There is no facet of leftist ideology more insidious than the left’s manipulation and exploitation of children in the name of transgender rights. In a recent interview, President Biden fully endorsed this abuse.
Last month, Biden was interviewed by transgender TikToker Dylan Mulvaney, who asked the president, “Do you think states should have a right to ban gender-affirming health care?” Biden responded that the bans are wrong both “as a moral question and as a legal question,” further decrying such legislation as “outrageous” and “immoral.”
Biden’s ire was directed at bans targeting the practice for minors, as very few states have proposed legislation to ban gender-affirming care for adults. Biden, as usual, does not know what he is talking about.
To begin, “gender-affirming care” is a euphemism, a facade meant to obscure what can only be described as barbarity. Children as young as 10 years old are being permitted to go on puberty blockers, drugs meant to “pause” puberty to allow for the further exploration of gender identity. While activists have claimed that these drugs are reversible, data suggest that one cannot simply “pause” puberty without serious repercussions.
One of these drugs, Lupron, first emerged in the late 80s as a form of chemical castration to treat prostate cancer. Today, Lupron has been linked to a laundry list of side effects, including loss of bone density, an uptick in depression and suicidality, and sterility when combined with cross-sex hormones.
The surgeries are even more atrocious. Teenage girls are having their healthy breasts removed in double mastectomies. The procedures for vaginoplasties and phalloplasties are particularly gruesome. In the former case, a fake vagina is sculpted by inverting the penis. In the latter, skin is excised from the forearm and molded into the shape of a phallus to be grafted back onto the body. Both surgeries carry staggering complication rates of 25 percent and 39 percent respectively and can cost over $24,000. Hospitals are making millions of dollars off this butchery by turning children into permanent medical patients. And if someone later regrets medical transition, it can already be too late to transition back.
Given these risks, the Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, France, and the UK have all adopted a “watchful waiting” approach and restricted gender-affirming surgery and puberty blockers for minors to research settings. Despite ample evidence of harm being done to children, medical authorities in the United States have largely refused to adopt this approach, labeling any concerns about the science supporting gender-affirming care “transphobic.” The fact that many on the left do not want to even have the discussion illustrates why our current system is exploitative of minors. People not yet capable of consent are expedited in gender transition, so hospitals can get rich by creating a new patient for life.
We should have nothing but love and compassion for people with gender dysphoria. While there are arguments to be had about allowing “gender-affirming care” for adults, the system in the United States does not have children’s best interest at heart. There is nothing compassionate about exploiting children’s emotional distress for profit.
With such clear indicators that “gender-affirming care” is nothing more than veiled opportunism, why do Americans allow it to continue? They are told by the left that “children will die” if any restrictions are imposed on these procedures. In reality, this could not be farther from the truth. Rates of suicide among transgender people remain extremely high for years after transition surgeries. Even journalists at The New York Times have questioned the science behind gender-affirming care.
There is only one solution to this atrocity. Ban it. And revoke the medical licenses of any doctors who continue to perform it.
This month, the Tennessee General Assembly filed a bill to ban gender-affirming care for minors. The bill prohibits the use of surgery or prescription drugs to treat gender being “inconsistent with the minor’s sex.” The bill also allows children to sue their parents for consenting to these treatments and courts to impose $25,000 fines if a health care provider violates the law. If passed, it would be among the strictest regulations on this issue in the country, and it would be a significant step in the right direction.
While President Biden is taking interviews to cover for the medical establishment’s corruption, the rest of the country is waking up to the horror behind the mutilation and castration of minors. The Democrats’ radicalism on this issue will be their undoing. To protect children from this medical opportunism, we must call it what it is: abuse.
Russell Kitsis
Russell Kitsis is a Jewish conservative student at Babson College. Russell is studying finance and hopes to work in investment banking upon graduation.
The views expressed in this article are the opinion of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Lone Conservative staff.
