california boy Posted Thursday at 07:09 PM Posted Thursday at 07:09 PM 3 hours ago, smac97 said: I find it troubling that limiting minors' access to sexualized events is controversial, and that a federal judge stopped it, and that the decision by the federal appellate court to reverse it was sort of close (8-5). Thanks, -Smac Do you find it troubling at all when the state starts to take over and decide what is appropriate or not appropriate rather than let the parents of their own children decide how they raise their children? For example should the state force children to read the Bible even if the parents find that to be inappropriate and goes against their own religious beliefs? How about forcing children to read anti-Mormon literature because the state thinks that Joseph Smith was grooming children and forcing high school girls to marry him. Would you find that offensive for your own children to experince attacks on your own moral and religious beliefs? Or is it only appropriate when it agrees with your own way you choose to raise your children. THIS is what you are advocating for. The take over of the state on issues that are best left to parents to decide what is appropriate for their children and what is actually a sexualized event. Do you have ANY REAL DATA that does show children are being sexualized by drag shows? What actually is the result of a child seeing a drag show or a drag queen reading a book in the library on a child? Just how many children have had proven harm witnessing such events and what does that harm even look like?
smac97 Posted Thursday at 07:42 PM Author Posted Thursday at 07:42 PM (edited) 1 hour ago, california boy said: Quote I find it troubling that limiting minors' access to sexualized events is controversial, and that a federal judge stopped it, and that the decision by the federal appellate court to reverse it was sort of close (8-5). Do you find it troubling at all when the state starts to take over and decide what is appropriate or not appropriate rather than let the parents of their own children decide how they raise their children? I do think parental authority should be the default, and state intervention in family decisions deserves close scrutiny. Neither of these considerations is absolute. We as a society already accept a number of limits that apply even when parents might consent: Minimum age for alcohol Restrictions on tattoos and certain body modifications Child labor laws? Prohibitions on exposing minors to obscenity or pornography Do you agree or disagree with these other instances of the state "tak{ing} over and decid{ing} what is appropriate or not appropriate" for children "rather than let the parents ... decide"? I would assume you agree with them, but I am open to correction. In any event, the debate seems to really be about where the line belongs, not whether any line can exist. I am open to arguments that this particular statute is drawn too broadly or too vaguely. I just do not accept the premise that the state must stay entirely out of the question of what sexualized content is appropriate for children in public or commercial settings. I would be interested in hearing more from you about this topic. 1 hour ago, california boy said: For example should the state force children to read the Bible even if the parents find that to be inappropriate and goes against their own religious beliefs? How about forcing children to read anti-Mormon literature because the state thinks that Joseph Smith was grooming children and forcing high school girls to marry him. Would you find that offensive for your own children to experince attacks on your own moral and religious beliefs? Or is it only appropriate when it agrees with your own way you choose to raise your children. That’s a useful test of the principle, so let’s take it seriously. Forcing children to read the Bible (or any religious text), or "anti-Mormon literature," either of which being against their parents’ beliefs, would be a clear establishment of religion and a direct violation of both parental rights and the Free Exercise Clause. The state would be affirmatively compelling a particular religious practice or viewpoint. Restricting minors’ access to sexualized live performances is a different category. It does not compel anyone to adopt a belief, practice a religion, or consume any particular content. It sets a boundary on what commercial or public adult-oriented sexual material may be presented to children. That kind of age-based restriction already exists in many areas (obscenity laws, pornography, alcohol, tobacco, certain performances) without being treated as equivalent to compelled religious instruction. One can consistently support parental primacy on matters of religious upbringing while also supporting some outer limits on the sexual content to which children can be exposed in public or commercial settings. The two are not the same exercise of state power. 1 hour ago, california boy said: THIS is what you are advocating for. The take over of the state on issues that are best left to parents to decide what is appropriate for their children and what is actually a sexualized event. Respectfully, no, I am not advocating for that. I am not advocating a “takeover” of parenting. I am defending the idea that the state may set some outer limits on the sexual content to which children can be exposed in public or commercial settings—just as it already does with obscenity, pornography, alcohol, and certain performances. Parental judgment remains primary in most areas, but that does not mean it is the only consideration when the question is what adults may present to other people’s children in shared spaces. 1 hour ago, california boy said: Do you have ANY REAL DATA that does show children are being sexualized by drag shows? What actually is the result of a child seeing a drag show or a drag queen reading a book in the library on a child? Just how many children have had proven harm witnessing such events and what does that harm even look like? The law in question is not limited to “drag shows.” It targets all live performances (not just drag shows) that meet a statutory definition involving nudity, sexual conduct, lewdness, etc., when those performances are deemed unsuitable for the age of the child present. Some events marketed as family-friendly have included highly sexualized elements; others have not. Treating every drag performance as identical is no more accurate than treating every restriction as a ban on two moms in a picture book. Could you clarify your perspective? If a drag show does not violate the statute, then the statute would not apply. Do you therefore endorse drag shows which do violate the statute? Drag shows depicting or simulating: Nudity Sexual conduct Sexual excitement Specific sexual activities (as defined under Florida law) Lewd conduct Lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts? Or putting aside specific endorsement, do you think children should be exposed to these behaviors? Or is your perspective more about leaving such matters to parents? If so, what are the parameters you envision? Are parental rights inviolate in your view? If not, what limitations do you think can or should exist? As for quantified “proven harm” from every possible exposure: that is a high bar that we do not require in most other areas of child-protection law. We do not demand a precise body count of damaged children before restricting minors’ access to pornography, strip clubs, or other adult sexual material. The question is whether the state may draw any age-based line around sexualized live performances at all. I think it may. Reasonable minds can disagree about where exactly that line should sit and how clearly a statute must define it. Thank you for sharing your perspective. Thanks, -Smac Edited Thursday at 08:16 PM by smac97 2
Analytics Posted Thursday at 08:29 PM Posted Thursday at 08:29 PM (edited) 4 hours ago, smac97 said: So what are your thoughts. Per the article, children cannot attend adult live performances depicting or simulating: Nudity Sexual conduct Sexual excitement Specific sexual activities (as defined under Florida law) Lewd conduct Lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts Do you think parents should be allowed to have their children attend adult live performances which feature these sorts of things? Or is your position more of a "I just think parental rights should supersede governmental oversight" sort of thing? I can't tell whether you want to have a serious conversation about this. Florida already had lots of laws that protect children from the things you find objectionable. This new law is clearly about identity politics and throwing red meat to voters who get worked up over imagined social issues. This law is in the same broad category as the proposed F.U.R.R.I.E.S Act in Texas that makes it illegal for school kids to use a litter box--it is addressing made-up problems that are used to manipulate voters. Hamburger Mary’s, a venue that hosts both adult-only and family-friendly drag performances, challenged the constitutionality of the Florida law. The district court, two of the three judges on the original appellate panel, and five judges in the later en banc dissent concluded that Hamburger Mary’s had shown a substantial likelihood of success on the merits and that enforcement should therefore be enjoined while the case was litigated. Those judges identified serious concerns involving vagueness, an unworkable age-specific standard, overbreadth, a severe chilling effect on protected expression, and broad regulatory discretion that could permit arbitrary or viewpoint-selective enforcement. So here is what I would like to hear from you: Was this law actually necessary? What concrete deficiency in Florida’s existing laws did it fix? And do you think it is well crafted when judged by ordinary standards for sound legislation: a real and identifiable problem, clear definitions, workable age calibration, proportional penalties, appropriate respect for parental autonomy, and safeguards against viewpoint-selective enforcement? Edited Thursday at 08:30 PM by Analytics 2
