Tag Archive for: Puberty Blockers

Groundbreaking Troop Bill Heads to Biden’s Desk with First-Ever Rebuke of Trans Ideology

/in , , , , , , , , , /by

After a frustrating and bitterly divided year in Congress, one thing that will go down as a bright shining success for the GOP is the passage of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). On Wednesday, the Senate voted to send the 1,800-page behemoth to President Joe Biden’s desk, where he will be forced to do something neither side ever thought possible: sign a bill protecting children from his radical transgender agenda.

It’s a stunning turn of events for both parties. For Republicans, the idea that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) could negotiate a deal that not only stopped taxpayer-funded gender transitions for military kids, but also erased the women in the draft provision and axed diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts with his narrow majority still has insiders shaking their heads in amazement. On the flip side, it shows just how vulnerable Democrats are after the November elections — especially on the trans issue, which pollsters almost universally believe cost Kamala Harris the White House.

That’s not to say that some of Schumer’s extremists didn’t put up a fight. Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) was furious at the policy change, threatening — for the first time in her career — to vote against the NDAA, “a position I do not take lightly,” she insisted. “It’s flat-out wrong,” she fumed on the Senate floor, arguing that taxpayers should be forced to fork over their hard-earned dollars for the butchery of children.

In a move that was mostly for show, Baldwin fought to add an amendment to the NDAA that would reinstate the language for taxpayer-funded gender surgeries and hormones. “Let’s be clear: we’re talking about parents who are in uniform serving our country who have earned the right to make the best decisions for their families,” Baldwin and 20 senators wrote. “I trust our servicemembers and their doctors to make the best healthcare decisions for their kids, not politicians.”

The amendment to remove the protections for minors was backed by Democratic Senators Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey (Mass.), Brian Schatz and Mazie Hirono (Hawaii), Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden (Ore.), Cory Booker and Andy Kim (N.J.), Dick Durbin (Ill.), Patty Murray (Wash.), Chris Van Hollen (Md.), Tina Smith and Amy Klobuchar (Minn.), Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), Alex Padilla (Calif.), John Fetterman (Pa.), Martin Heinrich (N.M.), John Hickenlooper (Colo.), and Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal (Conn.).

FRC’s senior director for Government Affairs, Quena Gonzalez, dismissed the push as “rank political theater.” “The effort failed,” he pointed out to The Washington Stand, “because it was designed to fail. If the Democrats who run the Senate had really wanted to block protections for military kids from taxpayer-funded gender transition procedures, they could’ve done that before the bill was ever negotiated with the Republican-led House.”

Instead, he points out, “language to protect kids was included in the base House text and in the base Senate text, even before it was negotiated. So to complain now — and file an amendment that won’t get 60 votes and is therefore doomed to fail — is pure posturing. Why did they wait until now, when it’s too late to do anything meaningful?” Gonzalez wondered. “Maybe they knew they didn’t have the votes. Or maybe they understood that it’s a political loser, but feel they have to keep pandering to their hard-core radical base. Two House Democrats, Reps. Tom Suozzi (D-N.Y.) and Seth Moulton (D-Mass.), wasted no time blaming the Left’s extremism on the related ‘gender identity’ issue of boys being allowed in girls’ sports, restrooms, showers, and locker rooms, etc.”

Fortunately for the Democratic Party, Schumer wouldn’t allow his senators to press the issue. Rather than let his members take a politically damaging vote that puts them on the record for a policy that Americans are very much against, he quietly shelved the amendment, telling the press brightly, “The NDAA is now on a glide path to final passage.” Throwing a bone to his far-Left caucus, he added, “Of course, the NDAA is not perfect. It doesn’t have everything either side would like. … But of course, you need bipartisanship to get this through the finish line.”

To most observers, this is one of the biggest signs yet that the country is at a tipping point on extreme gender ideology. “The passage of this NDAA is a huge loss for the Left,” Gonzalez insists. “Democrats ran for president and for Congress in part by calling conservatives who stood up to the woke mob ‘transphobic.’ For the longest time, we Christians have been told that we’re ‘on the wrong side of history,’ but we are on the right side of truth. This should give Christians courage,” he underscored. “When we stand up univocally for truth, even when it’s not culturally popular, we stand for unchanging principles that will ultimately be vindicated by a much higher authority than Congress, the president, or the Supreme Court.”

By way of background, the speaker explained to Family Research Council President Tony Perkins on “This Week on the Hill,” that the NDAA is usually passed with broad bipartisan agreement — a rarity in a city that can barely agree on anything. This year, he said, “We had some unnecessary controversy. One of the things that we were really focused on is … return[ing] the emphasis of our national defense policy to national defense. And so, we really were on guard to make sure that a lot of the woke progressive agenda was not part of that policy prescription. And we prevailed in that.”

Jubilantly, Johnson pointed out, “We, for the first time in federal law, will be preventing [the funding of] trans surgeries on minors. … You know, there [are] about two million-plus children that are [in] military families that are insured by Tricare, which is the big federal insurer. And we wanted to make sure that those taxpayer-funded dollars don’t go in any way to the provision of any kind of ‘gender-affirming care,’ as they call it. That would do dramatic harm — permanent harm — to these young people.”

Asked what it says about the Democratic Party that they’d pursue this cultural obsession at the expense of our military, the speaker could only shake his head. “I wish I could tell you,” he said. “I think that there [are] some on the Left [who] want to use every institution of the government to advance their woke progressive socialist policies [and] experiments, [hoping for] the transformational kind of change that they always brag about that they want to hoist upon America. But I can tell you what this election cycle affirmed for us, and that is that the American people are not having that. I mean, I think that’s one of the large reasons why President Donald J. Trump got reelected with the large mandate he has and why we won control of the Senate and the House for the Republican Party, because we’re advancing common-sense ideas. These traditional ideas that have made our country what it is are still held by the American people.”

At the end of the day, Johnson believes, “We’re still a center-Right country — in spite of what they’ve been trying to convince us of for the last several years, that we’ve gone progressive Left. We have not. And the American people demand common sense. They demand and desire and certainly need a military that is focused on lethality and protecting our national interest.”

Now, he celebrated, “This experimental, non-scientific nonsense that’s been going on everywhere will no longer be a part of the federal health care of our military servicemembers. So that was a big win. And we did a lot of other things as well,” he wanted people to know. “We’re trying to root out the DEI education nonsense in the military academies. And it goes on and on. But in addition to all of that, we also included the largest pay increase in many years for active-duty service members, enlisted members, a little over 14% pay raise. And that’s desperately needed. And we also added a lot of things to help with the quality of life for those who put on the uniform to serve our country, their families, and those related to them. So a lot of great, great wins in this policy, and we’re really excited that it got over the line.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: Disney Leaves LGBT Activism on Cutting Room Floor in New Series

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Here Are Donald Trump’s ‘Promises Made’ on Transgenderism and Abortion

/in , , , , , , , , , , , /by

As once-and-future President Donald J. Trump strode to the podium to deliver his victory speech after winning the 2024 presidential election, he made his exuberant followers a solemn vow: “I will govern by a simple motto: Promises made, promises kept.” President Trump, who made greater efforts to keep his campaign pledges as the 45th president than perhaps any modern president in decades, has vowed to protect children from irreversible surgeries, uproot extreme transgender ideology from government, enshrine parental rights, and end the weaponization of government against Christians and pro-life advocates.

Here are some of President-Elect Donald Trump’s most important 2024 campaign promises on transgender issues, abortion, and education.

President Donald Trump’s 2024 Promises on Transgender Ideology

The Biden-Harris administration’s advocacy of extreme transgender ideology did more to return the 45th president to office than any other issue. The Democratic polling firm Blueprint found that swing voters said the top reason they voted against the Democratic candidate in 2024 is that “Kamala Harris is focused more on cultural issues like transgender issues rather than helping the middle class.” And Republicans spent $65 million on ads highlighting the Democratic Party’s transgender extremism in three months.

But long before the election, President Trump had vowed to reel in the radicalism of the Obama-Biden-Harris administrations.

“Probably number one on my list … I will sign a law prohibiting child sexual mutilation — think of it, sexual mutilation — in all 50 states,” President Trump promised during his speech to the 2023 Pray Vote Stand Summit. He denounced governors like Minnesota’s Tim Walz (D) and California’s Gavin Newsom (D) for signing “depraved new laws that strip parents of parental rights and that encourage minors to be transported across state lines for sexual mutilation. … We will prosecute those involved in this sick California scheme for violating federal laws against kidnapping, sex trafficking, child abuse, and the deprivation of their civil rights.”

President Trump has long recognized the overreach, and political value, of extreme gender ideology. No later than February 2023, President Trump included a robust, 11-point plan to end gender “madness” in his “Agenda47” blueprint for his next administration. Trump posted these pledges on the Trump-Vance campaign website and articulated these points in a video posted on Rumble on February 1, 2023.

“Here’s my plan to stop the chemical, physical, and emotional mutilation of our children,” said the president.

  1. “On day one, I will revoke Joe Biden’s cruel policies on so-called ‘gender-affirming care,” which Trump called “ridiculous.” As he did at the Pray Vote Stand Summit, he promised to oppose “a process that includes giving kids puberty blockers, mutating their physical appearance, and ultimately performing surgery on minor children.”
  1. “I will sign a new executive order instructing every federal agency to cease all programs that promote the concept of sex and gender transition at any age,” he said.
  1. “I will then ask Congress to permanently stop federal taxpayer dollars from being used to promote or pay for these procedures and pass a law prohibiting child sexual mutilation in all 50 states,” he said, forecasting, “It’ll go very quickly.”
  1. ”I will declare that any hospital or health care provider that participates in the chemical or physical mutilation of minor youth will no longer meet federal health and safety standards for Medicaid and Medicare and will be terminated from the program immediately.” For instance, Boston Children’s Hospital received $1.4 million from the Executive Office of Health and Human Services (EOHHS) of Massachusetts for inflicting “gender transition services” between January 2015 and May 2023. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) also awardeda $3.3 million grant to build a website targeting young people in other states who identify as transgender.
  1. “Furthermore, I will support the creation of a private right of action for victims to sue doctors who have unforgivably performed these procedures on minor children,” said Trump. Within one week, two former victims of the transgender industry — Chloe Cole and Camille Kiefel — sued the doctors who misdiagnosed their mental illness as gender dysphoria and recommended surgical amputations.
  1. “The Department of Justice will investigate Big Pharma and the big hospital networks to determine whether they have deliberately covered up horrific long-term side effects of sex transitions in order to get rich at the expense of vulnerable patients — in this case, very vulnerable,” promised the 45th president. Economic considerations undeniably play a role in Dr. Shayne Taylor convinced Nashville’s Vanderbilt University to begin carrying out transgender surgeries, because “they require a lot of follow-ups. They require a lot of time, and they make money —they make money for the hospital.”
  1. ”We will also investigate whether Big Pharma or others have illegally marketed hormones and puberty blockers, which are in no way licensed or approved for this use,” said Trump about the off-label, experimental uses of drugs intended to temporarily suspend precocious puberty only until it could safely begin.
  1. “My Department of Education will inform states and school districts that if any teacher or school official suggests to a child that they could be trapped in the wrong body, they will be faced with severe consequences, including potential civil rights violations for sex discrimination and the elimination of federal funding,” he said.
  1. “As part of our new credentialing body for teachers, we will promote positive education about the nuclear family, the roles of mothers and fathers, and celebrating rather than erasing the things that make men and women different and unique,” said President Trump.
  1. “I will ask Congress to pass a bill establishing that the only genders recognized by the United States government are male and female, and they are assigned at birth. The bill will also make clear that Title IX prohibits men from participating in women’s sports,” said the president-elect. The injustice of having female athletes like Riley Gaines lose scholarships, prizes, or other opportunities to middling male athletes drove voters toward the Trump-Vance ticket, polls show.
  1. “And we will protect the rights of parents from being forced to allow their minor child to assume a gender which is new and an identity without the parent’s consent,” Trump vowed. When one mother’s former lesbian partner began to teach her four-year-old son about extreme gender ideology, she said the boy’s preschool sent her “edicts by email,” with no consideration that he, or she, may not be fully committed to his social transition.

