A plain old-fashioned newspaper crusade.
January 30, 2023 4:55 PM Subscribe
Why Is the New York Times So Obsessed With Trans Kids? A detailed, scathing editorial by Tom Scocca.
Jesse Singal doesn't care how many trans kids he gets killed, and it's fucking loathsome. (I absolutely am related to people who would beat the shit out of and/or throw out of the house any kid of theirs who a teacher outed as trans, it's not a bogeyman.)
posted by praemunire at 5:25 PM on January 30, 2023 [51 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 5:25 PM on January 30, 2023 [51 favorites]
I cannot overstate how much I loathe the evil behind so much of the propaganda and bigotry used to hurt people. They ruin so many lives because they are small people. Just... Frothing hatred that any attacks on people simply trying to live their best life is both ok and profitable, and political fodder for the control freaks.
Some of the people espousing hate are my family.
I think my life would have been infinitely richer if I had the words and knowledge and family stability to get on puberty blockers as a teen, when puberty was a terrifying nightmare that only slightly lessened.
And they are starting to pass laws against health care. Lives are going to be lost.
posted by Jacen at 5:29 PM on January 30, 2023 [30 favorites]
Some of the people espousing hate are my family.
I think my life would have been infinitely richer if I had the words and knowledge and family stability to get on puberty blockers as a teen, when puberty was a terrifying nightmare that only slightly lessened.
And they are starting to pass laws against health care. Lives are going to be lost.
posted by Jacen at 5:29 PM on January 30, 2023 [30 favorites]
... lives have already been lost thanks to the changes in the us ... not to belittle your point, it's just already happening
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:50 PM on January 30, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:50 PM on January 30, 2023 [13 favorites]
Jesse Singal and other despicable trash like him whip up all this panic because there aren't a lot of trans people. Singal et cie enjoy the panic, the attention, the clicks, the paychecks, the feeling that they're certainly definitely heroes asking the hard questions in the confidence that the people they bully and threaten are simply too small a group to hit back effectively. Whether this is sheer cynicism or a lack of self-insight, the whole point of the moral panic is that it's cheap, easy and completely safe. They'll all do a Greenwald and move further right the safer that gets, of course.
The audience is people who want to feel like they're liberal because that's nice but don't want to be liberal (never mind left) because that means giving stuff up, like the ability to control every aspect of your children's lives. The same people who support unions...except in their own workplace, where they're happy to hire union-busting consultants. Unions are great for other people who are authentically oppressed, some other kids somewhere are really trans and need to transition but their own kids are obviously just suffering from social contagion, racism just happens in the rural south and not in their own neighborhoods, everything they do is nice and right and it's ungrateful or pathological to suggest otherwise.
I have to say that one thing I miss about the pre-internet era is that I truly, truly didn't understand what a large percentage of humans are just incredibly, incredibly shitty. Just the sheer number of people who have the choice between minding their own business and going out of their way to hurt and exploit others and who of course choose the hurting. When I just thought most people were indifferent, I could get along in the world, but most people actively like hurting others and it really gets me down.
posted by Frowner at 5:54 PM on January 30, 2023 [160 favorites]
The audience is people who want to feel like they're liberal because that's nice but don't want to be liberal (never mind left) because that means giving stuff up, like the ability to control every aspect of your children's lives. The same people who support unions...except in their own workplace, where they're happy to hire union-busting consultants. Unions are great for other people who are authentically oppressed, some other kids somewhere are really trans and need to transition but their own kids are obviously just suffering from social contagion, racism just happens in the rural south and not in their own neighborhoods, everything they do is nice and right and it's ungrateful or pathological to suggest otherwise.
I have to say that one thing I miss about the pre-internet era is that I truly, truly didn't understand what a large percentage of humans are just incredibly, incredibly shitty. Just the sheer number of people who have the choice between minding their own business and going out of their way to hurt and exploit others and who of course choose the hurting. When I just thought most people were indifferent, I could get along in the world, but most people actively like hurting others and it really gets me down.
posted by Frowner at 5:54 PM on January 30, 2023 [160 favorites]
The NYT is running these articles for the rich, class-anxious liberal parents discussed here a few days ago who are terrified their kids will do something that irrevocably bars them from the elite, whether that’s transitioning or going to a hippie college or joining the Army or getting visible tattoos.
I think they mostly don’t see trans people as evil or fake, but they’re absolutely giving ammunition to those who do and who absolutely intend real irrevocable harm.
Abortion, as the article points out, is not treated this way because in the readers’ circles, it’s seen as far less destabilizing than carrying a baby to term. Teens choosing to have and keep a baby might be treated more similarly in the Times and similar outlets?
posted by smelendez at 5:54 PM on January 30, 2023 [21 favorites]
I think they mostly don’t see trans people as evil or fake, but they’re absolutely giving ammunition to those who do and who absolutely intend real irrevocable harm.
Abortion, as the article points out, is not treated this way because in the readers’ circles, it’s seen as far less destabilizing than carrying a baby to term. Teens choosing to have and keep a baby might be treated more similarly in the Times and similar outlets?
posted by smelendez at 5:54 PM on January 30, 2023 [21 favorites]
I wound up scrolling through a lot of this, because I'm the choir, but goddamn was the point elegantly made with the ending of that piece.
posted by entropone at 6:05 PM on January 30, 2023 [7 favorites]
posted by entropone at 6:05 PM on January 30, 2023 [7 favorites]
I have to say that one thing I miss about the pre-internet era is that I truly, truly didn't understand what a large percentage of humans are just incredibly, incredibly shitty.
Years ago I compared it to picking up a rock and seeing what was crawling on the underside. You can't unsee it.
posted by praemunire at 6:06 PM on January 30, 2023 [20 favorites]
Years ago I compared it to picking up a rock and seeing what was crawling on the underside. You can't unsee it.
posted by praemunire at 6:06 PM on January 30, 2023 [20 favorites]
Abortion, as the article points out, is not treated this way
Yet.
posted by Etrigan at 6:07 PM on January 30, 2023 [19 favorites]
Yet.
posted by Etrigan at 6:07 PM on January 30, 2023 [19 favorites]
Ryan Ken (who I think is nonbinary) did a good bit on this: The New York Times covering trans issues
posted by praemunire at 6:10 PM on January 30, 2023 [16 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 6:10 PM on January 30, 2023 [16 favorites]
Jesse Singal doesn't care how many trans kids he gets killed
One thing that struck me about the NYT article was the impressive extent to which it glossed over the fact that, sometimes, parents abandon or murder their trans children.
And that a very obvious reason that schools might err on the side of not running to tell parents that their kid wants to use a different name or different pronouns (even though parents might feel hurt or excluded!) is because a non-zero number of parents, when they find out that their kid wants to do that, kick that child out onto the streets, beat the shit out of them, or kill them.