smac97 Posted Thursday at 09:03 PM Author Posted Thursday at 09:03 PM (edited) 35 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote So what are your thoughts. Per the article, children cannot attend adult live performances depicting or simulating: Nudity Sexual conduct Sexual excitement Specific sexual activities (as defined under Florida law) Lewd conduct Lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts Do you think parents should be allowed to have their children attend adult live performances which feature these sorts of things? Or is your position more of a "I just think parental rights should supersede governmental oversight" sort of thing? I can't tell whether you want to have a serious conversation about this. I do want to have a serious conversation. Could you explain what part(s) of my comments are causing confusion on this point? 35 minutes ago, Analytics said: Florida already had lots of laws that protect children from the things you find objectionable. This new law is clearly about identity politics and throwing red meat to voters who get worked up over imagined social issues. This law is in the same broad category as the proposed F.U.R.R.I.E.S Act in Texas that makes it illegal for school kids to use a litter box--it is addressing made-up problems that are used to manipulate voters. Existing laws against obscenity and harmful material to minors are relevant, and it’s fair to ask whether a new statute is necessary or carefully drawn. Legislatures sometimes pass overlapping or politically timed measures; that criticism is not unique to this issue. That said, equating a law that restricts minors’ access to performances meeting a statutory definition of sexual or lewd content with a proposal about litter boxes in schools is a category error. One involves regulating adult-oriented sexualized performances in the presence of children. The other addresses a largely anecdotal or satirical claim that never reflected widespread policy. Treating them as the same kind of “made-up problem” collapses distinct questions into a single partisan narrative. I am willing to examine whether this particular statute is vague, overbroad, or redundant with prior law. I am less persuaded by the claim that any effort to set age-based limits on sexualized live performances must be dismissed as pure identity politics. Consequently, please identify which preexisting Florida statutes which you think already cover the same ground as the above-referenced statute covers. The underlying interest—limiting children’s exposure to certain sexual content in public or commercial settings—is not new, and it is a legitimate governmental objective. Children really are being exposed to highly sexualized content. While reasonable disagreement exists about the means and the drafting of the statute, that is different from saying the entire subject is imaginary. 35 minutes ago, Analytics said: Hamburger Mary’s, a venue that hosts both adult-only and family-friendly drag performances, challenged the constitutionality of the Florida law. The district court, two of the three judges on the original appellate panel, and five judges in the later en banc dissent concluded that Hamburger Mary’s had shown a substantial likelihood of success on the merits and that enforcement should therefore be enjoined while the case was litigated. Those judges identified serious concerns involving vagueness, an unworkable age-specific standard, overbreadth, a severe chilling effect on protected expression, and broad regulatory discretion that could permit arbitrary or viewpoint-selective enforcement. That’s a fair description of the procedural history. The district court and a majority of the original panel found a substantial likelihood of success on the vagueness and overbreadth claims and issued a broad injunction. Five judges on the en banc court agreed with that view in dissent. The en banc majority of eight, however, disagreed. It held that the statute’s use of “lewd,” as construed under existing Florida law, and its age-variable standard did not render the Act facially unconstitutional, and it vacated the injunction. Close divisions among judges are common on difficult First Amendment questions; they do not themselves establish that the losing side’s position is the correct one. The controlling decision at this stage is the en banc majority’s. 35 minutes ago, Analytics said: So here is what I would like to hear from you: Was this law actually necessary? What concrete deficiency in Florida’s existing laws did it fix? That is a legitimate policy question, and it is distinct from the constitutional one the en banc court decided. I don't think I have claimed that the statute was the only possible way to address the issue, or that Florida’s prior obscenity and harmful-to-minors laws were a complete nullity. Legislatures often add overlapping or more specific tools when they conclude existing provisions are hard to apply to live performances, slow to enforce, or uncertain in scope when the event is marketed as entertainment rather than explicit adult material. Whether this particular law was necessary is a judgment call about legislative priorities and drafting. Reasonable people can conclude it was redundant, poorly tailored, or politically motivated. My point has been narrower: the underlying interest in setting some age-based limits on sexualized live performances is not inherently illegitimate, and the en banc court found the statute survived the facial constitutional challenge that was brought. Necessity and constitutionality are related but not identical questions. I am open to arguments that better-drafted or more targeted tools would have been preferable. 35 minutes ago, Analytics said: And do you think it is well crafted when judged by ordinary standards for sound legislation: a real and identifiable problem, clear definitions, workable age calibration, proportional penalties, appropriate respect for parental autonomy, and safeguards against viewpoint-selective enforcement? Those are reasonable criteria for evaluating any statute. I'm not sure the statute in question scores perfectly on all of them. Clearer definitions and tighter tailoring are almost always preferable. Age-variable standards can create practical uncertainty for venues. Parental autonomy deserves due weight and deference (due, but not unlimited). Any law that touches expressive conduct needs safeguards against selective or viewpoint-driven enforcement. The dissent emphasized these concerns, and they are worth taking seriously in application. My position is not that the statute is a model of legislative craftsmanship. Rather, I think the state has a legitimate interest in placing some outer limits on sexualized live performances involving minors. I also think that existing - and constitutionally valid - categories of regulation (obscenity, harmful-to-minors material, age restrictions on adult entertainment) already reflect that interest, and that the en banc court found the facial constitutional challenge unlikely to succeed. One can accept those points while still preferring narrower drafting, stronger definitional clarity, or greater deference to parental decision-making in close cases. So while criticizing the law's language or design is fair, but I think that treating the entire subject as illegitimate or imaginary is a different claim. A few questions for you: Do you believe there should be any age-based legal limits on the sexual content of live performances that minors can attend, or is your position that parental consent should be the sole and final authority in every case? If Florida’s prior obscenity and harmful-to-minors statutes already fully solved the problem, why do similar age restrictions exist in many other states and localities for adult entertainment venues, strip clubs, and certain performances? Are those also unnecessary? CB compared this law to forcing children to read the Bible. What is the closest real-world parallel you see: is restricting minors from a sexualized stage performance more like compelled religious exercise, or more like existing limits on minors’ access to pornography, alcohol, or adult businesses? This is an important and difficult topic. I appreciate your efforts to treat it seriously. Thanks, -Smac Edited Thursday at 09:06 PM by smac97 1
SeekingUnderstanding Posted Thursday at 09:49 PM Posted Thursday at 09:49 PM 4 hours ago, smac97 said: Nevertheless, the existence of hard cases or bad-faith actors does not mean we abandon the underlying category. That a concept cannot be defined with exacting precision does not mean it cannot be defined at all. We already have legal concepts like “obscenity,” “harmful to minors,” “indecent exposure,” and age-based restrictions on alcohol, tobacco, and certain performances. Those terms are also contested at the margins, yet most people still accept that some line exists between material appropriate for adults and material that should not be presented to children in public or commercial settings. The examples you raise (books depicting same-sex parents, or a same-sex kiss in Lightyear) are not the same as sexually explicit or lewd live adult performances. Conflating ordinary representation of gay people with adult sexual content is, I think, a category error that makes productive disagreement harder. One can support age restrictions on sexualized entertainment without supporting the removal of books that simply show two moms or two dads. I'm sorry, but I don't think that the Florida legislature is acting in good faith. Instead they are threatening lawfare to rein in acts that go against their religious principles. If they were really concerned about lewd conduct and "grooming" why have they done nothing to prevent children from watching rated R movies with their parents? 1
smac97 Posted Thursday at 10:51 PM Author Posted Thursday at 10:51 PM 15 minutes ago, SeekingUnderstanding said: I'm sorry, but I don't think that the Florida legislature is acting in good faith. Instead they are threatening lawfare to rein in acts that go against their religious principles. If they were really concerned about lewd conduct and "grooming" why have they done nothing to prevent children from watching rated R movies with their parents? I understand the skepticism about legislative motives. Politicians of every stripe mix principle, politics, and constituency pressure, and it is fair to question whether a particular bill is primarily about child protection or about "signaling." That said, the comparison to R-rated movies watched with parents does not seem to work. An R-rated film is a recorded work that parents can preview, control, and contextualize in private. A live performance in a commercial or public venue is different in setting, immediacy, and the degree of parental control once the child is present. Existing law already treats live adult entertainment, obscenity, and age-restricted venues differently from private viewing of movies for related reasons. A person can criticize the Florida statute as poorly drafted, politically timed, or broader than necessary, but I think he could do that without treating every age-based limit on sexualized live performances as illegitimate religious lawfare. However, the reverse is also true: existing gaps or inconsistencies in how other forms of content are regulated do not automatically prove that any restriction in this area is pretextual. I would be interested in your responses to the questions I posed above: Do you believe there should be any age-based legal limits on the sexual content of live performances that minors can attend, or is your position that parental consent should be the sole and final authority in every case? If Florida’s prior obscenity and harmful-to-minors statutes already fully solved the problem, why do similar age restrictions exist in many other states and localities for adult entertainment venues, strip clubs, and certain performances? Are those also unnecessary? CB compared this law to forcing children to read the Bible. What is the closest real-world parallel you see: is restricting minors from a sexualized stage performance more like compelled religious exercise, or more like existing limits on minors’ access to pornography, alcohol, or adult businesses? Thank you for your participation. -Smac 1
