And . . . this is why we need a few hundred million of counter-spend against the Social Conservative propaganda.
We also need across the board clear unanimity about what the facts are about MtF athletes.
- if they benefit from medical assistance in transition from beginning of Tanner 2 (puberty blockers) they have no "masculine" athletic advantage to begin with.
- if they underwent a typical masculine puberty, then no more than 2 years of effective HRT removes any net "masculine" athletic advantage
This would be a great time to testify with historical, medical, and cultural facts and research that can counteract transmisia and transphobia .
Make these legislators look like the idiots that they are, embarrassing them into submission. If they would’ve spent that money in their states, to improve the actual living conditions of their constituents, people’s lives would’ve been significantly improved. Instead, they wasted it on attacking a small group of humans who were just trying to live their lives in peace.
If these rich crackpots can spend that much money on fabricated propaganda, they could also afford to pay their dang taxes.
I'm not a lawyer, nor do I claim any special expertise, so take this with a huge grain of salt. But Washington's anti-trans law seems unlikely to survive a court challenge.
The requirement that all girls, but not boys, need a medical exam to play sports is almost certainly a violation of Title IX, and also the constitution. And it's not just a doctor's note; past medical history doesn't count. You need an actual medical exam, verifying either genitals or chromosomes. That's clear disparate treatment based on sex. Without a compelling state interest at stake, that's unconstitutional. And it seems unlikely that rooting out a few trans girls will qualify as a compelling state interest in any rational court, though obviously not all courts are rational.
If all the claims can be handled under the Washington State constitution, as seems likely (I'm not an expert and I honestly don't know), then the initiative will almost certainly be overturned, and SCOTUS has a very consistent record of not getting involved in state constitutional issues. If the claims need to be challenged in federal court, the chances still seem pretty good, though it's far from certain.
If the initiative contains a severability clause, and that clause holds up in court, the medical exam requirement could be overturned while leaving the trans ban in place, though without an enforcement mechanism. But I suspect that the initiative does NOT contain a severability clause, which means the whole thing probably succeeds or fails as one.
I don't think this initiative is really about trans girls anyway. The right-wing extremists who pushed this pile of garbage don't think girls should be playing sports at all. Even cis girls. Some of them (at the Heritage Foundation, I think?) have said so in print. They're out to destroy girls' sports in the name of saving girls' sports. The medical exam requirement is probably as onerous as it is because they want to prevent girls (especially poor girls) from playing. If the initiative is actually implemented, that's not going to be a popular position outside the tiny Christian Nationalist base.
I'm disappointed that it passed, but I expect that it won't survive in court. I hope so anyway.
Haven’t these bigots, racists, and religious zealots learned anything from the midterms and earlier elections? Going after transgender youth is no longer the winning political issue they seem to think it is. Republicans have spent millions upon millions of dollars on ads attacking the trans community, and what has it gotten them? Absolutely nowhere. The vast majority of Americans have far more important concerns than politicians targeting a vulnerable community for political gain.
But we cannot let our guard down. These individuals have not given up, and we must remain vigilant, speak out, and challenge every attempt to push discriminatory legislation through. We cannot allow them to take away the rights, dignity, and protections of the transgender and LGBTQ+ communities. Their rights are not negotiable, and neither is our commitment to defending them.
Thanks, Erin. Good to hear that we can strike lots of these down. Dems have a problem with ballot measures. Even here in WI, voters were fooled into taking some veto powers away from the governor and banning DEI programs in state agencies. i can’t speak for the other states, but for Wisconsin, I sensed a lack of urgency and willingness during the campaigning from WisDems. The amendment questions were never in any door or phone canvass scripts, they never had literature to hand out about them and they started to but then stopped trying to get volunteers to spread the word about them. Dems have to be willing to create campaigns to fight against these things.
Unfortunately a lot of people really think a boy says they are a girl and then can immediately play on the girl's teams (And vice-versa). That's the one thing the anti-trans ads achieved.
