Speaker 1: Al Zone Media.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Dick It Happened Here, a podcast that is
Speaker 2: in no small part about the increasing and escalating series
Speaker 2: of anti trans laws being passed around the country. It's
Speaker 2: another one of those episodes. Things are getting worse, things
Speaker 2: are also getting weird. And with me to talk about
Speaker 2: worse and weird is Kay and Lee from Health Liberation
Speaker 2: Now welcome to the show.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I'm excited to talk to you both because, Okay, very
Speaker 2: very odd stuff has been happening. So the main reason
Speaker 2: I wanted to have yout you on is to talk
Speaker 2: about the stuff that's been happening in Ohio. So for
Speaker 2: people who are unaware, Ohio's legislature has been trying to
Speaker 2: pass a very draconian ban on all gender firm macare
Speaker 2: for minors. The States Republican governor vetoed the bill and
Speaker 2: this was for about one day. There was a lot
Speaker 2: of sort of like liberal cheering about like ah, compassionate Republicans,
Speaker 2: blah blah, blah blah. And then immediately after that, like
Speaker 2: like like the next day, when all of all of
Speaker 2: us we haven't even like we hadn't even really gotten
Speaker 2: into the weight hold on He's going to do something else. Uh.
Speaker 2: The thing that Dwine did is is, you know, and
Speaker 2: this is this is being framed as like an attempt
Speaker 2: to stave off the veto, which hasn't worked so far,
Speaker 2: but he immediately implemented a bunch of rules that say
Speaker 2: that in order to get gender firming care, and this
Speaker 2: is true of both miners and adults, which makes it
Speaker 2: in a lot of ways more draconian than the actual bill.
Speaker 2: It's quote unquote supposed to be preventing like getting passed.
Speaker 2: If you want to get gender refirming care, you need
Speaker 2: recommendations from a psychiatrist, an endocrinologist, and a bioethicist. And
Speaker 2: also all gender firmingcare in the state has to be
Speaker 2: reported to the government there and there's like other stuff too.
Speaker 2: So this is the technical term for this is this
Speaker 2: is extremely bad.
Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, yeah, I mean he also signed an executive
Speaker 4: order just banning surgery for everyone under eighteen too. Yeah,
Speaker 4: so yeah, yeah, I mean also I think I believe
Speaker 4: it was like everyone under twenty one also had to
Speaker 4: go through six months of counseling as well.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, at least six months of counseling. Yeah, there's
Speaker 3: no upper.
Speaker 5: Cap mm hmm.
Speaker 4: And like a lot of this was the wine and
Speaker 4: his spokespeople have ended up like justifying a lot of this,
Speaker 4: like trying to use language from clinicians working at clinics
Speaker 4: in Ohio that see trans youth and be like, well,
Speaker 4: you know, they're taking this comprehensive, multidisciplinary approach, and most
Speaker 4: of the people they see like get counseling instead of
Speaker 4: medical transitions. So they're actually like using a lot of
Speaker 4: the testimony against the band to try to justify these
Speaker 4: rules and regulations. And I don't think they're acting in
Speaker 4: good faith because when you actually like look at the details,
Speaker 4: are like, well, this would basically make it almost impossible
Speaker 4: for anyone at any age to transition. But it's like,
Speaker 4: you know, it's a very sneaky smart move, right, like
Speaker 4: being like, oh, look, we're trying to find a compromise.
Speaker 4: We're trying to make sure everyone gets good healthcare, and
Speaker 4: you know, unfortunately sometimes liberals and liberal media I'll just
Speaker 4: kind of eat that up without really looking at the details.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And one of the things that's happening here too
Speaker 2: is that so the US, where in places where there's
Speaker 2: pretty good access to gender affirming healthcare, it works off
Speaker 2: of something called informed consent and informed consent is like, okay,
Speaker 2: so you go there, they tell you what is going
Speaker 2: to happen, and you talk you talk to like a
Speaker 2: nurse or a doctor, and then once you know the
Speaker 2: life like what you're actually getting into, you say yes
Speaker 2: or no if you want to do something right, and
Speaker 2: you know, this is a this is a pretty good system.
Speaker 2: It still can be really annoying to navigate because of
Speaker 2: insurance stuff, and you know, like there's definitely problems with it,
Speaker 2: but it's a it's a much better system that exists
Speaker 2: in a lot of places. And you know, I think
Speaker 2: there have been two sets of comparisons about what these
Speaker 2: restrictions look like. And we're going to get to the
Speaker 2: comparisons to uh TARP restrictions on abortion in a second,
Speaker 2: but I want to talk about another thing that these
Speaker 2: restrictions strike me as very similar to, which is the
Speaker 2: British system. And the way the British system works is
Speaker 2: you get put on a wait list and then you die,
Speaker 2: or you go to our media like those are those
Speaker 2: are your options?
Speaker 3: Right?
