Within four years, Paul’s article was accepted as a traditional legal brief in Idaho. House Bill 71, which makes it a criminal offense to deliver gender-affirming care to trans youth, was signed into law by the state’s Republican governor Brad Little in April of last year. The ACLU filed a lawsuit against Idaho the following month, claiming that HB 71 is illegal on behalf of two unidentified trans teenagers. A preliminary lawsuit against HB 71 was issued by a U.S. District Court in December 2023, stating that the law may be enforced while legal action is pending.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals granted the injunction’s continuation in January. However, the state, which is represented by the right-wing Christian constitutional group Alliance Defending Freedom, is objecting to that decision. Paul’s is one of the many sources cited in the legal brief they filed on February 6 as support for their claim.
Erin Reed and Evan Urquhart, two separate journalists, have given in-depth explanations that claim Paul’s part contains false information. They emphasize that gender-affirming treatment for trans youth is scarcely “experimental,” and its benefits have been thoroughly researched. Numerous studies have revealed that rates of transition “regret” are really low, around 1- 2% for both top surgery and hormone replacement therapy. This is true even though some people may start transition and then eventually take steps to slow that transition. In fact, 94% of trans Americans who had started their social and/or medical transitions reported that their lives had improved, according to a recent study of 84,000 people.
Paul does, however, make reference to the mythical, dismissed idea of “rapid onset gender dysphoria,” which falsely claims that children who are exposed to trans people in school or on social media experience the condition as a result of being “socially contagious.” The article also suggests that there will be an epidemic of people who will regret their transitions as a result of the way we treat gender distress in children today, which she describes as depending on practitioners who “automatically agree to young women’s self-diagnosis.”
Paul has shown a “prolonged obsession” with trans young people, according to Strangio. She defended J.K. Rowling’s severe stigmatization in a bit she wrote for the Times’ opinion part in February of last year titled “In Defense of J.K.” Paul had penned at least five opinions about trans people by December 2022, according to Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR).
Paul’s opinion column is by no means the primary Times article to be used as support for anti-trans policy. Missouri issued an executive order in April 2023 that imposed fresh limitations on gender-affirming care for people of all ages, citing a New York Times article about the practice that was widely criticized as distorted and false. (After that, the executive order was removed.) The Times’ insurance has also been cited by lawmakers in Texas and Alabama in support of proposed anti-trans regulations.
According to Strangio in their critique, “there is such a strong connection from these New York Times articles to the ways in which these laws are defended in court and therefore ultimately upheld.” “The possibility of damage to transgender people from these works is not hypothetical.”
The Times’ individual readers have echoed these critiques from Strangio and others. Hundreds of New York Times subscribers signed an open letter last February denouncing the publication’s treatment of transgender people. The notice also provided various examples of how the Times’ coverage was used to support anti-trans laws.
