We all need to be calling out transphobia

We're noting C.I.'s  "Iraq snapshot" below because we all need to be calling out transphobia:

 

It's time for THUS SPOKE GLENNETHUSTRA.  Yes, it's time for Glenneth Greenwald and his  transphobia.  I'm being told that the link I provided isn't working.  Did he pull the piece?  I believe I just copied and pasted it.  I've got to take a shower after this dictation is done -- I'm on a treadmill right now -- and then a Zoom with a college on the east coast so I'll put a note in later as to the link or if it's gone.  [Added, here's the link.]  If there are any misquotes, I'm doing this from memory, I read the piece online last night before going to bed.  Glenneth writes to an e-mailer who is troubled by his transphobia:

As you rightly point out, I rarely talk about trans issues, in part because I generally try to avoid talking about anything where I have nothing unique to say due to lack of expertise or passion (which is how I feel about the trans debate), in part because I do think the Culture War (often by design but always in effect) distracts and divides us from larger and more consequential questions about how and where power is wielded, but in larger part because it's mostly an easy issue for me: I think adults should have the absolute right to do and be however they want, pursue whatever makes them happiest and most fulfilled, and they ought be respected both legally and socially regardless of those choices, including but by no means limited to pronoun use, which doesn't bother me at all. That's a principle in which I believe strongly: that society should be constructed to facilitate and maximize the self-actualization of the individual. That was not only the foundation of the successful effort to obtain equal rights for gay men and lesbians but also the core precept on which the Culture War consensus over the last 20 years or so was based, a consensus now sadly unraveling primarily over this issue.

The Culture War?  He's a coward.  He was a coward in college -- I have the receipts,  him in his too big jeans, walking around campus, farting all the time -- I'm serious he had some gas problem -- I know all of it and he's still a craven coward taking what's offered him.  He refused to fight as a gay man and instead cozied up to right-wingers and hoped to be their mascot.  He was pathetic then.  The same refusal to fight was evident in his departure from THE INTERCEPT.  He's an attorney.  The term "breach of contract" should be a familiar one to him.  He refused to sue THE INTERCEPT while making his grand stand.  And that's because Glenn never fights.  Coward.

Trans people, he insists, are distractions and divisions pulling "us from larger and more consequential questions about how and where power is wielded."  Spoken like a true Karen, Glenneth.  Trans people are in the minority, they are oppressed by the government and for you to pretend otherwise goes to both your cowardice and your stupidity.  

If you can't grasp his stupidity, Karen Hunter and her guests rejected that argument yesterday noting that it's target the transgendered right now, develop a blue print to use on others.

Glenneth is speaking of 'self-actualization'?  He really is an idiot.  No, self-actualization was not behind Stonewall or any other major LGBTQ+ protest and/or rebellion.  It was about equality.  If you hadn't been so scared of being seen as gay throughout most of your life, you might know some LGBTQ+ history.  But you were a stupid moron and you were too cowardly to read the books you should have in order to educate yourself.  What if ____ saw you with the book!!!  You know who I mean, Glenneth, the right-winger you crushed on in college but he was straight.  You did everything but doodle his name on your classroom notes.

He goes to Maslow because Glenneth doesn't believe in equality.  So he goes with the best of each own blah blah blah.  Amazing how offensive the words equality are too him until you remember that he is a right-winger.

He then appears to be saying -- read it carefully and grasp that logic is not his skill nor is presentation -- that gay and lesbian rights -- he ignores others -- are faltering now "unraveling primarily over this issue" -- trans people.  First off, learn some history you ahistorical idiot.  Second, trans rights are causing a backlash?  

Oh what a shocker.  I noted that reality last year.  And didn't couch it.  Yes, they are.  And I also noted that the backlash was coming anyway.  If anything Ls and Gs are lucky that trans persons have been taking the bulk of the scorn because they would otherwise be the primary target.  Instead, trans persons are the ones taking the hit but this is about everyone that is seen as an enemy of the right -- pro-choice, pro-equality, pro-democracy.  