Speaker 2: Or or you're really wealthy and you can you can
Speaker 2: bypass the public healthcare system and go to the private
Speaker 2: healthcare system. But you know, like I hope, like I
Speaker 2: hope you are like the air to mansion before you
Speaker 2: start that process, or you're in serious trouble. The thing
Speaker 2: about the British system is there's all of these paths
Speaker 2: of interlocking experts you have to go through in every
Speaker 2: single you have to get signatures from every single one
Speaker 2: of them. And what this means is you have this
Speaker 2: enormous sort of interminable British gender bureaucracy whose only job
Speaker 2: and only the only thing they want to do is
Speaker 2: stop you from getting healthcare. There's a very very good
Speaker 2: Philosophy Tube episode about this about what it's actually like
Speaker 2: to be in that system, and it's terrible. And this
Speaker 2: is a this is what the kinds of things that
Speaker 2: are being proposed to here are. In a lot of it's
Speaker 2: not exactly the same as a British system, but it's
Speaker 2: it's bringing it much closer to that system where it's
Speaker 2: basically impossible to get healthcare. And the thing about the
Speaker 2: British system and about these restrictions where you know, you
Speaker 2: have to have like a bioethicistant, a psychiatrist and endocrinologist,
Speaker 2: and you have to like do all you have to
Speaker 2: jump through all of these troops is that at every
Speaker 2: single point in the process, there is another gender bureaucrat
Speaker 2: who can just buy themself self decide that they're just
Speaker 2: doing a trans healthcare band. And you know, every every
Speaker 2: individual person you put into the process is another person
Speaker 2: who could just say no. And that's what the bridge
Speaker 2: system works, is that someone in the process just says
Speaker 2: no and you die in a wait list.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I mean, we know trans people in Britain and in
Speaker 4: other European countries where they have like a lot of gatekeeping,
Speaker 4: and you know, all of them have warned us like
Speaker 4: you do not want this coming to the US. Yeah,
Speaker 4: you know, reminding us like all the time, like how
Speaker 4: much easier are a lot of us trans people have
Speaker 4: it in terms of accessing healthcare?
Speaker 5: And just like, yeah, I mean everything I've heard about.
Speaker 4: Like the UK healthcare system sounds like nightmarish. People asking
Speaker 4: invasive questions about like your sexuality or your trauma history
Speaker 4: or for youth that often ends up like involving like
Speaker 4: genital inspections. For some reason, it just sounds like a horrible, dehumanizing,
Speaker 4: violating experience.
Speaker 5: And then yeah, and like a lot of people like.
Speaker 4: Spend years and years if they you know, and are
Speaker 4: lucky if they do it, are able to access care.
Speaker 5: A lot of people have to go private if they
Speaker 5: can afford to.
Speaker 3: Honestly, before, I mean technically it was during but before
Speaker 3: the full like onslaught of bills started to hit the US,
Speaker 3: Like there were Brits that were trying to sound the
Speaker 3: alarm and get the message out to US base.
Speaker 4: Yeah, like it was around when the Currabell ruling happened.
Speaker 4: Crabell was a d trans woman who's lawyer was affiliated
Speaker 4: with the ADF, with the British branch of Alliance Defending Freedom,
Speaker 4: which is behind a lot of the it's like an
Speaker 4: international Christian nationalist organization that's behind a lot of the
Speaker 4: healthcare bands in the US as well.
Speaker 5: Also the abortion birth control.
Speaker 4: Yeah, really nasty people. But anyway, so like Currabell, this
Speaker 4: this t trans woman.
Speaker 5: It's like she.
Speaker 4: Sued the NHS for allowing her to transition and originally
Speaker 4: like won her case and that led to basically like
Speaker 4: the end of positioning for you.
Speaker 5: Yeah, she submitted a judicial review.
Speaker 3: The initial review was favorable to her, but upon further review,
Speaker 3: the appeals did end up overturning it. But by that
Speaker 3: point the damage had already been done. Yeah, a bunch
Speaker 3: of people were starting to lose access to to care
Speaker 3: and the likes and the wheels were starting to spin
Speaker 3: internally as well in terms of the Tavistock system and
Speaker 3: so like. As a result, like the wait lists just
Speaker 3: ended up getting longer and longer and longer.
Speaker 4: So that was like a huge blow that happened in
Speaker 4: the UK, and like UK trails people like basically like
Speaker 4: by that point starting trying to warn people in the US,
Speaker 4: like this is going to come for you too, Yeah,
Speaker 4: like get ready, like they had already been already been
Speaker 4: like suffering under this like no anti transplits for a while,
Speaker 4: and they like knew it was going to spread on
Speaker 4: the board of the UK, And unfortunately it has.
Speaker 3: Yeah, in like the very early stages of our project,
Speaker 3: when we launched at the beginning of twenty twenty one,
Speaker 3: almost immediately after the Carabell initial ruling, we hosted a
Speaker 3: transcript of a podcast from Blood and Turf that was
Speaker 3: trying to deliver this message over to US based comrades.
Speaker 3: And unfortunately it does not appear to have reached as
Speaker 3: many people as it really needed to. But we do
Speaker 3: have that available in the event that people can still
Speaker 3: learn from it, because this onslot is not going to stop.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's not.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think one of the things that we're
Speaker 2: seeing now is that we're now seeing kind of an
Speaker 2: opening of new fronts in a way where you have,
Speaker 2: in the same state at the same time you have
Speaker 2: both what I guess I would call the American style
Speaker 2: approach of just straight up bands and then this kind
Speaker 2: of an attempt to implement this sort of British like,
Speaker 2: you know, attempt to implement this sort of like British
Speaker 2: endow bureaucracy system. And one of the things that's been
Speaker 2: happening with this is, you know, okay, so there's a
Speaker 2: lot of places where there's inspirations coming for this, and
Speaker 2: I think, you know, we mentioned it briefly earlier. One
Speaker 2: of the inspirations for this is obviously parp restrictions on abortion,
Speaker 2: where you have these like unbelievably restricted like basically these
Speaker 2: targeted things. When before before Roe v. Wade collapsed, there
Speaker 2: was you know, you could you could ban abortions by
Speaker 2: for example, you know, saying like passing a bill that
Speaker 2: says that like, okay, if you want to do abortions
Speaker 2: in a hospital, the walls in the hallways have to
Speaker 2: be like exactly like this diameter, which is not the
Speaker 2: same diameter as like as as normal hospital walls are.
