Opinion: TG People the New Demon for the Right?

[Carolyn Marie]

I think the writer has a good point. Now that gays and lesbians are mainstream, and for most, no longer "scary," we are taking their place among those to be feared.

http://www.latimes.c...0,2387747.story

Carolyn Marie

[Guest]

Good article but it took a month of Sundays to load. I liked the comments and I think that the American Taliban tag for their movement is right on the mark! I wanted to read more but i have to go to bed and could not wait for the second volume of War&Peace. That is why I'm not fond of that site. Thanks for sharing. Jody

[Guest Chrysee]

I wanted to read more but i have to go to bed and could not wait for the second volume of War&Peace.

Jody

I find that I always enjoy a good pop-up book, myself.

Good morning, J.T. sweetie!

Cissy

[Guest KimberlyF]

First it doesn't say the Right. It says social conservatives. I know MANY people who can't find a party because they are socially open and fiscally conservative.

This is specifically about the social conservatives. Their vote is locked in. So the question becomes if it exists, who are they creating this boogeyman for?

From what I can gather on the net, when an event happens like the Colleen Francis deal at Evergreen State College, there were a whole lot of mothers, feminists and lesbians (sometimes overlapping dynamics) who'd be more than happy to see a T free ENDA. These are not demographically the strongest core GOP voters.

[Guest Jenni_S]

From what I can gather on the net, when an event happens like the Colleen Francis deal at Evergreen State College, there were a whole lot of mothers, feminists and lesbians (sometimes overlapping dynamics) who'd be more than happy to see a T free ENDA. These are not demographically the strongest core GOP voters.

You're not kidding. The police report on that incident has been released, and it is NOT good. I think we're going to be hearing plenty about this in the next few days.

[Guest]

LOL, Cissy you always sneak up from behind and hit me with your one liners. I try to keep a straight face but you get me rolling. I said to a very dear friend that I thought we could be a stand-up comedy team, like George Burns and Gracie Allen. I want to be Gracie... Maybe the tickets wouldn't sell, but you are sure a lot of fun. Giggle. Jody

[Guest Mia J]

I agree Carolyn.

I have seen several right wing groups who have started to use us as the new demons.

The only thing that has changed over time is the name of the group they hate.

First it was the "commie reds", Then the gays, now it is our turn.

The bottom line is that they can not survive unless they have someone to point out as the great Satan to rally their cause around.

Who's turn will it be after us?

Mia

[Guest KimberlyF]

From what I can gather on the net, when an event happens like the Colleen Francis deal at Evergreen State College, there were a whole lot of mothers, feminists and lesbians (sometimes overlapping dynamics) who'd be more than happy to see a T free ENDA. These are not demographically the strongest core GOP voters.

You're not kidding. The police report on that incident has been released, and it is NOT good. I think we're going to be hearing plenty about this in the next few days.

Yep. I read something about its important for lesbian, women and gay men members of the “LGBT” to make the public-the media and the girls parents-aware that they dont support the infringement on rights for girls by 'men' (their word) like Colleen Francis, and that they dont support Gender Identity Laws which override equality laws designed to protect women and girls.

And this was prior to the police report confirming suspicions they had about the event.

[Drea]

As for the right not caring about trans, it seems to me since the political activists within the community have been bashing the right all along so why should the right care?

I've never had issues with right leaning people while the left leaning oones are always so verbally accepting, so much accepting they say but they are the ones who were the worst about adapting and never really saw me in the new role.

Add the way that left has used trans as an epithet. It really shows what they really think.

Edited November 3, 2012 by Drea
fixed "]" to "trans"

[Bulldog1948]

If the ultra right wing nut-jobs would spend more time reading what Jesus said and then applying what Jesus said, we would all be far better off.

Mike

[Guest KimberlyF]

As for the right not caring about trans, it seems to me since the political activists within the community have been bashing the right all along so why should the right care?

I've never had issues with right leaning people while the left leaning oones are always so verbally accepting, so much accepting they say but they are the ones who were the worst about adapting and never really saw me in the new role.

Add the way that left has used] as an epithet. It really shows what they really think.

