Keith Ablow is a Jerk…and a Bigot

You’ve probably heard by now that Keith Ablow wrote an op-ed (link, if you really need to read it) that has warned folks not to watch Dancing with the Stars this season as long as Chaz Bono is still competing…ostensibly because the simple act of seeing a transman dance is going to turn the nation’s children transgender.  Ablow, who uses air quotes around the word transsexual has managed in that op-ed and in subsequent public appearances on television and radio to slandered all transsexual people everywhere, has likened seeking gender reassignment to wanting to have ones arms cut off or being changed into a farm animal.

Jerk.

If you are inhabiting a male body and you believe yourself to be female you are essentially delusional.

…

I’m not going to have my kids watch a show in which people pretend to be farm animals.

–Keith Ablow

Is someone going to pull this guy’s license to practice…or what?

In order to treat a transperson, he would “team up with a spiritual counselor, if that seemed indicated.”  I can only beg that he never accept any gender dysphoric patient.  Ever.

Well Ablow has gotten some pushback…as well he should.

The Doctor is Out (Of Touch) by Jack Drescher of the APA:

Dr. Ablow is within his rights to express personal opinions about transgender people. However, as a psychiatrist speaking in a public forum, his audience is entitled to accurate scientific knowledge of a complex subject rather than opinions, scare tactics and inflammatory language.

Dr. Ablow, seeing Chaz Bono’s life as a tragedy, wants others to agree and his “prescription” is scaring people away from tuning in and seeing for themselves. Yet parents should not be afraid to learn something new. Tuning out uncomfortable information and maintaining silence only makes children (who cannot be shielded from this information in the modern age) more anxious. Children sensing parental anxiety become anxious as well.

Chaz Bono’s highly publicized transition can be a teaching moment about the lives of transgender people. Parents who don’t want their children to be confused should watch Dancing with the Stars and try to learn more about trans people themselves. Families watching the show together can become more informed about and sympathetic to trans people.

Don’t Let Your Kids Watch Dr. Keith Ablow by Dr. John Grohol of World of Psychology:

It’s not as if Dr. Ablow doesn’t have the capacity for empathy and talking about a person’s sense of self (rather than focusing on shallow physical attributes). Because by the end of the very same article, he says:

And if all that failed, and if Chaz Bono wanted either to kill herself or to undergo gender reassignment surgery [Ed. – notice how he seemingly and not-so-subtly equates suicide to the thought of undergoing transgender surgery], I would have taken that journey with her, too. I would have talked her parents through the hell of it. We would make the best of it.

How does Dr. Ablow know this isn’t exactly what happened? I mean, most people who undergo the painful – both emotionally and physically – transgendered change do so only after lots of discussion usually accompanied by psychotherapy. It’s not like it’s a decision made on the spur of the moment.

Come on, Dr. Grohol!  I contest your belief that Ablow has any empathy.  I’ll require scientific proof for that.

Apparently in Dr. Ablow’s eyes, people who undergo the transgendered process are broken individuals, in need of repair. There are no transgendered people – only people who are confused and in need of treatment to alleviate their condition.

I rest my case.

Let’s listen to someone who treats transsexual patients:

The second part of your question focuses on my ethics, which you suspect are faulty, presumably because I participate in a process that assists transsexuals in obtaining reassignment surgery. (Ironically others may perceive me to be unethical because I will not write a letter recommending a psychotic transsexual for reassignment surgery.)

For my part, I have fully accepted the professional role of helping this group of gender-disordered patients find a satisfactory means of getting past their profound dissatisfaction with their birth gender. If life were perfect and fair, the transsexual phenomenon would not exist. However, given the actual state of affairs, it seems not only proper but essential that professionals help transsexuals examine their transsexuality and, when appropriate, recommend them for surgery. My role is to provide the evaluation and therapy – over decades, if necessary – that will bring transsexuals (or non-transsexuals) to the crossroads at which they can accurately perceive their own reality and thus make their own informed decisions. I have never thought of myself as making the final decision. My role is to state whether to the best of my knowledge, the patient is a transsexual who is capable of deciding whether he or she wishes to be sexually reassigned. I see myself as offering a second opinion, although at this juncture my professional opinion has never differed from that of my patient.

–Gerald Ramsey, PhD, Transsexuals

Bryan Fischer of the AFA decided he needed to be part of this slander so he said of Chaz, “she is a surgically-mutilated female.”  Then he danced into victimhood territory.

Lastly, Fischer admits that the AFA is “being labeled by every major media outlet in the country as a hate group,” and in his totally twisted logic screams that he and his clan have nothing to do with the suicides of young transgender, gay, bisexual, and lesbian teens, because if being labeled evil caused people to commit suicide, the American Family Association would all have committed suicide.

–Bryan Fischer, the least self- aware human on the planet.

Mr. Fisher…and I use the term word mister with some trepidation…in order for there to be mass suicides at the AFA and One Million Moms, someone there would have to have a conscience…or sympathy…or empathy.  Bet yet, they should have all three.  But the One Dozen moms who called for a boycott of DWTS and the AFA have proven time and again that their hate organizations are devoid of any trace of conscience, sympathy, or empathy.

This fiasco has become so outrageous that even Fox News can’t stand it.  Megyn Kelly accused Ablow of spreading hatred.

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what’s going on … you’re becoming a — it seems a little bit silly with this homophobic stuff. … you’re getting a little off the wall.

There are a lot of people walking around who have gender issues, and they’re getting the shit beaten out of them. … it just says to children: ‘You know what? Maybe I could be a little more tolerant.’

—Howard Stern

He’s going off into this Netherland of wackiness where you yell about everything.

–Robyn Quivers

Last word should go to Chaz.

The only thing you will catch from watching Chaz is dance fever.

The season series begins on Monday.