Let’s put anti-trans fear mongering in the trash can where it belongs. So many positives from Tuesday after years of nothing but negatives. Hallelujah!
A parting shot from the rep controlled AZ leg. Brewer vetoed their attempts to pass anti-trans laws, so they sent this one to the peeps to pass...and this one applies to private schools too...
Longtime reader and lurker, and sadly, a Washington State resident.
I'm both dismayed and unsurprised by I-638 💔 Washington has longstanding problems that its reputation as a safe state obscures.
Since November 2024, I've experienced escalating transmisogyny here, from repeated verbal harassment to a violent attack. I've largely withdrawn from public life, yet still encounter hostility on essential trips. LGBTQ+ friends have experienced much the same.
Even healthcare providers in Puget Sound area counties have used sex-based medical classifications against me, in a state whose healthcare systems still categorize us by sex assigned at birth. Meanwhile, hospitals have retreated from gender-affirming care, and clinics serving our community have closed despite our supposed protections (you've covered this extensively—thank you 🩷).
Erin, your article, the comments here, and my years watching Washington's courts give me genuine hope for legal challenges.
But I'll never forget learning that my treatment in public wasn't noise. It was signal.
Little do these Republicans know is that God is going to render these anti-measures null and void. I can’t wait for the look on their faces when they find out that they have been fighting God. I just thought of something related to this article. Is not Arizona the same state that made a cis boy compete on the girl’s basketball team because of clerical error on his birth certificate. They made the mother get genetic testing so he could compete on the boy’s team. They are doubling up on their stupidity and defeat their own argument of biological reality. It shows the motivation was never about biological reality but about worshipping birth certificates even ones with clerical errors. I don’t know if the boy’s case ever got resolved. They said they did not have to honor the results of the genetic testing if it showed he is a boy. Media has mentioned nothing else about the case. Update: Google said case was resolved and school district paid for boy’s genetic testing and let him compete on boy’s team.
This is promising!!! I am happy my tarot reading for this week was spot on about positive changes!!! And next week, the energy is all about us as a collective and on individual levels coming into our own - whether it is our authentic identities, names, careers, or simply our trans magick/joy!!!
I'm in Colorado and was surprised it passed. Knowing our new governor and legislation and how they stand I'd be surprised if any legislation would assist any inforcement of it. It is causing anxiety through.
I’m an over-60-year-old trans woman. I am a physician trained in psychiatry and internal medicine. I am a member of WPATH and USPATH. I am living the trans experience and care for trans and nonbinary folks also. I care deeply about them…and myself. And I write this having given this matter a significant amount of thought, and after much reading and attending medical and lay person conferences.
I have also been a journalist, have worked alongside politicians, as well as mass media and PR professionals, having been one in major broadcast and print media.
I worry about the trans-athlete issue.
Let me break this up into a personal perspective and then a more public health perspective.
Personal:
I have been on estrogen almost three years now.
I want to play pickle ball. I’m not good. I’m uncoordinated often, and my T level is 25—almost nothing.
I want to join a league. And…. I will join the men. That’s because I am still, after three years, stronger than most. To play with the women, if I hit the ball solidly in a lucky moment, would not be fair. It is a clear biological advantage. So, I will go suck, as a woman, with the men.
I don’t want to win unfairly. And I don’t want to ostracize myself with new friends. It’s just not worth it (and, playing against the men will only force me to up my game, even though I will still stink). I would rather lose fairly than win unfairly, and frankly, I just want to go hit the ball and have fun.
Now, I’m not a 10-year-old kid who has not gone through puberty. If that were the case, and I came out, I’d want to …and deserve to…play with the girls. And, if my parents felt so, I would be entitled to puberty-blocking medication. That’s just my humble, MD/trans-caring opinion.
SO......this is not a monolithic matter. It’s quite complex and deserves a thoughtful debate.
