Tide is turning on support for transgenderism, just in time for 'Pride Month'

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There was a point in time when nearly half the population was willing to accept the core claim of transgenderism: that an individual's sex and gender could differ. Title IX was transmogrified to enshrine this claim and virtually every federal agency and every major corporation ritually reiterate acceptance. However, it appears the masses are now beginning to walk back their support.

The Pew Research Center released a report Thursday indicating that 65% of American adults surveyed in April said that an individual's gender is biologically determined.

Ninety percent of Trump supporters and 39% of Biden supporters answered that gender is biologically determined. Among Biden supporters, this was also the answer given by 64% of black people, 46% of Hispanics, 32% of whites, and 27% of Asians.

'The share of voters who say that sex at birth determines whether someone is a man or a woman has increased since 2017.'

The rejection of social constructivists' core premise by two-thirds of registered voters represents a continuation of a multi-year trend.

"The share of voters who say that sex at birth determines whether someone is a man or a woman has increased since 2017, and this increase has occurred within both parties," said the report.

Pew indicated that in September 2017, 53% of registered voters said gender corresponds with biological sex. Forty-five percent alternatively said sex and gender can be distinct. In 2021, the percentage of Americans affirming that gender was determined by sex increased to 56%. The number rose another four percentage points in 2022.

Between 2017 and 2024, belief that gender and sex could be distinct slipped among Democrats and Democratic-leaning respondents by 9 percentage points. During the same time period, there was a 12-point drop in belief among those in the Republican or Republican-leaning camp, from 20% to 8%.

The majority of American voters, 56%, are also now apparently uncomfortable when it comes to the description of individuals using plural pronouns — "they" or "them" as opposed to "he" or "she."

While 66% of Biden supporters — including 69% of white, 68% of Hispanic, and 72% of Asian backers — don't mind referring to men or women as genderless pluralities, once again, black supporters are not with the program. Fifty-five percent of black Biden supporters expressed discomfort using "they/them" pronouns.

The supermajority of Trump supporters evidently would prefer to refer to people as they are, especially those 50 or older.

There have been other indications in recent months and years that support for the LGBT agenda has been waning.

The Public Religion Research Institute interviewed over 22,000 American adults last year for its so-called American Values Atlas and found that support for homosexual "marriage" dropped by 2 percentage points; support for nondiscrimination protections dropped by 4 points; and opposition to Americans refusing services based on their deeply held religious convictions dropped 5 points.

Melissa Deckman, CEO of the institute, told PBS News that the decline was "largely driven by party polarization." Deckman also attempted to associate the decline with so-called "Christian nationalism."

Blaze News previously noted that Canada has also witnessed a decline. A recent Ipsos survey indicated there were "precipitous drops" in support for so-called LGBT rights. Support for overt displays of sexual preferences and so-called gender identity dropped by 12% since 2021.

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BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales exposes 'grooming and indoctrination' at the Dallas Pride all-ages event

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Saturday marked the beginning of a month — and in some cases, a season — that LGBT activists across the West have devoted to the capital vice, pride. As in past years, the heart of Texas has not gone untouched by this devotion.

Over the weekend, activists once again took to the streets of Dallas to proudly signal their support for all things non-straight.

The Dallas Pride Committee indicated in its guidebook that this year's festivities were dedicated to transvestites who are supposedly "a visible target for extremists — from the halls of Congress to the state legislatures to the streets."

BlazeTV host and Defend Our Kids: Texas executive director Sara Gonzales went to the Dallas Pride Music Festival to get a better sense of the varieties of agitprop and obscenities Texan activists decided to expose minors to this time around.

The guidebook advertised "age-appropriate entertainment" at the Dallas Pride Music Festival's so-called Teen Pride and Family Pride Zone.

'There was no 'adults only' area — all the graphic content I captured was from the main event.'

Teen Pride subjected teens 13 and older to transvestite performers in highly sexualized costumes, "a dedicated area for Trans services and organization," and "empowerment discussions by Trust the Process" — a panel discussion centered on encouraging confused children to disassociate with their respective biological realities.

"The entire festival was billed as 'family friendly,' including the parade in which the announcer called people 'sluts' and made jokes about male genitalia," Gonzales told Blaze News. "There was no 'adults only' area — all the graphic content I captured was from the main event, where children were present and welcomed."

Gonzales shared footage of the supposedly family-friendly festivities on her show, "Sara Gonzales Unfiltered," as well as on X, revealing kids were exposed to various degrees of vulgarity and sexualized exhibitions.

The amplified voice of a speaker at the festival can be heard in the video saying, "Where are my bisexuals? They're not really bisexual. They're just sluts."

Later in the video, an event speaker says to the all-ages crowd, "Oh, Cox Automotive," referencing a DEI-captive company apparently advertised nearby. "Cox. Well, you're in good company. Except for the ladies who are a little grossed out by that."

Gonzales also captured images of children and families ambling by LGBT merchandise and banners emblazoned with the words, "Boo, you whore!"; "Is dick a carb?"; "F*** you"; "over worked & under f***ed"; "you my friends should have been swallowed"; "p***y power"; and "Slut." There was, of course, also LGBT activist apparel targeted at children, including rainbow "Paw Patrol" gear and transvestite flag T-shirts.

'Because it's not family friendly. It's not even adult friendly.'

Gonzales told Blaze News that the "overwhelming majority of children were attending the event with what appeared to be single mothers."

— (@)

"You know what's so funny?" Gonzales said on her BlazeTV show. "Every time I go, I'm like, 'I hate going to this.' I feel like I need an exorcism every time I leave. ... I don't understand how they can get away with saying this is 'family-friendly.' I go to the family friendly festivals. I go to them. I have never once seen any of this. None of it. None of it."

"I have never seen flags that say, 'P***y power.' Sorry, edit. Yeah, you're going to have to mute that," continued Gonzales. "You know why? Because it's not family friendly. It's not even adult friendly. I've never been to an all-ages family-friendly festival that has fans with the c-word on it or people dressed like that."

Minnesota state Rep. Walter Hudson (R) said in response to Gonzales' video, "It's 'family friendly' because, like with so many things, they've appropriated the word, changed its definition, and smuggled in the substitute without telling you. To them, 'family' means queer. So, they're just saying queer-friendly. It's that simple."

BlazeTV host Steve Deace responded with an illustration of Carthaginian child sacrifice.

Christin Bentley, Texas state Republican executive committeewoman for Senate District 1, noted, "If you think this is 'family friendly' ... you're a degenerate."

"The LGBT festivals happening across the country this month are just a reminder of how far society has degraded," Gonzales told Blaze News. "What was once unthinkable to bring children to participate in is now celebrated by the left. There is nothing else to call it other than grooming and indoctrination — and quite frankly, child abuse."

Defend Our Kids: Texas, the initiative Gonzales helms, is actively working to stop the sexualization of children in the Lone Star State, "whether it be from drag story hour for toddlers or pornographic literature in school libraries."

Gonzales emphasized that "our children are under attack."

'The quicker they can poison young minds, the more chaos they can create within the family unit.'

"While we were largely successful last session in getting several critical bills passed, there is more work to be done to ensure Texas children are free from the exploitation and sexualization from adults — whether it be parents, teachers, Pride parades, or otherwise."

The BlazeTV host indicated that the Pride-themed campaign underway is "straight out of the Communist Manifesto: a move to destroy the nuclear family."

"The quicker they can poison young minds, the more chaos they can create within the family unit," said Gonzales. "They very much want your children, and they've said as much. It is up to us to be vigilant and stop it."

