Hoo boy! The future of our health in this country just keeps getting brighter and brighter, doesn't it? Republicans are repealing Obamacare, because apparently they think people like me shouldn't be allowed to have affordable insurance, defunding Planned Parenthood because godforbid people like me have a place to go to get health care once we lose our insurance, and it just keeps getting better.

On Thursday, Donald Trump's transition team announced a new addition to his policy team, Katy Talento! Talento, an an infectious disease epidemiologist, will be joining Trump’s Domestic Policy Council, focusing on health care policy. She has, according to the announcement provided, "nearly 20 years of experience in public health and health policy, as well as government oversight and investigations and program evaluation.”

That seems promising! She is literally the first person we've heard of in the new administration who has ANY experience in the relevant field!

She also has no idea how birth control works, and thinks that transgender people are just crazy!

In an article for The Federalist, Talento wrote about the "risks" of chemical birth control. Now, of course -- there are risks with birth control, as there are with any medication one takes. If you are a smoker over the age of 35, there are some birth control methods you shouldn't take, because they could cause blood clots or a stroke. However! The main gist of her article is that birth control causes abortions and miscarriages... AND COULD BREAK YOUR UTERUS FOREVER!

"Ladies," she writes in the intro, "it’s time you knew what your doctor isn’t telling you. Chemical birth control causes abortions and often has terrible side effects, including deliberate miscarriage."

Oddly, ladies, she doesn't actually explain anywhere in the article how birth control causes "abortions." This is just something we are supposed to assume is true. She does, however, explain why she thinks it causes a "miscarriage."

Preventing a fertilized egg (i.e. after conception) from hunkering down in the wall of the uterus, where it can grow normally. Progestin in birth control thins the endometrial lining (uterine wall), but a fertilized egg needs a thick, fluffy, blood-rich uterine wall to attach to and begin growth. Without it, the embryo can’t survive, and a miscarriage occurs. Remember, the lower the dose you’re taking (and doctors naturally prefer to put a woman on the lowest dose that still achieves the desired effect), the more this third “back-up plan” is engaged.

That, ladies, is not an abortion or a miscarriage, that is bullshit. First of all -- you are not pregnant when an egg is fertilized, you are pregnant when that egg is implanted. That is the medical and legal definition of being pregnant. Second, even if you subscribe to the scientifically incorrect view that fertilized egg = pregnancy, according to the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, there is no scientific evidence suggesting that birth control does anything to prevent implantation.

Oh! But what about this?

Maybe you’re okay with risking a miscarriage of an already-conceived embryo. What about breaking your uterus for good?

A broken uterus? That sounds scary! Don't want one of those! Talento warns that if you take birth control, and then get off of it, it may still break your uterus forever, making it harder for you to have a baby due to your too-thin uterine lining! Oh no! Why do our doctors hate us so?

Ladies, did your doctor tell you all the facts before writing that prescription? Did she tell you that the “safer,” lower-dose products could potentially lead to miscarriages of already-conceived embryos? Did she tell you that the longer you stay on the Pill, the more likely you are to ruin your uterus for baby-hosting altogether? Is this the freedom and peace of mind you were seeking when you popped that first Pill? Just asking.

Since you are just asking, that is also bullshit, according to The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

In another article about birth control for The Federalist, titled "Ladies: Is Birth Control The Mother Of All Medical Malpractice?" Talento also explained how birth control can ruin your whole life even if you do not take it, because men who feel entitled to "consequence-free" orgasms will run out on you and your unborn child.

Our reproductive health isn’t the only thing broken by the Pill and other vehicles delivering hormonal contraception. There’s also economic and relational devastation that has left women and children abandoned by men who now feel entitled to consequence-free orgasms. As a result, fewer and fewer women, men and especially children enjoy the stability, prosperity, and human flourishing that marriage between biological parents provides. After all, she could have been using birth control, so it’s not on you—right, bro?

Yes, ladies, there is probably nothing so emotionally satisfying as a man marrying you entirely out of obligation! #ROMANCE!

Of course, Talento is not only gross on the subject of abortion! She also has some opinions on trans people, and they are just as stupid.

In an article written for LifeSite News titled "Transgenderism: A Thought Experiment," Talento tries to make an argument that trans people exist because contraception exists, and this is just part and parcel of a war against our own bodies. Swear to god.

The ease with which societal elites in academia, medicine, and Hollywood sanction a child's war against his own body and call it healthy, normal, or something to celebrate has its foundation in the contraceptive revolution of our culture. Women were told that the very thing that most marks them as a woman, their wondrous reproductive systems, their fertility, is their enemy. If only they can break free from the tyranny of their own bodies, they will be free.

How truly awful do you have to be to suggest that people who are systemically discriminated against and oppressed, who are frequent victims of hate crimes and violence, and those who think that's pretty shitty, are "societal elites." Like they are going around keeping you down, by simply asking to not be oppressed. I can't even wrap my head around it.

Talento then goes on a whole "thought experiment" thing about how WHAT IF a white guy identified with black people and then decided they were a black person, Rachel Dolezal-style, and then sued all the black people for not accepting him as one of them.

What do we think about this man? Do we think that the problem is ours - our own intolerance? Are we the ones that need to change, and to resist the information being conveyed about this man by the biological facts of his skin color, ethnic history, and associated genes? Or do we reach out to him in compassion and love and try to address his deep psychological distress without affirming his self-rejection?

Just asking.

Yes, except the thing is that gender identity is very different from racial or ethnic identity. Trans people are not simply boys who arbitrarily "decided" they wanted to be girls, or girls who arbitrarily "decided" they wanted to be men. That is not a thing. If my tits randomly fell off and I suddenly grew a penis I would not suddenly be like "Oh, cool, I'm a man now, guess I'll go be a man! I feel just like one!" -- because I'm a woman, and I know I'm a woman the same way a trans woman knows she's a woman. I would still feel like a woman. If the same thing happened to Katy Talento, I am sure she would feel the same way. Because your secondary-sex characteristics do not define your gender. Duh.

Katy Talento is a person who is going to be in charge of health-related policies of the Trump administration. God help us all.

[Talking Points Memo | ReWire]