The issue over trans athletes has become the ONLY issue among the evil/angry/misinformed/loud-mouthed bigoted political leaders who have made us the scapegoat and hated population of the day. They have muddied the waters, and we, as a group, are falling for it. We argue back without thought, and bite on this rather than the other issues we face, drowning out our own urgencies as we are suckered into validating their nonsense.
And this is why, seeing the big picture, I have a position many won’t like: the transgender athlete matter needs to be quietly “shelved” for a bit. I’m not saying it’s not important. I’m not saying many arguments for the trans athlete are not justified. It should be brought forth, in due time, and in the correct way.
There are two big problems here: 1. we have bigger fish to fry i.e. concerns that affect all or most of us. This is not one of them. My pickleball issues are hardly a matter. It is a philosophically important issue, but sometimes we must triage the issues and respect the environment in which we are operating. 2. Many of those advocating for trans athletes, including medical researchers and professionals, are confused on how to formulate the argument. From my perspective, it’s frustrating to watch and take in, knowing they are ignorantly poking the bear, failing to see what the response might be, and without a way to protect all of us from being mauled.
Tuesday was an amazing day. This article by Erin reflects the start of what is going to be validation of our reflexive sigh of relief. People who moved abroad may now consider coming home. Amen.
Even on MSN, which has been loath to ever discuss the trans issues (even Rachel Maddow rarely, if ever discusses it), they spoke openly and empathically about our struggles, finally on Tuesday night, after many of the results had been returned. Thank you, Chris Hayes.
But if we keep coming at everyone with an all or none strategy, with arguments that I’ve seen which are (imho as a physician and a member of WPATH) just plain…frankly…frighteningly weak and not founded in data and science (even research presented at USPATH last year), we will alienate our allies who are come out from hiding, and who will help us moving forward. We can easily pick this very new scab. We need to pause before turning our fear into anger. Please.
We cannot be tone-deaf nor lacking mindfulness of the positions our allies still face. And we need to be mindful of the difference between prepubertal AMAB folks and post-pubertal folks, the competitive environments and levels, the importance in various situations, and that it is not a one-size-fits-all debate.
We are also not understanding how different politicians face different hills to climb, and some cannot be as open as others. Some still must hide a true support of us, which they may show in due time.
Of course, we should not neglect the trans-athlete issue. But we can prioritize our agenda, and when we end up on even more solid footing, we can then be thoughtful, insightful, and with well-considered points, advance this item in good time.
To be able to go to the bathroom, have a driver’s license, be able to be employed as anyone else can, have protections everyone else has—issues that everyone cares about—should take priority. We can’t be tone deaf, and we need to see the big playing field, focusing not only on this one solitary issue —upon which we might again die if we move without deep thinking.
Let’s not bite off our nose to spite our face. Let’s use the smart folks among us to create a studious, data-driven trans-athletic participation agenda that is based in logic, science, and kindness to all who have fears and concerns (including cis-gendered women, who we want, and need, as allies. Their fears and concerns matter, too).
For now, I can’t wait to be able to easily find a bathroom when changing planes in Texas.
With great respect for you as a physician and WPATH / USPATH member, take a few moments to read the link below. She's not a doctor, but, if memory serves, she has a PhD in science writing, and this essay is typically well referenced. The bottom line is that puberty, both first and second, takes much longer than the often-presumed couple of years. It's more like 10 - 15 years. Case in point, about 6 months ago I was out for a walk wearing my customary leggings, looked down, and realized my thighs had significantly feminized, this after 6 years of having a female body chemistry. (Yay!)
You'll be able to play pickle ball with the other women; you'll just have to wait a bit longer.
We in Washington will fight this through to it's expected outcome. I-638 Is Unconstitutional and unenforceable. And, I understand that legal challenges are planned. To expect young girls to expose themselves to an unfamiliar health care provider is obscene and many girls, including Trans girls will opt out.
And . . . this is why we need a few hundred million of counter-spend against the Social Conservative propaganda.
We also need across the board clear unanimity about what the facts are about MtF athletes.