While the Biden administration and corporations nationwide continue to lean into their respective pride devotions, it appears the general public is fast losing its appetite for the LGBT agenda.

After interviewing over 22,000 American adults for its so-called American Values Atlas last year, the Public Religion Research Institute found that support for LGBT policies had dropped for the first time. PBS News reported that support for homosexual "marriage" dropped by 2 percentage points; support for nondiscrimination protections dropped by 4 points; and opposition to Americans refusing services based on their deeply held religious convictions dropped 5 points.

In Canada, where the Trudeau government celebrates "Pride Season," a recent Ipsos survey indicated there were "precipitous drops" in support for so-called LGBT rights. Support for overt displays of sexual preferences and so-called gender identity dropped by 12% since 2021.

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Breastfeeding charity ousts trustees who sought to exclude men from its services

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La Leche League is a decades-old non-governmental organization present in nearly 90 countries whose stated mission is to help "mothers worldwide to breastfeed through mother-to-mother support, encouragement, information, and education."

LLL volunteers understand that breastfeeding is the most suitable source of nutrients for infants. Not only does naturally occurring breast milk help with human growth, it also helps stave off disease, accelerate immunity development, and aid in intestinal colonization.

Although breastfeeding is exclusively the province of women, gender ideologues keen to ignore the insuperable differences between the sexes apparently regard it it as yet another female space to invade. In recent years, radicals on both sides of the Atlantic have endeavored to do so by way of more make-believe, medical experimentation, and coercion.

LLL's U.S.-based board of directors recently informed the British wing of the lactation charity, which has over 70 groups across the U.K., that it must support "male lactation," according to the Telegraph. Accordingly, the LLLGB must cater to transvestic men who seek to have infants choke back their nausea medication-induced discharge.

The LLLGB was further informed that the charity's use of the term "mother" might amount to a "roadblock" and that doubts over gender ideology were "harmful."

Late last year, six of the LLGB's 12 trustees took a stand against the directors' attempt to insert mentally-compromised men into women's spaces nationwide, indicating that the demand contravened British law, which protects sex-segregated spaces. They implored the U.S.-based board to permit the organization to remain single-sex, as groups in Muslim countries and other nations resistant to gender ideology are permitted.

The international wing of the LLL responded in February, "We focus on providing breastfeeding support and understand the importance of making our spaces welcoming to all those who want to breastfeed or give their babies human milk."

"We don't argue with parents or other leaders about how they identify; we accept them with respect, just as they say they are, and do not refer to them with words that conflict with their identity," added LLLI.

For having dared to suggest that babies deserve real breast milk contra some drug-induced slurry from fetishists, the LLLI suspended the dissenting trustees, stating, "The continued promotion of LLL as an organization that excludes people is damaging to LLL's credibility."

One LLLGB trustee told the Telegraph, "Many breastfeeding supporters like me feel utterly disheartened by the way our charity has become obsessed and sidetracked by sex and gender issues. In the most recent diktat, we were informed that our charity is not and 'cannot become a single-sex' charity."

"We had already been told that the term 'mother' could be a 'roadblock'. Any attempt to question or debate these positions is hounded down as 'harmful,'" continued the trustee. "But these are not small changes or 'additive' terms to our messaging: it is fundamentally problematic to delivering on our philosophy as a charity. Crucially, it is not in the interests of mothers or babies."

The ousted trustees said in a statement obtained by the maternity care advocacy coalition With Woman, "La Leche League (LLL) has always been about mother-to-mother support to breastfeed. Being able to provide a female-only service is fundamental to the rights, safety and wellbeing of both mothers and babies."

"Pressure to abandon mother-only breastfeeding services has been building internationally at LLL for several years as gender-identity activism has gathered force," continued the statement. "We are now at the point that group leaders around the world are being told they must support 'male lactation.'"

The trustees indicated they have reached out to Britain's Charity Commission, which regulates registered charities in England and Wales. The Critic reported that the whistleblowers' report claims the charity is no longer acting in the beneficiaries' interest.

"We would like to reassure group leaders and the mothers who benefit from LLLGB's services that we are confident the law is on our side, as mother is a sex-based term in UK law," said the trustees.

A spokeswoman for the commission told the Telegraph, "We have received correspondence from groups of trustees, alerting us to a disagreement among the charity’s board about the way in which the charity delivers its services. We are assessing the information to determine whether this is a matter for the Commission as regulator to become involved in."

The U.K.-based Women's Rights Network said in a statement, "Let's call this what it is. An organisation helping men who want to put their nipples into babies' mouths, an suspending six trustees who rightly object. Babies should no be used to satisfy a male fetish. We applaud the LLL6."

It appears the LLL has been racing down the road to absurdity since at least 2020 when it said it supported "everyone who wants to breastfeed or chestfeed in reaching their goals. We do not discriminate based on sex, gender or gender identity. Trans men, trans women and non-binary individuals may choose to breastfeed or chestfeed their babies. You do not need to have given birth to breastfeed or chestfeed, as we can also see in the experiences of those nursing adopted babies."

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Radicals are targeting the esteemed doctor whose UK-commissioned report blew up the transgender narrative

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Dr. Hilary Cass is an award-winning British medical doctor who previously served as president of the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health. Esteemed in her field, politically innocuous, and a recipient of the Order of the British Empire, National Health Services England evidently figured Cass was the ideal candidate to lead an independent investigation into the U.K.'s sex-change regime and its youth-facing services.

Cass obliged them and started work on the review in 2020. Her landmark report — the product of roughly four years of penetrating investigation and analysis — came out earlier this month, transitioning public opinion and effectively putting a nail in the coffin of LGBT activists' narrative about so-called gender-affirming care.

The 388-page report not only indicated that the sex-change regime is built on weak and unreliable science but that if left unchecked, it has the potential to continue irreversibly damage minors, many of whom are, to begin with, likely incapable of properly consenting to sex-change medical interventions.

For daring to present the facts as they are contra what some may have hoped them to be, Cass has become a popular target for threats and smears by desperate gender ideologues and other leftist radicals.

The 66-year-old pediatrician recently told the Times (U.K.) that the most recent wave of backlash "started the day before the report came out when an influencer put up a picture of a list of papers that were apparently rejected for not being randomised control trials."

Among the fact-averse activists who seized upon the suggestion that the Cass report had failed to factor in various transgender narrative-affirming studies was Labor parliamentarian Dawn Butler. Butler told her fellow lawmakers in the House of Commons, "There are around 100 studies that have not been included in this Cass report and we need to know why."

Cass called Butler's assertion "completely wrong" and said it was "unforgivable" to undermine the report with such blatant falsehoods. The pediatrician told the Times that contrary to Butler's suggestion, researchers had gone through all of the activist-preferred studies, but pulled results from only 60 as the remainder were of inferior quality.

Butler eventually had to eat crow, apologizing in the British parliament, indicating she made the mistake of quoting a Stonewall briefing.

Last week I inadvertently misled the House by quoting a figure from a Stonewall briefing.\n\nI'm grateful for conversation with Dr Cass and am happy to correct the record because that's what politicians should do.\n\nI have more to say watch this space !
— (@)

Stonewall, of the U.K.'s most influential LGBT activist groups, has a knack for circulating false claims, having responded last month to NHS England's decision to end the prescription puberty blockers for children with the suggestion that luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone agonists, long used to chemically castrate sex offenders and known to deplete bone density, were "reversible."

Stonewall has also parroted the claim that "children as young as 2 recognise their trans identity."

