As a reporter, I sat through many child abuse cases. The details of some of those cases would make you throw up for two hours straight if I were to recount them. I won’t since PJ Media is not a tabloid, but some of the stories I heard in court would shock even the most jaded 21st-century news reader. Suffice it to say that I have seen parents and caregivers who had no business being within twelve city blocks of a child. There are times when a child should be as far away from a parent or caregiver as possible, so there is definitely a strong case to be made for removing children from abusive situations.
But what about a situation in which a child decides that he or she is a different gender? Maybe they truly were born that way, or perhaps, as is so often the case, they have been convinced they are trans through interactions with message boards, social media, their peers, or even their teachers. Their parents may see that their otherwise-regular child is on his or her way to making drastic, life-altering decisions about their mind and body.
These parents may outright refuse to permit the child to make such adult decisions at an early age, or they may simply want the child to “tap the brakes” and wait until they have a little life experience before making a commitment. At the urging of friends, educators, or other sources, that child may never tell his or her parents at all. And when it comes to the issue of transgenderism, any dissent is automatically vilified.
On Tuesday, California’s Senate Judiciary Committee approved Assembly Bill 665. The Legislative Digest reads:
AB 665, as amended, Wendy Carrillo. Minors: consent to mental health services.
This bill would align the existing laws by removing the additional requirement that, in order to consent to mental health treatment or counseling on an outpatient basis, or to residential shelter services, the minor must present a danger of serious physical or mental harm to themselves or to others, or be the alleged victim of incest or child abuse.
Existing law, for some purposes, requires that the mental health treatment or counseling include involvement of the minor’s parent or guardian unless the professional person treating or counseling the minor determines that the involvement would be inappropriate. For other purposes, existing law requires the involvement of the parent or guardian unless the professional person who is treating or counseling the minor, after consulting with the minor, determines that the involvement would be inappropriate.
This bill would also align the existing laws by requiring the professional person treating or counseling the minor to consult with the minor before determining whether involvement of the minor’s parent or guardian would be inappropriate.
Existing law defines professional person for these purposes to include, among other things, a mental health professional, a marriage and family therapist, a licensed educational psychologist, a clinical psychologist, the chief administrator of an agency, and a licensed professional clinical counselor, as defined.
This bill would add a registered psychologist, a registered psychological assistant, a psychological trainee, an associate clinical social worker, a social work intern, a clinical counselor trainee working under the supervision of a licensed professional, and a board-certified psychiatrist to the definition of professional person for these purposes.
This bill would make all of the above changes operative on July 1, 2024.
Here are two excerpts from the bill:
(g) Youth, especially youth of color, express significant trepidation about needing to disclose to parents their mental health concerns and their need to access services. Without access to a trained professional, youth report they turn to mostly free resources of mixed quality that they access without parental intervention or adult assistance, such as social media accounts and online videos.
(h) For LGBTQ+ youth, the rejection from parents, harassment in school, and the overall LGBTQ LGBTQ+ negativity present in society can lead to depression, anxiety, drug and alcohol use, and other negative outcomes. Over one-half of surveyed LGBTQ+ youth reported that not being able to get permission from their parents or guardians was sometimes or always a barrier to accessing mental health services.
(i) Providers, particularly school-based providers, find that obtaining parental consent for a youth who needs support is complicated by the parent or caretakers’ beliefs and stigma about mental health care.
(j) Most states allow youth under 18 years of age to consent to receiving mental health care on their own.
(b) A minor who is 12 years of age or older may consent to mental health treatment or counseling on an outpatient basis, or to residential shelter services, if both of the following requirements are satisfied:
(1) The minor, in the opinion of the attending professional person, is mature enough to participate intelligently in the outpatient services or residential shelter services.
(2) The minor (A) would present a danger of serious physical or mental harm to self or to others without the mental health treatment or counseling or residential shelter services, or (B) is the alleged victim of incest or child abuse.
(c) A professional person offering residential shelter services, whether as an individual or as a representative of an entity specified in paragraph (3) of subdivision (a), shall make their best efforts to notify the parent or guardian of the provision of services.
(d) The mental health treatment or counseling of a minor authorized by this section shall include involvement of the minor’s parent or guardian unless, in the opinion of the professional person who is treating or counseling the minor, the involvement would be inappropriate. The professional person who is treating or counseling the minor shall state in the client record whether and when the person attempted to contact the minor’s parent or guardian, and whether the attempt to contact was successful or unsuccessful, or the reason why, in the professional person’s opinion, it would be inappropriate to contact the minor’s parent or guardian.
The Washington Free Beacon points out that, should the bill become law, counselors and therapists would be able to emancipate a child at age 12 without the consent or even the knowledge of a parent or guardian. Parents were on hand to protest the bill, which some characterized as “heinous.” One parent said, “Have each of you used your elected platforms and networks to inform and speak with the people of California? It doesn’t seem so, because when I talk to my community, no one knows about it. And when they hear about it, they are shocked and angry that you would consider passing an extreme bill that would break apart families during a child’s most difficult and challenging years.”
Other people have expressed concern that children might use the law to have sex change operations against their parents’ wishes. Attorney Nicole Pearson testified, “The authors want to change the law to let a 12-year-old opt out of their home on a whim, invoking parental separation and emancipation of minors without any claim of danger or parental consent. This is child emancipation.” She added that the state could allow minors on Medi-Cal to receive mental health care without parental consent by making changes to the welfare code.
The bill was sponsored by Democrat Assemblywoman Wendy Carrillo and State Senator Scott Wiener. Despite the outcry of parents and others, objections were characterized as “lies” and “misinformation.” Weiner lamented the fact that his bill had been caught up in the “right-wing outrage machine.” For her part, Carrillo maintains, “We would never move a piece of policy that takes away parental discretion, to allow children to not have access to their parents. There’s been a lot of misinformation and lies about this bill to the point that it has national and international attention as to how we treat mental health services for young people in the United States and California.”
But under the bill, children as young as 12 could opt to leave home under the auspices of abuse. That abuse could simply be that a parent refused to allow a child to change his or her sex, or one could conceive of a situation in which a child tells a counselor that he knows he is trans but also knows that his parents would never accept him. At that point, the process of separation would begin.
As I stated at the top of the piece, I have seen ample evidence that there are parents who had no business being parents. I have sat through enough hair-raising and heartbreaking testimony to know that. But given California’s history and direction and the fact that Scott Wiener was a co-sponsor, the bill could easily become a vehicle to advance an agenda. Under the banner of “helping children,” this could simply be another avenue toward destroying families and children’s lives. Plant and nurture an idea, separate a child from any dissent, and create a convert for the new national religion and a client for the state and Big Pharma.