The Republican War on Transgender People, Drag Queens, and Queerness in General

[Mr. Tea]

it affects people I care about too but I don't bring that in as a manipulative tactic you self-righteous sentimental prat.

Really? Who's that, and how does it affect them? And no, "It affects all women, and I have a girlfriend and a mum and some female friends" doesn't cut it, because as P has already shown, an avalanche of trans women (or, if you prefer, straight cis men sneakily pretending to be trans women) raping cis women in toilets and changing rooms has singularly failed to occur in the countries that have self-ID laws.

 

[droid]

Sorry, could you please remove your n95 mask, it's difficult to make out what you're saying

Once someone gets this deep in the cult theres no going back. Lost cause. Just smile politely and shuffle away.

 

[HMGovt’s Glorious Return!]

Everyone's so touchy these days

 

[mixed_biscuits]

Absolutely not in bad faith. The ties between TERFs and the right-wing - including many deeply misogynistic, often explicitly anti-feminist institutions and individuals - are extensive and well documented. The LGB Alliance's (absolute clown organization, but still) ties to the Heritage Foundation and Witherspoon Institute, as well as Gary Powell's specific links to the Center for Bioethics and Culture, an American religious organization that focuses on restricting abortion rights (and which itself is linked to the infamous Alliance Defending Freedom, which among other things drafted the Mississippi legislation used in Dobbs vs. Jackson to overturn Roe). Kellie-Jay's innumerable dealings with the far right, praise of people like Tommy Robinson, Tucker Carlson, etc and so on. The Society for Evidence Based Gender Medicine's close to ties to the anti-LGBTQ and anti-abortion NGO Lovewise UK, which I already got into and is still there for anyone to read (fuck it I'll just link it again since I know yall are too lazy to do that) - that's Stella O'Malley as a reminder, an anti-trans Irish therapist at the very heart of the GC NGO web. Again, I could go on. And anyone paying attention to this discourse - something I don't recommend unless you really have a reason to - will know there's not a week that goes by without TERFs having to denounce (or just, like, be cool with) some misogynistic nonsense from some right-wing dude they're allied with in true "but I didn't think the leopards would eat my face" fashion.

The current tidal wave of anti-trans, drag queen, etc legislation is directly based in American right-wing religious ideology - again, a totally conscious strategy that they have, in their own words, been pursuing for the better part of a decade now - by the exact same people who want to outlaw all abortion and re-ban gay marriage (or failing that, legalize discrimination against gay people, which they recently succeeded in doing). This is who UK GCs have been happy to ally with. Or please, point me to anywhere where they delineate between themselves and their allies. Anywhere.

In this very thread who are you allied to? Dissensus's biggest/saddest MAGA fanboi and its resident anti-choice/anti-vax lunatic, and you have every chance to say "hmg's 10th-rate 4chan trolling and/or biscuits staunch belief that woman (nominally the people you're defending) shouldn't have bodily autonomy don't represent my views". But no, just silence. Every time trans issues come up someone - usually Benny - dredges up that Fallon Fox quote from 11 years ago, and I duly denounce it. When the Nashville shooting happened I said of course, completely indefensible, etc. Where you on a woman murdered for flying a Pride flag? Where are you on Chaya Raichik's stochastic terrorism? nowhere.


so no, it's not guilt by assocation. it's guilt by an overwhelming amount of evidence and the either inability or refusal to denounce all of the odious people espousing your cause.

You do realise Planned Parenthood came out of the Eugenics movement? Quite a lot of bad people are associated with some of your views if you want to play that game.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

also I forget that part where the UK was a totally harmonious polity that didn't have a generationally divisive vote that has thrown the country into disarray for the last 7 years. absolutely no polarization among British people.

I swear there is almost nothing sillier than smug Europeans pretending they are somehow above American nonsense. yall are just less honest about it.