Speaker 2: So now you can't do abortions in hospitals, and so
Speaker 2: they do things like this, right, and this is you know,
Speaker 2: this has been a huge problem for a long time
Speaker 2: answer anti abortion activists. I've been talking about it for ages.
Speaker 2: The Democrat Party did nothing, So you know, that's I think,
Speaker 2: I think it's sort of like forwarding of where this
Speaker 2: is going.
Speaker 3: Yeah, a direct parallel is actually over in Arizona, if
Speaker 3: I remember correctly, because one of the things that they
Speaker 3: ended up doing down in Arizona is a requirement that
Speaker 3: they tried to implement was this rather controversial piece where
Speaker 3: they also had to provide information on abortion reversals using
Speaker 3: certain types of hormone care. Right, similar to how in
Speaker 3: order for people to be able to provide gender affirming
Speaker 3: care they have to provide information about detransition and stuff
Speaker 3: like that. But when you actually start to look at
Speaker 3: some of the data, not all of it, it's some
Speaker 3: of the data that they are relying on to inform
Speaker 3: people of this. It is a wildly biased sample or
Speaker 3: just downright pseudoscience, right, Like, they looked at the evidence
Speaker 3: base for the abortion reversals and it didn't actually work
Speaker 3: the way that they were saying it was, and it
Speaker 3: was actually coming from very very very explicitly motivated groups.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 3: So, Yeah, like abortion has been difficult to access in
Speaker 3: Arizona for a very long time in part because of
Speaker 3: some of these like obnoxious requirements that people end up
Speaker 3: putting into place through trap laws.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, I think it's it's worth noting that, like,
Speaker 2: and this is true of both the anti trans bands
Speaker 2: and the and anti abortioning legislation, is that, like it's
Speaker 2: the science, they're just making it up a lot of
Speaker 2: the time. Like, you know, one of the like one
Speaker 2: of the very famous things there is these like fetal
Speaker 2: heartbeat bills that required like and the thing about like
Speaker 2: fetal heartbeat bills is that fetuses don't have heartbeats. You're
Speaker 2: not hearing a heartbeat. Like doctors will like force you
Speaker 2: to listen to this. It's like that it's not what's happening.
Speaker 2: It's literally not a heartbeat. But these people, like they
Speaker 2: put a stethoscope to a woman's chest and heard a
Speaker 2: beating and we're like, oh shit, it's the baby's heart.
Speaker 2: And it's like, no, it doesn't have a heart, Like wait,
Speaker 2: this is a fetus, Like what are you even talking about.
Speaker 2: But you know, and this kind of stuff, right is
Speaker 2: you know, they're they're they're they're basically they're they're doing
Speaker 2: just scientific malpractice, right, They're straight up lying to people,
Speaker 2: and then they're using that as a justification for you know,
Speaker 2: actual legislation which has sort of material impact and like
Speaker 2: you know, carries the force of the law behind it,
Speaker 2: et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And we've been seeing
Speaker 2: a lot of very similar kinds of things from from
Speaker 2: these anti trans legislation. And one of one of the
Speaker 2: ways that they've been able to use sort of pseudoscience
Speaker 2: to get restrictions on healthcare past and this is this
Speaker 2: is true both of sort of the straight up bands
Speaker 2: and also of these kind of like massive bureaucratic restrictions
Speaker 2: is by allying with groups of sort of of right
Speaker 2: wing detransitioners. And we're going to talk about that more
Speaker 2: after this ad break, because we unfortunately are reliant on
Speaker 2: ads to cover this stuff. So yeah, here's here's ads. Okay,
Speaker 2: we are back, and this is the point where we
Speaker 2: need to talk about the stuff in the Ohio story
Speaker 2: that is very weird. Now. I think if people have
Speaker 2: been following the story of sort of anti trans bills,
Speaker 2: one of the things that's been happening a lot is
Speaker 2: there's been this sort of there's there's a network of
Speaker 2: people who de transition and for various reasons I don't know,
Speaker 2: who have become very very hardline right wingers who have
Speaker 2: basically been doing like circuits of the capitals of you know,
Speaker 2: like state capitals and like going to Capitol Hill and
Speaker 2: like telling their quote unquote stories to try to get
Speaker 2: this to try to get like all trans healthcare bands. Now,
Speaker 2: so this is you know, this is something we've covered
Speaker 2: on the show in the past. What is very weird
Speaker 2: about Ohio is that you had a group of these
Speaker 2: right wing transitioners who specifically we're trying to get it
Speaker 2: looked like at very at least we're trying to get
Speaker 2: we're trying to stop the like the actual uh like
Speaker 2: gender firming care ban from going through, and we're in
Speaker 2: favor of more of this restriction stuff. Is that is
Speaker 2: that is that what am I getting this right?
Speaker 5: Not not exactly. There's a couple of.
Speaker 2: No, okay, Le, sorry, I'm I.
Speaker 3: I can provide my my brief description here real quick,
Speaker 3: and then you can retake aspects of that stuff. Because
Speaker 3: something to bear in mind is the fact that, like
Speaker 3: some of the opposition in the Ohio testimonies are actually
Speaker 3: coming from people who view themselves as very left wing.
Speaker 3: These are radical feminists. Specifically, they are just hardcore opposing I.