Well maybe in your day to day life. But it was people on the right that have violated your civil rights that Biden was speaking of, right?

[Guest LizMarie]

I'm sorry but the facts do not support your view on a larger scale, Drea. Every single piece of legislation that I can find that tries to take away rights from transgender individuals originates from the right, not the left. The left is not always fully supportive of us but they've not been actively campaigning to take away your right to use the correct bathroom. That has happened in several states, including Tennessee.

Take TN state Rep Richard Floyd, who introduced exactly that legislation in Tennessee and what he said about us:

He said if he was around any transgender person trying to enter a rest room or dressing room where his wife or daughters were, "I'd just try to stomp a mudhole in him and then stomp him dry."

So you've had some acceptance issues from left wingers. This is a right winger threatening physical violence against TGs and who is the primary sponsor of multiple pieces of legislation trying to dehumanize us.

In 2005, Wisconsin passed legislation banning any transgender healthcare for transgender prisoners, even continuation of hormone therapy. That law had to be overturned by a federal court and the overturning of that law was subsequently upheld by the US Supreme Court who refused to heal the Wisconsin appeal. Who proposed that law? Right wing Republicans, not liberals. The appeals court held that withholding hormone treatment was cruel and unusual punishment and by refusing to hear the state's appeal, the Supreme Court agreed in its entirety.

The judge in Oklahoma who was found denying a routine name change for a transgender woman was a right wing religious zealot, who admitted the same, was proud of it, and found us to be "bizarre" as human beings. The judge in Texas who tried to deny Nicki Araguz her recognition as a woman was a right wing Republican.

And let's look at the record of Mitt Romney, the Republican nominee this year - in 2006 Romney blocked anti-bullying regulations for Massachusetts public schools. Why?

Romney aides said publicly at the time that publication of the guide had been delayed because it was a lengthy document that required further review. But an e-mail authored in May of that year by a high-ranking Department of Public Health official - and obtained last week by the Globe through a public records request - reflected a different reason.

“Because this is using the terms ‘bisexual’ and ‘transgendered,’ DPH’s name may not be used in this publication,’’ wrote the official, Alda Rego-Weathers, then the deputy commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health.

Because the Department of Public Health was the primary sponsor and funding source of the guide, the move effectively blocked its publication.

Rego-Weathers said in the e-mail that she had been consulting with Romney’s office on the issue.

Stifling the guide’s publication was among steps that Romney and his aides took during his last year in office to distance the Republican governor from state programs designed to specifically support gays, lesbians, and bisexual and transgender people. His critics said it was part of an effort to court social conservatives as he prepared for his first campaign for president in 2008

.

Romney sacrificed gay and transgender kids on the altar of his presidential ambitions. How many GLBT suicides might have been prevented in the years since in Massachusetts if those regulations had gone into effect? We'll never know but given the TG suicide attempt rate, it's probably a lot.

Do we start to see a pattern here? If you want, I can go on and on about right wingers and their efforts to strip transgender persons of identity, legal protections, and basic rights. I can cite right wingers who deliberately incite violence against trans people.

Trying to equate lack of acceptance on the left with what the right is actively doing today to destroy us as individuals is, quite frankly, unbelievable and incredibly short sighted. I'll take ignorant individual bigots on the left any day over people who are actively trying to dehumanize and vilify me for being who I am.

[Guest Jenni_S]

I'm sorry but the facts do not support your view on a larger scale, Drea.

I see. So did Drea's personal experiences actually happen or not happen? You seem to be dismissing them outright, right there. No one's personal experience should ever be dismissed just because they're not the same as someone else's.

[Guest KimberlyF]

I'm sorry but the facts do not support your view on a larger scale, Drea.

When Drea used such phrases as "I've never had issues..." and "never really saw me in the new role." that she is relating personal experiences from her life. But sorry Drea, the facts don't support your experiences.

Interestingly enough, Drea's first paragraph kinda says that the Right isn't going to champion TG causes:

"As for the right not caring about trans, it seems to me since the political activists within the community have been bashing the right all along so why should the right care?"

Seems like this post made her case.

Politics isn't about morals. It's about voting blocks.

