“First in the nation gender-affirming care ban struck down in Arkansas” (from state-sponsored NPR):
The ruling by U.S. District Judge James Moody Jr. on Tuesday says the state of Arkansas violated several sections of the U.S. Constitution when it banned all gender-affirming treatments for people under 18. The 80-page ruling says depriving trans minors of treatments like hormone therapy would cause them irreparable harm, and that delaying care until adulthood would force teens to go through changes inconsistent with their gender identity.
“Rather than protecting children or safeguarding medical ethics, the evidence showed that the prohibited medical care improves the mental health and well-being of patients and that, by prohibiting it, the State undermined the interests it claims to be advancing,” the ruling reads. “The testimony of well-credentialed experts, doctors who provide gender-affirming medical care in Arkansas, and families that rely on that care directly refutes any claim by the State that the Act advances an interest in protecting children.”
This is not a political decision. Science requires that teenagers get injected with hormones and have various body parts cut off surgically. It is settled Science that youngsters who receive gender affirming care have improved mental health and well-being.
On the other hand… What did Science tell the folks who run the widely admired technocratically managed universal government-run health care system over in the United Kingdom? “England’s health service won’t give puberty blockers to children at gender clinics” (New York Post, June 11, 2023):
The NHS said the new rules were “an interim policy” that would undergo further review, including the outcome of a research study on the impact puberty-suppressing hormones have on gender dysphoria in children and young people. Findings published last year from a review of children’s gender services led by a pediatrician, Dr. Hilary Cass, said there were “gaps in the evidence base” about the blockers.
The “gaps in the evidence” identified in the U.K. simply do not exist for judges in the U.S.
Separately, what if you’re visiting a teenage recipient of gender-affirming care in a hospital in Arkansas and want to look fashionable? Levi’s has you covered for about $1,000 (photos from yesterday):
Bigger budget? Photos from a Coach store:
> 98% of gender confused boys and 88% of gender confused girls eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty
source: Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 2013 edition, pages 451-459, rates of persistence of gender dysphoria.
> follow-up study of 25 girls with gender identity disorder: only 12% who believed they were transsexuals (mean age 9), still believed so when they were older (mean age 23).
source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18194003
> Sweden study: post-op transsexuals have a suicide rate 19.1x higher than general population … “Our findings suggest that sex reassignment may not suffice as treatment for transsexualism”.
source: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21364939/
It is really sad, unfortunately, Americans have transformed into a society of instant gratification seekers. We want to be happy today without taking into consideration the long-term effect of today’s action.
The quick and easy way out for _(fill in the blank)_ is not always the best solution.
Hi guys! Let’s all chop off our dicks! Why? Because Science!
Sorry, Toucan Sam, I’m keeping my dick because Obama said, if you like your dick, you can keep your dick.
George A! Probably the best response ever. Is there a hall of fame?
“Well-credentialed experts” ==> Disturbed persons who had the stomach for studying “gender-science”.
“Doctors who provide gender-affirming medical care” ==> Doctors who cash in on the insanity.
“Families that rely on that care directly” ==> Victims of the above groups.
The judicial systems are so broken everywhere.
Why oh why did we let the founders put that sex change requirement in the Constitution?
At some point people are going to start treating that document like the roadkill it is. “Ok judge, send your armies.”
Is the Constitution really the problem, or is the problem that the form of government that the Founders intended depends on certain individual, social, and religious conditions that no longer exist?
Even a rebellious skeptic like Franklin was strongly influenced by Cotton’s Mather’s book Bonifacius, or Essays to Do Good.
Perverted judges can pervert justice regardless of what the Constitution says.
“If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.”
2 Chronicles 7:14
Or we could try MOAR PRIDE!!111!!
It’s not in the Constitution, which means it should be decided (insofar as law is concerned) at the state level. But that’s not good enough. It must be forced into a federal issue so that there is no state you can run to in order to escape the long arm of Science.
@FB, freedom is tough and it is meant for all situations including and especially for emergency situations. Bill of Rights was accepted during extra ordinary circumstances, Whiskey Rebellion, 1991 – 1994, and George Washington was fighting it. Ben Franklin did not mean that Republic is only for snowflakes. He meant that political power could corrupt people same way as it corrupted kings.
@perplexed: I never quoted Franklin here, just mentioned that even one of the least pious Founders was strongly influenced by Puritan Christianity. It remains how well the Constitution can be upheld by a people whose cultural values have shifted so significantly.
My main point was similar to zeroonetwo’s: why blame the Constitution for a problem that wouldn’t exist if the Constitution were upheld?