Skrmetti vs US update - Giving the book to Jordan Peterson

Do you remember the United States v. Skrmetti (Docket No. 23-477)? This is a pending U.S. Supreme Court case examining whether Tennessee’s Senate Bill 1 (SB1), which bans gender-affirming medical and surgical care for transgender minors, violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case centers on whether the law’s prohibition of treatments like surgery, puberty blockers, and hormone therapy for transgender youth under 18 constitutes unconstitutional sex-based discrimination. I’ve written several articles about this case. I also wrote a portion of the Amicus Brief and attended the supreme court oral arguments. It was surreal hearing my piece that I wrote recited to Supreme Court justice Alito (see below).

We are waiting for the US Supreme Court to reach a decision, which is supposed to come out in May 2025. Recently, I had the privilege of attending Jordan Peterson’s “We Who Wrestle with God” tour in Miami, Florida along with lawyer Diana Lutfi, the author of the Amicus Brief for Skrmetti v. US Supreme court oral arguments challenging transgender surgical and medical treatments for minors. The anticipation was palpable, but my excitement was not solely for his lecture. The main objective was for myself and Diana to meet Dr. Peterson and present him with a document we all signed, a moment I knew would be significant.

The document is the Amicus Brief for the Supreme Court for the oral arguments in the Skrmetti vs. the U.S. case.

The goal for the night was to meet Dr. Peterson and present him with the book from the Supreme Court, signed by himself, me, and Diana.

As usual, Dr. Peterson’s lecture was great, though he tends to go off on interesting tangents before returning to the point he is trying to convey. Some are fine with this style of communication, while leaving others frustrated.

It’s important to highlight where all this started. Back in September, I attended the Rescue the Republic event in Washington, DC. But some time ago, I wrote about my experience at Rescue the Republic hosted by Dr. Brett Weinstein and his wife, Dr. Heather Heying, in Washington, D.C., last September, where I saw several individuals, including:

• Robert F Kennedy, Jr. (HHS director / lawyer)

• Diana Lutfi (Lawyer)

• Walter Kirn (Novelist)

• Pierre Korey (Medical doctor)

• Tony Lyons (Publisher)

• Russel Brandt (Comedian)

• Jordan Peterson (Psychologist / Speaker)

• and many others.

I remember seeing Peterson speak at the Rescue the Republic event, as did Russell Brand and many others. It was a good day and probably what a political gathering should look like: lots of discussion, no violence, and making new friends. Little did I know what I would be doing a month or so later as the main lawyer behind the case Skrmetti v. the U.S. argued that minors who believe they are transgender should not have the right via their civil liberties to receive surgical and medical treatment.

It was at this conference where Diana Lutfi asked me to write a medical piece for the Supreme Court's oral arguments. I told her that I would help, and my initial idea was to ask a prominent breast surgeon who is against transgender procedures in minors to write the medical portion of the Amicus Brief. However, to my surprise, my colleague wouldn’t write it because of fear of being canceled or reprimanded by the board of medicine. This incident highlighted the challenges and risks involved in advocating for our case, especially in the current social and political climate.

Thus, it was upon me to write this piece titled Medicine is Discriminatory for a Good Reason, which I researched and wrote part 1B in this amicus brief that was to be presented by the Supreme Court. In this section, I presented compelling arguments and evidence to support our stance that minors who believe they are transgender should not have the right via their civil liberties to receive surgical and medical treatment. Once I gathered the research and made my arguments, I sent them swiftly to Diana, who curated them and put them into the completed amicus brief.

Back to Jordan Peterson, why is this significant? Little did I know that Diana had met with Jordan Peterson before meeting me, and he agreed as well to sign on to the amicus brief.

As I posted before, I went to the Supreme Court, slept on the sidewalk, got the ticket, and then got to observe all nine Supreme Court justices in front of me. To my surprise, I could hear the lawyer Tennessee Attorney General Matthew Rice read exactly my part, "Medicine is Discriminatory for a Good Reason," to Justice Alito. It was quite a surreal moment.

Going to Miami

I pitched the idea to Diana that we should take the Amicus Brief pamphlet from the Supreme Court and sign it, thanking Dr. Peterson for supporting the document and the fight against kids being butchered by transgender medicine. So, we went to Miami with the Amicus Brief in hand and saw Jordan Peterson in the Fillmore Theater during his We Who Wrestle with God tour. After the show, we were invited to take pictures with him and meet him.

The Amicus Brief that Jordan Peterson and myself signed.

It was another surreal moment in life presenting this amicus brief; all three were signatories. Both Diana and I presented it to him. To say the least, he was thrilled. He stopped his usual line of taking photographs to speak with us in-depth about how the case was going, what happened, and that he had remembered us both clearly - Diana from presenting the opportunity to sign on to the amicus brief, and he knew me from my book called The Revolutionary Ketamine and my work with ketamine and suicide. So, it was a reconnecting of sorts. I could tell he was pleased, but I found it interesting that he had to ask us how the case was going and the details because he had no idea. People in Peterson’s shoes who are this busy, it’s not surprising that they have so much on their plate that when they agree to sign on to things, it just slips by the wayside. There are some things they may follow up on and others they may not.

I think he must’ve been delighted to agree to sign his name on this little piece of history by that chance meeting with Diana. I saw the delight in his eyes when we presented him with the book and explained how the case was going, particularly when we met Diana, the author of the amicus brief.

Next, we met with French-Canadian expert on Christian symbolism, Jonathan Pageau. He has a podcast, The Symbolic World, exploring symbolism in sacred stories. We had an in-depth discussion about the new Disney Snow White movie and how it missed the mark. He and Gregg Hurwitz are trying to correct this through other projects involving fairy tales by highlighting the points they’re trying to make. Jonathan made many fascinating points, and the conversation was deep. Gregg Hurwitz has written for Marvel on titles like Wolverine, The Punisher, Foolkiller, and Moon Knight. He later moved to D.C., writing Batman: The Dark Knight.

At night’s end, the audience members get to ask Dr. Peterson questions. Diana raised her hand and asked him, "What about the story of Job? What about his struggle? How does it relate to what’s going on nowadays? Would you like to elaborate on that?"

Peterson took a deep breath and used all the time he had for questions on this single topic, addressing Diana specifically, as this is his next book. So, it was an interesting end to a historic night.