Every day, American parents face the challenges that come with a child telling them that he or she identifies as transgender. But how that challenge is handled varies wildly depending on where the parents live. In some states, schools socially transition children in secret or even take children from parents. In others, parental rights are respected. Two such stories show how big of a difference that can make.
The first story is playing out now in Massachusetts. In 2024, state authorities took Joseph and Arlene Kutzko’s then-15-year-old daughter from their home. The Kutzkos, devout Catholics, believe they were punished for refusing to affirm their daughter’s transgender identity, which was allegedly encouraged in secret by her school counselor. The state gained guardianship, but a court has granted a temporary injunction preventing the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families from administering testosterone to their daughter. Governor Maura Healey is defending the authorities—biological reality and parental rights be damned.
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The Kutzkos are going through hell. I know, because my family went through a similar hell six years ago.
In 2020, at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, my then-13-year-old daughter came home from school and told me she’d had a private meeting with school officials. They asked her which restroom she preferred and whether my husband and I supported her desire to be affirmed as transgender. We knew our daughter was questioning her sex, and we were trying to address the challenge at home. We were not invited to join that meeting.
In the weeks that followed, I discovered something more disturbing. In that same meeting, without our knowledge or consent, three school officials created a six-page social-transition plan with our daughter. The plan gave her the sole ability to make decisions about her name, pronouns, restrooms, locker rooms, and rooming with boys on overnight field trips.
Yet Florida authorities didn’t come for my daughter or go after my husband and myself. The state respected our freedom to help her understand her true identity. We told our daughter we loved her unconditionally. And we sought professional help.
For more than two years, we worked with a licensed counselor. We addressed our daughter’s anxiety, low self-esteem, discomfort with puberty, and other issues contributing to her distress. We gave her time to mature and room to express herself without dangerous and irreversible medical treatments. We also pulled her from public school, limited her internet use, and placed her in a private school where she could make new friends.
Eventually, her distress resolved. She is now comfortable in her female body. Compare that with what the Kutzkos believe is happening to them. They’ve spent the past two years separated from their daughter and are even barred from contacting her.
Massachusetts courts may yet intervene and restore custody to the Kutzkos while their daughter is still a minor. But the fact remains that they have been denied their right to parent and protect her. That right was never taken from my husband and myself. We believe that it saved our daughter’s life.
Since our experience, Florida has passed new laws to protect families from secretive school attempts to socially transition their children. The 2021 Parents’ Bill of Rights recognized parents’ fundamental rights concerning the upbringing, education, and care of their children. The 2022 Parental Rights in Education law strengthened parental involvement and restricted school practices that conceal certain information from parents. Then, in 2023, Florida enacted restrictions on sex-rejecting medical treatments being administered to children. (This measure helps ensure that parents don’t abuse their rights by supporting their son or daughter’s attempted transition.)
Massachusetts has no such protections for families. Nor do other blue states like New York and Illinois. Families in those states are at risk of enduring what the Kutzkos are reportedly going through. Many families already have. You just haven’t heard of them, in no small part because parents are often put under gag orders.
To its credit, the Trump administration has notified states that religious belief does not constitute child abuse or neglect. The administration should enforce this policy and hold states like Massachusetts accountable for what’s reportedly been done to the Kutzkos.
It would also be helpful if the Supreme Court took up a case to ensure parental rights in instances like this. And Congress should pass a law that protects all parents from being punished for protecting their kids from radical gender ideology. There’s hope on that front: Senator Eric Schmitt recently introduced the Yaeli Martinez Child Protection Act, which clarifies that defending your child’s biological sex isn’t abuse.
In the meantime, I have some blunt advice for parents: if your state doesn’t respect parental rights, get out—now. Move wherever you’ll be free to parent and protect your daughters and sons.
My daughter needed her mother and father. She needed professional help. She needed time. And she got what she needed because our state respects parents’ basic rights. The Kutzkos’ daughter needs the same things, but Massachusetts has stopped her from getting them. Two years later, her parents are still fighting for their rights, and there’s no guarantee they’ll prevail.
I hope they do. I hope their daughter gets the love and help she needs before it’s too late. And I hope that our leaders do whatever it takes to save our children.