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TRANSCRIPT:
It is of no surprise that the Grand Old Party (GOP) of the Republican platform represents a significant portion of voters and their elected officials with socially conservative beliefs.
There are, most definitely, members of the Democratic Party with more conservative views than most voters likely to identify as “Democrats.”
Nevertheless, we typically learn about Republicans attempting to drive policies to maintain a sense of social order—the kind that will not only appeal to their base but connect with a broad range of the American public who, at a fundamental level, seek cultural stability through common shared values.
But will driving through such policies as an attempt to counteract an agenda pulsating through progressive left American activism, high on steroids in certain academic circles and pumping through the corporate world, significantly impact mainstream culture itself—and the young minds it seeks to protect?
As Founding Father Thomas Jefferson stipulated in the Declaration of Independence, the main purpose of government is to protect our Natural Rights, and that government obtains its right to govern with the consent of We, the People. Indeed, and as a constitutional government, the powers of that government are meant to be limited by a set of laws and customs enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.
Thus, the question of the extent to which government can influence core moral and cultural values in society can be as timeless and ongoing as the changing seasons.
However, that is precisely what the GOP is attempting to facilitate, or otherwise, to merely show voters affiliated with social conservatism through the Republican Party that “something is being done” to maintain a degree of sanity in a nation perceived as infected with fantastical ideas about the essence of the Self.
A ban on “gender reassignment” for minors
In late July, New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu signed three different bills into law, prohibiting “transgender girls” from competing in athletic programs that match their “gender identity,” ensuring that parents of public school children have the right to know of “lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender” (LGBT) resources incorporated into lessons, and a ban on “gender reassignment” for minors, including genital surgery.
Various media publications have described Sununu as “socially liberal,” “fiscally conservative moderate,” and taking a “moderate course” as a Republican, as well as a “hardcore libertarian.” Furthermore, Sununu announced in July 2023 that he would not run for a fifth term as governor this year.
It could be that Sununu is pushing through as many donor-favored policies as possible before calling his governorship a day. To that end, we should note that he vetoed a bill that would have allowed some businesses and government entities to prevent men from using women-only spaces, such as restrooms and prisons.
So how will the signed legislation protect children?
First, House Bill 619 bans physicians from subjecting anyone under the age of 18 to genital surgeries and inhibits health care providers from sending them to a different state for those same surgeries. That said, an earlier draft included a ban on other “transgender” affiliated interventions such as mastectomies, cross-sex hormones, and puberty-blocking medication.
“This bill focuses on protecting the health and safety of New Hampshire’s children and has earned bipartisan support,” states a press release on behalf of Sunnu. “There is a reason that countries across the world—from Sweden to Norway, France, and the United Kingdom—have taken steps to pause these procedures and policies.”
Second, House Bill 1205 requires schools to designate athletic teams in grades 5 through 12 based “on the biological sex at birth,” and that sports designated for “females, women, or girls shall not be open to students of the male sex.”
Sounds, like, common sense that shouldn’t be explicitly set into law, right? But then again, we are living through a period of uncommon sense in our culture.
“HB 1205 ensures fairness and safety in women’s sports by maintaining integrity and competitive balance in athletic competitions,” Sununu said in a press release.
Third, House Bill 1312 builds upon the existing law requiring educators to provide advanced notice to parents about sex education curriculum and teaching resources, and expands to classroom instruction involving “sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or gender expression.” Parents could then withdraw their children from that instruction, provided they find alternative instruction agreed upon by the school district and, if cost applies, pay for it themselves.
Interestingly enough, in a May interview with the New Hampshire Bulletin, Republican New Hampshire Sen. Tim Lang said the law would not require a teacher to inform parents if they are planning to talk about “LGBTQ+ civil rights history,” and that notice would only need to be given if the lessons were straightforwardly about ideas of “gender identity and sexual orientation.”
Lang reportedly said, “It’s just informative to parents. Nothing stops the school from doing those classes. The class is allowed. That just says that if you do it, though, because this is a sensitive topic, you need to notify parents.”
Now isn’t that typical of a stunning number of Republican politicians who are trying to maneuver like surfers around an agenda the magnitude of giant ocean waves and monster winds, seemingly attempting to appease their voting base and donors instead of actively sailing the culture ship with a clear moral compass?
It is almost like the GOP is expressing:
“Essentially, we’re just gonna inform you that your child’s school is on fire. Just know that the fire will continue to spread.”
“We’re just gonna inform you that there is a gas leak at your child’s school kitchen. But we won’t do anything to stop the leak.”
