BROADview in Brief: Let's Get Nuanced!

A weirdly good week for reporting

Photo by Simon Berger on Unsplash

I grew up believing that Canada was like America, but better. Healthcare! Decent schools! So many nice playgrounds in Toronto! And—dare I say it?—Montreal bagels! (I like them, okay? I just don’t think they should be called bagels.)

But then came the fundamentalism of the new left, seeping northward from down here, and it seemed like it might actually be worse—more censorious, more captured, more dangerous for parents who didn’t want to affirm their trans-identified children.

So I took the announcement of a new policy from Alberta’s premier Danielle Smith as a return to sanity. I thought the restrictions on youth gender medicine might be a model for the rest of Canada.

Well, turns out, Alberta is the Texas of Canada, and much of the country sees Smith as a sore-y version of Ron DeSantis (get it? sore-y?). The Guardian recapped the situation as “Canadian conservatives divided over trans policy.” Which is funny because I’ve never seen an article saying liberals were divided over trans policy, but they sure are! If only someone had pitched such an article to major news outlets many times!

Still, Canadian endocrinologist Dr. Roy Eappen is sticking up for the policy, rooting his support in the World Health Organization’s comments, Europe’s policies, and many studies suggested kids with early-onset gender dysphoria grow up to be gay. “Last month, the WHO declined to issue guidelines for transgender procedures for children, on the grounds that ‘the evidence base . . . is limited and variable regarding the longer-term outcomes,’” he wrote in the Calgary Herald.

A growing number of countries have already banned or severely restricted children’s access to transgender interventions, based on systematic reviews of the science. That includes England, Sweden, Finland and Norway, while Belgium, France, Ireland and Italy have raised concerns. We’re talking about countries that are generally aligned with Canada, ideologically. They’re looking at the science and seeing red flags. What’s wrong with Alberta doing the same thing?

and:

Multiple studies have found that most kids who are confused or distressed about their sex end up realizing they’re gay — nearly two-thirds in a 2021 study of boys. Yet if they go down a transgender road, they’ll lose sight of who they really are.

Before England started taking child safeguarding seriously, clinicians at the country’s main transgender service referred to prescribing puberty blockers as “transing the gay away.” They also joked that “there would be no gay people left” if they continued helping kids medically transition. Is that really what Canadians want for our country’s gay and lesbian kids?

Sadly, Canadians have been warned that those expressing views advocating for better research, dispassionate science, and caution pose a threat of “extreme violence.” I’ve seen plenty of “punch TERFs” merch, but not the opposite. Am I missing it?

The Conversation published a piece by trans man and detransition researcher Kinnon Ross McKinnon about what many of us have been harping on, and which apparently Canada did not learn: making this issue about politics instead of science is bad for everybody.

We have noticed that what is presented as “fact” in these debates has distorted real complexities of gender-affirming health care, creating a rift between conservative and progressive information outlets. The result has left many in the dark about what is really at stake.

The article goes on to acknowledge some of what we know, and don’t know, about hormones and detransition and fertility and puberty blockers. Which is to say: not a whole helluva lot, which is why we need to depoliticize and do more and better research. Or, as I would have it: get the data! Comprehensively follow-up with the thousands of people who medically transitioned as minors so we know what we’re dealing with!

Speaking of not much research, most of it jaundiced: Unherd published a piece by consultant clinical neuropsychologist and professor of clinical neuropsychology Sallie Baxendale, about her attempts to publish a literature review of puberty blocker research. That many journals rejected it isn’t news, but the reasons for rejection? Somewhat chilling.

None of the reviewers identified any studies that I had missed that demonstrated safe and reversible impacts of puberty blockers on cognitive development, or presented any evidence contrary to my conclusions that the work just hasn’t been done. However, one suggested the evidence may be out there, it just hadn’t been published. They suggested that I trawl through non-peer reviewed conference presentations to look for unpublished studies that might tell a more positive story…

Another reviewer expressed concerns that publishing the conclusions from these studies risked stigmatising an already stigmatised group. A third suggested that I should focus on the positive things that puberty blockers could do, while a fourth suggested there was no point in publishing a review when there wasn’t enough literature to review. Another sought to diminish an entire field of neuroscience that has established puberty as a critical period of brain development as “my view”.

…However, the most astonishing response I received was from a reviewer who was concerned that I appeared to be approaching the topic from a “bias” of heavy caution. This reviewer argued that lots of things needed to be sorted out before a clear case for the “riskiness” of puberty blockers could be made, even circumstantially. Indeed, they appeared to be advocating for a default position of assuming medical treatments are safe, until proven otherwise.

