Private messages reveal that leaders of a major transgender health organization have been discussing ways to get female prison inmates to accept having biological men housed with them. The organization, called WPATH, is one of the most influential medical groups working on transgender issues in the world. Its official medical guidelines influence how hospitals operate, what insurance companies cover, and what government agencies decide — including prison policies across America.
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WPATH’s credibility has taken some serious hits recently. Experts have criticized the organization’s medical guidelines as being based on weak science and politics rather than solid evidence. Things got even worse in June when the Federal Trade Commission filed a lawsuit against WPATH, claiming the organization has misled people about how safe and effective transgender medical treatments actually are, especially for children.
Now The Daily Wire has obtained nearly 250 pages of private messages from WPATH’s internal online forum from mid-2024. These messages show how WPATH members really talk behind closed doors — and it’s quite different from what they say in public. This is the third part of an investigation into these private conversations.
One key figure in these messages is Michelle Webb, who runs a transgender health program for Washington State’s prison system. According to the messages, Webb suggested that female inmates should be brought in for serious conversations with trained staff members. The goal would be to help these women understand why biological men want to live in the women’s prison facilities.
From the Daily Wire:
“The cis female population should have open and frank discussions with trained staff, with community experts, to understand why the [transgender and gender diverse] females want to be in an affirmative environment,” wrote Webb in the online forum. “They [are] not trying to take resources; they are not getting ‘more than’ cis females, they are just looking to live their authentic lives and have equity.”
Webb explained many men had a difficult time integrating into women’s prison and were “not accepted by the cis females.”
“[Transgender and gender diverse] females living in the cis female facilities have all mentioned something they call the ‘mask’ meaning the mask they wore in the male facilities, the mask that kept them safe, it allowed them to blend in and not draw attention to themselves,” wrote Webb. “When individuals were moved to the female facilities, they found it difficult to drop the mask and this made their integration into the female facilities extremely difficult, they were often not accepted by the cis females and on occasion were ostracized.”
Webb was responding to a psychologist from Colorado’s prison system who asked what skills biological men identifying as transgender would need to learn in order to fit in at women’s prisons. That psychologist was designing a special program to help with this integration in Colorado. The psychologist noted that even with staff training, the broader culture and social attitudes in the prison would still work against these men, since that’s how both guards and other inmates form their opinions.
But many people argue this approach has the whole thing backwards. They say female inmates’ concerns shouldn’t be treated as a problem that needs fixing. Instead, these advocates point out that female prisoners are already extremely vulnerable, and their safety should come first. Some have noted that in the rush to accommodate transgender inmates, the needs of regular female prisoners have become even more invisible than they were before. Women in prison already struggle to get attention for their own problems and safety concerns.
The danger here is real and serious. Washington State, where these messages came from, has some of the most pro-transgender prison policies in the country. Now the federal government is investigating whether putting biological men in women’s prisons violates women’s basic right to be safe while locked up. In fact, a lawsuit filed in April claims that two women in a Washington State women’s prison were attacked by a large biological male inmate with a history of violence toward women. That inmate was placed in the women’s facility simply because he says he is a woman.
Legal experts working on these cases have raised serious concerns about what these private messages reveal. They point out that when prison officials spend time figuring out how to make male inmates feel more comfortable, they’re not focusing on protecting the female inmates who are actually in danger. These legal experts say that prisons have a basic legal responsibility and a moral duty to keep the women in their care safe from harm — not to put comfort ahead of safety.
The Washington State Department of Corrections did not respond when asked to comment on these revelations.
The Bible teaches us that God made men and women as distinct creations, and it emphasizes the importance of protecting people who cannot protect themselves. Genesis 1:27 tells us God “created mankind in his own image… male and female he created them.” When we ignore these basic differences just to follow an ideology, we’re not only going against what Scripture teaches — we’re putting real women in real danger. Asking women to ignore their safety instincts just to accommodate someone else’s feelings isn’t compassion. It’s a failure to do the most basic job of keeping vulnerable people safe.
What do you think about male inmates being housed in women’s prisons? Share your scriptures and prayers in the comments below.
(Excerpt from the Daily Wire. Photo Credit: welcomia via Canva Teams)
