This is medical care

Just keep repeating the mantras.

Repeating the mantras.

Repeating the mantras.

Repeating the mantras.

The mayor of Boston does.

Mayor Michelle Wu on Thursday reacted to the harassment and threats being leveled at Boston Children’s Hospital, attacks which the institution says began flooding in after misinformation about its transgender health program went viral. 

It’s not all misinformation though. It’s not true that toddlers are getting hysterectomies, but it is true that girls 18 and over are getting medically unnecessary hysterectomies in order to “affirm” their “genders.”

“This is medical care,” Wu said during an appearance on GBH’s “Boston Public Radio.” “This is one of the preeminent, most renowned medical institutions in the country, doing what they do best — which is providing important, necessary care for the health and wellbeing of our community members.” 

It isn’t though. It’s an attempt at psychological care, but the attempt is based on lunatic notions about “gender affirmation.” It’s a fashion, a fad, a cult, a Jonestown. It is not “medical care” as commonly understood.

The onslaught against the hospital started last week when a conservative Twitter account posted a range of false information about the services provided by the hospital. 

But the only item of false information the article goes on to spell out is the aforementioned hysterectomies for toddlers one. If there’s more than that, making up “a range,” then what is the more, and why aren’t they specifying it?

Dr. Theodore Calianos, president of the medical society, said he supports all efforts to hold accountable those responsible for the harassment directed at Boston Children’s. 

“The Medical Society decries all acts of bigotry, including aggression and threats aimed at patients and families seeking evidence-based, medically appropriate and necessary care and the health care workers who strive to deliver care in a safe and inclusive setting,” he said in a statement. “Actions that disrupt access to health care are dangerous, unacceptable, and reprehensible. These unjust and hateful threats not only contradict the Medical Society’s assertion that health care is a basic human right, but also reflect the harmful effects of the creation and dissemination of misinformation.”

But is the care evidence-based, medically appropriate, necessary? If so why are there detransitioners?

In response to the attacks on the hospital, U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins said in a statement on Wednesday that she will “ensure equal protection of transgender people under the law.”

“Children deserve an opportunity to thrive and grow as their own authentic selves,” Rollins said in a statement obtained by the Boston Globe. “Parents/guardians and health care providers who support them in that journey should be allowed to do so free of threats and harassment.”

How do all these parents and guardians and health care providers know what children’s “authentic selves” are? How does anyone? What does it mean? What if Hume was right and there is no self to find? What if there is some continuity to people’s thoughts and feelings over time but also a huge amount of discontinuity, such that it really doesn’t make all that much sense to rhapsodize about “authentic selves”? What if people would be better off and better people if they stopped focusing on their “authentic selves” and did something useful to others instead?

The mayor noted that when she recently attended a meeting of mayors from across the country, “just about every woman mayor” shared they’d experienced people demonstrating outside their homes or received threats on a regular basis. 

Every woman mayor? How does she know? How does she know they all identify as women? How does she know their authentic selves are all women? If they’re being harassed because they’re women why don’t they just transition?

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