These are people who lie--making up bogus science, cheat--gerrymandering their states so only they can win, and steal--or at least they try to with every election they lose. They have no ethics-no scruples. They shelter themselves under umbrellas with words like "family" and "freedom" and "America" which are exactly opposite their actions. And amazingly they claim to represent Jesus. They are a brood of vipers and a danger to us and all Americans. The danger to us is certainly more direct but the danger to our democracy is no less dire. If we can get our fellow Americans to take the steps to protect our democracy, as a byproduct we may be able to protect ourselves in states like Missouri.
It’s only a matter of time until we’re LEGALLY murdered en masse--trans people are already being murdered at rates 4-5 times higher than average. I spend all of my free time writing, reading, talking, demonstrating, organizing, and even mentoring and counseling queer youth, but at the end of the day what does it accomplish?
I can’t tell if people don’t believe that a genocide is coming, or if they just don’t care, and I’m losing all hope that a system with as much inertia as this eliminationist right wing anti-trans movement has can be stopped or diverted in time. Short of never letting the GOP take federal power again, I don’t see how this ends in any way that doesn’t involve us getting completely fucked.
> I can’t tell if people don’t believe that a genocide is coming, or if they just don’t care
It may be a third option: they want to help but they're scared. Remember–just as with Abortion–that the far right that has taken ahold of the GOP are literal terrorists and unfortunately, it's working.
As much as I dislike the tactics of the GOP re abortion, this is an even worse attack on individual rights. This goes to the very fabric of who a person is and their right to live as they choose. Dobbs was a terrible decision; the right which is imbued in our history is not the right to an abortion but the right of self-determination and the right to privacy under the 14th amendment, as borne out in the multiple privacy cases besides Roe (the ones the justices said they aren’t going after...we’ll see). The right to privacy is not enumerated in the Constitution but it has been settled time and time again that it exists. But this isn’t about privacy; this is about autonomy, parental rights, medical access, and right of adults to choose their own path in life. It’s about fundamental freedom, and I cannot believe we are having this discussion in the United States of America in 2023.
I don’t rightly care for Romney, but I definitely believe him when he stated his peers do not care for the constitution. They would go full Animal Farm with it if they could and probably where they are headed with it. Whatever they can do to bring about the Christian hellscape they want to enforce on all of us through “biblical laws”. It would be laughable if it wasn’t all so terrifying.
I don’t agree with Romney on a lot of issues but at least he sees the problem. He has been one of the more honorable Republicans under the circumstances.
I still say the right to transition and the right to abortion aren't linked. They are the same right. The right to personal bodily autonomy. Informed consent medical care for everyone, i say.
They have one of the most important threads in common, which is that in a free country, the government and other individuals do not get to impose their morality on anyone else, nor do they get to decide what is the right choice for someone else. For children, that right belongs to the parents legally, and for adults it is none of their freaking business.
I would go as far as to say that a minor, who is mature enough to identify as trans, is mature enough to seek transition care, probably with the help of a trusted adult like at school. A parent or guardian's views on it, when not in agreement and attempting to intervene and prevent or delay it, can essentially be neglect/abuse.
Yes, I should have been clearer about that, I was thinking of a situation in which the parents are in support of their child, which of course is often not the case. I was trying to make the point that even in the case of a minor, it is not the government’s or society’s job to decide what is in the best interest of the child. Typically that role defaults to the parent but hopefully with more autonomy and decision-making power to the child as they mature.
My goal would always be for a child/minor to have the full support of their family, but I couldn't let that get in the way of making lifesaving care accessible to them. This should absolutely be a role, for the public schools and other safe places, to give gentle guidance to kids, who often don't have someone else to talk to, or find answers from. My attitude, ultimately, is that if younger kids are identifying as trans, that is a right of self-expression, of feeling good about oneself, and a parent simply has no right to impose their will against it.
I wish that all parents would support their children’s right to self-expression/determination but we are a long way from children having autonomy in this area; that is much more complicated IMHO.
Legally speaking it certainly is. But I wouldn't stop working until we had a system that could cope with this challenge. This ties into the trend toward parental meddling in public schools - they are asserting their own "rights" that conveniently take away others'. I believe in consensus, in evidence, and above that individual liberty, and that means that trans kids do have the right to pursue this proven treatment, not that there's room for debate. Religion, ideology, prejudice, cannot dictate public policy, reality should guide us.
The law is horrible but Wash U and it’s doctors are being cowards. OB docs deal with higher level of liability (for a baby who suffered an injury during childbirth) their whole careers. They still come to work every day and take care of their patients. Wash U needs to shell out money and insure their transgender clinic providers at the same level as their OB providers. Leaving those few hundred patients without good options for care is also malpractice.
Liability for OB providers is also out of control, but there's a critical difference. If you're suing an OB provider, you at least need a vaguely credible story about how the OB provider failed to provide appropriate care.
