Backlash to transgender health care isn’t new − but the faulty science used to justify it has changed to meet the times
Share This
January 30, 2024
G. Samantha Rosenthal, Associate Professor of History, Roanoke College -
The Conversation
In the past century, there have been three waves of opposition to transgender health care.
In 1933, when the Nazis rose to power, they cracked down on transgender medical research and clinical practice in Europe. In 1979, a research report critical of transgender medicine led to the closure of the most well-respected clinics in the United States. And since 2021, when Arkansas became the first U.S. state among now at least 21 other states banning gender-affirming care for minors, we have been living in a third wave.
On the other hand, the archives of transgender medicine demonstrate that backlash against these practices has historically been rooted in pseudoscience. And today, an anti-science movement that aims to discredit science altogether is fueling the fire of the current wave of anti-trans panic.
The 1930s − eugenics and sexology collide
In the 1920s, the new science of hormones was just reaching maturation and entering mainstream consciousness. In the field of sexology – the study of human sexuality, founded in 19th century Europe – scientists were excited about research on animals demonstrating that removing or transplanting gonads could effectively change an organism’s sex.
In 1919, the German sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld founded the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft in Berlin, which became the world’s leading center for queer and transgender research and clinical practice. Hirschfeld worked closely with trans women as co-researchers throughout the 1920s. Several trans women also received care at the institute, including orchiectomies that halted the production of testosterone in their bodies.
Within months of Hitler’s rise to power in early 1933, a mob of far-right students broke into and shuttered the institute for being “un-German.” Some of the most famous images of Nazi book burning show the institute’s library set ablaze in an outdoor plaza.
Financial disclosure reports for the president and vice president are out and they show Vice President Kamala Harris was gifted tickets to one of the summer’s hottest concerts by the artist herself — Beyoncé
Walt Disney has cut its investment in programming for traditional television networks pretty dramatically as part of its strategy to maximize audiences and profit in the