The Fight Over Trans Rights Is About YOUR Rights, Not Just Theirs
Do you think Trump gives the slightest fuck about trans people? Don't be stupid.
This is it. This is Germany in the 1930s and what you do will be recorded in the history books. Your children and grandchildren will look back and ask what you did. Will you be able to look them in the face?
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Last week, Trump gave the game away. He did this because he’s stupid and venal and has the self-control of a toddler. He let his hatred of women spew out of his little anus mouth in front of a whole bunch of cameras and there’s no putting the toothpaste back in the tube.
On Friday, governors from both parties were at the White House and the puppet president started whining about trans kids playing sports. He singled out the governor of Maine, Janet Mills (D-GFY):
“Is Maine here, the governor of Maine?” he asked.
“I’m here,” she replied.
“Are you not going to comply with it?” he asked.
“I’m complying with state and federal laws,” Mills replied.
Trump, a lifelong misogynist and adjudicated rapist, cannot fucking tolerate when women don’t grovel before him. The thing he fears most in the world are smarter, more capable women, which, to be fair, is most women over the age of 13.1
Confronted by a hoo-man feeee-male not afraid of him, Trump defaulted to his base programming: Bully.
Trump responded, “We are the federal law.” He again threatened the state’s federal funding and said Maine may be a Democratic state but its residents largely agree with him on this issue.
“We’re going to follow the law,” she said.
“You’d better comply,” Trump warned. “Otherwise, you’re not getting any federal funding.”
“We’ll see you in court,” the governor replied.
So, two things here.
“We are the federal law” is classic authoritarian shit. I promise you, every ounce of Trump’s flabby drug-addled dementia-riddled brain was screaming to say, “I AM THE LAW!”,2 but he doesn’t quite have the courage to declare himself Emperor in person. He needs to tweet such declarations, safe on his toilet. Because like all bullies, he’s a fucking coward.
“You’d better comply” This was a critical mistake. The courts, especially Republican judges and justices, have made it explicitly clear that the federal government cannot coerce states by threatening to cut off funding. They COULD reverse themselves to help Trump but his position as dictator-for-life is by no means stable and leaving that door open for a Democratic president is extremely dangerous for red states and the GOP’s political project.
Governor Mills knows this which is why she responded with five simple words: “We’ll see you in court.”
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And then Trump defaulted to his second piece of base programming: Being a whiny little bitch:
“Good, I’ll see you in court. I look forward to that. That should be a real easy one,” Trump said. “And enjoy your life after governor because I don’t think you’ll be in elected politics.”
There’s nothing more dignified than a grown-ass man throwing a temper tantrum like a fucking child who didn’t get a second scoop of ice cream.
Here’s the bigger picture. There are maybe 10 trans athletes out of the NCAA’s roughly 500,00 players. Clearly, the problem is not that the trans community is overwhelming and dominating sports. Trump doesn’t care about the trans community. He never did and he never will. Oh, I’m sure as a lifelong bigot and piece of shit, he finds them “icky,” but he doesn’t interact with the community in everyday life any more than I do.
This is, as I continue to point out, a matter of conditioning.
The Next Step In Trans Genocide Was Just Taken. Are You Paying Attention Yet?
This is it. This is Germany in the 1930s and what you do will be recorded in the history books. Your children and grandchildren will look back and ask what you did. Will you be able to look them in the face?
The Republican Party has been conditioning the public to accept atrocities for the last several years. Target a small, powerless, and unpopular group. Demonize them. Legally cripple them. Make violence against them acceptable. And then you can just remove them from society and no one will speak out. Then move on to the next group you want to erase.
For Trump, it’s a little different. He’s using trans athletes to bend state governments to his will. I’m going to give you the rough numbers to highlight exactly how insidious this is. Republicans have been screaming about trans kids for the last decade or so. Non-stop. The legacy press has played along, especially the New York Times, because boosting fascist talking points is what they do.
Number of kids in the United States ages 13-17: Just shy of 21 million
Number of trans kids in the United States ages 13-17: About 300,000
That’s it. A little over 1.5% of the school-age population. Of that, a few hundred play sports.
So the idea that the sports thing is a “problem” to be solved is bullshit. Trump may or may not know these numbers. He’s very stupid and the people around him are pulling the strings. He just wants more power so he can make himself richer. But his puppet masters? THEY know these numbers and they don’t care. The point is to force states to comply with cruelty. If they bend the knee for trans people, they’ll bend the knee for eliminating immigrants of the “wrong color.” They’ll bend the knee when they come for same-sex marriage and the rights of the gay community. And then gay men can be removed. Don’t you know they’re dangerous? They spread disease and prey on children!3
And then it will be the Muslims and the Jews and the Chinese. There will always be another group that’s a “threat” or a “drain” on society. The disabled. The poor. The mentally ill. Republicans will come for each one in turn because that’s who they are. That’s who they’ve always been since the American Nazi Party marched in the streets.
I’m going to say this again (and again and again): It doesn’t matter what you think of the trans community. It doesn’t matter if you think of them at all. I cannot stress this to you enough. I have no personal investment in the trans community. I simply do not have any trans people in my life.
And yet, I will be at a protest on Thursday for the Arlington County School Board to make sure they know that we will not tolerate any plans to obey Trump’s royal edicts to abuse and ostracize the handful of trans kids in our schools.
This is not about their rights. Not really. This is about OUR rights. Because their rights ARE our rights. Once the rights of the trans community are taken away, once they are taken away, the fucking Nazis will come for the rest of us and no one will speak up because we will share a common guilt. We all looked away as an entire group of people were erased and now we’re just hoping we won’t be next.
But we will. Sooner or later, it will be our turn. History is very clear on this point.
Destroy the Nazis now, or be a victim or, worse, a collaborator later. Pick a fucking side.
There are 35 days until the first Blue Wave starts in Wisconsin and 252 days until it hits Virginia and Pennsylvania. If I were a billionaire fascist, I’d think REALLY hard about getting out of the way.
Democracy did not die in November of 2024 but the billionaire assholes have their knives out and it's up to us to keep them from their bloody work. Stay strong. We beat the fascists once and we’ll fucking do it again.
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This would explain Trump’s predilection for raping little girls.
Judge Dredd? More like, “Judge Inbredd,” amirite?!
If you don’t think we’re heading right back to those lies, you have not been paying attention and you need to wake the fuck up.
I’d say, there aren’t any trans people in your life *that you know of*. I remember a long time ago when i discovered someone I knew was trans. I literally had no idea the cute, short boyfriend of a woman in my grad program had previously been a woman.
Per HCR this morn (Where would we be if we didn't have HCR?) :
On July 28, 1974, Representative Bill Cohen (R-ME), who went on to a long Senate career but was at the time a junior member on the House Judiciary Committee. . . told the Bangor Daily News, “I would never compromise what I think is the right thing to do for the sake of an office; it’s just not that important. Only time will tell if the people will accept that judgment.”
It’s a good week to remember that politicians used to use as a yardstick the saying: “As Maine goes, so goes the nation.”
(BTW HCR lives in--and is from--Maine)