Analytics Posted 17 hours ago Posted 17 hours ago (edited) 19 hours ago, smac97 said: I do want to have a serious conversation. Could you explain what part(s) of my comments are causing confusion on this point? Your original post on this topic was based on Ron DeSantis's talking points rather than the actual legal issues of the real-world case. You began your analysis by saying, On 8/6/2026 at 9:48 AM, smac97 said: I find it troubling that limiting minors' access to sexualized events is controversial, and that a federal judge stopped it, and that the decision by the federal appellate court to reverse it was sort of close (8-5). This misconstrues both the legal background of this case and what this particular law actually changes in Florida. It is parroting what Ron DeSantis said about it ("This shouldn’t even be controversial, yet our law protecting kids required us to fend off lawsuits and win a case before a divided appellate court." and quotes Eric Daugherty saying, "HUGE WIN! Children are PROTECTED in Florida...", as if without this law, children were unprotected). 19 hours ago, smac97 said: I am willing to examine whether this particular statute is vague, overbroad, or redundant with prior law. I am less persuaded by the claim that any effort to set age-based limits on sexualized live performances must be dismissed as pure identity politics. Consequently, please identify which preexisting Florida statutes which you think already cover the same ground as the above-referenced statute covers. Existing laws in Florida include: Fla. Stat. § 847.013 — Exposing minors to harmful shows and exhibitions Fla. Stat. § 800.04(7) — Lewd or lascivious exhibition before a person under sixteen Fla. Stat. § 847.011(4) — Obscene live performances Fla. Stat. § 847.0133 — Showing obscene material to a minor Fla. Stat. § 800.03 — Exposure of sexual organs Fla. Stat. § 847.012 — Harmful material distributed to minors Fla. Stat. § 827.071 — Sexual performances by children and child pornography Fla. Stat. § 796.07 — Places operated for “lewdness” Fla. Stat. § 823.05 — Public nuisances involving lewdness or illegal conduct Fla. Stat. § 877.03 — Disorderly conduct and breach of the peace 19 hours ago, smac97 said: So while criticizing the law's language or design is fair, but I think that treating the entire subject as illegitimate or imaginary is a different claim. I think what is illegitimate and imaginary is Ron DeSantis's claim, which you parrotted, that this particular law shouldn't even be controversial, and the implication that his political oponents are against "limiting minors access to sxualized events." 19 hours ago, smac97 said: A few questions for you: Do you believe there should be any age-based legal limits on the sexual content of live performances that minors can attend, or is your position that parental consent should be the sole and final authority in every case? I don’t have an absolute rule. I can imagine sufficiently extreme sexual conduct where the state would be justified in overriding parental consent. But that doesn't answer the real questions surrounding the legal controversy around this law. Agreeing that some line may legitimately exist doesn't tell us where the line should be, whether Florida's existing laws already drew it adequately, or whether § 827.11 makes Florida a better place to live and raise a family. 19 hours ago, smac97 said: If Florida’s prior obscenity and harmful-to-minors statutes already fully solved the problem, why do similar age restrictions exist in many other states and localities for adult entertainment venues, strip clubs, and certain performances? Are those also unnecessary? Just as I don't think Florida needs redundant laws, I don't think other states need them, either. As an example, Orlando has an old theatre called The Plaza Live, which is owned by a non-profit called The Orlando Philharmonic Foundation. In December of 2022--5 months before the children of Florida were "protected" by SB1438, they had a show called "A Drag Queen Christmas." According to the Miami Herald: Quote When the historic Plaza Live theater in Orlando hosted an event last December called "A Drag Queen Christmas," the show drew a full house, noisy street demonstrators — and a small squad of undercover state agents there to document whether children were being exposed to sights that ran afoul of Florida's decency law. The Dec. 28 performance featured campy skits like "Screwdolph the Red-Nippled Man Deer" and shimmying, bare-chested men who wouldn't have been out of place at a Madonna concert. Also a hip thrust or two, similar to what is sometimes indulged in by NFL players after a touchdown. All of it was dutifully recorded by the undercover agents on state-issued iPhones. But while the agents took photos of three minors at the Orlando drag show — who appeared to be accompanied by adults — they acknowledged that nothing indecent had happened on stage, according to an incident report obtained exclusively by the Miami Herald. "Besides some of the outfits being provocative (bikinis and short shorts), agents did not witness any lewd acts such as exposure of genital organs," the brief report stated. "The performers did not have any physical contact while performing to the rhythm of the music with any patrons." Still, the state's Department of Business and Professional Regulation proceeded to file a complaint against the nonprofit that runs Plaza Live, claiming the venue had illegally exposed children to sexual content. The complaint, issued Feb. 3, seeks to strip the small, nonprofit theater of its liquor license — a serious blow that would likely put it out of business. It's all part of Gov. Ron DeSantis' statewide crackdown on drag shows, which could escalate further as legislators draft new laws to tighten restrictions on venues that allow minors into those performances. DeSantis has said he believes "sexualized" drag shows are dangerous for kids. Ahead of the Orlando event, state officials warned the Plaza Live not to let in children. Far-right figures — including the social-media account Libs of TikTok and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican — had been raising the alarm for days about the show, which toured the nation before coming to Florida. DBPR, which regulates alcohol sales in Florida and has its own sworn cops, says it has the authority to strip liquor licenses from venues that violate state law. DeSantis himself has said the goal is to financially hurt venues that allow children to see drag. "Having kids involved in this is wrong," the governor said last year. "It is a disturbing trend in our society to try to sexualize these young people. That is not the way you look out for our children, you protect children, you do not expose them to things that are inappropriate." Based on the agents' photos and videos, DBPR said the Plaza Live had allowed children to see "acts of sexual conduct, simulated sexual activity, and lewd, vulgar and indecent displays" — in violation of state laws that ban showing "lewd or lascivious" materials to minors under the age of 16. Although the complaint asserted that the Plaza Live broke decency laws, prosecutors have not filed criminal charges. The state is handling the case as a license-compliance matter. In the adult-entertainment industry, obscene acts generally include touching, sexual manipulation, or exposing an erection — none of which happened at the Plaza Live or any of the other venues targeted by the state over similar allegations since last summer. Carlos Guillermo Smith, a former Democratic state legislator from Orlando, said the report from state agents proves that the "moral panic" about drag shows is a "hoax." "What you see here is the governor sending in investigators and then dismissing what the investigators have to say because it doesn't fit into his narrative," said Guillermo Smith, who now works for Equality Florida, an LGBTQ rights group. "It's more evidence that all of this … is contrived, it's politically motivated. And it's not about protecting children. It's part of an ongoing effort to marginalize LGBT people and their allies because that's the vehicle that will get him to … the GOP nomination." He pointed out that parents can choose what movies to take their children to without the state interfering. DeSantis — who has said that parents need more rights in other areas like schools — does not advocate for parental choice when it comes to drag shows. The Orlando Philharmonic settled with state regulators and paid a $5,000 fine and agreed to no longer allow parents to take their children to such shows in the future. Let's summarize: 1- An old theatre had a show called A Drag Queen Christmas. 2- There was a sign at the entrance warning of potentially unsuitable content for those under the age of 18 3- A small squad of undercover state agents went there, secretly recording everything 4- According to the state agents, "nothing indecent had happened on stage" 5- Some parents chose to take a grand-total of three minors to see the show, where they were exposed to [gasp!] "a hip thrust or two", and "bare-chested men who wouldn't have been out of place at a Madonna concert." 6- State regulators went after the venue, who ended up settling for a $5,000 fine and a promise by the venue that it would take away parents rights to take their children to such shows in the future. And what is the reaction to all of this from Ron DeSantis and those who parrot him? We need more laws! Whatever one thinks of that performance, this is why I reject the suggestion that, before § 827.11, Florida was helpless to protect children from sexually inappropriate live entertainment. As this case proves, Florida had laws on the books, sent undercover law-enforcement officers to investigate the show, and initiated proceedings that threatened the venue’s licenses, and imposed hefty fines—all before § 827.11 existed. 19 hours ago, smac97 said: CB compared this law to forcing children to read the Bible. What is the closest real-world parallel you see: is restricting minors from a sexualized stage performance more like compelled religious exercise, or more like existing limits on minors’ access to pornography, alcohol, or adult businesses? I would say the closest real-world parallel to Fla. Stat. § 827.11 — Exposing children to an adult live performance is Fla. Stat. § 847.013 — Exposing minors to harmful shows and exhibitions. 19 hours ago, smac97 said: This is an important and difficult topic. I believe the importance of a topic like this should depend, at least in part, on how much actual harm it causes individuals and society. I seriously doubt that a young teenager suffers significant developmental harm from seeing “a hip thrust or two” or “bare-chested men who wouldn’t have been out of place at a Madonna concert.” And I have seen no evidence that parents taking children to performances like this constitutes a significant social problem. Given the low frequency and low severity of this, I'm quite happy to allow parents to make the judgment call on how to raise their own families. I think a much more important topic is how politicians have become so skilled at manipulating voters by taking unusual, marginal, and often made-up incidents, portraying them as widespread threats to children, and using the resulting fear to distract voters from the issues that are really important, mobilize voters, antagonize them against their neighbors who have different beliefs and cultures, and justify new exercises of state power that take away parents rights. The inability of so many voters to see what's really going on here is the really big issue that terrifies and depresses me. Edited 16 hours ago by Analytics 2
SeekingUnderstanding Posted 17 hours ago Posted 17 hours ago 17 hours ago, smac97 said: That said, the comparison to R-rated movies watched with parents does not seem to work. An R-rated film is a recorded work that parents can preview, control, and contextualize in private. A live performance in a commercial or public venue is different in setting, immediacy, and the degree of parental control once the child is present. Existing law already treats live adult entertainment, obscenity, and age-restricted venues differently from private viewing of movies for related reasons. Your acting as if public screening R rated movies doesn't exist. I'm sure you can link me to your advocacy efforts to end this obscene grooming of children.
