Have You Seen This?

John Oliver has come out with an excellent video supporting us and the conservatives are in a tizzy.

Jon Stewart Takes on Anti-Trans Legislation and Politicians
“What? Did trans people storm the Capitol?” Stewart jokes in the season premiere of his show The Problem With Jon Stewart.
The Advocate
By Alex Cooper
October 6, 2022


Jon Stewart returns Friday, October 7 for the second season of his Apple TV+ show The Problem With Jon Stewart. For the season premiere, Stewart looks at the “problem of gender.”

“Ah, yes, the gender wars!” Stewart exclaims at the start of the trailer. He then goes into the data, explaining that anti-trans legislation has increased by 800 percent in recent years.

“What? Did trans people storm the Capitol?” he jokes.

Friday’s episode will feature a guest lineup including parents of trans children Keisha Michaels and Debi Jackson, trans attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union Chase Strangio, endocrinologist Joshua Safer, and Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge.

In the trailer, Stewart is shown interviewing Rutledge. She tells Rutledge that almost 100 percent of those with gender dysphoria “can move past that.”

“That’s an incredibly made-up figure,” Stewart responds.

In another Advocate article the following week on another “John” this time Oliver…

John Oliver Calls Out Republican Transphobia
The comedian highlighted the absurdity with which the GOP is attacking transgender rights this election cycle.
By Christopher Wiggins
October 17 2022


There is a growing list of comedians debunking Republican-spread myths about transgender children. John Oliver is among them.

The comedian addressed conservative transphobes on Sunday’s Last Week Tonight on HBO.

“More people do seem comfortable coming out as trans and gender-nonconforming, which is great,” Oliver said. “But as you have undoubtedly noticed, in the past few years, some on the right have truly lost their minds about trans rights.”

Conservative disinformation about gender-affirming care, like the false notion that children can request on-demand surgery or make permanent changes without consulting a doctor, is devastating to young people looking for treatment.

[…]

Oliver explained all of the right-wing panic surrounding the health care of trans kids, the false and hateful slur that LGBTQ+ people are groomers, and the ridiculous conspiracy theory that schools have provided litter boxes to children who identify as furry as a sign of their commitment to inclusivity. So although the situation is not real, there is a conspiracy theory behind it.

Now then what do you expect the evangelical Christian right-wing has to say about the truth?

You probably think that they got their tail feather all ruffled and you would be right, this conservative media outlet is in a lather.

No Laughing Matter
John Oliver badly botches the “gender-affirming care” debate.
City Journa
By Leor Sapir
October 17, 2022


Yesterday, John Oliver devoted an episode of Last Week Tonight to transgender rights, specifically the controversy over “gender-affirming care” for minors. Along with Jon Stewart, who recently aired a similar episode, Oliver appears uninterested in doing actual investigative reporting. The timing is no coincidence: a two-week trial in federal court begins today over Arkansas’s Save Adolescents from Experimentation (SAFE) Act, and the left-leaning comedians possess immense power to shape public opinion. But Oliver’s argument, like Stewart’s, was little more than a misinformed genuflection to activists.

Oliver demonstrates his lack of critical thinking at the outset, when he informs his audience that he is about to discuss “LGBTQ rights.” Other than a 1967 CBS clip on homosexuality, which Oliver opens with in order to plant in his viewers’ mind the tenuous analogy, the entire episode is devoted to the trans issue. This is yet another example of activists using “LGB” as a cover for the “T”—exploiting public sympathy for the former to conceal the radical nature of the latter.

Don’t you just like it? It is like the kettle calling the pot black.

“...lack of critical thinking…” It is they who are ignoring all the medical literature and research and they are going by discredited or taken out of context research papers. Not only that but they want to drive a wedge our gay bothers and lesbian sisters and the trans community!

