Socialist students stage 'die-in' for 'gender affirming' care for kids

On August 5, Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) members at Florida International University (FIU) staged a “die-in” to protest the Florida Board of Medicine’s meeting to discuss whether children should be prevented from having access to gender-transition procedures.

A June 2 letter sent by Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo urged the Board to consider how weak the scientific evidence is undergirding “gender affirming” medical care for transgender youth, referring to gender transition procedures as “complex and irreversible.” 

FIU socialist students pantomimed their own deaths, holding paper gravestones as they lay on the lawn, claiming to represent “trans people who have died and those who will be killed by reactionary, anti-trans policies.”

The gravestones read with potential causes of death such as “denied care,” “overdose,” and “depression.”

[RELATED: Transgender activist urges children to ‘learn’ about transitioning ‘at a very young age’]

YDSA at FIU tweeted that “gender-affirming care” should be “FOR FREE,” and called the Florida GOP “deadly.”

They went on to claim that Ladapo was incorrect when he argued that puberty blockers are ineffective and dangerous, citing alleged “countless sources and studies” debunking them. 

According to an April 20 report by Ladapo, however, “[s]ystematic reviews on hormonal treatment for young people show a trend of low-quality evidence, small sample sizes, and medium to high risk of bias.”

A 2013 peer-reviewed study in the Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry appears to support Ladapo’s skepticism that gender-affirming care is the best option for gender-dysphoric youth.

[RELATED: This is how one university event encouraged ‘littles’ to ‘explore’ their gender identity]

According to the study, “Many children who experience gender dysphoria (GD), a sense of discomfort from incongruence between their gender identity and assigned sex, will not continue to experience dysphoria into adolescence and adulthood.”

Referring to previous research on the issue, the authors of the study go on to state that “for the majority of children majority of children (84.2%; n ¼ 207), the GD, the [gender dysphoria] desisted.”

The study’s own findings corroborated this previous scholarship, discovering that a majority of adolescents who initially sought help at a gender clinic in Amsterdam never returned, leaving the authors to conclude that they “no longer had a desire for gender reassignment.”

After public comment, and despite protests, the board voted to move forward and prohibit children from being gender-transitioned.

“Over the cries of our trans brothers, sisters, and siblings + allies, the Board of Medicine voted to accept DeSantis’ proposed rule.  Shameful decision from an ‘apolitical’ body,” YDSA tweeted.

Campus Reform reached out to the Florida International University and FIU Young Democratic Socialists of America for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.