Boston Children’s Hospital Under Fire for ‘Transgender’ Interventions That Damage and Disfigure Children
Boston Children’s Hospital is under fire for posting a series of videos touting its “Gender Multispecialty Services” (GeMS), a clinic that provides experimental medical interventions that can permanently disfigure and damage children’s bodies and harm their minds.
In 2007, the hospital was the first in the nation to open a clinic to “transition” children with sexual identity confusion into living as the opposite sex.
At one point, the hospital had more than 90 videos promoting “gender transitions” for children, adolescents, teens and young adults. But after exposure by activists who want to protect children from these destructive procedures, the hospital quickly and quietly removed the videos.
Some of the videos can still be found on Twitter and conservative news sites. (caution: disturbing content in the descriptions and videos that follow.).
One video, posted by libs of TikTok, shows Dr. Frances Grimstad, of Boston Children’s Division of Gynecology. She says, “A gender-affirming hysterectomy is very similar to most hysterectomies that occur.”
This, of course, is false.
The surgical removal of a woman’s uterus is usually performed because of serious medical concerns, such as abnormal bleeding, endometriosis, fibroids or cancer.
But in girls and young women with sexual identity confusion, the hospital is removing a perfectly healthy uterus because it agrees with her mental disorder. It does nothing to heal her mind.
https://twitter.com/libsoftiktok/status/1557775959217950725
Another video shows Dr. Jeremi Carswell, director of GeMS, answering the question, “When does a child know they’re [sic] transgender?”
She says, “A child will often know that they are transgender from the moment that they have any ability to express themselves. And parents will often tell us this. We have parents who tell us that their kids, they knew from the minute they were born, practically.”
This, of course, is also false.
Children don’t know what sex they are at birth. While their body is male or female, their understanding of what that means grows as they do – with the help and support of loving parents who affirm them in their masculinity or femininity.
She then describes toddler behaviors – crying when getting a haircut, trying on a sibling’s clothing, playing with toys typically associated with the opposite sex – and says these are symptoms of being “transgender.”
No. These are normal toddler behaviors. They don’t mean a child is “born into the wrong body.”
Then she describes the growing group of adolescents “who are really coming to the realization that they might be trans or gender diverse a little bit later on in their life. So what we’re seeing from them is that they always sorta knew something was maybe off and didn’t have the understanding to know they might be trans or have a different gender identity than the one they had been assigned.”
The falsehoods multiply. These adolescents are often confused and unhappy. Many have other emotional and mental disorders.
In addition, many are heavily influenced by peers and social media to join the transgender social contagion, as researcher Lisa Littman demonstrated and as journalist Abigail Shrier documented.
Also, sex isn’t “assigned” at birth – it’s recognized. Doctors and parents look at biological reality and say, “It’s a girl!” or “It’s a boy!”
Dr. Carswell is spouting transgender ideological jargon, not the truth.
https://twitter.com/libsoftiktok/status/1558669742126223361
A video featuring Kerry McGregor, a Doctor of Psychology at the hospital, doubled down on the claims, saying, “A good portion of children do know as early as from the womb” that they are transgender.
After the initial exposure by Libs of Tik Tok, news outlets were quick to expose more of how Boston Children’s harms children and young people.
Embed tweet: https://twitter.com/BillboardChris/status/1558823459651817477
Jordan Boyd, from The Federalist, reported:
For years now, BCH has mutilated children’s sexual organs under the guise of “inclusive reproductive health care for people of all gender identities and anatomies.” That includes prescribing hormones that suppress menstruation in underage girls and block the increase of testosterone in minor boys, phalloplasties and metoidioplasties for 18-year-old girls who want penises, vaginoplasties for 17-year-old boys who want vaginas, chest reconstruction and breast augmentation for children as young as 15, and even medically unnecessary hysterectomies for girls whom the hospital deems eligible for surgery.
Boyd added that the video series from the clinic “positively frames genital mutilation and chemical castration for minors without addressing the irreversible damage, such as ‘sexual dysfunction, infertility, cardiac event[,] endometrial cancer,’ and even transition regret that have resulted from those procedures.”
After the outcry about disfiguring and damaging children, the hospital said it received “threats” to hospital personnel, and the U.S. Attorney in Massachusetts said, “Today’s news about the alleged threats directed at Boston Children’s Hospital transgender health program is disturbing to say the least.”
We agree with Rod Dreher, writing at The American Conservative, who stated:
First off, anybody who threatens to physically harm anyone at Boston Children’s Hospital or any other medical facility over what they’re doing to children deserves what they get from law enforcement. Physical violence, and threats of physical violence, are a bright red line. This cannot be tolerated.
But at the same time, Dreher notes the Department of Justice (DOJ) has been “captured by the ideological left” and “we have every reason to be concerned that the State is going to go after people for speaking truths it finds ideologically inconvenient.”
The DOJ referred to “hate crimes” and “hate groups” who made these “alleged threats.”
Dreher asks:
What do they mean by “hate crimes”? Do they mean that the power of the US Government will be used to silence those who speak out about the despicable evil that Boston Children’s, and other hospitals around the country, are doing to children and minors?
Boston Children’s was the first in the country to begin these horrific medical interventions, and it boasts having treated more than 1,000 children.
Now, there are hundreds of such clinics across the country. Hundreds more offer opposite-sex hormones to young people, often without parental knowledge and consent.
Dreher writes:
The ugly fact is that you can no longer automatically trust your children’s pediatrician or your children’s schools. This gender ideology cult has captured these professions and institutions. This is NOT to say that all pediatricians and all teachers agree with it! I’m sure most don’t. But all it takes for ideological capture to happen is for the radicals to gain control, in part by intimidating everybody else within the institution into silence.
Christians must be aware of what’s happening in our culture. We must continue to pray against, speak out about and work to stop the irreparable damage done to these children, adolescents, teens and young adults.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jeff Johnston is a culture and policy analyst for Focus on the Family and a staff writer for the Daily Citizen. He researches, writes and teaches about topics of concern to families such as parental rights, religious freedom, LGBT issues, education and free speech. Johnston has been interviewed by CBS Sunday Morning, The New York Times, Associated Press News, The Christian Post, Rolling Stone and Vice, and is a frequent guest on radio and television outlets. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from San Diego State University with a Bachelors in English and a Teaching Credential. He and his wife have been married 30 years and have three grown sons.
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