“No serious country should be telling its children that they were born in the wrong gender,” said President Trump.” Under my leadership, this madness will end.”

President Donald Trump’s 2024 Promises on Abortion

Although the Trump 2024 presidential campaign retreated to a less committed policy on protecting the unborn, the Trump-Vance ticket promised to end the weaponization of the federal government against pro-life advocates and left the door open to some additional pro-life measures.

After the 2022 Dobbs decision, the Biden-Harris administration stood by as Jane’s Revenge attacked pro-life women’s resource centers and churches. It then established a federal task force to prosecute peaceful — often elderly — pro-life sidewalk counselors on flimsy charges that they violated the 1994 Federal Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act.

“To reverse these cruel travesties of justice, tonight I’m announcing that the moment I win the election, I will appoint a special task force to rapidly review the cases of every political prisoner who’s been unjustly persecuted by the Biden administration … so that I can study the situation very quickly and sign their pardons or commutations on day one,” President Trump told the 2023 Pray Vote Stand Summit. “Never again will the federal government be used to target religious believers.”

As president in 2017, President Trump strengthened pro-life policies that protected U.S. taxpayer funds from underwriting abortion around the world. He later enacted regulations preventing those who receive Title X funding from advocating abortion — which led Planned Parenthood to withdraw from the federal family planning program rather than give up abortion advocacy. The administration appears amenable to reenacting these measures. “On the question of defunding Planned Parenthood, look, I mean, our view is we don’t think that taxpayers should fund late-term abortions. That has been a consistent view of the Trump campaign the first time around. It will remain a consistent view,” said Vice President-Elect J.D. Vance last month.

Vance also personally distinguished between a “national abortion ban” and a “minimum national standard,” such as a bill to protect unborn babies from abortion after 15 weeks — although Trump has not registered his support for the measure.

President Trump kept his promise after he became the first candidate to release a list of potential Supreme Court justices’ names during the 2016 election. After seeing the hand of God deliver him from two assassination attempts, President Trump has found a divine purpose in carrying out his campaign promises. If he keeps these promises, which won the Republican Party eight out of 10 white evangelical voters and more than nine out of 10 pro-life votes, he will go far toward his goal to make America great again.

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson 

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: Why Young Voters Shifted Towards Trump

RELATED VIDEOS:

President Donald J. Trump Pledges Educational Gamechanger By Creating The American Academy

President Trump: ‘Religion and Christianity are the biggest things missing from this country’

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

‘Gender-Industrial Complex’ Worth Billions Annually: Report

/in , , , , , , , , , , , , , , /by

The most mysterious feature of the 2023 SAFE Act Wars was that virtually every major hospital system — across 20+ states — lobbied vehemently against the bills. At nearly every public hearing, the speaking roster was saturated by three groups speaking in opposition: transgender activists, families with trans-identifying youth who hadn’t yet come to regret the procedures, and medical professionals, typically associated with a local hospital system.

Yet 2023 was a tipping-point year, in which the number of states with laws protecting minors from gender transition procedures increased from four to 22. This dramatic shift occurred because the dangerous, experimental nature of these surgeries became increasingly apparent. Otherwise progressive European countries such as the U.K., Norway, and Denmark pulled back on providing gender transition procedures to minors. Even state legislators, many of whom lack a medical background, were able to clearly grasp the lack of medical evidence and the potential for harm with these procedures, often articulating those reasons in the legislation they passed.

This raises the question, if the fundamental unsoundness of providing gender transition procedures to minors was evident to everyone from Norway to North Dakota, why couldn’t hospitals see it? A recent report from the American Principles Project suggests an explanation: hospitals and drug manufacturers were blinded by the Benjamins — billions of dollars’ worth.

The American Principles Project (APP) commissioned business consulting firm Grand View Research to conduct a market analysis measuring the volume of the gender-reassignment surgery industry. They recently estimated its value at a whopping $4.12 billion in 2022, with a compounded annual growth rate of 8.4% through 2030. The APP published those numbers this summer in an 88-page report.

Estimate Is Likely an Undercount

Due to various complications in data collection, nearly all estimates of the U.S. gender transition industry will be conservative (tending to undercount rather than overcount), the APP report stated, including the one they commissioned. American health care lacks the comprehensive, centralized data collection of socialized medicine, so researchers must compile data in other ways. For instance, a 2022 study by Komodo Health analyzed insurance claims and found 42,000 minors diagnosed with gender dysphoria in 2021, but this necessarily excluded all medical activity not covered by insurance.

Other studies have also struggled to find complete datasets. For example, studies that analyze gender transition procedures based on their medical code will necessarily fail to detect gender transition procedures labeled with a generic medical code. In a 2019 video, Dr. Shayne Taylor explained that this was a deliberate strategy. “For the patient who gets a big bill because their insurance doesn’t cover any transgender-related codes, I usually write ‘endocrine disorder not otherwise specified’ to allow me to order the labs that I want,” Taylor said.

Taylor was influential in convincing Vanderbilt University Medical Center to practice gender transition procedures because “these surgeries make a lot of money.” Based on figures from the Philadelphia Center for Transgender Surgery, “female-to-male chest reconstruction could bring in $40,000,” and “around $20,000 for a vaginoplasty,” Taylor cited. “That doesn’t include your post-op visits. That doesn’t include your anesthesia, your OR. So I would think this has to be a gross underestimate. I think that’s just, like, the surgeon’s piece of it.”

Leaked video of the profit rationale behind the gender transition program at Vanderbilt University Medical Center may have played a role in Tennessee enacting legislation to protect minors from gender transition procedures in March 2023.

Another reason to believe these numbers represent an undercount is that estimates of the number of trans-identifying people in America are significantly higher. The pro-LGBT Williams Institute estimated in June 2022 that 1.6 million Americans identify as transgender, including approximately 300,000 youth aged 13-17. While it’s possible that the Williams Institute has a political motive to inflate these numbers, it still yields a much larger estimate than studies that look at medical data.

Transgender activist Robbi Katherine Anthony “(who prefers going by RKA),” APP notes, multiplied the number of transgender-identifying Americans with the “average cost of transition,” estimated at $150,000, to speculate that the potential gender transition market could be valued in excess of $200 billion, “larger than the entire film industry.”

Even if these studies are significant undercounts, they do serve to show the trend. Every study shows a dramatic increase over time in people seeking treatment for gender dysphoria, especially among young people. One study reviewed for the APP report showed that “health system encounters for gender identity disorder rose from 13,855 in 2016 to 38,470 in 2020.”

Costly Procedures

Why such staggering costs? Gender transition surgeries are attempting to reshape — or more accurately, war against — a person’s natural biology. Advanced plastic surgery techniques can recreate the appearance if not the function of different organs. But, as Taylor suggested, the price tag for each individual procedure can be pricey. The APP includes a list of common procedures and their prices:

  • Augmentation Mammoplasty, $6,000-12,000
  • Voice Feminization Surgery, $5,000-9,000
  • Reduction Thyrochondroplasty, $3,500-7,000
  • Orchiectomy, $5,000-8,000
  • Vaginoplasty, $10,000-40,000
  • Chest Masculinization Surgery, $6,000-10,000
  • Scrotoplasty, $4,000-6,000
  • Hysterectomy, $9,500-22,500
  • Phalloplasty, $20,000-150,000
  • Mastectomy, $15,000-50,000
  • Metoidioplasty, $20,000-30,000
  • Facial Feminization Surgery, $20,000-50,000+
  • Electrolysis, $50-200 (one-hour session)
  • Laser Hair Removal, $200-1,000
  • Vocal Training, $50-200 per hour

In general, these are surgeries to a person’s face, throat, chest, or genitalia that result in him or her looking more like the opposite sex. Readers who want more specificity can do their own research. It will not be family-friendly or conducive to good digestion. You have been warned.

These costs add up as trans-identifying individuals pursue multiple procedures. The APP estimated that the “total cost of fully transitioning” ranges from $87,300-410,600 for males and from $66,500-605,500 for females. This assumes five years of puberty blockers (at $3,000-$25,000 per year) and 60 years of cross-sex hormone use (from age 16 to age 76, the average life expectancy, with estrogen estimated at $240-2,400 per year and testosterone at $200-4,200 per year).

These cost estimates do not factor in related medical costs, such as hospital stays and anesthesia. Nor does it factor in the potential for secondary surgeries. “A study in the medical journal Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery found that up to a third of patients ‘undergo secondary surgical revision to address functional and aesthetic concerns after penile inversion vaginoplasty,’” cited the report. “A similar study in Aesthetic Plastic Surgery reported that revisions for transfeminine vaginoplasty are frequent. These are lifetime, repeat customers, and there are more of them all the time.”

Market Competitors

Whether the market is worth $4 billion annually or a somewhat larger amount, that’s a large pot to split between relatively few players.