Speaker 4: Mean, I would say they're they're actual politics are for
Speaker 4: a reactionary.
Speaker 2: Even Yeah, they call.
Speaker 5: Themselves left wing.
Speaker 4: They see themselves as being opposed to the right, like
Speaker 4: that's how they present themselves, and they definitely believe that
Speaker 4: their anti right wing.
Speaker 3: But there's there's also another component. This one is like
Speaker 3: the nuances are sometimes almost impossible to be able to
Speaker 3: tease out.
Speaker 5: I swear tomato tomato.
Speaker 3: But one of the people who was a proponent for
Speaker 3: both this current bill and a past bill is actually
Speaker 3: Corina Cone, who does not consider herself to be right wing.
Speaker 3: Though she does here to be working with a number
Speaker 3: of right wing people, she considers herself to be quote
Speaker 3: unquote libertarian. Now, this is a red flag for those
Speaker 3: of us who have done any sort of like real
Speaker 3: engagement with certain types of libertarians or political organizing or
Speaker 3: whatever in that if you actually pay attention to some
Speaker 3: of the arguments that are being made or the collaborations
Speaker 3: that are being made, you can generally tell which direction
Speaker 3: their politics are truly leaning towards right?
Speaker 5: Is it left wing? Is it right wing?
Speaker 3: And hers have been steering far and far more right wing.
Speaker 3: Like she uses the excuse of, you know, I want
Speaker 3: small government and stuff like that, but if you're working
Speaker 3: with like legislators to put in full on bands, I'm sorry, honey,
Speaker 3: that's not small government.
Speaker 5: That's not small government.
Speaker 3: That is the opposite of small government actually, and so like, like,
Speaker 3: it's kind of hard to sort of like encapsulate the
Speaker 3: entirety of like the proponents of the opposition into particular
Speaker 3: political alignments because a lot of it is really based
Speaker 3: off of, like what are their motivations and who are
Speaker 3: they willing to work with?
Speaker 5: Which again, tomato, tomato.
Speaker 3: But I'll have to come back to the Corona Cone
Speaker 3: one at some point here too, because that one is
Speaker 3: actually an important timeline in terms of understanding the Ohio bills.
Speaker 4: Mm hmm, yeah, I mean basically, I mean you have
Speaker 4: like these. You do have like right wing beat transition
Speaker 4: people like Chloe Cole or Christian Boseley, Laura Becker who
Speaker 4: like do you know they they'll be hanging out with
Speaker 4: like the Heritage Foundation or Billboard Chris or the Cue Shop, yeah,
Speaker 4: or Our Duty like and they very much are just
Speaker 4: working to try to pass these full on bands. But
Speaker 4: then yeah, you have also these like d trans Turf
Speaker 4: and they're more liberal fellow travelers who definitely see themselves
Speaker 4: as being opposed to the right and are opposed to
Speaker 4: I mean they they're opposed to the right because they
Speaker 4: see right being Christians as being a threat to them
Speaker 4: as well, and are at least smart enough to understand
Speaker 4: that if you know, right being Christians have their way,
Speaker 4: they're going to suffer too. But they also want to
Speaker 4: end trans healthcare or restrict it.
Speaker 5: I mean some of the.
Speaker 4: Two of the people who helped organize, helped collect the
Speaker 4: testimony the group statement that was submitted under the name
Speaker 4: are you asking why Max and Katie Robinson they have
Speaker 4: ties to Janice Raymond?
Speaker 5: That's serious, Yeah, they do.
Speaker 4: Janis Raymond help publish Max Robinson's book over Ats Spinefects
Speaker 4: Press this Swurf and Turf publisher. So yeah, they they're
Speaker 4: not actually approach Frans.
Speaker 2: Like, yeah, well we should, we should mention. So Janis
Speaker 2: Raymond for people who some we we've talked about on
Speaker 2: the show a few times, but Shann's Raymond wrote a
Speaker 2: book called The Transsexual Empire, and okay, so people normally
Speaker 2: leave off the subtitle of it, which is called It's
Speaker 2: the Transsexual Empire. The Making of the She Mail. It's
Speaker 2: like one of the original like original anti trans people,
Speaker 2: like incredibly violent transfo like like both both in terms
Speaker 2: of like the career of her work, like physically like
Speaker 2: violently anti trans and yeah, yeah, she is. She is
Speaker 2: connected to a lot of the modern anti trans groups
Speaker 2: and also the modern like the modern I don't know
Speaker 2: what you'd call them, people who are attempting to take
Speaker 2: away trans healthcare but who don't see themselves as anti trans.
Speaker 5: I have no idea how to even summarize that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, bad, I don't know.
Speaker 4: I kind of yes, yeah, yeah, so like I mean yeah,
Speaker 4: and I mean yeah, Max and kid fully endorse, uh,
Speaker 4: Janice Raymond's theories.
Speaker 5: I mean Janice Raymond.
Speaker 4: One of the things she's famous for is saying that like,
Speaker 4: like transsexualism should be morally mandate out of existence, like
Speaker 4: Max Robinson has said that she supports that. They also
Speaker 4: both I mean Janice Raymond focused heavily on trans women overall,
Speaker 4: and you know, also claim that basically like trans women
Speaker 4: were you know, committing sexual assaults against women just for existing. Yeah,
Speaker 4: Max and Kitty are also horrible transpasogynists to actually make
Speaker 4: I mean, Kitty makes a lot of propaganda tracking attacking
Speaker 4: transomen and trying to cast all trans women as predators.
