The Alberta government has invoked the Charter’s notwithstanding clause to prevent court challenges to a trio of laws impacting transgender youth and adults.
The clause is part of a bill now before the house, and Premier Danielle Smith says the move is necessary to protect children’s health and well-being.
She says their health could be jeopardized if challenges to the laws are tied up in court for a long time.
The notwithstanding clause allows governments to override Charter rights if deemed necessary as a way to balance the authority of both politicians and the courts.
The clause relates to laws that put restrictions on student pronoun changes at school, on girls’ and women’s sports, and on medical therapies for young people looking to transition.
Two of those bills are facing court challenges on the grounds they are harmful and unconstitutional.
The vast majority of trans kids actually are trans.
Why is it more concerning that a small percentage of kids would be misdiagnosed and receive the wrong treatment, than for the majority to get established healthcare that themselves, both parents, doctors and therapists all agree on?
Why not continue to optimize medical guidelines to minimize misdiagnosis, instead of a ban for everyone who needs the medical care?
The life of someone misdiagnosed into transitioning, is effectively the same life that trans people live before treatment. It does less harm to allow transition since most trans are diagnosed correctly, and any that were wrong could still be legally allowed to transition back.
These bills are also banning puberty blockers which safely allows them to delay the decision for several years.
Anyone tired of hearing about trans people should know that going through the wrong puberty will make trans people a bigger part of your life. Not only does that make their lives permanently more difficult to have mixed gender features, but it forces them to live with unwanted gender nonconformity that will be „in your face“ throughout society.