The article alludes to it here and there but never fully acknowledges what's at stake. There's something about how "not all kids have safe spaces at home." The demands of unnamed "dozens of parents" (I guess some people are afforded privacy!) are at one point hedged with "unless there is evidence of physical abuse at home."
Where, on the one side, you'll find anecdotes and "just asking questions," on the other side of the equation, they could have included plenty of studies and statistics demonstrating how vastly overrepresented LGBTQ+ kids are in foster care and juvenile justice systems. They could have acknowledged the appalling rates of homelessness among LGBTQ+ kids and the further risks and harms that come with that. They could have described the higher rates of physical and mental childhood abuse that trans kids contend with.
But no. All of that was swept aside in favor of the squeamishness of a handful of adults whose lives aren't on the line.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 6:17 PM on January 30, 2023 [93 favorites]
One thing that struck me about the NYT article was the impressive extent to which it glossed over the fact that, sometimes, parents abandon or murder their trans children.
And that a very obvious reason that schools might err on the side of not running to tell parents that their kid wants to use a different name or different pronouns (even though parents might feel hurt or excluded!) is because a non-zero number of parents, when they find out that their kid wants to do that, kick that child out onto the streets, beat the shit out of them, or kill them.
The article alludes to it here and there but never fully acknowledges what's at stake. There's something about how "not all kids have safe spaces at home." The demands of unnamed "dozens of parents" (I guess some people are afforded privacy!) are at one point hedged with "unless there is evidence of physical abuse at home."
Where, on the one side, you'll find anecdotes and "just asking questions," on the other side of the equation, they could have included plenty of studies and statistics demonstrating how vastly overrepresented LGBTQ+ kids are in foster care and juvenile justice systems. They could have acknowledged the appalling rates of homelessness among LGBTQ+ kids and the further risks and harms that come with that. They could have described the higher rates of physical and mental childhood abuse that trans kids contend with.
But no. All of that was swept aside in favor of the squeamishness of a handful of adults whose lives aren't on the line.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 6:17 PM on January 30, 2023 [93 favorites]
I know a trans woman who was thrown out of her house at age 15 by her parents when she told them she was trans. Her parents made it clear they never wanted to hear from her again.
If her aunt hadn't taken her in, she would have been homeless.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 6:54 PM on January 30, 2023 [25 favorites]
If her aunt hadn't taken her in, she would have been homeless.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 6:54 PM on January 30, 2023 [25 favorites]
Talking about my gender with my super-liberal, gay-friendly parents has ... not gone great.
They're normally quite good at avoiding the brain-worms. Coming out as bi to them way back when was no problem at all. But lately they've been talking about how inclusive language "erases women" and that my pronoun change must be because I'm being "trendy".
Are they sucking this stuff up from the Times (and the Atlantic and the Guardian and the etc. etc. etc.)? Or is this stuff in the Times because it's being written by people like my parents? Or both, in some horrific feedback loop?
Probably both.
posted by kyrademon at 6:59 PM on January 30, 2023 [65 favorites]
They're normally quite good at avoiding the brain-worms. Coming out as bi to them way back when was no problem at all. But lately they've been talking about how inclusive language "erases women" and that my pronoun change must be because I'm being "trendy".
Are they sucking this stuff up from the Times (and the Atlantic and the Guardian and the etc. etc. etc.)? Or is this stuff in the Times because it's being written by people like my parents? Or both, in some horrific feedback loop?
Probably both.
posted by kyrademon at 6:59 PM on January 30, 2023 [65 favorites]
Sure enough, a lot of people, particularly young ones, seem to come out as trans much more to make a statement about their desire to transgress gender boundaries than because they are suffering serious anguish
It's telling that Singal is willing to admit, in so many words, that his complaint is that kids aren't suffering enough.
posted by babelfish at 7:37 PM on January 30, 2023 [52 favorites]
It's telling that Singal is willing to admit, in so many words, that his complaint is that kids aren't suffering enough.
posted by babelfish at 7:37 PM on January 30, 2023 [52 favorites]
That article by Scocca is just so. Damn. Well researched and well written. Reading it (a) informed me in ways I hadn't expected, and (b) was a reminder of why I've been thinking I should cancel my NYT subscription: one doesn't read the NYT to become informed, one reads the NYT to appear informed. It's been a steaming heap for decades. (Judith Miller's Brotherhood of Enablers, I'm looking at you.) Sure, nice recipes and wordgames, but unfortunately it's far to painfully true that it's the Paper of Record. It's recording and reflecting the worst about how thinking [doesn't] happen in our culture. Like most of us, it reacts; it records a reaction to any feelings of unease. It can't sit with difficult feelings on complex topics, it reacts and dives into the mess driven by what it should be thinking and writing about. People (in America, for sure, perhaps elsewhere) seem to think it's their fucking job to be opinionated and outraged, and they don't entertain even having a hobby in consideration or reflection of any kind.
posted by armoir from antproof case at 7:43 PM on January 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
posted by armoir from antproof case at 7:43 PM on January 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
...another 4,700 teenagers age 13 to 19 had breast reductions.But where is the data on the reasons for surgery? I went to high school in the middle of a literal cornfield, more decades ago than I care to count, and I personally knew two girls who had breast reduction because of back pain and difficulty with daily activities.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:18 PM on January 30, 2023 [29 favorites]
So you're Just Asking Questions? Why? Are you asking questions out of a genuine concern for the wellbeing of people? Whose answers do you want to hear? What answers do you amplify, which do you silence? Does questioning who deserves human rights and dignity not presuppose that some people might not? Is that not monstrous?
posted by rustcrumb at 8:34 PM on January 30, 2023 [13 favorites]
posted by rustcrumb at 8:34 PM on January 30, 2023 [13 favorites]
seem to come out as trans much more to make a statement about their desire to transgress gender boundaries than because they are suffering serious anguish
It's so weird to think you have to have a Singal-approved reason to decide what your pronouns are. It's like that "I consent!" meme.
posted by praemunire at 8:51 PM on January 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
It's so weird to think you have to have a Singal-approved reason to decide what your pronouns are. It's like that "I consent!" meme.
posted by praemunire at 8:51 PM on January 30, 2023 [10 favorites]
Dr MacKinnon's research on detransitioners is actually more nuanced and trans-affirming than the article leads you to believe. He goes into why the sample size tends to be small, and he also talks about how a lot of the detransitioners he surveys either identify as non-binary or not really finding the cis/trans dichotomy to fit their own experiences of gender.
posted by creatrixtiara at 8:52 PM on January 30, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by creatrixtiara at 8:52 PM on January 30, 2023 [15 favorites]
I'm noticing the parallels with how the news stories quoted in the article talk about trans identity, and how people often talk about autism.
Focusing so much on the impact of the family and especially the parents, rather than on the autistic person themselves.