We progressed as a society throughout the 90s and the 00s and marriage equality coming in the '10s was a huge step for Americans.  Progress is never a brisk walk down the road.  Instead, people throw up barriers and blockades -- hate constructs that they pursue never grasping how ugly they come off to the people around them.  

An attack was coming regardless and it focused on transgender persons primarily (make no mistake, if an anti-trans agenda was achieved tomorrow, these same hate merchants would be going after lesbians and gay men).

Glenneth is wrong about the so-called "consensus" -- it's been ripped apart by liars which is why you need to call it out.  The playbook -- as we pointed out long before others started noting it -- was a repeat of Anita Bryant in the 70s.  Groomers was used to attack gay men back then and it's used to attack trans people   It's why history is important.  You need to know what happened before.  The hate merchants of the 70s used lies just as is happening now.  And they're running off support with their ugly remarks.  That happened in the 70s as well.  The more hatred emerged, the more obvious that we weren't dealing with people who were loving and caring and believed in the best for the country.  We were dealing with hateful, dishonest people who would just as soon turn on your straight ass as they did on gay men.  

FOX NEWS, as we've been the only ones to note (not bragging, just pointing out reality -- I'd love it others noted it, we could just link to it and I wouldn't have to spoon feed repeatedly) has reached its own tipping point.  They aren't sure how to proceed.  Basic cable subscribers are still with them.  If this were 1994, that might be a good business model.

It's 2023 and that doesn't cut it.  FOX NEWS no longer has FOX entertainment to help it out during tough patches.  THE SIMPSONS network is now part of ABC-DISNEY, et al.  To generate revenues, it is important that FOX NEWS has a streaming service.  FOX NATION was born.  And it looked like it was doing okay.  That was a mirage brought on by Roseanne Barr.  Interest in her return to stand up led to a lot of people signing up.  Some dropped it without ever paying -- using the trial system.  Many more dropped it six weeks or so after.  We noted that reality when it happened and we noted that in the "reason" for dropping, people were referring to the broadcasting of hate.  There was a Catholic male, for example, who identified as Catholic, stated he was religious but noted that FOX NEWS' idea of religious did not fit with him.  He stated he did not know any trans people but even he was offended by the coverage.  I've seen hundreds (thousands?) of the responses.  How bad is it?  Days ago, FOX NATION started reaching out with an offer of $1.99 a month if any of those people would sign back up.

They need subscribers.

DISNEY+ lied about subscribers.  The huge drop off they have right now is not a huge drop off.  They've actually stabilized.  But they lied for months about their numbers -- they did lie -- and that's one of the things that Bob Iger is not going to put up with.  They had to get honest.  But they were able to lie because trade papers -- VARIETY, THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER, etc -- print any lie.  They're not real journalists (especially at THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER) and NETFLIX would lie that X number streamed whatever film or series and it would be printed as fact.  No you type up "NETFLIX claims they had . . ."  Industry reporters -- unless they hate you -- do not ask you to back up anything and run with any claim.  So FOX NATION may claim that they're doing well -- that would keep their stock afloat.  But they are not doing well.  That's reality.

Why I was seeking out the data on that was because of history.  If this is happening to people who would subscribe to FOX NATION in the first place, this means they're losing from the center and the right.  This is the beginning of a turning point.  How long that will take, I have no idea.  But the hate merchants are repelling people that previously weren't repelled.

Back to Glenneth:

My only interest in trans issues is: 1) whether children are being manipulated, coerced and subject to unsafe and untested medical and psychiatric treatments: a concern we constantly debate when it comes to various age of consent and other child-rights questions, 2) relatively trivial but not irrelevant issues such as sports participation and access to women's only spaces (prisons, shelters, etc), and 3) whether this movement is starting to rely on regressive notions of what it means to be a boy and a girl. I have spent a lot of time talking in particular to lesbians about how butch lesbians in particular are virtually disappearing because so many of them now have their breasts removed, mustaches grown, and declare themselves men. 

