Republicans and the transgender community

[LizMarie]

Admin note: Topic has been split from a News posting.)

Every state that has passed a bill like this is controlled by Republicans.

Every anti-LGBT bill introduced in states and the US Congress in 2016, over 220 of them, were introduced by Republicans.

Even a state like Georgia, where a Republican governor vetoed such a measure, has a state legislature filled with Republicans who sent that measure to the governor's desk. Different governor and it might have gotten signed.

If you are a Republican, you have to face the fact that the GOP, even in its national party platform, is explicitly anti-transgender and anti-LGBT. The fact that a few Republicans break ranks does not invalidate the observation that the overwhelming majority of Republican politicians, when you consider the entire United States, are anti-transgender. Mike Pence is VP and is openly anti-trans and anti-LGBT. Trump has shown his true colors being anti-trans. Sessions has stated he will not support any federal lawsuits based on gender identity. These are all Republicans.

Ryan has said the Equality Act, which adds gender identity and sexual orientation to the 1964 Civil Rights Act is "dead on arrival". Ryan is a Republican.

Virginia just killed anti-trans legislation with a parliamentary trick. Who brought it up? Who sponsored it? Republicans.

This is NOT a "Texas problem". It's a Republican problem in North Carolina, Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Indiana, Iowa, Nebraska, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, and many other states. And even in states like Georgia, as I noted above, or South Dakota, those brave governors are NOT representative of their state parties because their state parties had enough votes to send such legislation to the governor to begin with. Cities like Magnolia in Mississippi? The state government wants to preempt what they did with a statewide ban on LGBT protection ordinances. And which party controls the Mississippi state legislature? Republicans.

It's time to be honest with ourselves. The GOP today, nationwide, is the largest, most well-organized anti-transgender force in the country. I say good for those few Republicans who oppose that but they are a minority. Trying to pretend they are not is fantasy. Begging the GOP to change is another fantasy. They will change for one reason only - vote them out of office.

Until Republicans who are anti-transgender begin losing on a large scale, they won't stop this. And we, as a community, need to be honest about that. If we can't be honest that the GOP is mostly anti-transgender in its current incarnation, then we're not dealing in realities.

For this reason, I advocate voting Democrat until the GOP changes. That won't get every anti-trans Republican but the Democratic Party being pro-trans does make it clear that anti-trans Democrats are not going to get support, consequently there are not nearly as many anti-trans Democrats as there are anti-trans Republicans.

Until we vote the GOP out and they realize that being anti-trans is a losing issue, this will continue. Until we ensure that Republicans driving low information transphobic voters to the polls is not a winning tactic, this will continue.

It's time to be honest with ourselves.

[Lady Sarah]

Being as the lgtbq community is a minority, we cannot vote out the GOP by ourselves. Please (also) bear in mind that we have many that are republican. However, I think Trump will make sure our next president and congress will be democrats, through his own actions.

[LizMarie]

Don't get me wrong. One of my brothers is a pro-LGBT Republican. I'm glad he is but he recognizes that his position is a significant minority for the party right now. He's also sure it's a long term losing position for the GOP, but as he phased it, "They only care about the short term for now."

[jentay1367]

There's some great information and facts in your original missive, Liz...thank you for taking your time to post that info.

[SailorMars1994]

It is sad but true it exists. And yes, a big round of applase to both the Govenor of Georgia and the people of North Carolina for voted the anti-trans dude out. Still, it is odd how one party has decided to be so wrong on trans issues. In Canada, the leader of the Ontario Conservative Party Patrick Brown has did a 180 from ''family values'' to support the trans community and asking those in his party who object over lgbt to not even bother to vote. The Conservative Premier in Manitoba has came out and said that gender nuetrual bathrooms in provincial buildings are a good idea and many many Conservativesm especially from the old Progressive Conservative Party has rather pro-lgbt. I have no idea why its almost a scandal to be lgbt anything in the US's right-wing circles

[JLT1]

There used to be a significant  number of "liberal" Republicans -fiscally conservative, socially liberal.  Now, there are so few of us left...

