The less equal campaign
Am I wrong to say that no one wants to make trans people less equal?
I get that there are plenty of malevolent people who dislike trans people along with gay people, feminists, lefties, atheists, you name it, but are there people who want to make trans people less equal? What would that even look like?
That question is related to one I ask a lot, which is “what do we mean by ‘trans rights’?” What exactly are trans rights? Trans people should have human rights, obviously, but what are specifically trans rights, and how do we know that anyone should have them?
There’s a lot of sloppy rhetoric about equality and rights all through the trans ControVersy, and I spend a lot of time trying to pin down what is meant.
How about Ron DeSantis? Does he want to make trans people less equal? I’m told he does, but I’m skeptical. What would that look like? What has he said that looks like that? I’m not disagreeing that DeSantis is a malevolent right-winger, but I continue to think making trans people “less equal” is just not on the right-wing agenda, not because they’re better than that but because it’s just not a thing.
With race, now, it’s a thing. With race we have a very clear very explicit history of less equal. See the Dred Scott ruling for example. With sex it’s also a thing: women weren’t allowed to vote.
But trans people? Is anyone saying they shouldn’t have voting rights, or that they have no rights which the cis people are bound to respect? Not that I know of. Maybe I’ve missed something.
Here’s the AP back in December:
A federal judge hearing a challenge to a transgender health care ban for minors and restrictions for adults noted Thursday that Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis repeatedly spread false information about doctors mutilating children’s genitals even though there’s been no such documented cases.
The law was sold as defending children from mutilation when it is actually about preventing trans children from getting health care, Judge Robert Hinkle said to Mohammad Jazil, a lawyer for the state.
But what is called “trans health care” can and does include altering the genitals. Is that health care as opposed to mutilation, or vice versa? Depends on who is talking.
At least 22 states have now enacted laws restricting or banning gender-affirming medical care for transgender minors, and many of those states face lawsuits. Courts have issued mixed rulings, with the nation’s first law, in Arkansas, struck down by a federal judge who said the ban on care violated the due process rights of transgender youth and their families.
But it’s a choice to call it “medical care.” If it weren’t labeled as “gender-affirming” then it would be mutilation, so that “gender-affirming” is carrying a lot of weight.
Anyway I couldn’t find anything in that article that indicates DeSantis is trying to make trans people less equal. It’s not a form of equality to have your genital mutilation called “medical care” even if you yourself want the genital mutilation or alteration. The whole thing is about something other than equality.
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I sincerely believe that I am a giraffe (NB: But only on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.) I am also easily upset, and it distresses me greatly when people get skeptical about my sincerely held belief. I definitely feel less equal, and in fact this issue has spoilt my whole day; and it had been going so well until now.
And it is only made worse because of this trans issue, for the fact of the matter is that I sincerely believe that I am a trans-giraffe.So be it known that us trans-giraffes have feelings too.
Now you know.
“Foremost, do no harm” is a phrase that I have always heard associated with the medical profession. I fail to see how mutilating a child’s genitals is anything but harm. Playing clever with soothing-sounding terms like “gender affirming healthcare” doesn’t change that underlying reality, in my mind.
Plus it’s a weird idea anyway. If a kid pretends to be a bear, and really gets into it, and gets upset when she’s told she’s not a bear, is it species-affirming care to super-glue her into a bearskin?
I identify as a very wealthy person. That means you must give me your money in order to affirm me. Not to do so would be phobic.
No, this is not a stickup. It’s just being kind.
Unpacking this is important, because there’s a lot being hidden from consideration and debate within these anodyne formulae. Calls for trans “rights” and trans “equality” are hiding demands for special privileges, and the acceptance and enforcement of lies. They are a demand to be accepted as the sex they are not and can never be. They are demands for unlimited access to all the rights, resources, facilities, and positions reserved and set aside on the basis of sex. Women are particularly disadvantaged by this because most of those provisions set aside exclusively for them are the result of recently won, hard fought women’s campaigns that wrested them from blind indifference, or hostile, systemic denial of women’s particular needs. Claiming that men pretending to be women should have equal access to them is a none-too-subtle way to claw these gains back from women. It’s a renewed insistence that no, women are not allowed to have anything of their own without men, and it is delivered by self-righteous, faux progressives with the added, insulting admonition for women to “be kind” and willingly accept this prohibition without resistance or complaint. This is never acknowledged by those working for trans “rights.” The reality of this boundary-breaking intrusion of men into women’s spaces is camouflaged behind theatrically indignant denunciations of “trans bans,” and lofty declarations about including “all women,” (meaning including men), while carefully hiding the cost to women’s health, safety, and dignity of these so-called “rights.” There is no right to be accepted as something you aren’t and can never be. That is nowhere near a right; it’s a negation of rights, the rights of women. We’re not supposed to see this or talk about it. It’s a shameless power grab that has the nerve to proclaim that it is a quest for justice that in fact subjects women and girls to grave injustice. The claim that “Trans rights are human rights!” is just the genderists’ version of “What’s good for General Motors is Good for America.”
As for “equality,” trans identified males claim to be “equal” to women. Their assertion is that wearing the right clothing and makeup, adopting the correct comportment and mannerisms, the unethical modification of a few documents, renders them fully female. Nobody has access to their gendered “soul” so the external trappings are supposed to be an acceptable substitute, that their “womanhood” is all it takes to open the doors they wish to enter. And doesn’t it goddamn well work in too many instances!
Calling the basic truth that humans can’t change sex “transphobic” is a necessary part of this “rights” movement because it all collapses if this is admitted or allowed to stand. This truth must be hidden and denied at all costs, because it ends the whole game. No discussion or examination is allowed. We’re supposed to shut up and sign the blank cheque, and let them fill in the details, no questions asked. Trans “rights” are left vague and undefined because they are not rights. They don’t want to be equal, they want to bypass the rules, standards, and laws that keep them from what they want. So not “rights”, not “equality”. Not without redefining these words into meaninglessness in the same way they’ve tried with “woman.” They can use all the lipstick in the world on this pig, but the only way they’ll keep everyone from seeing it as anything but a pig is to turn out the lights. NO DEBATE!
*Standing ovation for YNnB*
I read recently something which has resonated with me. It was about tolerance, but it applies to all kinds of exhortations which usually end ‘to one another’. For example:
Be tolerant to one another.
Be kind to one another.
Be respectful to one another.
Be polite to one another.
Be civil to one another.
The point was that these are social contracts. The part ‘to one another’ is an integral part of the contract; as soon as one party breaks the contract, by being intolerant, or unkind, or disrespectful, the person with whom they’ve broken it is no longer bound by it.
There’s a good reason for the part ‘to one another’. These exhortations have to be mutual, or what you get isn’t a fair society, but one of dominance and forced submission; and that is why the narcissistic sociopaths of the gender cult always omit it.
@6 really good point, and well put. It reminds me of something I occasionally say about ‘allies’. Allyship is supposed to be mutual – common cause to achieve a mutually desired goal or defend against a common enemy. There’s no point in person/country A being person/country B’s ally unless person/country B is also person/country A’s ally. One-sided allyship is, as you say, dominance and forced submission.
Well put, tigger. Demands to use wrong-sex language, to speak against one’s beliefs, and worst of all to alter one’s perceptions and thoughts to suit the pleasure of another–each of these is a breach of mutual respect and autonomy. There the fault lies.