Giving voice to the parents rather than speaking directly to the people whose wellbeing they are concerned about, (young trans people) creates such an odd, pathologising atmosphere around trans identity.
As if those young people are not entirely sentient?
posted by Zumbador at 9:23 PM on January 30, 2023 [67 favorites]
Focusing so much on the impact of the family and especially the parents, rather than on the autistic person themselves.
Giving voice to the parents rather than speaking directly to the people whose wellbeing they are concerned about, (young trans people) creates such an odd, pathologising atmosphere around trans identity.
As if those young people are not entirely sentient?
posted by Zumbador at 9:23 PM on January 30, 2023 [67 favorites]
kyrademon, I'm sorry your parents are being donks.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 9:25 PM on January 30, 2023 [8 favorites]
posted by evidenceofabsence at 9:25 PM on January 30, 2023 [8 favorites]
They're normally quite good at avoiding the brain-worms...Are they sucking this stuff up from the Times?
Unfortunately I think trans and nonbinary folks are currently at the point where gay people were in 80s. Not only is there a very determined backlash against them, but there isn't yet a critical mass of positive presence in the media and everyday life that will reassure people that all of this is fine. Without a backstop of positive examples and positive arguments your average person falls prey to this condescending and hurtful skepticism.
What's so frustrating is that if you are old enough you've seen all of this before. It's all recycled, from the hysteria about "grooming" to "you are just doing this for attention" to "we know what's natural and you don't."
posted by anhedonic at 9:41 PM on January 30, 2023 [64 favorites]
Unfortunately I think trans and nonbinary folks are currently at the point where gay people were in 80s. Not only is there a very determined backlash against them, but there isn't yet a critical mass of positive presence in the media and everyday life that will reassure people that all of this is fine. Without a backstop of positive examples and positive arguments your average person falls prey to this condescending and hurtful skepticism.
What's so frustrating is that if you are old enough you've seen all of this before. It's all recycled, from the hysteria about "grooming" to "you are just doing this for attention" to "we know what's natural and you don't."
posted by anhedonic at 9:41 PM on January 30, 2023 [64 favorites]
Transdisagreebia
posted by memebake at 12:01 AM on January 31, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by memebake at 12:01 AM on January 31, 2023 [1 favorite]
Thanks for posting this. I've been thinking to make an ask about the very obvious transphobic hysteria in The Times and The Guardian, but found it hard to word it. This post and many of the comments in the thread are helpful, but it is still confusing. And, anhedonic, I agree, a very frustrating deja vu.
posted by mumimor at 12:09 AM on January 31, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by mumimor at 12:09 AM on January 31, 2023 [6 favorites]
I don't have a lot to add to this article, but damn, it's a good summary of what's going on. It's not quite as bad in the US yet as it is in the UK, but look out, it's coming. I'm not in the US or the UK, but people should get ready to fight tooth and nail.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:32 AM on January 31, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:32 AM on January 31, 2023 [1 favorite]
The NYT is running these articles for the rich, class-anxious liberal parents discussed here a few days ago who are terrified their kids will do something that irrevocably bars them from the elite, whether that’s transitioning or going to a hippie college or joining the Army or getting visible tattoos.
To be fair, joining the Army should definitely be illegal.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:34 AM on January 31, 2023 [9 favorites]
To be fair, joining the Army should definitely be illegal.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 1:34 AM on January 31, 2023 [9 favorites]
The latest episode of the podcast Cancel Me, Daddy had a good discussion on the New York Times’ habit of just asking questions about trans people between Katelyn Burns and Michael Hobbes.
posted by Kattullus at 1:46 AM on January 31, 2023 [12 favorites]
posted by Kattullus at 1:46 AM on January 31, 2023 [12 favorites]
I google Courage Is A Habit out of curiosity and am just laughing because the resources and their decoding of the Evil Woke Things is just so so close to reality and yet missing it by a country mile. Oh noes, we might teach children to cooperate and consider other people's feelings!
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 2:47 AM on January 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by dorothyisunderwood at 2:47 AM on January 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
As a trans person who was kicked out of the family home as a freshly minted adult because my parents refused to accept my transition, it's heartening to see Mefites talking about these major outlets shamelessly peddling transphobia.
Trans people, and in particular trans youth, are the new media punching bag and it's getting people killed.
posted by neonamber at 2:58 AM on January 31, 2023 [37 favorites]
Trans people, and in particular trans youth, are the new media punching bag and it's getting people killed.
posted by neonamber at 2:58 AM on January 31, 2023 [37 favorites]
This is a very good article, thanks for posting.
QFT: The idea that coming out as gay is a low-stakes decision is an artifact of the writer living at a very particular moment in history, in a very particular sociocultural space
posted by chavenet at 3:05 AM on January 31, 2023 [17 favorites]
QFT: The idea that coming out as gay is a low-stakes decision is an artifact of the writer living at a very particular moment in history, in a very particular sociocultural space
posted by chavenet at 3:05 AM on January 31, 2023 [17 favorites]
The Irish media have hopped on this trend gleefully, but not with the same traction as in the UK. I think it might help that some of the essentialist arguments about women that are being used there - cis women as nurturers, ciswomen needing cis women only spaces for safety and so on - have hit the historical fact of mother and baby homes and Magdalen laundries, which were run by women who abused other women appallingly. Also, the current standard bearer for refusing to address a trans school child by their pronouns, Enoch Burke, is a total melt and clearly a very unhinged cult member so even the usual crew are running from him.
posted by lesbiassparrow at 4:03 AM on January 31, 2023 [17 favorites]
posted by lesbiassparrow at 4:03 AM on January 31, 2023 [17 favorites]
The only good thing about the trans panic is that the haters are actually right — the generation of kids in school now do, in fact, have a completely different relationship to gender than the NYT bloviators want them to. It’s one of the best things about raising kids right now.
I am intensely conscious that it’s my privilege that lets me live in a place and have my kids in schools that support trans and non-binary kids… but it is so, so beautiful to see. May everyone have the good fortune to see a child blossom like a child that finds the expression of their true identity.
posted by bgribble at 4:05 AM on January 31, 2023 [39 favorites]
I am intensely conscious that it’s my privilege that lets me live in a place and have my kids in schools that support trans and non-binary kids… but it is so, so beautiful to see. May everyone have the good fortune to see a child blossom like a child that finds the expression of their true identity.
posted by bgribble at 4:05 AM on January 31, 2023 [39 favorites]
God almighty, there is nothing wrong with being trans. Just like there is nothing wrong with being gay, being left handed, being autistic, or being American. Being trans will not ruin your child's life as long as you are not a shit person. If you are a shit person, you will ruin your child's life in one way or another regardless of their gender, so stop being shit.
We have had all of these fucking arguments already. Being different is just fucking fine.
