There’s a particularly odious Trump ad playing around here that concentrates on Kamala Harris’s past remarks about ensuring that everybody gets the healthcare they need, including trans people.
I'd also like to recommend, if you really think there might be issues with trans inclusion in sports, you read Julia Serano's substack article published a couple days ago on the subject. "Trans people and sports: Everything you need to know"
Julia is a trans woman, biologist, best selling author, and one of the foundational writers and thinkers on trans issues, going back decades.
There she gives a comprehensive, sourced, and easy to understand breakdown of every issue involved.
I'll take a look. I do think we need to think about elite-levels of competition, but I will be the first to admit that I don't know enough about this specific issue to have a hard-and-fast opinion.
Every governing body in sports has requirements for trans women to have been on HRT and reached specific levels of hormones in the normal female range, and in many cases, below that range. I won't even go into the silliness that is bans in chess, or darts, or pool.
Even at elite levels, as Julia points out, there is evidence that HRT not only negates any advantages of having had a testosterone dominant endocrine system, but actually puts trans women at a disadvantage. As for the idea that such a puberty gave one height, for example...and this is somehow unfair, that's oddly separated out from all the other things that make elite athletes elite.
Michael Phelps is a freak of nature. He is celebrated. Serena Williams, Simone Biles. You can't tell me it's fine that they are superlatively head and shoulders above any competitor and that's fine, but the accident of someone else's birth is not, only for the reason they were assigned male at birth.
Like that is somehow magical or...oh my god...unnatural.
We accept all sorts of genetic advantages. Having grown up wealthy and well-fed advantages, etc etc. There are tall women, no one complains.
The best evidence is that there are trans athletes. It's a thing, and has been, and they are not dominating anything. Anywhere.
This is manufactured transphobia. Please do read her article :)
As a Jew living in a world that always has and always will hate Jews, this piece really struck home for me. There is Jew hate on the far ends of both sides (even of those like me who are atheists and don’t practice the religion), but the ones on the MAGA side are the ones that would strive to destroy those they hate via any violent means possible. And Trump blows wind in their sails every time he opens his big fat fetid piehole.
Wonderful essay! We all should remember what we were taught as children (beside do unto others…etc. ) to put ourselves into the other person’s shoes. Michael, you demonstrated that perfectly. I remember the first time I ever saw a transgender or genderqueer person. I was 12 years old on the NYC subway enroute to school. The person seated across from me was dressed as a woman but with an adam’s apple and a strong jaw. I tried not to stare but our eyes locked and in that two second moment she looked wary, scared and vulnerable. I tried to communicate with my eyes that she needn’t be afraid of me and then quickly looked away. At times like this I return to that memory and think of all the people who still need to be on their guard at all times.
Such a great essay. If only everyone could reflect and put themselves in others shoes to see how much a person might be struggling or just trying to survive or live their life on their terms, we wouldn't have so much hate, fear, and division.
The person you quote recently shared their comment on a trans sub on Reddit and, curious, I figured I’d try to look up the original context (she didn’t link to the original post).
I never know what to expect when I hear that a comedian I admire has addressed the topic of being transgender on social media because oftentimes it isn’t good. The biggest lesson I’ve learned since coming out as trans five years ago is, simply: “just don’t have heroes.” Seriously.
To be trans is to never know if you should feel safe. Not safe as in “safe from physical harm” (although that’s a common worry), but also safe from psychic damage from seeing yourself misrepresented, mischaracterized, mocked and vilified by people who have public platforms.
So it’s nice to read this piece. It’s nice to know there are comedy people out there who don’t see my existence as a joke, and not just because of the whole psychic damage thing. Pre-transition I briefly did stand-up in the Bay Area and in the intervening years I’ve often contemplated getting into improv comedy and theater acting. But I always wondered if that would really be a safe environment for someone like me.
I see a lot of support of trans people coming from some parts of the entertainment world but hardly anything from mainstream comedians. I know your post was about more than just the trans community, but I thought I’d just say thank you for being the first comedian I’ve seen acknowledge any of this. It means a lot. I cried a little.
Thank you so much for this column! It's really the first time I've truly understood what it must be like to be trans. As a cis woman, I've never, since the day I was born, felt that I was in the wrong body. The best I could do was understand that there were people who felt this way.
