Moms 4 Liberty Chair Who Faked Gender Dysphoria Expresses Shock At Gender Dysphoria Dx
This one’s really stupid. We’re sorry.
by Mira Lazine
Man, it sure is easy to transition. I just walked into the doctor’s office the other day and, in the name of furthering Gender Ideology, they handed me a year’s supply of estrogen for free! I’m going in tomorrow to get surgery from a mailman using a rusty scalpel.
At least, that’s the type of thing you’d believe if you listened to the right-wing narrative on transitioning.
The reality is much less shocking and much more dystopian. While progress has been made to increase access, gatekeeping continues to dominate the majority of gender affirming care worldwide, with trans people being required to prove that they’re ‘really trans’ or ‘trans enough.’ Even in the US, many trans people could tell you about the thousand and one hoops to jump through - the endless therapy appointments, constant doubt by clinicians, insurance nightmares, and fear-mongering about risks all contribute to a culture that makes it incredibly difficult for most people to transition.
But transphobes don’t believe any of this is the case, despite the endless testimony to the contrary. Because when are they known for following the evidence?
Now, some healthcare providers have worked to reduce gatekeeping. Plume, for example, streamlines the process as much as possible, making hormones and surgery referrals a lot easier for trans people to access. Other clinics like Equitas Health in Ohio provide broader gender-affirming care as part of their broader coverage as clinicians.
Kaiser Permanente in California is another example of one of these kinds of clinics, with a presence all across the Golden State. It’s made headlines among the right-wing media for recognizing that trans kids exist, and as of yesterday it’s headlining anti-trans biologist Colin Wright’s substack ‘Reality’s Last Stand.’
What for, you ask? Why, it’s the egregious crime of helping a (supposed) 53 year old nonbinary person to transition over a period of many months! How dastardly!
screenshot from “Reality’s Last Stand”
But that’s actually not quite it. The article’s actually about helping a 53 year old be approved for a transition she didn’t want after she lied about being nonbinary!
Our protagonist here is Beth Bourne, a mother from Davis, California (and chair of Yolo County Moms for Liberty) who has an estranged trans child whom she does not support. She decries the coming out process, and after Kaiser is supportive of her child’s transition, decides to ‘educate’ herself by learning about rapid-onset gender dysphoria. This is the infamous, widely debunked idea that trans kids are swiftly ‘turning trans’ because of some vague social influence.
It's a bit bizarre that Bourne found this information. Googling ‘transgender’ pulls up supportive resources like GLAAD, HRC, the APA, and so forth. It’s almost as if she had some type of ax to grind! But why would someone who describes transitioning as an “[introducing] illness into an otherwise healthy body” be anti-trans? Imagine that!
So, in response to her kid considering transition in middle school, and after doing copious research on low quality blogs, Bourne has a radical idea - what if she goes undercover to show her kid how easy it is to transition! That’ll show them! That’ll save them from the dangers of transitioning!
Except… it doesn’t exactly go as Bourne planned.
As discussed, Bourne lied about being nonbinary, having gender dysphoria, and wanting a medical transition to get approved for this process.
And it still took her over 230 days to get through.
screenshot from Reality’s Last Stand
That’s right, this supposedly speedy process took months! Not very strong evidence of her point, but what do I know? I’m just a brainwashed trans menace!
A series of medical professionals took a psych history, and presented her with resources to learn about the risks of transitioning, as well as detailed explainers on all the procedures she was interested in
Bourne claims she presented red flags her team should have picked up on. What were these red flags you ask? She told them she had childhood trauma, and a family member with psychosis and body dysmorphia.
The specialist she was talking to, of course, pointed out these were unconnected to gender dysphoria so there was no reason to be concerned.
Bourne didn’t like this and was upset that she wasn’t stopped in her tracks because of this fake history of fake red flags. At the same time she carefully avoided presenting actual red flags, consistently presenting herself as a nonbinary patient with gender dysphoria who wanted to medically transition, for months on end.
The actual red flags that doctors would look for, in addition to psychosis, would be, say, a sense of uneasiness about whether she actually wanted to transition, showing that she didn't understand any of the risks or procedures, or not strongly identifying with the overall direction consistently over time. Essentially, any doubt, ignorance, or contradiction would be a true red flag.
Everything she described is, assuming that she was telling her story accurately, something you’d only experience if you were trying to do exactly what she did - lying about your certainty and speeding through the process with no limitations in terms of finances, insurance, family, or even personal self doubt. The vast majority of trans adults go through a much slower and more arduous process (and her experience was nothing like that of trans youth).
The doctors can’t be blamed for helping her through the process of getting care. Doctors take patients in good faith and assume they’re not trying to game the system to convince their trans child not to transition. From what Bourne described, she presented with persistent, consistent gender dysphoria (For example, writing of a conversation with one medical professional, “I told her that I didn’t like the ‘feeling of the female form and being chesty,’”) and clearly stated, reasonable goals for a medical transition.
What Bourne showed is that even as a 53-year-old with all the stars aligned in her favor, transitioning takes quite a while to get through. (For kids, obviously, there are many more barriers, assessments, and hoops to jump through.)
However, if you lie to your doctor, you can eventually convince them you have a condition you do not have and be approved for surgery you neither want nor need. Lying to your doctor would normally help no one, but I guess in the case of Bourne, it helped her score internet points with the anti-trans crowd. I still wouldn’t recommend it, though.
Mira Lazine is a freelance journalist covering transgender issues, politics, and science. She can be found on Twitter, Mastodon, and BlueSky, @MiraLazine