Thursday, August 18, 2022
"The co-founder of the pediatric gender identity clinic at Boston Children’s Hospital admitted to giving feminizing hormone therapy to a 13-year-old child during a lecture in 2013."
This day in Herstory: Amelia Isadora Platts Boynton Robinson, born August 18, 1911 (died August 26, 2015), was an American activist who was a leader of the American Civil Rights Movement in Selma, Alabama, and a key figure in the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches. In 1984, she became founding vice-president of the Schiller Institute affiliated with Lyndon LaRouche. She was awarded the Martin Luther King Jr. Freedom Medal in 1990.
US - Leading Doctor at Boston Children’s Hospital Gave Cross-Sex Hormones to 13-Year-Old
From Reduxx (Canada)
By Genevieve Gluck
August 18, 2022
The co-founder of the pediatric gender identity clinic at Boston Children’s Hospital admitted to giving feminizing hormone therapy to a 13-year-old child during a lecture in 2013. This is just the latest in a slew of disturbing news coming from the clinic related to transitioning extremely young children.
Last week, several promotional videos created by Boston Children’s Hospital went viral on Twitter. The first clip to be widely shared racked up over 1.6 million views and featured Gender Multispeciality Service (GeMS) clinician Dr. Frances Grimstad presenting hysterectomies as a form of “gender-affirming” therapy. … read full article
US - ‘Something stinks really bad in Port Townsend,’ columnist claims after mayor’s sexual tweets
From KIRO News Radio (USA)
By Dori Monson Show
August 18, 2022
What started as a swimming pool locker room clash between an 80-year-old Port Townsend woman and a self-identified transgender YMCA worker in July has now expanded into revelations involving the Olympic Peninsula town’s mayor.
Nearly four weeks after octogenarian Julie Jaman was banned from swimming at the town’s Mountain View Pool over the early July incident, Port Townsend Mayor David J. Faber is now under attack by some members of his small town of 10,000 residents – and at least one columnist/podcaster. … read full article
US - Republicans say America’s top pediatrics body has been hijacked by 'woke activists', is fast-tracking trans teens onto harmful drug cocktails, and push for congressional SCRUTINY should they re-take the House in November
Politicians Dan Bishop and Buddy Carter say the American Academy of Pediatrics has a 'woke' and harmful trans policy and are pushing for oversight
They bashed the AAP's ‘radical and harmful gender policies’ and vaunted plans to 'have them testify' before Congress
Republicans are poised to gain control of the House and its powerful health subcommittee in November
The health subcommittee could subject the AAP to scrutiny and questioning
DailyMail.com obtained leaked files that expose how rank-and-file pediatricians are slamming their academy for pushing puberty-blocking drugs on teens who identify as transgender
AAP says its policies are evidence-based, widely accepted, subject to review, and best bet for vulnerable teens
From Daily Mail (UK)
By JAMES REINL
August 18, 2022
Republicans have accused the top pediatrics body of bowing to ‘woke activists’ and fast-tracking trans teens into puberty-blockers and hormones, saying they will investigate the health scandal if they re-take the House in November’s midterms.
DailyMail.com spoke with Republican lawmakers Dan Bishop and Buddy Carter after a whistleblower revealed how the American Academy of Pediatrics was suppressing members’ concerns that its transgender policy damaged teens. … read full article
US - Yale professor blasted for program working with 3-year-olds on their 'gender journey'
The video was deleted from Yale School of Medicine's YouTube page
From Fox News (USA)
By Andrew Mark Miller
August 18, 2022
A Yale professor is drawing strong criticism on social media over a video in which she explains that she is part of a university program that helps children as young as three years old with their "gender journey."
"I am the director of the Yale Gender Program, which is an interdisciplinary program working with gender expansive individuals 3-25 and their families," Yale professor Christy Olezeski says in a video circulating on social media. "We help individuals who are questioning their gender identity or who identify as transgender or nonbinary, and we help them with their gender journey." … read full article
US - Boston Children’s Hospital Deletes Website Info Saying 17-Year-Olds Are Eligible for Vaginal Construction Surgery
From National Review (USA)
By Caroline Downey
August 18, 2022
In response to criticism, Boston Children’s Hospital deleted website information stating that 17-year-olds are eligible to receive gender-transition vaginoplasties, or the surgical construction of female reproductive genitalia on a boy.