According to the market analysis from Grand View Research, 11 hospital and surgery systems account for nearly half (48.7%) of the sex reassignment market revenue in 2022, with other medical systems comprising the rest. Seven of these are in California and New York (including Cedars Sinai, Mount Sinai, and Kaiser Permanente), and the other four are: Regents of the University of Michigan, Mayo Clinic, Cleveland Clinic, and The Johns Hopkins University.

(Keep in mind, however, that hospital and surgery centers operate in somewhat location-specific markets; coastal surgery centers are likely not competing for clients with, for instance, Sanford Health, the pro-transgender hospital giant of the upper Plains states.)

Grand View Research also attempted to construct a snapshot of the top drug companies providing gender transition hormones. However, this picture was far less complete; many puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones are prescribed off-label, making them harder to track, the APP explained.

The research only accounted for an estimated 14.6% of the market, totaling $234 million in 2022. The top five companies Grand View Research tracked were Pfizer, Inc. (4.6% estimated market share), AbbVie, Inc. (3.2%), End International plc (2.9%), Novartis AG (2.1%), and Lilly (1.8%).

Disaggregated data such as these contribute to the reliability of Grand View Research’s overall estimates. It shows their work, demonstrating that the overall estimates were not invented out of thin air, but represent the aggregate of more minute and concrete estimates, which are more likely to be accurate.

Lobbying Incentive

With such large potential profits on the line, it puts in perspective the efforts by hospital lobbyists seeking to defeat bills protecting minors from gender transition procedures.

If hospitals view gender-confused children as potential lifelong patients, then state laws protecting children from the depredations of gender transition procedures are a direct threat to their business model. Not only does it delay their ability to profit off these children for five years or so, but it also threatens their ability to recruit that child as a lifelong patient at all. Research cited by the Indiana State Medical Association in 2023 has shown that 60% to 95% of minors with gender dysphoria will eventually embrace their biological sex, if puberty is allowed to occur normally, whereas 95% of children who begin puberty blockers will proceed to cross-sex hormones and surgery.

These lobbying campaigns cannot be reduced to the simple question, what is the best practice medical care for children? The APP report notes, “There lurks beneath the surface of ‘best practices’ an incentive structure and a market, both real and potential.” That incentive structure and market are preventing medical systems from seeking the best interest of their gender-confused patients.

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED VIDEO: On the ‘Weaponization of U.S. Healthcare System’ from FDR to Today by Dr. Tamzin Rosenwasser

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Trans Activist Group Pressuring Corporations To Cover Child Sex Change Drugs In Insurance Plans

/in , , , , , , , , /by

A transgender activist group is pressuring corporations to provide insurance coverage for child sex change drugs and genital surgeries.

The Humans Rights Campaign (HRC) is an LGBTQ+ activist group that champions pediatric sex change interventions such as puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and sex change surgeries. Since 2002, the HRC has issued their Corporate Equality Index (CEI) survey, which scores corporations based on their commitment to LGBTQ+ activism and adherence to LGBTQ+ ideology; corporations can score up to 100 points if they fulfill all criteria outlined by the HRC.

The HRC claims the benefits of participating in the CEI survey include gaining positive publicity and attracting top talent, noting that the majority of Fortune 500 companies have participated in the survey. Conversely, receiving a low CEI score can make a company a target of media criticism.

However, HRC recently announced they will be updating their 2026 CEI criteria to require corporations offer insurance coverage for child sex change medications to obtain a top CEI score.

The updated criteria state corporations must offer pharmaceutical coverage for sex changes, specifying this includes “puberty blockers for youth.” Corporations will also have to provide insurance coverage for cross-sex hormones and genital surgeries, as well as offer short-term medical leave to transgender individuals.

Additionally, companies can score 10 of the needed 100 points by offering insurance coverage for at least five other transgender healthcare benefits described as “essential services and treatments.” This list of “essential” services includes hair removal required for reconstructive surgery, tracheal shave/reduction, facial feminization surgeries, voice modification surgery, voice modification therapy and lipoplasty/filling for body masculinization or feminization.

HRC has suspended the CEI score of companies they’ve perceived as faltering in their support of the LGBTQ+ agenda. For example, when Bud Light received pushback over their partnership with transgender activist Dylan Mulvaney, HRC suspended Anheuser-Busch’s perfect CEI score for not standing by Mulvaney during the controversy, according to the Associated Press.

They’ve also publicly chastised companies attempting to distance themselves from the index.

For instance, Tractor Supply Company, who obtained an almost-perfect CEI score in 2023, recently faced public criticism for engaging in LGBTQ+ activism. After receiving significant pushback, Tractor Supply Company issued a public statement on June 27, 2024, suggesting they were ending their relationship with the HRC and would not be participating in the survey.

HRC responded by launching a petition against Tractor Supply Company which was posted their social media pages and accused the company of “caving to right-wing extremists.”

“Tractor Supply is turning its back on its own neighbors, including LGBTQ+ people, by caving to far-right extremists on social media,” the petition stated. “Tractor Supply’s decision to no longer participate in the Human Rights Campaign Foundation’s Corporate Equality Index, halt its Diversity, Equity and Inclusion efforts, and desert its carbon emissions goals is only going to hurt customers and families in the communities they call home.”

The CEI is related to the trend of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investing, a movement that evaluates companies as targets for investment based on how they align with certain left-wing ideas. Companies with low ESG ratings can be viewed as riskier investments by ESG investors.

In fact, the ESG reports of several Fortune 500 companies such as Walmart, Amazon, and Disney explicitly cite the HRC’s index, and the companies’ respective scores. Two major investment firms, Blackrock and Vanguard, obtained perfect CEI scores in 2023.

If companies want to remain appealing to investors by obtaining a perfect CEI in 2026, they will be required to cover insurance coverage for pediatric sex change medications, such as puberty blockers.

Puberty blockers, which are given to children as young as eight years old, can have irreversible effects such as infertility, bone density loss and disruption of brain development.

The harmful impacts of puberty blockers were acknowledged by top child sex change doctors in a series of private educational recordings hosted by the World Professional Association of Transgender Health (WPATH). The recordings were part of WPATH’s Global Education summit in September 2022 in Montreal, Canada, and exclusively obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation through a public records request.

Several European countries, including England and Scotland, have discontinued treating gender distressed children with puberty blockers citing weak evidence to support their use.

In 2023-2024, 1,384 companies participated in the HRC’s Corporate Equality Index with 595 businesses earning a perfect score by meeting all criteria, according to the “Equality 100” page.”

The HRC recently completed their 2025 CEI survey, according to a copy of the survey on their website. To achieve a perfect score, companies had to have written policies that support employee sex changes, support trans-inclusive restrooms and facilities and offer LGBTQ-inclusive products and services.

The HRC has established LGBTQ+ activism criteria for other domains, including the Healthcare Equality Index, State Equality Index, and Municipal Equality Index.

The Human Rights Campaign did not respond to requests for comment.

AUTHOR

MEGAN BROCK

Contributor.

RELATED ARTICLES:

THE WPATH TAPES: Behind-The-Scenes Recordings Reveal What Top Gender Doctors Really Think About Sex Change Procedures

Top Psychiatrist Argues Schizophrenic Patients Can Consent To Sex Change Surgeries

House Votes to Overturn Biden’s Transgender Title IX Rewrite

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

THE WPATH TAPES: Behind-The-Scenes Recordings Reveal What Top Gender Doctors Really Think About Sex Change Procedures

/in , , , , , , , , /by

The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) is the leading authority in the field of gender medicine. Its guidance is routinely used by top medical associations in the U.S. and abroad, while its standards of care inform insurance companies’ approach to coverage policies.

But behind closed doors, top WPATH doctors discussed, and at times seemed to challenge, the organization’s own published guidelines for sex change procedures and acknowledged pushing experimental medical interventions that can have devastating and irreversible complications, according to exclusive footage obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

WPATH published highly influential clinical guidance called “Standards of Care for the Health of Transgender and Gender Diverse People, Version 8” (SOC 8), which recommends the use of invasive medical interventions such as puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and sex change surgeries, calling them “safe and effective.”

The DCNF filed a series of public records requests to WPATH SOC 8 co-authors who are employed at taxpayer-funded institutions, making their emails subject to open records laws. Buried in more than 100 pages of responsive records from the University of Nevada was a series of emails between prominent WPATH members and leaders, including WPATH Global Education Institute (GEI) Co-Chair Gail Knudson, that were sent in 2022. In one email, Knudson sent a colleague the link to a folder containing nearly 30 hours of recordings from WPATH’s GEI summit in September 2022 in Montreal, Canada, which included sessions on mental health, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and sex change surgery.

These sessions provided WPATH members with in-depth education on the clinical application of topics addressed in the SOC 8 treatment guidelines. However, the footage reveals WPATH-affiliated doctors advocating for children to undergo risky sex change procedures and even pushing for these treatments for patients struggling with severe mental health issues. Several sessions were dedicated exclusively to treating children and included recommendations for minors to receive puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones and surgeries.

For instance, WPATH guidance recommends addressing a patient’s mental health issues before giving them sex change medical interventions. However, in one recorded session, a WPATH faculty member and gender doctor claimed that mental health issues don’t necessarily affect a patient’s ability to receive cross-sex hormones.

READ: Top Psychiatrist Argues Schizophrenic Patients Can Consent To Sex Change Surgeries

In another video, a doctor told attendees children should be informed that cross-sex hormones will likely make them infertile but admitted that he will prescribe them anyway if a child says they want the treatment, regardless of the future consequences.

READ: ‘No Idea About Their Fertility’: Gender Doctors Shed Light On Grim Reality Facing Kids Considering Sex Changes

A surgeon euphemistically referred to a phalloplasty procedure, a surgical series that includes obliterating the vaginal cavity and creating a fake penis with harvested tissue, as an “adventure” for young people. He did this despite later admitting that those same procedures will “definitely” have “complications,” such as permanent issues with bladder function and tissue death.

READ: Gender Doctor Calls Genital Surgery An ‘Adventure’ For Young People While Describing Grisly Complications

One physician called the entire field of cross-sex hormones “off-label,” referring to the concept of drugs being used for alternative purposes than what they were approved for. The doctor went on to say that female patients might actually appreciate drug side effects that cause them to lose hair, because they’d look “more like men.”

READ: Video Shows Prominent Doctors Acknowledging, And Even Challenging, The Experimental Nature Of Sex Change Drugs

The Food and Drug Administration says that when it approves a drug, healthcare providers generally may prescribe that drug for an unapproved use, or off-label, when “they judge that it is medically appropriate for their patient.”

In several other videos, doctors argued in favor of transitioning patients who experience psychotic episodes. One admitted that some of his patients with schizophrenia have to be careful how much cross-sex hormones they take or they can’t “keep the voices down.”