[Guest Melissa~]

It's been my impression the Transgender people have always been the "bogeyman." It's no accident that the stonewall incident happened because TG people were there, not gays.

[Guest KimberlyF]

It's been my impression the Transgender people have always been the "bogeyman." It's no accident that the stonewall incident happened because TG people were there, not gays.

There has been some history. As I've mentioned before there is a backlash against the TG community due to Colleen Francis that is being led online by lesbian feminists who feel that transsexualism is a crock. Members of the LGBT are happy the Right Wing Alliance Defending Freedom group has taken the case of the students and parents against a TG even as the ADF misgenders this person. But that's OK because all the lesbians have done it since the story broke before they had all the facts.

[Guest Lacey Lynne - Free Spirit]

If the ultra right wing nut-jobs would spend more time reading what Jesus said and then applying what Jesus said, we would all be far better off.

Mike

Friggin' A correct, bro! Agree with you all the way. Right on.

The far-out right? Heck with 'em. Just my opinion.

Peace & Joy Lacey Lynne

[Drea]

I'm sorry but the facts do not support your view on a larger scale, Drea. Every single piece of legislation that I can find that tries to take away rights from transgender individuals originates from the right, not the left. The left is not always fully supportive of us but they've not been actively campaigning to take away your right to use the correct bathroom. That has happened in several states, including Tennessee.

What you state does not negate anything I said. I stated that the right wasn't going to support trans because the right has been getting bashed all along by the community as represented by the activists. Now this wasn't the case in the past. It only came up as a backlash to the political activists that have sought legislation. Unfortunaity the legislation has never focused on the sensible needs of medically indicated treatment. It has been written in very broad terms such that it would protect someone expressing their recreational crossdressing habit in the workplace. So as I said, it isn't surprising there is a backlash.

My personal experiences are just that, but I know they are not unique. I live in an area so politically conservative that there often isn't even a democrat candidate running. I happen to live not too far from a very large, left oriented metropolitan area where awareness is high and I would feel far more at risk there than here.

One can also look at where violence against trans occurs. Where are all the conservative areas where trans people have been victims of violence? The vast majority of these things happen in very strong left oriented areas.

I get a bit tired of the fear mongering about how terrible it is to transition in a small town and conservative areas. This is an unfounded bias in my opinion. I know many who have been successful in such conservative areas. I know far more struggling with acceptance among those in, or who\ go to so called trans friendly or more "liberal" areas

Here is this article that I think explains quite well why negative perceptiosn about conservative areas are wrong:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/04/opinion/were-here-were-queer-yall.html?_r=0

[Carolyn Marie]

One can also look at where violence against trans occurs. Where are all the conservative areas where trans people have been victims of violence? The vast majority of these things happen in very strong left oriented areas.

I'm not going to weigh in on the majority of the arguments back and forth here. My only comment concerns the quote above. Drea, in my reading of dozens, if not hundreds, of reports on TG related crimes, the thing that stands out is that the vast majority occur in high risk, high crime areas, mostly late at night or early in the morning, and most during of after high risk behaviors. I'm not sure what you consider a "left oriented area," but if you mean anyplace that isn't rural, then perhaps you're right. But I wouldn't characterize such places by their political leanings.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest LizMarie]

Drea, pushback? Really? Blacks should have meekly turned aside when whites pushed back? Come on.

As for the rest of what you said, you will not find a liberal politician who is working against us as transgenders. You will find conservative politicians doing far more than just not accepting you (or maybe accepting you partly). These are the people who have actually submitted legislation to take our rights away. Period. End of discussion. If that doesn't frighten you then it should.

Lots of us want a balanced budget and a more responsible government. We want fraud and abuse identified and dealt with. Lots of us are sympathetic to some things the Republicans say. But I'm sorry, I'm not going to vote for the guy whose party harbors members who want to round us up and put us behind electric fences. Or the party who has a guy who wants to stomp a "mudhole" into us. Or the party that tells women someone else has the right to tell them how to control their bodies. Or the party that constantly tries to qualify and redefine rape.