So, given the current state of affairs, I agree....

I wish I didn't, that reality was different. 

Sad,

Jen

[SailorMars1994]

Colin Powell, to my knowledge and I dont know every last thing about him is a reasoable Republican !

[LizMarie]

There used to be a significant  number of "liberal" Republicans -fiscally conservative, socially liberal.  Now, there are so few of us left...

So, given the current state of affairs, I agree....

I wish I didn't, that reality was different. 

Sad,

Jen

The current situation is largely because the GOP got in bed with religious conservatives. Barry Goldwater saw this coming back in the early 1980s.

"Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them."

Then later, in 1994, in the Washington Post, he said this:

"When you say 'radical right' today, I think of these moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican Party away from the Republican Party, and make a religious organization out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye."

And it seems Mr. Goldwater was pretty much on the mark.

I know several Republicans like you describe who've left the party precisely because of this sort of activity. I know others who want to fight to get their party back. I wish them luck.

The United States needs two healthy political parties, not one healthy one and one crippled by religion. Most real world working answers aren't strictly conservative or liberal. The real world is full of all sorts of shades of grey.

But for right now, with very very few exceptions, the best thing we can do and ask others to do is vote for someone other than any Republican. Vote Libertarian. Vote Green. Vote Democrat. Just don't vote Republican until they realize they can't win like this.

[Dena]

I regret that I am unable to talk about the president, his administrative team, his cabinet, the republicans or conservatives without risk of attracting the ire of the powers that be for this site. I would no doubt violate several of the tenants of the site. Therefore I shall abstain.

  I like being able to converse with you all.

Jeanette

You  may discuss the policies of the current administration and as long as you stick to the facts, we will not act. The issue is bashing where you name call or post fiction. We will not allow those actions against either party. We have taken action against site members on both sides for bashing so we don't discriminate. We would prefer not to see political topics because we pretty well know how they will end up but often these topic do need to be discussed so we permit them.

[SailorMars1994]

The current situation is largely because the GOP got in bed with religious conservatives. Barry Goldwater saw this coming back in the early 1980s.

"Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them."

Then later, in 1994, in the Washington Post, he said this:

"When you say 'radical right' today, I think of these moneymaking ventures by fellows like Pat Robertson and others who are trying to take the Republican Party away from the Republican Party, and make a religious organization out of it. If that ever happens, kiss politics goodbye."

And it seems Mr. Goldwater was pretty much on the mark.

I know several Republicans like you describe who've left the party precisely because of this sort of activity. I know others who want to fight to get their party back. I wish them luck.

The United States needs two healthy political parties, not one healthy one and one crippled by religion. Most real world working answers aren't strictly conservative or liberal. The real world is full of all sorts of shades of grey.

But for right now, with very very few exceptions, the best thing we can do and ask others to do is vote for someone other than any Republican. Vote Libertarian. Vote Green. Vote Democrat. Just don't vote Republican until they realize they can't win like this.

If it were 1964 I would have had been at a cross roads morally who to vote for if I was alive and an American. Lyndon Johnson and the fact that i loved his social policies of the time (civil rights) but how much i hated it when people of his personality have power(power hungry, ect) and then Barry Goldwater, who IMO was not in the right state of mind poltically to govern in 1964. But, he was an nice person with a big heart and much more centered in policies  out of that year. I probably would have picked Johnson tbh even tho Goldwater turned out to be super awesome in time. Goldwater, especcially in his later years kick arse and I dont even consider myself a righty

[LizMarie]

I would recommend that people take an honest look at what's happened already under Trump.

1. Trump rolled back trans student protections. Note that Betsy Devos tried to keep those protections but ultimately was told to back Sessions or resign.
2. Trump allowed Sessions to withdraw from supporting Gavin Grimm's case before the Supreme Court.
3. Trump allowed Sessions to withdraw from an EEOC case where an employer was discriminating against trans people.
4. Trump almost signed a sweeping anti-trans executive order whose contents were leaked to the press, only stopping when Ivanka and her husband stepped in and fought it.

