You have a good point, but I’d like to add that the group mentality is probably different from what a single bully would do or feel.
I think that this comes from these people being scared of not fitting in and from not having anything in common with the other people who don’t fit it, so instead of uniting for a common goal, they can only find unity in being against something that they have in common not being.
That’s why they attack minorities of all kinds.
It also explains the hypocrisy. The individual isn’t afraid of abortions, homosexuals or mexicans. Sometimes they need to accept those on an individual level, but they still go along with the anti-politics because it’s not about themselves personally.
Facism isn’t just based on simple hatred. It’s mostly based on fear of not fitting in, because the individual is well aware of their own not fitting in.
Fascism is also an ideology of fear. It requires an enemy that’s both weak and existentially threatening in order to frighten and divide people.
For the modern right that enemy is now the trans community. And make no mistake, it’s cynical and deliberate. Alt right figures sought and found the enemy they needed to galvanize voters, and now they’re stoking that fear as best they can.
When it was making rules against gender-affirming care for children, at least they could hide behind the (ludicrously false) “we’re protecting the children!” argument.
They can’t even do that here. There is just no justification for this beyond either “god doesn’t want this to happen” or just basic cruelty.
This is how it was explained to me; I’ll do the best I can to write it out in a way that makes sense.
You know how most left-leaning see MAGA as a cult of idiocy? Really Really dumb people easily motivated by propaganda, that if it weren’t for trump and other republican bad actors, they would just otherwise be innocent idiots ready to be manipulated by someone else? There exists a subset of conservatives that believe idiocy and gullibility applies to both sides. Just like a simple farmer can get turned storm-the-capitol-terrorist by a few tweets and youtube videos, the theory is that an innocent dumb gay kid can be turned trans by a few tiktoks. They don’t look at it like a rights issue; they don’t believe that most trans people actually exist. They look at it like catering to a dangerous cult who manipulates their followers into self-mutilation and a terribly unhappy life.
The thing about making an argument in good faith, is that logic and reason generally always apply to produce the same conclusions if given the same set of facts. There are plenty of people out there perfectly content to make a bad faith argument for personal gain, and I’m not really talking about those people. The issue with trans rights is that it’s very easy to make a good faith argument with only a minor dispute in facts that leads down a path of “treat the disease” rather than “give them rights” when solving in good faith for “protect the vulnerable”.
Think about it this way, You probably wouldn’t argue that law should cater towards the reality MAGA repubes believe the world to exist in, right?
I would hope that the difference is a trans person wasn’t manipulated by a deranged cult during their formative years. If that isn’t the difference, then the repubes were right all along.
If maga folks who think this way actually could get over their fear and disgust and see trans people as fellow humans, maybe they could truly listen to trans people’s experiences and listen to the medical community, and come to realize their view doesn’t line up with reality.
Thinking trans people are trans because someone convinced them they are is similar to thinking sexual preference is a choice (it isn’t, if you didn’t know that).
They retool and reuse a lot of anti LGB arguments - they still hate gay people, they just know it doesn’t play well right now.
The “protect the children” crowd put out so many lies that it’s impossible to keep up with. Chuds pretend that kids can just walk into a clinic, say “I think I’m a boy/girl” and walk out with a hormone script and a surgery appointment, and because most people don’t know anything about transgender care they believe it. I don’t think your average person actually is that bothered by real trans people, they’re just lead to believe that 8 year olds are getting their penises lopped off.
they’re just lead to believe that 8 year olds are getting their penises lopped off.
This is a huge part of it. A lot of these people have a huge misunderstanding of gender dysphoria and seriously think that people are convincing 8 year olds to have a sex change. It’s a lack of education and critical thinking skills that the leaders of right wing politics and religious/cult leaders have been perpetuating for a long time. Stupid people are easier to control.
That and a lack of empathy to even try to understand what another human is going through, especially if they are different from themselves. This too, probably stems from the same fascist playbook.