"If you deliberately try to undermine a report that has looked at the evidence of children's healthcare, then that's unforgivable. You are putting children at risk by doing that," added Cass.

Cass has apparently also been flooded with abusive emails, such that security services have reportedly had to intervene with advice.

"There are some pretty vile emails coming in at the moment. Most of which my team is protecting me from, so I'm not getting to see them," she told the Times. Some of them contained "words I wouldn't put in a newspaper."

"What dismays me is just how childish the debate can become," continued the pediatrician. "If I don't agree with somebody then I'm called transphobic or a Terf [trans-exclusionary radical feminist]."

Apparently, the security services Cass has been dealing with figure some radicals may seek to do more than threaten the doctor online.

"I'm not going on public transport at the moment," she told the Times, "following security advice, which is inconvenient."

Cass drew the ire of radicals for noting in her report that:

  • the "systematic review showed no clear evidence that social transition in childhood has any positive or negative mental health outcomes, and relatively weak evidence for any effect in adolescence";
  • puberty blockers "exert their intended effect in suppressing puberty," but compromise bone density and have no apparent impact on "gender dysphoria or body satisfaction";
  • there is a dearth of consistent evidence about the "effect of puberty suppression on psychological or psychosocial wellbeing, cognitive development, cardio-metabolic risk or fertility";
  • there is a lack of high-quality research assessing the outcomes of hormone interventions in adolescents confused about their sex;
  • there is no evidence to support the popular claim amongst gender ideologues that cross-sex hormones reduce the elevated risk of deaths amongst those suffering from gender dysphoria;
  • clinicians are incapable of determining with certainty which prospective child victims might simply grow out of their confusion;
  • for "most young people, a medical pathway will not be the best way to manage their gender-related distress"; and
  • the so-called science regarding "gender-affirming care" is "an area of remarkably weak evidence" built on "shaky foundations."

Whereas Stonewall and leftists find the facts hard to digest, others have willingly admitted fault.

A group of 16 senior clinical psychologists penned a letter in the Guardian on April 21, noting, "Whether intentionally or not, and many were doing their best in an impossible situation, it was clinical psychologists who promoted an ideology that was almost impossible to challenge; who, as the Cass report found, largely failed to carry out proper assessments of troubled young people, and thus put many on an 'irreversible medical pathway' that in most cases was inappropriate; and who failed in their most basic duty to keep proper records."

They concluded, "We are ashamed of the role psychology has played [in gender-affirming care]."

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Christian family paid for a meet and greet with Disney's Evil Queen but wound up with 'a man dressed in drag'

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A conservative Christian family hazarded a visit to the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida, earlier this month, likely hoping to create some good memories. The parents shelled out hundreds of dollars for a dinner at Disney’s Wilderness Lodge and a meet and greet with the Evil Queen — also known as Queen Grimhilde — from the 1937 classic film "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs."

When time came for their close encounter at the lodge's Artist Point, the family discovered that the actor playing the queen was neither the fairest of them all nor one among the fairer sex, reported That Park Place's Jonas Campbell.

The father told That Park Place, "We've had other meet-and-greets with other Villains, and they are truly the best character experiences that we've ever had. So we had high hopes for the Evil Queen leading up."

"So we all walked over towards the Evil Queen area, and while my kids and wife were interacting with the character, I was doing some video and took a few pictures from about 10 feet away, then handed my iPhone over to the cast member to take some pics for me so I could get in the picture," continued the father. "It was kind of loud inside, so I couldn't really hear what the character was saying until I got face to face [typical conversation distance of a few feet], and then it hit me that the Evil Queen, without a doubt, had a man's voice."

According to the father, extra to speaking in a male-presenting voice disparate in kind and tone from that of the filmic feminine antagonist, the drag queen towered above his family without the need of any sort of platform.

That Park Place highlighted various videos online wherein the same actor can be seen reprising the role of the Evil Queen.

A family has reached out to That Park Place claiming they spent over $300 on a character meet and greet dinner at Walt Disney World... only to discover the Evil Queen character was almost certainly a biological male. This represents the first time we've heard of Disney using a\u2026
— (@)

The costly encounter with an actor ostensibly playing two roles proved too much for the father, who complained.

"I told my waiter that I had a problem with something. He then asked what was the issue, and I simply stated I have a problem with Evil Queen being a man dressed in drag. The waiter immediately said he was going to get a manager, and he looked panicked," the father told That Park Place. "At first, I said I wanted to formally complain about the Evil Queen being a man and that I felt very disrespected by Disney because this is not the sort of thing my family values and they didn’t give us any type of notice that this sort of thing was even a possibility."

The irate father who had just blown roughly $60 per meal apparently made clear to the manager the trip had altogether costed him $8,000, not to mention his previous expenditures on Disney-branded adventures.

"At one point, the manager stated, 'I can assure you that she is a woman,'" continued the father. "She went even further, trying to shame me, informing me that 'she' was so excited to get the part as the Evil Queen. For a brief moment, I thought, 'Oh ... maybe I’m wrong,' but then I realized that I was just being gaslighted."

When the father asked whether the queen was a man, the manager allegedly responded, "I'm sorry, sir, I cannot answer that."

Campbell told Blaze News that "if it weren't in a context where there were children present and it were something that was reasonably to be expected by guests of the Walt Disney Company — [a company] that has been so tied to traditional values for so long — then I think that there is a world in which that is acceptable in commerce."

The investigative reporter also noted that it is important to consider context and the type of costume when considering transvestism, as in the case of the hulking queen.

Campbell noted, for instance, that the Fantasmic fireworks show involves the Maleficent character pulling off some physical feats that might justify the use of a male performer. There's also the various masked characters, where the sex of the actor is immaterial — with the exception of the smaller, shorter characters, where size contra gender may be the determining factor in casting.

In the case of the Evil Queen at the Wilderness Lodge resort, the actor appears in videos to be bare-faced and playing a female role that Campbell suggested likely "has a lot of competition."

According to Campbell, it's uncommon and perhaps even a first to have a transvestite assuming an open-faced role in the Orlando parks, whereas in Disney's California parks, there have been multiple sightings of cross-dressing cast members.

Disney has a man in a dress working in the dress store for little girls at Disneyland. This is who Disney wants girls to see when they first walk in to pick out a dress.
— (@)

Campbell suggested that there is a meaningful difference between woke content on Disney+ and woke content or performances in the parks. If a parent accidentally turns on Disney's drag queen special or is watching "Muppet Babies" with a child and takes issue when the cross-dressing Gonzo begins to regurgitate social constructivist agitprop, then all the parent needs to do is shut off the TV or change the program.

When visiting Walt Disney World, on the other hand — which Campbell stressed was "an international location where many cultures are coming together to this specific resort, many of them are not paying attention to what is on TV, what is on Disney+ in the same way" — it is easier to get blindsided and emotionally trapped.

"All of a sudden you're in an intimate setting where your children are very excited to experience this thing, they get to meet their favorite character," said Campbell. "[Various sources told That Park Place] the children are unsettled when finding out that these things are not quite how you would expect them to be."

Campbell suggested that the conservative Christian father and others like him are oftentimes placed in a difficult situation where, in order to "stand up for their own religious beliefs or their own beliefs about what truth is in front of their kids," they end up having to "take something that is bright and shiny and desirable" away from their children.

John F. Trent, the editor in chief of That Park Place, told Blaze News that this "appears to be a continued pattern from the Walt Disney Company and its 'not-at-all-secret gay agenda' as the company's Latoya Raveneau confirmed in March 2022."

