KISS’ Paul Stanley begins to take back comments on gender-affirming youth care
After sharing misinformation about gender-affirming care for minors on Sunday, Stanley clarified: “While my thoughts were clear, my words clearly were not.”
Aux News Gender
After sharing a lengthy statement on Sunday that included factual inaccuracies on best-practices gender-affirming care for young people, KISS guitarist Paul Stanley has walked back some of his comments (without deleting his initial post).
In a message posted to Twitter on April 30, Stanley shared that while his “thoughts were clear” in the original statement, his “words clearly were not.” That statement—entitled “My Thoughts On What I’m Seeing”—found Stanley echoing misinformation around healthcare for gender-diverse minors, and referred to making gender-affirming care available for those individuals as a “sad and dangerous fad.”
“There is a BIG difference between teaching acceptance and normalizing and even encouraging participation in a lifestyle that confuses young children into questioning their sexual identification,” Stanley wrote, also opining that parents who support their children in pursuing gender-affirming care see gender experience as “some sort of game.”
In recontextualizing his initial comments, Stanley wrote that “most importantly and above all else” he wants to be an ally to gender-diverse individuals. “I support those struggling with their sexual identity while enduring constant hostility and those whose path leads them to reassignment surgery,” Stanley writes. “It’s hard to fathom the kind of conviction that one must feel to take those steps.”
Much of Stanley’s original statement focused on his argument that gender-affirming care should not be accessible to those under the age of 18, a stance in direct opposition to the recommendations of every major medical organization in the United States. Despite a burgeoning misinformation campaign that fearmongers about “irreversible” procedures being offered to young children, the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Psychological Association have all asserted that offering gender-affirming care to young trans people is not only safe, but an essential, life-saving practice.
Furthermore, medical professionals who offer gender-affirming care—like Dr. Joshua D. Safer, MD, who spoke to Billboard on the subject last year— emphasize that the kind of surgeries often cited in these campaigns (such as “top surgery” or genital reconstruction surgery) are “typically reserved for adults” except under extenuating circumstances. Notably, Safer explains that more common youth interventions like puberty blockers—medications which temporarily halt puberty, limiting physical change—are also available to and used by cisgender patients who go through puberty “before the medical system considers them socially ready.”
Although Stanley’s new statement clearly walks back some of his initial claims, the guitarist isn’t ready to offer any direct, long-form clarification to his original comments yet. “A paragraph or two will remain far too short to fully convey my thoughts or point of view,” Stanley concluded, “so I will leave that for another time and place.”
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What the hell possesses these weirdos to weigh in anyway?
“Hey Paul, thanks for speaking with us! How’s the new album going?”
“It’s going great! We’ve written some killer new tunes and we’re bashing them out in the studio! It should be out in the summer!”“And will you guys tour?”“Absolutely! You know KISS has always thrived on the interaction with our army of fans with our amazing live show!”
“Right, and what about gender-affirming are for minors?”“I’m really glad you asked me thaaa…WHAAA?!”
Same as millions of others: they have social media and are gonna use it, goddammit.
Deep insecurities, they like the sound of their own voices and they believe that everyone will agree with them because they’re used to people agreeing with them, I suppose.
The same thing that possesses all of us to comment about virtually anything, whether here or on social media or anywhere else? Someone like Stanley just happens to have a bigger microphone.
He’s rich and he’s a Boomer
Thats kind of how parents feel when schools/teachers/administrators willingly and actively hide a child’s gender questions/transition/etc from their parents. It’s a 2 way street full of weirdos going in both directions.
Stanley’s initial statement to me smacked of “you kids are just a bunch of posers, back in the ’70s, we were rock’n’roll gender-bending pioneers!” And then he realized how horrendously stupid he sounded.So do you think we will get a similar retraction from Dee Snyder?
Snider tried to walk it back today after he was dropped from the San Francisco Pride Parade. loudwire.com/dee-snider-statement-dropped-sf-pride-parade/
tried, eh
I was holding off on forming an opinion about gender-affirming care until Paul Stanley, guitarist from the shitty rock band KISS, weighed in. I was specifically awaiting his thoughts on this matter, and am much relieved by this news.In an unrelated matter, I have recently received several 2-inch staples driven into my skull by a pneumatic nailerSCArkatorius/,
Yeah… I somehow still don’t see him as an ally. Also its real rich that a guy who looked like a drag queen his entire career was getting all up and arms about trans people and gender nonconformity. Also didn’t he write a song about 16 year old girls? Is anyone from Kiss not a terrible human?