Because we’re the enemy. We’re different and bad and we make them uncomfortable so we must be why they’re unhappy and why their lives aren’t what they thought they should be
I’ve been finding a strange peace in understanding our history. Not just the history beginning with the 20th century but the reality that we’ve always been everywhere. When we’re cracked down on we rise back in the shadows in a generation, the second the grip inevitably slips enough. Is it a good life? No, it’s one of crimes of desperation, like sex work. But it is a life, and it’s a life that many found worth living unlike a life in the closet.
Even if the worst comes to pass some of our killers’ descendants will claim us as ancestors. And I for one claim them as my descendants.
It makes more sense if you look at this as them needing a scapegoat.
Most people don’t (or until very recently didn’t) really understand what being transgender actually is all about.
This makes it really easy to fearmonger the general population, by painting their “lifestyle” as everything that is wrong with society.
And if you want to solve this issue… well clearly you have to vote for them, because the other guys don’t see the inherent dangers of transgenderism, now do they?
This is not anything inherent to being transgender. The scapegoat before this were homosexuals.
However society has progressed to the point where most people understand what homosexuality is, and accept (or at the very least tolerate) homosexuals existing as a part of society. It turns out they weren’t pedophilic devil worshipers after all…
That will happen with transgender people too. People will learn, acceptance will grow.
And when it does, these cretins move on to the next minority group.
Bonus round: Replace “transgender” with “Jew” in the things I mentioned above, and see what that reminds you of.
I know this is going to sound petty but small point of order - transgender is an adjective. It goes before who is being described - example “Transgender people”
“Transgenders"is a word that we in the community sometimes see from sources that want to create us as a wholesale noun. Usually same linguistic place as removing " cis” as an equal adjective in language and an adjective (ie “there are normal people and then there are transgenders”) or to create a differentiating noun wholesale by removing the space between adjective and noun ( ie. “that’s not a woman it’s a transwoman”)
These may seem a ridiculously small thing but in some places these linguistic cues are used either as subtle anti-trans dog whistles on the right… And on the other side of it inside the community the kindest way we tend to use the term is jokingly when doing impersonations of grandparents and the like… ie “Those kids today and their pokemans and their transgenders! When I was a kid we had bottlecaps and we liked it!”
Yeah, I was hesitating between using “transgenders” or “transgender people” there.
In the end I chose “transgenders” because it fit better with “homosexuals” a paragraph prior. I didn’t really mean anything more by it.
I’ll be sure to edit the comment though :)
P.S. I also used the word “transgenderism” a few paragraphs prior, which I know is sometimes used as a dog whistle too.
In that case I specifically chose to use that word because of the context of that sentence being an example of hate.
Oh no problem, you definitely have ally vibes so I didn’t think you meant anything by it, just doing a heads up since some folk legit don’t know. I saw “transgenderism” was being used in context of framed as not being proper nomenclature/ used by bigots but “transgenders” appeared to be used without the same context cues.
The real question here is why driver’s licenses have a gender field; we can’t sanely discuss questions about it (including why “they” care about this field so much) without answering this first.
It’s a wedge issue. They incite hatred against their preferred minority (trans people in this case) and then score points with their voters by passing laws to harm that minority.
These are people who make up their own fantasies about oppression where they walk away the hero and someone starts a slow clap. All of this is based really on insecurity and projecting that outwards rather than to try to become a better person inside. They project their fears on others and make others suffer, as that is the only thing that can satisfy someone who believes they are pushed into a corner.
Why do they care so much? Why? I want to ask them to show me on the doll where the trans person hurt them.
It’s not that they got hurt.
It’s that fascism is an engine of hatred that burns minorities for power.
Think about bullies: they aren’t attacking people who hurt them; they’re attacking people to make themselves seem dominant.
You have a good point, but I’d like to add that the group mentality is probably different from what a single bully would do or feel.
I think that this comes from these people being scared of not fitting in and from not having anything in common with the other people who don’t fit it, so instead of uniting for a common goal, they can only find unity in being against something that they have in common not being. That’s why they attack minorities of all kinds.
