AT LEAST WE HAVE LOVE FOR ANIMALS

My heart drops when I see vicious remarks aimed at groups of people–transgenders, refugees, non-whites–but I am encouraged at the news stories about the rat hole hero in Chicago; Flaco, the freed owl in New York City; and the pediatrician who volunteers care for the pets of the homeless in California.  Some of us can still be touched by what we consider beauty (I wish there was another word for what I mean), but my rotten feelings get so easily swept along in the path of manipulation, dishonesty, elitism, and so much more I don’t want to remind myself of.

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Socrates believed one should be skeptical of everything, and he practiced what he preached regarding democracy. Socrates was an outspoken critic of the Athenian government. Two of his biggest criticisms of democracy concerned the majority rule’s lack of knowledge and the potential for a demagogue.  Sound familiar?
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REPRESENTING THE LAND   Earlier this month, the Board of Trustees in Nederland, 45 miles northwest of Denver, authorized the appointment of two guardians to represent Boulder Creek and the watershed for purposes of preparing annual reports about the ecosystems’ health and to make recommendations on improving water quality, wildlife habitats and wetlands protection.

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HANDS OFF THE  HELPERS

Given a reported shortage of doctors, due in part to high insurance costs and to encroaching attempts to stomp out their professional oaths, including standards of care  being set by some state legislatures, the public is aimed at many being brutalized by the movement, be they women conscripted to parenthood, as well as the transgender treatment situation, both of them overlaid by volatile, uninformed emotions often twisted and shoved like a painful colonoscopy.  The abortion camps seem to have clarified themselves, but the question concerning Transgenders remains as murky as ever.  National uninformed pressure appears to be taking its toll on doctors, and therefore on patients.

For those with overwrought views on transition treatment for children, pro or con, I reviewed several articles on Google and did come away with the idea that maybe “Gender affirming treatment” misleads and possibly promotes less careful evaluations.  Just from my selective reading it seems that the first task of treatment is a joint approach by medical and psychological experts to determine an inclusive assessment prior to proceeding with “gender endorsing treatment.”