The standard joke about leftist headlines is that, whatever is going wrong in the world (usually because of climate change), the tag line to the report is always "women and children hardest hit." There's a new competitor in town, though, for the most victimized identity group: so-called transgender people who believe that mutilating their bodies with surgery will ease their very real psychic pain.

Vice "news" put out a remarkable article the other day about transgender woes. According to Vice, as medical institutions turn all their energy to preparing for and treating only the coronavirus and other life-threatening illnesses, "gender reassignment" surgeries are put on hold. In other words, the medical establishment is so transphobic that it will not treat transgender unhappiness as life-threatening.

As is so often the case today with mainstream media news, one is compelled to say, "This is not The Onion or the Babylon Bee. It's an attempt at real news by an outlet that does not view itself as a parody site (although clearly it should)."

In a time of serious epidemic disease and an even more serious epidemic panic, here's how the Vice article frames this latest tragedy to a victim identity group (emphasis added):

As Hospitals Prepare for COVID-19, Life-Saving Trans Surgeries Are Delayed Though medical facilities may soon become overtaxed for everyone, the coronavirus pandemic has shed light on how transgender people's care can be treated as "non-essential." For transgender and gender non-conforming people, gender-affirming surgeries are life-altering procedures, which, for many, can greatly reduce gender dysphoria and improve their quality of life. But in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, trans communities on Reddit and Twitter are being flooded with reports of postponed and canceled surgeries in the U.S., U.K., Spain, Thailand, and elsewhere, leading to enormous stress and disappointment on top of a global health crisis. This underscores a common experience amongst trans people seeking medical care or surgery: Research has suggested that gender-affirming surgery, in particular, has a notable and long-term impact on mental health, but far too often, trans people already wait far longer than is safe or healthy for this care. Further delays can be dangerous and even life-threatening.

Perhaps you're wondering why having your penis and testicles or your breasts amputated, and then having fake sexual characteristics constructed on your body, constitutes life-saving surgery. We're wondering, too. Sadly, the article never tells us why a "sex change" surgery should be just as important as open-heart surgery or coronavirus treatment.

The article explains that there are waitlists because the surgery requires specialists, who are not always available. Additionally, insurance companies often don't want to pay for what they view as elective, cosmetic surgery. Outside leftist land, those are scarcely life-threatening problems.

The only issue that seems to be remotely "life-threatening" is follow-up care. Those people who have had the surgery, like any post-surgical patients, are more vulnerable to catching a virus. Additionally, because of social distancing, friends who were to act as caregivers may vanish. S ome post-surgical care also takes place over the internet — precisely the same way doctors are handling all types of post-surgical care today.

And then there's anxiety. Violet Jones is a man who is waiting to have slice-and-dice surgery to make his body conform more closely to the feminine vision he has of himself:

Even though she [sic] understands why hospitals are making this decision, the possibility of a rescheduled surgery date has increased Violet Jones's levels of anxiety. "I've spent my entire life falling asleep while begging any theoretical omnipotent beings to let me wake up in the body I need to feel comfortable, and, [in May], that was finally going to happen," Jones said. "To lose that security would really harm my mental health and make it feel like it may never actually happen." Despite this stress, Jones is trying to keep things in perspective because of COVID-19's vast impact on public health for everyone: "I understand that this is largely out of my hands, and that if/when the decision is made to cancel or reschedule the surgery, it'll be for the greater good of those who need facilities."

Jones sounds like a decent person, albeit a deeply unhappy one. Perhaps the delayed surgeries will create an opportunity for people suffering from this tragic type of body dysmorphia to explore other avenues to ease their psychic pain. For example, rather than giving a man like Jones female hormones and plastic surgery, why not try giving him more male hormones to see if that creates better mind-body harmony?

Without diminishing the mental anguish of the people Vice interviewed for the article, let's remember again that a media outlet that would write something like this during a time of massive upheaval is a fundamentally unserious enterprise. It would be nice if, after this panic shakes itself out, more Americans than just conservatives understood that the mainstream media are not in the business of passing on information but, instead, are selling a very bizarre ideology.