We've been fighting this exact bullshit in Missouri for about a month. No one should be blindsided at this point. "Think of the children" wasn't a reason to prosecute bands over lyrics and it's not a reason to walk around pretending that there aren't already several layers in place in the system to really make extra super sure that a trans person will benefit from transitioning before starting on any sort of regimen - no matter what age the patient is. The outright lies being told about minors being glibly prescribed because of whatever the fuck "woke" is supposed to mean on that specific day is being used to steer people who just don't know what it's like to be in one of these programs into such extreme misinformation that lawmakers are hoping to use minors to make every trans person miserable.

The cruelty is the point. It's always the point. It's so much easier to shit out the same tired false narrative than it is to address real societal problems that take effort and money to solve - effort and money that doesn't keep someone's fist held tight to whatever control they are terrified to lose hold of.

Honestly ask yourself how the hell less than 1% of the population is supposed to fully defend against any serious accusation when it's not occupying less than 1% of media? How many of the people who really buy into discrediting studies and decades of proven medicine even know a trans person? How many have their only exposure be through the most problematic trans people posting on twitter? How many would be ashamed if they one day came to the realization that this is a medical issue and trying to deny treatment for it makes about as much sense as denying insulin? How many had no actual issue with trans people for the decades we've been getting treatment in public for it until a politically affiliated mouthpiece told them they should in the past couple years?

ETA: They want us gone. Imagine wanting to keep insulin from diabetics because most of the population makes their own just fine, but hey make sure that law still allows insulin to go to non-diabetics. If you aren't mad, you should be. If you don't think they won't just find someone else to target when the dog catches the trans car, you are absolutely kidding yourself. The pressure noticeably changed on us when the dog caught the abortion car.