Now, I think I understand better, and I realize that people who feel they have to "go along to get along" must be under just intolerable stress every day of their lives. How dare anyone deny others relief from that stress? How dare we, as a society, define so narrowly what is right for every living person?? The arrogance!!
And still, I can't understand perfectly. It may be beyond my understanding. But I'll try. And I'll accept and support those who live that experience, while I oppose the bigotry of people who try to define everyone by their narrow standards.
I keep alternating between trying to understand the fearful and distrustful attitude of TERFs and trying to address it.
For women I think becoming a TERF starts with a distrust of men who hurt them sexually. They are hurt by men and also women are stereotypically tasked with protecting children. Then they are surprised by transgender women and think they must protect children from dishonest men. I get it, but I wish they could heal enough to stop connecting sexual trauma to new meeting of strangers and casting an entire population of innocent strangers as a threat to them and their children.
I think we can all agree children should be safe. We disagree about when children are in danger and what actually keeps them safe.
People who reject transgender people are not seeing the existence of transgender children and are endangering their safety. To me, the safety of transgender children includes supporting their mental health by respecting their self concept by agreeing to use their preferred pronouns. The effects of being told you’re not who you say you are are expressed in the film I Saw the TV Glow where the main character half figures themself out but chooses the reality everyone else is guiding them into and the end effect is always supporting someone else’s party while being in mortal pain near death yourself. Some people in my community who I would otherwise like believe using proper pronouns in elementary school convinces kids to be transgender and places them at risk for getting surgery the TERFs are afraid of.
They don’t seem to realize that the key decision by middle school before puberty is not about surgery at all but is about whether to take puberty blockers to prevent the growth of breasts and start of periods for transgender men or the voice deepening and growth of hair in transgender women. That is the first major healthcare decision made by and with transgender family members. It is not surgery. It is reversible if it actually turns out they were just going through a phase where they confused liking an older sibling with being born in the wrong body themselves. How do you know you’re a tomboy and not a transgender man? Maybe the difference is wanting to pee in the backyard? Or wanting body hair? I am cisgender and a tomboy and don’t want these experiences but I do believe in learning from and emulating men as well as women. Other people I know are genderqueer or transgender men and wanted body hair and to dress more masculine. I don’t think it in any way compromises my femininity to acknowledge and support another person’s decisions to guide their physical appearance to make it easier for me to see their self concept.
What bothers me the most with the divisive rhetoric you call out here is that we don’t stop at rejecting transgender people but want to make laws to reverse family healthcare choices. We have a choice to learn and empathize or reject and run away, and there are politicians who think they know what is best for someone else’s family member and should control their healthcare without doing any of the research the family and their doctor have already done. I of course am talking about more than one family but still a vulnerable minority who don’t have voting power to challenge the decisions being made over their heads.
Thank you for eloquently phrasing the fallacy of targeting the victims.
I want to watch that show, "I saw the TV glow", I've seen good things about it, but reading your comment here does make it sound like it could be a tough watch.
It’s PG-13 but there are uncomfortable feelings and a suicide story and one scene of self harm without blood. It seems designed to make cisgender people feel the pain of being a closeted transgender person.
As an ally my realization was I don’t want to show transgender people how much I worry about them. I should think more about bringing them fun and making a party for them instead of making them support someone else’s party.