- if they benefit from medical assistance in transition from beginning of Tanner 2 (puberty blockers) they have no "masculine" athletic advantage to begin with.
- if they underwent a typical masculine puberty, then no more than 2 years of effective HRT removes any net "masculine" athletic advantage
Definitely 💯
This would be a great time to testify with historical, medical, and cultural facts and research that can counteract transmisia and transphobia .
Make these legislators look like the idiots that they are, embarrassing them into submission. If they would’ve spent that money in their states, to improve the actual living conditions of their constituents, people’s lives would’ve been significantly improved. Instead, they wasted it on attacking a small group of humans who were just trying to live their lives in peace.
If these rich crackpots can spend that much money on fabricated propaganda, they could also afford to pay their dang taxes.
Waste, Fraud and Abuse!!
YES!!!!🙌
I'm not a lawyer, nor do I claim any special expertise, so take this with a huge grain of salt. But Washington's anti-trans law seems unlikely to survive a court challenge.
The requirement that all girls, but not boys, need a medical exam to play sports is almost certainly a violation of Title IX, and also the constitution. And it's not just a doctor's note; past medical history doesn't count. You need an actual medical exam, verifying either genitals or chromosomes. That's clear disparate treatment based on sex. Without a compelling state interest at stake, that's unconstitutional. And it seems unlikely that rooting out a few trans girls will qualify as a compelling state interest in any rational court, though obviously not all courts are rational.
If all the claims can be handled under the Washington State constitution, as seems likely (I'm not an expert and I honestly don't know), then the initiative will almost certainly be overturned, and SCOTUS has a very consistent record of not getting involved in state constitutional issues. If the claims need to be challenged in federal court, the chances still seem pretty good, though it's far from certain.
If the initiative contains a severability clause, and that clause holds up in court, the medical exam requirement could be overturned while leaving the trans ban in place, though without an enforcement mechanism. But I suspect that the initiative does NOT contain a severability clause, which means the whole thing probably succeeds or fails as one.
I don't think this initiative is really about trans girls anyway. The right-wing extremists who pushed this pile of garbage don't think girls should be playing sports at all. Even cis girls. Some of them (at the Heritage Foundation, I think?) have said so in print. They're out to destroy girls' sports in the name of saving girls' sports. The medical exam requirement is probably as onerous as it is because they want to prevent girls (especially poor girls) from playing. If the initiative is actually implemented, that's not going to be a popular position outside the tiny Christian Nationalist base.
I'm disappointed that it passed, but I expect that it won't survive in court. I hope so anyway.
Haven’t these bigots, racists, and religious zealots learned anything from the midterms and earlier elections? Going after transgender youth is no longer the winning political issue they seem to think it is. Republicans have spent millions upon millions of dollars on ads attacking the trans community, and what has it gotten them? Absolutely nowhere. The vast majority of Americans have far more important concerns than politicians targeting a vulnerable community for political gain.
But we cannot let our guard down. These individuals have not given up, and we must remain vigilant, speak out, and challenge every attempt to push discriminatory legislation through. We cannot allow them to take away the rights, dignity, and protections of the transgender and LGBTQ+ communities. Their rights are not negotiable, and neither is our commitment to defending them.
Thanks, Erin. Good to hear that we can strike lots of these down. Dems have a problem with ballot measures. Even here in WI, voters were fooled into taking some veto powers away from the governor and banning DEI programs in state agencies. i can’t speak for the other states, but for Wisconsin, I sensed a lack of urgency and willingness during the campaigning from WisDems. The amendment questions were never in any door or phone canvass scripts, they never had literature to hand out about them and they started to but then stopped trying to get volunteers to spread the word about them. Dems have to be willing to create campaigns to fight against these things.
Unfortunately a lot of people really think a boy says they are a girl and then can immediately play on the girl's teams (And vice-versa). That's the one thing the anti-trans ads achieved.
Let’s put anti-trans fear mongering in the trash can where it belongs. So many positives from Tuesday after years of nothing but negatives. Hallelujah!