As of August 12, the medical center’s website said that “to qualify for gender affirmation at Boston Children’s Hospital, you must be at least 18 years old for phalloplasty or metoidioplasty and at least 17 years old for vaginoplasty,” according to an archive on the Wayback machine found by Fox News. … read full article
US - Church Endorses Transitions for Transgender Children 'at All Ages'
From Newsweek (USA)
By ANNA SKINNER
August 18, 2022
he Episcopal Church recently backed Episcopalians of any age seeking gender-affirming care in medical, social or other settings. The 80th General Convention, which is the highest governing body of the church, passed a resolution on the endorsement. It specified that Episcopalians seeking gender-affirming care would be accepted and supported by the church, a move that has sparked great debate on social media.
The 80th General Convention met in Baltimore, Maryland, in July. The General Convention considered 412 resolutions, including Resolution D066 endorsing gender-affirming care, one of several controversial resolutions passed. … read full article
US - Fire chaplain accuses Austin of axing him after he posted opposition to transgender athletes on blog
From The Washington Times (USA)
By Valerie Richardson
August 18, 2022
A volunteer fire chaplain filed a free-speech lawsuit Thursday against the city of Austin, Texas, charging that he was dismissed for expressing his opposition on his personal blog to men who identify as women competing in female athletics.
Andrew K. Fox, an ordained minister who holds a Ph.D., was forced out of the Austin Fire Department volunteer chaplaincy program last year after refusing to apologize for or recant his stance that “men and women are biologically different and men should not compete on women’s sports teams,” according to the complaint. … read full article
US - How Social Justice Became a New Religion
Our society is becoming less religious. Or is it?
From The Atlantic (USA)
By Helen Lewis
August 18, 2022
A quick question. If someone is yelling “repent” at you in the street, are they more likely to be (a) a religious preacher or (b) a left-wing activist?
The answer depends on where you are. Last October, a crowd gathered outside Netflix’s offices in Los Angeles to protest the release of Dave Chappelle’s comedy special The Closer, which contained a long riff criticizing transgender activists. Inevitably, there was a counterprotest: a lonely Chappelle fan holding a sign that read we like dave. This went over badly. Someone took the sign from him and ripped it up. Someone else shouted in his face, and their word choice was notable. The man who liked Dave was urged to “repent.” … read full article
US - Media Denial of Transgender Social Contagion Continues to Harm Young People
From Human Events (USA)
By Mia Ashton
August 17, 2022
On August 3, the headline of a CTV News article informed Canadians that “No, ‘social contagion’ isn’t driving transgender teens, study finds.”
For anyone with even the slightest knowledge of the gender issue, a declaration such as this may have come as a bit of a surprise. Does this mean we can now stop worrying about the recent meteoric rise in teenagers identifying as transgender? Can we set aside our concerns about whole friend groups coming out as trans and lining up to get irreversible medical procedures?
Not quite. Because the reported study was conducted by none other than Jack Turban, well-known activist psychiatrist and puberty-blocker enthusiast, and it has been widely criticized by an array of experts, including those who are themselves sympathetic to Turban’s political views, as already reported in The Post Millennial.
… read full article
US - School choice can save children from radical gender ideology
From Washington Examiner (USA)
By Ginny Gentles
August 18, 2022
Parents desperate to protect emotionally vulnerable children from cultlike indoctrination and secretive gender transitions need to leave the public school system, but not all families can afford alternative options to residentially assigned public schools. School choice programs help families escape government schools and swiftly find and afford safe education options for their children.
Parents are increasingly aware of the federal, state, and local policies that embrace and enforce gender ideology in the K-12 education system. Just as they did during prolonged school closures, parents are raising concerns at school board meetings and demanding that elected officials take action. But the radical gender ideology train has already left the station in many states and districts. … read full article
US - Left Pushes Radical Sex Ed Curriculum
From The Daily Signal (USA)
By Joshua Arnold
August 18, 2022
The school board for Wauwatosa, Wisconsin will consider a “Curriculum Revision proposal” to radically reshape its “Human Growth and Development” curriculum (essentially, sex ed) into a tool for radical, gender ideology indoctrination.
A Human Growth and Development committee comprised of “parents, teachers, school administrators, pupils, health care professionals, members of the clergy, and other residents of the school district” created guidelines, which teachers then turned into lesson plans. … read full article
US - Conservatives bet big on anti-woke message for midterm elections
From Washington Examiner (USA)
By Sarah Westwood
August 18, 2022
Some Republicans are betting the party can capitalize on the backlash to the Left's most controversial positions by leaning into the culture wars ahead of the midterm elections.
A new nonprofit group Citizens for Sanity plans to pour millions of dollars into ads taking aim at the cultural and political pieties of liberals, including transgender rights and certain criminal justice reforms. … read full article
US - Biden's Title IX takeover will give America an extreme makeover
From The Christian Post (USA)
By Ryan Bomberger
August 18, 2022
Imagine being a woman in 1972 when the Title IX Education Amendment was made law. Imagine the elation that girls and women felt when the federal government stepped in to ensure they could fairly compete in sports and other programs by banning sex discrimination.