Are they your children?  Why are you sticking your nose in someone else's family -- while claiming you're all about self-actualization?  Adults are smart enough to make decisions.  I don't need to hear your lies or your scare tactics.  Iowa was the only state that would perform surgery on someone under 18 (unless they're an emancipated minor, in which case, they are an adult in the eyes of the law).  Iowa has overturned that law.  In the US, parents must give consent.  We've heard a lot of whining via FOX NEWS that was all a bunch of garbage.  Scare tactics and lies.  My favorite was probably the 50 something man who came forward to save children from what he went through.  He transitioned while he was a child?

No, after 20 years in the US military, he decided he wanted to become a woman.  It was awful and he regrets it.  Because, it appears, he didn't want to be a woman, he wanted to be a young girl.  Sorry, changing your gender after forty will not make you a teenage girl.  But, more to the point, he didn't have surgery.  He was whining and whining about nothing.

We've heard a lot of those stories.  FOX NEWS loves to pimp the freak in the UK.  You know who I mean, right?  He's a she, he's a gay male, he's whatever will get attention at the moment.  Now he has had surgery -- not gender reassignment surgery, no he had surgery to look like his favorite member of BTS.  Freak.  Gender is the least of his problems.  Some people are just crazy.  Accept it.  Time and again, their 'journalism' is revealed to be nothing but what was once called "yellow journalism."  From WIKIPEIDA:

Yellow journalism and yellow press are American terms for journalism and associated newspapers that present little or no legitimate, well-researched news while instead using eye-catching headlines for increased sales.^[1] Techniques may include exaggerations of news events, scandal-mongering, or sensationalism. By extension, the term yellow journalism is used today as a pejorative to decry any journalism that treats news in an unprofessional or unethical fashion.^[2]

[. . .]

The term was coined in the mid-1890s to characterize the sensational journalism in the circulation war between Joseph Pulitzer's New York World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal. The battle peaked from 1895 to about 1898, and historical usage often refers specifically to this period. Both papers were accused by critics of sensationalizing the news in order to drive up circulation, although the newspapers did serious reporting as well. Richard F. Outcault, the author of a popular cartoon strip, the Yellow Kid, was tempted away from the World by Hearst and the cartoon accounted substantially towards a big increase in sales of the Journal.^[7] An English magazine in 1898 noted, "All American journalism is not 'yellow', though all strictly 'up-to-date' yellow journalism is American!"^[8]

The term was coined by Erwin Wardman, the editor of the New York Press. Wardman was the first to publish the term but there is evidence that expressions such as "yellow journalism" and "school of yellow kid journalism" were already used by newsmen of that time. Wardman never defined the term exactly. Possibly it was a mutation from earlier slander where Wardman twisted "new journalism" into "nude journalism".^{[4]: 32–33} Wardman had also used the expression "yellow kid journalism"^{[4]: 32–33} referring to the then-popular comic strip which was published by both Pulitzer and Hearst during a circulation war.^[9] In 1898 the paper simply elaborated: "We called them Yellow because they are Yellow."^{[4]: 32–33}

That's what FOX NEWS -- and others including THE NEW YORK TIMES -- having been offering with regards to trans issues.  A stupid woman who had her breasts removed and now regrets it.  Boo-hoo.  No sympathy.  You spent your entire FOX NEWS segment explaining you were under age.  You never once called out your parents -- or mentioned that they okayed the surgery (they did okay it).  You just wanted to whine about the doctor.

I've said before, if my children (were underage, they aren't) came to me and said they wanted to have surgery to transition, my first response would be that we need therapy.  Not because they're sick.  Not because they're stupid.  But because this is a big decision.  I'm not doubting them.  I am doubting me.  Meaning, I don't know all that would entail life after such surgery.  I would want them to explore that with a trained therapist.  Not to 'cure' them but so that they knew what was entailed.  That would not be a series of never-ending Freudian therapy sessions.  There would be a start date and an end date (firm) unless my child wanted to continue therapy.  But if that's what they wanted and the therapist had spoken to them about the issues in a manner that my child was comfortable with (discussing issues with your parents can be embarrassing -- specific issues), that's what would happen.

