The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals put a pause on a lower court’s injunction blocking Tennessee’s new ban on “sex change surgeries, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones” and “any drug or device” intended for the same purposes from taking effect. That’s a lot of negatives, but it all sorts out to “the ban can go into effect.” But with many other states blessedly passing the same law, and LGBTQ activists and the ACLU challenging them, this is certain to end up in the Supreme Court. There are more details at the link.

SCOTUS May Soon Face Appeal

That story quotes a senior legal fellow at Heritage’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies as saying that courts will have to decide “whether a state’s interest in protecting the welfare of children outweighs a parent’s interest in getting experimental medical treatment.”

Another conservative legal expert said this is an attempt by liberal activists to get courts to legalize what they could never get through legislatures, which is okaying treatments “that amount to genital mutilation or chemical castration of children.” Proponents argue that it’s necessary to prevent conditions like depression, anxiety, self-harm and suicide, but opponents say there’s no evidence of that, and that suicidal tendencies tend to remain even after the irreversible chemical and surgical mutilation.

Permanent Consequences From an Experimental Procedure

I would just add this: in the name of upholding the Hippocratic Oath to “do no harm,” governments ban “experimental” medical procedures. Some argue, reasonably, that such treatments should be made available to certain patients, like consenting adults who are facing terminal cancer for which no approved treatment will work. They have no alternatives other than death.

But in this case, we’re being asked to impose permanently body-altering “experimental” procedures on minors who cannot mentally or emotionally understand the full ramifications. This is why even the deep blue state of New York bans giving tattoos to anyone under 18 (but apparently, it’s okay to hack off their breasts and genitals). In most cases, these confused kids are just going through a phase they’ll outgrow, and the only threat of death is that they threaten to kill themselves if we don’t give it to them. That alone should be an alarm bell that we’re dealing with a mental issue, not a physical one.

I hope and pray that in the not-too-distant future, society will come to its senses and look back in horror at this as an era of widespread hysteria fed by radical activists, quack doctors, politicized school officials and peer and social media pressure. I can easily imagine future generations asking, “How could they have treated their own children like lab rats?” It’s a question we need to start asking right now.

If you think that’s too harsh, here’s yet another of a sadly growing number of “de-transitioners” who feel that they were misled and mutilated by the adults they trusted and are now suffering permanent consequences.

Mike Huckabee is the former governor of Arkansas and longtime conservative commentator on issues in culture and current events. A New York Times best-selling author, he hosts the weekly talk show Huckabee on TBN.

Originally published at MikeHuckabee.com. Reprinted with permission.