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Additional responses to anti-trans policies if you're personally uncomfortable with this or that [1]

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Date: 2025-05-29

I get it, some of y’all feel uncomfortable put on the spot with the current Republican culture war on trans people. Like most of the United States you’re uncomfortable with trans people in this or that specific place (bathrooms, track meets, the military, the pulpit). Many people have personal reservations about trans people. But on most issues, a majority don’t want restrictive laws and policies from the federal government.

Even if you disagree on this or that particular case, anti-trans law is bad law. Anti-trans policy is bad policy. And worse, anti-trans politics is a first step to eliminating civil rights for many Americans, including LGBTQ people, disabled people, and women. Republicans are trying to take what they see as an easy win to fracture communities and get a foothold for their flavor of nationalism.

You don’t have to argue the details of gender-affirming health care, sports participation, or military service. You don’t have to engage in deep discussions of gender. You don’t have to fight over this pawn or that pawn that’s been promoted to a national scandal. You can focus on the principle: Republicans are using hate to justify bad law and bad policy.

Here are some suggestions for how to pivot:

1. Trump’s actions of attacking state governments and universities over educational inclusion violate rule of law. Title IX defines a process for intervention and the limits of an intervention. The Trump administration has violated both. If Trump says it’s about student athletics, Title IX limits him to only those funds spent on student athletics. He can only sanction the organizations and departments specifically involved in student athletics. He can’t deny lunch money to kids in Maine, research funds to university, or whatever he’s threatening California with this week.

2. The “Gender Ideology” EO mandates a lot more than just the hot-button issues that the White House and Republican congresscritters are exploiting for clicks. Most polls show that a majority do not want restrictive laws on gender-affirming healthcare, social support, employment and education, even if people have personal objections.

3. Trans people have proven themselves to be valuable and dedicated civil servants and soldiers. The government’s own studies have not found trans people to be less fit for service, an unreasonable expense, or a security risk. The government’s actions are a political purge that makes those departments less capable to handle needs.

4. Going after trans people in the areas of health care and education is a trojan horse to advance a conservative attack on civil rights. The Department of Education has already quietly reversed cases for disabled students and students of color. Denial of identification goes hand-in-hand with mandates to require passports or real id for voting. Denial of insurance for gender-affirming health care is coupled with goals to restrict health care for neurodivergent people, people living with HIV, and research into health risks for minority populations.

5. The “studies” released by HHS to justify health-care policy changes have been sh---y. Multiple times they’ve cited studies that didn’t support their argument, studies that don’t exist, and right-wing propaganda media. They should fail as high school papers, much less as policy documents. They mischaracterize existing research and best practices (WPATH is strongly pro-counseling) to sell their own snake oil including conversion therapy. Health-care policy is driven by people with a history of child abuse and illegal medical practices.

6. Republicans have not been coy that their policy and propaganda blitz are just first steps to erasing civil rights, with other LGBTQIA people and women as the next steps. And this is reflected in the way that the Big Beautiful Bill was expanded overnight and without debate to deny coverage to all forms of gender affirming care at any age. Many bills deny, ban, or create civil risk for counseling (except for conversion therapy) and social support as well.

7. Bathroom bills don’t protect women. Trans women don’t pose a significant threat of violence. They do make gender-nonconforming women, especially women of color, more vulnerable to violence and negative encounters with law enforcement. (I fully suspect we’ll see a trans (bathroom) panic murder defense in the next decade.)

9. And if none of the above (and a half-dozen other arguments) are not comfortable for you, you could sit this one out and let the people who live with these issues and do the activism take the lead. We don’t all have unlimited energy, and we don’t all have to focus on the same issues. You can take the time to examine the realities of trans life in America.

I don’t expect or demand cis people to become trans rights activists, I do hope that cis liberals would refrain from the pile-ons started by Trump, Greene, Mace, and Libs of Ticktock that turn local and exceptional success into national scandals. The reality is that most of us don’t have safe schools, don’t have safe employers, and don’t have access to gender-affirming medicine and services. We have no control over the right-wing, social-media witch hunts.

EDIT: Another option is to just refuse to engage. “I’m here to talk about jobs and the economy.” Or possibly, “if we’re not going to talk about jobs and the economy, there’s no point to this conversation and I’m leaving.” You don’t have to take the bait if you’re not prepared and inclined to do so.

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