gender confusion

The New England Journal of Medicine continues to besmirch its once august reputation by pushing ideology rather than medical science when discussing our nation’s most contentious social issues. This is particularly true about so-called gender-affirming care for minors experiencing gender confusion. Even as repeated medical studies undercut the ideological narrative that puberty blockers, hormones, and even surgeries are the best means of caring for dysphoric children — and as country after country severely restricted those interventions — (with the exception of an unsubstantive criticism of the Cass Review) articles in the NEJM on the question usually pretend that the pushback never happened.

Now, the editors have done it again, publishing an article by Scott Skinner-Thompson, an LGBT activist law professor from the University of Colorado, Boulder, criticizing the Supreme Court for allowing Tennessee to legally prevent such interventions in children. The pretense begins with the headline, “The Faulty Logic behind the Supreme Court’s Failure to Protect Trans Minors.” To the contrary, Tennessee and other jurisdictions that have enacted such laws have done so to protect trans minors from potentially irreversible harm, in the knowledge that most gender dysphoric minors overcome their confusion by the time they reach adulthood.

Then, Skinner-Thompson leans on clearly ideological opinions by medical associations, despite at least one of which (WPATH) having been substantively discredited:

On June 18, 2025, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Tennessee’s ban on gender-affirming hormonal treatment for transgender minors against an Equal Protection Clause challenge in United States v. Skrmetti. Transgender adolescents who need these medical interventions but live in one of the many states that ban them may need to look elsewhere for care. Nearly every major relevant U.S. health care organization has concluded that the prescription of hormones and puberty blockers for treating gender dysphoria in transgender adolescents is often medically appropriate in that it can improve mental health and well-being, whereas untreated gender dysphoria can lead to depression, anxiety, and suicidality.

The tide is really turning against the gender ideologues who advocate experimenting on the bodies of children as a supposedly “medically necessary” treatment. Now, Italy’s National Bioethics Committee has recommended substantially ending the use of puberty-blocking drugs as a “treatment” for childhood gender confusion. From the Society for Evidence Based Gender Medicine’s press release: Excellent. If the government follows the advice of its bioethics commission, Italy will join a burgeoning list of countries — which includes the U.K., France, New Zealand, Finland, Norway, Sweden, France, and Denmark actively taking steps to end the madness. Once the execrable Admiral Levine is out of office as Trump reenters the presidency, I expect the U.S. to follow suit. That will leave the American medical establishment and a short Read More ›