comment: >
  
  US politics have far exceeded the imagination of any dystopian sci fi writing.
context: Imagine looking at the current state of the world and deciding that one of the most important issues is that Trans People have too many rights. >
  
  Honest to god, why the trans hate and drag queen fury?  Why can’t people just mind their own damn business?  The world would be a much better place. >
  
  They need a "Them" so they can be an "Us". >
  
  Used to be gays and black ppl, I wonder what they will pick in 10-20yrs from now.  Robosexuals? >
  
  It’s still the gays and black people. Very little has changed. What they’re resisting is the next generation that will benefit from our past achievements and liberate themselves even further than we were able to achieve for ourselves. >
  
  
  It’s still the gays and black people. 
  
  It is, but it is not as easy to go after them now, so they're specifically focusing on the trans community as their new 'other' of choice. Then once they've killed all of them, the gays will be back on the menu. >
  
  "Gays are back on the menu boys!"
  Wai.. not like that! >
  
  Well, they do say you are what you eat. >
  
  Culture wars are useful when you have no tangible ideas about how to actually govern. >
  
  They want to rule, not govern. >
  
  They want to rule forever while actually not doing anything productive but still keep getting more and more money while the world around them burns. >
  
  I'd call Trump an asshole, but an asshole has a useful function. >
  
  A blue whales asshole is almost 3 feet wide, and is the second largest asshole on the planet. >
  
  Did I miss something and Cultural War suddenly became a winning campaign strategy for the GOP? Last I checked, they weren't, especially at the polls. >
  
  sadly, it did great in 2016 and even more sadly, while Dems eked out congressional majorities and the presidency in 2020, it didn't turn off nearly enough people for a Blue Wave that year and we are stuck with horrible gerrymandering for another decade.  
  oh, and assclowns Desantis & Abbott won huge with it.   
  they don't have to win big, they just have to win enough. >
  
  They’ve been losing more nationally in every election since 2016. 2018, 2020, 2022 haven’t been good for republicans. >
  
  yes, but my point is they are winning "just enough."  
  i mean, they did take over the House. Was it a Red Wave? No. But they have that power now.  
  That's the whole point of cancer--it spreads everywhere. >
  
  As a trans person this shit is terrifying. I'm honestly worried that the majority of people don't care about us and are happy to let us die, and wouldn't help fight, and bleed with us.
  Please, someone prove me wrong. I'm not even American but I'm worried. >
  
  I am from the US and also trans, the amount of apathy towards our rights as people I find is scary. For a lot of people in my life it is the sort of thing where they'll acknowledge that it sucks but then shrug and move on without a second thought.
  I know seldom few who would fight and bleed for/with you or I, though I can't say most would be happy to see our suffering. They just don't have skin in the game and don't care because of it. >
  
  Oh yeah, all these supportive allies in the comments? They don't do anything else. It's a show for them. >
  
  Reddit is one thing, and a rather biased sample on average. While I appreciate the support this site really isn't particularly representative of how a lot of things are out and about in many parts of the world (such as mine upon which I draw my observations). >
  
  Allies seem to only know how to offer their sympathy and not actually stand up for us. It's sad. As someone else said today, they're more upset about gas stoves than trans people. >
  
  The conservative political project is truly deranged. >
  
  They're competing to see who the bigger bigot is.
  Truly disgusting stuff... >
  
  And they’re just salivating over being able to do a genocide to trans people >
  
  Guarantee you not a single one of these goddamn imbeciles knows a trans person or has ever spoken at length with one. >
  
  It's pretty rare, something like 0.5% of people, so that's a safe bet. >
  
  So it’s important to recognize that that’s the rate of out trans people. We don’t know what the actual rate of being trans is due to the extremely abusive attempts to keep people trans.
  It’s higher than 0.5%, as in recent generations where people feel more free to be themselves the numbers are significantly higher.
  Even taking a 0.5% incidence, however, and it’s still almost a certainty that most people know at least one trans person.
  It comes down to how our brains are real bad at estimating probability. 
  There’s about a 0.25% chance of anyone having the same birthday as you (1/365), yet having a group of randomly selected people have two who share the same birthday only requires a group of 23 people for a 50/50 shot.
  At a naive estimate, that means that if you know 50 people then you have a roughly 50% chance of knowing a trans person. >
  
  
  So it’s important to recognize that that’s the rate of out trans people. We don’t know what the actual rate of being trans is due to the extremely abusive attempts to keep people trans.  
  It’s higher than 0.5%, as in recent generations where people feel more free to be themselves the numbers are significantly higher.
  