If they came to me a day after turning 18 and said they wanted to transition, I'd explain, this is your life, it's a big decision for 18 but you are an adult so it's your decision.

Tattoos are often the least of things we regret doing when we were younger.  That's not to say transitioning is 'minor' like a tattoo.  It is to say that we all grow up with regrets.  When we get older, we realize more things.  

That's why, as a parent of a child, I would want therapy first.  Not months (unless my child wanted that) but a few weeks to be sure that all the issues were addressed with a professional before surgery.  (Again, I doubt my own expertise and I am also aware that when things go from general to specific, children can be uncomfortable talking with their parents.)  It's a huge decision for anyone but, as the parent, I would be the one responsible and I screw up parenting enough as it is without having my child come back to me in 10 or 20 years over a surgery.  

That's me.  (And I would hope that I would be aware of what was going on and not surprised by it one day with an announcement.  I hope I would be aware that this was a developing issue.  But I could miss that or anything else.)

I'm not here to parent you or to parent your child.  My plate is full, thank you very much.

You had a kid and it wasn't taken away by authorities?  You are responsible.  You handle it how you think it needs to be handled.  (Sadly, that would also mean not allowing your child to transition if that was your decision.  That's why your the parent.  Not me.  You parent your kids.)  Because it does fall under parental rights.  And it's hilarious to watch FOX NEWS rip apart parental rights while pretending to be for them.

These scare stories, this yellow journalism, needs to stop.  Shame on the uneducated Glenneth (I long ago told you he wasn't a very smart attorney and that he promoted the Iraq War).  If they told the truth, they couldn't whip up a frenzy of hate.  They know that which is why they lie.  

Again, no sympathy for any of FOX NEWS' interviewees who regret their decision.  Thus far, we've had adults who did things as adults and now feel bad.  Boo hoo.  I regret last week's hair cut.  (Not really, I've got a great stylist.)  Life is about regrets and thrills and hopes and fears and living.  You're going to make mistakes.  If you can't take accountability for your own mistakes, you're not much of a person.  And I don't have a lot of sympathy for you.  In addition, they've had adults who did things when they were not adults.  So take it up with your parents, I'm not here to parent you or your children. 

Or in the words of Goldie Hawn's character in DECEPTION, " Oh, for Ch**st's sake! Isn't anybody in charge around here?"

[We censor the use of any deity's name as a swear.  That's out of respect for others' religion.  That's not me pretending not to have a foul mouth.  If you're not a child and you know me, you know I have a wide range of curse words I pull from frequently.]

 

I also should note how cute it is that Glenneth tries to hide behind lesbians.  Glenneth, I find it difficult to believe that "butch lesbians" speak to you.  It seems that, if they did, they'd be slapping your face repeatedly.  So that leaves us with non-traditional lesbians and 'fem' lesbians.  So they're having trouble finding "butch lesbians."  Sigh.  Guess they're in the same boat straight women have been in for years -- you know, how that group infamously said for decades that it was hard to find a man to date who wasn't married or gay?  

Life is hard, for everyone.  And anecdotal is all Glenneth has to offer.

I really need to pause here a moment.

I really want to underscore how, in the 90s and 00s, America had to endure columnist Thomas Friedman who would pimp his own opinions into mythical cab drivers who populated his writing and now, in the '20s, Glenneth has introduced mythical butch lesbians to be his sock puppets.  

And I want to also note TERBLS.  Glenneth is our modern day Margaret Mead and has discovered a new social participant in the dialogue -- Trans Exclusionary Radical Butch Lesbians.  Oh, Glenneth, you are so accomplished.  Doing it all from Brazil, are you, all this research?  You are amazing, Glenneth, simply amazing.

He then goes on to whine about "parents not assigning a gender at birth"

What is that your business?

You claim to respect parental rights and now you're whining about how they're parenting.  It doesn't effect you.  Get your busybody nose out of it.  The ego on this person is astounding.  (As we note in "Read The Tea Leaves" at THIRD: "In the year 2028 . . . David Miranda explains why he divorced Glenn Greenwald, 'There just wasn't enough room in a California king for him, his ego and me'.") 