It also explains the hypocrisy. The individual isn’t afraid of abortions, homosexuals or mexicans. Sometimes they need to accept those on an individual level, but they still go along with the anti-politics because it’s not about themselves personally.
Facism isn’t just based on simple hatred. It’s mostly based on fear of not fitting in, because the individual is well aware of their own not fitting in.
Fascism is also an ideology of fear. It requires an enemy that’s both weak and existentially threatening in order to frighten and divide people.
For the modern right that enemy is now the trans community. And make no mistake, it’s cynical and deliberate. Alt right figures sought and found the enemy they needed to galvanize voters, and now they’re stoking that fear as best they can.
This is the part that I fail to comprehend either.
What is the worst thing that would happen if trans people have rights (including the right to just exist in society)?
When it was making rules against gender-affirming care for children, at least they could hide behind the (ludicrously false) “we’re protecting the children!” argument.
They can’t even do that here. There is just no justification for this beyond either “god doesn’t want this to happen” or just basic cruelty.
The cruelty has always been the point.
A hate based ideology always needs an outgroup to discriminate against. It’s really as simple as that.
When you’re conditioned to need power over the other, you will always seek someone to put your boot on.
This is how it was explained to me; I’ll do the best I can to write it out in a way that makes sense.
You know how most left-leaning see MAGA as a cult of idiocy? Really Really dumb people easily motivated by propaganda, that if it weren’t for trump and other republican bad actors, they would just otherwise be innocent idiots ready to be manipulated by someone else? There exists a subset of conservatives that believe idiocy and gullibility applies to both sides. Just like a simple farmer can get turned storm-the-capitol-terrorist by a few tweets and youtube videos, the theory is that an innocent dumb gay kid can be turned trans by a few tiktoks. They don’t look at it like a rights issue; they don’t believe that most trans people actually exist. They look at it like catering to a dangerous cult who manipulates their followers into self-mutilation and a terribly unhappy life.
The thing about making an argument in good faith, is that logic and reason generally always apply to produce the same conclusions if given the same set of facts. There are plenty of people out there perfectly content to make a bad faith argument for personal gain, and I’m not really talking about those people. The issue with trans rights is that it’s very easy to make a good faith argument with only a minor dispute in facts that leads down a path of “treat the disease” rather than “give them rights” when solving in good faith for “protect the vulnerable”.
Think about it this way, You probably wouldn’t argue that law should cater towards the reality MAGA repubes believe the world to exist in, right?
The difference between a MAGA cultist and a trans person, is that a MAGA cultist wants to see everyone other than themselves to suffer.
I would hope that the difference is a trans person wasn’t manipulated by a deranged cult during their formative years. If that isn’t the difference, then the repubes were right all along.
Well, they’re not right.
If maga folks who think this way actually could get over their fear and disgust and see trans people as fellow humans, maybe they could truly listen to trans people’s experiences and listen to the medical community, and come to realize their view doesn’t line up with reality.
Thinking trans people are trans because someone convinced them they are is similar to thinking sexual preference is a choice (it isn’t, if you didn’t know that).
They retool and reuse a lot of anti LGB arguments - they still hate gay people, they just know it doesn’t play well right now.
The “protect the children” crowd put out so many lies that it’s impossible to keep up with. Chuds pretend that kids can just walk into a clinic, say “I think I’m a boy/girl” and walk out with a hormone script and a surgery appointment, and because most people don’t know anything about transgender care they believe it. I don’t think your average person actually is that bothered by real trans people, they’re just lead to believe that 8 year olds are getting their penises lopped off.
This is a huge part of it. A lot of these people have a huge misunderstanding of gender dysphoria and seriously think that people are convincing 8 year olds to have a sex change. It’s a lack of education and critical thinking skills that the leaders of right wing politics and religious/cult leaders have been perpetuating for a long time. Stupid people are easier to control.
That and a lack of empathy to even try to understand what another human is going through, especially if they are different from themselves. This too, probably stems from the same fascist playbook.