Of course we are above American nonsense. Your two main political figures are the devil incaranate and someone who should be in a care home, whereas our two are a hyper-intelligent POC and a knight of the realm.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

it's a different tradeoff. for someone applying for a job working children is virtually nothing, the cost of having a background check run is virtually nothing. trans women, otoh, if they've visibly transitioned in any way, are not physically safe in men's bathrooms, let alone men's prisons. since we've established that trans women have been using women's bathrooms since basically time immemorial without issue, and since again, numerous countries have had self-ID for a decade now (Argentina the first in 2012) without issue, what you're saying is that trans women should either be at serious risk of physical violence or totally unable to use public bathrooms is a lesser concern than some cis women being uncomfortable at the idea of a trans woman using the bathroom.

also, "transwoman" is a term only used by TERFs, as it implies trans women are some other totally separate category of being, and "transactivist" is a not a word at all. it's not even a neologism.

Unfortunately for you language is use and coming over all Academie Francaise is 100 years out of date. Trans women and transwomen are literally phonetically identical. If you want to signal group membership to your in group the more effective way would be by appending a daily updated number that only members of the in group get, itself changed on an hourly basis according to an encrypted algorithm e.g. if someone says 'trans women 68372X681B' at 4:47pm you know they are a phobe.

 

[mixed_biscuits]

well, Mumsnet itself had to enact stricter moderation terms in 2018 in response to rampant transphobia

characterized by a former employee as'

"The first threads about trans people date from 2012, but looking at the board today, almost every conversation started is about trans people and trans rights. And, away from the site, people are starting to take notice. Last week, Mumsnet referred itself to the data commissioner after a whistleblower exposed information relating to transphobic posters on the site. The website has seemingly found itself at the heart of an unfolding culture war: one where trans people’s lives, safety and security are up for debate.


The anti-trans community on Mumsnet is something of an open secret. It has been present for years, and it appears that there has, for a while, been a lax approach to tackling this particular form of hate speech."

so yunno, there's that

or the fact that it's been widely touted as hotbed of transphobia for like 10 years because there's endless evidence that it is

so also that

I don't think that fully dispels the no-true-scotsman objection. Do you consider the Mumsnet screenshot I posted to be transphobic?

 

[DannyL]

another moron in the background. I've said everything I need to say for now don't worry!! it's all clear to see

out to all the lurkers who agree with me but don't wanna say cos of the dumb as fuck responses. I don't blame you

There aren't any. You've lost an argument with someone more intelligent than yourself. Log off and go away.

 

[maxi]

one reason behind all the random guys huffing this nonsense is because they're overcompensating for their own transphobia. they're weirded out by trans people and they're ashamed they feel disgust so they go the other way to overcompensate.

another factor is guilt about being too late to the party when it came to gay rights. they can't be arsed to look closely into this so just assume it's essentially a repeat of the same movement and don't wanna be on the wrong side of history again.

not giving a shit about women's rights seals the deal.

and on top of that, anyone who challenges the stupid claims gets raged at and pounced on, so anyone who wants to live a quiet life will either stay out of it or fall in line.

 

[maxi]

There aren't any. You've lost an argument with someone more intelligent than yourself. Log off and go away.

when you reply to one of my posts, I get a notification, which takes me back to this page even though I was done with it. you get that right? I just posted another bunch of points cos of you. well done

 

[CorpseysEvilTwin]

Everyone's so touchy these days

@malelesbian please help this lost soul.

 

[DannyL]

when you reply to one of my posts, I get a notification, which takes me back to this page even though I was done with it. you get that right? I just posted another bunch of points cos of you. well done

Where? I can see you posted a bunch of random, fact-free assertions, but that's not how you prove your point.

 

[Mr. Tea]

one reason behind all the random guys huffing this nonsense is because they're overcompensating for their own transphobia. they're weirded out by trans people and they're ashamed they feel disgust so they go the other way to overcompensate.

Yeah, I remember thinking "I know you are but what am I?" was pretty clever when I was about 10, too.

