...By Other Means

"Have you seen [the latest anti-trans awful thing] by [media pundit], Erin?" 

No I have not, and at this point I will actively resist doing so. This entire month has been brutal for transgender folk, and I have been the recipient of several stabs in the back. Therefore, in order to practice self-care, I'm not going to read/watch/listen to whatever dehumanizing garbage comes out of DC or the media. The only thing I plan to do is add the speakers to my growing list of people to keep an eye on, because I pay attention when people tell me that they mean to do me harm. 

If you have transgender loved ones, they're probably scared and hurting from the events of the past month. I encourage you to contact them and tell them what a dear friend of mine told me last week, which I have turned into an image for easy sharing across social media, to let them know that they can rely on you:

A friend of mine responded thus on Facebook:

Every time I hear some social conservative bring up the "pedophile" argument.... I'm reminded of institutions like the Catholic Church, and Boy Scouts of America, or the Duggar boy now in prison for possession of child pornography (after years of red flags his family glossed over) which espoused for years heavily socially conservative values, which had their own sex abuse of children scandals....

It's almost as if we need to remind people that trusting people based solely on group affiliation is a bad idea. The whole "in grouping" and "out grouping" is not rational thinking, but fear based emotions, mainly because Heinlein observed, people aren't rational animals, but animals that rationalize.

I see you, I support you, and I hope and pray that you remember that the people sending hate your way simply can't be reasoned with, because they didn't reason themselves into their stance.

That last sentence is an echo of a quote attributed to Jonathan Swift: “You cannot reason a person out of a position he did not reason himself into in the first place.” In other words, if someone arrived at a belief out of emotion, then you can't change their minds through persuasive argument. 

I believe Clausewitz had something to say on that topic.