(This rant is not directed at Metafilter but at every transphobe I encounter online and IRL.)
posted by plonkee at 5:10 AM on January 31, 2023 [13 favorites]
We have had all of these fucking arguments already. Being different is just fucking fine.
(This rant is not directed at Metafilter but at every transphobe I encounter online and IRL.)
posted by plonkee at 5:10 AM on January 31, 2023 [13 favorites]
I thought this was overall quite good, and I appreciate it being posted! This is personal for me because I am trans and my mom loves the New York Times and so these articles lead to earnest and painful conversations because my mom takes them seriously even as she is at a point where she accepts that I'm trans (which did not happen immediately). There are many many more cis people than there are trans people so it makes sense that their perspective is always going to be the default, even when talking about trans issues, and my mom without really realizing it is always sympathetic to the cis person in any given scenario even when they are causing harm to a trans person and I think pieces like the ones described are both a cause of this and an effect of that kind of thinking; cis discomfort matters more than trans anguish.
One thing he doesn't say that I would like to point out is that, if this anti-trans campaign is successful enough at marginalizing trans people, it won't stop with us. Everyone should stand in solidarity with trans people because it's the right thing to do but beyond that it is also the smart thing to do, especially if you're another type of queer. He draws parallels between the way parents and others talked about gay kids in the past and that's not coincidental, if they roll back trans rights they're going to keep going, and if past (and current) behavior is any indication the New York Times will be right there with them providing "liberal" cover for disgusting bigotry.
posted by an octopus IRL at 5:26 AM on January 31, 2023 [36 favorites]
One thing he doesn't say that I would like to point out is that, if this anti-trans campaign is successful enough at marginalizing trans people, it won't stop with us. Everyone should stand in solidarity with trans people because it's the right thing to do but beyond that it is also the smart thing to do, especially if you're another type of queer. He draws parallels between the way parents and others talked about gay kids in the past and that's not coincidental, if they roll back trans rights they're going to keep going, and if past (and current) behavior is any indication the New York Times will be right there with them providing "liberal" cover for disgusting bigotry.
posted by an octopus IRL at 5:26 AM on January 31, 2023 [36 favorites]
This is their demographic. They're putting this stuff out for Nice White People who have NYT subscriptions and "Hate Has No Home Here" signs on their lawns. That kind of thing doesn't mean you can't have bad ideas, and somebody at the NYT wants to sell their bad idea and knows how to do it.
Let's be clear, this is also a substantial portion of Metafilter's membership. Let's not pretend we're magically immune. Anyone who's been around had seen cis people on Metafilter buy this stuff before. Pretending you're/we're immune or enlightened or whatever is part of the problem.
posted by hoyland at 5:31 AM on January 31, 2023 [26 favorites]
Let's be clear, this is also a substantial portion of Metafilter's membership. Let's not pretend we're magically immune. Anyone who's been around had seen cis people on Metafilter buy this stuff before. Pretending you're/we're immune or enlightened or whatever is part of the problem.
posted by hoyland at 5:31 AM on January 31, 2023 [26 favorites]
I got into a fight about trans kids, with a therapist of all people, and he shared his “sources” with me, and they were all articles by Jesse Singal, and I was “there’s your problem.” I sent him some of Julia Serano’s posts about her experience with him (summary with links here) and his duplicitous shenanigans. Don’t know if it did any good.
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:34 AM on January 31, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by GenjiandProust at 6:34 AM on January 31, 2023 [15 favorites]
Thank you for posting this article. It's an excellent take down and nicely outlines yet another reason to hate the NYT. A newspaper that basically exists to help rich white people feel good and justified about being rich white people.
It was nice to see the breakdown in quantity and placement of coverage and focus that shows the total bankruptcy of framing those articles as "just asking questions!" They are trying to make people forget that Trans people are fully fledged people who should have agency over their own lives. They are not weird hypothetical quandaries up for debate and panic in the public square.
I was disappointed that the magazine, Popula, has a weird crypto-currency focus in its mission, but that's an aside that shouldn't detract from the article.
posted by being_quiet at 6:48 AM on January 31, 2023 [1 favorite]
It was nice to see the breakdown in quantity and placement of coverage and focus that shows the total bankruptcy of framing those articles as "just asking questions!" They are trying to make people forget that Trans people are fully fledged people who should have agency over their own lives. They are not weird hypothetical quandaries up for debate and panic in the public square.
I was disappointed that the magazine, Popula, has a weird crypto-currency focus in its mission, but that's an aside that shouldn't detract from the article.
posted by being_quiet at 6:48 AM on January 31, 2023 [1 favorite]
One of the things that drives me absolutely batshit about the discourse on puberty blockers is that we already know the long-term effects of them. Puberty blockers have been used for decades to treat precocious puberty in children, and have been proven to be safe and effective in that case. If they can safely prevent another Lina Medina when prescribed to a toddler until they reach the age of natural puberty, then they are safe to give to a pre-pubescent preteen for a couple years as well.
I'm going to go back and finish reading the article now, but speaking as a transfeminine person, I know it's absolutely going to be preaching to the choir.
posted by SansPoint at 6:55 AM on January 31, 2023 [14 favorites]
I'm going to go back and finish reading the article now, but speaking as a transfeminine person, I know it's absolutely going to be preaching to the choir.
posted by SansPoint at 6:55 AM on January 31, 2023 [14 favorites]
(See also Discourse Blog's 'The New York Times is Hooked on Transphobia.')
posted by box at 7:46 AM on January 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by box at 7:46 AM on January 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
Jesse Singal doesn't care how many trans kids he gets killed, and it's fucking loathsome. (I absolutely am related to people who would beat the shit out of and/or throw out of the house any kid of theirs who a teacher outed as trans, it's not a bogeyman.)
One of my children came to me after being booted by their birth fam for being trans. At least two of my friends currently have teenagers living with them who do not live with their families because their families couldn't accept their status; another Facebook friend just posted that she's considering this after learning of a couch-surfing teen in her orbit, looking for advice.
I was disowned by my family a decade ago for supporting the trans identity of my then-five-year-old. I was 47 at the time, so I had a home to go to and a long history with this family that made being disowned kind of a relief. That's never going to be true for a fifteen-year-old.
posted by Well I never at 7:59 AM on January 31, 2023 [25 favorites]
One of my children came to me after being booted by their birth fam for being trans. At least two of my friends currently have teenagers living with them who do not live with their families because their families couldn't accept their status; another Facebook friend just posted that she's considering this after learning of a couch-surfing teen in her orbit, looking for advice.
