I don’t even have a witty title for this. I’m so fucking beyond done with the alt-right, conservative Christendom, and their stranglehold on American politics. I don’t like getting political on here — I’d rather write about music and life hacks and inspiring things — but I can’t be silent about this shit.
There are calls to eradicate trans people. I wish I was exaggerating, but let’s hear the actual words of Michael Knowles, who spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday.
“For the good of society … transgenderism must be eradicated from public life entirely — the whole preposterous ideology, at every level.”
Oh, he can’t literally mean that, right? He just wants to ban drag shows. Never mind that the child beauty pageant world is a helluva lot more exploitative (and full of…dare I say…groomers). Or that more priests have molested children than drag queens. Masculine bodies in dresses are so scary, though.
That’s not what this fuckwad is talking about, though. Let him clarify.
“I called to ban transgenderism entirely … They said that I was calling for the extermination of transgender people. They said I was calling for a genocide … One, I don’t know how you could have a genocide of transgender people because genocide refers to genes, it refers to genetics, it refers to biology.”
So it’s not a genocide…because you’re not trying to eliminate a particular gene? But you’re cool with literally erasing an entire group of people? That’s not the part you want to backtrack on? Let’s hear more from this wadded up Subway napkin of a human being.
“Nobody is calling to exterminate anybody, because the other problem with that statement is that transgender people is not a real ontological category — it’s not a legitimate category of being. There are people who think that they are the wrong sex, but they are mistaken. They’re laboring under a delusion. And so we need to correct that delusion.”
And so we need to correct that delusion. Do tell, how do you plan on correcting that delusion? Surely it’s not through conversion therapy, which is proven to be ineffective and harmful. What’s the other option, die? Because it’s starting to seem like that’s what you want. I’m not even going to link to the nasty transphobic shit I’ve seen on the internet. I’d rather not dignify the shitstains who comment “41 percent” on pictures of trans folks just living their lives. But it’s obvious. If they can’t shut the fuck up and live their lives as their assigned gender, you want them dead.
You might say I don’t have a horse in this race. I’m not trans. I’m a cisgender woman. And yet somehow, the majority of the people I associate with are trans. My girlfriend is a trans woman. My three closest friends are trans women. My spiritual mentor is a trans woman. And when you talk shit about hurting them, you hurt me. Maybe that doesn’t matter to you. I’m just some chick with a blog, whatever. But you don’t know which of your loved ones could still be in the closet. You don’t know if your kid or parent or sibling or best friend has been struggling with their gender identity, and why would they let you in on that information if they were? You’re an asshole.
I wish I could humanize trans people in a way that would make their lives matter to you. I wish you could hear Tegan’s obnoxious laugh, or experience Pippa’s warm hugs. I wish you could feel the way Livvy makes me feel when her hand is in mine. I wish you would realize that these people are just like you. They have dreams and unique talents and personalities. They’re not some boogeyman trying to sneak into your daughter’s locker room or beat her swimming record. (And God knows no one would intentionally be in women’s sports, which are notoriously underpublicized and underfunded.)
I don’t even know how to end this. I’m just tired. I’m tired of folks not caring that literal genocidal rhetoric is being spewed by the people in power. I’m tired of worrying about my loved ones becoming victims of hate crimes. I’m tired of this shit being normalized. I’m so, so fucking tired.
JESSA JOYCE 