Speaker 4: And yeah, just not people you want on your side,
Speaker 4: because they're not.
Speaker 5: They're danger to all trans people.
Speaker 4: They're just like trying to find a way to influence
Speaker 4: trans healthcare in.
Speaker 5: A different way. And I mean, I I'm.
Speaker 4: Concerned that people will hear like, oh, look at all
Speaker 4: these ds, like these supposedly trans friendly, these trans people
Speaker 4: who testified against this ban, now realizing that these are
Speaker 4: actually like person with an agenda who I mean part
Speaker 4: of them. Part of what they want to do is
Speaker 4: to infiltrate like queer entry on subcultures and promo like
Speaker 4: profideology and recruit people.
Speaker 3: Like let's put it this way, So Max Robinson in
Speaker 3: terms of some of her beliefs, refers to medical transition
Speaker 3: for like trans masculine folks as a sato ritual, going
Speaker 3: back to Mary daily types of.
Speaker 5: Descriptions of things.
Speaker 3: And then Kitty was one of the people that was
Speaker 3: interviewed for and gave extensive background information for a BBC
Speaker 3: article that was released. I believe it was called something
Speaker 3: along the lines of we are being pressured into sex
Speaker 3: by some trans women, which is basically good, yes, that
Speaker 3: one right, like so yea even into this narrative that
Speaker 3: trans women are sexual predators right into the British media
Speaker 3: when they were already having a massive influx of anti
Speaker 3: trans media that was again feeding into the demonization of
Speaker 3: trans people as a whole, but then also like controlling
Speaker 3: trans youth and the likes and of course this article
Speaker 3: not only did it end up originally platforming like an
Speaker 3: actual like serial.
Speaker 2: Rape yeah, Lily kaid like someone someone a serial rapist
Speaker 2: so prolific that like, within like maybe thirty minutes of
Speaker 2: this article going up, like multiple like probably like a
Speaker 2: dozen people had come forward and been like she raped
Speaker 2: me like that. That is the person that the BBC
Speaker 2: was like coming forward to do this shit with.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she ended up posting basically a manifesto on her
Speaker 3: website that was even more extreme than aspects of the
Speaker 3: article showed off. And then I will also note that
Speaker 3: this article was originally I believe it was only translated
Speaker 3: into Portuguese in order to be oh yeah, moved into
Speaker 3: BBC Zila Yeah yeah, which is also one of the
Speaker 3: countries has one of the highest rates of trans femicide.
Speaker 3: So like, yeah, these these are the people that decided
Speaker 3: to go ahead and testify.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Like, well, I'm those of personally bring up Max
Speaker 4: and Kitty because like they were some of the people
Speaker 4: who helped like get the testimonies, Like I found a
Speaker 4: post on Kitty's tumblr blog looking for d trans and
Speaker 4: desisted women who were willing to testify against a ban.
Speaker 4: And then Max was the one who actually submitted the
Speaker 4: collective statement from Arius king Wise, he also submitted an
Speaker 4: individual statement to So basically like they found a bunch
Speaker 4: of like detrans and desisted turfs on Tumblr to sign
Speaker 4: a statement and then submit to like the state of Ohio,
Speaker 4: which is kind of wild to think about.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you don't normally expect to see testimony from turf tumblr,
Speaker 3: let alone transfer Tumblr.
Speaker 5: But that is like that happened? Yeah? Really who you
Speaker 5: want to show up for you?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Really not good in terms of who you want
Speaker 2: doing your.
Speaker 5: Legislation, Like oh god, yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: So okay, we need to take another ad break and
Speaker 2: then we will come back and talk more about this.
Speaker 2: So enjoy your brief capitalistic respite from the horror of capitalism.
Speaker 2: We are back.
Speaker 3: In order to properly understand the situation in Ohio, you
Speaker 3: kind of have to go back several years, right. One
Speaker 3: of the bills that ended up being proposed in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty was HB five to one three. This was another
Speaker 3: version of a proposed ban on gender firming care for
Speaker 3: trans youth in particular, and it was sponsored by Representatives
Speaker 3: Ron Hood and Bill Dean. This one is interesting because
Speaker 3: one of the group that ended up coming out in
Speaker 3: opposition to it was the Gendercare Consumer Advocacy Network. This
Speaker 3: is the organization that I helped found in twenty nineteen
Speaker 3: prior to my resignation. They submitted this opposition after my resignation,
Speaker 3: but it is available on archives. Then, in twenty twenty
Speaker 3: one and the twenty twenty two legislative session, there was
Speaker 3: the proposal for HP four or five four, which was
Speaker 3: another proposed ban on gender for main care for trans youth.
Speaker 3: This time it was being sponsored by Representative Gary Klick,
Speaker 3: who was also the sponsor of the current bill that
Speaker 3: had recently been vetoed and then the V two vtwed
Speaker 3: And in May of twenty twenty two, the Gender Care
Speaker 3: Consumer Advocacy Network or GCCAM testified in tentative support. The
Speaker 3: testimony was submitted by coronicone and included suggestions for amendments.
Speaker 3: These amendments are actually very important. One of the amendments
Speaker 3: that she recommended was on data tracking. I believe it
Speaker 3: says here The second amendment would be a requirement for physicians,
Speaker 3: mental health care providers, and other medical healthcare professionals mandating
Speaker 3: an annual report to the Ohio Department of Health the number, age,
Speaker 3: and sex of minor patients who are receiving gender transition
Speaker 3: services of any type. This was what she originally proposed
Speaker 3: as an amendment to the bill. The bill again did
Speaker 3: not end up passing, but now we are seeing HB
Speaker 3: sixty eight, which is the one that merges the ban
Speaker 3: on gender forming care for trans youth and a sports ban.
