What happened to one Massachusetts family is a parent’s nightmare.
Joseph and Arlene Kutzko say a counselor at Algonquin Regional High School began socially transitioning their teenage daughter without their knowledge, using a male name and pronouns at school while referring to her differently in communications with them. When the parents refused to affirm their daughter as a boy, citing their Catholic faith, they say the counselor reported them to the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF).
Then the machinery of the state took over.
DCF removed the girl from her home in December 2024, when she was 15, and assumed guardianship. A court order now prohibits her parents and older brother from contacting her.
The family says DCF placed their daughter in an unidentified facility where she was housed in a boys’ dormitory. They allege that she has been denied the opportunity to attend Sunday Mass and placed on birth control and psychiatric medication. A judge recently blocked the state from administering what the family describes as high-dose testosterone while the case proceeds. The next hearing is scheduled for October 29.
Because juvenile proceedings are confidential, DCF cannot publicly discuss the case, and the school has not publicly answered the family’s allegations. But if the family’s account is accurate, the sequence is stunning: A school helped a child adopt a new identity, concealed it from her parents, and then reported those parents to the government when they refused to go along.
This is not simply a disagreement over pronouns. A family has literally been torn apart.
Schools have no business encouraging children to lead secret lives that are knowingly hidden from their parents. Yet that is exactly what most gender policies invite, and even require, school employees to do.
<a href="https://www.doe.mass.edu/sfs/lgbtq/genderidentity.html?utm_source=chatgpt.com">Massachusetts guidance</a> tells school personnel to speak with a student before discussing the student’s gender identity with parents and to ask the student how the school should refer to him or her in communications with the family. Teachers and counselors may therefore use one name and set of pronouns at school while deliberately using another when talking to parents.
The concealment is not incidental. It is baked into the policy.
Schools may call the resulting measures “accommodations,” but they are far more consequential than that. Social transition can include changing a child’s name and pronouns, altering school records, granting access to opposite-sex facilities, and directing teachers and classmates to treat the child as the opposite sex. It changes the child’s social environment and reinforces a particular understanding of who that child is.
That is not neutral support. It is a psychosocial intervention allegedly undertaken without parental knowledge or consent — and, once the Kutzkos objected, an effort to force them to participate in an ideology they reject.
These policies, <a href="https://defendinged.org/investigations/list-of-school-district-transgender-gender-nonconforming-student-policies/">hardly unique to Massachusetts</a>, all but guarantee conflict by dividing the adults in a child’s life into two camps: those who “affirm” and those who don’t. A parent who asks questions, urges caution, or requests a psychological evaluation can quickly be cast as the enemy, even a bigot. The school employee offering immediate validation becomes the trusted adult.
This cannot be dismissed as one counselor exercising bad judgment. The larger problem is a policy framework that authorizes school employees to socially transition children and conceal it from their families. Once secrecy becomes official policy, any ideologically committed employee can intervene in a child’s identity, exclude the parents, and help set a life-altering government process in motion, all while claiming to have followed the rules.
It is more likely than not that this child will come to question or regret this hugely consequential decision made during adolescence. As underlying problems remain unresolved or if medical interventions produce consequences she was not prepared to face, will the school counselor and board of education members be there to help pick up the pieces for this family?
No. They never are. It is the parents who will be there to offer support and love while their child navigates the nightmare that all began with a school counselor who thought they knew best.
Parental rights do not disappear at the schoolhouse door. Schools act in loco parentis — in place of the parent — for limited purposes during the school day. That temporary authority is not a license to supplant parents or deceive them about something so consequential. Concealment is not an exercise of delegated parental authority. It is a betrayal of it.
Taken to its extreme, this ideology — and the school policies built around it — can turn parents’ concern into evidence against them and subsequently take their child away. That is the cruelty at the center of this case: A vulnerable child has been separated from her parents at the very moment she may need them most.
***
Erika Sanzi is senior director of communications at Defending Education.

An assembly at Bowmore Road Junior and Senior Public School celebrates International Day of Pink, aimed at building a more inclusive and diverse society by encouraging students to stand up against bullying towards their 2SLGBTQIA+ peers. The Toronto Distri

When A School’s Transgender Secret Becomes A Family’s Nightmare

child protective services

massachusetts

opinion

parental rights

transgender policy in schools

A Catholic couple in Massachusetts had their teen daughter taken away by the state after they refused to go along with a gender transition that was secretly being carried out at a public high school.
Joseph and Arlene Kutzko say Algonquin Regional High School called the Department of Children and Families (DCF) on them after they refused to &#8220;affirm&#8221; their daughter as a male. She was indoctrinated with transgender ideology at the school and secretly socially transitioned by the school counselor without their knowledge or consent, the parents say.
The state accused the parents of abuse for refusing the transition and took over guardianship of the girl. There is currently a restraining order in place that prevents the Kutzkos, including the girl&#8217;s older brother, from contacting her.
After losing custody in 2024, they have been fighting to get their daughter back. Currently, they are racing against the clock, trying to be with their daughter before she is medically &#8220;transitioned&#8221; and put on irreversibly damaging high-dose testosterone.
Appearing on Fox News Radio&#8217;s &#8220;Lighthouse Faith&#8221; <a href="https://radio.foxnews.com/2026/09/13/catholic-massachusetts-family-battling-state-authorities-to-get-daughter-back-after-school-began-to-secretly-transition-her-without-their-knowledge-and-removed-her-from-home/">podcast</a>, Joseph Kutzko said their daughter was seeing school counselor Denise Brienze &#8220;without our knowledge or consent,&#8221; adding that the school told them their child &#8220;was simply staying after school for extra math help.”
The couple hasn&#8217;t seen their daughter since late 2024. Arlene Kutzko said she &#8220;begged&#8221; to be able to &#8220;hug her or kiss her,&#8221; but was told, &#8220;they will not allow it.&#8221;
Arlene broke down in the Fox interview, expressing how much she misses her child. &#8220;Mama miss you, please come home,&#8221; she said through tears. &#8220;I&#8217;m begging you, please.&#8221; Joseph read a card the young girl wrote to him just months before she was &#8220;transitioned&#8221; by the school. &#8220;Without I would have nothing,&#8221; the daughter wrote to him. &#8220;Wholeheartedly, fully, sincerely, I love you with no end.&#8221;
The Kutzkos&#8217; case is one of many where parents have been punished for refusing to &#8220;affirm&#8221; a child&#8217;s so-called transgender identity. In Montana, Krista and Todd Kolstad, for example, say their 14-year-old daughter was taken into state custody after they objected to her gender transition. Parents in California have voiced similar allegations about Child Protective Services after they refused to affirm their child&#8217;s transition. There have been other reported cases in Indiana, Maryland, and other states, fueling the fight against radical gender ideology and the battle for strengthening parents&#8217; rights.
The Kutzkos&#8217; next court hearing is set for October 29, according to Fox News.