The shooter at Joel Osteen’s church in Houston this week may or may not have been trans, much like the shooters in Nashville and Colorado Springs may or may not have been nonbinary. Who knows? (The Swedish study found that “Female-to-males, but not male-to-females, had a higher risk for criminal convictions than their respective birth sex controls.”)

Meanwhile, the same day GLAAD parked its “New York Times is anti-trans” truck in front of NYT headquarters—a year after they premiered the roving censorship-demanding vehicle—the Grey Lady published an op-ed by Chase Strangio, of the ACLU, about trans visibility.

More news from Alejandra Q

National

·       This Monday, hundreds of activists rallied in the Iowa Capitol during a public hearing on Gov. Reynolds’ Bill 649. The bill will exclude individuals from entering sex-segregated spaces (bathrooms, locker rooms and domestic abuse or sexual assault shelters, for instance) based on their gender identity as well as require that an individual’s sex is listed along with their gender reassignment information on their birth certificate. (Iowa Capital Dispatch)

·       Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach sent letters to some of the state’s school districts warning about policies that advise staff not to disclose information to parents concerning their child’s gender transition. In response, the ACLU of Kansas Executive Director Micah Kubic released the following: “Students have a constitutional right to privacy with respect to information about their sexual orientation or gender identity. It is unlawful for school officials to disclose that information. Forced outing of transgender students likely violates federal privacy laws in addition to students' constitutional privacy rights. Denying students the right to use the name and pronouns that affirm their gender identity likely violates Title IX of the Educational Amendments of 1972 and the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution.”

·       The ACLU filed a federal complaint to the U.S. Department of Education’s Student Privacy Policy Office asking for an investigation on a Nebraska school. The complaint alleges that school officials outed a middle school student last fall without consent from the student’s parents, which the ACLU claims is in violation of the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act.

·       During a campaign stop, North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson, who is campaigning for governor, made some provocative statements concerning transgender bathroom use: “We're going to defend women in this state. That means if you're a man on Friday night, and all the sudden on Saturday, you feel like a woman, and you want to go in the women's bathroom in the mall, you will be arrested — or whatever we got to do to you.” His stance drew a lot of criticism, including from some Republican state legislators.

·       Utah’s governor Spencer Cox called for a school board to act against Natalie Cline, a Republican school board member who is accused of posting a photo of a female high school basketball player and questioning whether the student was transgender. Cline eventually apologized to the student, acknowledging that the social media post had sparked a 'firestorm' around teenager.

·       House Bill 156, a new bill sponsored by Wyoming’s House majority leader, would declare that gender-affirming care is “not in the best interest” of trans-identified minors. The bill would apply this presumption to custody battles, guardianships, and around Child Protective Services cases.

·       According to court papers, the Mesa Public Schools in Arizona is accused of using a “parental concealment cheat sheet” with the purpose of tracking the names and pronouns of 17 trans-identified students while keeping their parents in the dark. Following community controversy, the district is accused of rewriting its policy to obfuscate parents while continuing to enforce the non-notification policy.

·      On Friday, Montana filed a Supreme Court brief appealing district court judge Jason Marks’ decision to block Senate Bill 99. The governor’s Bill, which was signed into law last spring and blocked from taking effect in September, would have banned pediatric gender affirmation in the state.

·       On Monday, the new Democratic majority on the Perkiomen Valley school board (Pennsylvania) voted to rescind the district’s policy that barred trans-identified students from using bathrooms and locker rooms in accordance with their gender identities. The controversial policy had led to contentious school board meetings as well as a student walkout in favor of the policy.

More snippets and headlines:

·       How the Right Weaponized the Dobbs Ruling to Wage War on Trans People—The Supreme Court's infamous decision is being wielded against gender-affirming care in the first of many attacks on our rights to come. (When the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade with their now infamous ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the adverse disruptions to both the legal landscape of abortion and the quality of life of both abortion seekers and pregnant patients across the country were nearly immediate. But, the dystopia of Dobbs holding isn’t limited to reproductive freedoms—it has also endangered other constitutional privacy matters that determine the right to purchase and use contraception, the right of same-sex intimacy and marriage, and the right to marry across racial lines.  However, what’s become clear is that the far right intends to test the judicial system for future breaches by first targeting transgender people’s access to gender-affirming care.)

·       'Women's Bill of Rights' policies could impact daily lives of transgender community (The laws restrict definitions of a man, woman, girl, boy, mother and father. Several states are considering legislation that would create legal definitions for "man" and "woman" based on their reproductive system. This controversial proposed legislation -- dubbed by Republican lawmakers as the "Women's Bill of Rights" -- now seen in West Virginia, Iowa, Georgia, and other states has implications for the transgender community, which has been the target of conservative-backed restrictions nationwide.)

