87 Comments

The Democrats have been extremely quiet on this issue recently. Some stuff on Pride, sure.

I think they realize that transing kids is not a winning issue for Biden.

Former Democrat, Lifelong Liberal,

Expand full comment

When you think about it the transition industry is in many ways the apotheosis of western liberal ideals. Massive capitalist profits providing dangerous cosmetic medical procedures to mentally I'll children. Sexual stereotypes that are from the Victorian era. Misogyny that rivals Saudi Arabia. It's the attaching themselves to the LGB liberation movement that got the left political parties to join in being ultra pro trans.

Expand full comment

If they realized that they wouldn't have released the Title IX revised regs just before an election. Biden's staff are mostly in the cult.

There were plenty of polls they could have listened to showing most Americans were against this, but they've convinced themselves it's all MAGAts and ignoring any evidence to the contrary.

Expand full comment

Last summer their congressional leadership made a point of drinking bud lite on camera. They think it's a winning issue, or are true belivers, or are fiscally profiting from it. Not exclusive or's fwiw.

Expand full comment

Just label something as MAGA and you can get liberals to back off from rational decisions about anything. Unfortunately, this issue involves innocent mentally confused kids, trapping them with irreversible surgery and medicine.

Expand full comment

Former lifelong Democrat and now a member of Moms for Liberty... never in a million years thought this is where I'd be politically, but this issue is all I care about. The kids deserve better so I fight.

Expand full comment

It appears you spoke too soon. The democrats at the white house just posted a message on twitter supporting transgenderism that's not necessarily pride related. https://x.com/WhiteHouse/status/1806054826511343651

Expand full comment

Dick Levine is a child predator and mutilator. I don’t know how any parents could support this morally bankrupt regime. In a strange twist of fate, Twitter banning Babylon Bee for calling him Man of the Year instead of Women of the year led to Elon buying it and restoring free speech.

Protect women's sports: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-save-womens-sports-riley-gaines

Expand full comment

And Levine even said on camera that he was glad he waited to transition until after having children. So, "Hey kids. I sure am glad I didn't transition when I was your age, but you totally should transition now". What an awful man.

Expand full comment

that should be an ALL CAPS headline in MSM. Parents as well as children have been led astray and betrayed..

Expand full comment

Lifelong reliable lib Dem voter.. no more. Emergency brake. Dunce caps. Writing allover the blackboard..

Expand full comment

In an echo of other comments: Why do these ADULT men-who-dress-as-women WANT children to forego all the things they had: functional sexual capacity and Children of their own?

This is deranged and yet somehow passes for "normal". It is not normal. It is predatory and abusive.

Expand full comment

It's all about their fetish. Always has been.

Expand full comment

Up is down and down is up. It's all part of gaslighting. Who would have thought that the message of the 1944 movie "Gaslight" would become part of our culture.

Expand full comment

I believe the AAP was also somehow involved in this cover up. Can you explain how? This is all quite horrid.

Expand full comment

Yes, I'm sorry I didn't include that. I was rushing this morning. AAP also pressured WPATH to release SOC8 and remove age limits. That was reported well by Jesse, but I wanted to add this stuff about HHS and JH and the review and the evidence suppression and the caving to activism and...that NYT is getting much better but still not spelling it out for readers that these parents and kids were deliberately lied to.

Expand full comment

Thanks. So many medical clinicians and educators have lost all their personal integrity over this issue.

Expand full comment

I think you are correct, NSYA.

No one wants to appear as a conspiracy theorist nutjob, but it seems anything is possible.

Expand full comment

I think I saw in some of this that the AAP told wpath that they wouldn't endorse SOC8 if it didn't remove the age limits.

Expand full comment

The NYT reported that both the AAP and Levine's office pressured WPATH to remove age minimums for surgeries from SOC8.

Expand full comment

If the Department of Health and Human Services (and presumably Levine) and WPATH knew about the Johns Hopkins review that showed no evidence of surgeries and hormones being beneficial and all of them work together to keep those results from seeing the light of day, and we know the AAP was working with Levine to pressure WPATH to remove the age minimums, someone needs to ask if the AAP knew about the Johns Hopkins review and was part of the cover-up. Then someone needs to ask if that's why the AAP has resisted so hard and for so long for an evidence-based review - because they already had seen the results and had chosen to help suppress them from parents and the public

Expand full comment

I haven't seen any claims that AAP and Levine worked together, but there are probably some AAP members who are active in WPATH and would be aware of the JHU review. The AAP is now supposedly conducting its own review.

Expand full comment

You make a good point there. I should have worded that better. The AAP and Levine were both pressuring WPATH to remove age minimums. That doesn't prove they were actively working and consulting with each other to reach this goal.

Expand full comment

And why would the AAP bother with another review? They don’t have the expertise.

Expand full comment

I assume they have outsourced it, but I don't remember the details.

Expand full comment

Makes sense since they were asked to do this before the Cass report came out. But an incredible waste of resources after Cass and this unpublished Jhu work. They just don’t like the results. Quite frankly it goes against their Democratic bona fides. Their inclinations. It’s ridiculous. Facts are facts.

Expand full comment

Isn't it likely they are trying to get ahead of malpractice lawsuits? They want to say "oh but we were following the standards of care" and if there is an age limit in them, some doctors will be out in the cold when the lawsuits start to fall in thick flakes. Which they will. This is CYA I think. Maybe not even doctors -- maybe malpractice insurers fund AAP and BEGGED them to intervene to save their future bacon.