"It is clearly trying to target small children, their families, and even adults in an attempt to warp their minds into believing this objective evil is normal or even good," added Trent.

Blaze News reached out to Disney for comment but did not receive a response by deadline.

When asked what families considering a trip to Disney World might want to consider in light of the apparent threat of complicity in Disney's war on normalcy, Campbell told Blaze News, "First of all, prices at Walt Disney World are higher than they've ever been and are offering less and less value than they have for years. ... I'd recommend waiting a summer or finding something a little bit more welcome like these regional parks that are doing quite a good job."

"Dollywood, for instance, is a lovely park full of natural beauty. It's also welcoming to all guests even though they are very open to the fact that they do talk about God in the park," he said. "There are other options in the area. Universal, for instance, has been really stepping up their game, and I think a little competition for Disney with things like this is a good thing."

In the way of local alternatives, Blaze News previously reported that soon the Gospel Gardens at the 2,000-seat Basilica of Our Lady, Queen of the Universe nearby Walt Disney World will have a series of life-sized bronze sculptures of the Stations of the Cross — 14 representations of Christ's journey from his condemnation to his death and burial.

Further afield, there is the Ark Encounter in Williamstown, Kentucky — a full-size Noah's ark and creation museum — or the American Journey Experience in Irving, Texas — a museum containing more than 160,000 artifacts focusing on American history.

"I think that there are other options and of course, anything that has a family interacting together, spending time together, trying to do things that they enjoy together is a good thing," said Campbell.

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DeSantis tells Biden administration to pound sand: Florida 'will not comply' with woke Title IX rules



The Biden administration released its final Title IX regulations last week, effectively establishing "gender identity" as a protected class and requiring tens of thousands of schools across the country to embrace radical gender ideology, largely at the expense of girls.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) told the Democratic administration to pound sand Thursday, declaring the Sunshine State "will not comply."

Rules from radicals

According to the late Birch Bayh of Indiana, the Democratic senator who formally introduced Title IX to Congress in 1972, the purpose behind the original statute was to address institutional discrimination against women in federally funded education programs and activities.

The Biden administration — ostensibly stricken with a strain of social constructivism that has left it incapable of defining what a woman is and is not — infected Title IX with its philosophy last week, making changes that former Education Secretary Betsy DeVos told the National Review "guts the half century of protections and opportunities for women and callously replaces them with radical gender theory, as Biden's far-left political base demanded."

"I never thought I'd see the day where Title IX would be used to harm women, but sadly, that day has come," added DeVos.

Blaze News previously reported that under the new rules, sex discrimination now includes sexual preferences and "gender identity." Sex-based harassment now includes "harassment" on these bases.

The Biden Department of Education clarified that schools can no longer separate or treat people differently based on sex, stressing that preventing "someone from participating in school (including in sex-separate activities) consistent with their gender identity causes that person more than de minimis harm."

In effect, federally funded institutions and programs must allow trans-identifying men into women's locker rooms and restrooms. Those that refuse could face legal action.

DOE Secretary Miguel Cardona said in a statement, "These final regulations build on the legacy of Title IX by clarifying that all our nation's students can access schools that are safe, welcoming, and respect their rights."

'Where woke goes to die'

After securing a landslide re-election win in 2022 and swearing his oath of office on a Bible on loan from nationally syndicated radio host and cofounder of Blaze Media Glenn Beck, Republican Gov. DeSantis emphasized that "Florida is where woke goes to die."

DeSantis, who has so far made good on that pledge, doubled down Thursday, stating in a video, "Florida rejects Joe Biden's attempt to rewrite Title IX. We will not comply and will fight back."

"We are not going to let Joe Biden try to inject men into women's activities. We are not going to let Joe Biden undermine the rights of parents. And we are not going to let Joe Biden abuse his constitutional authority to try to impose these policies on us here in Florida," added the governor.

"We are not going to let Biden get away with it," continued DeSantis, whose state made the invasion of women's bathrooms by men a criminal offense last year. "We will not comply."

— (@)

Florida Education Commissioner Manny Diaz Jr. noted on X, "Biden's proposed changes will harm students and eliminate protections for girls at school. We will not fall in line with this radical agenda!"

Diaz noted Wednesday in a letter to superintendents, "At Governor Ron DeSantis' direction, no educational institutions should begin implementing any changes."

The education commissioner stressed that "instead of implementing Congress's clear directive to prevent discrimination based on biological sex, the Biden administration maims the statute beyond recognition" in an effort to "gaslight the country into believing that biological sex no longer has any meaning."

"In doing so, it seeks to commandeer Florida's educational institutions and force them to violate various federal and state laws, including the First Amendment and Florida's Parental Rights in Education Act, as well as statutes to protect students' privacy in bathrooms and locker rooms," continued Diaz. "In Florida, we respect parents’ rights to direct their children’s education. We protect our students’ safety and privacy. And we make sure every student is given the chance to thrive on and off campus. We will keep pressing to accomplish these goals."

Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody made clear that the Sunshine State would be challenging "this betrayal of women in court."

Biden\u2019s new Title IX rules shred protections for women\u2014that so many fought for over decades. The idea that young girls can now legally be forced to undress in the same room with males in what is supposed to be a safe space like a locker room, that a young woman could be randomly\u2026
— (@)

DeSantis' initiative was lauded by various conservatives and parental rights advocates.

State Rep. Fred Deutsch (R) of South Dakota said, "Every state should follow Florida's lead to reject Biden's rewrite of Title IX."

Nicky Neily, founder and president of Parents Defending Education, wrote, "We need more courageous leaders like Governor Ron DeSantis who reject and fight back against the Biden Administration's extreme Title IX changes."

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Scientific American pushes claims that science-based critiques of gender ideology are 'misinformation,' 'violence'



Gender ideologues have the Biden administration and multitudes of Democratic lawmakers across the country dutifully advancing their agenda and victimizing multitudes of Americans, but apparently that's not enough. They also appear keen to have the broader public buy into their narrative around sex, genital mutilations, and transgenderism.

In an effort to overcome or at the very least sidestep the common citizen's common sense, social constructivists have in recent decades attempted to mask their reality-defying philosophy in the language of science.

The trouble with this effort is that when exposed to actual scientific scrutiny, their claims have altogether failed to hold water. That has become especially clear in recent months where even Britain's National Health Service has pumped the brakes on so-called "gender-affirming care."

Faced with the collapse of their narrative, ideologues have worked to villainize critics and to reframe the debate about gender. On Friday, one such attempt was made in the pages of Scientific American, a 178-year-old science magazine published by the German-British Springer Nature Group.

Scientific American published an interview that originally appeared in OpenMind Magazine — former Discover magazine editor in chief Corey Powell's outlet that supposedly tackles "disinformation" in science.

The interview, originally made possible by a grant from the Pulitzer Center's aptly titled "Truth Decay" initiative, comprises an engagement between Powell and two transvestites, both of whom are self-identified activists: a French-Canadian man who calls himself Florence Ashley and describes himself as a "transfeminine activist, academic, and slut"; and Simon Dow-Kuang Sun, a senior fellow at the Center for Applied Transgender Studies in Chicago.

Blaze News previously reported that Ashley, an assistant professor at the University of Alberta Faculty of Law in Canada, wrote that where confused kids are concerned, "Unbounded social transition and ready access to puberty blockers ought to be treated as the default option, and support should be offered to parents who may have difficulty accepting their youth."