READ: ‘Keep The Voices Down’: In Unearthed Video, Doctors Discuss Putting Mentally Ill Patients, Including Kids, On Hormones

The DCNF consulted medical professionals from respected organizations, such as Do No Harm, who all argued that the comments from WPATH-affiliated doctors show that the transgender medical industry does not have patients’ best interests at heart.

While the average person, nationally and internationally, likely has never heard of WPATH, the modern medical industry is deeply tied to the organization and relies on it to dictate the standards of care for transgender medicine. WPATH’s guidelines are cited as criteria for obtaining insurance coverage by both private insurance companies and tax-funded insurance plans, positioning them as a lynchpin of the sex reassignment industry.

Additionally, their guidelines help inform policy statements from major medical and professional organizations, such as the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), the American Psychological Association and the Endocrine Society. The AAP is currently being sued by Isabelle Ayala, a former patient who was medically transitioned as a child, for allegedly rushing her through sex change medical procedures.

There’s been an explosion in the number of young people, including children, being put on hormones and puberty blockers and getting sex change surgeries, according to a study published in August 2023 by the JAMA Network. This surge has been fueled, in part, by groups like Planned Parenthood, which distributes cross-sex hormones to patients as young as 16. Planned Parenthood saw a roughly 125% jump in the number of transgender services it provided between 2020 and 2022.

Twenty-three states, however, have enacted legislation preventing doctors from performing sex change surgeries on minors amid backlash from concerned parents and doctors who don’t subscribe to the WPATH-endorsed “gender-affirming care” model. Gender-affirming care is another euphemism used by medical professionals to describe the idea that doctors should affirm a patient’s wish to live as the opposite biological sex through social transitioning, hormone therapy and even surgery.

The SOC 8 was released just days ahead of the 2022 symposium and contained several significant changes to how doctors and medical institutions implemented transgender medical treatment. For instance, WPATH removed minimum age requirements criteria that established when a child can or should receive transgender medical services such as puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and sex reassignment surgeries.

WPATH’s previous guidelines recommended that hormone therapy be given once a patient was over the age of 16, but the updated version removed this barrier and suggests hormone therapy begin at the first signs of sexual maturity.

The videos obtained by the DCNF give the first glimpse at how doctors and mental health professionals discussed implementing the new guidelines. To highlight the most significant portions of the content obtained in the records requests, the DCNF has decided to publish a series of articles collectively called “The WPATH Tapes.”

Following this release, the DCNF intends to publish all of the videos in their entirety in order to provide the public with necessary information about WPATH’s approach to medical care and shine a light on an influential organization that has largely remained anonymous until now.

The WPATH Tapes Table of Contents:

  1. Video Shows Prominent Doctors Acknowledging, And Even Challenging, The Experimental Nature Of Sex Change Drugs
  2. Top Psychiatrist Argues Schizophrenic Patients Can Consent To Sex Change Surgeries
  3. ‘Keep The Voices Down’: In Unearthed Video, Doctors Discuss Putting Mentally Ill Patients, Including Kids, On Hormones
  4. Gender Doctor Calls Genital Surgery An ‘Adventure’ For Young People While Describing Grisly Complications
  5. ‘No Idea About Their Fertility’: Gender Doctors Shed Light On Grim Reality Facing Kids Considering Sex Changes
  6. Leader Of Gender Medicine Org Says Binary Sex ‘Doesn’t Really Hold True,’ Cheers On ‘Deconstructed’ Biology
  7. Private Footage Reveals Leading Medical Org’s Efforts To ‘Normalize’ Gender Ideology

AUTHORS

MEGAN BROCK AND KATE ANDERSON

Contributors.

RELATED ARTICLES:

EXCLUSIVE: Prominent Psychologist Talks Nonstop About Gender-Transitioning 3-Year-Olds During Medical Training Course

Gender Doctor Calls Genital Surgery An ‘Adventure’ For Young People While Describing Grisly Complications

‘Keep The Voices Down’: In Unearthed Video, Doctors Discuss Putting Mentally Ill Patients, Including Kids, On Hormones

EXCLUSIVE: Top Doctors Complain Detransitioners Posed ‘Harm’ To Trans Members At Medical Conference

EXCLUSIVE: Gender Doctor Says Parents Who Oppose Transitioning Their Kid Have ‘Mental Illness’

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Caller column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

NHS Formally Declares Sex a ‘Biological’ Reality

/in , , , , , , , , , , , /by

Britain’s top health authority is officially rejecting transgender ideology and declaring that biological sex is a reality, while “gender identity” isn’t. The U.K.’s National Health Service (NHS) is revising its constitution to state, “We are defining sex as biological sex.” The proposed constitutional revisions stress a need for “respecting the biological differences between men and women,” further warning, “If these biological differences are not considered or respected, there is the potential for unintended adverse health consequences.”

Among other things, the constitutional revision will bar biological men who identify as women from accessing female-only wards, allow female patients to request other biological females for “intimate care,” and do away with terms such as “chestfeeding” and “birthing people.”

“We need to be making this robust case to refuse to wipe women out of the conversation,” Health Secretary Victoria Atkins stated, according to The Telegraph. “We have always been clear that sex matters and our services should respect that. By putting this in the NHS constitution we’re highlighting the importance of balancing the rights and needs of all patients to make a healthcare system that is faster, simpler and fairer for all.”

“The confusion between ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ in official policies like the NHS constitution is what has enabled women’s rights to be trampled over in the name of transgender identities,” explained Maya Forstater, co-founder and chief executive of the advocacy group Sex Matters. “Sex, of course, is a matter of biology, not identity, and it is welcome that the NHS is now spelling this out in relation to single-sex accommodation and intimate care.”

Last year, then-Health Secretary Steve Barclay announced similar plans to eliminate “wokery” in the NHS, including barring biological who identify as women from accessing female-only wards, doing away with terminology like “chestfeeding,” and restoring the word “woman” to NHS guidance on subjects like menopause and ovarian cancer. “We need a common-sense approach to sex and equality issues in the NHS,” Barclay said at the time. “It is vital that women’s voices are heard in the NHS and the privacy, dignity and safety of all patients are protected.”

The constitutional revisions are hardly the only changes the NHS is making in its approach to transgenderism. In March, NHS England formally banned the prescription of puberty blockers and hormone drugs to minors, announcing instead a focus on family therapy, individual child psychotherapy, parental support or counseling, and other forms of counseling and therapy. “Puberty blockers … are not available to children and young people for gender incongruence or gender dysphoria because there is not enough evidence of safety and clinical effectiveness,” NHS England announced. Last month, Scotland’s NHS offices followed suit, “pausing” the prescription of puberty blockers and hormone drugs to minors while health officials examine “evidence of safety and long-term impact for therapies.”

Many of the changes in how British healthcare practitioners approach transgenderism center around the publication of the Cass Review, an extensive four-year investigation led by renowned pediatrician Dr. Hilary Cass into gender transition procedures for minors. The report found that there was “remarkably weak evidence” to recommend the use of puberty blockers and hormone drugs, there was “no evidence” that gender transition procedures prevented or reduced the risk of suicide, the majority of children diagnosed with gender dysphoria suffer from a host of often-neglected psychological co-morbidities, and serious research into the harms of gender transition procedures was impeded by “toxic” debate surrounding the topic. Additionally, the groundbreaking 400-page report found that gender transition procedures for children are largely based on biased and even low-quality research.

For example, the infamous Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) clinic at Tavistock worked in close conjunction with transgender activist group Mermaids. In 2022, two years before her final report was due, Cass urgently recommended that the U.K. government shut down Tavistock’s GIDS clinic, based on concerns over an absence of child safeguarding and an excess of gender ideology guiding staff members’ decisions. Cass reported that staff and clinicians often rushed children as young as 10 years old onto puberty blocker and hormone drug regimens, sometimes after as few as three consultations. Ninety-six percent of child patients at Tavistock’s GIDS clinic were placed on puberty blockers and numerous whistleblowers reported that staff often diagnosed children with gender dysphoria while ignoring or neglecting other psychological conditions such as autism, anxiety, or depression.

In the wake of the Cass Review’s publication, a cohort of 16 unnamed clinical psychologists penned an open letter saying that they were “ashamed of the role psychology played in gender care” and of how psychologists “failed young people at Gender Identity Development Service clinics.” The clinicians called for “accountability for the managers and clinicians who pursued such unethical practice and caused avoidable harm to young people,” adding that “the role of our own profession should be fully examined.”

Numerous European countries have halted or placed stringent safeguards around gender transition procedures for minors. France, Sweden, Norway, and Finland have joined the U.K. in largely or entirely halting the prescription of puberty blockers and hormone drugs to children, warning that there is a lack of thorough research and study surrounding the safety and efficacy of gender transition procedures. Yet the U.S. still allows for gender transition procedures to be practiced on minors, earning the label of “outlier.”

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED VIDEO: Muslim leader demanding death to homosexuals

POST ON X:

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Two Out of Three Kids Will No Longer Identify as Transgender by Adulthood, Massive Study Finds

/in , , , , , , , , , /by

The vast majority of children who experience gender dysphoria will embrace their biological sex by adulthood, according to a sweeping national study that monitored children for 15 years.

Roughly two out of every three children who identify as transgender will embrace their birth sex by their mid-20s, the study found. People most likely to continue to identify as transgender have low self-esteem and other mental health challenges, researchers found.

A study of children in the Netherlands tracked 2,772 adolescents from the age of 11 to 26, asking them to rate their mental and physical health every three years for 15 years. The Youth and Adult Self-Report (YSR) asked participants to assess how much they agree with the statement, “I wish to be of the opposite sex.” A team of researchers then pored over the data from the Tracking Adolescent’s Individual Lives Survey (TRAILS) to measure “gender non-contentedness.”

The vast majority (78%) of people never felt any feelings of gender dysphoria, researchers noted. “In early adolescence, 11% of participants reported gender non-contentedness,” wrote researchers in the study, published in February in the peer-reviewed Archives of Sexual Behavior. “The prevalence decreased with age and was 4% at the last follow-up (around age 26)” — a desistance rate of 64%.

Researchers also found that adolescents were 950% more likely to feel better about their sex than to feel worse: 19% of participants felt decreased “gender non-contentedness,” as compared with only 2% whose feelings deepened over time. Participants whose gender confusion worsened over the years “more often were female,” researchers noted.

Feeling more severe gender dysphoria as an adult is also “associated with a lower [overall] self-worth, more behavioral and emotional problems, and a non-heterosexual sexual” preference.

