Informed Dissent

Informed Dissent — Week of Nov 22, 2025 News of the Week: Passport Ruling We walk through the recent U.S. Supreme Court order that allows the Trump administration to enforce a passport policy requiring sex markers to match sex as recorded at birth — eliminating the option of an “X” marker and ending self-identification on new passports, renewals, and corrections. We cover: * What the Orr v. Trump...

🎙️ Informed Dissent — Nov 15, 2025 This week, Jamie Reed and Cori Cohn hold down the fort while Lauren Leggieri recovers from being sick — we miss her and hope she’s back next week. Jamie and Cori are joined by Vincent Deboni for a wide-ranging discussion about how powerful ideologies tend to follow the same playbooks across countries and institutions. Together they tackle one of the biggest quest...

Week of November 8, 2025 Hosts: Jamie Reed, Lauren Leggieri, and Cori Cohn Sponsored by the LGB Courage Coalition ■ Lauren’s Headlines Key stories of the week in gender policy, medicine, and media. ■ Deep Dive Topic: “Who My Child Was and Would Be” — by James Marcus, The New Yorker Discussion: Jamie, Lauren, and Cori unpack the essay’s portrayal of parental loss, identity, and ideology — and how e...

Jamie Reed, Lauren Leggieri, and Cori Cohn break down the U.K.’s big news: the National Health Service launching a dedicated detransitioner service. What does this mean for accountability—and how does an institution open a clinic to address harm while continuing to cause it? Then, attorney Glenna Goldis joins to discuss the Texas doctor who fled to Oregon and the Kansas lawsuit challenging gender...

In this episode, we speak with Joe Figliolia , author of the Manhattan Institute’s new report on institutional capture inside the Texas Medical Association, and Dr. Lisa Ehrlich , who has seen that reality up close. We revisit the AAP’s 2018 Rafferty policy , walk through Texas SB 14 , and note the latest news of a Texas doctor losing her license under the new law. From Ignaz Semmelweis to the mec...

In this week’s Informed Dissent —our first real fall episode—Jamie Reed, Lauren Leggieri, and Cori Cohn take a darker turn, exploring how speech—whether protected, restricted, or weaponized—shapes the moral landscape of medicine, therapy, and the digital world. Our two deep dives reveal that speech isn’t an abstract legal theory—it can be tied to real harm. First, we examine the Chiles v. Salazar...

What should count as a mental disorder—and who gets to decide? In this week’s deep dive, Jamie Reed, Lauren Leggieri, and Cori Cohn examine how the DSM ( Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ) became one of the most politicized documents in modern medicine. From the pathologizing of homosexuality to today’s debates over “gender dysphoria,” the hosts explore how psychiatric labels...

Relaunch: Introducing Lauren Leggieri Welcome to the relaunch of Informed Dissent ! Each week, your hosts — Jamie Reed, Lauren Leggieri, and Cori Cohn — cut through the noise of the gender culture wars, tackling the stories behind lawsuits, medical controversies, school policies, and the very meaning of “gender.” In this episode, Jamie introduces new co-host Lauren Leggieri . Lauren reflects on th...

In this episode, Cori and Ben take the mic without their cohosts to reflect on two pressing stories shaping the gender debate. We begin with former Mermaids CEO Susie Green’s latest effort to advance the cause of medical transition for children. From there, we turn to the recent tragedy in Minneapolis, examining how quickly it has become a political football for competing ideological tribes. What...

In this episode, we discuss the activist-led campaign to discredit systematic reviews conducted by researchers at McMaster University because they were funded by SEGM (the Society for Evidence-Based Gender Medicine). We examine the researchers’ response, whether the campaign gained traction, and what it reveals about the politicization of evidence. From there, we step back to look at the broader l...

Today, Corinna and Ben speak with the psychiatrist Dr. Lauren Schwartz. Dr. Schwartz is a senior fellow with Do No Harm, the lead author of a 2025 paper on the health risks of estrogen use in males, and the coauthor of a chapter in Lawrence Krauss’s new anthology, The War on Science (“Gender-Affirming Care: The Abandonment of Medical and Academic Standards”). * Arkansas ban stands * Air Force rene...

Today we talk about the latest gender clinic closures and “pauses” on pediatric transition services and speculate about what the future holds for the young people who’ve been harmed by these practices. Who’s going to help them? How will they help them? Will anyone be held accountable for harming them? We discuss the case of Avery Jackson, the trans-identified boy who at age nine appeared on the co...

