calbear93 said:
sycasey said:
calbear93 said:
OneKeg said:
calbear93 said:
OneKeg said:
calbear93 said:
dajo9 said:
calbear93 said:
okaydo said:
Amount of time we spend on transgender issue that impacts such a small percentage of the population while we have a looming black swan event with the debt ceiling, runaway deficit, geopolitical issues that will reshape the new world order, China and Russia coming out more and more as blatant enemies looking to minimize us, school shooting, runaway crime where people do not feel safe doing basic things like taking public transportation. Yet we f****ing spend so many calories here and elsewhere on this stupid issue.
We are a country of morons on both sides of the aisle. And no, this is not just a Republican issue. This is also a Democrat issue in playing identity politics just to add another progressive badge when we have much greater priorities.
Can we get past identity politics in this country and be a serious country that can get past virtue signaling on both sides?
There are 1.3 million transgender adults in America. They have family and they have friends. Something like 5% of Americans are LGBT. They have family and they have friends. You insult them all (myself included) when you dismissively call it virtue signaling.
We hear so much about the transgender community because the right is targeting them in a culture war in order to win votes for the subjects that concern you (default, debt, etc). It all leads back to the same place. Money and power. Standing up against the targeted harassment of the transgender community is the right thing to do, in its own right. We wont abandon our family and friends. We can walk and chew gum.
How many are trans? LGBT includes much more than transgender. So 5% is highly misleading. If 1.3 million is correct, that is 0.4% of the American population.
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I just wanted to respond to your first paragraph here and say - there is no disagreement between you and dajo9 on this point. Right?
He is never said 5% of Americans are transgender. He said two separate things:
1. 1.3 million transgender adults in America
2. 5% of Americans are LGBT
These are independent statements. 5% is not misleading because it is talking about LGBT, who were the target in the last wave of hate-mongering (gay marriage and other issues that were the right wing rage twenty years ago). Whereas the 1.3 million is talking about transgender folks (who are the target in the current right-wing wave of hate).
I agree that we should absolutely focus on critical issues relating to debt, budget, geopolitics, resources. But in my opinion, we can't simultaneously give in when 1.3 million individuals are targeted with massive discrimination. I'd feel the same if the people targeted were, say, Armenian Americans, or Danish Americans. (Similar numbers on cursory google check - same order of magnitude as 1.3M). We have to focus on all of the above.
Or, you know, the right wing terrorists who are holding the country hostage with the debt ceiling could quit it with both that and with the massive discrimination. (It's largely the same people and those that represent them). But we know that's not going to happen.
We were talking about transgender issues. We were not discussing gay and lesbian issues. So highlighting 5% by lumping in groups that comprise 4.6% of that number is misleading.
It's like saying Freedom Caucus represents a large and important population of America. In fact, Republicans, which includes Freedom Caucus, represent almost 50%, and over 99% of Americans are political, including Republicans and Democrats. So, it is absolutely justifiable that they have such an important voice in Congress and, if anything, MGT should have a bigger role.
But that would be misleading because most Americans do not share the views of Freedom Caucus and MGT represents just a fringe segment of America.
So, the amount of attention we pay to transgender issue, if we are honest, overrepresents the impact it has on America. That doesn't mean we don't care, just like you not making 40% of your conversation about plight of Native Americans and alcohol addiction in the community doesn't mean you think they are insignificant.
I just don't think he meant it to be misleading. I don't think he was saying transgender issues are all or the majority of LGBT issues. The LGBT number is relevant because it was the target of the previous round of hate-filled litigation twenty years ago. We've seen this movie before and in my opinion, we need to rally to protect transgender people as we tried to do for the superset of LGBT people twenty years ago.
The plight of Native Americans and alcohol addiction that you bring up is certainly an issue, but it is not subject to an acute, recent rise in right-wing hate and litigation specifically over the last couple years as discrimination against transgender folks is. As discrimination against LGBT was 20 years ago. That's the distinction in my mind. Defending a group from direct attack as opposed to finding approaches to a long term (but still very serious) problem like the one you brought up in comparison (alcohol addiction etc.). Of course we need to do it all, which makes the right-wing's terrorist approach to everything (including the debt ceiling) so unfortunate for everyone.
OK, a reasonable counterpoint. And I see your point.
However, I disagree that the right started with transgender issue or special discrimination. I think it was a toxic reaction to the left's overemphasis of a group and putting that issue as an issue for emphasis in America's faces.
I'm sure we can chicken-and-egg this to oblivion, but for me, the first time I even thought of transgender issues in a political sense was when North Carolina passed that original "bathroom bill." So from my perspective it was a reaction to the right wing passing laws to restrict behavior. Maybe there was something before that where you think the Republicans were provoked, I dunno.
But for me it's about who is passing the laws to curtail freedoms and on this it's mostly the GOP.
Removing gender based bathrooms was the first overreaction by the left in my view.
From the Washington Examiner of all places:
"Here's where the New York Times places the start of the current battles:
'The initial efforts by the conservative movement to deploy transgender issues did not go well. In 2016, North Carolina legislators voted to bar transgender people from using the bathroom of their preference. It created a backlash so harsh from corporations, sports teams and even Bruce Springsteen that lawmakers eventually rescinded the bill.'
You would think that conservative North Carolina legislators were the first ones to "deploy transgender issues." You would think, judging by this account, that the state passed a law about men in women's bathrooms to score political points.
But there was a very specific trigger to the North Carolina bathroom bill. It was the Charlotte bathroom bill.
Charlotte passed a bill forcing private businesses to let male customers who identified as women use the women's room or be guilty of discrimination.
The state law was, in effect, a preemption of the bathroom portion of that bill."
Link:
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/your-reminder-that-the-left-started-the-culture-wars-over-transgenderismThis article casts liberals as starting the culture war over transgenderism but if you think hard about it the situation was that a city passed a law to help protect transgender (and gay) people and it wasn't about bathrooms at all.
Why did Charlotte do it?
Of the 20 most populous cities in the country, Charlotte (No. 17) was one of only three that didn't have a nondiscrimination policy in place for LGBT residents and they wanted to be seen as a progressive and welcoming city.
The ordinance included no language involving restroom accommodations for anybody. It simply removed existing policy language on the topic.
The state's response was to immediately forbid other municipalities from doing the same thing and by same thing we aren't talking about restrooms. We are talking about extending nondiscrimination protections to LGBT people.
Instead of just repealing Charlotte's ordinance, it prohibited any North Carolina municipality from passing an LGBT anti-discrimination ordinance. Most controversially, North Carolina became the first state in the nation to require transgender people to use public bathrooms and locker rooms of the gender on their birth certificate
Link:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/12/19/the-tumultuous-recent-history-of-north-carolinas-bathroom-bill-which-could-be-repealed/Link:
https://amp.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/article92685957.htmlBecause why? Because they are bigots. That's why. No other reason. And if your city wasn't full of bigots then they would force their morals on you.
The state's message was clear: Gays will not get discrimination protection. At the time, you could still be fired from your job in North Carolina for being gay. Since then of course the Supreme Court ruled against that which has only fueled the fires of conservatives.
This was an attack on the LGBT community couched as an issue about transgenders using restrooms because that was the one issue they thought more people would oppose and they were right about that. That has now expanded into an all out war against trans people but really against anyone who isn't vanilla straight including drag queens.
The left has fought back hard against that because sometimes in order to kill the cockroaches you have to shine light on them first to see where they are hiding. Charlotte turned the lights on in North Carolina. They are now out in plain view and they are going to be stomped eventually not just in North Carolina but across the US because most people aren't bigots.