He claimed in an article for the leftist blog Truthout that efforts to protect children from irreversible puberty blockers, genital mutilations, and LGBT propaganda are "rooted in racism and white supremacy."

Ashley has also called for the decriminalization of rape by fraud, particularly in cases in which a transvestite has sex with a victim without indicating he isn't actually a woman as advertised.

Sun, unlike Ashley, actually has credentials as a scientist and has studied neuroplasticity. However, the credibility of his scientific declarations concerning gender ideology may not altogether be scientific.

In an article he co-authored last year with Ashley, Sun declared there is "no such thing as a male or female brain." Just months later, a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science revealed that a group of Stanford Medicine researchers identified "highly replicable, generalizable, and behaviorally relevant sex differences in human functional brain organization localized to the default mode network, striatum, and limbic network."

The framing of the interview in Scientific American made clear that science would be taking a back seat and that the aim was political.

Powell's interview is prefaced with the following statement: "In 2023 alone, more than 500 anti-trans bills were proposed or adopted in nearly every state in the United States, targeting everything from drag performances to gender-affirming medical care to school inclusion policies for trans people. Support for these measures has been enabled and propelled by scientific misinformation, which has proven to be a distressingly effective tool in outraging a public that might otherwise be broadly empathetic, or at least uncertain about where to stand."

After recycling the suggestion that the science informing legislation against sex change mutilations is "disinformation," Scientific American recirculated the suggestion by Sun that the notion there are "just two sexes" — characterized in the piece as "sex essentialism" — is "completely wrong about the biology of how sex characteristics arise."

"The error is simply that the gametes are a determining factor of sex — that once you know what gametes a person produces, that's their sex and nothing about it can change," claimed Sun. "But biology is a dynamic system where an organism starts in a particular state and grows through life and through development with multiple systems interacting. That is, more precisely, how sex works. Sex essentialism boils all that down to one, immutable characteristic to preclude transness as a biological phenomenon."

Ashley chimed in, saying, "The people who use ideas about biological sex against trans people are first appealing to the idea of biology as a description of difference, but then they do a jump and use that conception of biology as a form of meaning. The thing is, we organize society around meaning, not difference. Biology at its core can't tell you what matters to human organizations."

"We should really be asking what we care about, and then look to see if biology has anything to say about it. If you go through that exercise, then you realize that biology really has very little, if not virtually nothing, to say about things like trans rights," added Ashley.

The Canadian activist went on to intimate that when a scientist interprets empirical results in a way that hurts the transgender narrative, he or she is committing "epistemological violence."

"Epistemological violence occurs when a researcher or somebody else interprets empirical results in a way that devalues, pathologizes, or harms a marginalized group, even though there are equally good or better explanations for the same data," said Ashley.

Ashley then noted in the interview, "We should try to interpret the data in a way that's compatible with their inclusion and well-being, if that's an equally good interpretation."

The interview concluded with a call for shutting down undesirable speech.

"Shut down misinformation and hate when you see it crop up around you," Ashley told Powell. "Oftentimes we don't like confrontation, so we just let misinformation go. We need people to start speaking up whenever it comes up. And be loud. We’re in an ecosystem where the anti-trans voices are trying to portray themselves as speaking for a silent majority. We need people to be loud enough to counter any impression of a silent majority.

While Scientific American claims it is "committed to sharing trustworthy knowledge" and "enhancing our understanding," it has also indicated it is committed to "advancing social justice." It appears these commitments are not equally weighted.

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Blaze News investigates: A child was removed by a red state following complaints over Christian views deemed sickening

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Blue states abound with efforts to encroach on parental rights and to put distance between parents and children. It may, however, be a mistake to presume that residency in a red state with a Republican trifecta and a parental bill of rights in effect could offer any guarantee of relative protection.

The Indiana Department of Child Services had a male minor suffering from both anorexia and gender dysphoria removed from the custody of his loving, traditional Catholic parents in 2021, even though Mary and Jeremy Cox were getting him help.

The Coxes' refusal to compromise on their deeply held religious convictions and affirm the so-called transgender identity of their 16-year-old son appears to have been a driving factor behind both the DCS' initial investigation into the family and the state's subsequent efforts to keep the teen — referred to as A.C. in court documents — out of his familial home.

The parents fought the state every step of the way but had no luck in the trial court or the appellate court.

Seeking to help the Coxes find redress, the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty and attorney Joshua Hershberger of the Hershberger Law Office petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the parents' case last year, warning that similar cases were bound to recur "due to developing conflicts between parents and their children concerning gender identity."

The high court ultimately declined to decide whether the Coxes, a software engineer and a clinical studies manager with a master of science degree in biochemistry and molecular biology, should have lost custody of their son.

That declination could prove consequential, not just for other vulnerable children but for parental rights across the country.

Fallout and revisionism

Media reports following the high court's declination on March 18 frequently recirculated vulgar remarks attributed to the Coxes that were found to be unsubstantiated.

Mainstream reports also parroted the narrative advanced by the state in its counter-brief and in the public statements attributed to Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita (R), which together went along the lines of: A.C. was sick and not receiving the care he needed while in the custody of his parents. Beneficent agents of the state saw it as their duty to intervene, not because of the parents' reality-affirming and tradition-informed beliefs but because A.C. would be better served outside of their home and sphere of influence.

Even without mediation by the mainstream press, the state's position has resonated with some legal scholars.

Following a quick read of the briefs filed with the Supreme Court, law professor Aviva Orenstein, the Karen Lake Buttrey and Donald W. Buttrey Chair at Indiana University Bloomington's Maurer School of Law, told Blaze News, "Religious beliefs can't be a protection for abusive behavior, and frankly, what the state alleged — which was not accepted by the other side, so you know, we have to dig deeper — it sounded pretty credible to me: that the parents were being abusive towards this child."

Court documents and attorneys for the family have painted a different and altogether more convincing picture — one in which the Coxes' case was a significant battle lost in the ongoing war over parental rights.

"In my view, the state has simply ignored the facts of the case," Hershberger told Blaze News. "The line has been, 'It's about the eating disorder, not about the transgender identity,' and yet the trial court barred [the parents] from speaking about the entire topic of gender identity. In fact, one of the key reasons in the motion asking for removal was that the parents had not accepted LGBTQ resources on parenting [transgender] children."

Other parental rights advocates and religious groups are confident this custody battle was from the outset ideologically driven — not least because it's become increasingly clear in recent months that so-called "gender-affirming care" is largely based, at best, on pseudoscience — calling the whole ordeal a "moral and legal outrage."

While so far unsuccessful, the Coxes' saga has also prompted legislative efforts to ensure that something comparable does not recur in the Hoosier State.

Although the past is disputed and the future is uncertain, Mary and Jeremy Cox know now that they must "continue to advocate for state policies and laws that protect parental rights, the free exercise of religion, and free speech" so that "parents of faith can raise their children without fear of state officials knocking on their doors and taking their children."

Raising the alarm

Bishop Timothy Doherty, who oversees the Dioceses of Lafayette-in-Indiana, refrained from commenting on the case, except to note that he finds it "problematic that much of Catholic teaching is characterized as 'religious,' when so many directives are based on reason."

Dr. Bill Donohue, president of the Catholic League, did not similarly hold back, telling Blaze News, "It is a fundamental principle in Western jurisprudence that children do not belong to the state — they belong to parents. This principle cannot be overridden save for the most egregious of instances."

"What happened to Mary and Jeremy Cox is a moral and legal outrage," stressed Donohue.

