight paragraphs in the parent, which is very unusual. It's already bloated, and we should be thinking about how to trim it, not make it bigger.
 * The David Reimer article is about David Reimer, and to the extent that Mr. and Mrs. Reimer's opinions might be reported anywhere at Wikipedia, that would be the article to report them in. It just makes no sense to have their opinions in the John Money article, when it's apparently not important enough for anyone to have bothered to include them in the David Reimer article. Per that first edit summary, it's still more appropriate to the Reimer article than here, and if you wanted to add it to the Reimer article, appropriately sourced, I would have no objection. Mathglot (talk) 04:04, 10 February 2023 (UTC)
 * "Your bold edit mostly plays up details of the Reimer parents' opinions of what caused their sons' deaths (i.e., Money's methodology)."
 * But that’s not true: I didn’t add the part about the opinion of David’s parents. My only change was to specify the apparently condensed timeline of his severe depression as reported by his mother, which added just 6 words to the length. I would be in support of removing the line about his parents’ belief as to the cause of the Reimer twins’ deaths. Encyclopedia Lu (talk) 05:28, 11 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Removing it is fine by me. If you wanted to trim the whole section down considerably, that would be fine, too. If there's any unique information here that isn't present in the Reimer article and ought to be, I'd support moving it over there as well, if appropriate, WP:DUE, relevant, and sourced. Mathglot (talk) 11:31, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Encyclopedia Lu, in this edit, you removed a sourced quotation and replaced it with a quotation with slightly different wording, attributing it to "HealthyPlace.com", allegedly containing material originally published in an article in Rolling Stone. The original journal source remains in the article right after that one, and the two sources disagree. Also, HealthyPlace sounds a bit dodgy of a source, because the material is second-hand, and especially because they appeared to have copied 43 pages from Rolling Stone, which is a likely copy violation (for them, not for us; or maybe even for us by extension; I'm unsure on this point). Can you remove this HP source and replace the original quotation, or else if you believe that HP quoted him correctly and the journal didn't, find a source that will support the quote as they give it, and resolve this contradiction? Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 23:51, 13 February 2023 (UTC)


 * The original link was dead and the archived version displays only the first page of the PDF, so I replaced it with HealthyPlace’s mirror of Colapinto’s article for Rolling Stone (with the latter credited). So I wouldn’t consider it a contradiction: the original source with the purported quotation—which I believe was mistaken, perhaps because the Wikipedia editor didn’t copy & paste it—is unavailable. Encyclopedia Lu (talk) 05:48, 14 February 2023 (UTC)

According to right wing groups
Why is it necessary to say "right wing groups"? There is a source for the magazine on the page. He either said the quoted line or he didnt. If he didnt say it, get rid of the quote, if he did say it then get rid of the "Colapinto reported that, according to a right-wing group critical of his teachings, Money told Paidika, a Dutch journal, of pedophilia:"

Making the source out to be a right wing group lends bias to the article. It gives the impression that he didnt say what was quoted, but the source of where the quote comes from is there. RobStrong80 (talk) 05:14, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Why the hell does the article not mention this man's disgusting acts towards children at the very start, and instead conveniently hides it away farther down the article?
The section which refers to him as "a New Zealand psychologist, sexologist and author known for his research into sexual identity and biology of gender." Should include a mention of his taking photos of naked children and having them perform sexual acts, his coercion of a small boy's parents to allow him to perform an unnecassary surgery, or at the very least describe him as "controversial". It's quite suspicous that wikipedia would prefer to hide all this lower in the article. I was always told wikipedia didn't have bias. 75.73.185.112 (talk) 21:51, 16 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Not mention it? Did you read the article? The third paragraph of the lead is entirely devoted to it, and the largest section of the article by far is about controversies including the material you describe. What exactly would you like to change? Mathglot (talk) 23:29, 16 August 2022 (UTC)
 * @Mathglot there is nothing in the lead that talks about his pervasions. 42.125.117.185 (talk) 00:56, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * @42.125.117.185 perversions 42.125.117.185 (talk) 00:57, 12 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Per WP:LEAD, the lead is a summary of the most important parts of the body of the article. If you can find reliable sources that discuss what you wish to add, then feel free to add it to the body first in the appropriate section, along with citations to those sources. "Perversions" is a strong word, so make sure your sources are of impeccable quality, and would stand up to scrutiny at WP:RSN. After you have added this content to the body, you can add a summary of it to the lead, assuming that there is consensus for it. Mathglot (talk) 22:55, 13 February 2023 (UTC)
 * @Mathglot you said, "The third paragraph of the lead is entirely devoted to it". I am replying to that. There is nothing in the lead about any of the controversies surrounding him. You made the claim there was. It's now only included at the end of the article. 42.125.117.185 (talk) 08:36, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Are we looking at the same article? There are four paragraphs in the lead, and the entirety of the third paragraph is critical of Money. But rather than bicker about this, if you wish to make a specific proposal to improve the article, please do so. How would you change the lead in order to make the article better? Feel free to paste some text below with your version of a better lead section. Mathglot (talk) 09:37, 22 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Appparently not! SOrry man, dont know how I missed that. RobStrong80 (talk) 04:54, 23 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Not a problem! Can't tell you how many times I've done that; it's all good. Mathglot (talk) 05:22, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

