Two parents in Indiana continue to fight for custody after a court yanked their child from their home because they refused to accept his “gender identity.”
As Fox News reports, “[I]n 2021, Indiana officials began investigating the Coxes after a report found they were not referring to their child by his preferred gender identity, removing the teen from their custody and placing him in a ‘gender-affirming’ home.” An appeals court upheld the decision. Now the Coxes are pleading with the Supreme Court to hear their case.
When ideological zealots steal children from their parents based on these imaginary offenses, it is de facto kidnapping. “They are coming for your children” in the most literal sense — this was always the endgame of gender ideology.
Despite being a predictable culmination, we are still on the frontier of this final stage, and it will often appear as though these are isolated incidents. But remember, that’s exactly how it began with hormone blockers and so-called transgender surgeries for children. As these examples of court-sanctioned child snatching gain attention, watch for the following progression to unfold. It should sound familiar by now.
First, the left will claim that “it totally isn’t happening!” or that the entire issue is nothing more than a right-wing fever dream. Then, as the truth becomes more evident, the left will begin to acknowledge that it is happening, “but it’s super rare!” Finally, once it becomes impossible to deny, the left will fully embrace it and claim that anyone opposed to it is a bigot who supports child abuse.
You might recall the recent uproar over a bill introduced by Democrats in Maine known as LD 1735. The bill went viral as conservatives mounted opposition to it. The left circled the wagons and claimed the whole thing was much ado about nothing. Far-left website Advocate suggested the hoopla was unwarranted because “the bill provides protections for trans youth and their parents for seeking gender-affirming care as well as having the state take emergency custody of abused trans kids if the child is within its borders.”
But the problem is that their definition of “abused trans kids” is any child with parents unwilling to affirm their so-called gender identity. Legislators backing the bill clearly don’t care about the real definition of child abuse. They want Maine to be a sanctuary state for the sterilization and sexual mutilation of children.
That’s where this whole thing is eventually headed, and anyone telling you otherwise is either an imbecile or a liar.
The American Academy of Pediatrics publishes papers claiming that “withholding gender affirming care is harmful to children and amounts to state-sanctioned medical neglect and emotional abuse.” In Massachusetts, a government agency issued its 2024 recommendations to the governor and state lawmakers urging them to “Improve Massachusetts child abuse laws to explicitly include the withholding of gender-affirming care for LGBTQ youth.” The report continues, “In particular, the Commission recommends that the state examine the possibility of codifying gender-affirming child welfare protections in state law to better support youth and families.”
The left will continue its incremental effort to reclass the rejection of trans ideology as child abuse, paving the way for ideological jurisprudence and leaving parents mired in endless litigation intended to demoralize and strip them of their most basic rights.
This is not a fringe concept. Last year in California, a bill was introduced that would, among other things, consider parents unfit if they denied their child’s self-proclaimed gender identity. Gov. Gavin Newsom ultimately vetoed the bill, not because of its reprehensible content, but because, according to Newsom, “a court, under existing law, is required to consider a child’s health, safety, and welfare when determining the best interests of a child in these proceedings, including the parent’s affirmation of the child’s gender identity.”
In other words, Newsom fully supports the idea that parents have no rights whatsoever and believes that existing laws already give courts the power to rob parents of their children if they refuse to bend a knee to gender ideology.
Just as it was with hormone blockers and transgender surgeries for kids, early examples will be few and far between. “There must be more to the story than we’re being told” will be a common interpretation. In some instances, that might be the case. But over time, the situation will become cut and dry. A child will go to school and express his “gender identity” to a teacher. The teacher will report it up the chain, and it will eventually make its way to Child Protective Services and the courts — for no reason other than parents’ unwillingness to embrace a false reality. More loving parents will lose their children.
What can be done? First, the sane population within America needs to take this seriously and fight it with every tool at our disposal.
And if all else fails?
In 2019, a clip from Ben Shapiro’s podcast went viral as part of a discussion about basic parental rights and the left’s habitual infringement on those rights. In discussing the inevitable result of tyranny through incrementalism, Shapiro correctly pointed out that “it’s not extreme to defend the fundamental rights the Constitution was created in order to protect. These rights preexist government. My right to raise my child in my faith is my right, that is a First Amendment right. Beto O’rourke does not get to raise my child, and if he tries, I will meet him at the door with a gun.”
When Americans have exhausted every other means to protect their children, when government ignores our pleas, disregards our warnings, and tramples our inherent right to raise our children — we are morally obligated to defend our children and those rights by any means necessary.
If deranged tyrants want to come for America’s kids, they should be shaking in their boots before they even ring the doorbell.