Michael, that's amazing. Especially the ending. Maga in general and Trump, specifically do seek to divide and conquer. One wonders where it will stop? Are my eyes the right color? Was I born in the correct state? Is my religion on the list? It seems fantastical and almost silly to ask these questions, but you only need to look to North Korea and their rules on proper clothing to see that it is not that far-fetched. Every citizen is a unique individual. We group ourselves in dozens of different ways to find community, support, information, and sometimes protection, but our thoughts and our feelings are our own. Trump seems to be using the middle school playbook here, by making anyone who is not close enough to him in ever-changing and ever-more toxic ways, the enemy. It's Mean Girls, but in the real world, with people's livelihoods and safety on the line. Transgender people, Trump's latest victims, are human beings. I don't know what it feels like to be in a body that does not fit what my mind feels that I am, but I can only imagine it is a horrible and scary feeling. Existing in this current world while being transgender must be hard enough without a commercial like this exposing these individuals to more ridicule and danger just to cull a few votes. What Trump does not realize, however, is that there are many folks in this country who do not hate people because they were born differently or have a different journey. In fact, I'd venture to say the majority of people don't hate other people in the way that some Maga and Trump does. The fear that he is stirring will reach some people, but not the majority. People who want everyone to be safe and have access to healthcare and education and food are the majority in this country. We don't often picket or storm buildings, but we do vote. And those people on the fence that saw that commercial may not have liked what they saw. He was preaching to the choir there, not to undecided voters. He made a mistake. Take it from this unmarried, childless, menopausal cat lady: my vote will not be for the divider who fosters fear. He labeled me and I could laugh about it. Transgender people do not have that luxury. Neither do Haitian immigrants. Neither do pregnant women in need of medical help. Dehumanizing people is wrong, and I suspect, through the make-up and the verbal faux pas, that Trump knows that. No one who would risk the safety of another to get power is deserving of that power.
Excellent piece, Michael. I, too, had noticed the ad and thought about writing on it, but you saved me the keystrokes. Too bad that the people who really need to read it never will; you'd have to somehow condense it into a meme.
Thank you for this. As ugly as things are these days, I still remember being floored by this ad when I first saw it. It's just so...gross. And it made me feel gross to watch it.
In Canada, we don't normally see US television ads, even when watching US programming, but when I was watching the World Series on Fox this particular ad played several times. I'd vaguely heard about it, but I was shocked to see the shear meanness of it, and the blatant way the ad manipulates soundbites to push a scaremongering agenda with zero regard for truth. I find it shameful that it was created, and that it is being aired. I hope its ugliness backfires.
Michael, all,
I'd also like to recommend, if you really think there might be issues with trans inclusion in sports, you read Julia Serano's substack article published a couple days ago on the subject. "Trans people and sports: Everything you need to know"
Julia is a trans woman, biologist, best selling author, and one of the foundational writers and thinkers on trans issues, going back decades.
There she gives a comprehensive, sourced, and easy to understand breakdown of every issue involved.
I'll take a look. I do think we need to think about elite-levels of competition, but I will be the first to admit that I don't know enough about this specific issue to have a hard-and-fast opinion.
Every governing body in sports has requirements for trans women to have been on HRT and reached specific levels of hormones in the normal female range, and in many cases, below that range. I won't even go into the silliness that is bans in chess, or darts, or pool.
Even at elite levels, as Julia points out, there is evidence that HRT not only negates any advantages of having had a testosterone dominant endocrine system, but actually puts trans women at a disadvantage. As for the idea that such a puberty gave one height, for example...and this is somehow unfair, that's oddly separated out from all the other things that make elite athletes elite.
Michael Phelps is a freak of nature. He is celebrated. Serena Williams, Simone Biles. You can't tell me it's fine that they are superlatively head and shoulders above any competitor and that's fine, but the accident of someone else's birth is not, only for the reason they were assigned male at birth.
Like that is somehow magical or...oh my god...unnatural.
We accept all sorts of genetic advantages. Having grown up wealthy and well-fed advantages, etc etc. There are tall women, no one complains.
The best evidence is that there are trans athletes. It's a thing, and has been, and they are not dominating anything. Anywhere.
This is manufactured transphobia. Please do read her article :)
Michael,
Please do use the entire post. I kinda think the ending is the most important part :)
This right here, Mike. Well done. And that ad ought not to have passed the FCC filters. Geezus.
As a Jew living in a world that always has and always will hate Jews, this piece really struck home for me. There is Jew hate on the far ends of both sides (even of those like me who are atheists and don’t practice the religion), but the ones on the MAGA side are the ones that would strive to destroy those they hate via any violent means possible. And Trump blows wind in their sails every time he opens his big fat fetid piehole.
Wonderful essay! We all should remember what we were taught as children (beside do unto others…etc. ) to put ourselves into the other person’s shoes. Michael, you demonstrated that perfectly. I remember the first time I ever saw a transgender or genderqueer person. I was 12 years old on the NYC subway enroute to school. The person seated across from me was dressed as a woman but with an adam’s apple and a strong jaw. I tried not to stare but our eyes locked and in that two second moment she looked wary, scared and vulnerable. I tried to communicate with my eyes that she needn’t be afraid of me and then quickly looked away. At times like this I return to that memory and think of all the people who still need to be on their guard at all times.
