French Senators voted in favour of the introduction of measures curtailing child-gender transitions, prompting an outcry from the political Left.
The move on May 28 has been praised as an imperfect “first step” by those on the Right, who said more needed to be done to protect children from “gender ideology”.
Under the new legislation, minors would be banned from being subjected to surgical interventions regarding alleged “gender dysphoria”, with the provision of cross-sex hormones to under-18s also being banned.
It will remain legal to prescribe children puberty blockers, although only after they are monitored by a relevant specialist for two years or more.
Speaking in the wake of the vote, Reconquête MEP Nicolas Bay said it was good to see action being taken to protect children but that more still needed to be done.
“This draft law is far from perfect, since it still authorises puberty blockers for minors,” he said.
He also expressed scepticism as to whether the legislation would ever be voted on in the French lower house, as he believes that French President Emmanuel Macron’s government will block the law over fears it is “transphobic”.
Bay ridiculed such claims, arguing that current adherents of gender ideology had gone too far.
“At Reconquête, we fight gender ideology and its abuses. A woman is a woman, a man is a man,” Bay added.
“If some people have identity problems, we have to help them but by providing psychological support, not by mutilating them and encouraging them in their delusions, especially children who are full of imagination and vulnerable to propaganda.
“When she was 5, my daughter wanted to be a fairy. Should I have had wings transplanted on her back? If someone is convinced they are a dog or Napoleon, should they be operated accordingly and have their civil status changed?” he asked.
“The whole thing is as ridiculous as it is dangerous,” Bay concluded.
Left-wing politicians in France have responded to the legislation’s passing with fury, lambasting efforts by the Republicans and Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party as being an attempt to dehumanise trans people.
“The real problems you have are that trans people exist and you can do nothing to prevent it and no law can do it,” Green Senator Mélanie Vogel argued before the vote.
She added that her “transgender niece” — whom she described as being a “little girl” — would be targeted under the legislation.
“I am not distressed by her trans identity at all,” Vogel said while attacking the right.
“What distresses me is the fact of knowing that I cannot completely protect her from people like you.”
The vote also provoked an angry reaction from trans activists in the country, some of whom compared France to Iran over the proposal.
“This proposed law is a shame! A shame for France!,” trans journalist Béatrice Denaes said on French radio.
“We are going to be the first Western country, equal to Russia or Iran, to ban them from living their lives!”
Iran is one of the few countries in the Middle East where transgender surgeries are not only legal but State-subsidised, with the procedure being seen as a legitimate way of avoiding “sin” for adherents to the country’s brand of Shia Islam.
French Senate backs curbs on child sex transitions (brusselssignal.eu)