I was disowned by my family a decade ago for supporting the trans identity of my then-five-year-old. I was 47 at the time, so I had a home to go to and a long history with this family that made being disowned kind of a relief. That's never going to be true for a fifteen-year-old.
posted by Well I never at 7:59 AM on January 31, 2023 [25 favorites]
I am intensely conscious that it’s my privilege that lets me live in a place and have my kids in schools that support trans and non-binary kids… but it is so, so beautiful to see. May everyone have the good fortune to see a child blossom like a child that finds the expression of their true identity.
This, too. My own trans 15yo attracts lots of other queer, trans, or generally non-conforming kids, and I love it.
A couple of weeks ago, one of his friends stopped by when he wasn't here, and we chatted while we waited for him to get home. This young bisexual cis-identified women is being slut-shamed at school, and while that completely sucks, I loved that she had the language for it. She sat there telling me about slut-shaming and misogyny, in so many words, and I was really heartened that she has that language for it even as it's happening to her. It still sucks, but she has these tools to help her not internalize it.
Right now my son is dating the only other trans masc teen we know who is on hormones. I know a lot of people with trans or enby kids who are embracing them as best they can, but it's pretty rare still (despite what the NYT says) for parents to approve medical interventions. My partner (my kids' dad) is trans, as our many of our friends, and for us, it was an easy decision—we didn't want our son to suffer the dysphoria of estrogen puberty. That he has never had a period and will not need top surgery makes me so happy.
I think our history makes all of this easier for us. Our best friend/sometimes lover transitions female-to-male beginning in, maybe 1995? My partner began his transition a year later. We worked through our issues with it decades ago. But we also have this long, lived experience that frees us from worrying about "what if they make decisions as teenagers that affect them their whole lives?" Our family has had to make major decisions about treatment, surgery, and the like, and some of us also live with tattoos that are, not exactly regrettable, but no longer good fits (for instance, lesbian tattoos acquired in The Before Days). So we tend to believe that people can adapt as they learn more about themselves. We're much more worried about the suffering that not supporting kids' gender identities can cause than about the suffering that supporting them might create down the road.
posted by Well I never at 8:13 AM on January 31, 2023 [33 favorites]
This, too. My own trans 15yo attracts lots of other queer, trans, or generally non-conforming kids, and I love it.
A couple of weeks ago, one of his friends stopped by when he wasn't here, and we chatted while we waited for him to get home. This young bisexual cis-identified women is being slut-shamed at school, and while that completely sucks, I loved that she had the language for it. She sat there telling me about slut-shaming and misogyny, in so many words, and I was really heartened that she has that language for it even as it's happening to her. It still sucks, but she has these tools to help her not internalize it.
Right now my son is dating the only other trans masc teen we know who is on hormones. I know a lot of people with trans or enby kids who are embracing them as best they can, but it's pretty rare still (despite what the NYT says) for parents to approve medical interventions. My partner (my kids' dad) is trans, as our many of our friends, and for us, it was an easy decision—we didn't want our son to suffer the dysphoria of estrogen puberty. That he has never had a period and will not need top surgery makes me so happy.
I think our history makes all of this easier for us. Our best friend/sometimes lover transitions female-to-male beginning in, maybe 1995? My partner began his transition a year later. We worked through our issues with it decades ago. But we also have this long, lived experience that frees us from worrying about "what if they make decisions as teenagers that affect them their whole lives?" Our family has had to make major decisions about treatment, surgery, and the like, and some of us also live with tattoos that are, not exactly regrettable, but no longer good fits (for instance, lesbian tattoos acquired in The Before Days). So we tend to believe that people can adapt as they learn more about themselves. We're much more worried about the suffering that not supporting kids' gender identities can cause than about the suffering that supporting them might create down the road.
posted by Well I never at 8:13 AM on January 31, 2023 [33 favorites]
Let's not pretend we're magically immune. Anyone who's been around had seen cis people on Metafilter buy this stuff before.I'm cishet and W.E.I.R.D. and as a result my point of view is somewhat impoverished. I'm incredibly grateful to all the MeFites who go out of their way to enrich my understanding. It is absolutely not your job to educate me, and so I'm very thankful when you do.
I think the top thing that got through to me from MeFi is that we are talking about real people, not hypotheticals; human beings who are not some trolley problem to debate.
And the second thing, alluded to by an octopus IRL above, is that these duplicitous transphobes always make some form of consequentialist argument and then completely omit the half of the consequences suffered by trans people in favor of cis people. I have sometimes needed someone here to tell me those consequences because they were rendered invisible in an article. Again, not anyone's job here, but I'm grateful, and I don't know another place on the internet where I might have gotten that. And now I'm instantly, reflexively skeptical of any FART stuff I see.
Thank you everyone who does that in the face of what must be deeply frustrating, if not existentially threatening, conditions. You got through to me, at least.
posted by Horkus at 8:59 AM on January 31, 2023 [21 favorites]
I google Courage Is A Habit out of curiosity and am just laughing because the resources and their decoding of the Evil Woke Things is just so so close to reality and yet missing it by a country mile. Oh noes, we might teach children to cooperate and consider other people's feelings!
The idea that kids may grow up with empathy is definitely a problem for the right, and has been for a long time. I remember seeing a flyer (it might even have been passed out at a school) in the 90s that was titled "Signs That Your Child Might Be on Drugs" and it was a long list of things like "being overly concerned about global warming" "giving money to homelss people" and "worrying about inequality". I fucking kid you not. The right has been trying to pathologize empathy, humanity, and caring of any kind for decades because it fucks up their agenda. It's why I have no truck with people who think conservatives didn't use to be as bad as they are now WRT cranking up hatred and division. They just used to be more subtle about it.
posted by oneirodynia at 10:31 AM on January 31, 2023 [22 favorites]
The idea that kids may grow up with empathy is definitely a problem for the right, and has been for a long time. I remember seeing a flyer (it might even have been passed out at a school) in the 90s that was titled "Signs That Your Child Might Be on Drugs" and it was a long list of things like "being overly concerned about global warming" "giving money to homelss people" and "worrying about inequality". I fucking kid you not. The right has been trying to pathologize empathy, humanity, and caring of any kind for decades because it fucks up their agenda. It's why I have no truck with people who think conservatives didn't use to be as bad as they are now WRT cranking up hatred and division. They just used to be more subtle about it.
posted by oneirodynia at 10:31 AM on January 31, 2023 [22 favorites]
There are many many more cis people than there are trans people so it makes sense that their perspective is always going to be the default, even when talking about trans issues, and my mom without really realizing it is always sympathetic to the cis person in any given scenario even when they are causing harm to a trans person and I think pieces like the ones described are both a cause of this and an effect of that kind of thinking; cis discomfort matters more than trans anguish.The crux of the issue—and of many issues like this—is that the demographic with the most power, due to both privilege and sheer volume, is simultaneously the one with the least investment in what happens with this, the least education or awareness of what's actually involved, and the one that actually gets to determine what shapes the conversation and what it focuses on.
