A father in Texas is fighting to keep custody of his 6-year-old son while the boy’s mother claims he’s a transgender girl.
According to court documents obtained by The Federalist, the boy, James, only dresses as a girl and goes by the name “Luna” when he is with his mother, who has enrolled him in first grade as a female. The father, though, claims the little boy never dresses as a girl — even when given the option — when they are together, always choosing to align himself with his biological sex.
The boy’s father, in fact, told The Federalist that James “violently refuses to wear girl’s clothes at my home.” Nevertheless, in their divorce proceedings, the mother has reportedly accused the father of child abuse for not affirming their son’s transgenderism.
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As a result, she is working to strip James’ dad of his parental rights. She also is pushing for the boy’s father to pay for James’ visits to a gender-affirming therapist as well as medical treatments that could include irreversible hormonal alterations, starting at age eight.
James’ mother, a pediatrician, has been taking their son to a gender transition therapist who has diagnosed the 6-year-old child with gender dysphoria, despite the present inconsistencies in James’ chosen identity.
The father, for his part, has collected a series of testimonies from people who have only seen James identify as a male.
“Based on the three occasions I’ve spent time with him, I’d say he acts and looks unmistakably like a healthy 6-year-old boy,” said Bill Lovell, senior pastor at the boy’s church, Christ Church Carrollton. “I am praying for [him], an average 6-year-old boy, a sweet-natured, intelligent, lovable, and at this point, particularly vulnerable young man, caught up in a titanic clash of worldviews.”
Walt Heyer, author of The Federalist story and a formerly transgender female, pushed back against the therapist’s diagnosis, arguing one of the main criteria for childhood gender dysphoria is that the child be “persistent, consistent, and insistent about being the opposite sex.”
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“If James truly had gender dysphoria,” Heyer wrote, “he would demand the proper pronouns, always dress as a girl and insistently, persistently, and consistently claim to be a girl in all situations, not just with mom.”
Heyer has accused the therapist of “wrap[ping] herself in rainbow colors” and “dismiss[ing] evidence to the contrary” of a gender dysphoric diagnosis.