  Yeah, the youth number is 1.4% or so and they probably have not learned enough about society to figure out that there's people out there want to see them executed, so they're not lying about it yet in an effort to hide from evil people. As they get older they might go on Facebook or read the news and that could change for the individual.
  The same concept applies with homosexual/bisexual and likely anything else that the republicans/religious groups deem "unacceptable." >
  
  Remember his ban on trans people in the military? This isn't new ground for him. 
  He is capitalizing on it being a forefront issue with the Republican Party right now, tho. >
  
  It's pretty telling that Republicans are so scared of trans people when they make up like, what, 0.01% of the population? >
  
  In the US it's 1.6%.  That number is 5% among younger people.  
  Just as with statistics on how many people describe themselves as something other than heterosexual, the numbers are much higher among younger people and growing.  Not because more people are gay or trans, but because more people are comfortable being out and that's a very good thing. >
  
  5% is a huge number. I am shocked. I’m nearly 40 and I do think if I were younger I might identify as non-binary. Deciphering my sexuality was more critical for me in the 90s than my gender. I imagine if the language was more at the forefront while I was at that stage of development I may have explored the intricacies of gender expression as well. >
  
  Honestly I would be surprised if it didn't end up closer to 10% once people understand us better and it's no longer fashionable to hate us.
  I mean think about that 5% number. That's with all the bullshit surrounding trans people the last nearly 10 years, which has totally exploded the last 3 years. That 5% number isn't due to acceptance, it's due to information availability and trans visibility.
  People like me who would have come out as kids weren't able to because we didn't even know people like us existed. We didn't have vocabulary for it. The best we got was Jerry Springer.
  When we hit acceptance, not just visibility, I expect that number to double at least.
  Remember, LGBTQ people as a whole used to be about 5%. Now it's what like 30% in the younger crowd? Wouldn't surprise me a bit if with acceptance trans people were at least 10%. 15% wouldn't surprise me, though I do expect that would be the upper bound. >
  
  I am really, really, REALLY tired of being called a child abuser by these… Child abusers. >
  
  Can’t wait for the “that’s not what he actually meant!!!” crowd over in r/conservative >
  
  Of course he fucking is.
  The US Christian Nationalist movement systematically criminalizing our fucking existence and he is giving them what they want.
  This is not a fucking game. They are about building the legal and social groundwork for classifying sex and gender variation outside cis/heterosexual norms as being inherently sexual.
  The "drag bans", the "bathroom bills", the attacks on trans youth and now adult's medical care, the attempts to pull information about LGBTQ but especially trans people from public scools and libraries, and everything else they're doing, they're working towards making the public existence of trans and gender nonconforming people a sex crime.
  The laws they're trying to pass are so vaguely worded, the existence of trans and gender variant people is being classified as inherently sexual/"adult"/obscene/etc. And if they are able to pass these bans on "performers" they are absolutely going to use it to attack us in every other area of public life too.
  After all, if someone they consider a "man in a dress" is legally classified as an "adult performer" when all they're doing is reading Mary Poppins to kids in a library while dressed as the titular character, what exactly does that mean for the person whom they consider a "man in a dress" who is just trying to go to her job as a 5th grade Music teacher? Or hell, just trying to go to the grocery store?
  They don't actually distinguish between "drag queen" and "trans woman", or between "performance" and "just going about our lives". They see trans and GNC people's existence as inherently sexual, and our clothing and gender presentation as the expression of a perverse fetish. If we are anywhere in public where a child might possibly see us, even if it's standing in line at the 7-11, they are claiming that this is pedophilic grooming through forcibly exposing children to degenerate sexual activity.
  And they aren't going to fucking stop voluntarily. There is no goddamn line where they will decide they've gone far enough, except the point at which we no longer exist. >
  
  These motherfuckers are so pathetic. They find people to bully, so sadistic haters will vote for them. >
  
  They peaked in high school and are still trying to ride that wave. You're right, it's absolutely pathetic. >
  
  Well they got to bully trans people without suffering any repercussions back then. Good times. It's all they had and they want it back. >
  
  Anyone that votes for him is a horrible person just like him. >
  
  This dude is Satan... he's gonna do a Hitler and turn America into a dictatorship. I know what'll happen, they had a chance to prosecute Hitler but failed and then he got in power and the rest is history. History will repeat itself again. >
  
  It is amazing that they haven’t labelled him the Anti-Christ. When I was growing up, the profile that was made of whom and what he would be fits Trump almost perfectly. >
  
  There's a site out there where a priest uses biblical verses and analysis to describe him as the antichrist. I don't have it on hand but a quick Google should bring it up
  Its..uncanny. >
  
  The party of small, non-intrusive government... as long as you agree with everything the party says. >
  
  freedom! >
  
  trump will promise anything to get elected. Once in office he could hardly get anything done at all outside of watching tv or golfing. 
  I don’t think republicans believe he’s worth electing anymore. 
  He’s going to be a spoiler for his parties ticket. >
  