At some point last year, I pirated a copy of Irreversible Damage—the book about how dangerous groups of trans teens are bullying cis teens into getting top surgery—and decided I was going to try and read it with an open mind. I enjoy the messiness of sociological phenomena, where meaningful causes curdle into bad behavior, and was curious whether I'd learn something new and complicated about trans culture that I didn't already know. But leaving aside the author's conspicuous giddiness that dipshits like Ben Shapiro were her friends now, even leaving aside how her entire book was rooted on research like "I DM'd someone who claimed to be a de-transitioned former trans 12-year-old," it was shockingly obvious how much of her worldview was rooted in her trying to score points against online randos who'd annoyed her, as if irritable people on Twitter were somehow a meaningful way to study society at large. And even moving away from the trans panic or her insensitivity to trans issues as a whole, it's fucked-up that someone with the power to become a major voice in the discourse is also operating entirely from a place of "wanting to own someone with 30 followers on Twitter who successfully BOFA'd her once."
From a distance, you can't always tell which JAQ-offs are genuinely plotting trans erasure and genocide, which ones are operating on resentful kneejerk reactionary responses to people they want to "win against" online and can't be bothered to examine the possibility that their worldview might hurt people, and which are essentially ivory-tower gossips who can't help but peek their nose into zeitgeist-y issues, and love nothing more than getting to have opinions on things. But it ultimately doesn't matter whether Jesse Singal is pro-genocide, an oblivious patronizing geek, or just angry that people make fun of his Substack. Because they're all byproducts of the same phenomenon, which is that of people with the privilege to simultaneously affect trans people's lives and to know nothing whatsoever about what's going on.
Ditto the sort of NYT reader who'd be swayed by this bullshit crusade: they're the kind of person who'll talk about these articles because their hobby is chatting about Issues with friends, and they'll parrot whatever they learned here, and that shit'll seep ever-deeper into our culture, while simultaneously lending a blind eye to both the lawmakers who will pass vicious legislature in bloodless language and to the kinds of literal murderers whose hatred gets egged on by this cultural mentality.
(Ages ago, before he became the NYT's idiot crypto reporter, Kevin Roose wrote a great book about evangelical college students. One of his observations was that very few of the students he met were hatefully homophobic; a lot were just oblivious or ignorant, and almost all of them actively disliked the one violent homophobe on campus. But that one homophobe couldn't have existed without all of the well-meaning idiot teens parroting Bible misquotes all around him; they may never have wanted to harm a single soul, but they justified the one potential killer's existence—and they're probably blithely voting in anti-transgender politicians, less for crusade's sake than because "trans erasure" just doesn't ping them as something worth putting in the BAD column.)
As a cis man who tries to actively speak up when people say dumb transphobic shit, I've found that debate is far less effective with my fellow cis folks than when I emphasize how ridiculous it is for them to worry about this stuff. A simple "Why do you care?" issued with gentle scorn goes a surprisingly long way: I've been able to push a few parents towards being less shitty and intrusive with their children by persuading them, not to become a loud outspoken pro-trans activist, but to stop treating this like it's An Issue worth troubling themselves about. People like getting to be self-righteous, so debates and anger often just lock them into their mindset; they hate feeling silly. The correct attitude towards trans politics isn't necessarily to grab a copy of Gender Trouble or become well-versed in gender-as-identity versus sex-as-biology (or what-have-you); for a lot of people, it's probably just not to think about this too much, while also dimly recognizing that politicians taking outright steps to make people's lives harder for no reason is a shitty thing to do. And that often brings people to the sort of genial place where, suddenly, hate speech and hate crimes do strike them as genuinely disturbing, in a way that maybe inspires them to get informed and take action.
Which is why this New York Times crusade is so pernicious. It doesn't "call attention to trans people" or "cover the discourse." It consciously creates a state of opposition to, resistance towards, and fear of trans people. And like we've seen in the UK, where The Guardian ran a simple campaign, that low-level transphobic radiation can lead to normalizing extremist outlooks, and disturbingly quickly at that. I'm not positive that we're headed there as a nation—I'm holding out some hope that the average American has too much to deal with nowadays to be more than weary at this new round of hate—but boy does shit like this make me worry.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 11:25 AM on January 31, 2023 [25 favorites]
Conservative politicos and general media look for targets of opportunity. I have no idea how to defang this or how to teach people that "Hey, you see how they're targeting a group of people you've NEVER heard of being an issue? That's because they see power and profit in putting them up against a wall, not because there's any problems."
But people will continue to be super gullible for "Are you SURE you don't need Volcano Insurance?" grifts that hook in doubt and pull it outward into fear.
posted by Slackermagee at 1:22 PM on January 31, 2023 [3 favorites]
But people will continue to be super gullible for "Are you SURE you don't need Volcano Insurance?" grifts that hook in doubt and pull it outward into fear.
posted by Slackermagee at 1:22 PM on January 31, 2023 [3 favorites]
Meanwhile, the American Academy of Pediatrics is out here now recommending that obese kids age 14 and up be referred for bariatric surgery, and that Ozempic and similar be used wherever there is a comorbidity. 'Cause, you know, bariatric surgery, nothing invasive or lifelong about that, and the semaglutide drugs are so well-studied for long-term effects. Gotta discipline those unruly teenage bodies!
posted by praemunire at 1:27 PM on January 31, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by praemunire at 1:27 PM on January 31, 2023 [15 favorites]
Bariatric surgery? Christ alive. Talk about being miserable for the rest of your days. Transit time like a pneumatic tube and -- but that's in service of thinness, so nothing can be really wrong with it. Was just thinking the other day about how maybe it was not, perhaps, okay to have received fen/phen and Redux as a teen who just had a few extra pounds to shift.
The sign I tore down was replaced with stickers to the same effect, and I could only get one of them. Felt bad about that. But a mole was whacked.
posted by Countess Elena at 4:34 PM on January 31, 2023 [5 favorites]
The sign I tore down was replaced with stickers to the same effect, and I could only get one of them. Felt bad about that. But a mole was whacked.
posted by Countess Elena at 4:34 PM on January 31, 2023 [5 favorites]
(Incidentally, this is a theory of mine, but I have the vague idea that in a certain narrow sense it was less difficult to be a trans person about twenty years ago. If somebody "got a sex change" and performed gender really, really hard, the usual suspects didn't like it, but they didn't try to, say, destabilize the UK over it or strip every book out of a whole state's schools. Moral panic and covert cyberwar: a winning combination.)
posted by Countess Elena at 4:59 PM on January 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by Countess Elena at 4:59 PM on January 31, 2023 [4 favorites]
20 years ago, society in general was enough to punish the very few who had the strength and energy to come out. Now that the kids are generally alright, I think the cons are doing damage control in a barn doors open situation.
