CITIZEN: Key protections against ‘transitioning’ children in effect as the case proceeds at 6th Circuit.

On May 3, the ACLU filed a lawsuit attempting to prevent Senate Bill 150’s protections against ‘gender transitioning’ minor children from going into effect. The law is currently in effect as the case continues at the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Echoing the false claims found within Governor Andy Beshear’s veto message, the ACLU advocated for ‘transitioning’ children through the use of puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones.

Use of such chemicals to interfere with a child’s normally functioning body can lead to irreversible side effects, further gender confusion, and paves the way for sex-change surgery.

Despite the false claims of Beshear and the ACLU, this gender confusion contributes to the suicide epidemic rather than relieves it. The compassionate and loving thing to do is tell these kids that they are accepted, loved, and full of worth without having to mutilate their bodies or alter their ‘identity.’

Attorney General Daniel Cameron’s office has been defending Senate Bill 150 from the ACLU’s legal challenge, which is now before the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Family Foundation signed onto an amicus legal brief with 29 other state Family Policy Councils, Family Policy Alliance, and the Hale Institute to support the defense of these commonsense protections for children.

Our legal brief focused on exposing the flawed and false claim that parents have a constitutional right to ‘transition’ their children through the use of chemicals.

First, framing the issue as a debate over medical care is misleading and a distraction from the real issue. These life-altering interventions affect a child’s procreative capacity and attack healthy bodies by halting or destroying natural physiological processes. Such interventions are “medicine” only in the sense that doctors and drugs are involved. Thus, a parental right to direct the medical care of a child cannot be used to justify them.

Second, the claim of parents’ rights is inadequate, but more fundamentally, there is a hostility and irreconcilability between the concept of parental rights and its suggested use to renounce the objective meaning of biological sex, upon which parentage itself rests and from which it arises.

Third, the centuries-enduring and constitutionally foundational common law stands firmly opposed to a parental prerogative to permanently injure their children’s normally functioning bodies. The power of parents over their children is derived from their duty, including the natural duty to protect their personal security.

A decision from the Sixth Circuit Court is expected by the end of September.