Expand full comment

Yes I think you are exactly right on this. What a disaster. No integrity. It’s my profession and my professional org. I’m disgusted

Expand full comment

This has truly crossed over into the land of cover-up and maybe even conspiracy. But how do we get people who are moderate and on the left to pay attention to us without sounding like crazy conspiracy theorist? So far, the only mainstream outlet covering this is the NYT, but the article is so watered down and so many important things aren't covered, and since it's behind a paywall most people can't see it anyway. The rest of the coverage is from the New York post, daily mail, and the daily wire. The people we most need to see this will believe that the story is untrue or hate speech just on the basis of which news outlets are covering it.

Expand full comment

They (NYT) turned off the comments immediately.

Expand full comment

NPR did air an interview with Dr. Cass. I don't have much hope that they will pick up this story but I didn't think they would interview Dr Cass either so who knows...

Expand full comment

So much for the signs ‘we believe in science’. When there is zero evidence supporting youth gender transition we all know where the science is.

Expand full comment

I have been wondering for years now how this can go on - how people can't see the absurdity. I still don't have the answer, but the fact that cover-ups are taking place in government and academia certainly is part of the answer. Oy vey!

Expand full comment

Thank you Lisa for such a clear article in such filthy circumstances

Expand full comment

I am not religious but have come to realize that evil is a real force in the world.

When I see creeps like clownish Levine, the hideous Jeffrey Marsh, and others of their ilk, I think:

Not today Satan, not today.

To be clear, the above is directed toward the mentally ill monsters who work to gaslight children into believing they were born with the wrong body and offer mutilation as the solution.

Expand full comment

Thank you for being on top of this, Lisa, and for the additional information. I would say that, even without the information noted, this reporter is perhaps the only one at the Times who has done fair reporting on these issues, and I thought this story reflected that as well.

I was also surprised at how good the headline and subhead were (“Biden Officials Pushed to Remove Age Limits for Trans Surgery, Documents Show: Newly released emails from an influential group issuing transgender medical guidelines indicate that U.S. health officials lobbied to remove age minimums for surgery in minors because of concerns over political fallout”), appropriate to the major scandal that this is.

The problem, as always, is how best to keep the pressure up and make this scandal so visible it cannot be ignored. Fingers crossed maybe someone like Pamela Paul will do a follow-up at the Times. Michelle Goldberg really should get her head out of that place where the sun don’t shine and write on this, but on that I will not hold my breath.

Bottom line is heads need to roll, and they need to roll now.

Expand full comment

Whenever I see Rachel Levine's picture I feel really, really mad. Like Madame Defarge level mad.

Expand full comment

This is going to go very badly.

It’s not a good look at all for the Democratic Party.

It’s going to grow and grow.

Expand full comment

oh, wild. The comments are gone again. There is something strange going on with this story. Not only that, but the link to James Cantor's report is very tiny (just one letter). Someone doesn't want to talk about this.

Expand full comment

The comments are gone.

I consider comments on NYT to be backdoor journalism--since "all the news that's fit to print" censors so much news.

I always try to get comments in that can direct people to different sources--many are Substack writers, or organizations--Genspect, SEGM, LGB Alliance, and so forth. Generally, the censors won't let these comments in.

And the reporter, trans.

Lots of trans gatekeepers at NYT.

Expand full comment

Azeen Ghoryashi is not trans. She actually does pretty good reporting--walking the line to appear unbiased but dropping a lot of facts.

Expand full comment

My mistake? I assumed, as I see this often--the activists are on the inside. And the media organizations want trans reporters to report on trans issues.

Our laws have allowed the erasure of history, the creation of fake documents for synthetic sex identities.

Yes, I am cranky too.

Expand full comment

Yep. It is enough to make you crazy.

Expand full comment

And there are frequently open comments in her articles.

Expand full comment

My goodness they are so ideologically captured they thought removing age limits would get more political support.

Expand full comment

Basically the "advocate" said he would refer things to their department to fix the link. I also asked why the comments were removed and he said this: I would've been happy to confirm the reasons why, but I'm afraid we do not have access to this information via our chat channel. This is managed by a different department. - But as advised above, I'll definitely be sure to pass on the feedback. If you'd like to pass on the complaint directly, please feel free to email us at NYTNews@nytimes.com or Editorial@nytimes.com. My apologies for the inconveniences caused by this.

Expand full comment

almost makes me want to buy a NYT subscription just so I can comment.

Expand full comment

I am chatting with customer support now.

Expand full comment

let us all know what the upshot is. thx!

Expand full comment

Right now the full documents are also on the LGBT Courage website! https://www.lgbtcourage.org/wpath

In here (exhibit 168) I also see the name of Annelou de Vries in communication with Karen Robinson of Johns Hopkins.

What was Annelou's involvement in commissioning the systematic review, and was she also involved in getting it surpressed? Or was that done by others in WPATH?

Expand full comment

'Can you believe the John Hopkins folks agreed to this?'

I work in research funding, and yes, I can 100% believe it, because they never read the terms and conditions. The legal team will look at them after they're successful, but the academics try to avoid actual, formal processes as much as possible.

Expand full comment