If I may set the bar incredibly low, at least he did not respond by digging in his heels and saying even shittier and shittier things.
I guess but the fact he said he wants to be an ally after just vomiting up leftover Fox News taking points is a tad silly. But yes he didn’t do the Rowling of doubling down until you dig through the Earths core.
If he dug those heels in, he’d never get them out …
I feel like a lot of these guys are feeling uncomfortable by association and feel some need to be like “Yeah ok I wore makeup but not like THAT”
I think that one was Gene, but let’s not split hairs.
Let’s split tongues instead!
Yeah… I somehow still don’t see him as an ally. Also its real rich that a guy who looked like a drag queen his entire career was getting all up and arms about trans people and gender nonconformity. Also didn’t he write a song about 16 year old girls? Is anyone from Kiss not a terrible human?
eric carr was supposedly a real nice fella, but he dead now.
Kiss is a horrible, Dollar Tree band fronted by a disgusting lumpy frontman, and offer nothing to anyone with ears. Also, Paul Stanley is wrong with his initial statement, and a waste of space. But the important take away is what a STD of a band KISS are. Be better a better ally, and a less toxic human.
The really just plain weird part about this is that Dee Snider, beloved LGBT ally since the fucking ‘80s, decided to give this comment his full support, and up to now hasn’t made any kind of further statement about it, even after it became clear how betrayed his entire fanbase felt and he started getting support from the worst people in the world.
Dee Snider is 100% right to support Stanley’s initial comment.
Well it’s hard to care too much when your fanbase consists of about 349 people
i guess gender non-conformity/exploration is cool only when cis dudes can score hot chicks from it…?
Snider made a statement today:loudwire.com/dee-snider-statement-dropped-sf-pride-parade/It’s better thought out than Stanley’s but neither really addresses what was possibly the most offensive part of Stanley’s post, calling gender-affirming care of minors a “sad and dangerous fad.” Which is right of the rightwing playbook. It also played into the totally false rightwing narrative that gender affirming care means children are regularly getting genital reassignment surgery.
Jesus what an embarrassing statement.
John Denver died for nothing thanks to you Snider!
+FZ
Lots of weird people support LGB QIA and not T.
Glad we got his perspective. Now, can somebody please FIND JA RULE, get a
hold of this motherfucker so I can make sense of all this!
What exactly is the value of getting every celebrity’s opinion on trans people and gender affirming care? Have we decided that we can come to some sort of popular consensus about the private healthcare decisions of other people’s children? If 60% of ignorant people, who have zero knowledge of the science and process, decide that something that does not affect them in the slightest is “icky” then we can just go ahead and ban it? What exactly is the endgame here?It doesn’t seem to be a major controversy among healthcare professionals and medical organizations. Or at least certainly not to the extent that it is amongst stupid people and their misinformation campaigns. It’s all about fear.Awfully rich to refer to trans people existing as a “fad.” Ah, yes, in America where there is so much support and empathy for trans people. lol. Who wouldn’t want to face the mockery, hatred, and accusations of pedophilia just to be comfortable in your own body? It’s a real hip fad that lots of people are jumping on. Right? Which is why trans people make up such an overwhelming percentage of the population.If we have decent, up to date science and medical understanding of the process and its effects and safety, then what business is it if a family decides together that its in the best interest of their child? Especially if it prevents misery and suicide and psychological anguish.It’s the same people who are perfectly comfortable with other people’s children being killed in mass shootings because “that’s the price we pay for freedom”. Why does gender affirming care not fall under the Freedom umbrella? Is it preventing YOU from living your life? Please explain, idiots.
There is zero evidence that transitioning kids helps. We are performing medical experiments on kids and turning them into lifelong patients all because…what? A culture war?
That sounds exactly like someone who knows absolutely nothing about this subject or anyone who is going through this on a personal level would say.
You are wildly misinformed, and I can tell that by your ignorant statement.
It is not a culture war, it is people’s lives and identities.
I am a diagnosed dysphoric (though I have not and will never transition) and a lesbian – I know a lot about this issue. There’s no solid evidence base for transitioning. Absolutely none. Not for adults and certainly not for kids. It is an experimental treatment that leaves kids sterilized and European countries are currently rolling back the Dutch Protocol because of it. This is a medical scandal and so many so-called progressive people are blindly pushing it because of tribalism.
