I Am Angry

[Content Note: Trans hatred; sexual assault.]

I have always loathed—and always will—the despicable attempts to justify discrimination against trans people under the auspices of "protecting" me.

The "trans predator" meme is wretched trash: It was wretched trash when Phyllis Schlafly was using it to tank the ERA before my ancient ass was ever born, and it is wretched trash now.

I am incandescently angry that people who support policy that will harm trans people, including children, make the indefensible and malicious argument that I need to be "protected" from trans women in bathrooms, or anywhere else.

It has always been a vile argument.

But there's something even more grotesque about trans protections being revoked, and such revocation being defended on the basis of protecting cis women from imaginary trans predators, when it comes from the administration of a president who is, by his own admission, a confessed serial sexual predator.

A man who has bragged about grabbing women by their genitals. A man who has boasted about peeking at naked pageant contestants in their dressing rooms.

Don't fucking tell me that you give a single shit about protecting cis women from sexual violence when you happily support a man who has assaulted women and gloated about it; whose ex-wife gave sworn testimony that he sexually assaulted her; who counts among his friends a convicted rapist; who sexualizes his own daughters; who threatened to sue the dozen-plus women who reported he sexually assaulted them.

Everything about the rollback of trans protections is bullshit—the aggressive void of basic decency, the "state's rights" dodge that ensures the people who are most vulnerable by virtue of where they live are least likely to get the protection they need and deserve, the arrogance of cis people asserting the "right" to audit trans lives under the auspices of "different opinions"—but the fact that, this time, the purveyor of this hostile filth is himself a sexual predator is utterly rage-inducing.

It is unfathomable that anyone would make such cynical, unsubstantiable, harmful arguments about "protecting" cis women in the first place. That they will make them when the signature on the rescindment paper belongs to a man who has himself harmed countless women is unforgivable.

Shakesville is run as a safe space. First-time commenters: Please read Shakesville's Commenting Policy and Feminism 101 Section before commenting. We also do lots of in-thread moderation, so we ask that everyone read the entirety of any thread before commenting, to ensure compliance with any in-thread moderation. Thank you.

blog comments powered by Disqus