Speaker 3: Because I guess you know, trans youth plane chess is
Speaker 3: somehow like threatening. But so this one was again represented
Speaker 3: like sponsored by reps preentive Click, and this time, curiously enough,
Speaker 3: Karina had been working more extensively with Click during various
Speaker 3: portions of the.
Speaker 5: Of the push for the bill.
Speaker 3: Right, you know, she testified multiple times she's posted videos
Speaker 3: with him, pictures, et cetera. Another person who had originally
Speaker 3: founded the organization, Carrie Callahan, did originally start opposing. Curiously
Speaker 3: she did not note her prior experience with the organization,
Speaker 3: but she did start to oppose the bill, and then
Speaker 3: later starts to put out basically like a more general
Speaker 3: call for opposition to HB sixty eight, right, you know,
Speaker 3: trying to collect in you know, various types of detransitioned
Speaker 3: people who were opposed to bands on gender affirming care right,
Speaker 3: and then who is it that ends up showing up?
Speaker 3: It's this weird little like Turf group that originally came
Speaker 3: out of d Trans Turf Tumbler in twenty thirteen, that
Speaker 3: historically speaking, she had prior working relationships with and even
Speaker 3: presented their stories to us path.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and also I mean Max Robinson too, like both
Speaker 4: her both Max Robinson and Carrie Callahan were both featured
Speaker 4: in Jesse Single's Atlantic article too. There's lots of points
Speaker 4: of connection. They've been they've known each other since at
Speaker 4: least twenty sixteen, and you know, work together.
Speaker 3: Like I can't say for certain how it is that
Speaker 3: they ended up there. Personally, to me, it seems a
Speaker 3: little weird that people who had prior relationships dating back
Speaker 3: a decade are showing up in the same place again,
Speaker 3: And like they are also showing up in legislative testimony
Speaker 3: for the first time in the state where some like
Speaker 3: one of the central figures for a long time there
Speaker 3: is putting out a call to oppose this particular bill.
Speaker 3: Like the coincidences are racking up a little bit here.
Speaker 3: It might be good to ask some further questions about
Speaker 3: what exactly happened, because I have some questions. So, you know,
Speaker 3: this happened in December of twenty twenty three. Right. Eventually
Speaker 3: Governor Dwine goes ahead and vetos. But at the same
Speaker 3: time he makes his you know, proposal for the drafting
Speaker 3: of new regulations with you know, the Department of Health
Speaker 3: and the likes, and within that is the suggestion of
Speaker 3: detailed data tracking. That is reported to the Department of
Speaker 3: Health and then to the general public every six months,
Speaker 3: focusing on things like, you know, I don't think that
Speaker 3: he wanted to focus on like the number of people
Speaker 3: that were doing it, but he did include a like
Speaker 3: the nature of the diagnosis. It applies to all ages.
Speaker 3: It was not originally restricted to trans youth, like the
Speaker 3: original testimony was from from gc CAN. The time range
Speaker 3: was also ended up being like it's shortened. He wants
Speaker 3: it every six months, not every year. But you know,
Speaker 3: very similar kinds of things, right in terms of what
Speaker 3: it is that he is proposing for this mass collection
Speaker 3: of data and a previous testimony that was submitted to
Speaker 3: the Ohio Legislature. In fact, like not long after that fact,
Speaker 3: Representative Clique ended up going on an interview with Tony
Speaker 3: Perkins of Family Research Council talking about the pending veto.
Speaker 3: They originally did this interview on January ninth, and he
Speaker 3: noted that the data collection suggestion was originally included in
Speaker 3: a draft version of his bill, but was removed due
Speaker 3: to opposition, and so he's glad actually that that was included,
Speaker 3: although he wished that there would be even more restrictions.
Speaker 3: He actually was going to encourage the governor to also
Speaker 3: sign an executive order banning the use of puberty blockers,
Speaker 3: not just surgery. As far as I can tell, that
Speaker 3: has not happened, but he did say that he was
Speaker 3: going to try. But like it's like there's there's definitely
Speaker 3: some weird kind of like escalations that end up happening,
Speaker 3: and some of the like some of the interconnecting threads
Speaker 3: with individuals that again just happened to keep showing up
Speaker 3: in the same place over and over and over again,
Speaker 3: either in support or in opposition. Some folks have been
Speaker 3: consistently opposed, whereas other people have been kind of flip flopping.
Speaker 3: The GCCN organization is one of the ones that flip flopped.
Speaker 3: It originally opposed all bands, and then now all of
Speaker 3: a sudden, it's like, you know, the person that they
Speaker 3: are throwing out into these testimonies was arguing in favor
Speaker 3: of them, and then like, you know, the the quote
Speaker 3: unquote are you asking why? Collective and to be fair,
Speaker 3: Carrie Callahan have also been firmly opposed to full on
Speaker 3: bands and the Christian right pretty much from the beginning,
Speaker 3: though for very very very different reasons.