With this new law, gender-affirming care providers have no defense against a lawsuit that could come up to fifteen years later. Washington University's actions are regrettable, but they really were boxed into a corner.
A courageous individual doctor could choose to take the risk and treat transgender patients, knowing they could be financially ruined at some time in the future. An institution like Washington University just cannot make that choice.
I disagree. This isn’t time for the lonely fight by the solo provider or even time for the fight by the small Planned Parenthood clinic. It’s time for big institutions and large physician groups to step in and fight for what is right for their patients. Wash U has over a 10 billion dollar endowment. They are perfect for the job.
Agree with this completely. Here’s the money quote from the article/ACLU. “The University of Missouri and Washington University made a choice to place politics and fear of politicians above the patients and families they serve by discontinuing to provide the evidence-based care supported by nearly every major medical organization,”
I was intrigued by the reference to Missouri laws chapter 538 mentioned in one of Erin's excerpts, saying its provisions would not apply to this new law.
Turns out that chapter 538.228 says in effect that any licensed physician working in a government agency or in nonprofit community health care "shall not be liable for any civil damages for acts or omissions unless the damages were occasioned by gross negligence or by willful or wanton acts or omissions." That's a bit oversimplified, but it's the gist.
There are two exceptions: abortions and now gender affirming care.
This is a relatively recent development. It was a key aspect of Ron DeSandFlea's "Don't Say Gay" law, which attempted to put the law beyond legal challenge by claiming there were no enforcement provisions, it merely created a cause for action, i..e. gave lots of people standing to sue, so there was no basis on which to sue the state. You'd have to wait to be sued and then fight those suits one by one.
The idea is the same for this provision of the Missouri law. "Oh,o, this provision doesn't ban trans care, it merely means that you can do everything right but still be sued 15 years later. You wanna take the risk? Go ahead. We're not stopping you."
I'll say the same thing I said when arguing with somebody about the FL law who used the meme that it doesn't say "you can't say the word 'gay.'" "These people are not idiots," I said. "They know what they're doing."
Poopy news. How do you counter-act state sponsored discrimination that has the underlying intent to exterminate our existence? These government sponsored acts really are a call to arms on all fronts for us.
These are people who lie--making up bogus science, cheat--gerrymandering their states so only they can win, and steal--or at least they try to with every election they lose. They have no ethics-no scruples. They shelter themselves under umbrellas with words like "family" and "freedom" and "America" which are exactly opposite their actions. And amazingly they claim to represent Jesus. They are a brood of vipers and a danger to us and all Americans. The danger to us is certainly more direct but the danger to our democracy is no less dire. If we can get our fellow Americans to take the steps to protect our democracy, as a byproduct we may be able to protect ourselves in states like Missouri.
This. Is. Genocide. We’re in the “Ghetto” phase. It’s only a matter of time before we’re murdered en masse outright.
It’s only a matter of time until we’re LEGALLY murdered en masse--trans people are already being murdered at rates 4-5 times higher than average. I spend all of my free time writing, reading, talking, demonstrating, organizing, and even mentoring and counseling queer youth, but at the end of the day what does it accomplish?
I can’t tell if people don’t believe that a genocide is coming, or if they just don’t care, and I’m losing all hope that a system with as much inertia as this eliminationist right wing anti-trans movement has can be stopped or diverted in time. Short of never letting the GOP take federal power again, I don’t see how this ends in any way that doesn’t involve us getting completely fucked.
> I can’t tell if people don’t believe that a genocide is coming, or if they just don’t care
It may be a third option: they want to help but they're scared. Remember–just as with Abortion–that the far right that has taken ahold of the GOP are literal terrorists and unfortunately, it's working.
As much as I dislike the tactics of the GOP re abortion, this is an even worse attack on individual rights. This goes to the very fabric of who a person is and their right to live as they choose. Dobbs was a terrible decision; the right which is imbued in our history is not the right to an abortion but the right of self-determination and the right to privacy under the 14th amendment, as borne out in the multiple privacy cases besides Roe (the ones the justices said they aren’t going after...we’ll see). The right to privacy is not enumerated in the Constitution but it has been settled time and time again that it exists. But this isn’t about privacy; this is about autonomy, parental rights, medical access, and right of adults to choose their own path in life. It’s about fundamental freedom, and I cannot believe we are having this discussion in the United States of America in 2023.
I don’t rightly care for Romney, but I definitely believe him when he stated his peers do not care for the constitution. They would go full Animal Farm with it if they could and probably where they are headed with it. Whatever they can do to bring about the Christian hellscape they want to enforce on all of us through “biblical laws”. It would be laughable if it wasn’t all so terrifying.
I don’t agree with Romney on a lot of issues but at least he sees the problem. He has been one of the more honorable Republicans under the circumstances.
I still say the right to transition and the right to abortion aren't linked. They are the same right. The right to personal bodily autonomy. Informed consent medical care for everyone, i say.