Donohue suggested that if "Indiana can, in effect, legally kidnap kids," the outlook appears to be especially bleak in liberal states such as New York and California.

"Not only is this an ominous sign for Catholics, it is a bad omen for people of all faiths," continued Donohue.

Alvin Lui, the president of the parental rights advocacy group Courage Is a Habit, underscored that the risk is shared by all parents out of step with the ideological fads of the day.

"The religious families are the first to be targeted, especially Christian and Catholic families, but this is being extended to any families who do not follow whatever the current Marxist or woke agenda is," Lui told Blaze News. "Parents must come to the sobering fact that we can no longer depend on anyone else to protect our kids. We have to take a strong stand BEFORE tragedy arrives at our doorstep."

Lui has campaigned in recent months against proposed legislation in Maine and other states that would serve to separate children from parents if those kids are said to be seeking "gender-affirming care." He has elsewhere shared parental strategies for protecting kids.

The parental rights advocate added, "The transgender cult and the people funding them do not care about the Constitution. They want it completely abolished because they're a big part of the cultural revolution to dismantle America."

Losing a child

A.C. notified his parents in December 2019 that he identified as a girl. He requested to be referred to both by a new name and by pronouns corresponding to his new feminine persona.

Besides an apparent case of gender dysphoria, A.C. also suffered from anorexia — a condition that worsened while he was away at an ostensibly woke residential high school, the Indiana Academy of Science, Mathematics, and Humanities on the Ball State University campus.

As indicated in their September 2023 petition for writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court, Mary and Jeremy Cox pursued therapeutic help for their son by February 2020. After ten months of therapeutic care, the parents apparently sought out a new therapist for "substantial assistance with the identity issue or with family dynamics."

Having monitored A.C.'s weight while he was away at school and observed a worsening trend, the Coxes decided to un-enroll him after the 2020-2021 school year and sign him up for a different school.

After a wellness check with his primary care physician in April 2021, A.C. was apparently referred to a specialist on eating disorders, then underwent a psycho-social assessment. Mary Cox subsequently scheduled a full mental health evaluation for her son on June 3, 2021.

Becket and Hershberger noted in the petition that "in seeking treatment for concerns about A.C.'s weight loss and eating habits, the Parents followed the recommendations of A.C.'s primary care physician. Throughout this period, the Parents engaged in conversations with A.C. concerning their religious beliefs and gender identity and attempted to find middle ground by using the nickname 'A.'"

Hershberger told Blaze News, "They did everything to try to meet [A.C.] in the middle, trying to understand how to even use the term 'they.' They're also meeting all of his medical, educational and mental health needs. They recognize the problem is his eating habit. They were following their doctor's recommendation and they had in fact scheduled an appointment with a specialist prior to the state intervening in their home."

Evidently, someone outside the home figured A.C.'s parents for villains who, despite proactively taking these steps, still refused to affirm the boy's so-called gender identity.

According to the state's counter-brief, the DCS started its case against the Coxes in May 2021 after receiving two reports that the parents "were suspected of abusing or neglecting their child, A.C. One report alleged that Mother was using 'rude and demeaning language' toward A.C. 'regarding Child’s transgender identity.'"

"The second report, just ten days later, alleged that parents were 'verbally and emotionally abusing Child because they do not accept Child's transgender identity,' and that 'the abuse was getting worse,'" claimed the counter-brief.

These allegations — suggestive of a conflation of the parents' views on gender ideology with abuse from the start — were later dropped, but not until months after they served the purpose of excusing interference on the part of the state.

A DCS family case manager investigated the misleading reports, met with the Coxes, and spoke with an employee at the boy's school. The department then initiated a proceeding on the basis of the neglect and abuse allegations.

The trial court heard that the boy's parents were allegedly not getting him treatment and that he had thoughts of self-harm because his "gender identity was 'not being accepted'" and he had been removed from school, said the counter-brief.

Jeremy Cox told the court in turn that he and his wife had deeply held religious beliefs on gender and had previously sought therapeutic treatment for their son. The parents further noted that their son had other medical problems, largely tying back to his anorexia.

The DCS underscored at the initial detention hearing, "We just feel that at this point in time this child needs to be in a home that's not going to teach her that trans, like everything about transgender … tell her how she should think and how she should feel. However, she should be in a home where she is excepted [sic] for who she is."

Hershberger told Blaze News that the DCS "specifically argued that the child should be in a home … that would verbally affirm the child's transgender identity in contrast to the parents' religious beliefs."

The trial court issued an initial order in which it preliminarily concluded there was probable cause to believe that A.C. was a Child In Need of Service and ordered the teen removed from the Coxes' custody in June 2021. The court allowed the parents to visit their child for a few hours unsupervised once a week "so long as certain topics are not addressed," namely their views on gender ideology.

Hershberger and Becket summarized the result thusly: "The trial court removed A.C. from fit parents, held that their beliefs and best judgment equaled neglect, shut down meaningful conversation about their core disagreement even in therapy (until the Parents requested clarification), and limited visitation to a few hours one day a week."

In the months that followed, A.C.’s condition worsened significantly whilst in state custody, such that he reached a weight of just 100 pounds and was allegedly at risk of brain and bone injury. Despite his illness, A.C. did not believe that he needed any treatment.

At a later trial court hearing, all parties agreed to drop the "unsubstantiated" allegations of neglect and abuse against the parents. The court accepted the dismissal in November 2021 as well as the understanding that A.C. posed a danger to himself. The recognition that the Coxes were, after all, fit parents did not, however, reunify their family and enable them to resume caring for their son.

At a Dec. 8, 2021, dispositional hearing, the DCS allegedly testified that the disagreement between the Coxes and A.C. over transgenderism remained a barrier to his return home.

The parents appealed the case to the Indiana Court of Appeals, taking issue also with the trial court's prohibition on their ability to speak forthrightly with their son.

In October 2022, the appellate court ruled that the trial court's decisions were not in violation of the state and federal constitutions.

"The Parents have the right to exercise their religious beliefs," said the appellate court, "but they do not have the right to exercise them in a manner that causes physical or emotional harm to the child."

The Indiana Court of Appeals concluded that while the Coxes were fit parents, the familial disagreement over the boy's gender identity was exacerbating his eating disorder.

The Indiana Supreme Court declined to hear the case.

Pinning high hopes on the high court

Running short on options, the Coxes fought to put their case before the U.S. Supreme Court, presenting the following questions:

  • Whether a prior restraint barring a religious parent's speech about the topic of sex and gender with their child while allowing and even requiring speech on the same topic from a different viewpoint violates the Free Speech or Free Exercise clause of the First Amendment; and
  • Whether a trial court's order removing a child from fit parents without a particularized finding of neglect or abuse violates their right to the care, custody, and control of their child under the Fourteenth Amendment.

The petition for a writ of certiorari filed on behalf of the Coxes emphasized that their faith "does not prevent them from using nicknames or attempting to work and live with others that hold different beliefs; however, their faith requires them to refrain from speaking in a manner that their faith instructs is immoral, dishonest, or harmful."

Moreover, the petition indicated that "in addition to the Parents' religious views, based on scientific evidence and their own experience as parents, M.C. and J.C. believe that using crossgender pronouns or names inconsistent with a child's biological sex is not in a child’s best interest."

Becket and Hershberger stressed in the petition that, "Given the facts of this case and the arbitrary and almost absolute power it grants to juvenile courts over custody and parental speech, no parent in Indiana — and especially no parent with a child that struggles with mental health issues — should sleep easy tonight."