I'm currently rewatching The X-Files from the beginning. I just heard this line in Season 2, episode 3:
Mulder: "Fear. It's the oldest tool of power. If you're distracted by the fear of those around you, it keeps you from seeing the actions of those"
This was written 30 years ago, and nothing has changed.
Such a great essay. If only everyone could reflect and put themselves in others shoes to see how much a person might be struggling or just trying to survive or live their life on their terms, we wouldn't have so much hate, fear, and division.
The person you quote recently shared their comment on a trans sub on Reddit and, curious, I figured I’d try to look up the original context (she didn’t link to the original post).
I never know what to expect when I hear that a comedian I admire has addressed the topic of being transgender on social media because oftentimes it isn’t good. The biggest lesson I’ve learned since coming out as trans five years ago is, simply: “just don’t have heroes.” Seriously.
To be trans is to never know if you should feel safe. Not safe as in “safe from physical harm” (although that’s a common worry), but also safe from psychic damage from seeing yourself misrepresented, mischaracterized, mocked and vilified by people who have public platforms.
So it’s nice to read this piece. It’s nice to know there are comedy people out there who don’t see my existence as a joke, and not just because of the whole psychic damage thing. Pre-transition I briefly did stand-up in the Bay Area and in the intervening years I’ve often contemplated getting into improv comedy and theater acting. But I always wondered if that would really be a safe environment for someone like me.
I see a lot of support of trans people coming from some parts of the entertainment world but hardly anything from mainstream comedians. I know your post was about more than just the trans community, but I thought I’d just say thank you for being the first comedian I’ve seen acknowledge any of this. It means a lot. I cried a little.
Thank you so much for this column! It's really the first time I've truly understood what it must be like to be trans. As a cis woman, I've never, since the day I was born, felt that I was in the wrong body. The best I could do was understand that there were people who felt this way.
Now, I think I understand better, and I realize that people who feel they have to "go along to get along" must be under just intolerable stress every day of their lives. How dare anyone deny others relief from that stress? How dare we, as a society, define so narrowly what is right for every living person?? The arrogance!!
And still, I can't understand perfectly. It may be beyond my understanding. But I'll try. And I'll accept and support those who live that experience, while I oppose the bigotry of people who try to define everyone by their narrow standards.
I keep alternating between trying to understand the fearful and distrustful attitude of TERFs and trying to address it.
For women I think becoming a TERF starts with a distrust of men who hurt them sexually. They are hurt by men and also women are stereotypically tasked with protecting children. Then they are surprised by transgender women and think they must protect children from dishonest men. I get it, but I wish they could heal enough to stop connecting sexual trauma to new meeting of strangers and casting an entire population of innocent strangers as a threat to them and their children.
I think we can all agree children should be safe. We disagree about when children are in danger and what actually keeps them safe.
People who reject transgender people are not seeing the existence of transgender children and are endangering their safety. To me, the safety of transgender children includes supporting their mental health by respecting their self concept by agreeing to use their preferred pronouns. The effects of being told you’re not who you say you are are expressed in the film I Saw the TV Glow where the main character half figures themself out but chooses the reality everyone else is guiding them into and the end effect is always supporting someone else’s party while being in mortal pain near death yourself. Some people in my community who I would otherwise like believe using proper pronouns in elementary school convinces kids to be transgender and places them at risk for getting surgery the TERFs are afraid of.
They don’t seem to realize that the key decision by middle school before puberty is not about surgery at all but is about whether to take puberty blockers to prevent the growth of breasts and start of periods for transgender men or the voice deepening and growth of hair in transgender women. That is the first major healthcare decision made by and with transgender family members. It is not surgery. It is reversible if it actually turns out they were just going through a phase where they confused liking an older sibling with being born in the wrong body themselves. How do you know you’re a tomboy and not a transgender man? Maybe the difference is wanting to pee in the backyard? Or wanting body hair? I am cisgender and a tomboy and don’t want these experiences but I do believe in learning from and emulating men as well as women. Other people I know are genderqueer or transgender men and wanted body hair and to dress more masculine. I don’t think it in any way compromises my femininity to acknowledge and support another person’s decisions to guide their physical appearance to make it easier for me to see their self concept.
