Pakistani Immigrant Family Forced to Flee Washington to Avoid State 'Transitioning Their Autistic Son Into Their Daughter'

A Muslim Pakistani immigrant father who checked-in his 16-year-old autistic son to a Seattle hospital in a "terrible state of distress" was shocked to be told that his son was transgender and ended up hiring a lawyer who advised him to nod along with the state's assessment just to get his kid back so he and his family could flee the state.

From City Journal, "When the State Comes for Your Kids":

Ahmed is a Pakistani immigrant, a faithful Muslim, and until recently, a financial consultant to Seattle's high-tech sector. But when he reached me by phone in October 2020, he was just one more frightened father. Days earlier, he and his wife had checked their 16-year-old son into Seattle Children's Hospital for credible threats of suicide. Now, Ahmed was worried that the white coats who had gently admitted his son to their care would refuse to return him.

"They sent an email to us, you know, 'you should take your 'daughter' to the gender clinic,'" he told me.

At first, Ahmed (I have changed names in this essay to protect the identities of minor children) assumed there had been a mistake. He had dropped off a son, Syed, to the hospital, in a terrible state of distress. Now, the email he received from the mental health experts used a new name for that son and claimed he was Ahmed's daughter. "They were trying to create a customer for their gender clinic . . . and they seemed to absolutely want to push us in that direction," he said when I spoke to him again this May, recalling the horror of last October. "We had calls with counselors and therapists in the establishment, telling us how important it is for him to change his gender, because that's the only way he's going to be better out of this suicidal depressive state."

Syed had been a "straight-A student" and--according to his parents and the family's therapist--quite brilliant. He is also on the autism spectrum, a young man who neglects to make eye contact and must be given rules for how long to shake hands, shower, or brush his teeth. High school was a slog for him, as it often is for kids on the spectrum who find that the social demands of adolescence have risen beyond their capacity to meet them. "He tried to ask a few girls out. It didn't work out and he got frustrated and angry, and that kind of thing. And so, those girl-boy things get kind of tough for autistic kids, those developmental issues. And that's where puberty can be very, very hard with the hormones rushing and all this stuff."

When lockdowns hit, the boy who was already struggling socially and befuddled by questions neurotypical teens take for granted (How do I show a girl I like her? How do I make the other kids include me?) began to spend all day and night on the Internet. "He's an autistic kid, and so he kind of...

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