Transgender Flags

Catholic Parents Refused To Trans Their Teen. A Blue State Just Took Her Away.

Blue State Takes 15YO Daughter From Catholic Couple Who Won’t Trans Her

gender affirming care for minors

transgender policy

After weeks of watching women in pink gather outside of a Massachusetts courthouse in support of child-killer Lindsay Clancy, America’s mothers finally have a real victim to rally for: Karyann Parkinson. The Virginia mother of five is a casualty of an overzealous criminal justice system and is serving a suspended six-month prison sentence.
Parkinson didn’t brutally murder anyone, but she was convicted last week of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. She landed on the state’s abuse and neglect registry because she allowed her five-year-old son to walk half a mile to a pond in order to collect goose feathers.
Writing on the case for Reason, the queen of free-range parenting Lenore Skenazy explained, “A passerby saw Sam and alerted security. One of the community&#8217;s security guards escorted the boy back and gave Parkinson an earful. Pretty soon there were three cop cars, just as many cops, a security vehicle, and two Child Protective Services (CPS) workers at Parkinson&#8217;s door.”
Some important context: Parkinson was pregnant in June in Virginia when this much law enforcement showed up and lectured the mother of five on basic parenting. It’s no wonder she lost patience, and fast. Who among us wouldn’t lose her temper at such an overreaction in the face of a rational parenting decision?
Parkinson didn’t get in this much trouble because she actually put her son at risk. She ran afoul of the law because she got mouthy. Skenazy wrote, “She admits she was upset with the guard and asked him where in the homeowners-association rules it says that a child can&#8217;t walk by himself. The guard said it was against the law anyway and called the police. When the first cop arrived, Parkinson told him, &#8216;I don&#8217;t have any interest in talking to you.&#8217; This did not make things go smoother. The cop called for backup and summoned CPS.”
Parkinson didn’t come to the decision to give her kindergarten-aged son freedom lightly. She was, like Skenazy, a committed and ideological “free-range parent,” of the belief that giving kids freedom is a vaccine for any host of issues plaguing most of today’s youth, from anxiety to depression.
Skenazy reported, “In Virginia, Parkinson spent one summer interning at the Institute for Justice and another working in the law office of former Virginia state Sen. Jill Vogel (R–Winchester). Vogel was actually co-sponsor of the reasonable childhood independence law that passed in Virginia, unanimously, in 2023.”
The bill says that neglect is only when you put your child in serious, obvious danger. What was the “obvious danger” exactly?
The irony here is that the same week the news broke that Parkinson is only avoiding jail time “pending good behavior and compliance with CPS&#8217; conditions,” Clancy, the Massachusetts mother of three, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/lindsay-clancy-trial-ends-in-mistrial-after-defenses-hail-mary-attempt">escaped</a> a murder conviction after admitting to killing her three children.
It’s a frustrating and infuriating time to be a mother: those of us fighting to do it right, working to give our kids confidence and independence, are swimming upstream, one cranky security guard and patrol officer away from prison. Meanwhile, Clancy is comfortably tucked away not in prison, but instead in a mental facility.
There’s another contrast between these two mothers. Parkinson’s crime, if you want to call it that, came from believing her child was capable of more than the adults around him thought he was. She was willing to go against a parenting culture that increasingly treats children as both extraordinarily fragile and burdensome.
That culture has produced an entire vocabulary around how exhausting children are because we’re required to over-parent to such a degree. “Because kids.” “Mommy needs wine.” “Touched out.” “Overstimulated.” Children are simultaneously too vulnerable to walk down the street alone and so emotionally demanding that their mothers are expected to organize their entire lives around managing them.
Clancy herself participated in an attachment-parenting Facebook group, where she once described her son, who was three when she killed him, as “the most difficult human being” and wrote that “everything he does is a battle.” In photographs of the crime scene, beside a bloodied knife sat a wine mug <a href="https://nypost.com/2026/07/27/us-news/bloody-knife-other-grisly-evidence-photos-revealed-during-lindsay-clancys-murder-trial-opening-arguments/">bearing</a> the words “Because kids.”
There is something deeply broken about a parenting culture that treats childhood independence as criminal while treating maternal resentment of children as so ordinary that we put jokes about it on t-shirts and coffee mugs.
If American mothers are looking for a reason to put on matching shirts and rally behind one of our own, we’ve been standing outside the wrong courthouse. Our solidarity belongs with the mother being punished for believing in her child, not the mother celebrated as a victim after killing hers.
***
Bethany Mandel (<a href="https://x.com/bethanyshondark" target="_blank" rel="noopener">@bethanyshondark</a>) is a homeschooling mother of six. She podcasts at the Mom Wars and writes for its <a href="https://themomwars.substack.com/">Substack</a>.
This article is part of <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/introducing-upstream-a-lifestyle-and-culture-section-of-the-daily-wire" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Upstream,</a> The Daily Wire’s new home for culture and lifestyle. Real human insight and human stories — from our featured writers to you.

