The American College of Pediatricians has come out swinging at efforts to label transgender children as healthy and normal. In a report released March 21, the officers of the group declared, “A person’s belief that he or she is something they are not is, at best, a sign of confused thinking.”
The report went on to say, “Conditioning children into believing a lifetime of chemical and surgical impersonation of the opposite sex is normal and healthful is child abuse.”
The statement is called “temporary” with a full report scheduled for release this summer. But the two-page document pulls no punches in condemning toleration of transgender behaviors by parents, educators and other adults.
“The American College of Pediatricians urges educators and legislators to reject all policies that condition children to accept as normal a life of chemical and surgical impersonation of the opposite sex,” the statement says. “Facts — not ideology — determine reality.”
Everyone is born with a biological sex, the statement says but “no one is born with a gender.” The statement defines “gender” as an awareness and sense of oneself as male or female. Gender, the statement explains, is a sociological and psychological concept, not an objective biological one.
“No one is born with an awareness of themselves as male or female. This awareness develops over time and like all developmental processes may be derailed by a child’s subjective perceptions, relationships and adverse experiences from infancy forward,” the report contends.
“People who identify as ‘feeling like the opposite sex’ or ‘somewhere in between’ do not comprise a third sex. They remain biological men or biological women,” according to the report.
‘Gender dysphoria’
When a child feels like the opposite sex “an objective psychological problem exists that lies in the mind, not the body” and should be treated as such, according to the report. Children feeling this way suffer from “gender dysphoria” formerly listed as Gender Identity Disorder and recognized as a mental disorder in the most recent edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychiatric Association, the statement explains.
As many as 98 percent of gender confused boys and 88 percent of gender confused girls eventually accept their biological sex after naturally passing through puberty, according to the report.
The authors of the report acknowledge that “exceedingly rare disorders of sex development are all medically identifiable deviations from the sexual binary norm” and adds “such individuals do not constitute a third sex.”
Instead, the authors argue, “endorsing gender discordance as normal via public education and legal polices will confuse children and parents, leading more children to present to ‘gender clinics.’”
It is hard to imagine a stronger statement condemning acceptance of transgender behaviors in children. Yet consider what is happening in the nation’s schools.
On April 29, 2014, the United States Department of Education ruled that sex discrimination outlawed by Title IX of the U.S. Education Amendments of 1972 applied to gender identity. The original wording of that historic amendment reads, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.”
More than 40 years later, the U.S. Department of Education said, “Title IX’s sex discrimination prohibition extends to claims of discrimination based on gender identity or failure to conform to stereotypical notions of masculinity or femininity. … Similarly, the actual or perceived sexual orientation or gender identity of the parties does not change a school’s obligation.”
The ruling was applied to every public and private elementary and secondary school, college or university receiving any type of federal financial assistance. By equating gender as sex, Department of Education rule-makers imposed on the nation a standard not envisioned in the original law and a standard condemned by the American College of Pediatricians.
Now the U.S. Justice Department sues school districts to force schools to allow transgender students to use the school restrooms and locker rooms that match their gender identity but not their biological sexual identity.
One must ask where is the concern for basic individual rights of children and others who do not suffer from gender dysphoria? Where is the concern for their rights such as privacy and safety? How are privacy and safety protected when biological boys are allowed to use girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms or when biological girls are allowed to use boys’ bathrooms and locker rooms? The invitation to predatory behavior is obvious.
Perhaps the tide is turning. In November 2015 voters in Houston, Texas, overwhelmingly repealed an ordinance adopted by the city council providing special protected class status for sexual orientation and gender identity. The slogan of those fighting that protected status was crude but true — “No men in women’s bathrooms.”
Anti-discrimination protection
You may remember that Houston’s mayor attempted to silence church opposition to her pet project by subpoenaing sermon outlines of pastors who opposed her efforts. She lost that effort too.
Now the fight has switched to Charlotte, North Carolina. Like Houston, the city council there adopted an ordinance extending anti-discrimination protection on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. The vote was 7–4.
The backlash was immediate and strong. By an overwhelming vote the state legislature adopted a bill blocking such actions by local governments and specifically blocking transgender individuals from using public bathrooms that correspond to the gender identity instead of their biological identity. The bill was quickly signed by the governor.
Now the state is being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union and others.
Since January, one study found that 44 bills in 16 state legislatures have been filed to protect the safety and privacy of women and men by ensuring public bathrooms can be used only by persons of the same biological sex as that specified on the bathroom door. A backlash has begun.
Recent rules promulgated by the U.S. Department of Education and others are wrong and need to be rolled back. We believe roll back efforts will only continue and grow as communities and states enter this debate.
As the statement by the American College of Pediatricians says, gender dysphoria is a psychological issue that needs to be treated, not a right that should be protected by public policy.
To read the American College of Pediatricians report, visit www.acpeds.org/the-college-speaks/position-statements/gender-ideology-harms-children.
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