Of course new Texas law barring gender treatments for kids should stay in effect | Opinion
Left to their own devices, adolescents often make poor decisions, and some of them carry life-long consequences. This, combined with the permanence of some acceptable treatment plans for gender-dysphoric kids, motivated lawmakers in Texas to intervene.
Just as minors cannot get tattoos, drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes or even skip school for months at a time, they now can’t interrupt their own biological clock, pump themselves with cross-sex hormones and receive doctor-approved mastectomies. This might seem like common sense, but to some, it looks like Texas lawmakers interfering in parents’ rights.
A handful of families with children who want these treatments for their kids sued the state. An Austin-based state judge, Maria Cantú Hexsel, reviewed the suit and blocked the bill the legislature passed that bans minors from receiving puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones or surgeries that could alter their young lives forever. However, the Texas Attorney General’s Office immediately filed an appeal with the state Supreme Court, so Cantú Hexsel’s injunction will take a back seat and SB14 will still go into effect Friday.
This is not the end of the debate, of course. About 21 states have similar laws that are either in effect or facing legal challenges like Texas. One or more are bound to go to the U.S. Supreme Court, even though — like abortion — it’s far better off handled state by state.
Texas’ law is justified and should go into effect for many reasons. The state Legislature is made up of men and women who represent the will of their constituents. On this issue, they came together and decided to pass a ban. This is democracy; it should stand.
The judge’s decision is worth noting, though, because in it she describes a common argument among advocates for cross-sex hormone therapy for children. Hexsel wrote that SB 14 “interferes with Texas families’ private decisions and strips Texas parents … of the right to seek, direct, and provide medical care for their children.” She also wrote that the law would result in “the loss of access to safe, effective, and medically necessary treatment for transgender adolescents experiencing gender dysphoria.”
There are two problems here. First is the idea that Texas’ law interferes with parental rights. As a mother of four, I’m an advocate of parental rights in an era when they seem questioned by the left and the right. Americans have rights, but not to do anything we want, including as parents.
Namely, in this case, parents don’t have the right to do something that could be potentially harmful to their children. It’s no different than the fact that parents can’t give their children alcohol if they’re still underage.
The second concern is that the law would make the “safe, effective, and medically necessary treatment” for children unavailable. While she’s partially correct — the treatments are banned, though the law doesn’t punish parents or children for receiving them — the rub is over whether cross-sex hormone treatment and gender surgeries are “safe, effective, and medically necessary.”
It loops back to the first issue: Parents have rights to their children but they don’t have the right to hurt them. Are the modern day treatments prescribed for gender dysphoria harmful or helpful? This is the entire crux upon which the debate currently stands.
As the name suggests, puberty blockers stop a person’s natural, biological development. Cross-sex hormones then inject upon a female who has gender dysphoria, loads of testosterone. If the girl follows through with surgery, she’ll have her healthy breasts removed and a penis fabricated from part of her forearm. From this point on, she’ll never bear children, nurse a baby. These are irreversible changes, and we don’t yet know the long-term implications of making them.
The stories of young girls who pursued such treatment as teenagers and now regret them are heartbreaking. Kinnon MacKinnon, a researcher who is transgender, has interviewed 40 detransitioners, people who regret transitioning from one gender to another and now have attempted to reverse it, who received treatments in their 20s. Their experiences changed MacKinnon’s perspective on how many people wind up regretting their decisions. LGBTQ advocates dispute the idea that detransitioning is common.
Evidence on the long-term outcomes of minors who receive gender treatments is not yet available. Why would we allow children to embrace a treatment for which the outcome is unknown? Caution should reign here. Even European countries that were originally much more progressive in embracing intense treatments for gender dysphoria have begun to take a more conservative approach, citing the lack of data and research that support more aggressive approaches for minors, such as gender surgery.
The Texas law in question simply would prevent this. And because gender confusion has skyrocketed, particularly among girls, this law prevents a child from doing something that she may later regret.
What if parents embraced a cautious approach and found they saved their child a lifetime of regret? Thanks to the Texas law, that’s now a reality.