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America’s Broken Parenting Culture Criminalizes Independence

free range parenting

lindsay clancy

parenting culture

virginia

While Massachusetts mother Lindsay Clancy waits for 12 jurors to decide whether she should be held criminally responsible for killing her three children, a Virginia mother landed on her state&#8217;s child abuse and neglect registry for letting her son take a walk.
<a href="https://reason.com/2026/09/02/virginia-mom-gets-6-month-suspended-jail-sentence-for-letting-5-year-old-walk-to-the-pond/">Karyann Parkinson</a> told her 5-year-old son, Sam, that he could walk down the street in their gated community in Williamsburg, Virginia, to look for feathers. They had walked down that same street together hundreds of times, she said — including six times that morning — and at eight months pregnant, Parkinson just wanted to stay home and get lunch ready, so she allowed Sam to walk by himself.
That short walk quickly set off a chain of events: someone saw the boy and alerted one of the community security guards, who took Sam home and scolded Parkinson for allowing him to walk alone, Reason Magazine reported. He also reportedly told Sam that his mother was wrong to allow him out alone and that bad people might do something to him if he didn&#8217;t have an adult with him.
&#8220;This scared the crap out of him,&#8221; Parkinson explained.
Later, a police officer arrived, and Parkinson made it clear she&#8217;d had enough: &#8220;I don&#8217;t have any interest in talking to you.&#8221;
And then the cavalry showed up: multiple police and Child Protective Services (CPS) workers arrived at her home to investigate.
Parkinson called her husband to come home, and he did. &#8220;I told [the authorities] that kids need to be able to take reasonable risks in order to grow up non-anxious,&#8221; her husband said.
Police charged Parkinson with &#8220;contributing to the delinquency of a minor.&#8221; CPS investigated her for abuse and neglect, and because it ultimately found the allegations to be &#8220;substantiated,&#8221; it placed Parkinson on the state&#8217;s child abuse and neglect registry. She will remain there for seven years.
After a judge convicted her on the above charge, he immediately suspended the sentence — but even though she will serve no jail time pending good behavior, the punishment for the mother is a steep one, and her conviction remains.
The fact that her name is on the child abuse and neglect registry likely means that she will be barred from volunteering at her children&#8217;s schools. Her conviction could also prevent her from getting her law license — she&#8217;d also been preparing for the bar exam when the incident occurred.

child in the rain collecting autumn leaves, view from the back

Mom Lands On Abuse Registry For Letting Her Kid Take A Walk

karyann parkinson

parenting

WASHINGTON—Advocates fighting radical gender ideology are pushing the White House to target child welfare programs, The Daily Wire has learned, pointing to national examples of the state removing children from loving parents who refuse to support gender ideology.
Many of the advocates involved in this effort played pivotal roles fighting gender extremism over the past decade. These individuals are intimately acquainted with the stories of parents who lost custody of their children for refusing to call their daughter a son or refusing to put their child through life altering transgender procedures.
The Daily Wire reviewed the copy of a draft executive order that these advocates plan to present to President Donald Trump, an executive order that proposes the president tie child welfare programs&#8217; federal funding to a rejection of gender ideology. The advocates plan to follow up on this proposed order with legislation in Congress.
The order redefines child abuse and neglect, since, under the current language, leftist organizations claim that child abuse includes refusing to affirm a child&#8217;s gender identity. It would also tie federal funding for foster care to state plans that don&#8217;t refuse foster parents for their religious or political beliefs, as well as programs that don&#8217;t house foster children according to gender identity.
The proposed language of the executive order paints a stark picture of the parents facing Child Protective Services investigations, threats of losing custody, and denials of custody because they will not affirm child gender transitions. It describes how many child welfare services and family court personnel have been trained to remove children from parents who refuse to agree to sex-rejecting interventions.
And it notes that family courts in custody cases often award custody of children to the parent who affirms that child&#8217;s gender identity confusion. Ted Hudacko, for example, <a href="https://nypost.com/2022/02/26/dad-lost-custody-after-questioning-sons-transgender-identity/">lost custody of one of his sons</a> to his ex-wife for questioning the impacts of gender transition attempts on children.
Advocates explained to The Daily Wire that their goal is for Trump to consider withholding federal funds from agencies that are investigating parents for &#8220;child abuse&#8221; for refusing to transition their kids, and to protect families that refuse to comply with ideological foster care principles.
&#8220;My team and I have been pulling on every level to get this proposed executive order in front of the President, contacting every contact we have in the administration, including agency leaders,&#8221; shared Erin Friday, president of Our Duty-USA, a non-partisan parent advocacy group. Friday, one of the advocates spearheading the effort, was investigated for refusing to affirm her daughter&#8217;s supposed gender identity.
&#8220;This administration is dedicated to protecting children and families from gender ideology,&#8221; she explained, &#8220;and if we could meet with President Trump or get the proposed order in his hands, parents would be able to stop living in fear that if they refuse to treat their child as the opposite sex, they will be adjudicated abusive.&#8221;
Though the president <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/11/fostering-the-future-for-american-children-and-families/">extensively reformed the foster care system</a> with a November executive order, there is concern that the recent order does not address the complete issue: notably, the enticement aspect, where pro-transgender activists coach children on how to circumvent their parents who refuse to consent to transgender procedures, and get themselves into the foster care system where they can begin transgender treatments.
The Daily Wire obtained a copy of a letter from a West Coast Child Welfare Agency sent to a parent who refused to support or affirm their child&#8217;s new gender identity. The parent asked to remain anonymous pending trial, and the child has been placed in an &#8220;affirming&#8221; residence during the interim period.
The letter informs the parent that &#8220;our office received a report of abuse,&#8221; accusing the parent of being &#8220;responsible for the mental injury&#8221; of the child.
&#8220;Your actions and statements towards [the child] have caused significant mental injury,&#8221; the letter states. &#8220;The severe harm perpetrated showed serious disregard for [child&#8217;s] social and emotional well-being. Your adverse reactions to [child] expressing their gender identity have caused serious harm to [child&#8217;s] psychological functioning.&#8221;
Friday argues that there are many more such cases, often kept from the public eye due to legal constraints on the parents.
&#8220;The public is unaware that children are being kidnapped by child protective services and family judges because these cases are usually sealed or there are confidentiality laws that prevent parents from going public,&#8221; she explained.
In many states, foster care laws grant children a right to begin transgender interventions and to be housed with families or institutions that will validate and promote transgenderism. This opens up a whole other can of worms: in California, for example, foster care <a href="https://www.cdss.ca.gov/inforesources/foster-care/extended-foster-care-ab-12">can extend</a> up to the age of 25 in some circumstances, meaning that a grown man who says he identifies as a woman could be sharing living quarters with an already at-risk young girl.
Erin Lee is a mother who was investigated by CPS for refusing to &#8220;affirm&#8221; her 12-year-old daughter when she said that she was a transgender boy. Lee, who sued the school with her husband, told The Daily Wire that school employees &#8220;secretly groomed and transitioned&#8221; her daughter and sent a &#8220;mandated reporter to my home for a &#8216;well-child check'&#8221; when she refused to comply.
&#8220;We managed to evade losing our children that day, but I’ve met many parents who weren’t so lucky,&#8221; Lee shared. &#8220;I also had a six-year-old and infant at the time, and I shudder to think that I could have lost all three of my kids for being a good parent, for being unwilling to lie to my daughter and send her down a path of self-hatred and destruction. I was labeled abusive for not affirming my child’s mental health distress.&#8221;
The Lee&#8217;s case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which ultimately refused to take up the case. But Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and Neil Gorsuch said in a statement that they were concerned about federal courts avoiding the “particularly contentious” question of whether schools are violating parents&#8217; fundamental rights when they &#8220;without parental knowledge or consent&#8221; encourage or assist &#8220;a student to transition to a new gender.&#8221;
Since Lee has gone public, she has met hundreds of families who have come into contact with Child Protective Services for not affirming their child&#8217;s gender confusion. This is particularly common in Colorado, she shared, where children are influenced by school officials or teachers who then use the &#8220;broken and rotten family court system to gain custody of the minor child.&#8221;
Colorado&#8217;s HB 24-1039 mandates that schools affirm a student&#8217;s social gender transition, meaning use the name of a student&#8217;s choice during school and extracurricular activities, declaring it &#8220;discriminatory to knowingly or intentionally use a name other than the student&#8217;s chosen name.&#8221; Students can file a report with the school, or a federal civil rights complaint, if they are &#8220;discriminated&#8221; against by a teacher who calls them a different name.
The state&#8217;s HB 24-1017 establishes a bill of rights for foster kids in Colorado, mandating that all foster families must affirm their foster child&#8217;s gender identity, essentially mandating that families who will not affirm a child&#8217;s gender identity cannot foster.
&#8220;In court, all these kids and their groomers have to say is that parents are not using the new name and pronouns, and 100% of the time, that’s enough to warrant parents losing custody of their children,&#8221; Lee insisted. &#8220;It feels like the twilight zone. How could this be happening, and why is no one doing anything about it?&#8221;
Advocates have long argued that the first step on the conveyor belt toward child gender transition is often public school, where leftwing teachers and counselors encourage children to explore their gender identity or identify as transgender.
Lee saw this firsthand: her young daughter came home confused about her sex, and within days, her family had CPS knocking on the door.
&#8220;They abused our child, yet we were the ones being labeled abusive,&#8221; she said.