Speaker 4: I mean some other opposition was like, well, people will
Speaker 4: go to like could go to other states where there's
Speaker 4: less restrictions, Like no, the stuff we have, you know,
Speaker 4: HIAS already like has a lot of restrictions, and majority
Speaker 4: of trans youth like only get counseling and they don't
Speaker 4: get any like none of them get surgery, and most
Speaker 4: of them, like only a very small number of them
Speaker 4: get puberty blockers or horrormones. So this should be like
Speaker 4: this should be an example for the entire country. Like
Speaker 4: that was kind of Carrie Gallahan's take on things. And
Speaker 4: then like I mean, yeah, a lot of the more
Speaker 4: like the d trans turfs, like the Robinson's or other
Speaker 4: members of our vesting wives. It's like, okay, well they're
Speaker 4: opposed to the Christian Right, and they recognize that like
Speaker 4: if the Christian Right gains more power and is banning things,
Speaker 4: that's bad not just for trans people but also for
Speaker 4: you know, cis, lesbian and gay people and says women
Speaker 4: and you know it will end up hurting them too.
Speaker 4: So I mean, even from a self preservation stance, they
Speaker 4: understand like why they should be opposed to the Christian Right,
Speaker 4: but they're still if you actually read their testimony. A
Speaker 4: lot of them do make it clear that they're posed
Speaker 4: to transition. Like one one person called it like compared
Speaker 4: medical like trans healthcare to like a hydra said that
Speaker 4: like it would only be cutting off ahead.
Speaker 5: Like these aren't.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and so a lot of them were, you know,
Speaker 4: we're also kind of praising uh, you know regulations like
Speaker 4: the group uh statement talks about like it's like, you know,
Speaker 4: shutting down clinics when improve anyone's quality of care. Ohio's
Speaker 4: existing programs are known for their moderation.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 4: They don't perform surgery on minors. Many clinics out of
Speaker 4: state do. Lata YadA.
Speaker 3: So Max Robinson's testimony also said similar, but that she
Speaker 3: had it on good word from an Ohio in right,
Speaker 3: I have yes, you had.
Speaker 4: Say I hear if I'm good authority from an Ohio
Speaker 4: in that pediactric gender clinics there prescribed hormones pretty sparingly
Speaker 4: and don't actually perform any underage transition surgeries. Other states do, though,
Speaker 4: So there's like this whole thing. It's like like they're
Speaker 4: still kind of scaremonger.
Speaker 5: It's like, oh, but these other.
Speaker 4: States, like we're transition as a minor those are bad,
Speaker 4: but they're still making it clear that the idea that
Speaker 4: people having easy access to transition, especially as youth, is like.
Speaker 5: A bad thing in their minds.
Speaker 4: I don't think we actually mentioned like how like if
Speaker 4: you actually look at the collective statement, that are you
Speaker 4: asking why issued and like who signed it? Like a
Speaker 4: whole bunch of them didn't actually transition, Like a lot
Speaker 4: of them are actually desisted, which means that they like
Speaker 4: never actually medically transitioned. They considered transitioning or maybe socially transitioned,
Speaker 4: but then they decided not to medically transition, possibly after
Speaker 4: you know, converting to anti transfeminism or the like. So
Speaker 4: it's just a bunch of people who like I decided
Speaker 4: not to transition. I'm desisted, like you know, testifying against
Speaker 4: a healthcare ban. It's also like a kind of a
Speaker 4: classic strategy too. It is like they have a bunch
Speaker 4: of like desisted people along mixed in with people who actually,
Speaker 4: so you like, transition and do transition to kind of
Speaker 4: like inflate the numbers. Yeah, this is a standard. Yeah, this
Speaker 4: is very standard. It's an old trick. It's it's like
Speaker 4: oh yeah, you're like okay, yeah, and then a bunch
Speaker 4: of them are also like saying the ones who did
Speaker 4: like you know, transition and new transition, they're like emphasizing
Speaker 4: how they a few of them like are emphasizing how young.
Speaker 5: They were when they transitioned and be transitioned. Again, not exactly, yeah,
Speaker 5: not exactly.
Speaker 3: Protrums this collective here with like pretty pretty explicit turf ties,
Speaker 3: including some of them directly to Trannis. Rammond herself was
Speaker 3: the bulk of the opposition de transitioned people to the bill.
Speaker 3: I should note, like that's fifteen signatures right there. People
Speaker 3: are talking about like how there were nineteen people that
Speaker 3: were opposed, so fifteen of them were either like part
Speaker 3: of the recruitment or actively recruited on d trans turf tumpler.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and then like at least five of them are
Speaker 4: just assisted they're transitions. It's not clear about everyone, but yeah, yeah, it's.
Speaker 5: It's weird.
Speaker 1: It's just.
Speaker 3: It's really weird. And it's also been really weird to
Speaker 3: see the media just kind of take that.
Speaker 4: Testimony of theirs at face value that it's been a
Speaker 4: problem for a long time. It is like getting the
Speaker 4: media to actually sort of like investigate or care about
Speaker 4: people's like political views or activism or actually kind of
Speaker 4: being like like sometimes like I think, like I say,
Speaker 4: like the Basilon New York Times story we were talking
Speaker 4: about before, has Grace Liton Ski Smith and there without
Speaker 4: saying that she was you know, affiliated with J. C.
Speaker 5: Kan and she's like not just with the president, she
Speaker 5: was the president. Yeah. Yeah, so it's like.
Speaker 4: It's like, Okay, she's just like represented as just like
Speaker 4: you know, as a deutrons woman without going into like
Speaker 4: actually she's the head of this political organization, and that's
Speaker 4: just this has happened.
Speaker 5: This has been a problem for years.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, So it's just like, I mean, just a whole
Speaker 4: lot of different sketchy characters kind of came out for
Speaker 4: what's going.
Speaker 5: On in Ohio. I mean, you have like.
