Letters: Jan. 16, 2025

All for the sake of ignorance

Many well-intentioned Christians consider homosexuals and transgenders sick people who therefore need Conversion therapy because all gay and transgender people must be “perverted sinners.” Religious fundamentalists portray Democrats as wanting (all children) to become gay or transgender so much that they hire teachers who’ll teach all children to accept gay and transgender students as equal human beings – err – How outrageous! What the religious right doesn’t get is that some heart patients need to have new hearts surgically implanted, and, some unfortunate children are born with cleft palates that cause other children to reject them. So the truth is that they and many other afflicted people have been compassionately (helped) by doctors, who perform corrective surgeries, in part, because their patients were previously considered “abnormal” and thus became targets for bullying and abuse. Does that ring any bells?

Many epileptics and diabetic people were once considered “possessed,” before medical science created drugs that stabilized them. And, of course, paraplegic veterans are now routinely fitted with robotic limbs that help them walk, So why do self-righteous religious people condemn operations on transgender people simply because they were born with a genetic anomaly? Aren’t sins consciously committed, while anomalies are uncontrolled processes of nature? So why preach to gay and transgender people? Just accept them and let them be themselves!

Here’s a news flash! Gender transi-tioning operations are compassionate ways to prevent suffering! No child wakes up thinking, “Hmm, maybe gay people have lots of fun so I’ll start being gay,” or, “If being a boy isn’t so great, I’ll become a girl instead.” And in truth, do you know any sane parents who demand transitioning operations for their children just because they want a boy instead of a girl, or vice versa? There is virtually no evidence that any parent is so cruel or sick as to force their child to undergo transitioning surgery! — aided by doctors who study for years in graduate school just to, (supposedly) get perverted kicks from “mutilating children’s genitals” – especially after they rack up student debt amounting to many hundreds of thousands of dollars? Boy, they really must have a burning desire to mutilate children! But let’s get real! How many parents does anyone know who truly have no objections to “mutilating” their boys or girls just to please themselves? Zilch, right? But if you claim to know some parents who do, have you reported them to the police yet?

When a child or teenager wants to transition it’s because the bodies they inhabit don’t match or feel authentic to the gender of their brains – so they often become depressed and even suicidal! Put yourself in their shoes, as people who are severely depressed because their bodies truly don’t match the gender of their brains, and who become social outcasts because their genetic anomaly makes others feel uncomfortable, and sometimes causes parents to disown their children? (Elon Musk being a prime example – Musk disowned his own child for being transgender and will outlaw transitioning surgery in the name of his selfish political agendas).

So why do so many members of fundamentalist faiths insist they must save gay or transgender people, or that, physicians who perform such operations to (heal—not hurt)! Under the Hippocratic oath! Well, the truth is, many parents of transgender children lovingly allow their children to have operations that they know their children want (and need)! The process itself takes several years and must include the consent of both parents or legal guardians, as well as requiring extensive psychological counseling--(including many sessions for children with and without, their parents present). And after they transition, very few are unhappy with their new bodies—rather, in a recent poll, 99.7% expressed gratitude for receiving their operations, and are happier than they have ever been! 

So why is the religious right so upset and frightened that they need to conjure up sadistic doctors, and cruel parents, who force their children to become gay, or gender-changing? Does the religious right understand that If any doctors performed gender-changing operations conspiratorially, they would have lost their right to practice medicine long ago!-as well as the fact that both parents and their legal guardians, must also have the consent of (the children).

Understand?
The word “ignorance,” doesn’t just describe someone stupid, it also applies to anyone who willfully ignores solid evidence in favor of their own biases and superstition. And “Liberal” doesn’t describe anyone who wants to promote freedom for all, so they can live their lives without being unjustly controlled by others—You know, like the leaders of Totalitarian regimes do!
Peter W. Johnson
Superior, Wisconsin