Screenshot 2026-01-02 at 4.03.47 PM

Inside The Push For Trump To Keep Radical Gender Ideology Out Of Child Welfare Programs

donald trump

foster care

transgender

<a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/california" target="_blank" rel="noopener">California</a> residents fear mental health professionals are one step closer to giving custody of minors 12 and older to the state after lawmakers advanced a bill on Tuesday that aligns with existing laws for children to receive certain services without parental consent.
On Tuesday, lawmakers in the state&#8217;s Senate Judiciary Committee advanced <a href="https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB665">Assembly Bill 665</a>, which gives minors over the targeted age group authority to receive mental health services from counselors and therapists who could allegedly sign off on children checking into state-run youth shelters as long they provide evidence of serious physical or mental harm to themselves or others, or if they&#8217;re a victim of incest or child abuse.
Although the bill&#8217;s text does not explicitly contain language that changes the state&#8217;s child welfare system or removal processes, some Californians allege the law — authored by Democrats Assembly Member Wendy Carrillo and State Senator Scott Wiener — indicates &#8220;parental separation and emancipation of minors.&#8221;
&#8220;The authors want to change the law to let a 12-year-old opt out of their home on a whim, invoking parental separation and emancipation of minors without any claim of danger or parental consent,&#8221; Nicole Pearson, an attorney, said in her testimony against the bill, according to <a href="https://freebeacon.com/california/california-assembly-bill-665/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Washington Free Beacon</a>. &#8220;This is child emancipation.&#8221;
Wiener, however, argues the bill &#8220;protects children.&#8221;
&#8220;It makes children safer,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It makes children healthier. It&#8217;s unfortunate that this bill, like so many, has been caught up in this right-wing outrage machine.&#8221;
Carrillo claimed the state would &#8220;never&#8221; pass a law that strips parental discretion or remove access to their children.
&#8220;There&#8217;s been a lot of misinformation and lies about this bill to the point that it has national and international attention as to how we treat mental health services for young people in the United States and California,&#8221; she said.
<a class="c-link c-link--focus-visible" href="https://onelink.to/dwapp" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-stringify-link="https://onelink.to/dwapp" data-sk="tooltip_parent" aria-describedby="sk-tooltip-102078">CLICK HERE TO GET THE DAILY WIRE APP</a>
According to the <a href="https://youthlaw.org/resources/californias-ab-665-equitable-access-mental-health-services#:~:text=AB%20665%20would%20grant%20youth,require%20consent%20from%20a%20guardian." target="_blank" rel="noopener">National Center for Youth Law</a>, minors of the targeted age group can receive healthcare through private health insurance plans and have the authorization to consent to outpatient care on their behalf when considered mature enough to participate. The new bill would give youth over 12 the ability to consent to mental health counseling regardless of insurance type.
&#8220;Youth relying on the state&#8217;s Medi-Cal program — offered to families with lower incomes — cannot access mental health care on their own without approval from a parent or guardian, unless they meet a much higher need level,&#8221; the center&#8217;s website reads. &#8220;This added barrier to support prevents many tweens and teens from getting the care they need and threatens their well-being.&#8221;
Weiner also noted the bill only applies to low-income children in Medi-Cal, the state&#8217;s Medicaid program.
Pearson said in her testimony that if lawmakers wanted to remove the parental consent requirement for minors to receive mental health services through Medi-Cal, they could change California&#8217;s welfare code and keep state-run shelters&#8217; admittance rules the same.
However, the National Center for Youth Law&#8217;s attorney Taylor Chambers said that changing the code would convolute billing for doctors and counselors.
California Democrats have launched a campaign to strip parental authority over their children, specifically in the name of &#8220;gender affirmation.&#8221; Last week, the Senate Judiciary Committee <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/california-state-senator-warns-parents-to-flee-state-after-gender-affirmation-bill-advances" target="_blank" rel="noopener">advanced</a> separate legislation to accuse parents of child abuse if they refuse to affirm their children&#8217;s gender identity.
Last year, Weiner <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/california-senate-passes-transgender-refuge-bill-eroding-parental-rights" target="_blank" rel="noopener">authored</a> a bill that passed, making California a haven for children who wish to go through transgender surgeries and parents who support them in the procedures while making it more difficult for those who do not want their child to go through such treatments.