“Gender non-contentedness, while being relatively common during early adolescence, in general decreases with age and appears to be associated with a poorer self-concept and mental health throughout development,” they concluded.

Experts felt vindicated by the latest research. “This new study simply confirms what has been known for over a decade,” Jay Richards, Ph.D., told The Washington Stand. In 2013, the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) “noted that most kids who experience distress with their sexed bodies resolve those feelings after they pass through natural puberty,” Richards — who serves as director of the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Life, Religion, and Family at the Heritage Foundation — told TWS.

The Dutch study acknowledges it did not break new ground. Although few studies follow the same cohort for such a long period of time, the analysts admitted their findings fell in line with the best available literature. “The few longitudinal studies that have been conducted in a clinical setting found low persistence rates of early childhood gender dysphoric feelings into adolescence and adulthood,” wrote the researchers, linking to studies from 2016 and 2021. The latter found, “Boys clinic-referred for gender identity concerns in childhood had a high rate of desistance.”

Yet this and other studies reveal that “minors who are put on puberty blockers for the purposes of ‘gender affirmation’ are extremely likely to go on to take cross-hormones” such as estrogen and testosterone, Richards told TWS. Studies show up to 93% of children who begin on puberty blockers will go on to receive cross-sex hormone injections. Experts say the transgender industry’s early medical intervention actually deepens and prolongs feelings of gender dysphoria that would otherwise go away on their own. “This is what makes ‘gender-affirming’ (that is, sex-denying) medical interventions on minors such a medical atrocity. These interventions fast track troubled kids onto a path to sterilization and lifelong medical problems,” explained Richards.

The harm goes beyond lost fertility. “There is no research into long-term harms, but some evidence suggests decreased IQ and brittle bones. Permanent sterility is guaranteed for minors who go through full hormonal “transition.” Sexual dysfunction appears to be extremely common as well,” wrote Leor Sapir, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute, at The Hill. So-called “gender-affirming hormonal treatment” (GAHT) causes “permanent physical changes including excruciating genital growth, vaginal atrophy and tearing and much higher risk for cancer and cardiovascular disease.”

The authors of the new study said they hope their findings will “help adolescents to realize that it is normal to have some doubts about one’s identity and one’s gender identity during this age period and that this is also relatively common.” It should “provide some perspective to clinicians primarily seeing individuals with intense gender dysphoric feelings.”

This study, and others like it, prove that “children need time, not gender-‘affirming’ medical mutilation,” said Sarah Parshall Perry of the Heritage Foundation.

A growing number of young people subjected to transgender ideology at pediatric gender clinics say they wish they had known how common, and fleeting, feelings of transgenderism can be. “Young people, particularly young women, are very susceptible to social contagion. They are the most susceptible demographic,” Prisha Mosley, a detransitioner who now works with the Independent Women’s Forum, told Laura Ingraham Thursday evening. “And as for the 1% who continues to feel that way, they deserve ethical and data-based mental health care.”

She noted how easily she received transgender injections and procedures, as compared to treatment for her bona fide mental health issues. “I had actually been seeking mental health care and services for trauma and other mental illnesses that were diagnosed prior to my gender dysphoria diagnosis for several years. But as soon as I heard about gender ideology online and expressed to my doctors that I felt I was born in the wrong body, I was immediately fast-tracked,” Mosley told Ingraham on Fox News. She said it took her “almost 10 years after getting my diagnosis for Borderline Personality Disorder to find a dialectical behavioral therapist to treat it, but it was less than two years to go from hormones to a double mastectomy and transition.”

Mosley urged parents to guard their children against the predatory transgender industry, cautioning them to be cognizant of “the way people are manipulating and breaking down language” on the issue of gender. “And then do your best to prepare your children for that. Maybe tell them that there are tricky people out there who will twist language and manipulate them, because unfortunately, it’s true.”

“Sometimes these predators — these people — they’ll wear pins that say, ‘You’re safe with me,’ and all of that, but that can oftentimes be a signal that you’re not safe,” warned Mosley.

“This new Dutch study reminds us that children are being subjected to experimental medical interventions to treat what, in most cases, is a temporary psychological state,” Richards told TWS. “This is a grotesque perversion of the medical maxim to ‘first, do no harm.’”

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Biden Admin Sues Utah to House Male Prisoner in Women’s Prison

With Over 50+ LGBT Holidays, Christians Must Continue to ‘Speak the Truth in Love’

 

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Leaked Files Reveal WPATH’s Awareness of ‘Debilitating,’ ‘Potentially Fatal’ Effects of Trans Procedures

/in , , , , , , , , , /by

The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) has a long history. The Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh wrote that WPATH “is the organization that major hospitals and gender clinics cite as the all-important authority on so-called ‘trans healthcare.’” Controversial at its core, WPATH has faced immense criticism over the years from those who do not support gender transition procedures, while at the same time receiving strong support from those who see cross-sex hormones, puberty blocking drugs, and surgeries to remove healthy organs as “gender affirming care.”

Despite losing over 60% of its members between January 2023 and January 2024, “WPATH is somehow now taken seriously as the standard-setter in the field, by major hospitals and medical associations,” Walsh wrote. But in reality, he continued, WPATH “is maybe the single greatest scam in modern medicine. … The WPATH of today is the proud product of decades of quackery and sexual experimentation. It is a threat to public health and in particular to children.”

On March 4, the U.S. think tank Environmental Progress released leaked files from WPATH that “revealed that the clinicians who shape how ‘gender medicine’ is regulated and practiced around the world consistently violate medical ethics and informed consent.”

It continued, “In the WPATH Files, members demonstrate a lack of consideration for long-term patient outcomes despite being aware of the debilitating and potentially fatal side effects of cross-sex hormones and other treatments. Messages in the files show that patients with severe mental health issues, such as schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder, and other vulnerabilities such as homelessness, are being allowed to consent to hormonal and surgical interventions. Members dismiss concerns about these patients and characterize efforts to protect them as unnecessary ‘gatekeeping.’”

Most unsettling about the leaked files, experts have pointed out, is that they prove the alleged “medical professionals” are keenly aware “they are offering minors life-changing treatments they cannot fully understand.” On Wednesday, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins highlighted on “Washington Watch” that the “injuries described in the files” that WPATH members are aware of “include sterilization, loss of sexual function, liver tumors, and even death.”

Concerning the leaked files, Dr. Quentin Van Meter, a pediatric endocrinologist and executive committee member of the American College of Pediatricians, observed on “Washington Watch” that “it’s a very large battering ram that’s hit the wall … that has been hiding all of the information that they know, and they willingly discuss among themselves.” He added that the files prove that the procedures they are doing on “these kids are clearly experimental [and] not based on science.”

He explained that doctors have been warning against WPATH and their practices for years in hearings and courts — efforts that have been repeatedly “shot down.” Van Meter emphasized that WPATH considers their work as “saving grace” and that they “save lives.” For years, WPATH has claimed that any contrary belief “is a bald-faced lie, and is politically motivated by right-wing conspiracy theorists,” he said. “That’s been their mantra since we’ve known them on the scene.”

Ultimately, he argued, the “WPATH secrets that have now been leaked show that [they have] no scientific background [and] that they are living and repeating lies over and over again. It’s quite shocking.” But he also described it as a “gift,” since it exposes the truth that “this is not good for children.”

Perkins added, “It exposes the fact that many of these entities that are held out as experts have been compromised by the political agendas of these ideologically driven individuals.” He continued, “This is what happens when this ideology, untethered to truth and ethics, mixes with science. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should do it.”

Especially since “it leads to horrible outcomes for children,” Perkins contended. Children that “can’t drive … can’t get a tattoo, but we’re letting them cut off body parts and … make them think they’re changing their gender.”

Van Meter agreed. “This needs to be shouted from the … hilltops: ‘Stop.’ The whole world must stop this nonsense, this insanity. We have hurt hundreds of thousands of children irreparably since this whole process began in the mid-2000s, and we’ve got to put a stop to it.”

Perkins asked if the leaked information would be enough to make “the medical associations … stop and rethink” what they’re doing. Van Meter responded, “That would be the intellectually correct thing to do.” However, what unsettled the doctor the most was how “casual” and “flippant” the members of WPATH seem to be discussing this. “The ideology is embedded so deeply in their minds that I don’t think they really care,” he remarked.

“It’s sad,” Perkins concluded. “It is absolutely sad. What an indictment against our culture to allow this to occur.”

AUTHOR

Sarah Holliday

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: Pandering to LGBT Activists Just Blew Up in This Politician’s Face

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2024 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

UK Report: Over One Third of Children on Puberty Blockers Experienced Worsened Mental Health

/in , , , , , , , , , , /by

New research from the United Kingdom is showing that over a third of children placed on puberty blockers and hormone drugs suffered severe mental health deterioration afterwards.

A 2011 study conducted at the Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) clinic for children reported that children who were put on puberty blockers suffered no adverse mental health effects. However, new analysis conducted by Susan McPherson, a professor of psychology and sociology at the University of Essex, and retired social scientist David Freedman found that the majority of children put on puberty blockers and hormone drugs experienced erratic and fluctuating mental health, including over a third whose mental health “reliably deteriorated.”

The original study, conducted on 44 children between the ages of 12 and 15, was reportedly based on group averages, while the new analysis relied on individual results, which McPherson and Freedman explained “allows us to look at how a treatment is performing in terms of the percentage of patients improving, deteriorating, and showing clinically significant change. … It is possible, using this approach, to look at patterns, such as who is benefitting and who is not.”

Last year, Britain’s National Health Service (NHS) opted to close down the Tavistock GIDS clinic after a government report found that the staff rushed and even pressured minors into taking puberty blockers and hormone drugs with almost no psychological or medical oversight. A reported 96% of child patients were placed on puberty blockers by Tavistock staffers, and concerns were raised over a tendentious focus on “gender dysphoria,” instead of considering other psychological factors in recommending drugs or surgeries for minors, which were summarily dismissed. In fact, the situation was so concerning that Dr. Hillary Cass, the pediatrician tasked by the government with investigating the claims against Tavistock, offered her recommendation to shut down the clinic several months early, saying she had enough information already to justify closing Tavistock.

Cass particularly stressed concerns she had over the use of puberty blockers and other hormone drugs, which the Tavistock clinic had been prescribing to children as young as 10 years old, many of whom were already on the autism spectrum or suffering various mental health issues like depression or eating disorders. In her interim report to the NHS, Cass noted, “There is lack of consensus and open discussion about the nature of gender dysphoria and therefore about the appropriate clinical response.” She added, “There has not been routine and consistent data collection, which means it is not possible to accurately track the outcomes and pathways that children and young people take through the service.”

