In Defending “Transgenderism,” the Left Again Employs Scientism

In defending the hideously evil “transgender” agenda, the left frequently hails so-called “medical experts,” the “medical community,” “medical consensus,” and the like. In other words, we’re supposed to believe that men can become women, and vice versa, because the “expert class” has told us this is so. This is clearly the case in the recently decided Skrmetti case, where the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) upheld legislation from the state of Tennessee that protects children from medical mutilation in the name of “transgenderism.” 

Arguments from the left during the Skrmetti proceedings, and the left’s many complaints after SCOTUS’s 6-3 decision, often referred to the “expert class” as they tried to make their case for the absurd and evil idea that children could be subjected to heinous medical procedures in an ignorant and foolish attempt to change their sex. Thankfully, SCOTUS was having none of it, especially Justice Clarence Thomas.

In a separate, concurring opinion, Justice Thomas slams the left’s so-called “expert class.” Thomas writes,

The Court rightly rejects efforts by the United States and the private plaintiffs to accord outsized credit to claims about medical consensus and expertise. The United States [under the Biden Admn.] asserted that “the medical community and the nation’s leading hospitals overwhelmingly agree” with the Government’s position that the treatments outlawed by SB1 [the TN legislation] can be medically necessary. Brief for United States 35; see also Brief for Respondents in Support of Petitioner 5 (asserting that “[e]very major medical association in the United States” supports this position). The implication of these arguments is that courts should defer to so-called expert consensus.

There are several problems with appealing and deferring to the authority of the expert class. First, so-called experts have no license to countermand the “wisdom, fairness, or logic of legislative choices.”…Second, contrary to the representations of the United States and the private plaintiffs, there is no medical consensus on how best to treat gender dysphoria in children. Third, notwithstanding the alleged experts’ view that young children can provide informed consent to irreversible sex-transition treatments, whether such consent is possible is a question of medical ethics that States must decide for themselves. Fourth, there are particularly good reasons to question the expert class here, as recent revelations suggest that leading voices in this area have relied on questionable evidence, and have allowed ideology to influence their medical guidance.

Note that in his first and third points, Justice Thomas is basically saying that scientists (medical doctors, etc.) aren’t necessarily good legislators or policy makers. C.S. Lewis agreed. In 1958, in Willing Slaves of the Welfare State, Lewis wrote,

[T]he new oligarchy must more and more base its claim to plan us on its claim to knowledge. If we are to be mothered, mother must know best. This means they must increasingly rely on the advice of scientists, till in the end the politicians proper become merely the scientists’ puppets. Technocracy is the form to which a planned society must tend. Now I dread specialists in power because they are specialists speaking outside their special subjects. Let scientists tell us about sciences. But government involves questions about the good for man, and justice, and what things are worth having at what price; and on these a scientific training gives a man’s opinion no added value. Let the doctor tell me I shall die unless I do so-and-so; but whether life is worth having on those terms is no more a question for him than for any other man…I dread government in the name of science. That is how tyrannies come in.

The “expert class” and Lewis’s “specialists in power” are one and the same. After the Skrmetti ruling, the left continued to its appeal to their “expert class.” Writing of “puberty-blocking drugs and hormone therapies,” Scientific American declared “Their use for gender dysphoria is currently supported by the American Medical Association, the American Association of Pediatrics, the American Psychological Association and other important medical institutions.”

In a press release post Skrmetti, the American Academy of Pediatrics—no-doubt considering themselves a part of the “expert class”—stated “Gender-affirming care is medically necessary for treating gender dysphoria and is backed by decades of peer-reviewed research, clinical experience, and scientific consensus.”

In an interview after the Skrmetti ruling was announced, on MSNBC’s All In with Chris Hayes show, the aptly named “Chase Strangio”—the ACLU “transgender” (a “strangely” deceived woman pretending to be a man) lawyer who argued Skrmetti before SCOTUS—regularly referred to “doctors” or “experts” in attempting to make the case that we should allow children to be subjected to ghastly “transgender” treatments.

In other words, according to the left, we must completely surrender to transgender agenda because of “science.” Of course, real science is no friend to “transgenderism,” so the left must again rely on “scientism.” Whether or not you’re familiar with scientism, if you’re at least four years old, you’ve lived it.

The Covid era that we all suffered under was saturated with scientism. Anthony Fauci, et al reeked of scientism! Of course, scientism is not science. It is an ideology that is often confused with science. It is, rather, an abuse of the scientific method and scientific authority.

Scientism seeks to elevate the methods of natural science to a level where it is the bar by which every other intellectual discipline is held. Scientism ridicules faith and religion and tells us that “God is dead.” Scientism tells us that the “debate is over,” so shut up and get in line. Again, this was never more evident and real for us all than during the Covid era.

The left regularly employs scientism. Whether abortion, “climate change,” immigration, and the like, the modern left frequently appeals to the “experts” in an attempt to get their way. Adherents of scientism promote fear and anger to try and scare or enrage enough followers to accomplish their goals.

Leftists are more prone to fall into scientism because of their abandonment of God and His absolute truths. The “transgender” movement stands opposed to one of the oldest truths in the history of humanity, so of course “transgender” apologists must resort to scientism. Thank God, most of America simply isn’t falling for it. 

(See this column at American Thinker.)

Copyright 2025, Trevor Grant Thomas
At the Intersection of Politics, Science, Faith, and Reason.
www.trevorgrantthomas.com
Trevor is the author of the The Miracle and Magnificence of America
trevorgrantthomas@gmail.com