PETERS – Smith’s healthcare change poses real danger for Alberta trans kids
From left: Jordan Peterson, Danielle Smith, Tucker Carlson, Conrad Black, Jan. 24, 2024. (Image: X.com / Danielle Smith)
IT HAS TO BE MORE THAN A LITTLE DISTURBING for the LGBTQ2S+ community in Alberta that the person who was just days ago glad-handing with Tucker Carlson and Jordan Peterson is now radically reshaping healthcare laws for trans kids in that province.
Premier Danielle Smith unveiled the sweeping changes earlier this week — not in ready-to-debate legislation or even in a detailed news release, but in a video posted to social media meant to couch the draconian crackdown in comforting smiles and soothing elevator music.
Trans people and advocates saw right through it, though, just as they did Smith’s laughable plea that the issue be depoliticized.
ArmchairMayor.ca 
Mr. Peters I don’t agree with many views coming from Jordan Peterson, Danielle Smith, Tucker Carlson, and Conrad Black but I defend their right to say them as long as the views are not defamatory, and without lawful justification or excuse, that is likely to injure the reputation of any person by exposing them to hatred, contempt or ridicule.
Mr. Peters you don’t have a monopoly on the truth and neither does Mel or me. Why should we not be able to hear these conservative pundits; Jordan Peterson, Danielle Smith, Tucker Carlson, and Conrad Black?
I understand that Tucker Carlson is in Moscow to interview Putin. Does this make Tucker Putin’s “useful idiot”? Narratives of European history since WWII is consumed by the two world wars, the Holocaust, the Soviet menace, and are remarkably inward-looking.
Our Narrative in the West was divided between good and evil. We were always good and anyone who opposed us was evil and no debate. What we did was always done with good intentions regardless of how many died and who benefited.
I am dismayed that Mr. Peters, a journalist , describes a meeting held by Danielle Smith as “presenting draconian policies”, “radically reshaping healthcare laws”, and how this was done was a “laughable plea” by Smith. The greatest sin of a journalist is to manipulate information by using loaded words or by omission and refuse to include in their journalism what they know needs to be debated.
Ninety five percent who call themselves journalists are building Potemkin Villages, moving from one narrative to the next, from one backdrop to the next hate mongering creating their own facts without asking questions. The lack of debate on issues that people ‘working people” (Liberal. Conservative and Socialist are asking and need answers to without going to the streets about Covid-19, Education, Ukraine, Gaza, Taiwan, but we never ask about our involvement in any of this.
Mr. Peters what exactly makes your opinions, or the opinions of LGBTQ2S+ community more credible than Tucker Carlsons’s opinions. What is taking place in the classrooms of our province, and what is being said by our Minister of Education needs to be debated from all sides that is how we arrive at understanding.
The purpose of journalism is to disseminate a rigorously objective documentation of what happens in the world, without inserting the journalists’ or any institution’s biases, leaving the reader to form their opinion on the events about which they are reading.
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Can someone in opposition to the proposed legislation explain why it’s immediately sensible to restrict minors from walking into a tattoo shop to get permanent art, but not sensible to restrict a minor from walking into a doctor’s office to make a substantial and permanent change to their body?
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Hormone therapy is not a permanent change for teenagers, rather , it’s a pause. If the teen decides to stop the therapy nature kicks in and the body goes back to its natural coarse. Hormone therapy is a much bigger decision than simply getting a tattoo and needs to have several gate keepers, but elected politicians and talking heads shouldn’t be included in the gatekeeping. This is a very big decision for the individual and the family, doctors and phycologists ought to be the gatekeepers, this ought not be a political wedge issue.
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Yes I’m aware that the drugs are not permanent, although I’m not sure to what extent they pose any problems if reversed after many years. What I’m talking about is surgery or other irreversible changes. Gender dysmorphia surgery in Alberta has occurred for a minor as young as 14.
I would be interested to hear the arguments against having such a restriction. As we bar minors from a number of things, tobacco and alcohol are some of them. Tattoos another. A minor cannot legally consent to a sex act. The obvious premise of course is that the child cannot grasp the implications of these choices at a young age.
We allow politicians to make rules for the above, and we have never had any outrage for those restrictions. We have not called for allowing doctors to determine if a minor could get married for example, if a doctor determined they had the maturity and intellect of an adult.
The argument that we should keep these decisions out of the law and in the hands of doctors is a red herring in my opinion. If a child can’t comprehend the impact of a decision made at 15, such as a mastectomy, how can a doctor make that determination for them? There are a number of examples of serious regret from adults who underwent gender reassignment. A doctor isn’t the one left living the rest of that child’s life.
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We’re seeing an exodus of “non-desirables”, be they from the LGBTQ community or other groups, to BC due to our neighbours intolerance. This is a touchy topic but shouldn’t this be a topic between a family and their Dr. rather than the provincial gov’t and Tucker Carlson, Conrad Black and Jordan Peterson?
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The doctors caused the opioid crisis. Whatever the doctors say need to be taken with a grain or two of salt. No one is immune to scrutiny, especially the doctors, especially modern day doctors.
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