Over the years, numerous whistleblowers — former staff governor Dr. David Bell, consultants and nurses like Marcus and Sue Evans, child safeguarding officer Sonia Appleby, and countless former patients who now, as adults, regret being put on puberty blockers and hormone drugs — have sounded the alarm over the Tavistock clinic’s practices. Most have pointed out that children and their parents were often denied informed consent as staffers rushed children onto puberty blockers after only three or four meetings. Some whistleblowers even explained that topics like “sexual orientation” were effectively off-limits and that a transgender identity and a battery of hormone drugs were the only options explored by clinicians. Others pointed out that the drastic rise in children going through Tavistock (from about 250 “patients” in 2011 to over 5,000 in 2021) and linked it to the growing puberty blocker and hormone drug industry.

The findings of the new analysis of the Tavistock study are in line with research conducted and published by Family Research Council. Dr. Jennifer Bauwens, director of FRC’s Center for Family Studies, explained earlier this year:

“At one time, gender dysphoria was considered a mental disorder, but now, due to the increasing prevalence of a worldview shaped by gender identity ideology, it has morphed into a human rights issue. The ideology borrows from the mental health aspects of gender dysphoria in order to justify medical ‘intervention.’”

She continued, “Advocates of gender-affirming care insist it is both lifesaving and evidence-based health care for those who identify as transgender. But the research used to make such a claim is full of methodological errors and can be easily disputed as a research body that is incomplete.” Notably, the original Tavistock study from 2011 focused on group studies instead of on individual situations and results. Bauwens added, “Not only are the currently published studies problematic, but there is a lack of ongoing and long-term follow-up reports that address the impact of cross-sex hormones and surgeries.”

In June, the NHS banned the use of puberty blockers and hormone drugs on minors, following a growing swath of European medical experts who have backed off gender transition procedures for children. France, Sweden, Finland, and Norway have also put restrictions on the use of puberty blockers and hormone drugs on children. The U.S. still hasn’t.

AUTHOR

S.A. McCarthy

S.A. McCarthy serves as a news writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICES:

‘Let Us Raise Our Kids’: Thousands of Canadians Protest LGBT School Policies

Most Americans Don’t Consider Same-Sex Couples Raising Kids ‘Completely Acceptable’: Pew Poll

Roy Introduces Bill to Repeal FACE Act and End the Persecution of Pro-Lifers

‘There Are New Threats’: Experts Discuss How to Stop the Sexualization of Children

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Chloe Cole: Anyone Trying to Hide Kids’ Gender Identity Is ‘Plain Perverted’

/in , , , , , /by

There aren’t a lot of 19-year-olds who give up their birthdays to go to Congress and plead for kids’ lives. But Chloe Cole isn’t your average teenager. The face of the detransitioner movement has come into her own by walking a painful path she prays no one else follows. Now, after years of suffering, self-doubt, and irreversible surgery, Chloe is a living warning to parents that the scars of trying to be someone else never fully heal.

“I look in the mirror sometimes, and I feel like a monster,” she told the roomful of elected leaders last month. Chloe talked emotionally about the double mastectomy that doctors encouraged at just 15. “After my breasts were taken away from me, the tissue was incinerated — before I was able to legally drive.” It was the loss of that piece of herself that drove the nightmare home. “Every single night after every bath, after every shower, I would have to look down at these huge wounds that were on my chest,” she remembered. Even the skin grafts that they “took of my nipples” haunted her. The masculine replacements that doctors made “are weeping fluid today,” she admitted to the hushed room of leaders.

These are the horrors that Chloe travels the world to share. Now, with the shock that the number of U.S. gender reassignment surgeries has tripled, her cause is even more urgent. She wants people to know that she was never suicidal before her transition. That changed almost instantly. “After my surgery, I did become suicidal,” Cole admits. “I’m doing better now, but my parents almost got the dead daughter promised to them by my doctors.”

She was referring to the intimidation tactics used by a shocking number of clinics on moms and dads who are concerned about letting their children move forward with cross-sex hormones and mutilation. “I mean, really, they were just giving me what I, as the child, wanted rather than stopping [me] and letting me be a kid and thinking about what it might have been that I actually needed — which was psychotherapy and just being given a chance to just grow up,” Chloe told former Congressman Jody Hice on Friday’s “Washington Watch.”

And the doctors “expected my parents to go along with all of this. They told them that it was going to be life or death for me, that I would become suicidal if I were not on these interventions. And really, what it came down to was they said that to manipulate my parents.”

But as Chloe explains it, she was just a small-town girl in rural California who was on the verge of puberty and uncomfortable with what was happening to her body. “And when I told my parents that I felt like a boy, in retrospect, all I meant was that I hated puberty, that I wanted this newfound sexual tension to go away.” She started reading things online that if she didn’t feel like a girl, she probably wasn’t. In a letter that she left on the dining room table, she told her parents that she wanted to be a boy. “They had no idea what to do,” she recalls in a lengthy profile piece for The Telegraph.

At therapy, the “experts” — like so many of her teachers — ignored years of evidence that Chloe was most likely autistic. She says she never felt “super close” to her parents, and “I must have had some sort of attachment issue. I started at five or six to reject physical affection.” Despite those underlying issues, doctors urged Chloe’s mom and dad to consent to puberty blockers at just 13.

“They told them that blood was going to be on their hands … and that they only had those two choices. No other choices were presented to us. They never told them about the possibility that I would resist or detransition or of me regretting these procedures. They said that it was more likely that I that I would regret going through puberty than I ever would being on these interventions,” Cole explained to Hice.

Two years later, at the tender age of 15, Chloe made the decision that she has regretted ever since: “I had a double mastectomy, meaning that my breasts had been removed permanently.” After months of physical pain and trauma, she realized she “regretted all of these interventions, that I was too young to be making decisions like this, and that by doing all of this, I was losing parts of my adulthood before I could even call myself a woman, and that one day I wanted to be able to have kids of my own.”

Sitting in a psychology class about parenting and family barely a year later, Cole had what she now considers “a huge wake-up call.” “As I listened, I reali[zed] that I had a maternal instinct, that one day I’d like to have kids of my own, but that the effects of being prescribed puberty blockers and testosterone during my transition might mean I couldn’t.”

But these weren’t things she was thinking of at 15 when she had her body irreversibly altered. “But sitting in that class, it hurt me really deeply to reali[ze] how a part of me had been taken away. … It shattered my heart into a million pieces.” She talks about spending a lot of time in bed, “unable to get up, crying silently. I didn’t know what life would look like from there and who I would be, but I just knew I couldn’t take any more testosterone shots.”

What came next was a long and difficult chapter marked by indifferent doctors and the open betrayal of the same LGBT movement that had pushed her toward this mess. “I actually got a really aggressive response from the transgender community and the people who had celebrated me the most through my transition,” Chloe told Hice, “[They] … were now turning their back on me, and they were saying the cruelest things to me. And even my doctors — I wasn’t getting any support from them. I wasn’t getting any help as to how to go off of the hormones or any of the complications that I was having from these procedures. It was an incredibly lonely experience, so much more difficult than transitioning in the first place.”

Trying to figure it “all out on my own,” Chloe started stumbling on other people with similar horror stories — people who felt damaged and regretted it. “And while on one hand, it was kind of comforting knowing that I wasn’t the only one going through this,” it was also, she explained, “incredibly painful and terrifying that I’m not the only one who has been hurt by this, that there are many people out there — the amount of which we’ll never know. … And I wanted to be able to advocate for other people, especially the other kids who have been in this situation — and to prevent it from happening ever again.”

When Hice characterizes what happened to Chloe as abuse, she embraces the term. “That’s absolutely what it is at every single level. I was failed by these adults — these people who call themselves doctors, who are supposed to help my parents in raising me and getting me care.”

That’s why she’s adamant that parents do more digging about what’s really going on. “… [A] good percentage of these people — if not all of them — have had some sort of co-morbidity issue, whether it be like a learning disorder, such as ADHD or autism, or like a cluster B personality disorder, depression, social anxiety. Or, overwhelmingly, many of them have a history of trauma, whether it be of sexual abuse or assault or rape or a parental or family trauma. And it’s hard to know how that might play into the way that a person sees themselves in relation to their sex.”

The idea that schools want to hide these issues or keep a child’s gender identity a secret is, in her opinion, “plain perverted.” “ …[I]t’s incredibly concerning that these schools think that they can control what the child is exposed to more than the parent. I mean, back when I was in school, when I was in middle and high school, we had like waivers for parents to sign off for sex ed. But they don’t get a choice on this?”

So where should parents start? What would have helped Chloe when she was struggling?

“The best thing to do is to … not go the path of having these children go on permanent interventions that will affect them for the rest of their lives,” she insisted. “It’s important to speak to them directly and openly about where these feelings are coming from. What is it that makes them feel like they’re not enough as their own sex? What is influencing them to think that they can just opt out of either being a boy or a girl and go the other path? And to remember to be compassionate to them, to let them know that they are loved. That they are perfect as they are. That the issue is not their body or the way that they look or were born, but the way that they see it.”

As frightening as the idea may be to parents, moms and dads are the ones best equipped to guide their children through this. That means taking control over the negative voices that are corrupting their view of themselves. As Chloe concluded:

“[T]ry to remove the influence that is making them think otherwise—whether it be from school, whether they’re learning it in class from their peers, or from the internet, and to respond accordingly. Like … in the case of it being from social media or the internet, you might have to take away their devices and to replace it with something else like a sport or encouraging them to go out and develop a hobby. Or if it’s coming from school, then you’ll have to be more involved in your child’s education to see what is going on in the classroom, to look at the curriculum. And you may have to move schools, you may have to end up homeschooling them, which is not an option for every parent.

“It is incredibly difficult. But I think in the very end it’s worth it, because that gives you full control over what your child is being exposed to and what they’re taught.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

‘Sexual Imperialism’: The World Bank Debanks Uganda over Anti Molestation Law

Rock Stars Take on Transgender Agenda

Women Speak Out Against YMCA ‘Transgender’ Bathroom Policies

RELATED TWEET:

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.

The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Whistleblower Explains How the Transgender Industry Convinces Parents to Mutilate Their Kids

/in , , , , , , , , , , /by

A whistleblower’s explosive account reveals that the transgender medical industry uses high-pressure techniques, employs its own cadre of “experts,” and lies about the impact of puberty blockers and other drugs to convince parents to authorize lifelong “gender-affirming care” that effectively, or literally, castrates their children. When the parents refuse, at least one transgender clinic disregarded the will of the custodial parent, the insider’s testimony states.