A parting shot from the rep controlled AZ leg. Brewer vetoed their attempts to pass anti-trans laws, so they sent this one to the peeps to pass...and this one applies to private schools too...
Longtime reader and lurker, and sadly, a Washington State resident.
I'm both dismayed and unsurprised by I-638 💔 Washington has longstanding problems that its reputation as a safe state obscures.
Since November 2024, I've experienced escalating transmisogyny here, from repeated verbal harassment to a violent attack. I've largely withdrawn from public life, yet still encounter hostility on essential trips. LGBTQ+ friends have experienced much the same.
Even healthcare providers in Puget Sound area counties have used sex-based medical classifications against me, in a state whose healthcare systems still categorize us by sex assigned at birth. Meanwhile, hospitals have retreated from gender-affirming care, and clinics serving our community have closed despite our supposed protections (you've covered this extensively—thank you 🩷).
Erin, your article, the comments here, and my years watching Washington's courts give me genuine hope for legal challenges.
But I'll never forget learning that my treatment in public wasn't noise. It was signal.
"Bitter aftertaste" is exactly right.
There is still much work to do.
Little do these Republicans know is that God is going to render these anti-measures null and void. I can’t wait for the look on their faces when they find out that they have been fighting God. I just thought of something related to this article. Is not Arizona the same state that made a cis boy compete on the girl’s basketball team because of clerical error on his birth certificate. They made the mother get genetic testing so he could compete on the boy’s team. They are doubling up on their stupidity and defeat their own argument of biological reality. It shows the motivation was never about biological reality but about worshipping birth certificates even ones with clerical errors. I don’t know if the boy’s case ever got resolved. They said they did not have to honor the results of the genetic testing if it showed he is a boy. Media has mentioned nothing else about the case. Update: Google said case was resolved and school district paid for boy’s genetic testing and let him compete on boy’s team.
This is promising!!! I am happy my tarot reading for this week was spot on about positive changes!!! And next week, the energy is all about us as a collective and on individual levels coming into our own - whether it is our authentic identities, names, careers, or simply our trans magick/joy!!!
The season of change is upon us 🏳️⚧️
I'm in Colorado and was surprised it passed. Knowing our new governor and legislation and how they stand I'd be surprised if any legislation would assist any inforcement of it. It is causing anxiety through.
Hi everyone.
I’m an over-60-year-old trans woman. I am a physician trained in psychiatry and internal medicine. I am a member of WPATH and USPATH. I am living the trans experience and care for trans and nonbinary folks also. I care deeply about them…and myself. And I write this having given this matter a significant amount of thought, and after much reading and attending medical and lay person conferences.
I have also been a journalist, have worked alongside politicians, as well as mass media and PR professionals, having been one in major broadcast and print media.
I worry about the trans-athlete issue.
Let me break this up into a personal perspective and then a more public health perspective.
Personal:
I have been on estrogen almost three years now.
I want to play pickle ball. I’m not good. I’m uncoordinated often, and my T level is 25—almost nothing.
I want to join a league. And…. I will join the men. That’s because I am still, after three years, stronger than most. To play with the women, if I hit the ball solidly in a lucky moment, would not be fair. It is a clear biological advantage. So, I will go suck, as a woman, with the men.
I don’t want to win unfairly. And I don’t want to ostracize myself with new friends. It’s just not worth it (and, playing against the men will only force me to up my game, even though I will still stink). I would rather lose fairly than win unfairly, and frankly, I just want to go hit the ball and have fun.
Now, I’m not a 10-year-old kid who has not gone through puberty. If that were the case, and I came out, I’d want to …and deserve to…play with the girls. And, if my parents felt so, I would be entitled to puberty-blocking medication. That’s just my humble, MD/trans-caring opinion.
SO......this is not a monolithic matter. It’s quite complex and deserves a thoughtful debate.
