And besides, the doctor added — in specific reference to breast reduction surgery — it can always be reversed later in life.
"Actually, people make life altering decisions in adolescence all the time, and honestly most of them are good, it's just the bad ones that we talk about," said Dr. Johanna Olson-Kennedy, who serves as the medical director for the Center for Transyouth Health and Development at the Children's Hospital Los Angeles.
As proof of her claim, Olson-Kennedy noted that not all children take part in dangerous and foolhardy social media challenges; some of them take the SATs.
"So what we do know is that adolescents actually have the capacity to make a reasonable, logical decision. And here's the thing about chest surgery. If you want breasts at a later point in your life, you can go and get them," the doctor continued.
The clip started gaining steam on social media after being posted to Twitter by Daily Wire columnist Matt Walsh, who called Olson-Kennedy's comments "pure evil."
Watch this. A prominent “trans-affirming” doctor says it’s okay to chop the breasts off of a teen girl because kids “most of the time make good decisions” and a girl can always get new breasts later if she wants. These quacks are destroying our children. This is pure evil. pic.twitter.com/2sF7YPa5b5
— Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) May 24, 2021
Olson-Kennedy, who is also an associate professor at the University of Southern California, appears to have delivered the remarks during a July 2018 "Gender Spectrum Professional Symposium," according to reports.
The Daily Caller reported that the video was also mentioned in a popular book written by Wall Street Journal columnist Abigail Shrier, titled, "Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters."
In her book, Shrier examined the medical and psychological injury being caused to teenage girls — many of whom never considered undergoing a gender transition until it was pushed on them by adult counselors and social media influencers — who adopt a transgender lifestyle and undergo a sex change.
The book's blurb on Amazon relays that Shrier "has dug deep into the trans epidemic, talking to the girls, their agonized parents, and the counselors and doctors who enable gender transitions, as well as to 'detransitioners' — young women who bitterly regret what they have done to themselves."
According to Olson-Kennedy's bio page on CHLA's website, she is a highly decorated medical professional who "has been providing medical intervention for transgender youth and young adults including puberty suppression and cross sex hormones for the past six years, and is considered a national expert in this area."
