VANCOUVER, British Columbia (LifeSiteNews) – British Columbia New Democratic Party (NDP) members rejected legislation restricting gender-transition procedures for children and requiring parental consent for pronouns changes in school.
On October 8, the BC Legislative Assembly voted down the Protecting Minors From Gender Transition Act, which aimed to protect children from the worst effects of the LGBT agenda, by a 48-40 vote.
“I stand before you today not only as a member at this legislature but as a mother. British Columbia is sleepwalking into the greatest medical scandal in modern history, and it’s our kids who are at risk,” Independent Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) Jordan Kealy of the One BC Party said while introducing the bill.
“In B.C. today, doctors are causing irreversible harm to children with puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries,” she continued.
The legislation introduced a series of safeguards for children being encouraged to gender transition at school as well as requiring increased parental involvement.
The act sought to ban puberty blockers and irreversible gender-mutilating surgeries for minors. It also would have prevented the use of “preferred” pronouns or names in schools without parental consent and banned public funding for gender transitions.
Furthermore, the legislation would have held medical staff and doctors accountable for transitioning children by allowing parents or guardians to sue doctors, clinics, or schools for up to 25 years after any gender-related treatment was provided, including claims for “loss of fertility” or other long-term harms.
The legislation come as a significant body of evidence shows that “affirming” gender confusion carries serious harms, especially when done with impressionable children who lack the mental development, emotional maturity, and life experience to consider the long-term ramifications of the decisions being pushed on them, or full knowledge about the long-term effects of life-altering, physically transformative, and often irreversible surgical and chemical procedures.
Studies find that more than 80 percent of children suffering gender dysphoria outgrow it on their own by late adolescence and that “transition” procedures, including “reassignment” surgery, fail to resolve gender-confused individuals’ heightened tendency to engage in self-harm and suicide – and even exacerbate it, including by reinforcing their confusion and neglecting the actual root causes of their mental strife.
While the legislation was voted down before its first reading, it was narrowly rejected with a difference of only eight votes between those opposed and those in favor.
At the same time, some Canadian provinces have been successful in passing pro-family legislation to protect minors from undergoing irreversible medical interventions. As LifeSiteNews previously reported, Alberta is preparing to invoke the notwithstanding clause to override opposition to three laws that protect children from the LGBT agenda. Saskatchewan made a similar decision to protect pro-family legislation from the courts in 2023.
Additionally, Alberta has banned books with sexually explicit as well as pornographic material, many of which contain LGBT and even pedophilic content, from all school libraries.