Now imagine every gain in Title IX being wiped out by a pseudoscience that wants to erase women.
Today, an extremist Biden administration has no regard for the meaning of words. The President’s proposed radical changes to Title IX render the actual text meaningless and turn federally-funded schools into pronoun police and political propagandists for the LGBT lobby. Transgenderism has become this administration’s battering ram as it relentlessly tries to break down the walls of common sense. … read full article
US - After Reports Biological Male Allegedly Assaulted Girl In FL School Bathroom, Florida Education Department Takes Action
From The Daily Wire (USA)
By Mary Margaret Olohan
August 18, 2022
The Florida Department of Education is ordering schools to alert parents if their children are forced to use bathrooms with students of the opposite sex following allegations that a biologically male transgender student sexually assaulted a girl in a Florida public school bathroom.
“We find this allegation deeply disturbing and troubling. Clearly, if Brevard Public Schools had commonsense policies that separate bathrooms and locker rooms by biological sex at birth, this incident would not have been possible,” Alex Lanfranconi, Director Of Communications at the Florida Department of Education, told The Daily Wire on Thursday afternoon. … read full article
US - The U.S. Tavistock
It’s time for Planned Parenthood to close too
From Parents with Inconvenient Truths about Trans (PITT) (USA)
August 18, 2022
Are you among the many people who have recently received a donation solicitation from Planned Parenthood? Their current outreach makes sense. With the recent Supreme Court decision, women’s reproductive rights and access to an abortion are being canceled, rolled back, or threatened in many states. Funds from these Planned Parenthood solicitations will presumably be used to fight to restore these rights nationwide. Or so one would think. … read full article
UK - We are all “culture warriors”
Some of us just pretend not to be
From The Critic (UK)
By Ian Leslie
August 18, 2022
On the day after Salman Rushdie was nearly stabbed to death, the chairman of Britain’s Society of Authors thought it would be fun to post a Twitter poll. “Fellow authors,” it read. “Have you ever received a death threat (credible or otherwise)?” The options included “Hell, yes” and “Show me, dammit” (as in, just show me the results).
The flippant tone of this tweet might seem bizarre to those unfamiliar with the social media output of its originator, the novelist Joanne Harris. To those familiar with it, the intent was transparent: to have a dig at one “fellow author” in particular. J.K. Rowling had just posted evidence of a death threat made to her on Twitter, in a reply to her expression of sympathy for Rushdie. Rather than condemning this threat, Harris seems to have regarded it as an opportunity to put Britain’s most popular author in her place. … read full article
UK - Entry 8 – Beyond the Headlines
From The Cass Review (UK)
By Hilary Cass
August 18, 2022
Medicine is the science of uncertainty and the art of probability - William Osler
There has been wide-spread reporting of NHS England’s decision to establish two early adopter services and as a result bring the contract for the Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) at the Tavistock and Portman clinic to a managed close next Spring. Within this coverage I feel that some of the detail about the key components of the future regionalised service delivery model, that I set out in my latest advice to NHS England , has sometimes been overlooked. … read full article
UK - Fury over 'sexist' and 'woke' NHS job ad: Health chiefs seek 'candidates who identify as female' for £100,000-a-year director of operations role
£100,000 director of operations role was posted by Barts Health Trust this week
Ad particularly interested in hearing from candidates who 'identify as female'
Charities and experts have slammed the NHS ad for being discriminatory to men
From Daily Mail (UK)
By JOHN ELY
August 18, 2022
The NHS has been slammed as sexist and woke after advertising for a senior role in which the candidate preferably 'identifies as female'.
Barts Health NHS Trust in London is hiring a director of operations that will be paid an annual salary of around £100,000. ... read full article
UK - If Joanne Harris won’t defend women, I won’t support her
From The Post By UnHerd (UK)
By Rose George
August 18, 2022
I am a coward. I travel to faraway places alone, I have been to war and down sewers and into dangerous places. But I am a coward because I do not have the guts of Kathleen Stock, or JK Rowling or Rachel Rooney or any other of the creative and clever women who have been hounded out of jobs or given regular death threats because they have dared to say in public what should be banal.
