A group of thirteen state attorneys general warned Attorney General Merrick Garland against investigating critics of child gender transition surgeries.
Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti is leading the effort, demanding that Garland “stand down” on acting on the requests of several medical organizations to investigate “disinformation campaigns” about child gender transitions.
The letter came after the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), American Medical Association (AMA), and the Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) asked Biden’s attorney general to take “swift action to investigate and prosecute” people responsible for making threats against hospitals and doctors that are targeted for “providing evidence-based gender-affirming care.”
“From Boston to Akron to Nashville to Seattle, children’s hospitals, academic health systems, and physicians are being targeted and threatened for providing evidence-based health care,” the medical groups told Garland.
“The attacks are rooted in an intentional campaign of disinformation, where a few high-profile users on social media share false and misleading information targeting individual physicians and hospitals, resulting in a rapid escalation of threats, harassment, and disruption of care across multiple jurisdictions,” the medical groups added.
Obviously, doctors don’t like people looking over their shoulders. But what starts as a serious critique of a serious issue can easily devolve into a hysterical social media sideshow complete with “influencers” looking to stir up trouble.
Making threats against doctors and hospitals should be prosecuted. But we all know how the Justice Department would interpret “threats,” and Republican AGs are drawing a line trying to keep Garland from straying into viewpoint suppression.
“A free society cannot tolerate trusted professionals calling on law enforcement and big tech to suppress criticism,” Skrmetti told Fox News Digital. “We are slipping into a dangerous orthodoxy where dissent is pushed further and further to the margins.”
“America was founded through passionate disagreement, and the ongoing vitality of our Republic depends on our shared commitment to free speech,” he added.
Stanley Goldfarb, chairman of medical watchdog Do No Harm, criticized the medical associations and commended the attorneys general for their letter.
“Medical associations should follow the science, not try to stifle public debate – especially when they’re pushing a divisive ideology that could literally ruin children’s lives,” Goldfarb said.
“The AMA demands that we follow their lead without question, yet these are the same forces who falsely equate psychological counseling for children to ‘conversion therapy’ in order to railroad minors into a predetermined path of drugs and surgery,” Goldfarb continued.
“The better path is to listen to these state attorneys general and let this conversation continue nationwide,” he added.
As far as “providing evidence-based gender-affirming care,” there is now a monumental debate going on in the medical community about the necessity and efficacy of “gender-affirming care.” There is no objective “evidence” that children would be better off with this care, and when it comes to cutting into a child in a procedure that might permanently alter his or her life, the state has a compelling interest in seeing that the needs of the child are kept paramount.
There is just too much medical quackery in the “gender-affirming care” industry. These clinics are sprouting up all over the country. What are the credentials of the physicians running these clinics? What guide are they using to fulfill their oaths to “do no harm”? What kind of regulation are they subject to?
These medical associations are obviously in business to help their members both professionally and financially. Perhaps a more neutral point of view is needed to protect the child and uphold the highest standards of medical care.
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