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Craven behaviour has been allowed to fester in our institutions for way too long. This individual is *responsible* for the fairness and safety of soccer in Alberta. Guess what chucklefuck? Stating the truth and protecting the girls in your leagues won’t be all sugar and spice given the current activist narrative bullshit climate. Find a backbone already and start fighting for reality and women’s rights
This is such a good turn. Dissent against gender ideology is breaking into the mainstream. Reprinting here to boost awareness.
“As a kid, I was your classic tomboy. I wore short hair, boys’ clothes, and spent most of my time running around outside with my mostly male friends. But it went deeper than that. I fantasized about being the prince and not the princess in Disney stories, and as my body started developing, it didn’t match my expectations.
I would have easily fit the diagnostic criteria for childhood gender dysphoria — back when there actually were diagnostic criteria and before today’s “affirming” approach that does away with any veneer of caution.
Article contentWhen I hit puberty, I started to develop feelings for girls, reinforcing the sense that I was different. By that point, Canada had become a much more accepting place, and I am grateful for that. I just wanted to be left alone to figure things out for myself.
And I did figure things out. At 16, I met my girlfriend and we’ve been together ever since. I am 34 now, and we recently got married and am expecting a child. It has been something of a fairy tale, and we both got to be the princess.
At the same time, there was also an ideology growing around me that could have radically altered my course in life. The idea that some people are “born into the wrong body” was going mainstream. I initially bought into this idea. It was positioned as a natural extension of gay rights. How? I didn’t really know, but it seems like the good, progressive thing to believe.
I wondered into my late 20s whether transition was something I should have done and if I would one day wake up miserable because I was supposed to be a man. After all, so many of the women who were transitioning seemed to be so much like me.
But then I started to hear about “trans kids.” I instinctively knew that it was wrong for youth under 18. It is wrong to medicalize them, and it is wrong to confuse them about their sex at a vulnerable age.
That was more than five years ago, and I’ve been an advocate for preserving young people’s bodies and fertility ever since. For a long time, it didn’t feel like this topic would ever get the attention it deserved. Slowly but surely, the conversation started to reach a wider audience.
Last year, New Brunswick Premier Blaine Higgs and Saskatchewan Premier Scott Moe both introduced policies on name and pronoun changes in schools. While these “social transition” steps seem harmless, they are psychological interventions that can encourage a child to lock in their identity and proceed to more permanent changes.
Early this year, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith announced the most comprehensive set of policies in Canada focusing on the areas of schools, medicine and sports. Recently, she announced that legislation will be tabled this fall
I am grateful to Smith and I applaud her courage in the face of attacks. The premier is constantly accused of hatred and bigotry for seeking to preserve the bodily integrity of youth under 18 and their ability to make fully informed decisions when they reach adulthood.
Article contentSmith has helped move the needle. In a political climate that can get vitriolic, it was far from a safe bet to introduce these policies.
It’s time for the other perspective to be offered. I am a married lesbian and I support Smith. I am grateful for her willingness to take on this issue.
I got lucky. I was able to grow up without the influence of activists making me believe that I should change my body because of my gender nonconformity. My baby and my ability to carry her are the biggest blessings of my life.
For so many young girls, this opportunity has been taken from them. Smith’s proposed legislation will help prevent this from happening to others, and we all owe her a great debt for that.
-Eva Kurilova is a freelance writer who has been engaged with the province’s gender policies.”
Proud to be an Albertan today!
The contempt our Federal Canadian Government has for our province seems to know no bounds. We are the only province in a Canada that has a democratic mechanism to elect senators. There are currently three elected senators in waiting that were patently ignored, and instead to represent Alberta a radical gender activist Kristopher Wells and a lawyer that has donated at least 30,000 dollars to the federal Liberal Party.
Here is the list of Senators the citizens of Alberta have democratically nominated for the Senate:
So we have a partisan appointment:
“Fridhandler is a corporate lawyer, arbitrator, mediator, and businessman with over 40 years of legal experience.
[…]
Fridhandler has been an active supporter of the federal Liberal Party during his career, serving as the party’s election co-chair in Alberta between 2004 and 2009, according to his biography page on the website of Calgary law firm Burnet, Duckworth & Palmer LLP, where he has been a partner since 1990.”
And then we have the wacko rainbow gender activist:
“Kristopher Wells’s biography describes him as “an educator and a champion for the 2SLGBTQ+ community who has used research and advocacy to help advance diversity, equity, and human rights in Alberta and across the country.”
He is the editor-in-chief of Journal of LGBT Youth, which is the “world’s leading research publication on 2SLGBTQ+ youth,” according to his biography on the website for MacEwan University in Edmonton, where Wells is an associate professor.