Child holding adult’s hand

California Residents Fear New Bill Gives Mental Health Professionals Authority To ‘Emancipate’ 12 Year Olds From Parents

California Residents Fear New State Bill Gives Mental Health Professionals Authority To 'Emancipate' 12 Year Olds From Parents

california

child abuse

lgbtq

politics

scott wiener

Social Issues

A California mom whose 19-year-old daughter had “transitioned” to the identity of a male in high school and then later committed suicide blasted California Child Protective Services to the California Judiciary Senate, <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12221449/California-mom-claims-19-year-old-daughter-murdered-gender-ideology.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">saying</a> her daughter was “murdered by gender ideology.”
Abigail Martinez, whose daughter Yaeli had suffered from depression as a young teenager and later identified as “Andrew,” told <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10612285/California-mom-claims-LA-school-encouraged-daughter-transition-blame-suicide.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Mail</a> in 2022 that Yaeli’s school encouraged her to take hormones, undergo gender reassignment surgery, secretly join an LGBT group, and not to speak to her mother.
Martinez had stated that Yaeli showed signs of depression by 8th grade after being bullied and started questioning her sexuality at around 15 years old, adding:
<blockquote>
Once she moved to high school, by the beginning of sophomore year things changed drastically. &#8230; She talked to her sister about how she liked girls. She was questioning her sexuality. It was a shock, but she was trying to find out her identity. It&#8217;s normal, what children don&#8217;t go through that at that age? &#8230; But I never imagined what the school would do. &#8230; The school was telling her to go to these LGBT groups behind my back. She went from questioning her sexuality to her gender. &#8230; 
She had these peers at school two years older than her. They were the ones who brought these ideas – “Maybe you&#8217;re depressed because don&#8217;t you feel like you&#8217;re a boy?” – and the school was supportive of that. &#8230; The school told her these groups were the place to go, and I didn&#8217;t need to know about it. &#8230; I asked her what was going on, and she tried to deny it, because she was told that if she talked about it at home, I would not support it.
</blockquote>
Martinez claimed Yaeli was urged by the school and her LGBT support group to ingest hormones and look into gender reassignment surgery, leaving her mother out of her decision-making. The girl was allegedly informed by her peers that the only way California would pay for the surgery would be to move into foster care. Martinez said a friend of her daughter’s and her parents “coached” Yaeli, convincing her to leave home and tell Department of Child and Family Services (DCFS) that Martinez had slapped her face.
“My daughter was murdered by a gender ideology,” Martinez told the California Judiciary Senate. “CPS took my daughter when she was 16 years old. It was helped by her public school counselor and LGBTQ group and another trans-identified girl. My daughter was taken from her loving home because the state of California claims I was abusive for not affirming her trans identity. I lost my daughter over a name and pronouns.”
CPS helped Yaeli move to a group home, only permitting Martinez to visit her once a week for an hour.
“Why are there so many transgender in foster care?” Martinez rhetorically asked the Senate. “Because this state take them from their families, tell them to run, then steals them. Parents are given one option to treat their distressed child: Affirm drugs and remove their healthy body part or else lose your child.”
“The abuse claim against me was finally dropped, but it was too late,” she recalled. “The damage was done. By then, my daughter was in horrible mental and physical pain. My daughter knelt down in front of a train. She was murdered by gender ideology.”

Human hands hair cut using a scissors lock of hair wearing a wedding ring a clothing red color

‘Murdered By Gender Ideology’: Mother Whose Daughter Committed Suicide Blasts Child Protective Services

children

In a 7-2 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-376_7l48.pdf">upheld</a> a federal statute that forces states to place Native American children with Native families, even if it’s not in the child’s best interest.
The Court rejected several families’ challenge to the 1978 Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), which was created to maintain Native American culture by prioritizing Native families in the adoption of Native children. 
The “issues are complicated” Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote for the majority in Haaland v. Brackeen, but the “bottom line is that we reject all of petitioners’ challenges to the statute.”
Justice Barrett was joined in the majority by the Court’s three Democrat-appointed justices, along with Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Neil Gorsuch, and Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito dissented.
However, the law prioritizes placing the child in a Native family even if it is not in the child’s best interest and if the Native family is not of the same tribe. The law gives tribal leaders the ability to strip children from non-Native foster families and even to supersede the wishes of the child’s biological parents.
For instance, under the law, a Native child in Minnesota was ripped from a loving non-Native family who wanted to adopt her and given to her grandmother, who had lost her foster license due to a criminal conviction. 
The lead plaintiffs in the case, Chad and Jennifer Brackeen, fostered a 10-month-old child and sought to adopt him after a year, with his parents’ support. However, because his parents were members of the Navajo and Cherokee tribes, and both those tribes opposed the adoption, the child was ordered to be removed from the family and placed in New Mexico under the ICWA.
Several families challenged the law on a few main points. First, they argued that the ICWA was unconstitutional under the 10th Amendment because it violated states’ rights to regulate family matters. Second, they argued that the law creates race classifications and makes race-based decisions, which are unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment.
The Court rejected the federalism claim but did not decide the equal protection claim, leaving it for lower courts to decide.
Barrett argued that because the ICWA applies to both private and public parties equally, the states have no claim that the federal government targeted their rights. She also argued that the federal government has supremacy and that it is normal for state laws to be superseded by federal law.
Justice Thomas wrote a dissent, arguing that the ICWA unconstitutionally encroached on states’ police powers and that the Indian Commerce Clause does not apply to children. Thomas accused the Court of using “loose language” and that the Court’s broad definition of the clause had no basis in the Constitutional text. He also pointed out how many of the children affected would have never stepped foot on a reservation. 
Justice Alito’s dissent attacked the majority opinion on its consequences and argued the Court “loses sight” of what is important in the case — the best interests of the child. Alito walked through the specific cases, showing how under the ICWA, the children would be ripped from loving non-Indian families despite the harms that would occur by doing so — simply because the tribe’s government desired it. 
Justice Kavanaugh wrote a concurring opinion that emphasized the equal protection claim was not addressed, stating the issue is “serious” and challenges “bedrock equal protection principles.”
“Under the Act, a child in foster care or adoption proceedings may in some cases be denied a particular placement because of the child’s race — even if the placement is otherwise determined to be in the child’s best interests,” Kavanaugh wrote. He went on to state the same for prospective foster and adoptive parents — that they could be denied because of their race. 
Justice Gorsuch wrote a concurring opinion, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, that emphasized the horrific treatment of Native Americans throughout American history and the resulting importance of the ICWA. 
The decision was met with praise from the Biden Administration and tribal sovereignty advocates. “Our Nation’s painful history looms large over today’s decision. In the not-so-distant past, Native children were stolen from the arms of the people who loved them,” Biden <a href="https://apnews.com/article/supreme-court-native-american-children-adoption-8eee3db1e97cee84a7fdcd98d43df795">said</a> in a statement.
The Cherokee Nation, Morongo Band of Mission Indians, Oneida Nation, and Quinault Indian Nation said in a joint statement, “We hope this decision will lay to rest the political attacks aimed at diminishing tribal sovereignty and creating instability throughout Indian law that have persisted for too long.”
“We are glad to see the Supreme Court recognized the important benefits of ICWA and allowed the law to stand,” the Choctaw Nation <a href="https://www.choctawnation.com/news/news-releases/choctaw-nation-statement-regarding-decision-in-brackeen-v-haaland/">said</a>.