SeekingUnderstanding Posted 17 hours ago Posted 17 hours ago 27 minutes ago, Analytics said: We need more laws! The true cry of conservatives everywhere. Especially if they are designed to target minority communities our religions tell us to hate.
smac97 Posted 16 hours ago Author Posted 16 hours ago 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Your original post on this topic was based on Ron DeSantis's talking points rather than the actual legal issues of the real-world case. You began your analysis by saying, My original post was based on a news item, for which I provided a link. That news item quoted Gov. DeSantis, but it also stated: "Critics have argued the measure could be used to crack down on certain drag performances and chill free expression." Overall, I thought the article did a good job of clinically describing the news item at hand. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote I find it troubling that limiting minors' access to sexualized events is controversial, and that a federal judge stopped it, and that the decision by the federal appellate court to reverse it was sort of close (8-5). This misconstrues both the legal background of this case and what this particular law actually changes in Florida. Could you elaborate? What am I misconstruing? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: It is parroting what Ron DeSantis said about it ("This shouldn’t even be controversial, yet our law protecting kids required us to fend off lawsuits and win a case before a divided appellate court." and quotes Eric Daugherty saying, "HUGE WIN! Children are PROTECTED in Florida...", as if without this law, children were unprotected). I was not parroting Gov. DeSantis. I was expressing my own viewpoint, which happens to be similar to his. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote I am willing to examine whether this particular statute is vague, overbroad, or redundant with prior law. I am less persuaded by the claim that any effort to set age-based limits on sexualized live performances must be dismissed as pure identity politics. Consequently, please identify which preexisting Florida statutes which you think already cover the same ground as the above-referenced statute covers. Existing laws in Florida include: Fla. Stat. § 847.013 — Exposing minors to harmful shows and exhibitions Fla. Stat. § 800.04(7) — Lewd or lascivious exhibition before a person under sixteen Fla. Stat. § 847.011(4) — Obscene live performances Fla. Stat. § 847.0133 — Showing obscene material to a minor Fla. Stat. § 800.03 — Exposure of sexual organs Fla. Stat. § 847.012 — Harmful material distributed to minors Fla. Stat. § 827.071 — Sexual performances by children and child pornography Fla. Stat. § 796.07 — Places operated for “lewdness” Fla. Stat. § 823.05 — Public nuisances involving lewdness or illegal conduct Fla. Stat. § 877.03 — Disorderly conduct and breach of the peace ... Quote CB compared this law to forcing children to read the Bible. What is the closest real-world parallel you see: is restricting minors from a sexualized stage performance more like compelled religious exercise, or more like existing limits on minors’ access to pornography, alcohol, or adult businesses? I would say the closest real-world parallel to Fla. Stat. § 827.11 — Exposing children to an adult live performance is Fla. Stat. § 847.013 — Exposing minors to harmful shows and exhibitions. Okay. Thank you for this list, and for the comparison between 827.11 and 847.013. I asked Grok to compare the two: Quote The two statutes overlap in purpose (protecting minors from certain sexualized content) but differ significantly in scope, focus, and key details. 1. Core subject matter § 847.013 (older statute): Targets motion pictures, videotapes, exhibitions, shows, presentations, or representations that depict nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, sexual battery, bestiality, or sadomasochistic abuse and that are “harmful to minors.” It is primarily aimed at recorded/filmed material and commercial exhibition or rental of that material. § 827.11 (2023 statute): Targets adult live performances — any show, exhibition, or presentation in front of a live audience that depicts or simulates nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, specific sexual activities, lewd conduct, or lewd exposure of prosthetic/imitation genitals or breasts, when the three-prong test is met. Key distinction: 827.11 is specifically written for live performances. 847.013 is written primarily for motion pictures and similar recorded or exhibited material (though its language is broad enough to reach some live shows). 2. Definition of the prohibited content Both use a version of the Miller/“harmful to minors” three-prong test, but they are not identical: Element § 847.013 (via “harmful to minors” in § 847.001) § 827.11 Prurient interest Predominantly appeals to a prurient, shameful, or morbid interest Same Patent offensiveness Patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community as a whole with respect to what is suitable for minors Patently offensive to prevailing standards in the adult community of this state as a whole with respect to what is suitable for the age of the child present Value Without serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for minors Without serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value for the age of the child present § 827.11 is more explicitly age-variable (“the age of the child present”) and adds “lewd conduct” and “lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts.” 3. Parental accompaniment § 847.013: Explicitly exempts a minor who is accompanied by a parent (or either parent). § 827.11: Contains no parental-accompaniment exception. Ignorance of age, misrepresentation of age, or belief in consent are also barred as defenses. 4. Monetary consideration / commercial element § 847.013: The main prohibitions are tied to exhibiting, selling, renting, or admitting for a monetary consideration. § 827.11: Simply prohibits knowingly admitting a child to an adult live performance. It does not require that admission be for money. 5. Penalties and other features Both make a violation a first-degree misdemeanor. § 847.013 includes detailed provisions on injunctive relief, false age representations, and a legislative preemption of local ordinances on the subject. § 827.11 is shorter and more narrowly focused on the act of admitting a child to a qualifying live performance. Bottom line § 827.11 is not merely a restatement of § 847.013. It was written to reach live adult performances with a specific definition that includes lewd conduct and prosthetic/imitation exposure, uses an age-of-the-child standard, eliminates the parental-accompaniment safe harbor that exists in 847.013, and does not require a commercial/monetary element. The older statute remains focused primarily on motion pictures and similar material sold, rented, or exhibited for money. What are your thoughts about this? Do you think the earlier statute was sufficient to cover drag shows? Way back in the day I clerked for a judge in Tacoma who heard an interesting criminal case about a guy manufacturing meth. He had been pulled over in his truck, the bed of which was full of boxes containing jars filled with alcohol and a white sludge at the bottom, which turned out to be powdered Sudafed tablets. My recollection is that everyone, including the criminal defense attorney, agreed that the only possible purpose for having jars full of alcohol with powdered Sudafed was to make meth, which is a controlled substance. However, the criminal statute in place at the time only criminalized the production of a controlled substance, which had not yet happened (since there was no meth or other controlled substances in the truck, just a bunch of pseudoephedrine, which is not a controlled substance). The criminal defense attorney argued that the statute - as worded - only criminalized the completion of "production," not interim steps are are incrementally headed that way. He also contrasted Washington's statute with Idaho's, which did criminalize both "production" and "taking a substantial step towards the production" of controlled substances. The judge agreed with the criminal defense attorney and dismissed the case. The prosecutor was not happy, but the judge noted that criminal statutes are often refined by these sorts of developments, which eventually filter up to the legislature so that they can fill in the gaps. Another example: Years ago I worked with a criminal defense attorney in Utah. He came back from a hearing and said that he had succeeded in getting serious criminal charges against my client dismissed. The criminal statute in question was sort of complex, but basically criminalized physical contact between an adult's mouth, genitals or hands with any part of a minor's genitals or anus. However, there was one combination that the legislature had left out, namely, an adults mouth to a minor's anus. This was precisely what the police had charged the defendant, and the statute did not criminalize it, so the defendant effectively got away with it. It is my understanding that in both instances the state legislatures have either amended existing statutes or enacted new ones to address the foregoing "gaps" in what the criminal statutes cover. I think something similar happened in Florida. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote So while criticizing the law's language or design is fair, but I think that treating the entire subject as illegitimate or imaginary is a different claim. I think what is illegitimate and imaginary is Ron DeSantis's claim, which you parrotted, that this particular law shouldn't even be controversial, and the implication that his political oponents are against "limiting minors access to sxualized events." I'm not sure I understand your position. Do you think the statute is controversial or not? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote Do you believe there should be any age-based legal limits on the sexual content of live performances that minors can attend, or is your position that parental consent should be the sole and final authority in every case? I don’t have an absolute rule. I can imagine sufficiently extreme sexual conduct where the state would be justified in overriding parental consent. Fair enough. Can you allow for principled departure from your position on this? Is it possible and reasonable that citizens and their legislative representatives might prefer to not limited constraints to only "sufficiently extreme sexual conduct"? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: But that doesn't answer the real questions surrounding the legal controversy around this law. I would be interested in hearing what you feel these "real questions" are. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Agreeing that some line may legitimately exist doesn't tell us where the line should be, whether Florida's existing laws already drew it adequately, or whether § 827.11 makes Florida a better place to live and raise a family. But isn't this what the legislative process is for? To make judgment calls about "whether Florida's existing laws" were sufficient to address whether children should be allowed to view highly sexualized live adult performances? As for "whether § 827.11 makes Florida a better place to live and raise a family," I think it does. You (apparently?) do not. Again, isn't that what the legislative process does all the time? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote If Florida’s prior obscenity and harmful-to-minors statutes already fully solved the problem, why do similar age restrictions exist in many other states and localities for adult entertainment venues, strip clubs, and certain performances? Are those also unnecessary? Just as I don't think Florida needs redundant laws, I don't think other states need them, either. Okay. I think we just disagree about redundancy, as I think the statutes overlap but still have some material differences. Criminal statutes are regularly created or refined to address more particularized behaviors. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: As an example, Orlando has an old theatre called The Plaza Live, which is owned by a non-profit called The Orlando Philharmonic Foundation. In December of 2022--5 months before the children of Florida were "protected" by SB1438, they had a show called "A Drag Queen Christmas." According to the Miami Herald: The Orlando Philharmonic settled with state regulators and payd a $5,000 fine and agreed to no longer allow parents to take their children to such shows in the future. Let's summarize: 1- An old theatre had a show called A Drag Queen Christmas. 2- There was a sign at the entrance warning of potentially unsuitable content for those under the age of 18 3- A small squad of undercover state agents went there, secretly recording everything 4- According to the state agents, "nothing indecent had happened on stage" 5- Some parents chose to take a grand-total of three minors to see the show, where they were exposed to [gasp!] "a hip thrust or two", and "bare-chested men who wouldn't have been out of place at a Madonna concert." 6- State regulators went after the venue, who ended up settling for a $5,000 fine and a promise by the venue that it would take away parents rights to take their children to such shows in the future. And what is the reaction to all of this from Ron DeSantis and those who parrot him? We need more laws! Whatever one thinks of that performance, this is why I reject the suggestion that, before § 827.11, Florida was helpless to protect children from sexually inappropriate live entertainment. I don't think anyone has made "the suggestion that, before § 827.11, Florida was helpless to protect children from sexually inappropriate live entertainment." Again, criminal statutes are amended or created all the time to more specifically address particularized behaviors. As noted above, § 827.11 seems to cover ground that other statutes did not, or did not cover with clarity and concision. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: Quote This is an important and difficult topic. I believe the importance of a topic like this should depend, at least in part, on how much actual harm it causes individuals and society. Okay. Is it possible that exposing children to highly sexualized live adult performances causes "actual harm" to individuals and/or society? Do you think legislatures and societies are obligated to wait until "actual harm" accrues and becomes a very serious problem before taking steps to legislative mitigate it? Can it be reasonable and appropriate for legislatures to take reasonable preemptive steps to avoid the "actual harm" before it actually harms society and individuals? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: I seriously doubt that a young teenager suffers significant developmental harm from seeing “a hip thrust or two” or “bare-chested men who wouldn’t have been out of place at a Madonna concert.” And I have seen no evidence that parents taking children to performances like this constitutes a significant social problem. Given the low frequency and low severity of this, I'm quite happy to allow parents to make the judgment call on how to raise their own families. I have previously posted a number of news items about children being exposed to highly sexualized behaviors at drag shows, "Pride" parades, and so on. A sampling: SF Cop Says Nudity Around Kids is OK at Pride Parade Graphic “Pride” Parades Attacking the Innocence of Children San Francisco Pride Parade features public nudity around kids, 'Fetish Zone' with urine Why drag queen performances are not appropriate for children Yes, kink belongs at Pride. And I want my kids to see it. Don't Look Away: These Are the 'Family-Friendly' Pride Events the Left Is Pushing On Kids Prepping Kids for a Pride Parade Journalist Witnesses Naked Men Playing with Kids at Pride Children as Sex Objects: Why NYC Gay Pride Parade Is Being Called a 'Celebration of Pedophilia' DC Pride parade marked by depravity, grooming of children despite ‘family friendly’ billing Pride Parade Clips Show Shocking and Bizarre Moments — with Children in Attendance Pride Month Jumps the Shark Yale Professor Wants Your Kids To See Sex At Pride Parades So They’re Not ‘Homophobes’ Dallas Club Investigated After Drag Show for Kids Why Drag Events for Kids Are Inappropriate—And Actually Work Against the LGBT Community Children to experience sexual content at "Drag the kids to pride" (video included) Not for children! A lot of the events in the foregoing links involve quite a bit more than “a hip thrust or two” or “bare-chested men who wouldn’t have been out of place at a Madonna concert.” 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: I think a much more important topic is how politicians have become so skilled at manipulating voters by taking unusual, marginal, and often made-up incidents, What "made-up" incidents are you referring to here? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: portraying them as widespread threats to children, We have had all sorts of discussions about bishops who have abused children while acting in that capacity. Given the size of the Church, the number of actual incidents is statistically tiny, but does that mean that the Church can therefore safely disregard the issue, take not remedial efforts to mitigate risks, etc.? Also, is it ever appropriate for a legislature to anticipate, and preemptively take steps to curb or avoid, "widespread threats to children" before they actually materialize? Also, is it possible that the legislature in Florida decided that the exposure of children to highly sexualized adult live performances was sufficiently "widespread" as to warrant a statutory response? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: and using the resulting fear to distract voters from the issues that are really important, I think this is an example of the "not as bad as" fallacy, or the "fallacy of relative privation" or "appeal to worse problems" or the "starving children in Africa" argument. It happens when someone tries to dismiss a problem or complaint just because a worse problem exists somewhere else. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: mobilize voters, Well, yes. Legislators may well be incentivized to pass laws that they think will please their constituencies. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: antagonize them against their neighbors who have different beliefs and cultures, We live in a pluralistic society, so there are differences of opinions. Some people may indeed have "beliefs and cultures" in which it is acceptable to expose children to highly sexualized live adult performances (if you would like to identify these, feel free). Other people, meanwhile, have "beliefs and cultures" which find that unacceptable. We generally let the democratic process govern such differences. That said, the result is that legislatures pass laws to be enforced by the State and by law enforcement. 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: and justify new exercises of state power that take away parents rights. Previously you said that the new statute was unnecessary/redundant because preexisting statutes were already sufficient to address the issue. Do you characterize those statutes as "tak{ing} away parents rights"? Here you seem to be saying that the statute amounts to "new exercises of state power," which would seem to suggest that the new statute is not "redundant" after all (since its effect is "new"). Could you clarify? 23 minutes ago, Analytics said: The inability of so many voters to see what's really going on here is the really big issue that terrifies and depresses me. What is it that you think is "really going on here"? I appreciate your input. Thanks, -Smac
smac97 Posted 16 hours ago Author Posted 16 hours ago 1 hour ago, SeekingUnderstanding said: Quote That said, the comparison to R-rated movies watched with parents does not seem to work. An R-rated film is a recorded work that parents can preview, control, and contextualize in private. A live performance in a commercial or public venue is different in setting, immediacy, and the degree of parental control once the child is present. Existing law already treats live adult entertainment, obscenity, and age-restricted venues differently from private viewing of movies for related reasons. Your acting as if public screening R rated movies doesn't exist. Not quite. I am saying the comparison to R-rate movies does not really work here. 1 hour ago, SeekingUnderstanding said: I'm sure you can link me to your advocacy efforts to end this obscene grooming of children. Florida Statute § 847.013: Prohibits knowingly exhibiting, selling, renting, or-providing paid admission for minors to view motion pictures, shows, or representations depicting nudity, sexual conduct, sexual excitement, or abuse that is "harmful to minors". Violations are generally first-degree misdemeanors punishable by up to one year in jail. Florida Statute § 847.012: Criminalizes selling, renting, loaning, or distributing materials defined as harmful to minors to a child under 18. I think this is an example of the "not as bad as" fallacy, or the "fallacy of relative privation" or "appeal to worse problems" or the "starving children in Africa" argument. It happens when someone tries to dismiss a problem or complaint just because a worse problem exists somewhere else. You seem to be suggesting that until and unless I first express concern about this or that other social ill, it is not legitimate for me to speak about the one under discussion here. I respectfully do not agree with that proposition. Thanks, -Smac