Wells has also helped with the creation of the Pride Tape initiative, which several National Hockey League players have adopted in recent years.”
I’m not sure Trudeau could have picked people LESS representative of the people of Alberta. Let’s take a peek at the calibre of Well’s interaction with the public.
JFC. This is the fringe of the fringe. What a completely inappropriate and disappointing decision made by the Liberal Party of Canada.
I cannot vote for a party that is favour of undermining parents’ relationship with their children, and a party that is favour of putting children on medical pathways that lead to sterilization and life long medicalization.
Then the Leader of the NDP decides to hide replies like this:
Nope, nope, nope. We can’t have people who major in medical science denial anywhere near the levers of power.
Thank you to Our Duty Canada for composing this letter.
An Open Letter to the Alberta Medical Association (AMA)
Regarding the February 1st Statement from the AMA
Section of Pediatrics on gender-affirming treatments March 2024
On February 1, 2024 your association released a statement in response to
Alberta Premiere Danielle Smith’s proposed changes to the treatment of
trans-identified children and adolescents, those struggling with gender
ideation. We ask that you consider and respond to our questions and
concerns regarding your statement and explain how the official position
described therein is consistent with your profession’s fundamental
principle to first “do no harm.”
We are a group of concerned parents, most of whom have children
struggling with gender ideation and grappling with the largely unrestricted
social and medical options being presented to them in Canada. We believe
that no child has the necessary cognitive and psychosocial maturity to
provide informed consent to the use of off-label synthetic hormones and
surgical procedures, often referred to as “gender-affirming healthcare,”
that have irreversible and damaging effects on their health and fertility.
We also carefully follow the results of peer-reviewed research in this area,
which, to date, has NOT yielded strong evidence of the safety or efficacy
of gender-affirming medical treatments. Therefore, we work to increase
public awareness and pressure our social, medical and political
organizations to conduct themselves from an evidence-based perspective.
We have identified several areas of concern in your recent statement and
we address them herein. In summary, your statement contains
generalizations that are not supported by sound evidence; false statements
about the safety and efficacy of the off-label drugs you recommend for
children and adolescents; reference to your steadfast opposition to
safeguarding children and adolescents through proper regulatory
processes and networks; and finally, a strong disregard for age-appropriate
decision-making and consent to medical treatments and surgical
procedures that have irreversible and damaging effects, and which
increasing numbers of youth are living to regret.
Your statement first asserts that “transgender youth have higher rates of
mental health issues and suicidality because of the stigma attached to
their status. The mental health of these children and youth will be markedly
worse when denied care.” The fact is, however, that recent peer-reviewed
research, such as this 20-year Finnish study, does NOT show that gender
affirming healthcare improves the mental health outcomes of children and
adolescents. For example, and perhaps most importantly, this research
does NOT find decreased suicide rates in youth who have accessed
gender-affirming medical treatment.
Your statement further asserts that “the effects of puberty-blocking agents
are not irreversible; and once treatment stops, puberty goes forward.
Treatment allows the patient time to determine their options without
permanent effects.” This assertion is particularly disturbing for two
reasons: (1) it blatantly misleads readers about how puberty blockers are
actually used in trans-identified children and adolescents, and (2)
consequently, it evades the full truth about the actual impacts of these
off-label drugs. In regard to (1), your assertion is premised on cases where
puberty blockers are used for brief periods of time and then stopped so
that natural puberty can progress.
However, this is not how puberty
blockers are actually being used in the majority of trans-identified children
and adolescents. In reality, puberty blockers are most often followed by
cross-sex hormone treatment (up to 98% of the time) and these minors
never go through natural puberty. Further, the long-term effects of puberty
blockers when they are followed by cross-sex hormones are
well-documented and dire, as even the president of WPATH confirms in
this linked video and with this statement, “Every single child or adolescent
who was truly blocked at Tanner Stage 2 has never experienced orgasm, I
mean it’s really about zero.” The pituitary gland is actually rendered
indefinitely dormant with GnRH Analogues (Puberty Blockers), which is why
several countries, most recently England, have corrected their course and
banned their use for gender affirming healthcare. Medical associations owe
it to the public to provide COMPLETE and TRUTHFUL information, which
your statement does NOT do.
Your statement goes on to point out that “Bottom surgery in Canada is
already limited to patients over 18 years.” Once again, you assert a
half-truth that is misleading to readers when you state that “bottom surgery”
is limited, but you remain silent about bilateral mastectomies (“top
surgery”). The fact is that bilateral mastectomies ARE being performed
on patients UNDER 18 YEARS old in Canada. We know this first-hand
because it has happened to our own children, and we know that this
procedure is completely irreversible. Asserting half-truths and omitting
information is not conducive to maintaining the trust of the public.
