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| LGBTQ people scare the fearful because they seem to threaten their imagine world order. Photo: valentin russanov |
The extreme anti-trans activism we see today is about much more than gender diversity. The transphobia is driven by a deep and irrational fear of the unknown, a fear political extremists are exploiting in order to gain power.
When I started this blog back in 2008, most of the transgender debate gave the impression of being about "facts", both inside and outside the transgender community. We wrote article after article about science addressing gender variance and the real life experiences of trans people themselves.
Sure, there were transphobic activists around, as well as transphobic pseudo-science. But many believed that it should and could be possible to come to an agreement on what gender variance was, based on sound science and the lived experience of trans people.
Those of us who took part in the debate back then, still have a tendency to appeal to science, facts and the reality of the lived experience of trans people when debating transgender issues, the idea being that our opponents will actually listen to knowledge-based arguments. It worked before, so why not now?
This is about much more than gender identity
In order to understand this, it is important to understand that the current backlash against transgender people is not really about transgender people in isolation – or about what it really means to be transgender.
It may look as if the "debate" continues to be about "facts", given that anti-trans activists often refer to "science" when dismissing transgender identities. But the truth is that this has nothing to do with science or facts. This is all about feelings, and particularly about the fear of the unknown. They are not debating in order to learn. They are debating in order to win. They seek control.
Moreover, at this point in history the social and economic context makes it so much easier to use transphobia as a political tool.