Here he really reaches and we may have to break this paragraph up into sections:

I regrettably liked Matt Walsh's film because the central question -- "What is a Woman?" -- is impossible to answer for those who deny that it's about biology and anatomy precisely because any attempt to answer it in any other way will dredge up gender stereotypes that we -- in my view, rightly -- have finally discarded (a woman is someone who likes wearing dresses, playing with dolls, cries a lot, hates sports, and is more sensitive). 

No, it won't.  It will if you're uneducated hick named Glenneth Greenwald.  

Try reading Carol Tavris' THE MISMEASUREMENT OF WOMEN: WHY WOMEN ARE NOT THE BETTER SEX, THE INFERIOR SEX OR THE OPPOSITE SEX.  That book came out in 1992.  As usual Glenneth wants to weigh in without doing any work.  This is a topic feminists have dealt with forever and a day.  And that was the point -- last week? -- I was making here about the ones who are erasing women are not transgender women but people like cis women in my industry who are rushing to self-describe as "actors."  As I said, actress is a noble profession.  If we're not comfortable with that term, why aren't we using a different one instead of adopting "actor" which is a term for men.  Men are not the norm -- a point Carol makes repeatedly in her book.  "Singer" is a non-gender related term.  If we want a non-gender related term for acting, we need to come up with one.  If we're using "actor," why?  Why aren't we asking that men call themselves "actress" -- why are we bending over to accommodate men?  I'm not joking on this.  "Actress" is being walked away from not by transgender women or transgender men but by cis gender actresses.  Who's really erasing women -- answer that.

Matt Walsh is a transphobe and that's why Glenneth embraces him.  Glenneth -- friend of lesbians and so worried about gender constructs (which he can only manage to term "gender stereotypes") doesn't write about women, do you ever notice that?  Do you ever notice how this 'champion' of women doesn't reTweet women.  Maybe one reTweet every 30 or so Tweets is a woman.  But Glenneth is our brave supporter or ally -- in his mind.  

He's full of garbage and always has been a sexist pig -- yes, again, I'm going back to his college days.

Feminists have been addressing gender constructs for decades.  Want to go back to Mary Woolstonecraft Shelley -- because we certainly can.  Glenneth's ignorance of the work, research and literature on this topic is appalling.  What's worse is he's writing this in a 'response' -- not shooting off the top of his head. He knows nothing and he thinks he can b.s. his way out with a lot of words.  But he doesn't know what he's talking about and, honestly, owes us all an apology.

What is a woman?

If you have to ask, I don't think I should have to speak to you.  My time is valuable and limited.  I don't have time for your nonsense.  

How stupid are you?  What is a woman?

Even in the 19th century there wasn't one answer to that question.  

How did you get a college degree -- let alone a law degree -- and remain so stupid?

Is it based on having a period?  Well if so, that rules out all adult women who've gone through the change, who have had surgery that stops  menstruation (such as endometrial ablation), women who are not menstruating due to physical activity and/or lack of caloric intake (bulimics, anorexics, and some women in certain endurance competitions, etc),  women practicing certain birth control (such as Depo-Provera) . . .

Again, I'm so sorry that you're so damn stupid.

And why the hell are you -- a gay man -- so interested in a woman's gender?  Do you think you have the right to ask someone if they're a woman or not?  If they tell you they are, does that mean you have the right to look at their genitals' to prove they're not lying?

Honestly, what is that your business?

If Pat comes up to you and asks you the time, and you tell her the time and Pat responds, "Thank you.  Sorry, even as a girl, I never wore a watch" -- do you think that you somehow need proof to identify Pat's gender.  Pat just told you she's a woman.  End of story. 

I don't understand it.  Are you in a lab setting?  Will you be dissecting Pat?  

Are you fearful that you're going to bump into Pat in the ladies room because, if you are, Glenneth, you shouldn't be in the ladies room.  

Again, things that are none of your business.

You are a transphobe and you are using every lie you can think of to justify that.  