smac97 Posted 15 hours ago Author Posted 15 hours ago On 7/24/2026 at 5:32 PM, smac97 said: I think the Cass Report is not accurately described as a "panic piece." Same goes for Dr. Paul McHugh's 2019 Amicus brief submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court. And the NY Times article about Dr. Johanna Olson-Kennedy and her decision, on for political reasons, to not publish "a long-awaited study of puberty-blocking drugs." And this October 2022 Reuters article, "Youth In Transition," which included Parts 1 through 4 ("A Dearth of Science," "The Social Element," "Lost in Limbo" and "The Matter of Regret"). And this 2026 story, "Cairns Clinic Scandal: Urgent Call to Halt Child Transition": More here: And this 2023 article in the British Medical Journal, "Gender dysphoria in young people is rising—and so is professional disagreement," which includes this intro: And this: Joshua P. Cohen, Europe and U.S. Diverge Sharply on Treatment of Gender Incongruence in Minors, Forbes (updated Dec. 2, 2023). And this: Azeen Ghorayshi, Youth Gender Medications Limited in England, Part of Big Shift in Europe, N.Y. Times (Apr. 9, 2024) And this: Hannah Barnes, Why Disturbing Leaks from US Gender Group WPATH Ring Alarm Bells in the NHS, Guardian (Mar. 9, 2024) And this: Azeen Ghorayshi, Biden Officials Pushed to Remove Age Limits for Trans Surgery, Documents Show, N.Y. Times (June 25, 2024) More: I Thought I Was Saving Trans Kids. Now I’m Blowing the Whistle Tavistock trust whistleblower David Bell: ‘I believed I was doing the right thing’ The Responsibility to Inform The pullback from youth gender transition has begun A Slow Trek Back to Truth? Puberty Blockers, Cross-Sex Hormones, and Youth Suicide DC children's hospital offered 'gender affirming' hysterectomies for kids, audio and deleted webpage reveal Putting numbers on the rise in children seeking gender care Why disturbing leaks from US gender group WPATH ring alarm bells in the NHS Sex Reassignment Doesn’t Work. Here Is the Evidence Dr. Paul McHugh's SCOTUS Amicus Brief I Wish I Had Been Told About These Risks Before I Had Gender Surgery Gender dysphoria and psychiatric comorbidities in childhood: a systematic review Most kids grow out of their desire to change their sex The Cass Report Four-Year Study on Gender Affirming Care in the UK Warns of the Dangers of 'Gender Transition' for Kids Opinion: Europe’s example on gender treatment Affirming Deception: Dishonesty in Gender-Medicine British Medical Journal: Gender Ideology Not Settled Science Why Europe and America are going in opposite directions on youth transgender medicine Medical Journal’s False Consensus on ‘Gender-Affirming Care’ Transgender Care Needs Better Science, More Transparency Second Thoughts on ‘Gender-Affirming Care’ Discussing So-Called “Gender-Affirming Care” With Dr. Elliot Kaminetzky Money Is Driving Medicine’s Embrace of Child Transgenderism Woke doc refused to publish $10 million trans kids study that showed puberty blockers didn’t help mental health Gender dysphoria in young people is rising—and so is professional disagreement Thousands of Minors Have Received ‘Gender-Affirming Surgeries’ The Economist (June 2024) : Research into trans medicine has been manipulated A Grok summary: Quote Summary of the article The piece (originally published in The Economist on June 29, 2024, and reproduced by SEGM) examines court documents from an Alabama youth gender-medicine case. Those documents show that the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) interfered with independent systematic reviews it had commissioned from Johns Hopkins University’s Evidence-Based Practice Center. Key points: After the Cass Review in England questioned the evidence base for youth gender medicine, WPATH defended its own guidelines by claiming they rested on “far more systematic reviews.” Court records reveal that from the start of the 2018 contract, WPATH sought to control what the Johns Hopkins researchers could publish. WPATH officials told the researchers the data “cannot be used without WPATH approval” and that the researchers “cannot publish their findings independently.” Johns Hopkins faculty resisted, citing academic freedom and standards for systematic reviews. A compromise was reached giving WPATH the right to review and comment but not to block publication. After seeing draft papers in 2020, WPATH imposed a new policy allowing it to stop papers based on their conclusions. The Johns Hopkins team ultimately published only one paper (a 2021 meta-analysis on hormone therapy). Documents indicate a WPATH individual was involved in that paper’s design, drafting, and approval—despite the published article claiming otherwise. Five other commissioned reviews appear never to have been published. An internal WPATH email stated that research must be scrutinized so that publication would not “negatively affect the provision of transgender health care.” Separate documents show that Rachel Levine (U.S. Assistant Secretary for Health) successfully pressed WPATH to remove minimum-age recommendations from its 2022 Standards of Care. The article concludes that these revelations undermine WPATH’s claim to base its recommendations on rigorous, independent science. Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy (January 2023) : The Myth of “Reliable Research” in Pediatric Gender Medicine: A critical evaluation of the Dutch Studies—and research that has followed A Grok summary: Quote Title: The Myth of “Reliable Research” in Pediatric Gender Medicine: A critical evaluation of the Dutch Studies—and research that has followed Authors: E. Abbruzzese, Stephen B. Levine, and Julia W. Mason Published: Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, 2023 (online January 2023) The paper argues that the two foundational Dutch studies (de Vries et al., 2011 and 2014) that underpinned the “Dutch protocol” for medical gender transition in adolescents are methodologically flawed and should never have been used to justify scaling these interventions into routine clinical practice. Main critiques of the Dutch studies Selection bias – Only the most successful cases were included in the final analyses, inflating apparent benefits. Measurement artifact – The reported “resolution of gender dysphoria” largely resulted from reversing the scoring of the gender dysphoria questionnaire after patients had transitioned, rather than from genuine clinical improvement. Confounding – Patients received concurrent psychotherapy, making it impossible to isolate the effects of hormones and surgery from the effects of psychological support. The authors also note that the original Dutch protocol was developed for a small, carefully screened group of early-onset, primarily natal-male patients. It has limited applicability to the current population of mostly adolescent-onset, predominantly natal-female patients who often present with significant psychiatric comorbidity and non-binary identities. Broader argument Subsequent research has not remedied these foundational weaknesses. Many later studies from gender clinics continue to exhibit “spin”—presenting weak or negative findings as positive and definitive. The paper contrasts the weak evidence base with the significant, known risks of medical transition (infertility, sexual dysfunction, lifelong medical dependence, and potential for regret) and notes that several European countries (Sweden, Finland, England) have already restricted these interventions for minors after conducting systematic reviews. Conclusion The authors call for gender medicine to acknowledge the serious limitations and uncertainties in the existing evidence, to stop treating the Dutch studies as reliable proof of benefit, and to prioritize high-quality research before further expanding medical and surgical interventions for gender-dysphoric youth. Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy (June 2025) : The Façade of Medical Consensus: How Medical Associations Prioritize Politics Over Science A Grok summary: Quote Title: The Façade of Medical Consensus: How Medical Associations Prioritize Politics Over Science Author: Chloe K. Jones Publication: Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy The article argues that major U.S. medical associations have presented a false appearance of scientific consensus on “gender-affirming care” for minors, and that this consensus is driven more by politics than by rigorous evidence. Main arguments Manufactured consensus Medical associations have repeatedly told courts that puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries for minors are “standard,” “evidence-based,” and supported by a broad medical consensus. District courts relied on these claims when enjoining state restrictions. The author contends this consensus was coordinated by activists to create a “united front” for litigation rather than emerging from strong evidence. Weak underlying evidence Independent systematic reviews (most notably the Cass Review in England, plus reviews in Sweden and Finland) have found the evidence base for these interventions to be remarkably weak. Several European countries have since sharply restricted the treatments. The article also notes instances in which negative research findings appear to have been delayed or suppressed. Political influence on standards of care Discovery in the Alabama litigation revealed that WPATH (whose standards many associations adopted) deliberately avoided conducting systematic reviews because the results would have been unfavorable for policy and lawsuits. Internal communications showed WPATH sought a “tool for our attorneys.” Political pressure from the Biden administration (via Admiral Rachel Levine) and the American Academy of Pediatrics led WPATH to remove minimum-age recommendations from its 2022 Standards of Care for political rather than scientific reasons. Inconsistent views of adolescent development The author highlights a striking inconsistency: the same medical associations that insist adolescents are mature and capable enough to consent to irreversible gender interventions have, in juvenile criminal cases (e.g., Miller v. Alabama), argued the opposite—that adolescents have incomplete identity formation, poor future orientation, impulsivity, and a heightened capacity for change, and therefore deserve reduced culpability. This selective characterization of adolescent psychology, the article suggests, indicates that scientific claims are being shaped to fit preferred policy outcomes. Conclusion Because major medical associations have subordinated scientific rigor to political advocacy on this issue, courts should give their amicus briefs and policy statements less weight. The apparent “medical consensus” is better understood as an advocacy position than as a neutral distillation of the evidence. Thanks, -Smac
Analytics Posted 13 hours ago Posted 13 hours ago 2 hours ago, smac97 said: What is it that you think is "really going on here"? I wrote a fairly long response to this, and it was somehow deleted by the editor when I tried to post it. Rather than trying to retype everything, I offer the following synthesis of all of these related issues. I worked hard to make an unbiased prompt that addresses the real issues, I think Claude's analysis is spot-on. I'll put the prompt in a quote box and Claude's response in the main body so that you can more easily respond to it if you wish. Quote Prompt: In the context of the recent Florida legal battles over drag performances, someone asked: “Can it be reasonable and appropriate for legislatures to take preemptive steps to prevent harm before that harm actually occurs?” The person making this argument is strongly religious and believes that children’s exposure to “sexualized behavior” at some queer cultural events is an important societal problem that may justify stronger laws and more aggressive enforcement. I am trying to put that claim into perspective. How serious and well-established is the potential harm from a minor being exposed to sexualized material at a live performance? How should the government’s interest in preventing possible harm to children be balanced against freedom of expression, parental autonomy, and the danger of vague or selectively enforced laws? I am particularly interested in the distinction between a legitimate child-protection law and a culture-war law that uses unusual or highly publicized incidents to justify broader state control. Critics of Ron DeSantis, for example, have argued that his conception of “parental rights” sometimes appears stronger when parents share the state’s preferred values and weaker when they do not. Assess that criticism fairly rather than simply accepting or rejecting it. More broadly, I want to test the principle consistently. An