Gender-affirming treatment for adolescents was equated with “abuse” by anti-LGBTQ+ Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA).
The conspiracy theorist tweeted, “The abuse of our children MUST cease,” and included a link to an article from the conservative Washington Times, which claimed that American youngsters had more access to gender-affirming treatment than their European counterparts.
Get rid of child genital mutilation immediately!” Greene continued.
According to the research referenced in the piece Greene linked, the United States is overly accommodating in its provision of gender-affirming health care for youngsters. Do No Harm, a far-right group claiming to “defend medicine” by fighting against an “assault on our healthcare system by awakened activists,” organised and led the survey.
The report contrasts the number of clinics in the United States that provide gender-affirming treatment (it claims over 300) with nations like Ireland and Norway, where it is only offered at a single hospital. Yet, when compared to the United States, both nations’ populations are tiny. Norway and Ireland both have populations of 5 million, but the United States has 331.9 million inhabitants.
People on Twitter called out Greene for retweeting the story, exposing her ignorance and providing examples of actual child abuse.
Greene has been a vocal opponent of transgender persons and gender-affirming health treatment for quite some time. She filed legislation in August that would prohibit providing this potentially lifesaving service to minors on a federal level.
Her proposed legislation would make it a class C felony to provide gender-affirming care to a minor under the age of 18, prohibit the use of federal funds for such care (regardless of the patient’s age), prohibit the teaching of such care in medical schools, prohibit the funding of gender-affirming care by health care plans under the Affordable Care Act, and prevent the immigration to the United States of anyone who provided such care.
A week before submitting her bill, Greene told Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson, “It’s truly genital mutilation, it’s puberty blockers that induce chemical castration, adolescent females literally having their breasts hacked off, teenage guys being castrated.” In other words, “This ought to be forbidden.”
Evidence suggests that transgender persons who get gender-affirming treatment have a much lower risk of suicide in the long term. Gender-affirming treatment for adolescents is supported by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, and other major medical and mental health organisations.