“We’re just letting you know that your child is possibly, no potentially, being spiritually poisoned at school. Nothing stops the school from poisoning your children. The poison is allowed, and because this is a moral toxin, you need to be informed.”
Well, some might argue that in times where common sense is seemingly uncommon, We, the People need to support laws that explicitly attempt to preserve values that often align with the Christian principles rooted in America's founding moral fabric.
(What do you think, dear reader?)
Vetoing a bill over a matter supposedly non-existent in New Hampshire
While passing the three bills described above, Sununu vetoed House Bill 396, which would have allowed businesses and government entities to classify “persons based on biological sex” to access restrooms, locker rooms, and prisons because “classification serves the compelling state interests of protecting the privacy rights and physical safety of such persons and others.”
That bill would have directly reversed policies signed into law by Sununu himself in 2018 to supposedly protect “transgender” individuals from discrimination with respect to accessing the aforementioned facilities.
“The challenge with HB 396 is that in some cases it seeks to solve problems that have not presented themselves in New Hampshire, and in doing so invites unnecessary discord,” Sununu wrote in a statement.
Maybe these “problems” have yet to present themselves in New Hampshire, especially given the rate at which members of the American youth are increasingly identifying as “transgender” or simply members of the opposite sex?
What can research teach us?
According to a thorough review of over 60 studies published by the American College of Pediatricians (ACPeds) in February 2024, the share of youth identifying as “bisexual, gay, or otherwise questioning” has over doubled from 11 percent in 2015 to almost 25 percent in 2021.
The authors point to a longitudinal study of more than 11,000 children across the United States between 9 and 10 years of age; the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (ABCDS) stated that the 0.48 percent of children who identified as “transgender” were more likely to experience depression, anxiety and have suicidal ideas or intentions. The referenced ABCS publication argued that it is unclear whether this finding is “due to stigma, minority stress, discrimination, or gender dysphoria,” but it is nonetheless “paramount” that this “vulnerable” group receives “appropriate” mental health support.
Furthermore, the review also considers the analysis of five independent cross-sectional datasets involving 641,860 individuals, in which the researchers found that compared to “cisgender individuals, transgender and gender-diverse individuals have, on average, higher rates of autism, other neurodevelopmental and psychiatric diagnoses.”
And on that note, the extensive probe of over 60 studies concluded that there is “no long-term evidence that mental health concerns are decreased or alleviated” after minors undertook “gender affirming therapies” when seeking to align themselves with the sex they supposedly desire to be.
Well, wouldn’t you know?
(Surprise, surprise. Duh.)
And if that weren’t enough, a 2018 ACPeds review highlighted that 80 to 95 percent of children with “gender dysphoria,” in which they feel a mismatch between their experienced sex and their actual sex, accepted their biological sex by late adolescence. In fact, the procedure of altering their bodies to align their physical form with that of the opposite sex, according to the publication, “may not suffice as treatment for transsexualism, and should inspire improved psychiatric and somatic care after sex reassignment for this patient group.”
Here is a possible solution for someone who feels “trapped in the wrong body” and deeply desires to be the opposite sex: they could be offered the kind of professional support, be it “cognitive behavioral therapy,” neuro-linguistic programming, or given advancements in surgery and real-time imaging, the physical “rewiring” of the brain region responsible for influencing sexual behavior, such that the resultant outcome is a sense of inner peace without having to undergo a toxic cocktail of treatments and surgeries that, ultimately, does nothing to alter biological sex at a fundamental chromosomal DNA level.
And yet, it can be argued that the normalization of “transgenderism” has little to do with supporting an individual overcome the mismatch between their biological sex and, potentially, that of their brain structure or psychological state. Instead, this sinister agenda is a ploy to disfigure, disrupt, and destroy the pillar of the nuclear family within a healthy society, and with that, respecting marriage as a union between one man and one woman as compatible with a Christian belief system.
(Okay, so in Klinefelter syndrome, a boy is born with an extra copy of the X chromosome. But he is still a male. In fact, a tiny proportion of babies—1.7 percent according to a review from the American Journal of Human Biology—are born with intersex characteristics in which their reproductive or sexual anatomy doesn’t entirely conform to either sex. Yet, any one of them can still be aligned with male or female because, sometimes, intersexuality isn’t discovered until later in childhood or even adulthood.)
Folks—this is about eradicating Christianity, and rooting out the interwoven, lingering strands of culture inspired by the Bible from the moral fabric of this great democratic republic of Nature’s Law and Natural Rights.
So if anyone believes in vetoing a bill over a “transgender” matter that is supposedly non-existent in their state, it will absolutely, unequivocally become an existing matter if We, the People, sit back, twiddle our thumbs, complain—and allow it.
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