They have one of the most important threads in common, which is that in a free country, the government and other individuals do not get to impose their morality on anyone else, nor do they get to decide what is the right choice for someone else. For children, that right belongs to the parents legally, and for adults it is none of their freaking business.
I would go as far as to say that a minor, who is mature enough to identify as trans, is mature enough to seek transition care, probably with the help of a trusted adult like at school. A parent or guardian's views on it, when not in agreement and attempting to intervene and prevent or delay it, can essentially be neglect/abuse.
Yes, I should have been clearer about that, I was thinking of a situation in which the parents are in support of their child, which of course is often not the case. I was trying to make the point that even in the case of a minor, it is not the government’s or society’s job to decide what is in the best interest of the child. Typically that role defaults to the parent but hopefully with more autonomy and decision-making power to the child as they mature.
My goal would always be for a child/minor to have the full support of their family, but I couldn't let that get in the way of making lifesaving care accessible to them. This should absolutely be a role, for the public schools and other safe places, to give gentle guidance to kids, who often don't have someone else to talk to, or find answers from. My attitude, ultimately, is that if younger kids are identifying as trans, that is a right of self-expression, of feeling good about oneself, and a parent simply has no right to impose their will against it.
I wish that all parents would support their children’s right to self-expression/determination but we are a long way from children having autonomy in this area; that is much more complicated IMHO.
Legally speaking it certainly is. But I wouldn't stop working until we had a system that could cope with this challenge. This ties into the trend toward parental meddling in public schools - they are asserting their own "rights" that conveniently take away others'. I believe in consensus, in evidence, and above that individual liberty, and that means that trans kids do have the right to pursue this proven treatment, not that there's room for debate. Religion, ideology, prejudice, cannot dictate public policy, reality should guide us.
The law is horrible but Wash U and it’s doctors are being cowards. OB docs deal with higher level of liability (for a baby who suffered an injury during childbirth) their whole careers. They still come to work every day and take care of their patients. Wash U needs to shell out money and insure their transgender clinic providers at the same level as their OB providers. Leaving those few hundred patients without good options for care is also malpractice.
Liability for OB providers is also out of control, but there's a critical difference. If you're suing an OB provider, you at least need a vaguely credible story about how the OB provider failed to provide appropriate care.
With this new law, gender-affirming care providers have no defense against a lawsuit that could come up to fifteen years later. Washington University's actions are regrettable, but they really were boxed into a corner.
A courageous individual doctor could choose to take the risk and treat transgender patients, knowing they could be financially ruined at some time in the future. An institution like Washington University just cannot make that choice.
I disagree. This isn’t time for the lonely fight by the solo provider or even time for the fight by the small Planned Parenthood clinic. It’s time for big institutions and large physician groups to step in and fight for what is right for their patients. Wash U has over a 10 billion dollar endowment. They are perfect for the job.
Inside Higher Ed frames the universities’ actions as “exceeding” what’s required by the legislation, and compares this to Vanderbilt caving to the Tennessee AG a few months ago: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/diversity/sex-gender/2023/09/15/two-missouri-universities-halt-treatments-trans-youths
Agree with this completely. Here’s the money quote from the article/ACLU. “The University of Missouri and Washington University made a choice to place politics and fear of politicians above the patients and families they serve by discontinuing to provide the evidence-based care supported by nearly every major medical organization,”
GOP have no conscience.
I was intrigued by the reference to Missouri laws chapter 538 mentioned in one of Erin's excerpts, saying its provisions would not apply to this new law.
Turns out that chapter 538.228 says in effect that any licensed physician working in a government agency or in nonprofit community health care "shall not be liable for any civil damages for acts or omissions unless the damages were occasioned by gross negligence or by willful or wanton acts or omissions." That's a bit oversimplified, but it's the gist.
There are two exceptions: abortions and now gender affirming care.
This is a relatively recent development. It was a key aspect of Ron DeSandFlea's "Don't Say Gay" law, which attempted to put the law beyond legal challenge by claiming there were no enforcement provisions, it merely created a cause for action, i..e. gave lots of people standing to sue, so there was no basis on which to sue the state. You'd have to wait to be sued and then fight those suits one by one.
The idea is the same for this provision of the Missouri law. "Oh,o, this provision doesn't ban trans care, it merely means that you can do everything right but still be sued 15 years later. You wanna take the risk? Go ahead. We're not stopping you."
I'll say the same thing I said when arguing with somebody about the FL law who used the meme that it doesn't say "you can't say the word 'gay.'" "These people are not idiots," I said. "They know what they're doing."
Poopy news. How do you counter-act state sponsored discrimination that has the underlying intent to exterminate our existence? These government sponsored acts really are a call to arms on all fronts for us.
Strong words. Some may say they are over the top. But yet out of their mouths come words like "exterminate". They mean what they are saying.
Strong but appropriate words.