The Heritage Defense Foundation, a Christian advocacy group, evidently agreed, noting in its amicus brief in support of the Coxes that "left unaddressed, the violation at issue will destabilize the bedrock of society and foster anxiety among parents across the country regarding the security of their parental rights."

"Where the parents have not been determined to be or to have been abusive or neglectful, the state has no jurisdiction to override the decision-making of the parents regarding what is in the best interests of their child. 'The child is not the mere creature of the State,'" continued the HDF.

"If custody by parents is always subject to the will of the state, even when the parents have committed no wrong, parents become mere servants of the state," added the HDF. "The state and its bureaucrats become the arbitrary micro-managers of every family, controlling them with the implied threat: 'Do what the current political administration says or lose your children.'"

Concerning the parents' last-ditch legal effort, Lori Windham, vice president and senior counsel at Becket, and Hershberger said in a joint statement, "We are confident that the Supreme Court will ultimately protect this basic right and ensure that parents can raise their children consistent with their religious beliefs."

The Coxes stated, "We love our son and wanted to care for him, but the state of Indiana robbed us of that opportunity by taking him from our home and banning us from speaking to him about gender."

"We are hopeful that the justices will take our case and protect other parents from having to endure the nightmare we did," they added.

The state alternatively argued that the case, which involved no damages claim, was moot now that A.C. had aged out of foster care and no relief could be given; that the temporary speech restriction was lawful; that the appellate court's holdings did not conflict with the decisions of any other court; and that there was "no prospect that the narrow factual issues here will reoccur."

Another setback

The Supreme Court ultimately declined to take up the case last month.

The Coxes said in response, "No other loving parents should have to endure what we did. The pain of having our son taken from our home and kept from our care because of our beliefs will stay with us forever."

The bereaved couple added, "We can't change the past, but we will continue to fight for a future where parents of faith can raise their children without fear of state officials knocking on their doors and taking their children."

Hershberger said in a statement to Blaze News that while "SCOTUS denied the Petition of Mary and Jeremy Cox, we did accomplish the goal of placing this fact pattern in front of SCOTUS as a real and growing threat to parental rights, freedom of religion, and free speech."

"These constitutional principles represent a cause — not just a case — and we will continue to advocate for that cause in law and culture,” added the attorney, who is also a teaching pastor in southeast Indiana.

Joe Davis, a former litigator at Jones Walker LLP who now serves as legal counsel at Becket, emphasized to Blaze News that the case amounted to "every parent's worst nightmare" and a "shocking and chilling attack on parental rights." He indicated that absent a ruling from the Supreme Court, those keen to break up families will be furthered emboldened.

Mary Cox confirmed to Blaze News that she and Jeremy Cox have separately sued the DCS and the case workers for "making false statements about family in their initial report and court documents."

State sympathies

Following the exhaustion of the Coxes' legal options, the Indiana Attorney General's Office directed Blaze News to Rokita's February statement to mainstream publications, where he said, "We always protect parental rights and religious liberty."

"Neither we nor the Indiana courts believe that the State can remove a child because of a parent's religious beliefs, views about gender identity, or anything of the sort. Our office is fulfilling our statutory duty to defend this state agency and to keep an oath I swore when I took office," said Rokita, a Catholic Republican whose office underscored he has made a habit of fighting "transanity."

"As the record shows, this state agency acted not on the use of pronouns but because of the child's extreme eating disorder," said Rokita, who is legally obligated to defend state agencies in court.

While Rokita retroactively disentangled the two concerns, the Department of Child Services clearly acted early on because of pronoun use and the corresponding gender affirmations. The state even noted in its counter-brief that the family case manager had expressed concern to the trial court that A.C. had "thoughts of self-harm because the child's gender identity was 'not being accepted.'" Removal was clearly perceived as a way of landing A.C. in an environment where his gender dysphoria would be ideologically buttressed.

"The Indiana governor sets DCS policy and hires those employees," continued Rokita. "I am very sympathetic to the parents, and everyone who follows my work as attorney general knows that I am the biggest defender and proponent of parental rights."

Mary Cox told Blaze New that "the state ignored the clear and undisputed facts of the case and decided to defend a government agency that forced its ideology on parents rather than defend parental rights."

Blaze News reached out to the DCS for comment but did receive a response by deadline.

The DCS has, however, previously stated that when evaluating a child's best interest, it endeavors to make a "holistic evaluation of the child's physical and mental health and environment."

"DCS does not — and will not — pursue a case solely on a parent's choice not to affirm their child's gender identity," added the department.

Removal-affirming care

Professor Orenstein of the Maurer School of Law suggested that the state's case was well argued and dismissed religious conservatives' alternative framing.

"We're getting to the point where if you wave the flag of religion, you can do what you want," said Orenstein, who has served as a court-appointed special advocate for abused and neglected children. "At some point, this cannot be the trump card to everything — that 'these are my religious beliefs.'"

When asked whether a refusal to affirm a child's so-called gender identity would qualify under state law as neglect, Orenstein responded, "I don't think per se."

"It's okay for parents not to jump immediately on board," continued the professor. However, if a child is in danger, and it is "very clear the kid's behavior is connected to what the parents are doing," the professor suggested the state has an obligation to intervene.

In the case of such an ideological disagreement with a teenager — particularly a disagreement that has obvious health consequences — Orenstein suggested "you should let the person decide." Failing to defer to a child on such matters might otherwise register as "an elemental lack of respect for the child's personhood, but that goes along with conservative religious values in a very patriarchal system. You know, that is, 'I am the parent and I am in charge.'"

In conversation with Orenstein, Blaze News raised the matter of California Gov. Gavin Newsom's September refusal to ratify Assembly Bill 957, a bill that would have had courts factor in a parent's affirmation of the child's gender identity when determining the best interests of a child in a child custody or visitation proceeding. At the time, Newsom expressed concern that such a law could set a precedent that might be weaponized, in turn, against minorities by "other-minded officials."

When asked whether the Coxes' case might be used as a template by bad actors or "other-minded officials" against other parents with deeply held convictions, including progressive parents, Orenstein suggested that when it comes to political conservatives, "there's no low too low. Would this be a talking point? Perhaps. Would it be a good argument? No."

G. David Caudill, founder and executive director of the LGBT activist organization Equality Indiana, suggested that critics' concerns about the results of the matter "are exaggerated."

Having been asked to comment about concerns that child services might be weaponized against families with viewpoints regarded as undesirable to the state, Caudill said, "The use of the word 'weaponized' in regards to governmental actions is used by extremists when they dislike the results of that governmental action. The word 'weaponized' is a buzzword used to rile up and rally their activist base and voters."

The final word

Mary Cox torpedoed the insinuation that concerns about the DCS' weaponization amount to empty rhetoric. She said in a written reply to Blaze News, "DCS testified at the initial hearing: 'We just feel that at this point in time this child needs to be in a home that's not going to teach her that trans, like everything about transgender — tell her how she should think and how she should feel.'"

"This is not just a risk. This is a reality," said Mrs. Cox.

"We are gravely concerned that our case will be used against other Indiana parents," continued the Christian mother. "Further, as we explained in our petition to SCOTUS, several states have passed laws allowing state agencies to remove or hide children from their parents if the parents do not agree to 'gender-affirming care.' And Abigail Martinez, a mother from California that endured a similar case, filed an amicus brief with SCOTUS on our behalf."

Blaze News previously detailed Martinez's claims that the government of Los Angels County encouraged her daughter to identify as male, to sign up for sex-change treatments, and to be placed in foster care. The young girl, who was battling depression, ultimately committed suicide.

