Trans Kids Attacked on Health Care and Freedom of Association
Leading Off: A Bay area provider ends care for minors and the UK group GirlGuiding promotes bigotry against both girls and boys. Top story lines as the week begins.
photo illustration by Aly Gibbs
Right wing governments in the US and UK have viciously targeted young people in their campaign to promote anti-trans discrimination. Two groups have just capitulated to governmental pressure.
Sutter Health officially stopped providing gender-affirming care for minors last week. Sutter, a major San Francisco Bay Area health system, had announced the decision on Nov. 20, Trans Day of Remembrance, becoming the latest to cave in to the Trump regime's lawless demands.
This decision, by a one-time leader in LGBTQ+ care, flies in direct opposition to California law, which has repeatedly affirmed equal access to health care for trans people.
State Sen. Scott Wiener urged the organization to reverse its decision, calling it a “mistake,” and saying, “MAGA is scapegoating LGBTQ youth to distract from Trump’s complete failure to improve the cost of living for working people.”
Protesters rallied at the headquarters of the UK group, Girlguiding, on Saturday to denounce its discriminatory decision to ban trans girls from joining.
“I’ve been in Guiding since the age of five,” said an organizer, Elois Lawrence, 21, “and as a queer woman this is heartbreaking.” About 100 girls and family members had gathered for the rally in Edinburgh, Scotland, the Press Association reported.
Girlguiding, a group similar to the Girl Scouts, announced the ban this month, immediately setting off a backslash. The outcry only gew when it followed up with the bigoted statement that its ban did not apply to trans boys. It told PinkNews: “In line with the Equality Act 2010 definition, girl and woman refers to those who are biologically female (however they identify). If someone’s biologically female they can join.”
This explicit denial of transmasculine identity stands directly in contrast to its stated commitment to “treating everyone with dignity and respect, particularly those from marginalized groups.”
“It seems as if the organization has had its arm twisted to do this,” a protester, Marnie Collin, told the Press Association. “It sends out a bad message to give into force.”
This is the season for the introduction of legislative bills, and this year, just like the previous, we are seeing a large number of anti-trans bills. We have a Florida bill that would make it illegal to fire people for transphobia, a New Hampshire bathroom ban applying to private businesses, and a national trans youth care ban proposed by Marjorie Taylor Greene, just to name a few.
While seeing bill after bill attacking trans people’s right to exist is alarming, it is critical to temper that with the knowledge that the vast majority of anti-trans legislation fails. At this stage, it is impossible to know which will pass and which won't. But tracking these proposals is an important barometer of Republican attitudes toward trans people and what angles it is prioritizing.
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