Washington, D.C. landmarks

Supreme Court Upholds Law Enabling Tribes To Bar Non-Native Families From Adopting Native Children

adoption

Native Americans

supreme court

U.S.

A Minnesota mother whose 6-year-old son was returned to her after a year in foster care despite protestations from the boy’s father was convicted of murdering the boy with a shotgun.
Julissa Thaler, 29, who reportedly had a history of mental illness, <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/julissa-thaler-convicted-killing-6-year-old-son-eli-hart-minnesota/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">asked</a> a store clerk for ammunition that would “blow the biggest hole” before murdering her son Eli Hart in May 2022, shooting nine shots into him before putting his body in the trunk of her vehicle. According to authorities, Thaler bought the shotgun soon after Eli&#8217;s father Tory filed papers asking the court for full custody. Eli had been placed in foster care in January 2021 with his foster mother Nikita Kronberg.
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Eli Hart was 6. His mother is on trial for his murder. Eli’s father told the jury in Hennepin County “..he was everything to me..he completed my life.” Eli’s dad add that he liked bubbles, playing with toy cars, and fishing. <a href="https://twitter.com/KSTP?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@kstp</a> <a href="https://t.co/GrSekOUSZ0">pic.twitter.com/GrSekOUSZ0</a>
&mdash; Eric Chaloux (@EricChalouxKSTP) <a href="https://twitter.com/EricChalouxKSTP/status/1621544837244764160?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 3, 2023</a></blockquote>
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An exhausting day of testimony is over in the Julissa Thaler trial. This image may stick with me forever. Little 6-year-old Eli Hart&#39;s backpack was thrown in the trash, his homework still inside. His dad testified that Eli loved going to school. Loved being social. Senseless. <a href="https://t.co/O0DQs4JOxh">pic.twitter.com/O0DQs4JOxh</a>
&mdash; Lou Raguse (@LouRaguse) <a href="https://twitter.com/LouRaguse/status/1621643047422332929?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 3, 2023</a></blockquote>
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“During that time, Eli and Tory were able to start a relationship, and their bond was powerful from the start,” Kronberg wrote on a <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/nkgn4c-funeral-and-headstone" target="_blank" rel="noopener">GoFundMe page</a> dedicated to paying for the funeral costs. “Eli fell in love with his father and loved spending time with him. Tory was excited to make up for all the lost years and was thrilled to start teaching his son how to fish and ride a bike with no training wheels.”
“At the end of December 2021, Eli returned to his mother&#8217;s house for a home trial,” Kronberg continued. “Due to many red flags, Eli&#8217;s mother was showing, Tory tried extremely hard to get custody of Eli. Unfortunately, more false Orders of Protection were filed, which postponed custody hearings. Numerous parties made many statements to CPS, fearing that mom would harm Eli if full custody were returned. Sadly full custody was returned on May 10, 2022.”
“Eli&#8217;s brutal murder is one of the most horrific cases I have encountered in 30 years working in the criminal legal system,” Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty stated. “Nothing will ever fill the emptiness Eli&#8217;s father and other loved ones now live with every day, but I&#8217;m hopeful this verdict will make it just a bit easier to remember Eli as the toothless, happy, smiling little boy we have seen in photos.”
The trial was so disturbing that jurors were offered crisis counseling. Prosecutor Dan Allard <a href="https://www.kare11.com/article/news/local/prosecutors-to-self-edit-in-julissa-thaler-trial-for-murder-of-6-year-old-eli-hart/89-16e58f00-8d69-477b-a776-1a2a48cdbb44" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told jurors</a> they would not see the graphic photos of Eli, who was strapped into his seat in the car when he was repeatedly shot. Allard told the judge, “We are self-editing because I don&#8217;t want to see them again. They are horrid. The jury doesn&#8217;t want to see them. They are as bad as I&#8217;ve seen in any case.”
Thaler&#8217;s former boyfriend, Robert Pikkarainen, said that the night before the murder, Eli didn&#8217;t want to go to bed. He told the court, “We started playing with the kitties and Eli was getting rowdy and Mom didn&#8217;t like it. She was hitting him. Then Eli was hitting her — they were fighting. So she put the shotgun in the car and she came back up. I was lying in her bed. She grabbed Eli and went downstairs.”
Insurance broker Mathias Martin testified that Thaler wanted a $400,000 policy for her son. He recalled that when he informed her policies for children only go up to roughly $50,000, “she was very adamant about $400,000, no less.”
Tory Hart’s fiancée Josie Josephson, told <a href="https://www.fox9.com/news/eli-hart-mother-arrested-in-case-of-boys-body-found-in-trunk-mound-orono" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fox 9</a>, “Not only did we express concerns to multiple people, multiple times…every time the response was, ‘This is something for family courts.’ (CPS) said laws do not allow us to address this, unless (they) see physical abuse, (they) have no grounds to remove him from her home.”
Eli Hart’s father Tory Hart <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/eli-hart-lawsuit-father-dakota-county-murder/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">filed</a> a wrongful death lawsuit against Dakota County in August 2022.

