The Thai House of Representatives voted 400-10 to legalize same-sex marriage. The bill will go to the senate and presumably get signed by the king.
SOMETIMES, IT’S THE LITTLE THINGS
I have a long list of possible stories this month, but I’m not inspired by any of them. Want to get a sense of what I’m facing? Transgender youth health policies in Europe getting restricted, a gay wedding at Mar-A-Lago, some polling results show support for our community slipping, PFLAG sued Texas for something, One Million Moms unhappy with full-body deodorant ads, and there’s more!
GLBT’s support Biden, but only at 68 percent (Hello fellow travelers! What’s up with that?), something happened at the Philadelphia LGBT Center, DeSantis in the news, fight over displaying the rainbow flag at US embassies, and a mystery item marked “Missouri sex offenders?”
Oh, there’s other stuff too. Instead of all this however, I would rather discuss an unrelated article about the disappearance of chocolate chip ice cream. Readers, chocolate chip is my favorite flavor, and believe me, I’ve noticed as it has slowly vanished, replaced by a vast array of unacceptable ice cream options featuring cookies and candy and bubble gum and other childish ingredients. What the hell? I gather from the article that chocolate chip went seasonal, and in general, sales have gone way downhill. The thing is, as any of you who share my feelings on this subject know, chocolate chip has a very distinct and satisfying taste. It’s not like vanilla ice cream with bits of chocolate. It is it’s own remarkable and irreplaceable experience. Sometimes, it’s the little things that bother one more than the big ones.
A GAY WEDDING AT MAR-A-LAGO
I didn’t even mention that the Thai House of Representatives voted 400-10 to legalize same-sex marriage. The bill will go to the senate and presumably get signed by the king. I’m imagining a spectacular musical number to go along with this process, starring the entire legislature with solos by the king, his British paramour and a couple dozen of his children. Maybe one or two of them are gay.
And speaking of marriage, let me check on this gay wedding at Mar-A-Lago, because really, who would do that? Here’s your answer: John Sullivan, vice chair and treasurer of the Tennessee Log Cabin Republicans married his now-husband, Dan Medora, on February 23. Don’t get me started on the ridiculous Log Cabin Club. Once a somewhat legitimate effort to make headway in the pre-Trump Republican Party, it is now a ludicrous group of MAGA contrarians, whose sycophantic attempt at being part of the movement does nothing to assuage the contempt they receive from their Trumpy comrades.
MIDDLE GROUND ON TRANS YOUTH HEALTH ELUDES AMERICANS
The European transgender story is actually the most important one of the month by far, so by rights I should have started discussing it prior to bringing up the chocolate chip ice cream tragedy. But—Omar Khayyam alert—the moving finger writes; and, having writ, moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit shall lure it back to cancel half a line, nor all thy tears wash out a word of it. In other words, I’m not changing anything. What’s done is done.
So, for the last year or so, various European medical authorities have begun to question the science around giving puberty blockers and/or hormones to transgender youth in the absence of fairly rigorous psychological examinations. Both Norway and Sweden have restricted the prescription of drugs for teens and children, although don’t ask me exactly how or which agencies or mucky mucks have done so. Most recently, England’s National Health Service moved to ban “routine” use of puberty blockers, and some giant study is also underway. A BBC report cites Health Minister Maria Caulfield, who said “We have always been clear that children’s safety and wellbeing is paramount, so we welcome this landmark decision by the NHS. Ending the routine prescription of puberty blockers will help ensure that care is based on evidence, expert clinical opinion and is in the best interests of the child.” Treatments will still be available on a case-by-case basis.
These countries of course operate national health organizations and make decisions somewhat free from the chaotic politics we see here in the U.S.. Our transgender youth policies demand an all or nothing viewpoint, ban everything or approve anything, and allow for zero nuance from either side of the debate. As a reporter, I’ve been hard-pressed to evaluate the scientific studies that emerge from left and right because… hello, I’m not a scientist. Whereas the science around, say, gay conversion efforts was virtually universal (they are bad), the science around puberty blockers is unclear. First, we haven’t had enough time to see the big picture. Second, although blockers are clearly invaluable to many pre-teens, they also come with risks, and those risks might not be appropriate for everyone. Ditto hormones.
It seems logical that pre-teens especially should be very carefully evaluated before drugs are prescribed. But I’m not sure this is always the case. Yet our community is basically forced to tell courts and legislatures that the situation is clear-cut. Our adversaries, in turn, aim to ban all treatments as a matter of law. When I see the hesitation from fairly progressive European countries that in general lean towards a middle ground, it gives me pause. Yet our options are the high road (us) or the low road (them) with nary an exit ramp for either.
I see no immediate solutions.
ONE MILLION MOMS AND ME
Oops, I don’t have any room for the other list items. I did check the intriguing “Missouri sex offenders?” item, and found a CNN report that starts: “A newly proposed law in Missouri could charge teachers and counselors with a felony and require them to register as sex offenders if they’re found guilty of supporting transgender students who are socially transitioning.” This is the type of story I steer clear of, because the state legislatures are filled with insane people who propose insane bills that go nowhere. No one can ever be charged as a sex offender for supporting transgender kids, period and no such bill would ever advance, so let’s drop that idea.
And for once, I agree with One Million Moms that these explicit deodorant commercials are nasty and in bad taste. Keep your smelly nether regions to yourself and off my TV screen. Same with the toilet paper bears and women on the toilet. What happened to minimal standards of politesse? And what happened to chocolate chip ice cream?