In light of the recent release of the WPATH Files, we find the following part
of your statement to be an effort to escape the duty to be transparent that,
as a regulatory body for the entire province of Alberta, is crucial to the
AMA’s role and responsibility: “Requiring a private registry of physicians to
provide gender-affirming care has the feel of surveillance, to which we
object. It is an unnecessary bureaucratic process given the current
existence of effective referral processes and networks.” First, what you
refer to as “surveillance” is understood by the Albertans to whom you are
accountable as the transparency you are charged to uphold. Second, you
fail to explain that your referral process is based on the WPATH guidelines,
which have been largely discredited. The fact is that these guidelines, for
“gender-affirming healthcare,” are not evidence-based, but experimental.
A 2023 article in the prestigious British Medical Journal confirms this. As
parents, we are paying close attention to this, and we are asking that our
medical professionals do the same. Statements like the one you have just
made show us that you are NOT paying attention and that you are NOT
following the overwhelming and growing body of evidence.
When professional medical associations cease to be guided by
evidence-based research and principles, and cease to be open and honest
with the public, then the public– rightly and understandably– becomes
alarmed and will, in turn, support the intervention of governments and
ultimately the courts. While we do respect the doctor/patient relationship,
your lack of adherence to the evidence is a symptom of a problem to which
you, as a medical association, have contributed. Your statement is shining
evidence of this.
There is, however, one part of your statement with which we could not
agree more: “Children and youth have the right to the appropriate medical
care.” Children and adolescents DO have the right to safe, evidence-based,
non-experimental medical care that protects them from long-term harm
such as loss of sexual function and infertility. This right is enshrined in the
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Moreover, children,
adolescents and their families ALSO have the right to provide informed
consent to drugs and surgical procedures that are recommended to them.
This requires doctors and medical associations to be informed and
evidence-based, transparent and accountable. Your statement shows a
shocking disregard for these responsibilities, which the AMA SHOULD hold
sacred. Full stop.
We strongly recommend that your organization cease to follow the
guidelines put forth by the heavily discredited WPATH, stop promoting
medical negligence and harm while operating from a non-evidence-based
perspective, and change course now as progressive European countries
including Sweden, Finland, England, Norway and France have already
done.
We ask that you explain your comments from an evidence-based
perspective. If you cannot, we must assume that they, along with your
official position, are ideologically driven, in which case we call for complete
retraction or substantial correction to the AMA’s original statement. Should
you fail to respond, we will understand that as further dismissal of the
parents, children and adolescents, and citizens to whom you are
responsible, and we will proceed accordingly.
In Support of Children and Families,
Our Duty Canad
Having recently gotten into a discussion about the misnamed “Gender Affirming Care” with some of my acquaintances we broached many contentious topics but one point that stuck out was when we got into pronoun territory.
My interlocutor was brought up the idea that the shortening of names – like Stan for Stanley – was a preference and that people were just being polite by referring to the individual as they would like to be referred to.
I stumbled a bit on proposing a counter argument for this point – in hindsight it is fairly straightforward to construct a response.
If a person insists on calling a self proclaimed “Stan”, “Stanley” it might indeed be considered a bit offensive. So how is this different that using she/her pronouns for a male who is under the false notion that he is female?
Well, Stan and Stanly are both terms that are technically correct for the person in question. Is it inconsiderate to ignore their wishes, yes certainly, but here in this free society we don’t have to associate with people who we judge are inconsiderate toward us.
The male expecting people to use “she/her” when to referring to him is a completely different case. Pronouns and preferred names are not in the same category of linguistic use. In English pronouns are sexed, thus males are attributed he/him and females are attributed she/her.
If you hold a set of beliefs that do not comport with reality – that is a male believing that he is somehow a woman (adult human female) – that is perfectly fine. Your personal belief about your reality are of no concern to anyone else in society.
The expectation though of people outside your gender delusion to play along with and be party to your departure from the material reality we all share is not acceptable, especially if you are a person that sees the harm Gender Ideology does to women and society.
Thus, the argument of using a preferred name vs. a pronoun is distinctly a false equivalence as in the first case two real descriptors that accurately represent reality are being offered. In the second case using the “wrong” pronouns is a decision to comport with reality or the decision to ignore the evidence your senses are reporting and submit to someone else’s interpretation of reality – no one is obliged to do so.
Both cases associated with someone is who you perceive to be offensive is not usually not a mandatory experience. Occasionally being offended in society is a part of life and one must learn to deal with it.
Compelling the speech of others is a distinctly authoritarian notion and should not be encouraged in a society that values freedom of thought and expression.
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