 

[maxi]

Where? I can see you posted a bunch of random, fact-free assertions, but that's not how you prove your point.

good morning. they're not random but yeah they're just opinions. I was doing the fact heavy stuff a few pages ago with tea but it was just taken in bad faith anyway and considered disingenuous. do you think there's anything I could say that could convince you, whether its backed up or not? any disagreement with padraig so far has just been an expression of bigotry apparently.

it's funny cos fwiw I don't disagree with the thread title. there is an ugly backlash against trans and gay people from the republican party and the far-right in general. I just think there are areas where women's rights are impacted as well. it's really not that crazy of a thing to think.

there are many people who think this, and they're not all rabid neo-nazi fascists with a frothing hatred of trans people. or to be more careful with my words and avoid a strawman - they are not transphobic. some of them are trans themselves. can that not be acknowledged at least? even if you disagree with everything I say and think it's all a load of bollocks and I'm an idiot who's been misled by misinformation.

if we can't view each other as arguing in good faith, then there's no point bringing facts into it wouldn't you agree?

 

[DannyL]

good morning. they're not random but yeah they're just opinions. I was doing the fact heavy stuff a few pages ago with tea but it was just taken in bad faith anyway and considered disingenuous. do you think there's anything I could say that could convince you, whether its backed up or not? any disagreement with padraig so far has just been an expression of bigotry apparently.

it's funny cos fwiw I don't disagree with the thread title. there is an ugly backlash against trans and gay people from the republican party and the far-right in general. I just think there are areas where women's rights are impacted as well. it's really not that crazy of a thing to think.

there are many people who think this, and they're not all rabid neo-nazi fascists with a frothing hatred of trans people. or to be more careful with my words and avoid a strawman - they are not transphobic. some of them are trans themselves. can that not be acknowledged at least? even if you disagree with everything I say and think it's all a load of bollocks and I'm an idiot who's been misled by misinformation.

if we can't view each other as arguing in good faith, then there's no point bringing facts into it wouldn't you agree?

I agree with you about bad faith attacks, it's why I don't bother arguing online much.
As to what would convince me - I think a really open, honest acknowledgment that you might not understand another's experience. I don't *understand* the lived experience of being trans *from the inside* but I can clearly see the bigotry, hatred, motivated reasoning and bad faith arguments being used to attack trans people, the lies, the weirdo fantasies, the projections, the talking over, the refusal to accept trans accounts of their selfhood. This thread is replete with it, and when someone like Padraig drops a ton of evidence, no one really engages with it, largely because it's irrefutable.

I'll go back and look at some of your points when I have a moment. I guess good faith starts with acknowledgement of the limits of one's own knowledge and being willing to listen to others, thoughtfully, rather than to try and shout them down.

 

[DannyL]

BTW listening to that podcast about trans children upthread was genuinely illuminating for me - it showed the historical ubiquity of transness and how these bodies were policed and medicalised. I don't think someone could argue me out of thinking the evidence presented there is basically correct. But you'd have to be willing to listen to it and it's a complex multifacted argument.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

You do realise Planned Parenthood came out of the Eugenics movement?

I know who Margaret Sanger was, yeah. She's been dead for going on 60 years and modern Planned Parenthood is vastly different from her original vision. Whatever public credibility eugenics had was destroyed, as I'm sure you already know, by its close association with the Nazis. Modern eugenics is almost entirely a far-right phenomenon under the guise of "human biodiversity" (HBD), which is just a newer iteration of exactly the kind of pseudoscience race theory that the Nazis advocated (and before them, phrenologists etc).

Whereas the many awful people promoting anti-trans (and anti-choice, it's mostly the same people) rhetoric and policies are doing so right now. They are not long dead, and the organizations they're involved in are expressing their current, actual views. So that equivalence is false.

This an approach RWers will also commonly use when claiming that anti-racists are actually the real racists, saying some version of "but which party was against/ended slavery?", as if the respective political parties have been frozen since in stasis since 1860, the Civil Rights Act and subsequent mass exodus of white Southern Democrats never happened, etc

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

To tie all that back into this thread, HDB proponents were, surprise, some of the earliest supporters of the Blanchard/Bailey autogynephilia theory (i.e. that trans women transition as/because of a sexual fetish), which is a cornerstone of both TERF-style ideology and the right-wing religious attacks on trans people (ACPeds etc) - all stuff that I, again, have already detailed multiple times in this thread.

