In 1999 Devor went to work for the Harry Benjamin International Gender Dysphoria Association -- which later became the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) -- as coauthor of its standards of care (SOC). She has continued her association ever since, and also joined the research committee of the Canadian Professional Association for Transgender Health (CPATH) in 2014.
Lisa MacRichards has written extensively on WPATH. In her article for Canadian Gender Report in 2019, she wrote:
WPATH is not the typical professional organization that develops clinical practice guidelines. WPATH is a hybrid professional and activist organization, where activists have become voting members and have served as president. In fact, it can be argued that WPATH is activist-led rather than evidence-led, as witnessed at their conferences. Their guidelines are just following what is being performed in gender clinics based on informed consent.
Not only that, but members of the WPATH SOC Committee revealed massive conflicts of interests.
When looking at the WPATH committee who worked on the current SOC document [2011], a cursory examination of the members reveals that every one of the members have significant COIs. All of them either receive income based on recommendations in the guidelines, work at clinics or universities who receive funds from advocacy groups, foundations, or pharmaceutical companies who heavily favour a certain treatment paradigm, or have received grants and published papers or research in transgender care.
As Chair of Transgender Studies and owner of the Transgender Archives, Devor’s career is dependent on a large and growing population of “transgender” people. The conflict of interest is obvious.
Jennifer (James) Pritzker
WPATH is funded by prominent trans activist Jennifer (James) Pritzker, a member of the powerful and influential American family of billionaires and politicians. Pritzker, a former colonel in the US Army, founded the acquisitions company Squadron Capital in 2012. Squadron invests in a handful of medical tech companies. Jennifer Bilek has done extensive research on the funders (and founders) of the gender industry. She has written of Pritzker
Once a family man and a decorated member of the armed forces, Jennifer Pritzker now identifies as transgender. He has made transgenderism a high note in philanthropic funding through his Tawani Foundation. He is one of the largest contributors to transgender causes and, with his family, an enormous influence in the rapid institutionalization of transgenderism.
Some of the organizations Jennifer owns and funds are especially noteworthy to examining the rapid induction of transgender ideology into medical, legal and educational institutions. Pritzker owns Squadron Capital, an acquisitions corporation, with a focus on medical technology, medical devices, and orthopedic implants, and the Tawani Foundation, a philanthropic organization with a grants focus on Gender & Human Sexuality.
Thus, already in Pritzker’s employ since 1999 and immersed in gender ideology through her work with WPATH, Devor finally petitioned her employer, the University of Victoria (UVic), to create a Chair of Transgender Studies. She had a million dollars in her back pocket to seal the deal. The media reported:
The position emerged largely from the efforts of Devor himself [sic]. As a gender non-conforming person, he has always been interested in gender. “I saw the need for [the position],” he said. “I set out to make it happen . . . [and put] a proposal before the Senate and the Board of Governors.”
Devor said that UVic proved to be very welcoming and supportive of the proposal for a new Chair, and he faced no trouble while trying to establish this position. “When [the proposal] came before the Senate [on Oct. 2 last year] . . . the vote went through unanimously in support. And there was a very big round of applause, followed by [President Jamie Cassels] making some lovely comments . . . You couldn’t get a better experience.”
The chair was funded by Pritzker’s Tawani Foundation, to the tune of $1 million, with a further million available through matching funds. With that kind of money on offer, it’s not surprising UVic was pleased.
In 2016 Devor was named the first Chair in Transgender Studies. Sitting beside her at the official opening ceremony was her near neighbour, New Democratic Party (NDP) Member of Parliament (MP) Randall Garrison, architect of Bill C16, which added gender identity and gender expression to the Canadian Human Rights Act the following year.
One of the regular marketing activities of the chair is hosting a biennial Moving Trans History Forward conference which has been running since 2014. Devor hired Martine Rothblatt, billionaire trans-identified man and proponent of transhumanism as her featured speaker in 2016, and followed that up by awarding him an honorary degree in 2019.
(Some believe that transgenderism is only a stepping stone to transhumanism, in which human brains will eventually be housed in robotic bodies. With transgender ideology we are encouraged to dissociate from our bodies and see them as products we are free to cut up as we wish. It’s notable that a “transgender woman” is the world’s leading proponent of transhumanism.)
The Chair’s website says its work is fostering research and scholarship in Transgender Studies
Encouraging both existing and new scholars to pursue careers in Transgender Studies and building local, national and international linkages with others working in Transgender Studies
Hosting visiting academic and community scholars
Proactive community outreach and knowledge mobilization
Teaching and mentoring related to the area of Transgender Studies
Assisting faculty to integrate Transgender Studies content into their courses
Subject matter expert of the Transgender Archives
Fundraising in support of the Chair in Transgender Studies and the Transgender Archives
In other words, if the money flowing north across the Canada/US border can be visualized as a pipeline, Devor functions as a shower head, sprinkling money and influence to water the gender ideology field in Canada through community outreach, fundraising, propaganda and networking. Her CV, available online, details media appearances all over the country. Even the tiniest references to her are included.
And so, step-by-step, is credibility and authority manufactured. A woman working for a lobby group calling itself a medical association, funded by a man who calls himself a woman and is financially invested in the medical equipment sector, is eventually handed a million dollars by the same man to get set up as a highly prestigious chair at a university – instant credibility.
felicia rembrandt is a Canadian feminist, writer and activist. Her twitter handle is: felicia rembrandt @ripsintolabels
This piece was originally featured in Sledge And Crowbar.
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