  God I hope so >
  
  It’s such a small issue that is easy to propagandise about.
  If I had kids and I had to choose between a trans daughter or a suicidal teen then I would prefer a trans daughter. Just because I am not personally trans, it doesn’t mean I cannot support those who are. 
  The fact is these people exist whether we ignore them or help them and if we support them from a younger age then maybe they will grow up feeling less of a freak and something dirty to be hidden away or ashamed of. >
  
  You understand that, regardless of whether or not someone is trans or what their biological sex is, it’s illegal to burst into bathrooms and sexually harass people, right? This imagined crisis of boys saying they’re girls so they can go into bathrooms and leer at women totally free from reprisal is such a farce. By your logic, gay men should not be allowed into boys’ rooms and lesbians should not be allowed into girls’ rooms because those are the places where people have the genitals they prefer.
  Simultaneously, this idea that there exists a class of elite male athletes who are simultaneously ready to do anything to be a winner and also introspective enough to say to themselves “I absolutely cannot beat another man, I have to pretend to be a woman to even have a chance of winning” is childish thinking at best. >
  
  Because the party that's all about freedom, personal liberties, and smaller government... oh, wait. >
  
  Who is keeping a list of conservatives “top priorities”?
  Ditch healthcare 
  end social security 
  limit education through banning books and strict whitey friendly curriculums (i’m very white btw)
  ban green energy 
  snuggle up to dictators and acquire one of your very own
  end drag shows (except for rudy, he can totally keep on)
  no more bare shoulders and ankles 
  pregnancies, lots and lots of pregnancies 
  30% tax for you, no tax for wealthy 
  double our votes by counting them twice and making votes against us illegal 
  add the occupation of “serf” to the national census 
  i’m sure i forgot a few hundred idiotic ideas they have >
  
  “First they came for the Communists And I did not speak out
  Because I was not a Communist 
  Then they came for the Socialists And I did not speak out
  Because I was not a Socialist 
  Then they came for the trade unionists And I did not speak out
  Because I was not a trade unionist Then they came for the Jews
  And I did not speak out
  Because I was not a Jew 
  Then they came for me
  And there was no one left
  To speak out for me.” —Martin Niemöller >
  
  I see this quoted often when it comes to attacks on LGBT folks. It's almost funny in some weird way because one of the first groups targeted by the nazis was the Trans and gays population, yet they get left out. >
  
  Martin Niemöller was a priest. That's no surprise that he'd leave out or overlook LGBT people. >
  
  What kind of a fucked up country allows an identifiable and at-risk group to be openly threatened like this?  Just what does "go after" mean here? >
  
  It’s not allowed. >
  
  Well he's done it, walking free and no consequences at all, again.  So yes, it is allowed. >
  
  Keep fanning the flames you tangerine douche bag!!! Unite the entire country against you!!! Nothing gets more Democrat voters out than Trump shouting his rhetoric of hate and division!!! He's actually better for the entire country campaigning then he would be in jail. Keep that poopshoot of a mouth running Donnie Dipshit!!!! >
  
  Remember when Trump said that he would do everything to protect LGBT communities from violence?  Pepperidge Farm Remembers. >
  
  This extended election cycle is going to have a body count.
  The people who can't wait to use those guns have been at a fever pitch for years and just need a target.
  The candidate in an attempt to get media approval will be competitive in getting ugly with their campaigns.  They are going to have to outdo each other on attacks on trans, globalists, and whatever enemy conjured up du jour.  It's not gonna happen, it IS happening and will get worse. >
  
  Gotta keep up with DeSantis. >
  
  I guess he's not selling these anymore... >
  
  Twinks for trump! >
  
  Reporters need to hammer home this question: How does attacking trans and gay people improve the lives of Americans? What economic gain is to be had doing this? Where are your fiscal policies? Where is "infrastructure week"? Name ONE policy you have that brings economic relief to low income people, you know, your base? >
  
  I agree, they should hammer it in. And hopefully enough people will listen. Sadly, a large portion will be duped even then. Conservatives will be convinced it's not the rich making record profits causing inflation, but the underprivileged trans people. They'll be convinced that it's not the Christians torturing LGBTQ Youth in Conversion Therapy Camps, but parents supporting their LGBTQ kids. They'll be convinced its not the literally sex offenders in the GOP or the Christians grooming children, but teachers telling kids to accept themselves. Fox News and other conservative stations have done a great job at getting their voters to point the finger but everyone besides the rich making record profits and bribing politicians, sorry, I mean "donating to" "lobbying" and "offering jobs" to politicians. I really hope enough people won't buy into it, but I know a lot will.