The issue over trans athletes has become the ONLY issue among the evil/angry/misinformed/loud-mouthed bigoted political leaders who have made us the scapegoat and hated population of the day. They have muddied the waters, and we, as a group, are falling for it. We argue back without thought, and bite on this rather than the other issues we face, drowning out our own urgencies as we are suckered into validating their nonsense.
And this is why, seeing the big picture, I have a position many won’t like: the transgender athlete matter needs to be quietly “shelved” for a bit. I’m not saying it’s not important. I’m not saying many arguments for the trans athlete are not justified. It should be brought forth, in due time, and in the correct way.
There are two big problems here: 1. we have bigger fish to fry i.e. concerns that affect all or most of us. This is not one of them. My pickleball issues are hardly a matter. It is a philosophically important issue, but sometimes we must triage the issues and respect the environment in which we are operating. 2. Many of those advocating for trans athletes, including medical researchers and professionals, are confused on how to formulate the argument. From my perspective, it’s frustrating to watch and take in, knowing they are ignorantly poking the bear, failing to see what the response might be, and without a way to protect all of us from being mauled.
Tuesday was an amazing day. This article by Erin reflects the start of what is going to be validation of our reflexive sigh of relief. People who moved abroad may now consider coming home. Amen.
Even on MSN, which has been loath to ever discuss the trans issues (even Rachel Maddow rarely, if ever discusses it), they spoke openly and empathically about our struggles, finally on Tuesday night, after many of the results had been returned. Thank you, Chris Hayes.
But if we keep coming at everyone with an all or none strategy, with arguments that I’ve seen which are (imho as a physician and a member of WPATH) just plain…frankly…frighteningly weak and not founded in data and science (even research presented at USPATH last year), we will alienate our allies who are come out from hiding, and who will help us moving forward. We can easily pick this very new scab. We need to pause before turning our fear into anger. Please.
We cannot be tone-deaf nor lacking mindfulness of the positions our allies still face. And we need to be mindful of the difference between prepubertal AMAB folks and post-pubertal folks, the competitive environments and levels, the importance in various situations, and that it is not a one-size-fits-all debate.
We are also not understanding how different politicians face different hills to climb, and some cannot be as open as others. Some still must hide a true support of us, which they may show in due time.
Of course, we should not neglect the trans-athlete issue. But we can prioritize our agenda, and when we end up on even more solid footing, we can then be thoughtful, insightful, and with well-considered points, advance this item in good time.
To be able to go to the bathroom, have a driver’s license, be able to be employed as anyone else can, have protections everyone else has—issues that everyone cares about—should take priority. We can’t be tone deaf, and we need to see the big playing field, focusing not only on this one solitary issue —upon which we might again die if we move without deep thinking.
Let’s not bite off our nose to spite our face. Let’s use the smart folks among us to create a studious, data-driven trans-athletic participation agenda that is based in logic, science, and kindness to all who have fears and concerns (including cis-gendered women, who we want, and need, as allies. Their fears and concerns matter, too).
For now, I can’t wait to be able to easily find a bathroom when changing planes in Texas.
Thanks for considering.
With great respect for you as a physician and WPATH / USPATH member, take a few moments to read the link below. She's not a doctor, but, if memory serves, she has a PhD in science writing, and this essay is typically well referenced. The bottom line is that puberty, both first and second, takes much longer than the often-presumed couple of years. It's more like 10 - 15 years. Case in point, about 6 months ago I was out for a walk wearing my customary leggings, looked down, and realized my thighs had significantly feminized, this after 6 years of having a female body chemistry. (Yay!)
You'll be able to play pickle ball with the other women; you'll just have to wait a bit longer.
https://stainedglasswoman.substack.com/p/transition-timelines
There are opening to create a politics of inclusivity and a rejection of fear.
We in Washington will fight this through to it's expected outcome. I-638 Is Unconstitutional and unenforceable. And, I understand that legal challenges are planned. To expect young girls to expose themselves to an unfamiliar health care provider is obscene and many girls, including Trans girls will opt out.
Thank you, EITM for staying on top of this.