To the editor:

The Saturday before New Year’s Eve with some questions on my mind. What has happened to Mike DeWine that caused him to veto HB 68 and what he said at his press conference? Will the people of Ohio be bamboozled by the radical left wing liberal hog wash of gender dysphoria affirming medicine and surgery? Why did DeWine choose not to protect women’s sports?

Gender dysphoria affirming medical treatment is as much of a political philosophy, ideology, and fad as it is a mental illness. Transgender social media influencer Blaire White will affirm it is a mental health problem that has been turned into a political issue by liberal activists. These are liberal activists from the upper middle-class suburbs who want to be the most liberal ideologically woke parent(s) on their street. Who has the biggest house on the biggest hill on the big side of town, with biggest car in the driveway has been replaced by who can be the most woke liberal in the neighborhood.

You must understand there is a child mental health crisis in the United States. According to mental health experts’ today’s teenagers have more anxiety than mental patients of the 1950s. Other mental disorders such as depression, self-harm and gender dysphoria are also at all-time highs among teens. We can blame everything from technology to the breakdown of the family structure, but the mental health crisis is real. We need to treat mental Illness, not affirm mental illness. In other words, there is not a lobby to affirm children cutting themselves, we treat them with counselling. All mental illnesses should be treated with counselling. Then parents, counselors and psychiatrists can make decisions on a treatment plan.

The first section of HB 68 reads like a parent’s bill of rights. DeWine claimed HB 68 took rights away from parents and gave parental decisions to the government, quite the opposite. You can read it for yourself here, https://www.legislature.ohio.gov/legislation/135/hb68

In his press conference DeWine mentioned the opposition to HB 68 from doctors and hospitals. Doctors, hospitals and pharmaceutical companies support gender dysphoria affirming treatment, because it creates patients/customers for life. Gender dysphoria affirming treatment is not a one stop shop. Patients must return for prescriptions, physical check-ups, and surgeries. It’s a lifelong stream of income for doctors, pharmaceutical companies, hospitals, and insurance companies.

De-transitioning, or going back to one’s biological gender, is not as easy as DeWine made it sound in his press conference. It requires medical treatment, medication (or weening off medication), and possibly surgeries. This keeps the income stream going for years for doctors, hospitals, pharmaceutical companies, and insurance companies in one way or another.

DeWine said “this is about life,” stating parents and doctors told him “Some children would not be here if not for treatments.” People suffering from gender dysphoria have a higher risk of suicide than everyone else in society. Gender dysphoria affirming care is not the answer DeWine thinks. On March 20, 2023 the National Library of Medicine (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) published an article that research shows no statical difference in the suicidal thoughts and attempts of people who have transition treatment and people who do not have gender dysphoria affirming treatment. They wrote one sentence that sounds like transition treatment has the opposite effect: “Those who lived full-time in the gender/had a full social transition had greater odds of ever experiencing thoughts of suicide compared to those with no plan to receive treatment for transition.”

HB 68 also had a protect women’s sports aspect. Biological males have more fast twitch muscle fibers, higher lung capacity and more bone density to name a few things that give men a biological advantage over biological women in sports. That is why men/boys who were mediocre versus other men dominate women/girls’ sports after they identify as female. Women/girls who work hard their entire lives for scholarships and awards should not have those dreams taken away by a biological male. A man who went by the name Fallon Fox in mixed martial arts (a similar league to UFC) who told the league he was a woman and broke the bones in a woman’s face and fractured another’s skull. This happened because of his biologically superior muscles and bone density. I am happy to say a woman with superior fighting skills challenged beat Mr. Fallon Fox.

European nations took a liberal approach to trans-kids for years. Countries that allowed the liberal use of puberty blockers, estrogen treatments, testosterone blockers and surgeries found out there are complications. There also comes a point when the effects of the treatments are irreversible. When these trans-kids became adults, some say they outgrew the urge to transition, but it was too late the damage was done and irreversible. In recent years European nations have been reversing their stance on the liberal use of puberty blockers, estrogen and testosterone treatments, and sex change surgery for minors. They are adopting policies similar to the ones in Ohio HB 68.

Ohio law does not allow children to smoke, does not allow children to drink alcohol, or vote. We say it is because the children’s minds have not developed enough to make these decisions. Using that logic, we should not allow children to make decisions that will have life altering, lifelong consequences dealing with their health, because it’s the latest fad. We as a state, community and human race should absolutely be treating the mental illness crisis. The mental illness that is giving children anxiety, depression, self-harm behaviors and gender dysphoria should be taken seriously. Gender dysphoria affirming treatments are not the cure to the mental health crisis.

John R. Morrow,

Liverpool Township