BROADview in Brief
Itty-Bitty Anti-Kitty Committee
It’s the first week of October which means it’s Banned Books Week in my American library world. Is there a link between gender and book banning in the news these days? Gee, let me check…why, it turns out there is! Paige Masten shared in the Charlotte Observer that Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools just banned a picture book about crayons, Annabel Tuggle reported for KTAB that Abilene, Texas has gotten its knickers in a knot about a statue celebrating Itty-Bitty Kitty-Corn, and Alan Cumming had to defend his picture book, The Adventures of Honey and Leon, after an Iowa school district attempted to ban it for portraying a pair of sweet dogs with two dads--okay that was on the basis of sex, not gender, but it all gets lumped together at some schools. Honey and Leon survived, but check out what was banned in that district, books like Their Eyes Were Watching God, Brave New World, The Fault in Our Stars, A Separate Peace, and The Handmaid’s Tale.
Where do I stand on all this? I find book-banning rituals bizarre whether they’re done on the left in the name of anti-racism or on the right in the name of childhood innocence (and I find book-burning rituals even stranger, thanks Canada). I’ll restrain myself with that for now—I’ve been working on a more detailed piece because, of course, it is absolutely complicated. I’ll just add that if you want to share the joy of make-believe and gentle lessons through stories with your child, you can do that without overthinking Frog and Toad. And you can tell your kids that a red crayon can do anything a blue crayon can, that unicorns are make-believe, and that a kitty is always a kitty, but, as Mr. Rogers would say, isn’t it fun to play pretend sometimes? The only way preschoolers will believe unicorn kitties are real is if the adults around them all present these tales as fact, not fiction…but that’s a person problem, not a book problem.
In US news, New York Times reporters Ernesto Londoño and Mitch Smith covered some of the court cases we’ve been sharing on In Brief. Note the box labeled “The Anti-Trans Push” on that page and reflect that the plaintiffs in three of the four listed cases are essentially seeking to sexually stunt and sterilize their trans-identified children. I might therefore assume that the Times is calling the families who are suing anti-trans, yet I know that is not their intent. It’s a weird world.
Since we published last week, the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that schools in Iowa cannot require students and staff to use preferred pronouns, and a county judge in Wisconsin ruled that a school district cannot allow student gender transitions without parental consent.
Meanwhile, Nebraska is trying to finesse youth gender medicalization by banning surgeries for minors but developing temporary regulations that allow children to take puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones after 40 hours of neutral therapy and a seven-day waiting period. Perhaps Nebraska has discovered that puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones have an evidence base that has hitherto been lacking. If so, I hope they release that evidence for the general public to read sometime soon.
Aaron Sibarium reported for the Free Beacon on Planned Parenthood’s head-first dive into selling cross-sex hormones to 18-year-olds after a 30-minute consultation. Hey, it’s an hour-long single consult in my neck of the woods, but yes, no diagnosis is asked for or required: “‘I have always been a very strong supporter of Planned Parenthood and am pro-choice,’ said Laura Edwards-Leeper, who co-founded the nation’s first pediatric gender clinic, at Boston Children’s Hospital, in 2007. ‘But they have taken on something that they are not equipped to handle.’ The lack of gatekeeping is so bad, she added, that some of her patients received hormones from Planned Parenthood before coming to her for an assessment.” It’s 2023…who needs doctors when we have r/AskTransgender?
In news from north of the border, Hina Husain wrote about the gender identity education debates for Unherd, “Canadian Parents Are Sick of Progressives,” while Jamie Sarkonak noted in the National Post that an injunction was granted this past week that pauses Saskatchewan’s new school pronoun policy. Long and short: Canadians, you need your own expert witnesses. First, we are already working Dr. Erica Anderson too hard in the US, and second, American expert witnesses won’t cut it in Canadian courts. There are Canadian doctors who know the truth, and they need to stand up for Canadian children. If you’re a medical professional who is willing to help in your home country, please contact SEGM. They’re a helpful medical clearinghouse.
