THE TREVOR PROJECT
Projecting The Unsupported Narrative And Pushing A False Definition Of Yutes
Wikipedia describes the Trevor Project as:
”… an American nonprofit organization founded in 1998. Focused on suicide prevention efforts among lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning (LGBTQ) youth, they offer a toll-free telephone number where confidential assistance is provided by trained counselors. The stated goals of the project are to provide crisis intervention and suicide prevention services for youth (defined by the organization as people under 25), as well as to offer guidance and resources to parents and educators in order to foster safe, accepting, and inclusive environments for all youth, at home, schools and colleges.”
Before I get into the Trevor Project and suicide prevention among members of the LGBTQ+ community, I need to spend a bit time discussing “Yutes”.
Sorry for the the humor about a serious topic but here is the reason for bringing Joe Pesci and Fred Gywn into the conversation — it is their attempt to come to agreement of what a “yute’ is. I have always believed that a “yute” was person who was not an adult. BUT both the folks at the Trevor Project AND CDC define a “yute” as a person under the age of 25. Why would they do that? It’s really very simple if “yutes” suddenly include people between the ages of 18 and 24 the epidemiology of an age related outcome is horribly confused. Why? Because there is no eight year old child on the planet that behaves like a 24 year old adult. While the line between 17 and 18 may be a bit blurry the difference comes clearly into focus when an 18 year old suddenly finds out that being in the military or working full time is not quite the same as wondering who they’re going to take or be taken by to the prom.
Note well that CDC does not stratify COVID data that way. Not at all. In fact CDC stratifies COVID data in five year periods:
Yutes are yutes and adults are adults. Why else does CDC stratify the data as they did? Because CDC and the folks at the Trevor project know that the behavior of people from 0-17 years old is vastly different than the behavior of people from 18 to 25 years old and certainly different than those who are older than 75 years of age.
The very simple reason that both The Trevor Project and their partners at CDC include people between 0 and 25 in the category of youths is because there isn’t enough data in the group “0-17 years of age” to justify their programs.
Case in point — the CDC data on suicide stratified by age in 10 year increments except for the age groups 10 - 14 and 15 -24.
CDC tells us that the suicide rate among ALL children 10-14 years old is 2.8/100,000 people or 0.0028%. The next age group is 15-24 years of age and the rate is 14.2/100,000 or 0.0142% - about five times the rate among children 10-14 and more in keeping with the rate among all other age groups.
Why am I suspicious about these suicide rates? Because CDC begins the stratification with a five year interval then switches to a ten year interval and in doing so they manage to bury the suicide rate among children 15-17 years of age by including adults 18-24 years of age in the group. Why? My guess is that even when combined with the suicide rate among 10-14 year olds the suicide rate among 15-17 years is small compared to the adults 18 - 24 years of age. However, neither all adults or all children who commit suicide identified as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. Further, as I will show you next the number of suicides among the LGBTQ+ children is not known with any degree of accuracy and is likely to be very small which does not make it insignificant to those left behind but for some reason it warrants a massive government intervention and social upheaval above and beyond current suicide prevention efforts in other groups such as combat veterans.
First, let’s try to understand what the true population of those who identify as transgender really is. Susan Ciancio who writes for Human Life International did an excellent job of presenting the data on the percentage of transgender people in the United States. In her article: “Transgenderism on the Rise in America: What’s a Catholic to Do?” Ciancio begins with the estimate from the Williams Institute at the UCLA School of Law that 0.6% of the U.S. population identifies as transgender. The Williams Institute is:
”…the leading research center on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy. We ensure that facts — not stereotypes — inform laws, policies, and judicial decisions that affect the LGBT community.”
IF I call Ford Motor Company and ask them: “What is the best car on road?” they’ll have me in a brand new Mustang before the line is disconnected. And so it is not unreasonable to expect that the “leading research center on sexual orientation and gender identity law” will do what ever they can to maximize the size of the population that they are most concerned with.
Interestingly but not surprisingly, the Williams Institute actually got their estimate from our friends at CDC who generated its estimate from their own Behavior Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) and Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS). As I discussed I have little faith in the accuracy of questionnaire data in which “yutes” are asked about their sexual behavior because “yutes” are after all just “yutes” unless, of course you consider an adult (a person over 18 years of age) to be a “yute”.
According to Ciancio: “In addition, transgender youth ages 13-17 make up 0.7% of the youth population. That’s about 150,000 people.” IF, according to the CDC, the rate of suicide among ALL children 10 -14 years is in the vicinity of old is 2.8/100,000 (581 suicides or 871.5/150,000) and we use Ciancio reported rate of 0.7% of all youth who committed suicide were also “transgender” then just over 6 “transgender children” 10 -14. committed suicide.
According to Statista in 2021 there were 43,080,000 people between the ages of 15 and 24 in the U.S. If I use the hybrid age group of 15-24 in which there was a suicide rate of 14.2/100,000 then there should have been 6,117 suicides (not different from the 6,062 reported by CDC) and 0.7% or 42.8 should have occurred among “transgender youth”
I know of no other way to arrive at that the number of suicide among transgender “youth” and neither does CDC or, of course, The Trevor Project. IF they did they most certainly would have told us. But this is what the folks at the Trevor Project tell us:
”Through legislation, litigation, and public education, The Trevor Project is the leading advocate for LGBTQ youth mental health in preventative and intervention efforts at the federal, state, and local level to address factors that place LGBTQ youth at significantly higher risk of suicide.” (Emphasis added)
And they tell us that without providing one single bit of data that supports that statement. For example, the Trevor Projects reports:
But none of this gets at the actual number of suicides committed by LGBTQ “youth” or more precisely, the number of only “transgender youth” who actually committed suicide. Further, the numbers provided by the Trevor Project are seriously misaligned with the data on suicides among ALL people in the age range of 10 - 24 provided by the CDC — e.g. fewer than 7,000 people out of a total population of about 65,000,000 actually committed suicide and only a small fraction of those identified as LGBTQ and an even smaller fraction identified as transgender.
The folks at the Trevor Project have reviewed survey data on suicide ideation (seriously considered) from CDC and others who also relied on CDC and then suggested that suicide ideation is a good surrogate for actual suicide among “transgender youth”. It is not.
The Trevor Project is relying on myth and fear. Be informed and don’t be fearful.
Union Kentucky
27 March 2023