Allegations of illegal activity come from an affidavit and accompanying article by Jamie Reed, a far-Left LGBT activist who worked for four years at The Washington University Transgender Center at St. Louis Children’s Hospital. The affidavit attests doctors in the university’s transgender clinic prescribed experimental drugs to young children, ignored the children’s physical and mental health concerns, and may have committed Medicaid and insurance fraud. Her heartrending report has touched off separate investigations by Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey (R) and U.S. Senator Josh Hawley (R-Mo.).

Yet her record of the pediatric gender clinic’s actions during her 2018-2022 tenure also contains damning information about the way the industry overcomes wary parents’ concerns and traps children into decades of costly, harmful “treatments.”

Enjoying news and commentary from a biblical worldview?

Stand with The Washington Stand by partnering with Family Research Council.

The facility referred young people reportedly suffering “gender dysphoria” for an evaluation with a psychologist chosen from on a list of doctors they “knew they would say yes” to the gender transition, Reed states. One psychologist at the hospital was particularly “known to approve virtually everyone seeking transition,” she writes. If no outside psychologist signed the letter, the center referred the child to their two in-house psychologists, who would certify that the child should begin the gender reassignment process.

For the youngest patients, this meant beginning puberty blockers before administering a lifetime of cross-sex hormones. “The Center tells the public and parents of patients that the point of puberty blockers is to give children time to figure out their gender identity,” she writes. But in reality, the center uses those drugs “just until children are old enough to be put on cross-sex hormones. Doctors at the Center always prescribe cross-sex hormones for children who have been taking puberty blockers.” (Emphasis in original.)

The doctors’ insistence, rather than the children’s persistence, may explain another discrepancy: Left to their own devices, approximately 85% of children with gender dysphoria will identify with their birth sex by the time they reach adulthood. But nearly 100% of children placed on puberty blockers continue the gender transition process, notes Jennifer Bauwens, director of the Center for Family Studies at the Family Research Council.

Doctors lie to assure parents will approve the puberty blockers, Reed reveals. “The doctors at the Center tell the public and tell parents of patients that puberty blockers are fully reversible. They really are not. They do lasting damage to the body,” says Reed. Those damages include “sterilization, reduced bone density, cognitive problems, increased body fat percentage and body mass index, decreased lean body mass, and arterial hypertension,” writes Bauwens.

Reed describes meetings between concerned parents, who wanted answers to the scientific findings they had uncovered about the dangers of puberty blockers, and gender clinic employees, who sought to sell them a lifetime of medical interventions. “The clinicians would dismiss the research that the parents had found and speak down to the parents,” Reed testifies. The facility exhibited a thorough “lack of regard for the rights of parents,” as “doctors saw themselves as more informed decision-makers over the fate of these children.” Clinic employees “would also malign any parent that was not on board with medicalizing their children,” says Reed.

That echoes the experiences of relatives in the documentary “Dead Name,” especially Helen, who was told to “celebrate” her child’s transgender identity after her former lesbian partner had introduced Helen’s four-year-old son, Jonas, to transgender ideology. Helen recounts that a parade of preschool officials and therapists presented her preschooler’s decision as a fait accompli. “They never said, ‘We need to talk about this,’” Helen says. “It was always edicts by email.”

Parents who resisted received the ultimate high-pressure sales tactic: “Experts” said they must approve their child’s gender transition or witness the child’s suicide. “A common tactic was for doctors to tell the parent of a [girl], ‘You can either have a living son or a dead daughter.’ The clinicians would tell parents of a [boy], ‘You can either have a living daughter or dead son,’” Reed testifies. The employees made these comments “to parents in front of their children,” which “introduced the idea of suicide to the children” — something that equally violates known research and medical ethics, Bauwens says.

“It is entirely inappropriate and unethical for anyone in my profession to plant the idea that an inevitable outcome will be suicide (even in the absence of expressed suicidal ideation) if the clinician’s counsel for gender-affirming care is not followed,” Bauwens told Nebraska legislators last week while testifying on behalf of Bill 574, the Let Them Grow Act, which would protect minors from transgender injections and surgeries. “This is blatantly manipulative and has no part in promoting psychological or relational health.”

It’s also erroneous. Numerous studies have found gender transition procedures do not help, and sometimes harm, patients’ mental health. “There are no reliable studies showing” a positive correlation between transgender injections/surgeries and improved mental health, Reed writes.

When parents still refused, or withdrew consent for, the procedures employees at the gender transition clinic continued the treatment, Reed alleges. They would even intervene in custody disputes against parents who disagreed with plans to transition their children. “One of our doctors actually testified in a custody hearing against a father who opposed a mother’s wish to start their 11-year-old daughter on puberty blockers,” Reed notes. But they also ignored the judges’ orders and sided with anyone who brought a child into the office for a gender transition. “I was told not to ask for custody agreements because ‘if we have the custody agreement, we have to follow it,’” Reed notes in legal documents.

To make matters worse many, perhaps most, of the young people who entered the university’s gender clinic had not experienced gender dysphoria at all, Reed states, but a form of social contagion. During her four years at the center, the total number of calls the center received increased between 400% and 800%, and girls began to outnumber boys. Traditionally, most cases of gender dysphoria involved males who identify as female. When she began, she heard about 10 calls a month from teenage girls who identified as male; that had increased five-fold by the time she left, with this cohort making up 70% of the center’s calls.

“It became clear that many children coming to the Center had gender identities that were likely the result of social contagion,” Reed writes. A 2018 study from Dr. Lisa Littman found that rapid onset gender dysphoria (ROGD) can be “initiated, magnified, spread, and maintained via the mechanisms of social and peer contagion,” including peer pressure via online platforms. Reed concludes, “Social media is at least partly responsible for this large increase in children seeking gender transition.”

Yet the center lobbied these minors to begin puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones (typically testosterone injections) and ignored the side effects, Reed writes. “The Center never discontinues cross-sex hormones, no matter the outcome,” she says.

The industry is big business. “Certainly pubertal blockers could run thousands of dollars per month in out-of-pocket expenses,” says Dr. Michael Haller at the University of Florida’s department of pediatrics. Transgender surgeries are “a huge money-maker,” said Dr. Shayne Taylor of Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s Clinic for Transgender Health in 2018.

The problems Reed identifies affect all cases of transgender identity, because ideological considerations have narrowed the medical standards and available “treatments” for gender dysphoria, Bauwens told The Washington Stand. “A multitude of treatments have been researched to help children through depression. Yet when it comes to gender dysphoria, there’s only one path currently being prescribed: that is to try to become someone else,” she told Nebraska lawmakers.

“These interventions are being endorsed based on consensus, not evidence: Practices were voted on rather than standing on the merits of solid research findings addressing gender dysphoria,” Bauwens noted. “The success rates for nonintervention for gender dysphoria already exceed most psychological interventions.”

Children need to be “protected from misdiagnosis and scientifically unsupported, highly invasive, and potentially irreversible interventions that will impact the rest of their lives.”

Surprisingly Reed — who says, “I support trans rights” — agrees. “Given the secrecy and lack of rigorous standards that characterize youth gender transition across the country, I believe that to ensure the safety of American children, we need a moratorium on the hormonal and surgical treatment of young people with gender dysphoria,” Reed concludes.

Lawmakers promise to act on the legally actionable items in her whistleblower testimony. “Accountability is coming,” Senator Hawley has promised.

But investigations and prosecutions cannot bring wholeness to the lives permanently altered by the gender transition industry.

“It’s important as others are affirming a false identity that we need to go out of our way, as parents and as a community of believers, to affirm our young people in who they are,” Bauwens told “Washington Watch with Tony Perkins” last fall. “Transing a child is never the answer.”

AUTHOR

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Florida Medical Boards Confirm, Clarify Ban on Gender Transition Procedures on Minors

What Wokeness? Army Claims Extremism Has Nothing to Do with Recruitment Woes

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Report: U.S. Is ‘Most Permissive Country’ for Minor Gender Transition

/in , , , , , , , , , , , /by

UPDATE:

”The United States is the most permissive country when it comes to the legal and medical gender transition of children,” according to a 12-country policy review by medical advocacy group Do No Harm. The group compared “different legal requirements for gender change-related treatments and actions” among the U.S. and the 11 countries of Northern and Western Europe. These countries — Belgium, Denmark, Iceland, Ireland, Finland, France, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and the United Kingdom — “share the United States’ broad support for transgenderism” yet “reject the gender-affirming care model for children.”

Do No Harm explained that America has adopted a “gender affirmation” policy for children, which “assumes that gender incongruence can manifest as early as age four and that questioning a minor’s gender self-definition is harmful and unethical. The American Academy of Pediatrics has embraced an affirm-only/affirm-early policy since 2018, and most states abide by its guidance despite withering medical and scientific criticism.” By contrast, some European countries “have explicitly abandoned” the gender-affirming care model and “now discourage automatic deference to a child’s self-declaration on the grounds that the risks outweigh the benefits.” They also recommend “months-long psychotherapy sessions to address co-occurring mental health problems.”

The report proceeded with a country-by-country comparison of requirements for the medical and legal gender transition of children.

American restrictions on puberty blockers vary by state, but “the most permissive states do not impose restrictions,” and blockers have been prescribed “as early as age eight.” Oregonians “are legally entitled” to blockers “from age 15,” with Medicaid assistance and without parental consent. In Iceland, there is “no minimum age” except as a “matter of clinical judgment.” The U.K. permits blockers “from the earliest stages of puberty,” while Belgium, France, and Norway permit blockers from Tanner Stage II, or “once physiological signs of puberty manifest.” Denmark, Netherlands, and Sweden allow puberty blockers “from age 12.” Finland allows them “about age 13.” Ireland allows them “under 16 years old.” In tiny Luxembourg, “no official guidance exists,” but “in practice, adolescents almost always receive blockers in a neighboring country.”

Restrictions on prescribing cross-sex hormones (estrogen and testosterone) to minors also vary state by state across the U.S., but “the practice has been documented with parental consent in children under the age of 13.” In Oregon, minors may “access cross-sex hormones from age 15 without consent and with Medicaid assistance.” France has “no age restrictions” on cross-sex hormones, but “clinicians generally will not administer them before Tanner Stage II.” Again, Luxembourg has “no official guidance,” but “Patients almost always receive hormones in a neighboring Country.” In every other European country studied, cross-sex hormones were available “from age 16,” although the U.K. requires that “individuals must have been receiving puberty blockers for at least one year.”