“Anti-trans” bills have proliferated across the nation, Oliver insists, and they have done so against a backdrop of “attacks and harassment” of hospitals providing “gender-affirming care” to youth. I am unaware of any “attacks” against hospitals or their employees. One bomb threat was issued against Boston Children’s Hospital and was thankfully investigated and addressed by local police. But this again is a rhetorical tactic taken out of the trans movement’s playbook: use a single example of extreme, unlawful conduct and claim that it is representative of all criticism, even skepticism, toward a movement making radical claims about human nature and society.

No they lie, other hospitals have received threats against the hospitals and/or the doctors.

DOJ must investigate and prosecute those behind children's hospital harassment campaign, medical groups say
Fierce Health Care
By Dave Muoio
October 3, 2022


Provider groups penned a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland today calling for the Department of Justice to take a harder stance on harassment campaigns targeted at pediatric hospitals and staff that provide gender-affirming care services.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association and the Children’s Hospital Association told the attorney general "there is elevated and justifiable fear among families, patients and staff" resulting from bomb threats, protestors, phone calls and emails. While hospitals have ramped up their security in conjunction with law enforcement, some providers have needed 24/7 security due to messages sent to their personal accounts.

“Individuals in all workplaces have the right to a safe environment, out of harm’s way and free of intimidation or reprisal,” AMA President Jack Resneck Jr., M.D., said in a statement accompanying the letter. “As physicians, we condemn groups that promote hate-motivated intolerance and toxic misinformation that can lead to grave real-world violence and extremism and jeopardize patients' health outcomes.

[…]

At least 21 children's hospitals have been targeted by name in the social media harassment campaigns, leading 18 of those to modify their online information regarding gender-affirming care for young patients, STAT recently reported.

That is what the demagogues causing around the country, they are creating fear in the trans children, fear in the parents, fear in the medical staff. While at the same time garnering votes from the white supremacist voters.

---

While we are on the media, another news media comes out with an editorial against Tennessee’s anti-trans legislation. 

What is Tennessee's problem with trans children? They need support not derision. | Opinion

The problem with trans kids isn’t Matt Walsh or Brittany Dean’s perceived problem. The problem is that transgender children are dying by suicide at an alarming rate.

The Tennessean

Members of the Metro Council LGBTQ Caucus Guest Columnists

September 22, 2022

It’s happening again. The LGBTQ community has had to defend itself time and again in Tennessee. Instead of opening minds to listen and understand, we’re met with ridicule and hate speech from talk radio, celebrities, and even from elected officials. In most of whom refuse to listen and learn, to empathize with someone’s personal situation.

The problem with trans kids is that they’re surrounded by adults who don’t believe them when they tell us who they are. Instead of surrounding them with the love, care and understanding that all children deserve, they’re being met with insults, mockery, and hate.

Recently, you may have heard a transphobic podcast from Matt Walsh, a self-described “theocratic fascist.” He claimed to have led an investigation into the Transgender Health Center at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He specifically targeted the pediatric clinic and used disinformation to rally his supporters.

They hit the nail on the head!

How many points did they get right!

Trans kids and their parents are scared for their safety, their physical and mental health, and for their future in a state where the highest office holder has betrayed all trust that the transgender community will be able to continue to have sovereignty over their personal legal decisions.

That is effect of all this draconian legislation against trans children. It is scaring the parents. It is scaring the children. It is green lighting bad behavior by other classmates and by parents. Just look at some of the video of boards of education meetings you can see the angry the demagoguery and that is the behavior that the right wants stir up.

Doctors take the Hippocratic Oath to do no harm. By not giving gender affirming care, they are hurting that child. They are making them feel unaccepted. In the future, they won’t be truthful with doctors, and they will subsequently avoid care for all of their health needs.

For the LGBT community, especially those of us from small towns, finding an affirming doctor can be the difference of life and death.

The problem with trans kids isn’t Matt Walsh or Brittany Dean’s perceived problem. The problem is that transgender children are dying by suicide at an alarming rate, which continues to increase due to this attack on their liberty.

And they don’t care who they hurt because they have to know that this is hurting children, but they just don’t care. They see us as sub-human.