Thaler

Child Welfare Workers Returned 6-Year-Old To His Mom. She’s Convicted Of Murdering Him With 9 Shots From A Shotgun.

crime

minnesota

murder

Single mother and Virginia state Senate candidate <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/journalist-calls-child-protective-services-on-senate-candidate-and-single-mom-over-columbus-day-tweet/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Tina Ramirez</a> (R) made it clear that she was ready to fight back after self-described journalist David Leavitt apparently reported her to Child Protective Services over a tweet.
The offending tweet was a simple statement from Ramirez wishing her followers a happy <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/elizabeth-warren-celebrates-indigenous-peoples-day-social-media-happy-columbus-day-chief/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Columbus Day</a> — and Leavitt, who had previously expressed his own views eschewing the holiday, accused her of promoting rape and racism, among other things.
The spat escalated quickly throughout the day on Monday, and after Ramirez made it clear that she intended to teach her child history without interference from left-wing activists, Leavitt first entreated his 330,000+ followers to call CPS and report her for &#8220;abuse&#8221; because he claimed she was teaching her child to be racist.
Leavitt eventually opted to make the call himself — all the while complaining that he had to sit on hold for more than an hour to file his report with the state.
Ramirez pushed back, accusing Leavitt of wasting state resources in his pursuit of what amounted to political persecution — and Christina Pushaw, rapid response director for Governor <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/does-it-say-that-in-the-bill-ron-desantis-rebukes-reporter-for-pushing-dont-say-gay-narrative/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ron DeSantis</a> (R-FL), was among a number of people who suggested that might actually be a crime in the state of Virginia.
&#8220;Isn’t this a crime in VA? It’s like making a false 911 call or Swatting. Report him to the state police and AG’s office. Get him arrested. If he doesn’t face consequences he will do it again,&#8221; Pushaw said.
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Isn’t this a crime in VA? It’s like making a false 911 call or Swatting. Report him to the state police and AG’s office. Get him arrested. If he doesn’t face consequences he will do it again.
&mdash; Christina Pushaw 🐊 🇺🇸 (@ChristinaPushaw) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChristinaPushaw/status/1579796301486886913?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 11, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Ramirez apparently did just that, announcing on Tuesday that she had followed her words with actions — or, at least, with a phone call to Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares (R) to report the issue.
&#8220;I spoke with AG @JasonMiyaresVA&#8217;s office this morning about being falsely reported to CPS. He stands behind parent&#8217;s rights &amp; I&#8217;m confident that the AG will fight for individual parent&#8217;s decisions to raise their kids &amp; guard against efforts to weaponize our schools and CPS,&#8221; she tweeted.
https://twitter.com/TinaRamirezVA/status/1579830867513708550
&#8220;On a personal note, Abigail and I are doing great and we appreciate all the support as the left continues to bully our family,&#8221; she continued. &#8220;The real tragedy in all of this is the time wasted by @David_Leavitt, which consumed valuable CPS resources, putting children in harm&#8217;s way.&#8221;

Tina Ramirez

Tina Ramirez Fights Back After Activist Calls CPS To ‘Report’ Her Columbus Day Tweet

Tina Ramirez Fights Back After Activist Calls CPS To 'Report' Her Columbus Day Tweet

christopher columbus

Columbus Day

Self-described &#8220;Award-winning multi-media journalist&#8221; David Leavitt called Child Protective Services on Virginia State Senate candidate Tina Ramirez, reporting her for &#8220;child abuse&#8221; because her opinion of <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/columbus-day-what-really-killed-so-many-natives-robert-kraychik/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Columbus Day</a> differed from his.
The spat began with an apparent non-sequitur, when Leavitt replied to a tweet from Ramirez over reports that <a href="https://dailywire.com/news/new-paypal-policy-lets-company-pull-2500-from-users-accounts-if-they-promote-misinformation/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">PayPal planned to fine</a> people for spreading &#8220;misinformation&#8221; — a story broken by Daily Wire reporter Ben Zeisloft.
&#8220;Only women can be pregnant. Do I owe PayPal $2500 now?&#8221; Ramirez asked, to which Leavitt replied, &#8220;Why are you celebrating torture, rape, murder, and enslavement?&#8221;
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Why are you celebrating torture, rape, murder, and enslavement?
&mdash; David Leavitt 🎲🎮🧙‍♂️🌈 (@David_Leavitt) <a href="https://twitter.com/David_Leavitt/status/1579547835078692864?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 10, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Leavitt appeared to be referencing another tweet in which Ramirez wished her followers a happy Columbus Day, and Ramirez responded with a simple explanation: &#8220;I teach my daughter real American history. I refuse to join the radical left&#8217;s campaign to erase history.&#8221;
https://twitter.com/TinaRamirezVA/status/1579576278721916928
Leavitt responded by attempting to get some of his 330,000+ followers to harass Ramirez by reporting her to Child Protective Services.
&#8220;Can someone please call child care services on Tina Ramirez who&#8217;s teaching her child to be a racist?&#8221; he asked.
He then apparently decided to make the call himself — and complained about the long wait time to speak to someone at the hotline.
&#8220;The Virginia State hotline for child abuse has a 10+ minute hold and is experiencing &#8216;high call volumes&#8217; with 14 callers ahead of me. This is absolutely unacceptable. How many people try to report child abuse and hang up? How many children will continue to be abused?&#8221; he asked.
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The Virginia State hotline for child abuse has a 10+ minute hold and is experiencing “high call volumes” with 14 callers ahead of me.
This is absolutely unacceptable. How many people try to report child abuse and hang up? How many children will continue to be abused? <a href="https://t.co/yZOKEqTAcn">pic.twitter.com/yZOKEqTAcn</a>
&mdash; David Leavitt 🎲🎮🧙‍♂️🌈 (@David_Leavitt) <a href="https://twitter.com/David_Leavitt/status/1579581164922482688?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 10, 2022</a></blockquote>
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While Leavitt continued to hold — and continued to complain about the wait time — Ramirez responded: &#8220;Mighty bold and liberal of you to lecture a Hispanic mother with a black daughter on racism. What’s next? Are you going to lecture me on women’s rights?&#8221;
Leavitt responded by wondering whether she knew he was waiting to report her — and then informed her that &#8220;having a black child doesn&#8217;t make you any less racist.&#8221;
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Having a black child doesn&#39;t make you any less racist<a href="https://t.co/QnrkB39TTq">https://t.co/QnrkB39TTq</a>
&mdash; David Leavitt 🎲🎮🧙‍♂️🌈 (@David_Leavitt) <a href="https://twitter.com/David_Leavitt/status/1579589942766104577?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 10, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Leavitt <a href="https://twitter.com/David_Leavitt/status/1579593293780094976" target="_blank" rel="noopener">continued to complain</a> about the wait time, posting updates showing that he had been on hold for over an hour. As he waited on the line to report Ramirez for abusing her child —by celebrating Columbus Day — he lamented the amount of abuse that must be taking place in Virginia for wait times to be so long.
Ramirez responded to the entire situation in a Twitter thread of her own, saying, &#8220;Tonight, @David_Leavitt called Child Protective Services to report &#8216;child abuse&#8217; because I teach my daughter about Christopher Columbus and real American history. As a single mother, I am my daughter&#8217;s only support. This is appalling for a number of reasons.&#8221;
https://twitter.com/TinaRamirezVA/status/1579644309959512065
&#8220;Radical leftist @David_Leavitt didn&#8217;t just call CPS to level accusations against me,&#8221; she continued. &#8220;He waited an hour on hold, tying up the lines of our CPS professionals trying to help Virginia&#8217;s children. The radical left is willing to put our children at risk to cancel conservatives.&#8221;
&#8220;It’s no surprise that a member of the radical left is willing to go so far as to call CPS on a single mother &#8211; simply because they want to erase history. The radical left doesn’t want parents making decisions for their own families,&#8221; Ramirez added.
https://twitter.com/TinaRamirezVA/status/1579644313755348992
&#8220;This goes back to what Virginians fought for in 2021 when they elected @GlennYoungkin: parent’s rights,&#8221; Ramirez concluded. &#8220;The radical left is willing to sit on hold with CPS for a full hour to level accusations of child abuse — all because we don’t agree with their out-of-touch worldview.&#8221;

