“Tooogie Howser” — A Tennessee State Law for Trans Gender Dysphoria in the Light of the Tennessee Supreme Court Decision

That fear was reinforced as I entered the legal profession. In 2007, a law school professor from Northeastern told us to follow traditional gender norms in court. She told me that I wasn’t a good male advocate and that I shouldn’t have been soft- spoken in class. Outside class, I found my appearance was regularly the subject of mockery. While working in New York City, some judges and court officers called me “Doogie Howser”, and asked if my child would go to work the next day. I was perceived as too boyish to be either a woman or an adult man. After one job interview, I later learned, staff members questioned whether I would be “taken seriously” in court. After graduation, I stayed away from the courtroom because of fear that my future clients would pay the price if I told them I was female.

In some sense, I am speaking not only to the nine justices who will decide this case but also to a country confused, skeptical and unnecessarily fearful of trans health care.

It took nearly a year for LW to get the go ahead, but LW’s mom says that at 15, her once troubled child is an easy and happy teenager, now that she is getting access to treatments for gender dysphoria. The family has to make a 10 hour drive out of state to procure drugs for the transition because they are not allowed for minor girls in Tennessee.

Although the Tennessee legislature did hear testimony from individual doctors in support of the ban, all the major medical associations that deal with gender dysphoria have filed briefs supporting these treatments for trans kids, including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association.

The real purpose of the ban can be seen in the language of the statute. The statute encourages children to respond to sex and bars treatments that might encourage adolescents to be less happy with their sex.

Gender Dysphoria Treatment in the Western Hemisphere: From Birth to Death, Legal Action for the Alliance for Defending Freedom

The senator says that “you have countries in Western Europe that were ahead of us in terms of these types of medications.” They’re pulling back because they’ve had a long runway, and they’re realizing that the adverse effects of some of the medications are far outweighing the benefit that they have.

John Bursch of the conservative Christian legal advocacy group Alliance Defending Freedom echoes that sentiment, noting that some Western European and Scandinavian countries have not only been at this longer, they have national health care systems that cover everyone.

“They can track a patient from birth until death. And so if someone gets cross-sex hormones for the purpose of a gender change at age 15, they can look at how they’re doing at age 20,25, 45 65 and see what the outcomes were,” Bursch notes.

The drugs are accessible in a research setting and can still be used by minor already using the medications.

The law bars access to treatment for kids who want to transition from their sex assigned at birth, but permits those same medications to be used when treating minors suffering from other conditions, like endometriosis or early-onset puberty.

Adult patients will still be provided gender-affirming care. But lawyers for the trans kids argue that if states can ban gender dysphoria treatments for minors, the next step will be to ban such treatments for adults, too.

Getting a tattoo in Tennessee, but no medicine for transgender children: A challenge to a state law that bans gender-affirming medical treatments for minor children

“People make assumptions. They say it’s just a phase, because they don’t know what it’s like,” LW says of her experience. It can definitely feel lost, given how slow the process is.

“You can’t get a tattoo in Tennessee unless you’re 18. You can’t smoke. He told NPR that you can’t drink. Tennessee regulates “a number of different types of medical procedures,” Johnson said, adding that “it felt like this was the best public policy to prevent kids form suffering from irreversible consequences, things that cannot be undone.”

Tennessee State Sen. Jack Johnson, who introduced the challenged bill, says the law is just another example of the state exercising its regulatory power.

ACLU lawyer Chase Strangio, the first openly trans lawyer to argue in front of the Supreme Court, represented the kids and their parents. He thinks that Tennesseebans these medications for one and only one purpose.

Prelogar said she acknowledged that there was a debate on the issue both in the United States and elsewhere, but she said she “stand[s] by that there is a consensus that these treatments can be medically necessary for some adolescents — and that’s true no matter what source you look at.”

Roberts asked why the courts should be involved in the scientific uncertainty about the long-term implications of gender-affirming medical treatments for minor children. That view was echoed by Justice Samuel Alito, who cited Swedish data, and said it was “directly contrary to the sweeping statement in your petition” that “these treatments have benefits that greatly outweigh the risks and the dangers.”

But she faced intense questioning from the court’s conservatives. Notably, Justice Neil Gorsuch, who wrote a majority opinion in a historic case that granted employment protections to gay and transgender workers, remained silent through the hours-long arguments.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s conservative majority appeared skeptical Wednesday of a challenge to a Tennessee law that bans gender-affirming care for transgender children.