I have not spoken at meetings while people have pelted rocks at the windows trying to drown out women simply trying to have a debate. I wish I had the guts and I hope that one day I will find my stern stuff (I’m still smarting over a Twitter troll who said I had a paunch), because this modern assault on women’s rights, and the capture of countless institutions — including far too many schools — by Stonewall gender ideology is unprecedented and appalling. … read full article
UK - To those defending Joanne Harris
Our open letter criticising her leadership at the Society of Authors provoked a rebuttal. Here’s our response:
From Julie Bindel's podcasts and writing (USA)
By Julie Bindel
August 18, 2022
On August 16th we published, on this platform, an open letter to the Society of Authors expressing disquiet at its failure to speak out on violent threats against authors, and the lamentable behaviour of the chair of its management board, Joanne Harris. Another open letter has been written in response. It is littered with errors and misrepresentations, which we wish to correct.
We also wish to question some aspects of Ms Harris’s personal response, but first wish to state clearly that we have no issues with her personal views. Our issue is her failure to separate those views from her role at the Society of Authors, and the way she has cast those who hold opposing views, and suffer harassment and even loss of livelihood as a response, as authors of their own misfortune. … read full article
Scotland - Putting The 'Men' Into Menstruation Again: The Period Indignity Officer
Once again it's Testicles that trump Tampax, in Scotland's latest well thought out but badly executed initiative.
From 4W (USA)
By Kathryn
Aug 18, 2022
My Mooncup truly has run over at the news Scotland has appointed it's first Period Dignity Officer.
Wait..." what's that you say, Skippy?" It's a man? "Oh. Oh well, at least they've...done SOMETHING, I suppose." … read full article
Australia - Transgender Coles workers complain about being forced to hand out Harry Potter collectable cards - because it 'triggers' thoughts about JK Rowling's views on trans women
Transgender Coles staff upset at being made to hand out Harry Potter cards
Trans activist Norrie May-Welby called on supermarket to give staff the choice
Coles in May 2022 declared it had 900 'transgender and gender diverse staff'
Author JK Rowling has argued trans movement denied biological women's rights
From Daily Mail (UK)
By STEPHEN JOHNSON
August 18, 2022
Transgender Coles staff have complained about having to hand out Harry Potter cards that may 'trigger' thoughts about author JK Rowling's controversial views on trans women.
Packs of the Potter-themed collectable cards have been distributed to shoppers across Australia since July for every $30 spent at the supermarket. … read full article
Australia - Aus parents battle to protect kids from trans ideology in face of prosecution threats
From The Christian Institute (UK)
August 18, 2022
Distraught parents in the Australian state of Victoria fear prosecution if they do not encourage their children’s gender confusion.
Six months after the state’s conversion therapy ban came into effect, parents say they feel powerless to step in while their children are subjected to radical transgender ideology encouraged by elected officials. … read full article
Australia - Australian National Uni Students’ Association Offers Binders, Tucking Underwear to Students
From 4W (USA)
By J.K. Williams
Aug 18, 2022
The “Queer* Department” of the ANU Students' Association is offering potentially harmful “gender affirming gear” to students in Canberra.
Interested students just needed to fill out a form and the Queer* Department would be in contact when the “gear” arrives.
The “gender affirming gear” includes breast binders and tucking underwear. … read full article
Australia - All-girls private school rejects a trans student, 12, because 'she's a male' - as her furious mum unleashes on the college
Single mum Emma Jensen is suing all-girls school Carinity Education Southside
She said her daughter, Harley, was denied a place because she is transgender
Ms Jensen said an employee told her Harley's gender would not be considered
She said Harley 'is a female' and has identified as a female since kindergarten
From Daily Mail (UK)
By ASHLEY NICKEL
August 17, 2022
The furious mother of a transgender student is suing an all-girls school for denying her child a place because she was 'born a male'.
Single mother of four Emma Jensen said she was excited for her two children Rylee, 13, and Harley, 12, to attend private Brisbane school Carinity Education Southside after seeing photos of their relatives in the school's foyer. … read full article
New Zealand - Parents of gender-questioning children in NZ being let down
Lack of local media reporting on significant international developments on child and youth gender treatment is leaving New Zealand families to make life-changing decisions in an information vacuum
From Newsroom (NZ)
By Dr. Sarah Donovan
August 18, 2022
For anyone interested in evolving health issues and in particular care and treatment being provided for children and teenagers identifying as transgender or non-binary, there have been some pretty extraordinary developments in recent weeks. But you wouldn’t know it from reading the papers here.
In recent days the UK media has reported that up to 1000 families are expected to file a medical negligence lawsuit against the Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service, the National Health Service’s gender clinic for children, young people and their families. Key grievances relate to claims about harmful side effects from puberty blockers, and the view that children and young people were rushed into drug treatment without adequate assessment and counselling. … read full article