To them, it’s “icky” and “weird”. Therefore, it must be WRONG.
Sadly, I don’t think that’s an oversimplification. For them, it really is just that simple.
Probably, but I think there’s also a big element of “God hates you because my minister said so” or whatever.
Conservatives have an over active “ick” sensitivity.
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2017-41186-006
Because we’re the enemy. We’re different and bad and we make them uncomfortable so we must be why they’re unhappy and why their lives aren’t what they thought they should be
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I’ve been finding a strange peace in understanding our history. Not just the history beginning with the 20th century but the reality that we’ve always been everywhere. When we’re cracked down on we rise back in the shadows in a generation, the second the grip inevitably slips enough. Is it a good life? No, it’s one of crimes of desperation, like sex work. But it is a life, and it’s a life that many found worth living unlike a life in the closet.
Even if the worst comes to pass some of our killers’ descendants will claim us as ancestors. And I for one claim them as my descendants.
It makes more sense if you look at this as them needing a scapegoat.
Most people don’t (or until very recently didn’t) really understand what being transgender actually is all about.
This makes it really easy to fearmonger the general population, by painting their “lifestyle” as everything that is wrong with society.
And if you want to solve this issue… well clearly you have to vote for them, because the other guys don’t see the inherent dangers of transgenderism, now do they?
This is not anything inherent to being transgender. The scapegoat before this were homosexuals.
However society has progressed to the point where most people understand what homosexuality is, and accept (or at the very least tolerate) homosexuals existing as a part of society. It turns out they weren’t pedophilic devil worshipers after all…
That will happen with transgender people too. People will learn, acceptance will grow.
And when it does, these cretins move on to the next minority group.
Bonus round: Replace “transgender” with “Jew” in the things I mentioned above, and see what that reminds you of.
I know this is going to sound petty but small point of order - transgender is an adjective. It goes before who is being described - example “Transgender people”
“Transgenders"is a word that we in the community sometimes see from sources that want to create us as a wholesale noun. Usually same linguistic place as removing " cis” as an equal adjective in language and an adjective (ie “there are normal people and then there are transgenders”) or to create a differentiating noun wholesale by removing the space between adjective and noun ( ie. “that’s not a woman it’s a transwoman”)
These may seem a ridiculously small thing but in some places these linguistic cues are used either as subtle anti-trans dog whistles on the right… And on the other side of it inside the community the kindest way we tend to use the term is jokingly when doing impersonations of grandparents and the like… ie “Those kids today and their pokemans and their transgenders! When I was a kid we had bottlecaps and we liked it!”
Yeah, I was hesitating between using “transgenders” or “transgender people” there.
In the end I chose “transgenders” because it fit better with “homosexuals” a paragraph prior. I didn’t really mean anything more by it.
I’ll be sure to edit the comment though :)
P.S. I also used the word “transgenderism” a few paragraphs prior, which I know is sometimes used as a dog whistle too.
In that case I specifically chose to use that word because of the context of that sentence being an example of hate.
Oh no problem, you definitely have ally vibes so I didn’t think you meant anything by it, just doing a heads up since some folk legit don’t know. I saw “transgenderism” was being used in context of framed as not being proper nomenclature/ used by bigots but “transgenders” appeared to be used without the same context cues.
The real question here is why driver’s licenses have a gender field; we can’t sanely discuss questions about it (including why “they” care about this field so much) without answering this first.
The general answer seems to be that law enforcement can match it against records to determine if someone might be a subject of interest they’re on the lookout for.
Since the new Florida policy makes this harder, by raising the odds that a license does not match current records… I have no answer for you.
It’s a wedge issue. They incite hatred against their preferred minority (trans people in this case) and then score points with their voters by passing laws to harm that minority.
These are people who make up their own fantasies about oppression where they walk away the hero and someone starts a slow clap. All of this is based really on insecurity and projecting that outwards rather than to try to become a better person inside. They project their fears on others and make others suffer, as that is the only thing that can satisfy someone who believes they are pushed into a corner.
Conservatism is a mental disorder.
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