PPFA’s Politics Are a Danger to Themselves and Others

*See update below.*

The Planned Parenthood Federation of America has now fired a doctor, their most recent president, Dr. Leana Wen, in part because she refused to use medically inaccurate language to refer to the sex of patients who become pregnant. This is according to BuzzFeed, buried under a litany of detailed, backstabbing complaints that should make anyone think twice about accepting a job as Wen’s replacement:

“Two sources told BuzzFeed News that Wen also refused to use “trans-inclusive” language, for example saying “people” instead of “women” and telling staff that she believed talking about transgender issues would “isolate people in the Midwest.” …”

BuzzFeed was the first outlet to mention this issue, while the New York Times and Washington Post seem to have ignored it. Based on the unusual nature of the situation, where the organization’s staff seems oddly confident that they’ll be supported in monstering a woman of color, a doctor, even, they should have been more keen to look deeper for an explanation.

Ultimately, Planned Parenthood probably did Dr. Wen a favor. The rest of their accredited medical personnel will hopefully take the chance to consider whether or not the organization, having shown themselves willing to fire any dissenters, is going to expose them to a degree of medical liability beyond their worst nightmares. 

Planned Parenthood has long operated as a chain of reproductive health clinics that had a parallel political arm to support their medical work. As it has related to the issue of abortion care, Women’s Liberation Front understands and supports that work, and we’ve been loathe to complain about them for that reason. 

Yet it now seems clear that the political arm of Planned Parenthood sees itself as having a clinic chain to back up their increasingly unrealistic beliefs on gender, and they appear to have thrown concern for medical accuracy and patient health out the window in this pursuit.

As ridiculous as the stunt was, conservative pundit Steven Crowder was able to get Planned Parenthood staff to go along with his playacting that he identified as a woman. Staff were so determined to validate Crowder’s pretended “gender identity” that they failed to disclose the fact that taking  Plan B is dangerous to men, or that his positive “pregnancy” test results indicate that he should be evaluated for testicular cancer. Whereas it’s known that numerous men who claim to be women have fetishes surrounding female reproductive biology, the clinic staff seem to be required to subordinate even patient safety to the maintenance of an elaborate falsehood.

Under PPFA’s new informed consent model for passing out cross-sex hormones like they’re candy, moreover, heartbroken parents have named PPFA clinics as one of the places where their children were able to get health-ruining hormone prescriptions without any endocrinological testing or mental health screening.

How long can this go on before a furious detransitioner or bereaved family takes a Planned Parenthood clinic to court for the decisions of a board and political staff who have doubled down at every turn on pretending that biological sex is a physically irrelevant state of mind?

Dr. Wen probably just dodged a lot of trouble. PPFA’s troubles are only beginning. We hope staff and the board can find it in themselves to pull out of this disastrous alliance with the gender identity movement before it destroys whatever good they’re trying to do.

*Update: In a story published by NBC News, both Dr. Wen and a PPFA board member who identifies as transgender have denied the claim first published in Buzzfeed that Dr. Wen’s views on the transgender movement played a role in her firing. Given that story also describes how PPFA seeks to expand its sideline of prescribing cross-sex hormones to gender non-conforming patients, we are skeptical of this denial.