20 years ago was really bad. Very few people can just 'gender really, really hard' - passing was even more of a fraught thing back then.
posted by porpoise at 7:30 PM on January 31, 2023 [13 favorites]
20 years ago was really bad. Very few people can just 'gender really, really hard' - passing was even more of a fraught thing back then.
posted by porpoise at 7:30 PM on January 31, 2023 [13 favorites]
Hi, I'm a real life trans and nonbinary person, and I'd really like the NYT to stop talking about people like me and kids like me as abstractions, and start speaking to us as people. We should be the subject of interviews, not the subject of discussion. Their coverage misleads people about us while silencing our voices. It's also cited in support of the anti trans bills.
I'm angry, and I'm disgusted, because people are letting themselves be "concerned," when what they are really concerned with are their own feelings and fears. What people should be concerned with is saving people's lives and letting people be happy as themselves.
Gender-affirming healthcare and transition saves lives and create better mental health outcomes. It's been well studied: here's a paper from 2021, here's a whole article covering other papers from 2022. Trans kids deserve evidence-based medical care and social support.
Unless someone at the NYT can offer a statistically significant better alternative in terms of health outcomes, they need to shut the hell up.
And until they start centering transgender people's voices in these stories, they need to be called out as transphobic. They also need to be called out for distracting people from the real ways that trans people are oppressed, how folks, especially trans women and trans feminine people of color, are subject to violence, abuse, and harassment, and how the policing of people's bodies isn't just transphobic, but also supports patriarchy.
If you care, and you don't know what you can do, here's how you can send a letter to the editors.
Honestly you'd be better off subscribing to Teen Vogue (see this) than the NYT.
posted by Chrysopoeia at 9:35 PM on January 31, 2023 [33 favorites]
I'm angry, and I'm disgusted, because people are letting themselves be "concerned," when what they are really concerned with are their own feelings and fears. What people should be concerned with is saving people's lives and letting people be happy as themselves.
Gender-affirming healthcare and transition saves lives and create better mental health outcomes. It's been well studied: here's a paper from 2021, here's a whole article covering other papers from 2022. Trans kids deserve evidence-based medical care and social support.
Unless someone at the NYT can offer a statistically significant better alternative in terms of health outcomes, they need to shut the hell up.
And until they start centering transgender people's voices in these stories, they need to be called out as transphobic. They also need to be called out for distracting people from the real ways that trans people are oppressed, how folks, especially trans women and trans feminine people of color, are subject to violence, abuse, and harassment, and how the policing of people's bodies isn't just transphobic, but also supports patriarchy.
If you care, and you don't know what you can do, here's how you can send a letter to the editors.
Honestly you'd be better off subscribing to Teen Vogue (see this) than the NYT.
posted by Chrysopoeia at 9:35 PM on January 31, 2023 [33 favorites]
I would love to have recommendations for professional works on how transgender and transsexuality acceptance progressed in Thailand Brazil.
As information to fuel a possible counterpoint in future legislative debates (not only in the USA).
posted by porpoise at 9:58 PM on January 31, 2023
As information to fuel a possible counterpoint in future legislative debates (not only in the USA).
posted by porpoise at 9:58 PM on January 31, 2023
Not to detract from the central issue here -- the very real, active, and specific harm that the Times is doing to trans youth, but truly, this comes as no surprise. In general, when it comes to issues important to socially conscious people, the New York Times functions as an institutional concern troll. Instead of taking a stand, it "teaches the controversy," treating conservative talking points as worthy of as serious response. What's worse, because the Times unofficially wears the "liberal media" crown, anything to its left is considered fringe, and what gets billed as the reasonable center is positioned solidly to its right. You'll never convince me that it's not all according to plan.
posted by xigxag at 10:24 PM on January 31, 2023 [14 favorites]
posted by xigxag at 10:24 PM on January 31, 2023 [14 favorites]
As a bisexual cis woman who was a teenager in the 90s, so much of the rhetoric around "trans women are predators" and "trans women don't belong in women-only spaces" reminds me of what some lesbian communities said about bisexual cis women in the 90s. Same song, different verse.
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 11:05 PM on January 31, 2023 [14 favorites]
posted by chariot pulled by cassowaries at 11:05 PM on January 31, 2023 [14 favorites]
20 years ago was really bad. Very few people can just 'gender really, really hard' - passing was even more of a fraught thing back then.
I don't know if you're speaking from experience, but, if not, please let people speak for themselves. It's not yet 20 years since I came out, but it's getting there. Some things are better, some in ways that are almost mind-blowing, some thing are worse. Some are pretty much the same and cis people just forgot.
posted by hoyland at 4:50 AM on February 1, 2023 [2 favorites]
I don't know if you're speaking from experience, but, if not, please let people speak for themselves. It's not yet 20 years since I came out, but it's getting there. Some things are better, some in ways that are almost mind-blowing, some thing are worse. Some are pretty much the same and cis people just forgot.
posted by hoyland at 4:50 AM on February 1, 2023 [2 favorites]
Fuck 'em
Who you are is your own business.
How you treat people is your responsibility.
I really don't want to be alive in this world.
posted by allium cepa at 5:32 AM on February 1, 2023
Who you are is your own business.
How you treat people is your responsibility.
I really don't want to be alive in this world.
posted by allium cepa at 5:32 AM on February 1, 2023
As a cis lesbian, I am posting this and then leaving this thread because a) this thread isn't about cis people but b) since the comment above is still here, this is why I don't offer any thoughts about being a lesbian on metafilter.
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:02 AM on February 1, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by nakedmolerats at 9:02 AM on February 1, 2023 [3 favorites]
With how sad and enraging the news has been for trans people, I try to take joy where I find it... and the latest news on Trans rights out of Finland has made my fucking day!
posted by SansPoint at 11:10 AM on February 1, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by SansPoint at 11:10 AM on February 1, 2023 [6 favorites]
Jessie also had a terrible opinion piece about DEI work lately that also rang hollow in my experience. The guy comes across as a try-hard provocateur.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/17/opinion/dei-trainings-effective.html
posted by ckoerner at 3:58 PM on February 1, 2023
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/17/opinion/dei-trainings-effective.html
posted by ckoerner at 3:58 PM on February 1, 2023
I have a feeling some parents are shouting "Why didn't the school tell me?!" as a way of avoiding the more challenging question: "Why didn't my child feel comfortable talking to me?"
posted by evidenceofabsence at 2:16 AM on February 2, 2023 [11 favorites]
posted by evidenceofabsence at 2:16 AM on February 2, 2023 [11 favorites]
Any parent in this position is already well aware of why their child didn’t feel comfortable talking to them. They just don’t want to admit that it’s their fault that their child didn’t feel comfortable talking to them.
posted by Etrigan at 4:32 AM on February 2, 2023 [15 favorites]
posted by Etrigan at 4:32 AM on February 2, 2023 [15 favorites]
And in the wake of the legislation from Florida and later other states, I've heard other bigoted, deluded parents say that their child wouldn't even be trans at all if trans-inclusive material at school hadn't given them the idea.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 5:13 PM on February 2, 2023
posted by The Underpants Monster at 5:13 PM on February 2, 2023
And in the wake of the legislation from Florida and later other states, I've heard other bigoted, deluded parents say that their child wouldn't even be trans at all if trans-inclusive material at school hadn't given them the idea.