· Feb 14–Transgender patient whose gender-affirming surgery was canceled is suing Children’s Hospital Colorado (Children’s stopped performing gender-affirming surgeries over the summer, noting unprecedented referrals and threats to hospitals across the country (An 18-year-old transgender patient whose surgery was called off when Children’s Hospital Colorado stopped providing gender-affirming surgeries is suing the hospital. The ACLU of Colorado filed the lawsuit Wednesday on behalf of the 18-year-old, claiming the hospital violated state anti-discrimination laws.)

· Feb 14–America First Legal Sues Biden’s HHS for Illegally Concealing (Communications Related to its Support of Experimental “Transgender” Medical Practices on Children (Today, America First Legal (AFL) filed a lawsuit against the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to enforce its Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for HHS Assistant Secretary Levine’s communications regarding pediatric “transgender clinics,” otherwise known as the genital mutilation and sterilization of America’s children. In March of 2023, HHS Assistant Secretary Levine stated that socially and medically transitioning children to a “different sex” had support “at the highest levels of the federal government,” including President Biden and that anyone that dared to question the wisdom or safety of such experiments on children was “ideologically and politically motivated.”)

· Feb 14–Livermore Joint Unified School District suspends student for stating transgender student “used to be a girl”—California (On February 13, 2024, Sean Kullman reported in an article on Substack that a student at Livermore Joint Unified School District was accused of bullying and suspended because he said that a transgender student “used to be a girl.” Kullman explained: A friend with whom John was having a conversation asked, why does Jane look like that? John responded quite simply by saying, “He used to be a girl.” This comment was overheard by another student, and the student reported it to Vice Principal [redacted] on November 7th via email sometime after school hours, according to John’s parents.)

· Feb 14–3 bills targeting transgender students approved by Arizona Senate panel—Republicans are pushing to put a trans bathroom ban and limit on preferred pronouns on the 2024 ballot.

· Feb 15–ACLU files lawsuit against Virginia Dept. of Education for transgender model policies—The ACLU claims the policies harm transgender students. Two transgender students, including one in York County, are whom the suits are filed on behalf of.

· Feb 15–Critics slam proposed ‘trans’ issues BK charter school that would allow 9-year-olds to ‘explore their gender’: ‘Indoctrinating’ (A proposed “trans” and “queer” issues Brooklyn charter school — which promises to let kids as young as nine “explore their gender” identity — is causing outrage from critics who are blasting it for “indoctrinating” children.

· Feb 15–I Was Fired After Blowing the Whistle' Tamara Pietzke exposed the dangers of gender-affirming care' in The Free Press.—Then, she lost her job. She reveals the cost of speaking out and why she has no regrets.

· Feb 15–Bipartisan Coalition Halts Transgender Surgery Ban for Minors in Wyoming—A surprise alliance between the Wyoming Freedom Caucus and Democrats blocked a bill banning transgender surgeries for minors. This rare bipartisan effort reveals a deeper debate on parental rights and government intervention in personal medical decisions.

· Feb 15–Republicans Propose Bills Reversing Current Policies On Transgender Students—Republican lawmakers proposed two bills Wednesday: one to require school administrators to notify parents if their child begins a social gender transition in school, and the other to require transgender athletes to compete under the gender they were assigned at birth. CT

International

·       Last week, The Australia Medical Association published its 2023 position statement urging for improvements to “gender-affirming care access.” The position statement also claims providers of gender affirming interventions need to be “protected and supported” based on claims that an Australian medical insurer, MDA National, was restricting cover for those providing pediatric gender affirmation.

·       Layla Le Fey, a 44-year-old trans-identified male from Portslade, East Sussex, could face eight weeks in jail over threats directed against Kellie-Jay Keen and Helen Joyce. Le Fey’s threats include those to “kill, blind and break the backs” of his intended targets and threatening to set fire to their homes. “If you want to prove your point that some trans people are extremely violent, I'm game,” claimed Le Fey.

·       Democrat Baroness Burt of Solihull proposed a Bill that would ban conversion practices based on both sexual orientation and gender identity. The bill would make it an offence to practice, or to offer to practice, “conversion therapy” leading some peers to warn that the bill would create ‘thought crime’ offences by limiting people’s ability to discuss gender matters.

·       A UK court ruled that The Green Party had discriminated against its former deputy leader, Dr Shahrar Ali, due to his gender critical beliefs. The Green Party of England and Wales forced Ali out of his role, leading Ali to launch legal action against the party after which Dr Ali was awarded £9,100 in damages.

·       Following an uncontested election, Stonewall writer and co-founder, Simon Fanshawe, was announced as Edinburgh University’s next rector. Fanshawe has been criticized for his support for gender-critical feminism and for challenging Stonewall’s switch on policies concerning transgender people.

What else happened this week? Please tell us in the comments, which are open to all.