“The truth is that data from more than a dozen studies of more than 30,000 transgender and gender-diverse young people consistently show that access to gender-affirming care is associated with better mental health outcomes—and that lack of access to such care is associated with higher rates of suicidality, depression and self-harming behavior.”
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/what-the-science-on-gender-affirming-care-for-transgender-kids-really-shows/
BBBbbbut that contradicts what billionaire childrens author said in meme
Unfortunately it seems like almost every publication is heavily biased on these issues one way or the other, and Scientific American is no exception, to the point it hinders their accuracy (consciously or not). This part of the article you linked is especially embarrassing: New research in 17,151 people who had ever socially transitioned found that 86.9 percent persisted in their gender identity. Of the 2,242 people who reported that they reverted to living as the gender associated with the sex they were assigned at birth, just 15.9 percent said they did so because of internal factors such as questioning their experienced gender but also because of fear, mental health issues and suicide attempts. The rest reported the cause was social, economic and familial stigma and discrimination. A third reported that they ceased living openly as a trans person because doing so was “just too hard for me.”
They say “people who had ever socially transitioned” – this is misleading to the point it’s basically an outright lie (not intentional, I think the author just completely misunderstood the thing they’re citing). That’s a survey of currently transitioned people – 86.9% of them had never detransitioned, and the 13.1% who had done so retransitioned later on. So for one thing, it says nothing about detransition rates overall (which is the point the author thinks they’re making). And also, for this particular group of people, of course the reasons are primarily going to be about those external factors; this is basic common sense. Data on detransition is essentially worthless if you actively exclude presently detransitioned people from the data collection.The studies in the quote you posted may not be as misleading as that, but they don’t really provide truly high quality evidence. One problem is the length of them – something like a 1-year follow-up simply isn’t enough time to definitively say anything much at all.
The one study discussed in that article that DID measure outcomes in adults showed that “access to hormone therapy in early adolescence was associated with a 60 percent reduction in suicidality in the past year and that access in late adolescence was associated with a 50 percent reduction.” That might sound great at first glance, but like the survey above, this research is only about currently transitioned people – basically, all it tells us is that trans adults who had hormone therapy when they were young are happier than trans adults who “desired but never accessed” it. Another common-sense conclusion that doesn’t really say much. There’s absolutely no comparison with any data on people who wanted hormone therapy when they were young but ultimately desisted from transitioning (or detransitioned). And even the conclusion it does draw is muddied somewhat by external factors – e.g. the people who had hormone therapy when young predictably have more supportive families (75-80% have supportive families, compared to 33% of the no-HRT subjects). Having an unsupportive family itself is obviously likely to exacerbate negative mental health outcomes, regardless of treatment.
WPATH themselves funded a systematic review in 2021 specifically about hormone therapy, covering all ages: https://academic.oup.com/jes/article/5/4/bvab011/6126016. It looks like hormone therapy is associated with positive outcomes, but the authors made a point to say “Certainty in this conclusion is limited by high risk of bias in study designs, small sample sizes, and confounding with other interventions.” Hopefully there are better studies ongoing. They also couldn’t draw any conclusion at all regarding rates of suicide.
Lol
You’re wrong about the evidence. There’s lots of evidence for the benefits of transitioning, and it’s growing every day. To give just one example, this is the latest and largest scale study from one of the foremost experts on the topic: Olson,
K. R., Durwood, L., Horton, R., Gallagher, N. M., & Devor, A. (2022).
Gender identity 5 years after social transition. Pediatrics,150(2),
e2021056082.
That study is an odd one to cite as a rebuttal to chungking express here; it’s completely irrelevant to what she’s saying. The study simply gauged rates of retransition in socially transitioned children. It says literally nothing about medical transition, puberty blockers etc, and it isn’t trying to (it does specifically mention that only 11.7% of the study sample were taking puberty blockers). They didn’t even measure the mental wellbeing of those children in any way, it’s purely basic statistics…
I should have been more clear. I cited that study to debunk the myth that transitioners frequently come to regret their transitions or that transitioning in youth is a ‘fad,’ as Stanley called it. This study shows that the vast majority (94%) of those who transitioned maintained their trans identity five years later. I could also cite evidence (as others have) that the mental health outcomes of trans youth getting gender affirming care are overwhelmingly positive. Certainly not the “medical scandal” the poster makes it out to be.
Ah, I thought as you were replying to them you meant it to counter what they were saying, instead of what Stanley was saying. In that case it’s a fair point.
