A New York jury awarded Fox Varian $2 million dollars in a malpractice lawsuit against medical professionals who attempted to socially and surgically “transition” her to look like the opposite sex.

This is the first time a “detransitioner” has won a medical malpractice suit against those who caused irreversible psychological and physical damage to a person struggling with sexual identity confusion.

Varian underwent a double mastectomy in 2019 when she was only 16 years old, hardly competent to consent to an operation that left her with scarring, ongoing pain, and the inability to ever nurse a child.

Four years after her surgery, she filed a lawsuit against her psychologist, Kenneth Einhorn, who had written a referral letter to Dr. Simon Chin, the surgeon who performed the double mastectomy on the teenager.

Writing at The Free Press, Benjamin Ryan explained that the jury decision hinged on “whether the care providers failed to observe standard safeguards and whether any deviations from those standards injured the patient.”

Ryan reported that Varian was 15 when “she began questioning her gender during sessions with her psychologist.” Born Isabella, she first changed her name to Gabriel, identifying as androgynous.

It’s not too often that you see former first lady, Senator and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Christian podcaster Allie Beth Stuckey in the same story — but that’s exactly what happened last week.

Writing in The Atlantic, Mrs. Clinton called out Mrs. Stuckey for her use of the term “toxic empathy” — which is also the name of the social conservative’s bestselling book. In the context of the magazine article, though, the former Secretary of State was incredulous that a Christian could string those two words together.

“Toxic empathy!” Clinton wrote. “What an oxymoron. I don’t know if the phrase reflects moral blindness or moral bankruptcy, but either way it’s appalling.”

Mrs. Clinton’s comments certainly reflect her worldview.

Allie Beth Stuckey is neither morally blind nor bankrupt. In fact, she is one of the leading Christian lights of the social conservative movement — willing to wade into controversial topics and unafraid to say what so many others seem reluctant to declare.

According to Allie Beth, “Empathy becomes toxic when it encourages you to affirm sin, validate lies or support destructive policies.”

In her Atlantic piece, Mrs. Clinton suggested “that Christians like me — and people of faith more generally — have a responsibility to stand up to the extremists who use religion to divide our society and undermine our democracy.”

Kathryn Burgum, the White House’s new Senior Advisor for Addiction Recovery, credits God for her sobriety.

“If not for the grace of God, I would not be alive today, over 23 years in recovery [from alcohol addiction],” Burgum, the wife of Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, shared at President Trump’s press conference announcing the Great American Recovery Initiative.

“My message is simple: Never give up hope for recovery.”

The president established the Great American Recovery Initiative with an executive order on January 29. The interdisciplinary group of officials will ensure federal efforts to combat drug and alcohol addiction effectively serve three goals:

• Preventing addiction
• Prioritizing treatment
• Celebrating recovery

The Trump administration tapped Burgum to lead the initiative alongside Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is also in long-term recovery from substance addiction.

In her Oval Office address, Burgum emphasized the importance of honesty, vulnerability and empathy in encouraging others to seek treatment for addiction. But human intervention alone did not change her life.

Humans are social creatures. Our success as adult citizens rests largely in the vibrancy and size of our social networks. After all, the unapologetically Christian poet, John Donne properly noted, “No man is an island, Entire of itself.”

A new study published in JAMA Pediatrics documents how important close family relationships in adolescence are in helping our children develop robust and meaningful social connections throughout adulthood.

The four Columbia University researchers who conducted this study explain, “Higher family connection in adolescence was significantly associated with a greater prevalence of high social connection in adulthood.”

As well, they state, “These findings suggest that safe, stable, and nurturing family relationships during adolescence may contribute to greater relational well-being in adulthood, potentially reducing social disconnection.”

Specifically, this research team reported that high levels of meaningful social connection were “more than twice as common” for adults who had “high” levels of family connectedness as adolescents compared to peers who grew up with the lowest levels of family connectedness.

Closer connections in one’s family of origin contributed not only to more social relationships, but also higher quality community friendships compared with those who grew up without close family ties.