I’m going to get all sorts of fun responses for trying to empathize with those with whom I disagree (instead of just writing “dumb bigots”) but here goes:
First, remember that even gay marriage is fairly new to America, it’s been around for less time than the MCU.
There are a lot of folks who almost have mental whiplash, gay marriage went from illegal to “you could get fired for being vocally uncomfortable about it” in fairly quick order.
Now, to make things even more wild for those folks, mainstream culture is pretty insistent that gender isn’t even a thing anymore. Add in some pretty wild news stories/videos*, worries for their kids and the notion that the Left refuses to say there might be any issues whatsoever and you can kinda see where a backlash could crop up.
eg: trans women being reassigned to women’s prisons and then assaulting the women etc, a 6"2, 220lb woman practically murdering her handball oppoisition, some fairly sketchy research practices by some of the authorities (WPATH) on the subject etc.
Can we compromise? No trans people in sports and trans people have their own unique prison or cell block and young teens can take puberty blockers and estrogen so they don’t need to try to pay 150,000 in facial feminization plastic surgery at 18 or 19, money of which they can only get quickly from sex work and not going to school? Sound like a good compromise?
A lot of this stuff is mostly at the state level which seems almost reasonable.
I imagine the big actual fight on this would come down to when are parents able to over-ride their kids wishes and vice versa. It’s a shitty battle for trans kids; if you don’t let them access medicine early, it puts them on a brutal path as you pointed out. But I also can’t imagine conservatives would be chill letting their kids alter their sex at such a young age. (From the parents’ perspective, what if this is just some teenage drama with lifelong repercussions?)
We don’t let kids get tattoos (and thank Christ for that, otherwise I’d probably have Wolverine fighting the Zerg on my chest or something) this seems bigger.
I dunno, like most real world issues, it’s tricky. And at the fun intersection of children and a rapidly changing perspective of gender, well damn, there are going to be some ugly fights.
This aligns with what I have heard from folks I know in that world. Fear motivated by exaggerating one off and isolated incidents. The information silos in the conservative world (especially news) is frightening.
No, most people aren’t going out of their way to hurt trans people, but those loud extremists are creating a negative connotation in some people’s minds. That’s no different from racism.
Extremists on both sides are a problem, so when you say “those loud extremists” a reasonable person would have no idea who you’re talking about. I think you’re correct in either instance, but I doubt that’s what you where going for.
There’s a reason conservatives campaign against “woke.” And most conservatives I know socially called the election a win against woke, even if they couldn’t exactly name a woke policy that Harris proposed.
Harris explicitly didn’t play identity politics, and I applaud her for it. I think the left is starting to realise even people who agree with them dislike being told what to think … one can dream right.
Sadly (though I am admittedly a pessimist and would love to be wrong) I think the Left elites/party brass are coming to that realization on identity politics. But I dont think mainstream/cultural Left is and unfortunately, I think Right and centre Right curious voters view the political and cultural Left as the same.
I’m going to get all sorts of fun responses for trying to empathize with those with whom I disagree (instead of just writing “dumb bigots”) but here goes:
First, remember that even gay marriage is fairly new to America, it’s been around for less time than the MCU.
There are a lot of folks who almost have mental whiplash, gay marriage went from illegal to “you could get fired for being vocally uncomfortable about it” in fairly quick order.
Now, to make things even more wild for those folks, mainstream culture is pretty insistent that gender isn’t even a thing anymore. Add in some pretty wild news stories/videos*, worries for their kids and the notion that the Left refuses to say there might be any issues whatsoever and you can kinda see where a backlash could crop up.
Can we compromise? No trans people in sports and trans people have their own unique prison or cell block and young teens can take puberty blockers and estrogen so they don’t need to try to pay 150,000 in facial feminization plastic surgery at 18 or 19, money of which they can only get quickly from sex work and not going to school? Sound like a good compromise?
I don’t know what the answers are!
A lot of this stuff is mostly at the state level which seems almost reasonable.
I imagine the big actual fight on this would come down to when are parents able to over-ride their kids wishes and vice versa. It’s a shitty battle for trans kids; if you don’t let them access medicine early, it puts them on a brutal path as you pointed out. But I also can’t imagine conservatives would be chill letting their kids alter their sex at such a young age. (From the parents’ perspective, what if this is just some teenage drama with lifelong repercussions?)
We don’t let kids get tattoos (and thank Christ for that, otherwise I’d probably have Wolverine fighting the Zerg on my chest or something) this seems bigger.
I dunno, like most real world issues, it’s tricky. And at the fun intersection of children and a rapidly changing perspective of gender, well damn, there are going to be some ugly fights.
This aligns with what I have heard from folks I know in that world. Fear motivated by exaggerating one off and isolated incidents. The information silos in the conservative world (especially news) is frightening.
Which I don’t get because they’re all about rape as a jail punishment
Talk to any random person on the street and they don’t fucking care about identity politics.
Extremists are not the mainstream no matter how much they shout about it.
No, most people aren’t going out of their way to hurt trans people, but those loud extremists are creating a negative connotation in some people’s minds. That’s no different from racism.
Extremists on both sides are a problem, so when you say “those loud extremists” a reasonable person would have no idea who you’re talking about. I think you’re correct in either instance, but I doubt that’s what you where going for.
Oh. My bad. I thought a reasonable person would assume I meant the loud extremists that match the topic of this post.
There’s a reason conservatives campaign against “woke.” And most conservatives I know socially called the election a win against woke, even if they couldn’t exactly name a woke policy that Harris proposed.
Harris explicitly didn’t play identity politics, and I applaud her for it. I think the left is starting to realise even people who agree with them dislike being told what to think … one can dream right.
I like your dream and fully agree on Harris.
Sadly (though I am admittedly a pessimist and would love to be wrong) I think the Left elites/party brass are coming to that realization on identity politics. But I dont think mainstream/cultural Left is and unfortunately, I think Right and centre Right curious voters view the political and cultural Left as the same.