NPR reports that children's hospitals are the latest target of anti-LGBTQ harassment

Once again, NPR is kind of late to the party. We’ve already seen outlets like VICE expose the coordinated hate campaigns against children’s hospitals providing gender-affirming care to kids. NPR now has a “special series” called “Untangling Disinformation,” and under that banner, they’re reporting that children’s hospitals are the latest target of anti-LBGTQ harassment.

Twitchy just told you about the most recent “harassment” campaign started by Libs of TikTok, who called Children’s National Hospital in Washington, D.C. to ask about a gender-affirming hysterectomy for her 16-year-old. Did they perform surgeries on children that young? The operator, whom the hospital says “provided the wrong information,” said they start even younger. But the hospital has since come out and claimed no one under 18 receives surgery.

NPR is grotesque.

1. Wants Big Tech to ban ⁦⁦@libsoftiktok⁩
2. Wants to ban “drawing attn to targets that might be harassed.”
2. Cites Media Matters as experts
3. Defends trans’ing kids as “developmentally appropriate.”
4. Funded by YOUR tax $$ https://t.co/s1gryzrwcI

— Liz Wheeler (@Liz_Wheeler) August 27, 2022

NPR reports:

Hospitals and doctors around the country are facing harassment and even death threats over the medical care they offer to transgender kids. In many cases, they have been the subject of posts by a Twitter account called Libs of TikTok, as well as stories in conservative media outlets casting gender-affirming care as child abuse and mutilation.

Which raises the question: where should social networks draw the line with accounts promoting narratives that spark harassment campaigns on their platforms and beyond?

…

Pediatricians and children’s hospitals are just the latest targets of right-wing outrage, in a new iteration of decades-old smears of gay, lesbian and transgender people as pedophiles or “groomers.”

“The Libs of TikTok account has been a major actor in driving a lot of the harassment campaigns that we’ve seen over the past year,” said Ari Drennen, LGBTQ program director at Media Matters for America, the liberal advocacy group.