Pretty much giving us the definition of irony, it turns out a member of an Oregon state mental health advisory board identifies as a turtle.
A turtle.
Unfortunately, this is an all true story. JD Holt, who goes by JD Terrapin on social media, is one of two dozen people who make up the Consumer Advisory Council , a panel that’s currently advising Oregon’s Health Authority director on best practices concerning mental health. The group has been tasked to "investigate," "evaluate" and "recommend" the state’s taxpayer-funded behavioral health resources, and can establish "committees to investigate specific areas of interest related to Behavioral Health services,” according to Yahoo News.
Which, you’d assume, means the people on it actually have healthy mental states, considering they’re advising state officials on the matter.
And you'd be wrong.
Holt self-identifies as a terrapin, which, if you didn’t already know, is a small, freshwater turtle species. She (I think, though I'm genuinely not sure here) also claims preferred pronouns of “they/them/turtle” - despite “turtle” being a noun and not a pronoun, but who really cares about grammar these days, anyway?
"Hello everybody, it's JD. I use they, them and turtle for my pronouns. I'm in the Springfield-Eugene area and I get to be part of the council," Holt said during a recorded virtual meeting on December 20.
Meet JD Terrapin Holt, an actual member of the Oregon Consumer Advisory Council. JD uses "Turtle/They/Them" pronouns and helps develop policies surrounding mental health and addiction.
— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) March 10, 2025
This is real…pic.twitter.com/fASoZkJN6V
Apparently, this is an actual thing. Not the notion that a human being can be a turtle, because that’s still insane. But there are people on the Earth planet who “identify” as turtles, enough so that Yahoo News notes there’s an entire category listed on Gender Wiki as “turtlegender,” defined as "a xenogender identity in which one feels a gendered connection to turtles” and who “may feel their gender is replaced by a 'turtle,' or their gender is best described with the use of turtles.”
Related: Congressional Hearing ERUPTS After Chairman Correctly Refers to 'Trans' Rep. As a Male
We used to just call those “crazy people.”
I can only imagine this kind of madness only exists in first world nations, where clean water isn’t hard to find and most people’s biggest frustration is their signal being too weak for Instagram to load on their smartphone.
Bring back asylums already.