False claims
Of the universe, I changed the sentence you added to the lead in which you claimed that the gender identity clinic carried out "surgeries on infants". This is false, nor was it stated in the source. As per WP:VERIFY it should never been put in the article and unfortunately stayed up for almost one year. Please do not put content on Wikipedia which is not in the citation. Going forward, I hope you can become a more accurate editor.

For interested readers, the clinic at Johns Hopkins under Money was quite strict, only allowing adults and requiring they live two years as the opposite gender before being allowed any medical intervention. John Money did support surgeries for infants with intersex conditions (ambiguous genitalia) to give them a more binary male or female appearance, a practice still fought by intersex activists. However, these are not carried out in gender identity clinics, they are carried out in the urology departments and always have been. From this, he later derived a theory for gender in general, which lead to his experiment on David Reimer. Unfortunately this article has been modified significantly in the past year (for the worse) to make it seem like Money held beliefs he didn't (probably because of mythology peddled by a variety of conservative talking heads who are misguided, even if well meaning). While Money did support allowing carefully screened transgender people access to transition, he was quite old school in his beliefs. He did not quite believe in 'gender identity' as many people think of it today.

His experiment on David Reimer was a reflection of his strong belief in 'nurture'. Given this, he certainly didn't support the transitioning of young dysphoric children with normal genitalia, because he believed they could be reared out of gender dysphoria into a role conducive with their biological sex. This is made clear in his collaborations with the controversial psychoanalyst Robert Stoller, who aimed to prevent young children with gender dysphoria from transitioning through rather cruel methods. His student Richard Green and his student Kenneth Zucker both had similar ideas in their work. All four of them have faced significant criticism from prominent transgender individuals.

There are a number of misleading claims on this article which are not supported by their citations which I am beginning to work through. I will also tag Mathglot to make them aware of potential issues with the article as it seems they have some presence here. Others can feel free to weigh in. Zenomonoz (talk) 10:10, 21 May 2023 (UTC)


 * I have removed a second long-standing unverified claim: "Money held the view that affectional paedophilia is caused by a surplus of parental love that became erotic, and is not a behavioural disorder. Rather, he took the position that heterosexuality is another example of a societal and therefore superficial, ideological concept". If anybody can find any of his papers stating that, they are welcome to add it back, but it sounds suspect from everything I have read. Zenomonoz (talk) — Preceding undated comment added 10:21, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
 * , good job with the removals, and thanks for the ping. It sounds to me like you’re on the right track. There have always been people at this article who have extrapolated from Money’s controversial positions either on pedophilia or in the Reimer case and decided to condemn everything he did without any source-based justification. It is fine to remove anything that is unsourced, and I encourage you to do so. I’m away with spotty wifi so can’t help much now, but please continue with what you are doing, and ping me if you need occasional feedback, and definitely ping me in a month when I’ll be able to take a better look and help out as needed. Thanks, Mathglot (talk) 11:24, 21 May 2023 (UTC)
 * Oops, thanks for catching. I must have misread. Of the universe (talk) 06:06, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 8 July 2023
Change "it's" to "its" in the following line:

"Despite this the condition was heavily stigmatized due to a lack of understanding towards it's effects, and was incorrectly thought to cause severe developmental problems" Nabarlek (talk) 09:24, 8 July 2023 (UTC)
 * ✅  — Paper9oll  (🔔 • 📝)  10:08, 8 July 2023 (UTC)