What bothers me the most with the divisive rhetoric you call out here is that we don’t stop at rejecting transgender people but want to make laws to reverse family healthcare choices. We have a choice to learn and empathize or reject and run away, and there are politicians who think they know what is best for someone else’s family member and should control their healthcare without doing any of the research the family and their doctor have already done. I of course am talking about more than one family but still a vulnerable minority who don’t have voting power to challenge the decisions being made over their heads.
Thank you for eloquently phrasing the fallacy of targeting the victims.
I want to watch that show, "I saw the TV glow", I've seen good things about it, but reading your comment here does make it sound like it could be a tough watch.
It’s PG-13 but there are uncomfortable feelings and a suicide story and one scene of self harm without blood. It seems designed to make cisgender people feel the pain of being a closeted transgender person.
As an ally my realization was I don’t want to show transgender people how much I worry about them. I should think more about bringing them fun and making a party for them instead of making them support someone else’s party.
Excellent
Michael, that's amazing. Especially the ending. Maga in general and Trump, specifically do seek to divide and conquer. One wonders where it will stop? Are my eyes the right color? Was I born in the correct state? Is my religion on the list? It seems fantastical and almost silly to ask these questions, but you only need to look to North Korea and their rules on proper clothing to see that it is not that far-fetched. Every citizen is a unique individual. We group ourselves in dozens of different ways to find community, support, information, and sometimes protection, but our thoughts and our feelings are our own. Trump seems to be using the middle school playbook here, by making anyone who is not close enough to him in ever-changing and ever-more toxic ways, the enemy. It's Mean Girls, but in the real world, with people's livelihoods and safety on the line. Transgender people, Trump's latest victims, are human beings. I don't know what it feels like to be in a body that does not fit what my mind feels that I am, but I can only imagine it is a horrible and scary feeling. Existing in this current world while being transgender must be hard enough without a commercial like this exposing these individuals to more ridicule and danger just to cull a few votes. What Trump does not realize, however, is that there are many folks in this country who do not hate people because they were born differently or have a different journey. In fact, I'd venture to say the majority of people don't hate other people in the way that some Maga and Trump does. The fear that he is stirring will reach some people, but not the majority. People who want everyone to be safe and have access to healthcare and education and food are the majority in this country. We don't often picket or storm buildings, but we do vote. And those people on the fence that saw that commercial may not have liked what they saw. He was preaching to the choir there, not to undecided voters. He made a mistake. Take it from this unmarried, childless, menopausal cat lady: my vote will not be for the divider who fosters fear. He labeled me and I could laugh about it. Transgender people do not have that luxury. Neither do Haitian immigrants. Neither do pregnant women in need of medical help. Dehumanizing people is wrong, and I suspect, through the make-up and the verbal faux pas, that Trump knows that. No one who would risk the safety of another to get power is deserving of that power.
Excellent piece, Michael. I, too, had noticed the ad and thought about writing on it, but you saved me the keystrokes. Too bad that the people who really need to read it never will; you'd have to somehow condense it into a meme.
Thank you for this. As ugly as things are these days, I still remember being floored by this ad when I first saw it. It's just so...gross. And it made me feel gross to watch it.
Incidentally, Charlemagne tha God - who is featured in the ad - issued a cease and desist to the trump campaign - https://www.insideradio.com/free/charlamagne-tha-god-sends-cease-and-desist-letter-to-trump-campaign/article_df9218c8-917f-11ef-9ed9-13fcf2be8c77.html
In Canada, we don't normally see US television ads, even when watching US programming, but when I was watching the World Series on Fox this particular ad played several times. I'd vaguely heard about it, but I was shocked to see the shear meanness of it, and the blatant way the ad manipulates soundbites to push a scaremongering agenda with zero regard for truth. I find it shameful that it was created, and that it is being aired. I hope its ugliness backfires.
dear michael,
excellent piece. i love this: "they/them is you/me"
love
myq