TVC Asks IRS to Reverse Tax Deduction for Sex-change Operation
Traditional Values Coalition is concerned that IRS’s recent decision to grant a medical tax deduction for a man’s “sex change” operation will help what it calls the “homo-trans” effort to undermine the biological realities of
Traditional Values Coalition is concerned that IRS’s recent decision to grant a medical tax deduction for a man’s “sex change” operation will help what it calls the “homo-trans” effort to undermine the biological realities of male and female.
The Internal Revenue Service granted Rhiannon O’Donnabhain, who was diagnosed with gender dysphoria, a tax deduction for his sex-reassignment surgery in 2001 after Massachusetts-based Gay & Lesbian Advocates & Defenders (GLAD) appealed to the IRS, contending the operation was a medical expense. The IRS had initially denied O’Donnabhain’s request for a tax deduction, classifying his operation was cosmetic.
GLAD attorney Karen Loewy, who represented O’Donnabhain in his appeal said in a press release that the IRS’s “decision recognizes that sex reassignment can be as medically necessary for some people as an appendectomy or heart bypass surgery.”
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“Any notion that medical treatment for a transgender person is purely cosmetic is based on misunderstanding and prejudice, not medical science,” she said.
But Traditional Values Coalition Chairman Rev. Louis P. Sheldon wants the decision reversed, saying it sent the wrong message to those who suffer from a Gender Identity Disorder that a sex-reassignment surgery can cure their mental condition.
“On behalf of the 43,000 churches that are associated with the Traditional Values Coalition, I am urging Mr. Everson to reverse this decision,” said Sheldon on Tuesday.
He also said the IRS should not allow itself to become a pawn in the hands of the homosexual/transgender movement.
In a letter of concern sent to IRS Commissioner Mark Everson, Sheldon wrote, “[B]y giving this tax deduction, your agency will be encouraging other mentally disturbed individuals to consider such surgery as an unneeded surgical procedure for what is a troubled mind—not a troubled body.”
“The homo/trans movement is currently guided by a belief that concepts such as male and female are simply cultural inventions that can be altered at will by the individual,” continued Sheldon.
He added that the “Interrnational Gender Bill of Rights,” issued by a transgender legal group in 1993 and allows individuals to define their own sex or gender identity “is a sure recipe for sexual confusion and life-long despair.”
One such example, pointed Sheldon in an editorial, can be found in the case of a boy named David Reimer who underwent one of the first sex reassignment surgeries under the leadership of John Hopkins University’s Dr. John Money.
According to As Nature Made Him: The Boy Who Was Raised As A Girl, by John Colapinto, Reimer was one of two male twins who genitals were mutilated during a botched circumcision. Dr. Money convinced Reimer’s parents to surgically alter his sex and raise him as a girl. But when Reimer grew older, he learned of the truth of his gender and rejected being a girl. He later committed suicide in spring of 2004.
Dr. Paul McHugh, the University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University, wrote his essay, “Surgical Sex” for FIRST THINGS (November 2004), about the negative effects the surgery had on Reimer, which Money did not document in his reports.
“The psychologist in charge hid, by actually misreporting, the news that the boy, despite the efforts of his parents to treat him and raise him as a girl, had constantly challenged their treatment of him, ultimately found out about the deception, and restored himself as a male. Sadly, he carried an additional diagnosis of major depression and ultimately committed suicide,” wrote McHugh.
“The simple fact is that no one can change sexes,” said Sheldon in his letter to the IRS. “A male who has his sex organs removed and takes hormones for breast enhancement is still genetically a male—not a woman. This is an unchangeable reality. A man can no more become a woman than he can become a Dodge Minivan. A person who thinks otherwise is delusional—and needs professional care.”
Traditional Values Coalition has also published a special report, “A Gender Identity Disorder Goes Mainstream,” on what it believes is the radical sexual confusion agenda being pushed by homo-trans groups.