And amazingly, skull shape is also a part of current anti-trans rhetoric, common enough that there's an entire Twitter trope of transphobes referencing supposedly male and female skull shapes and saying things like "1000 years from now archaeologists will classify your skeleton as male", which is not only not how that works - there are differences, but sexual dimorphism isn't consistent across populations or individuals, so you can't automatically classify a skull as male or female - and one of the dumbest/weirdest supposed owns in a space crammed with dumb weird nonsense. It's a subset of the "transvestigation" end of transphobia, wherein people claim they can always tell who's cis/trans. It pretty much inevitably devolves, as you might guess, into saying that any woman who has any nominally masculine characteristic - tall, muscular, squarer jaw, whatever - is trans. One of its craziest offshoots is a conspiracy thing claiming that Michelle Obama is trans, like real Pizzagate level that seems like it's satire until you realize there are people who take it seriously.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

I don't think that fully dispels the no-true-scotsman objection. Do you consider the Mumsnet screenshot I posted to be transphobic?

I looked at it

I don't think the original post - the screenshot - is really transphobic. there are disapproving overtones, but it's a parent struggling to get to grips with a major event that just happened, and it's reasonable in that context. if her kid had been saying this for 3 years and she was asking for advice on how to stop it, different story.

the comments, however, are overwhelmingly transphobic. the very first one says there is no such thing as trans children (the child in question is 15, tbc). not just no surgery/hormones, they don't exist. they frequently mention "social contagion" and blame social media, and say transition is a fad and/or attention-seeking (i.e. ROGD). they complain that about transitioning being a replacement for pushing against normative gender roles without transitioning. and so on. every single one of these is a key TERF talking point and none of them are true. multiple posts direct her to a support group for parents, Bayswater, which enumerates those same points and more - all the greatest TERF hits, really - in greater detail, as well as linking to specific GC websites - the 4th Wave, Transgender Trend (I mean, come on), etc. the entire message is "don't trust your child, it's a phase, do everything you can to stamp it out". that is the essence of transphobia.

I'm sure that there are plenty of areas of mumsnet which focus on parenting issues that have nothing to do with trans people, but based on that thread, in addition to all the other evidence, I would absolutely call it a haven for transphobia. I mean one of the commenters literally says "us TERFs". if that's not sufficient evidence, what exactly is?

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

do you think there's anything I could say that could convince you, whether its backed up or not?

I thought your arguments about domestic violence were in good faith (tho perhaps not coincidentally they're the least concerned with trans people)

the thing is, everywhere else I can see, you're advancing arguments created by transphobes, and making them in usually the same terms. if you want me to enumerate point by point, I can, but for now let's just say in general. so even if you're making them in good faith, they're bad arguments and no offense, sometimes quite ignorant, arguments.

look, I am aware that I can be abrasive. this stuff fills me with boiling rage. not the flamewar insults - I could not give less of a shit about any of that - but the abject cruelty that is at the bottom of most transphobia. this won't be news to anyone, but it's fucking hard to be a trans person, or gender non-conforming, on so many levels, and to see that cruelty play out - and it's absolutely not only from TERFs and RWers; the queer community is full of transphobia (and misogyny, racism, etc - how could it be? it exists in the same world as straight people, with the same problems) - is very difficult. but I would infinitely - infinitely! - rather get more people to empathize with trans people and support their rights than "win a debate".

so if you say you're not trying to be a part of that cruelty, alrite, great. it is hard to tell sometimes bc there's a quite of legitimately frothing hate (and fear, in the literal phobia sense) for trans people, up to and including actual rabid fascists like Matt Walsh.

then my question, or I guess questions, would be: how can I best explain to you, or any other interested person, that trans rights is not about denying the rights of cis women - that they are in fact, closely linked parts of the same struggle? and that the narrative that it is has been almost entirely created and driven by people operating in bad faith, or more charitably, who are misguided? cos I've done multiple lengthy breakdowns of the exact processes by which that narrative is created and sustained, with names and facts and links, and people don't even contest them - they just ignore them entirely and repeat the same gender-critical talking points ad nauseam again and again.

oh and lurker massive, if you're actually out there by all means weigh in. I will patiently answer your questions too.