Do No Harm provided few specifics regarding the status of parental consent for these chemical gender transition procedures. They do say that, besides Oregon, “in most states, puberty blockers cannot be administered before age 18 without parental consent,” but they provide no insight on cross-sex hormones. However, California passed a bill in September effectively removing any parental consent requirement.

By contrast, children may not access gender transition chemical treatments until age 16 or 18 in nearly every country. Denmark is the most permissive, allowing children without parental consent to access puberty blockers at 15. In the U.K., “instances of children under 16 receiving blockers without consent are reportedly rare,” although such consent is not required. To access cross-sex hormones without consent in either country, children must be 16. In Iceland, Ireland, Netherlands, and Norway, children must be 16 to access either puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones, although Norway raises the age for cross-sex hormones to 18 “if the treatment is considered irreversible.” Sweden also allows cross-sex hormones without consent at 16, “so long as the individual is deemed sufficiently mature,” while it bars puberty blockers without consent until age 18. In Belgium, Finland, and France, neither treatment is available without parental consent until a person turns 18.

The report also compared the number of youth gender clinics in the various countries. The U.S. led by far, with “more than 60 pediatric gender clinics and 300 clinics” that “provide hormonal interventions to minors.” France also has many locations because “care is decentralized,” and “any doctor can prescribe treatment for medical transition.”

But after that the number quickly dwindles. Sweden administers all gender transition procedures through four hospitals, of which three provide surgery. Denmark administers gender transition hormones at only three locations. There are only two hospitals or clinics providing medical gender transitions in Belgium, Finland, and soon the U.K., which currently has one. Iceland, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, and Norway have one gender transition facility apiece. Granted, the United States is far larger than many of these countries. But the U.S. has a population 2.5 times larger than all the countries except France, while it has 20 times as many clinics providing hormonal interventions to minors.

Do No Harm also compared the minimum age at which countries allow persons to legally change their gender in civil registries. In the U.S., “there is no minimum age” for federal documentation, such as passports or Social Security cards, but such changes require the consent of both parents. There is more variation in state documentation, such as ID cards and birth certificates, but at least seven states “permit minors to change their birth certificate gender markers with parental consent.”

Three European countries, Iceland, Luxembourg, and the U.K., have policies similar to the U.S. federal government in that there is no age limit, but children under the age of 18 need parental consent to change legally recognized gender. In Norway, gender markers can be changed, with parental permission, from age six, and from age 16 without parental permission. Netherlands also allows 16-year-olds to legally change their gender without parental permission. In Belgium and Ireland, 16-year-olds may change their legal gender identity with parental consent, and 18-year-olds may change it without parental consent. Denmark, Finland, France, and Sweden do not allow minors under the age of 18 to legally change their gender identity.

The U.S. also exceeds most European countries in legally recognizing genders other than male or female. Federal “passports offer an X gender option,” and a sizable number of states allow a gender marker of “X” on identification documents (22 states plus D.C. on driver’s licenses, and 16 states plus D.C. on birth certificates). Only Iceland permits gender variation, allowing “third gender and/or nonbinary designations” on official documents. Denmark and Ireland allow a third gender option on IDs and passports respectively, but their “civil registry is binary.” In the Netherlands, a person may only obtain a gender neutral designation through a court. In the other seven countries, Belgium, Finland, France, Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, and the U.K., “male and female are the only recognized genders.”

“The United States is the most permissive country when it comes to the legal and medical gender transition of children,” concluded the review. “Only France comes close, yet unlike the U.S., France’s medical authorities have recognized the uncertainties involved in transgender medical care for children and have urged ‘great caution’ in its use.”

“Given the growing body of evidence and the European consensus, which is grounded in medical science and common sense,” pleaded Do No Harm, “the United States should reconsider the gender-affirming care model to protect the youngest and most vulnerable patients.”

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: Texas MassResistance forces leftist School Board to remove obscene library book. And more on their way out!

RELATED TWEET:

RELATED VIDEO: Frederik Jansen on the link between LGBTQ+ and the Frankfurt School – The Laughland Report

RELATED TWEET:

RELATED ARTICLES:

Team Biden Joins the School Library Wars, Launching Federal Investigation

Supreme Court to Hear Religious Freedom Employment Case

EDITORS NOTE: This The Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©All rights reserved. The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

GENITAL MUTILATION IN AMERICA: List of 13 U.S. Hospitals That Operate on Underaged Children’s Sex Organs For Profit

/in , , , , , , , , , /by

There are only two genders and a global epidemic of social disorders and mental illnesses. 

We have been writing about the grooming of children by public schools, colleges and universities to provide sex partners for perverts, pederasts and pedophiles.

But even more onerous are those doctors who swore an oath to “first do no harm” that are profiting from the mutilation of the sex organs of underaged children.

This is nothing more than genital mutilation for profit.

No one can change their gender! What they can do is mutilate themselves psychologically, spiritually and physically. This is the greatest and most culturally destructive myth of my generation.

It is barbaric and goes against science and all that is right and the truth. Genital mutilation is not healthcare!

What is most disturbing is the number of “pediatric gender clinics”, a.k.a. genital mutilation factories, that have taken root across America since 2007.

Joshua Arnold staff writer at The Washington Stand in an August 25th, 2022 article titled At Least 13 U.S. Hospitals Perform Gender Transition Surgeries on Minors listed the following hospitals who butcher underaged children to make a buck:

  1. The UCLA Gender Health Program’s pediatric practice (Los Angeles, Calif.) includes “puberty suppression therapy” and “hormone replacement therapy.” It also features “gender affirmation surgery.” According to their website, “most surgical procedures are not recommended until adulthood,” which implies that at least some gender transition surgical procedures may be performed prior to adulthood.
  1. The Gender Clinic at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health (Palo Alto, Calif.) treats both minors and “adults 18 years and older,” offering “puberty blockers and gender affirming hormones.” They provide gender transition surgery to “adolescents and young adults,” touting their “innovative surgical techniques” and “state-of-the-art operating suites.” They boldly state their not-so-medical opinion that “everyone deserves to have their physical body reflect their gender identity.”
  1. The Division of Plastic Surgery at Connecticut Children’s Hospital (Hartford, Conn.) “offers surgical options for gender affirmation to adolescents.” Their Gender Program recommends parents contact them “when puberty begins” for a range of treatments including “puberty blockers” and “hormone therapy.” They also link to various gender dysphoria support groups, including a Hartford group for ages 16-26 and a Bridgeport group for ages 13-24. In these support groups, children could develop close, emotional bonds to adults who are not relatives.
  1. The Essence Clinic at St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital (Boise, Id.) offers “hormonal therapy, including puberty blockers” and “surgical consultations and referrals” to “children, adolescents, and young adults.” Two of its five providers specialize in surgery.
  1. The Gender Development Program at the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago (Chicago, Ill., Westchester, Ill.) offers “gender-affirming surgery referrals” for “children and adolescents,” who may “begin care with us up to age 22.” They say they “work closely with several surgeons who are experienced in this type of care and can provide more information and referrals for patients seeking these services.” However, their 19-member gender development team includes two pediatric surgeons, a pediatric plastic surgeon, and an attending physician of plastic and reconstructive surgery, and one of their three locations is a “surgical treatment center,” making it likely that they perform surgeries in-house.
  1. At the University of Illinois Hospital (Chicago, Ill.), “gender affirming surgery” is systematically interwoven into their surgical department, with no division between surgeons performing gender transition procedures and surgeons performing other types of plastic surgeries, and seemingly no division in care between children and adults. As an example, the program’s director “focuses on the reconstructive needs of infants, children, adolescents, and young adults up to age 25” and “specializes with adolescents and young adults in the realm of chest reconstruction, including asymmetric breasts, oversized breasts (female macromastia and male gynecomastia), and top surgery.”
  1. The Boston Children’s Hospital (Boston, Mass.) has offered “gender-affirming chest surgeries for individuals over 15 years old” (see above).
  1. The Child and Adolescent Transgender Center for Health at Boston Medical Center (Boston, Mass.) provides “access to onsite hormone blockers,” “gender-affirming hormone therapy,” and “referral to … other Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery services” for “children, adolescents, and young adults.” The Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery presents a “unified structure” for all “gender affirming care.” An anonymous testimonial on their website indicates they perform transgender surgeries on minors, “As a parent of a child going through the transgender experience, I have found valuable information on this site. After the surgery, I will be caring for him/her at my home.”
  1. The Gender and Sexuality Service at NYU Langone’s Hassenfeld Children’s Hospital (New York, N.Y.) will perform “gender-affirming medical interventions” on a “child, adolescent, or young adult,” working with health insurers “to obtain approvals for presurgical and surgical procedures.” The sizable “Gender and Sexuality Service Team” of nearly 19 doctors include four who represent plastic and reconstructive surgery.
  1. Golisano Children’s Hospital, associated with University of Rochester Medicine, (Rochester, N.Y.) features “gender health services” to “youth and young adults” including “cross-gender hormone therapy,” “pubertal blockade,” and “surgical services” with three surgeons listed.
  1. Doernbecher Children’s Hospital (Portland, Ore., Beaverton, Ore.) offers “a full range of services for transgender and gender-nonconforming children and teens,” including hormone treatments, surgery, and handouts with tips on how to appear more like the opposite sex. They “evaluate surgery for teens on an individual basis.”
  1. The Gender Clinic at Seattle Children’s Hospital (Seattle, Wash.) accepts “new patients ages 9 to 16.” The services they provide include “puberty blockers,” “gender-affirming hormones,” and “gender-affirming surgery.” While gender transition procedures for minors require parental consent, “Washington state privacy laws limit parent and caregiver access to adolescents’ health information. … The patient chooses whether to consent to releasing medical information.”
  1. The Gender Health Clinic at Children’s Wisconsin (Milwaukee, Wisc.) focuses on “children and youth” and “will meet with new patients through age 16.” They offer “puberty-suppressing hormone therapy, gender-affirming hormone therapy, surgical treatments, and speech/voice training.” They refer patients 17 or older to “an adult hormone provider.”

We are saddened that some of our major university medical centers are in the business of doing irreparable harm to underaged children. This is gender mutilation of the worst kind.

This isn’t doing these patients any good to believe that by mutilating their sexual organs they can change their gender. Gender is immutable. Science tells us so.

To perform these types of “therapies” and surgeries is criminal at best.

©Dr. Rich Swier. All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Deaths Among Female Children Increase by 57% Immediately After Taking Covid-19 Vaccine

Here’s how to confront your local Library Board when they push pornography on children.

Twitter declined to remove sex video exploiting minors, according to lawsuit supported by powerful watchdog groups

World Economic Forum Promotes ‘Brain Implants’ for Children