LAWSUITS

Fenway Health, a federally funded clinic, knowingly and willfully removed safety procedures, known as “gate-keeping”, from its transgender healthcare practice. This decision was not supported by any scientific evidence, to the contrary, Fenway was pursuing its goal of acquiring more transgender patients by responding to the demands of activists who felt that the safety protocols were “needless gate-keeping.” The lawsuit asserts that based on this new policy, Shape Shifter was rapidly medicalized, and his sexual orientation and symptoms of internalized homophobia were treated with deliberate indifference. Under the “gate-keeping” model of care internalized homophobia is a counter-indicator to transition, because studies had identified it as the leading cause of transition regret. The lawsuit alleges that under Fenway’s undifferentiated care and undue influence Shape Shifter underwent a number of surgical procedures and fully transitioned. Shape Shifter should have been treated for internalized homophobia, but instead he was converted to transgender. The lawsuit alleges that Fenway’s apathetic attitude toward Shape Shifter’s sexual orientation and its associated distress violated his civil rights, and caused him irreversible, irreparable physical and mental injury. As a result of transitioning, Shape Shifter cannot express himself as a gay man, and must live with dissonance between who he is and how he appears.