Protect children from dangerous policies
We read with interest state Treasurer Erick Russell’s assertions that anti-trans proposals endanger kids. On the contrary, current policies to hide and distort important medical information from caregivers endanger children. Requiring girls to compete against biological boys for hardearned scholarships and recognition is devastating, unfair and has led to injuries across New England.
On Feb.17, at the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference State Open indoor track meet, a biological male placed among the top six competitors in two events. This unfair competition robbed two female high school athletes from Thomaston and Bloomfield from participating in their regional championship. Our proposal would protect young women and initiate the public debate they deserve.
We agree that “for a child struggling with their identity, even one caring adult can be lifesaving.”
Who cares more for a child than the people sacrificing everything for them — their parents. The state of Connecticut expects parents to provide the best mental and medical care for their children. Care cannot be provided and a child is put at risk when a school and other adults maintain duplicate records or use one name in school, and another with parents to hide gender dysphoria. Creating secrets and artificial records is a recipe for more anguish and anxiety for any child, particularly those with underlying mental health problems.
Take the Silvestrini family who is the subject of a legal brief filed by Attorney General William Tong. Marissa is a Connecticut mom whose children attended middle school in Massachusetts. Marissa discovered that both of her children were being socially transitioned at school. Her daughter transitioned into a son, and her son into a daughter. Allegedly ignored by school officials, she and their father were helpless to say “no.” In the matter of her son, the parents allegedly were deceived by school officials for months. Remarkably, the resources of the Attorney General’s office have been brought against Marissa and her family. Their children deserve the involvement of their loved ones, dignity and the protection of their parents who know them best.
Many well-intentioned officials insist that hiding gender dysphoria from parents is necessary to prevent death by suicide. This claim has always been suspect, but has finally been proven false and discredited. What we believe is the most recent and definitive study on gender dysphoric children and suicide has been published. It says the risk of suicide, while high, is the same as other non-dysphoric children with the same underlying conditions. Our children need mental health treatment to address their underlying conditions to prevent suicide, not secrets kept by well-intentioned, but naive adults.
Treasurer Russell may be interested to learn that there are children, who are set on a path of social gender transition, puberty blockers, hormone therapy, surgery and a lifetime of medical interventions and complications, and are gay, not trapped in the opposite sex body. Some gay people are concerned that a rush to transition gay children is actually the new “conversion therapy.” Nobody benefits from having this important discussion kept behind the closed doors of school and sports administrators and out of public debate.
Our proposals are consistent with good public policy and are also overwhelmingly supported by voters. Seventy-one percent of voters oppose policies that hide social gender transitions by school officials from parents, including 76% of black voters and 59% of Democrats, according to a poll by Parents Defending Education. State Treasurer Russell has engaged the debate. It is time for the General Assembly to step up and protect children from deceptive, unfair and dangerous policies being adopted across Connecticut.