Why don't you try telling people how Pat being a woman harms your life?  And if you can't, why don't just shut the f**k up?

Because that is the reality.  Pat being a woman has nothing to do with you at all.

You have no reason to attacks transgender people.  You need to stop it and you need to stop lying that it's funny or hip.  It's disgusting and hateful.

But attack them is all you do.  Again, back to the same paragraph:

That's why Dylan Mulvaney has become controversial: she's a cartoon of what a woman in the 1950s was supposed to be, and to see someone who lived her whole life as a man pronounce herself a woman based upon such exaggerated caricatures of "what a woman is" does strike me as not much different than minstrel shows where whites express their caricatured version of "what it means to be black." 

Glenneth wrote that.  It would be a man, I think.  Well it would, wouldn't it?

Those familiar with actual women are probably smiling.  

Glenneth never bothered reading the work of women.  Nora Ephron, before she became a successful director, was ESQUIRE's media critic. She wrote about a woman who had surgery to transition.  The woman had bought into stereotypical constructs of women and had become June Cleaver without any sex drive.  

So, Glenneth, you think you're being clever but you're not.  For actual wit on the topic, refer to Nora's 70s essay "Conundrum."  Some would argue it hasn't aged well.  Nora (who I knew) is sending up the woman for her extreme notions.  Transitioning isn't really the issue of the piece other than that the woman had the surgery.  

Dylan Mulvaney?  Sorry.  I do have a life.  I had to look her up.  What's exaggerated?  What am I missing?  Or, after Nora's take on the former soldier who became the dainty, tea sipping woman who couldn't handle the bonnet on her car (she was British) or mingling with those rough, hairy men, am I just not seeing it?

Because I don't see it.  I see a young woman. She's 26.  THE NEW REPUBLIC pulled an article on Pete Buttigieg that made a good point regarding maturity (that's not an insult to him today, he's matured since the article was published).  It was noting that there are 'growth spurts' when a closeted person comes out.  And I mention that because Dylan has transitioned and she did so after the age of 18.  I'd say she's still young. THE NEW YORK TIMES and others excused Bully Boy Bush's drunk driving arrest in 1976 as "youth" and he was 30.  So I think a young woman finding her way deserves a lot more latitude than a War Criminal.  

She appears to be doing Amy Sedaris, not a 50s caricature.  Maybe I've missed something in the four videos I had to stream this morning to learn of her.

I don't know why you're acting this way, Glenneth.  Well I do.  I've written about PARIS BURNING before, right?  About Glenneth in college and his near vomiting reaction to the film -- even without seeing it?  He's also has a real aversion to being seen as femme.

It's his own personal problem.  

But there's nothing wrong with Dylan.  And she's not a cartoon of a 1950s woman.  I'm so sick of people who talk about decades and don't know what they're talking about (see Ava and my "Media: They lie" for more on that).  Dylan is just fine the way she is and she doesn't need a transphobe judging her.  

Again, what is Dylan's life Glenneth's business?

He's worse than Gladys Kravitz on BEWITCHED.  I don't own a gun but, if I did, and Glenneth and his big nose came looking in my window, I just might shoot.  Maybe that's the only way a buttinsky like Glenneth learns?

An apology to Chelsea Manning.  When she was trashing him, I did understand some of it.  But the transphobia?  I hadn't heard him express that and I'd never read his Tweets at that point.  Having read his Tweets, I now get her point.  She was right on the transphobia, she nailed it 100%.  My apologies to Chelsea for not realizing what he was.  

Back to Glenneth:

And I absolutely question why someone can simply declare a new gender identity that must be instantly respected based solely on self-declaration but that can't be done for racial identity (à la Rachel Dolezal).

Your are just an idiot.  You don't understand genetics, you don't understand constructs, you don't know the history -- around the world -- involving third-sex, for instance.  I can't help it that you're so damn stupid that you think this is a new development in our society.  Surgery is apparently new, less than a hundred years.  But we've dealt with and welcomed -- around the world -- larger understandings than we have today.