The Republican Party has a large wing that is racist, homophobic, and transphobic and that wing is proud of this. I tried to change the Republican party and conservative friends for years. Very few ever listened to facts. And more interestingly, so far every single person who has personally rejected me since I came out is a right wing religious transphobe. Every single one. I have 5 conservative friends who accept me who happen to not be religious zealots and I have a couple dozen liberal friends who accept me and not one of them has rejected me.

It's very clear that on the political level, the people who represent a threat to us are the right wing religious zealots all of whom support the Republican Party. Any transgender person who then votes for that party thus baffles me. That's asking to be kicked around.

I am socially liberal and fiscally conservative. Neither major party represents me but the party that comes closest is the Democrats. And if you really think the Republicans are for smaller government, I suggest you review every single president since Abe Lincoln, the first Republican. All of them have overseen growing governments, not shrinking ones.

[Guest KimberlyF]

I've said this before that politicians are full of it and look for voting blocks. But here is an interesting factoid. In 2011 and 2012 I counted 20 names from the USA listed on the scrolls of the TDOR. 20 for 20 come from cities with Democratic mayors. And 17 of 20 came from places Obama won on Tues.

That seems to back up the article Drea linked to pretty well.

[Carolyn Marie]

20 for 20 come from cities with Democratic mayors. And 17 of 20 came from places Obama won on Tues.

That seems to back up the article Drea linked to pretty well.

You've got to be kidding, Kim. So city mayors and state governors are responsible for the murders committed in their jurisdictions? If the electorates had put Republican's in office those murders would not have been committed? Those statistics prove nothing, in my view.

Carolyn Marie

[Guest KimberlyF]

20 for 20 come from cities with Democratic mayors. And 17 of 20 came from places Obama won on Tues.

That seems to back up the article Drea linked to pretty well.

You've got to be kidding, Kim. So city mayors and state governors are responsible for the murders committed in their jurisdictions? If the electorates had put Republican's in office those murders would not have been committed? Those statistics prove nothing, in my view.

Carolyn Marie

What I said was it seemed to back up Drea's link pretty well. Considering the votes for Obama and Romney were about 2% apart, and considering Romney carried most of the south or as the article calls it, "the nation’s most evangelical and politically conservative region", it seems to back up the premise of the article nicely.

From the piece:

"Many people assume that because the South is the nation’s most evangelical and politically conservative region, it is probably also a hotbed for hate crimes against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people. But while such crimes do occur, they are less common than in large urban centers, where the absence of a tight community and the abundance of strangers make it easier to target people for their differences."

So all of the murders the past two years have happened in non-conservative mostly northern areas. The fact that they all have Dem mayors proves they're not heavy conservative areas. Again, I never once claimed that anyone would be alive if by some chance Hollywood, Callifornia elected a Republican mayor.

But given the stats that, some may wonder if there isn't a bit of demonizing going on in both directions?

[Guest Melissa~]

I think there is an effect of people being lower profile in highly conservative areas too. it's just not that cut and dried as an example Drea's rather dry forum profile keeps any hint of history at bay.

[Drea]

You've got to be kidding, Kim. So city mayors and state governors are responsible for the murders committed in their jurisdictions? If the electorates had put Republican's in office those murders would not have been committed? Those statistics prove nothing, in my view.

I would never have read that into Kim's statement. Of course a governer is not personally responsible for the act of individual. However the the fact that left oriented politicians typically are the ones getting elected in the areas where these things have happened does support my assertion that such things are occuring in left leaning areas.

I have said it before, if trans people did the smart thing, what business do which is support both sides so it doesn't matter who wins they will have some obligation towards trans so much more could be achieved. But as I noted, long before any right winder went sponsoring any law against trans, trans were already bashing the right..so politicians will do what they always have done when one group attacks them, they write off that group because it is pointless and will do what they can to make that group's issues fodder and to gain support to the extent that they can from people who are offended them. To go claim this reaction is the cause of the original action just doesn't hold water.

The really sad thing about the way the community makes these assumptions and promotes misconceptions about how terrible it is to be trans in conservative dominated areas is that it is false and it causes people to needlessly stress, to go thru difficult relocations which might not be any easier and quite possibly be more difficult.