But your other point, I do think “overwhelmingly positive” is an overstatement re: gender-affirming care (which I already detailed in my other, too-long post above – tl;dr a WPATH-funded systematic review concluded the evidence may be positive but it’s “limited by high risk of bias in study designs, small sample sizes, and confounding with other interventions”). There is some positive evidence, but it’s not that strong, and I don’t think it’s kind to the people considering treatment to exaggerate the outcomes.
That is absolutely untrue and so basic in it’s misunderstanding that I’m not even going to waste my time citing real evidence (as others have, thank you).I have a nibling and a sibling who have gone through this and I am intimately involved and knowledgeable about what it entails and how it effects a young person’s development. Please don’t throw any more bullshit propaganda my way.
Lol no
Well that’s just verifiably wrong. Gender affirming care, and support and affirmation from family and friends, has been shown in all major reviews to be helpful to the vast majority of trans kids (and adults). We are not performing medical experiments; hormone replacement therapy has been around for decades. Gender affirmation surgery is quite rare among people under 18 (it’s actually more common for cisgender girls to have breast enhancement or reduction surgeries that trans girls). And, very few people express regret following transition (this, according to the most recent and largest study tracking people over 5 years). In short, gender affirming care is critical and needed.
Really? Because the research definitely supports gender affirming care.
If 60% of ignorant people, who have zero knowledge of the science and process, decide that something that does not affect them in the slightest is “icky” then we can just go ahead and ban it?That’s the unfortunate reality in many red states right now. Not that that right ever followed the science on anything to begin with.
Its been a hip fad since *check notes* ummm…. well the 20th century for gender affirming care, long ass time for existence of trans people dating by to the 18th century, Middle Ages and likely beyond that. Obviously the same as pogs and parachute pants!
south asian hijra are mentioned in the kama sutra! what a bunch of n00bs.
“Despite a burgeoning misinformation campaign that fearmongers about “irreversible” procedures being offered to young children, the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Psychological Association have all asserted that offering gender-affirming care to young trans people is not only safe, but an essential, life-saving practice.”Those organizations have been ideologically captured. You cannot reverse long term “gender-affirming” care. Full stop.
I have no problem at all with my kids and their gender identities. But hoo boy if any one of them wanted to dress up like Star-Boy or whatever this guy was, I would strongly encourage them against it.
While Stanley does play rhythm guitar for KISS, he is lead vocal/frontman for the band. I believe the author owes an apology to Ace Frehley, Vinnie Vincent, Mark St. John, Bruce Kulick and Tommy Thayer.
Frehley’s a Trump supporter. And Kiss did do a co-headlining tour with Ted Nugent fairly recently.
good lord, what is wrong with his face?????
Yeah, I’m not sure I’d trust the judgment of a guy who made such poor plastic surgery decisions.
There’s a reason those guys wore make-up.
Not sure I’d trust the judgment of someone who mocked Paul Stanley’s plastic surgery history so blithely.
Sorry, are people who got plastic surgery now a protected class?
Too bad, because he was right. The people who support this crap would have supported lobotomies too.
I support one for YOU.
lol
Sik burn.
Let’s all, right now as a society, decide not to care what the “Let’s Put the X in Sex” guy thinks about stuff.
He has absolutely nothing to apologize for. We are living in absolutely absurd times.
Does he consider himself qualified to comment because he does drag shows for a living, or what?
Are Kiss still allowed in those states with anti-drag protesters?
Always a fun time when fringe reactionary moral panics reach mainstream idiots.
Yeah, I’ve always encouraged my children to get their penis and testicles cut off for no good reason.
I believe from the evidence I’ve read that there should be far, far greater restrictions placed on gender reassignment for U18s, if not an outright ban. There are few downsides to a “wait and see” approach and the harm that has been done from irreversible procedures like puberty blockers (often without holistic mental health assessments) is scandalous. See the Tavistock Centre case here in the UK.
Questioning your gender identity immediately should be normalized. We clearly don’t know what makes kids into non-neurotic non-fascist emotionally mature decent human being adults. That, and taking out the bully culture, might be it.
The problem is that the propaganda works really well. People actually believe that teens and preteens are going in for full genital changing surgery all the time. Yes, they are really stupid people that believe that, but stupid people are a huge percentage of Americans. This country isn’t going to last much longer. We hate each other too much. The anti trans/gay hate is just a small tendril of that. For me the real question is whether we are going to have a violent civil war or a paperwork breakup.