Journalist Calls Child Protective Services On Senate Candidate And Single Mom Over Columbus Day Tweet

David Leavitt Calls Child Protective Services On Senate Candidate Tina Ramirez Over Columbus Day Tweet

PayPal

An author of the leading <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/transgender" target="_blank" rel="noopener">transgender</a> health association’s new guidelines for adolescents revealed that they have called Child Protective Services on uncooperative parents who did not affirm their child’s newly chosen transgender identity. The World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) held a session on the “Adolescent” chapter during their annual conference on Monday that was livestreamed online.
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🚨BREAKING: Ren Massey, an author of WPATH&#39;s new Guidelines, says &quot;there are at least some Child Protective Service workers who are willing to enforce the need for affirmation by parents,&quot; which can be used to threaten hesitant parents into affirming their child&#39;s trans identity. <a href="https://t.co/388IxSoFjq">pic.twitter.com/388IxSoFjq</a>
&mdash; Colin Wright (@SwipeWright) <a href="https://twitter.com/SwipeWright/status/1572375023008055296?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 20, 2022</a></blockquote>
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Dr. Ren Massey, a trans-identified female Clinical Child Psychologist from Atlanta, Georgia, revealed during a Q&amp;A session that calling Child Protective Services is a “resource” for clinicians to “enforce the need for affirmation by parents.” Massey goes as far as to suggest that merely informing parents that a call to CPS can be made might be enough to pressure them to cooperate.
The Daily Wire <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/leading-transgender-health-association-releases-new-guidelines">previously reported</a> that the 8th edition guidelines released last week indicated that the state may be enabled to intervene in order to assist with the child’s transition if parents do not affirm their child’s newly chosen identity.
“I had to make a call to Child Protective Services on a case and the Child Protective Services worker asked me about if some of the issues I was calling about were about the parents not being supportive or being emotionally abusive around gender identity issues,” said Massey.
Massey appeared pleasantly surprised to learn that CPS workers in Georgia had intervened in instances where parents were hesitant to accept their child’s new transgender identity. “And that was educative for me to learn that in my conservative state there are at least some Child Protective Service workers who are willing to enforce the need for affirmation by parents at least with social transition needs, names, pronouns et cetera,” said Massey. “So that may be a resource in states, provinces, regions, countries around the world.”
Massey suggests that threatening to call Child Protective Services on a parent who doesn&#8217;t affirm their child’s transgender identity may be all that is needed for the parent to cooperate with socially transitioning their child. “Even before making that call, letting parents know that if that’s true where you are practicing that might get their attention a little bit,” said Massey.
WPATH’s <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/26895269.2022.2100644">new guidance</a> also suggests that parental consent for minors to obtain medical treatments are recommended, but not required, and that the state may intervene when a parent refuses to affirm their child’s transgender identity.
“6.11- We recommend when gender-affirming medical or surgical treatments are indicated for adolescents, health care professionals working with transgender and gender diverse adolescents involve parent(s)/guardian(s) in the assessment and treatment process, unless their involvement is determined to be harmful to the adolescent or not feasible.” (emphasis added).
Statement 6.11 in Chapter 6 on adolescents further elaborates: “Helping youth and parent(s)/caregiver(s) work together on important gender care decisions is a primary goal. However, in some cases, parent(s)/caregiver(s) may be too rejecting of their adolescent child and their child’s gender needs to be part of the clinical evaluation process. In these situations, youth may require the engagement of larger systems of advocacy and support to move forward with the necessary support and care (Dubin et al., 2020).” (emphasis added).
The Appendix contains a “Summary Criteria for Adolescents” that further demonstrates that parents should be involved unless their involvement is deemed “harmful” or “not feasible” to their child’s medical transition. “Involvement of parent(s)/guardian(s) in the assessment process, unless their involvement is determined to be harmful to the adolescent or not feasible.”

Trans

Author Of New WPATH Guidelines Recommends Threatening Parents With Call To Child Protective Services

Gender Pronouns

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