Speaker 4: You know, Republicans and right wing Christians who just want
Speaker 4: to straight up ban transition and move towards eliminating it
Speaker 4: for for all trans people and workers, making it, you know,
Speaker 4: as impossible for trans people to live in society as
Speaker 4: they can. And then you have kind of more like
Speaker 4: tricky Republicans like de Wine sort of like pretending to
Speaker 4: find some kind of compromise and be like oh, we're
Speaker 4: just trying to work for like more comprehensive healthcare that
Speaker 4: like so everyone gets what they need, and like sort
Speaker 4: of like using some of the language that was used
Speaker 4: by clinicians who are trying to fight against the band
Speaker 4: and their testimony and you know, trying to claim make
Speaker 4: these claims, but if we actually look at the details,
Speaker 4: like the regulations they're proposing would make it nearly impossible
Speaker 4: for anyone to transition, you know, both youth and adults.
Speaker 4: And then you have like, you know, these different medical
Speaker 4: professionals and kind of more liberal transphobic d trans people
Speaker 4: who want more gatekeeping and regulation and control over trans
Speaker 4: people and are kind of like using de transition and
Speaker 4: transition regret as a justification for that or praising being
Speaker 4: like oh well, Ohio, their youth clinics are already really
Speaker 4: good because they're very cautious and they use therapy a
Speaker 4: lot more than they actually allow youth to medically transition.
Speaker 4: I mean, that argument didn't seem to work out at all. Instead,
Speaker 4: it sounds like the governor kind of was like, oh,
Speaker 4: two thirds of youth only get therapy instead of medical transition,
Speaker 4: we should do that for everyone. Uh, It's like sort
Speaker 4: of like you know, if you propose restrictions, say oh
Speaker 4: this is great, then of course the people who are
Speaker 4: more extreme will just like take that and run with it.
Speaker 5: And then you know you have uh, you know, d trans.
Speaker 4: Turfs showing up and testifying for their own weird reasons.
Speaker 4: You know, probably because of their connections to carry Galahan,
Speaker 4: but you know, this also is a chance for them
Speaker 4: to sort of like you know, launder their image, make
Speaker 4: it seem like, oh, look we're good, we're good d
Speaker 4: trans people, we oppose the religious right, we're fighting against
Speaker 4: these bands.
Speaker 5: And then people who don't necessarily like know any.
Speaker 4: Better will like come here maybe right right, because this
Speaker 4: is like that's a strategy. They often pretend to be
Speaker 4: more trans friendly than they really are to sort of
Speaker 4: like draw people in or be able to like influence
Speaker 4: queer and trans communities and slowly slip in like crypto
Speaker 4: turf ideology and recruit people.
Speaker 5: Or just yeah.
Speaker 4: So, I mean it's like there's just a whole lot
Speaker 4: of different and you know, anti trans groups and individuals
Speaker 4: like stretching from like paternalistic medical professionals who want more gaykeeping,
Speaker 4: who want to restrict the number of people transitioning like
Speaker 4: all the way to you know, like Christian nationalists you
Speaker 4: want to just you know, wipe us out completely.
Speaker 5: And you know, not only.
Speaker 4: Uh, you know, are basically at war with bodily autonomy
Speaker 4: in general.
Speaker 5: They don't want anyway. They want to be the ones
Speaker 5: to control what people do with their bodies.
Speaker 4: Like they also want to you know, restrict reproductive care
Speaker 4: and abortion.
Speaker 5: It's all part of the same war.
Speaker 4: Uh, just control people and assort their version of authoritary
Speaker 4: in Christianity. And then you have you know, uh, you know,
Speaker 4: weird de trans turfs, and it's just like all you
Speaker 4: kind of have to like understand like all these different
Speaker 4: factions and how they sort of like interact together and
Speaker 4: how you know they try to use each other, you know,
Speaker 4: con see them overwhelming. But like the more we kind
Speaker 4: of understand like what we're up against, like the easier
Speaker 4: it is for us to develop strategies of resistance. And
Speaker 4: it's like, you know, even though you know, it can
Speaker 4: seem like we're up against a lot of different groups,
Speaker 4: but like, you know, we're also part of this larger
Speaker 4: fight for liberation, and you know, we can connect, you know,
Speaker 4: with with feminists who are fighting for reproductive autonomy. We
Speaker 4: can connect with like disability liberation activists who are fighting
Speaker 4: for better healthcare for everyone. We do potentially have lots
Speaker 4: of allies. We do have lots of connections like with
Speaker 4: other movements, And so when you think of it that way,
Speaker 4: it's like, Okay, we're not just like one small group
Speaker 4: up against this whole like Goliath. Let's like, no, We're
Speaker 4: part of this larger movement that is fighting so that
Speaker 4: everyone is free and that everyone gets the health care
Speaker 4: they deserve.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I mean, I think that one of the
Speaker 2: one of the sort of tangential things here too is,
Speaker 2: you know, this is an extremely negative example of the
Speaker 2: amount of influence that a very very small number of
Speaker 2: people can wield who have extremely unpopular ideologies. On the
Speaker 2: other hand, there are a lot of us, and the
Speaker 2: things that we believe are very popular, and you know,
Speaker 2: the amount of power that we can wield if we
Speaker 2: are willing to organize and are when we understand what
Speaker 2: we're organizing against is immense, and it is enough to
Speaker 2: drive these people into the fucking ground.
Speaker 6: Hell yeah, yeah, it could happen here as a production
Speaker 6: of cool Zone Media.
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