In the UK, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak could not tolerate Labour’s Keir Starmer stealing all the gender headlines over the summer, so he announced with great conviction at the Conservative Party conference this week that people shouldn’t be bullied into believing that anyone can be any sex they want to be: “a man is a man, a woman is a woman--that’s just common sense!” According to the BBC, Conservatives are also discussing whether the NHS should go back to having hospital wards based on sex, not gender, with trans patients having their own wards or rooms. The LGBTQIA++ advocacy website, Pink News, reported that this may be “unlawful and impractical.”
And in Australia, journalist Bernard Lane shared that the Chief Psychiatrist for Queensland has written that the state will be conducting an independent review of the treatment for gender dysphoric children. Dr. John Reilly wrote this in response to a letter from Dr. Jillian Spencer, a child and adolescent psychiatrist who has been a vocal critic of so-called “gender-affirming care.” There’s no scope or timeline for the review, however, so we’ll see how that plays out.
On the academic front, the “Sex/Gender Differences: The Big Conversation” conference took place last weekend in New Mexico, and I know at least one of our subscribers attended in person. I watched some of it online and am looking forward to seeing more of the presentations when the videos are posted. Everyone I listened to was highly professional, many of the talks were thought-provoking, and I sat on my hands in the Zoom chat when certain speakers refused to define basic terms like, say, “sex” or “gender.” Someone named Jim could not restrain himself, however—could it have been due to testosterone??—and I believe the word “clownshow” was one of his Zoom quotes in the moment. Nonetheless, the conversations in the room seemed cordial. Colin Wright was there, so I hope he’ll write it up for Reality’s Last Stand. So far it appears that no one was rushed to the ER after listening to people they disagreed with, and Carole Hooven even found a friend!
Speaking of listening to people, Heterodox Academy is moving forward with the anthropology symposium that was canceled. “Uncanceled: Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby: Why Biological Sex Remains a Necessary Analytic Category in Anthropology” features Canadian, American, and Spanish anthropologists and will be held online on Wednesday, November 8th. To give you a little background on one of the speakers, Professor Elizabeth Weiss sued her soon-to-be-ex-university, San Jose State for retaliation last year. Among other examples of harassment detailed by Inside Higher Ed, her dean and department chair hosted a panel called “What to Do When a Tenured Professor Is Branded a Racist,” denigrating an anonymous “Professor Jones” but clearly referencing Weiss. For context, Dr. Weiss holds currently controversial views on the repatriation of bones from indigenous peoples--shhh, we’re not allowed to talk about that. According to the College Fix, Weiss reached an out-of-court settlement with the university, is resigning from SJSU effective May 2024, and is now a Heterodox Academy faculty fellow.
And finally, sports news: the Associated Press reported that FINA canceled its new “open” category races at an upcoming World Cup meet after no one signed up. On the one hand, duh: the open category needed to include men…and on the other hand, hunh: it would have been a cakewalk (or swim) to medal! And the Daily Mail shared that the entire women’s swim team at Roanoke College in Virginia stood together and stood up against being bullied by their college administration into accepting a transwoman elite swimmer onto their team. It sounds like the whole situation was a hot mess.
Please share your thoughts on sex, gender, cancellations, cakewalks, and book bans in the comments below or through this form, and I hope you have an excellent weekend!
With heartfelt appreciation for the research assistance of Alejandra Q.
Kate, not only do you offer a great sum-up of the news each week, but your interspersed comments are 💯💯💯 top of the line. This time around, I loved, just as one of many excellent observations, “The only way preschoolers will believe unicorn kitties are real is if the adults around them all present these tales as fact, not fiction…but that’s a person problem, not a book problem.” And, BTW, on the subject of books, here’s a terrific one for kids, complete with lesson plans: https://www.transgendertrend.com/product/my-body-is-me/
As a retired pediatrician, I have to disagree with what I think is Lisa's position on banning books for prepubertal children. There are some books clearly written to influence the worldview of young children, whose values and lives really should be protected by their parents. In adolescence, one needs real wisdom. There are so many books about which I have limited insights which appear to desire to convert these easily confused kids. This is a tough area for a platform like Substack and its subscribers who clearly embrace free flowing discussion.