Today the gang discusses the Trump Administration’s severing of its partnership with the Trevor Project, as well as California Governor Gavin Newsom’s recent appearance on the Shawn Ryan Show. Plus news headlines, announcements, and more! * Trump defunds the Trevor Project * TP’s 2023 fiscal report * Trump Admin cutting off federal funding to hospitals providing GAC for minors * Newsom on the Shaw...

Cori, Jamie, and Sarah catch up on their gender-related travels, which took Jamie to Washington DC for the Federal Trade Commission workshop on consumer fraud in gender medicine and Cori and Sarah to France for the European Society for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry conference. We also discuss new research on sexual satisfaction and whether or not it's possible to improve on the French man-on-the...

Alex Byrne is the Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor of Philosophy at MIT and the author of the book Trouble with Gender: Sex Facts, Gender Fictions . Last week, Alex revealed in a Washington Post op-ed that he was one of the nine co-authors of the anonymous HHS report on pediatric gender medicine. He is married to the evolutionary biologist Carole Hooven . CORRECTIONS: UPenn is restoring titles an...

Maud Maron is running to be Manhattan’s next District Attorney “to restore safety and sanity to our streets and subways.” She’s also a mom of four children who are all NYC public school graduates or students. Maud worked as a public defender for over two decades at the Legal Aid Society in the Manhattan and the Bronx criminal courts. She taught criminal law at Cardozo Law School and has a long tra...

Today we’re joined by very good friend of the pod, Leor Sapir! Leor Sapir is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute. He holds a Ph. D. in Political Science from Boston College and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the Program on Constitutional Government at Harvard University. Since joining MI, Sapir has become a widely recognized thought leader on topics related to pediatric gender medicine, ed...

We’ve decided to open up our polycule to guests! Today it’s Dr. Anna Hutchinson, the London-based clinical psychologist specializing in adolescent mental and physical health. From 2013 to 2017, Dr. Hutchinson worked at the Tavistock Clinic’s Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS), where she observed first hand the significant shifts in patient demographics and referral rates. She raised concer...

On this special episode, we discuss part four of the New York Times’s six-part series about the history of pediatric gender medicine. Episode 4, “The Whistleblower,” is about Jamie Reed, who blew the whistle on the pediatric gender clinic at Washington University in St. Louis in 2023. Jamie tells us what the Times got right, what they left out, plus a whole lot more. * “The Whistleblower” * Jamie’...

On Thursday evening, The New York Times released “The Protocol,” its highly anticipated podcast on the history of pediatric gender medicine. We do a deep-dive into the first two episodes of the six-part series: “The Beginning” and “The Gender Kids.” * Olson-Kennedy study * Olympus spa ruling * CA trans athlete wins * Loudon County update * The Protocol * Dept Q * The Golden Notebook * A Mother’s R...

Today we answer some listeners’ questions and then discuss Jonathan Cowan’s op-ed for Politico. And Eliza comes out! * CMS investigates GAC hospitals * breast cancer study * Kansas lawsuit * CA sports rules changes * Democratic Arizona senator’s comments about sports * Politico op-ed * Leor Sapir’s thread about the op-ed * goblincore * cottagecore * Furry event at UC Irvine * The View from Somewhe...

Today we discuss: * The 2016 CMS Report on Gender Dysphoria and Gender Reassignment Surgery . * NBC's reporting on the new bill prohibiting Medicaid from covering sex-trait modification procedures. * Jamie getting thrown out of the APA meeting , from which one gender session was leaked . * The FTC’s plan to investigate fraud in the gender-affirming care industry. * The MIT "Born in the Right Body"...

Cori, Eliza, and Jamie revisit the HHS report , “Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria: Review of Evidence and Best Practices.” They talk about the libertarian case for age limits on hormonal and surgical interventions and the homophobia underlying the entire enterprise of transition. Health and Human Services Report Sunday event in Cambridge: Born in the Right Body. Montana judge finds trans c...

This week we discuss the MAGA look, the low-down dirty tactics of Maine legislators, the sophistry of psychotic professors, and the moral dilemma of patronizing businesses that use WPATH’s standards of care to inform their medical benefits policies . * MAGA aesthetics * The Psychology of Totalitarianism * An Abundance of Caution * Maine LD380 * All of Us Strangers * Histories of the Transgender Ch...

Today we discuss the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ evidence review, “Treatment for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria Review of Evidence and Best Practices.” What did the review say? Is it unbiased and dispassionate? Was it a good idea for the HHS to withhold the authors’ names? Will it convince anyone on the other side of this debate? How have news outlets been reporting on it? All that a...