And it's ironic, but they're probably right, but not in the way they mean .
When I was a child and a teenager, the term "non binary" did not exist. So I grew up thinking that I'm just very peculiar in the way I relate to gender, and it was just one of the many things I didn't understand about myself so I just set it aside, marked "zumbador oddness".
I only recently found that the word matched the experience I've had since as far back as I can remember.
If I'd been exposed to trans inclusive materials when I was a child, I would have had a very different life. One in which I understood myself better. That can only be a good thing, right?
Well, not according to these people, I guess.
It's one of the things I wonder about. While I don't feel like being non binary is a choice, what would be so bad about it, if it were?
Have we allowed these bigots to make us give up the right to choose who we are?
I see so many young trans people online stressing about whether they are "really" trans and trying to access that elusive inner certainty.
Imposter syndrome is a bugger. What if it was just as acceptable to choose, than to state "born this way" ?
posted by Zumbador at 8:57 PM on February 3, 2023 [11 favorites]
And it's ironic, but they're probably right, but not in the way they mean .
When I was a child and a teenager, the term "non binary" did not exist. So I grew up thinking that I'm just very peculiar in the way I relate to gender, and it was just one of the many things I didn't understand about myself so I just set it aside, marked "zumbador oddness".
I only recently found that the word matched the experience I've had since as far back as I can remember.
If I'd been exposed to trans inclusive materials when I was a child, I would have had a very different life. One in which I understood myself better. That can only be a good thing, right?
Well, not according to these people, I guess.
It's one of the things I wonder about. While I don't feel like being non binary is a choice, what would be so bad about it, if it were?
Have we allowed these bigots to make us give up the right to choose who we are?
I see so many young trans people online stressing about whether they are "really" trans and trying to access that elusive inner certainty.
Imposter syndrome is a bugger. What if it was just as acceptable to choose, than to state "born this way" ?
posted by Zumbador at 8:57 PM on February 3, 2023 [11 favorites]
Peeking at Singal's Twitter feed, he is clearly upset that his name will be immortalized as the inspiration (if not author of) the trans genocide that politicians are now calling for.
Still not upset at putting all of his hate and anger out there, of course, just that he might go down in history as a proto-Himmler instead of a liberal hero saving the Democrats from the trans menace.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 7:13 AM on February 4, 2023 [6 favorites]
Still not upset at putting all of his hate and anger out there, of course, just that he might go down in history as a proto-Himmler instead of a liberal hero saving the Democrats from the trans menace.
posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 7:13 AM on February 4, 2023 [6 favorites]
It's one of the things I wonder about. While I don't feel like being non binary is a choice, what would be so bad about it, if it were?
"Born this way" is, fundamentally, a kind of respectability politics. There are situations where it's the right strategy, but, at the end of the day, it says transness (or queerness or ...) is only worthy of respect if it is "unavoidable" or "natural", something that was done to us. Things like fMRI studies on trans people are interesting, but they're ultimately incredibly dangerous to trans people, even if people may take comfort in them or feel validated by them.
posted by hoyland at 11:21 AM on February 4, 2023 [7 favorites]
"Born this way" is, fundamentally, a kind of respectability politics. There are situations where it's the right strategy, but, at the end of the day, it says transness (or queerness or ...) is only worthy of respect if it is "unavoidable" or "natural", something that was done to us. Things like fMRI studies on trans people are interesting, but they're ultimately incredibly dangerous to trans people, even if people may take comfort in them or feel validated by them.
posted by hoyland at 11:21 AM on February 4, 2023 [7 favorites]
Looks like at least one other major US paper is looking to catch up to the Times in the "inciting moral panic" department:
Chloe Simon & Alyssa Tirrell: The Washington Post is filling its opinion section with anti-LGBTQ figures
Chloe Simon & Alyssa Tirrell: The Washington Post is filling its opinion section with anti-LGBTQ figures
The Washington Post, whose news-side coverage of LGBTQ issues in the recent past has been notably excellent, recently hired three opinion-editorial columnists who have a history of making anti-LGBTQ statements, primarily against the transgender community.posted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 8:06 AM on February 8, 2023 [3 favorites]
On January 25, the Post announced it was adding seven new opinion-editorial columnists to its staff. Three out of the seven columnists — Ramesh Ponnuru, Ruy Teixeira, and Jim Geraghty — have conservative backgrounds, with positions of leadership or fellowships with organizations like American Enterprise Institute and National Review. All three are slated to write weekly and monthly columns regarding politics and related topics.
While right-wing media networks such as Fox News and One America News Network have been consistent in their blatant, anti-LGBTQ coverage, mainstream media have at times resorted to presenting LGBTQ rights as a political debate. The New York Times has repeatedly given cover to anti-trans extremists and hired anti-LGBTQ contributors; meanwhile other outlets such as The New Yorker have published puff pieces on controversial, anti-LGBTQ figures.
Among its mainstream media peers, The Washington Post has generally provided fair coverage of LGBTQ issues, including recent anti-LGBTQ educational initiatives, the Respect for Marriage Act, and anti-drag sentiments. The paper’s decision to hire three columnists who have repeatedly heaped scorn on the LGBTQ community is a backslide, and an especially harmful one in a time when violence against LGBTQ people is an everyday threat.
Harron Walker:
180 (and counting) past and present New York Times contributors have signed an open letter to the paper’s standards editor condemning the ongoing unethical anti-trans bias in its coverage of trans, non-binary and gender nonconforming people. Read it here https://nytletter.composted by Glegrinof the Pig-Man at 6:09 AM on February 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
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This is their demographic. They're putting this stuff out for Nice White People who have NYT subscriptions and "Hate Has No Home Here" signs on their lawns. That kind of thing doesn't mean you can't have bad ideas, and somebody at the NYT wants to sell their bad idea and knows how to do it.
Today I tore down a paper sign outing and/or slandering a trans teacher and directing the reader to an anti-trans/LGBTQ site called "Courage Is a Habit." I don't know this teacher (why should I?) and when I google her name, I get another hate-linked news site, nothing else. Maybe she did something bad! Maybe she didn't, and that's my guess. If these bastards told me it was cold out, I'd wear shorts. Sometimes a siege mentality is appropriate, and that's when there is, in fact, a siege.
posted by Countess Elena at 5:23 PM on January 30, 2023 [108 favorites]