Mrs. Cox stressed that this is not a problem that only traditional Christians should worry about.

Like Lui and Donohue, she noted that "teachings around family life and human sexuality lie at the heart of most religions. For this reason, parents of any religion or no religion at all that hold to a traditional view of gender should be concerned."

"No other loving parents should have to endure what we did," said Mrs. Cox.

Mrs. Cox indicated that readers ought to know that "if this can happen in Indiana, it can happen anywhere. We lost custody of our child because we disagreed with the state about gender, and it could happen to your family as well. We need to work together to ensure that parental rights are protected in law and culture."

Cox Family Testimonial Videoyoutu.be

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Trudeau-appointed Supreme Court justice opts for 'person with a vagina' rather than 'woman' in rape case

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Leftists captive to radical gender ideology routinely engage in mental gymnastics in order to reference the very immutable realities they seek to undermine.

The Biden administration replaced the term "mother" with "birthing person" in a public health section of a 2022 budget. Rather than use the word "woman," Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) opted instead for "menstruating people."

It appears social constructivism has had a similar impact north of the border.

A Trudeau appointee on the Supreme Court of Canada recently took issue with a lower court's use of the word "woman." According to Justice Sheilah Martin, it would have been less confusing for an officer of the court to refer to a female rape victim — in a case that was not involving transvestites or non-straights — as a "person with a vagina."

Critics have roundly ridiculed the Canadian high court over its embrace of woke language conventions, especially when dealing with a case as serious as rape.

Background

The court took up two separate and unrelated rape cases linked only because the "Court of Appeals overturned the convictions on the basis of alleged errors of law in the trial judges' credibility and reliability assessments."

According to the Court of Appeals, the "trial judges erred in law by making assumptions about human behavior not grounded in the evidence."

One of the cases concerned Christopher James Kruk's rape conviction. Kruk reportedly found a woman "intoxicated, lost, and distressed one night in downtown Vancouver." He took her to his house where he claimed she spilled water on herself then passed out with her pants around her ankles. The victim testified that she woke up to find herself in a state of undress with Kruk actively violating her.

The trial judge stated, "[The complainant's] evidence is devoid of detail, yet she claims to be certain that she was not mistaken. She said she felt [Mr. Kruk's] penis inside her and she knew what she was feeling. In short, her tactile sense was engaged. It is extremely unlikely that a woman would be mistaken about that feeling."

The Court of Appeals indicated that the trial judge in Kruk's case erred in concluding that it would be unlikely a woman would be mistaken about the feeling of being raped.

'Engender[ing] confusion'

The Canadian Supreme Court overrode the Court of Appeals and upheld the original conviction at trial in its Friday ruling.

While Justice Martin agreed the trial judge's "conclusion was grounded in his assessment of the complainant's testimony," she took issue with his language.

Martin wrote that the trial judge's choice "to use the words 'a woman' may have been unfortunate and engendered confusion."

The judge, a former recipient of the YWCA's Advancement of Women Award, made sure to use her preferred turn of phrase in the same section, writing, "Where a person with a vagina testifies credibly and with certainty that they felt penile‑vaginal penetration, a trial judge must be entitled to conclude that they are unlikely to be mistaken."

The female justice did not appear to provide any explanation for why the word "woman" might create confusion in a case concerning a man's alleged rape of a woman. However, it has been suggested she may have been attempting to address what she called "an improper generalization" between women in general and the victim.

Nevertheless, the Trudeau appointee's use of the term "person with a vagina" is the first such usage in a Canadian judicial decision, reported the National Post.

Following the Friday decision, the high court and Martin, a "person with a vagina," were roundly ridiculed.

Conservative parliamentarian Melissa Lantsman responded to the ruling, writing, "No, there is nothing confusing about the word 'woman,' it's common sense. It's not hateful, bigoted, wrong or unfair in anyway. This is just complete nonsense that moves nothing forward. It's not 'progress.'"

The X user Wall Street Silver wrote, "Everything ok up there Canada? We are sort of worried about you guys."

Libs of TikTok tweeted, "RIP Canada."

The Toronto Sun highlighted that two days after the ruling, the Supreme Court of Canada posted a possibly confusing message to social media honoring female judges.

"March 10, we celebrate International Day of Women Judges, which recognized the importance of the full and equal participation of women at all levels of the judiciary," said the post, which featured an image of Martin.

March 10, we celebrate International Day of Women Judges, which recognized the importance of the full and equal participation of women at all levels of the judiciary.\n\n\ud83d\udcf8 Justices Moreau, O\u2019Bonsawin, Karakatsanis, C\u00f4t\u00e9 and Martin
— (@)

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'On the inside, I am a lesbian': Male Spanish soldiers are legally changing genders to get women's benefits

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Women in the Spanish military reportedly enjoy various benefits on account of their sex — such as boosted pay, improved pensions, and better sleeping arrangements. A handful of male soldiers have figured out a novel way to address this systematic inequality: claim to be women.

According to the Spanish newspaper El Español, male soldiers have begun to exploit the "Trans Law," which socialist parliamentarians managed to pass in early 2023 despite strong opposition from conservatives and feminists.

Under the new law, men no longer need to take cross-sex hormones for two years or undergo medical evaluations in order to call themselves "women." Now, they just have to fill out some paperwork and formally request that their ID card and passport reflect their preferred gender identity.

The Telegraph highlighted how the passage of this law coincided with the rollout of added benefits for women in the military and in the security forces as a means to drive up female recruitment.

Ostensibly seeking to exploit the one law in order to enjoy the fruits of the other, 41 men in the Spanish territory of Ceuta in North Africa have legally changed their gender identifiers in the last year. The majority of these newly minted "women" are serving in the military or the police. Only four of the men bothered to legally change their names, and there is no indication that anyone has changed their marital status, according to El Español.

Roberto Perdigones, one of the men now listed on official documents as a woman, is a 35-year-old corporal in the army stationed in Ceuta. Perdigones has a beard, male genitalia, a biological son, and a strong physical attraction to women.

Perdigones told El Español, "On the outside, I feel like a heterosexual man, but on the inside, I am a lesbian. And it is the latter that counts. This is why I made the legal change to become a woman."

Perdigones indicated that "affirmative action measures" incentivized men to switch genders on their documentation.

Since first identifying as a woman last year, he claims he has acquired improved sleeping quarters, his own bathroom, and a fatter paycheck.

"For changing my gender, I have been told that my pension has gone up because women get more to compensate for inequality," Perdigones told El Español. "I also get 15 per cent more salary for being a mother."

"I even have a private room in the barracks, all to myself, with a private bathroom," continued the corporal. "This is because I cannot be with men as I am a woman, and I did not consider it appropriate to be with biological women out of respect for them."

In addition to better accommodations and pay, Perdigones does not have to abide by the hair and jewelry restrictions imposed on male soldiers.

Outside the military, Perdigones told the paper that there are additional benefits. For starters, when applying for various police and security roles, he only has to satisfy the requirements set in women-specific physical tests, which reportedly tend to be less demanding. His status as a woman also gives him a fighting chance in custody battles over his son.

An unidentified officer with Spain's civil guard, one of the country's two national police forces, told the Spanish newspaper that some of his colleagues have been exploiting the "Trans Law" as a "kind of rebellion" against such leftist policies.

"I have already seen several cases among my colleagues, and it is going to increase, because there are quite a few people who have requested it and are in the process," said the officer. "So, from time to time, the number is going to be much higher."

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