In Transgender Kids at 9.50 pm, RTÉ 2, Louis Theroux travels to San Francisco where a group of pioneering medical professionals help children who say they were born in the wrong body transition from boy to girl or girl to boy at ever younger ages. A paralysed former Royal Marines' commando flies to dangerous places in Flying to the Ends of the Earth (8.00pm Channel 4) while Himmler comes under the harsh spotlight in Himmler: The Decent One - Storyville, 10.00pm BBC 4.
Louis Theroux: Transgender Kids
RTÉ 2 9.50pm
Louis Theroux travels to San Francisco where a group of pioneering medical professionals help children who say they were born in the wrong body transition from boy to girl or girl to boy at ever younger ages. At the Child and Adolescent Gender Center at UCSF Hospital Louis meets children who have been diagnosed with gender dysphoria. Louis is told that children as young as three can show signs of rejecting the gender they were assigned at birth, leaving parents with a difficult dilemma - do they start transitioning a child who is still developing their own identity or do they wait and risk making the change once their body has gone through the transformations of puberty? It is a decision that can be the start of a complex series of medical interventions, from puberty blockers to hormone replacement therapy and eventually gender reassignment surgery. Louis spends time with children and their families as they negotiate their way along this life-changing journey.
Flying to the Ends of the Earth
8.00pm Channel 4
Seven years ago, Royal Marine commando Arthur Williams was paralysed in a car crash. An inveterate adrenaline junkie, he needed another outlet for his spirit of adventure and so taught himself to fly. In this new three-part series, Williams flies to some of the world’s smallest and most dangerous landing strips to find out why people want to live at the ends of the earth. He discovers how tiny planes are opening up the planet’s most remote and most beautiful wildernesses. The series features grizzly bears and gold prospectors in Northern Canada, and tracks the deadly race to harvest Himalayan Viagra in Nepal, flying through dangerous mountain air currents. We also meet flying missionaries spreading the Word deep in the Papuan jungle.
Himmler: The Decent One - Storyville
10.00pm BBC 4
Through previously undiscovered private letters, photos and diaries that were found in the Himmler family house in 1945, this documentary exposes a unique and at times uncomfortable access to the life and mind of the merciless 'architect of the Final Solution', Heinrich Himmler. Himmler writes, 'In life one must always be decent, courageous and kind-hearted'. How can a man be a hero in his own eyes and a mass murderer in the eyes of the world? The text of the film consists exclusively of original documents from Himmler's lifetime, combined with news and personal archive from sources ranging from the descendants of top Nazis to working-class individuals. It forms a unique portrait of one the most prominent figures of the Third Reich, the SS commander Heinrich Himmler.