adolescent might encounter sexualized or provocative material at a drag performance, but adolescents can also be subjected to religious environments that emphasize sexual purity, shame, fear, obedience, or eternal consequences. Some people would argue that those environments can also cause psychological harm. If the state may override parental judgment in order to protect children from one category of potentially harmful ideas, experiences, or cultural influences, what principle prevents it from doing the same in the religious context? Please address the strongest arguments on both sides. In particular: What kinds of harm justify preventive legislation before actual injury can be demonstrated? How much evidence should be required before the state restricts constitutionally protected expression? When should parental autonomy yield to the state’s interest in child welfare? Does it matter whether the alleged harm comes from sexual content, religious teaching, political ideology, or some other source? What limiting principle prevents “protecting children” from becoming a general justification for government suppression of disfavored values? I am not asking whether drag performances or religious upbringing are morally equivalent. I am asking whether the legal and philosophical principle used to justify state intervention can be applied consistently. Please answer in no more than 800 words. Claude Fable 5 High This is one of the genuinely hard problems in liberal constitutionalism, and the honest answer is that the principle can be applied consistently — but rarely is, and the mechanisms courts use to manage it are imperfect compromises rather than clean solutions. The empirical baseline. The evidence that a minor suffers serious, lasting harm from a single or occasional exposure to sexualized content at a live performance is weak. The research literature on harm to children from sexual content concerns chronic exposure, exposure combined with abuse, or exposure to pornographic material — not brief encounters with adult-themed entertainment. Courts have noticed this. In HM Florida-ORL v. Griffin, the litigation over Florida's SB 1438, judges observed that Florida already had obscenity statutes covering material harmful to minors, and that the new law's vaguer standard ("lewd conduct" in "adult live performances") added little except uncertainty. That gap — between existing narrowly drawn law and new broadly drawn law — is itself evidence about legislative purpose. When a state passes a redundant statute with softer definitional edges, the plausible function is not closing a protection gap but chilling a disfavored expressive category. When is preemptive legislation legitimate? The defensible framework requires three things: harm that is serious, harm that is empirically probable rather than speculative, and means that are narrowly tailored. Obscenity-as-to-minors doctrine (Ginsberg v. New York) already satisfies this for genuinely explicit material. The strongest case for the Florida-style approach is that legislatures may act on reasonable predictive judgment without waiting for longitudinal studies, that community standards about what children should see are legitimately majoritarian within constitutional limits, and that parents who bring children to such events don't extinguish the state's independent interest in child welfare (we don't let parents take children to strip clubs). That argument deserves to be taken seriously; it is not mere pretext in every mouth that utters it. The counterargument: when the asserted harm is speculative and the restricted activity is expressive, the First Amendment deliberately raises the evidentiary bar — precisely because "protecting children" is history's most versatile justification for censorship (comic books, rock lyrics, video games, Brown v. Entertainment Merchants being the canonical rebuke). The parental-rights asymmetry. The criticism of DeSantis-era policy has real force and should be stated precisely: parental rights were invoked as near-absolute against school curricula, library books, and medical decisions the state disfavored, but were overridden when parents affirmatively chose to bring children to drag events or sought gender-related care. A consistent parental-rights theory cannot do both. The fair defense is that no one holds parental rights as absolute — everyone accepts a floor (abuse, neglect) — so the disagreement is really about where the floor sits, and Florida voters located sexualized performance below it. But that defense concedes the deeper point: "parental rights" was functioning as a rhetorical vehicle for substantive value preferences, not as a neutral procedural principle. That's a legitimate way to do democratic politics, but it should be named as such. The religion parallel. Your consistency test bites hard. There is a serious clinical literature on religious trauma — shame-based purity teaching, fear of damnation, high-control environments — arguably better developed than the literature on drag-show exposure. If the state may override parental judgment based on contested predictions of psychological harm from cultural content, nothing internal to that principle protects intensive religious formation. What actually protects it is doctrinal and political: Wisconsin v. Yoder and free-exercise jurisprudence give religious child-rearing heightened constitutional armor that secular expression lacks, and religious majorities hold political power that drag performers do not. That asymmetry is defensible only if one thinks religion is constitutionally special (the Founders did); it is not defensible as an application of a neutral harm principle. The limiting principle. The best available one is procedural rather than substantive: the state may act preemptively only where (1) the harm is concrete and supported by evidence meeting a burden proportional to the liberty restricted; (2) the statute is precise enough that enforcement discretion cannot track viewpoint; and (3) the law is content-neutral in application — meaning a legislature genuinely worried about sexualized content must regulate Hooters, beauty pageants, and cheerleading routines by the same standard it applies to drag. Selective application is the tell. A child-protection law survives the consistency test; a culture-war law fails it visibly. The uncomfortable residue: this framework would also constrain interventions progressives might favor against religious environments, and it permits some genuinely harmful things in both categories to continue. Liberal neutrality buys pluralism at the price of tolerating harms it cannot prove to a demanding standard. Those who find that price too high — on either side — are rejecting liberal constitutionalism itself, which is a coherent position, but one that should be defended openly rather than smuggled in under "protecting children."
smac97 Posted 12 hours ago Author Posted 12 hours ago 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: I wrote a fairly long response to this, and it was somehow deleted by the editor when I tried to post it. Rather than trying to retype everything, I offer the following synthesis of all of these related issues. I worked hard to make an unbiased prompt that addresses the real issues, I think Claude's analysis is spot-on. I'll put the prompt in a quote box and Claude's response in the main body so that you can more easily respond to it if you wish. Okay. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: Claude Fable 5 High This is one of the genuinely hard problems in liberal constitutionalism, and the honest answer is that the principle can be applied consistently — but rarely is, and the mechanisms courts use to manage it are imperfect compromises rather than clean solutions. The empirical baseline. The evidence that a minor suffers serious, lasting harm from a single or occasional exposure to sexualized content at a live performance is weak. "The evidence that a minor suffers serious, lasting harm from a single or occasional vodka tonic is weak." And yet we still have a categorical prohibition against minors imbibing. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The research literature on harm to children from sexual content concerns chronic exposure, exposure combined with abuse, or exposure to pornographic material — not brief encounters with adult-themed entertainment. Ah. How would this play out in the real world? Would you agree with the following statement? In the absence of legal constraints, children and/or their parents are at liberty to attend sexually explicit adult live performances, and so run the risk of "chronic exposure, exposure combined with abuse, or exposure to pornographic material." 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: Courts have noticed this. In HM Florida-ORL v. Griffin, the litigation over Florida's SB 1438, judges observed that Florida already had obscenity statutes covering material harmful to minors, and that the new law's vaguer standard ("lewd conduct" in "adult live performances") added little except uncertainty. Claude apparently did not tell you that the "judges" referenced here are those who dissented. The actual decision held: "The Supreme Court of Florida’s definition of 'lewd' eliminates any overbreadth, and the use of the phrase 'age of the child present' does not render the Act unconstitutionally vague." That's the bummer thing about AI. It's not ready for primetime when it comes to substantive legal analysis. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: That gap — between existing narrowly drawn law and new broadly drawn law — is itself evidence about legislative purpose. When a state passes a redundant statute with softer definitional edges, the plausible function is not closing a protection gap but chilling a disfavored expressive category. Two thoughts: First, the new statute seems to have harder definitional edges in many respects. Second, yes, the legislature can chill or prohibit a "disfavored expressive category" as long as it does so within the confines of the Constitution. And the 8th Circuit held that this is what Florida has done. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: When is preemptive legislation legitimate? I'm not persuaded that the statute was preemptive. I've previously provided ample citations to situations in which children have been exposed to explicitly sexual adult live performances. I'm reasonably confident there were instances of this in Florida. The statute, then, could be seen as remedial rather than preemptive. Either way, though, it is a legitimate legislative exercise. There is no principle of law that says that a legislature must sit on its hands and wait for a substantial number of harmful events to occur before it can take steps to mitigate or prohibit those events from happening. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The defensible framework requires three things: harm that is serious, harm that is empirically probable rather than speculative, and means that are narrowly tailored. Obscenity-as-to-minors doctrine (Ginsberg v. New York) already satisfies this for genuinely explicit material. The strongest case for the Florida-style approach is that legislatures may act on reasonable predictive judgment without waiting for longitudinal studies, that community standards about what children should see are legitimately majoritarian within constitutional limits, and that parents who bring children to such events don't extinguish the state's independent interest in child welfare (we don't let parents take children to strip clubs). That argument deserves to be taken seriously; it is not mere pretext in every mouth that utters it. I agree with this. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The counterargument: when the asserted harm is speculative and the restricted activity is expressive, the First Amendment deliberately raises the evidentiary bar — precisely because "protecting children" is history's most versatile justification for censorship (comic books, rock lyrics, video games, Brown v. Entertainment Merchants being the canonical rebuke). Sure. But the constitutional question was asked and answered by the 8th Circuit. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The parental-rights asymmetry. The criticism of DeSantis-era policy has real force and should be stated precisely: parental rights were invoked as near-absolute against school curricula, library books, and medical decisions the state disfavored, but were overridden when parents affirmatively chose to bring children to drag events or sought gender-related care. Yes, parental rights are not absolute. Florida, like every state, has long imposed significant limits on parental authority. A few ordinary examples: Parents cannot consent to their child having sex with an adult. Age-of-consent and child-sex-offense laws categorically disable both the minor’s agreement and any parental attempt to authorize it. Parents cannot authorize female genital mutilation or most non-therapeutic sterilizations of minors. Parents can lose custody or have their rights terminated for abuse, neglect, or abandonment under Chapter 39; the state may intervene even over parental objection when a child’s safety is at stake. Compulsory education laws and certain vaccination/school-entry requirements constrain parental choice. Child labor laws limit the hours and types of work parents may permit. Parents cannot refuse life-saving medical treatment in many circumstances without the state being able to intervene. The Florida Parents’ Bill of Rights itself (Chapter 1014) explicitly states that it does not authorize a parent to engage in unlawful conduct or to abuse or neglect a child, and it does not apply to parental decisions that would end life. In short, parental rights in Florida have never been "near-absolute." They are fundamental but bounded by the child’s welfare and by specific statutory prohibitions. Pointing to limits on taking children to sexually explicit adult performances, or to restrictions on certain medical pathways for minors, does not uniquely contradict a previously “near-absolute” regime—because no such regime existed. The real debate is which limits are justified and whether they are applied consistently, not whether the state suddenly invented constraints on parental authority. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: A consistent parental-rights theory cannot do both. The fair defense is that no one holds parental rights as absolute — everyone accepts a floor (abuse, neglect) — so the disagreement is really about where the floor sits, and Florida voters located sexualized performance below it. I agree with this. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: But that defense concedes the deeper point: "parental rights" was functioning as a rhetorical vehicle for substantive value preferences, not as a neutral procedural principle. That's a legitimate way to do democratic politics, but it should be named as such. I think it's a given. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The religion parallel. Your consistency test bites hard. There is a serious clinical literature on religious trauma — shame-based purity teaching, fear of damnation, high-control environments — arguably better developed than the literature on drag-show exposure. The "not as bad as" fallacy again. And I would like to see that literature. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: If the state may override parental judgment based on contested predictions of psychological harm from cultural content, nothing internal to that principle protects intensive religious formation. What actually protects it is doctrinal and political: Wisconsin v. Yoder and free-exercise jurisprudence give religious child-rearing heightened constitutional armor that secular expression lacks, and religious majorities hold political power that drag performers do not. That asymmetry is defensible only if one thinks religion is constitutionally special (the Founders did); it is not defensible as an application of a neutral harm principle. "That asymmetry is defensible only if one thinks religion is constitutionally special." Is there any question about religion being "constitutionally special"? Also, just because an action is taken under the rubric of "religion" does not protect it from state intervention. 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The limiting principle. The best available one is procedural rather than substantive: the state may act preemptively only where (1) the harm is concrete and supported by evidence meeting a burden proportional to the liberty restricted; (2) the statute is precise enough that enforcement discretion cannot track viewpoint; and (3) the law is content-neutral in application — meaning a legislature genuinely worried about sexualized content must regulate Hooters, beauty pageants, and cheerleading routines by the same standard it applies to drag. Selective application is the tell. A child-protection law survives the consistency test; a culture-war law fails it visibly. I am not aware that "Hooters, beauty pageants, and cheerleading routines" involve Nudity Sexual conduct Sexual excitement Specific sexual activities (as defined under Florida law) Lewd conduct Lewd exposure of prosthetic or imitation genitals or breasts 40 minutes ago, Analytics said: The uncomfortable residue: this framework would also constrain interventions progressives might favor against religious environments, and it permits some genuinely harmful things in both categories to continue. Liberal neutrality buys pluralism at the price of tolerating harms it cannot prove to a demanding standard. Those who find that price too high — on either side — are rejecting liberal constitutionalism itself, which is a coherent position, but one that should be defended openly rather than smuggled in under "protecting children." I think this presupposes, rather than demonstrates, ulterior motives. Thanks, -Smac
Calm Posted 12 hours ago Posted 12 hours ago 3 hours ago, smac97 said: Do you think the earlier statute was sufficient to cover drag shows? I don’t understand. Analytics’ example showed a drag show being investigated under the earlier statue, Why wouldn’t that demonstrate sufficiency in covering drag shows? 1
smac97 Posted 11 hours ago Author Posted 11 hours ago 19 minutes ago, Calm said: Quote Do you think the earlier statute was sufficient to cover drag shows? I don’t understand. Analytics’ example showed a drag show being investigated under the earlier statue, Yes. That other statute was a less-than-ideal fit, but it's what was on the books at the time. 19 minutes ago, Calm said: Why wouldn’t that demonstrate sufficiency in covering drag shows? Because an investigation is at the front end of a legal process, and may or may not culminate in a conviction, and I think the new statute was not in place at the time (I'm open to correction on that point). Thanks, -Smac
Analytics Posted 10 hours ago Posted 10 hours ago (edited) 1 hour ago, smac97 said: Yes. That other statute was a less-than-ideal fit, but it's what was on the books at the time. Because an investigation is at the front end of a legal process, and may or may not culminate in a conviction, and I think the new statute was not in place at the time (I'm open to correction on that point). The Plaza Live case is an ideal case study about whether the new law was necessary: The state's own investigators said the show was raunchy and suggestive, but that there was no genital exposure, no physical sexual interaction with audience members, and no lewd acts. In other words, this was a marginal case. It wasn't marketed as being family friendly, and only three minors were there. They successfully prosecuted this under the old laws--the venue had to pay a $5,000 administrative penalty, and promise that it would forbid people under the age of 18 from attending in the future, even with parental approval. You've successfully argued that in general, there are situations when new laws might be necessary, but you haven't explained why this law was necessary, and have ignored the fact that for these types of events, the old laws were working as intended. Edited 10 hours ago by Analytics 1
smac97 Posted 8 hours ago Author Posted 8 hours ago 1 hour ago, Analytics said: Quote Yes. That other statute was a less-than-ideal fit, but it's what was on the books at the time. Because an investigation is at the front end of a legal process, and may or may not culminate in a conviction, and I think the new statute was not in place at the time (I'm open to correction on that point). The Plaza Live case is an ideal case study about whether the new law was necessary: 1. The state's own investigators said the show was raunchy and suggestive, but that there was no genital exposure, no physical sexual interaction with audience members, and no lewd acts. In other words, this was a marginal case. 2. It wasn't marketed as being family friendly, and only three minors were there. 3. They successfully prosecuted this under the old laws--the venue had to pay a $5,000 administrative penalty, and promise that it would forbid people under the age of 18 from attending in the future, even with parental approval. From your source: "Although the complaint asserted that the Plaza Live broke decency laws, prosecutors have not filed criminal charges. The state is handling the case as a license-compliance matter." It appears that whether the charges in Plaza Live would have stood up in a criminal context (rather than an administrative one) was never determined. Would you agree with that? 1 hour ago, Analytics said: You've successfully argued that in general, there are situations when new laws might be necessary, but you haven't explained why this law was necessary, and have ignored the fact that for these types of events, the old laws were working as intended. I could not immediately find any published cases where the older statute - Fla. Stat. § 847.013 - was applied to adult live performances. I previously noted that there are some substantial differences between the two statutes. As for whether their overlap or non-overlap defines whether the new statute is "necessary," I think that's really hard to assess. Whether a statute that is more narrowly crafted towards adult live performances (and which has different parameters and applications) is "necessary" seems to have a good amount of "value judgment" aromas coming off it. In any event, both are misdemeanors. Thanks, -Smac
Calm Posted 8 hours ago Posted 8 hours ago 37 minutes ago, smac97 said: It appears that whether the charges in Plaza Live would have stood up in a criminal context (rather than an administrative one) was never determined. Would you agree with that? Given the apparent eagerness (based on investment) of the government to prosecute, seems like it’s a good assumption that the charges would not have stood up and that is why they weren’t filled.
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