The promise that pro-Trump trans voters made has to be faced squarely now - we're not going to be protected in our civil rights. There is a long history of marginalized people seeing their rights violated at the state level. Claiming this is a "state's rights" issue is allowing bigotry to work again. The NAACP filed a brief on behalf of Gavin Grimm and transgender people that brought up that long and very ugly history that is even ongoing right now.

There is no reason to believe that many states will ever accept trans civil rights without federal pressure and Trump removed that pressure. Each day I see more cases where Sessions says he won't intervene, which translates into letting states do what they want.

In Wisconsin, Scott Walker and the GOP just did a double whammy on trans state employees. First they changed the law so that state employee health care plans explicitly refuse to provide any trans coverage, not even hormones. Then they changed the state employee gender declaration process to require that you show you are on an approved medical program (at your own expense, obviously) or be listed as your birth sex.

That's one state acting on "state's rights" under Republican control.

Today's GOP is not Eisenhower's GOP. It's not a party of business first, of fiscal conservatism, or of "live and let live" as it used to be. Today's GOP is on an ugly path towards becoming the Christian equivalent of a Taliban like party, dictating everyone must adhere to their strict fundamentalist view of society.

A good friend of mine is a former Republican and a pastor, and he now constantly chides Republican people over how what they are doing is not really Godly and is not what Jesus would do. I'm thankful for him and the minority of open minded religious people like him, but there is a large group who oppose us and who now have a political voice via their control of the GOP.

Transgender Republicans need to start facing reality and realize that hoping Trump will save them from Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, and various state governments and legislatures is a false dream. And as I said, until we start voting them out, they will keep doing this. The only way for trans friendly Republicans to make headway is for anti-trans Republicans to be shoved out of office.

The country won't die if Democrats run it for 8 more years but right now, under the Trump administration, trans murders are skyrocketing even above last year's record total. We've had 7 in the first 9 weeks of 2017. At that pace, last year's record of 26 may be shattered by July. And please note that Sessions has also said he is not interested in DOJ pursuing hate crime charges in any of those deaths.

If Trump cared, he would give sessions his famous "You're fired!" line. The fact that he has not fired Sessions means that Trump accepts this, whether he personally approves or not. Often politicians will take a policy position at odds with their personal beliefs for political gain. This is what it looks like Trump has done to me. And we're the ones who will be harmed by that choice.

[SailorMars1994]

I would recommend that people take an honest look at what's happened already under Trump.

1. Trump rolled back trans student protections. Note that Betsy Devos tried to keep those protections but ultimately was told to back Sessions or resign.
2. Trump allowed Sessions to withdraw from supporting Gavin Grimm's case before the Supreme Court.
3. Trump allowed Sessions to withdraw from an EEOC case where an employer was discriminating against trans people.
4. Trump almost signed a sweeping anti-trans executive order whose contents were leaked to the press, only stopping when Ivanka and her husband stepped in and fought it.

The promise that pro-Trump trans voters made has to be faced squarely now - we're not going to be protected in our civil rights. There is a long history of marginalized people seeing their rights violated at the state level. Claiming this is a "state's rights" issue is allowing bigotry to work again. The NAACP filed a brief on behalf of Gavin Grimm and transgender people that brought up that long and very ugly history that is even ongoing right now.

There is no reason to believe that many states will ever accept trans civil rights without federal pressure and Trump removed that pressure. Each day I see more cases where Sessions says he won't intervene, which translates into letting states do what they want.

In Wisconsin, Scott Walker and the GOP just did a double whammy on trans state employees. First they changed the law so that state employee health care plans explicitly refuse to provide any trans coverage, not even hormones. Then they changed the state employee gender declaration process to require that you show you are on an approved medical program (at your own expense, obviously) or be listed as your birth sex.

That's one state acting on "state's rights" under Republican control.

Today's GOP is not Eisenhower's GOP. It's not a party of business first, of fiscal conservatism, or of "live and let live" as it used to be. Today's GOP is on an ugly path towards becoming the Christian equivalent of a Taliban like party, dictating everyone must adhere to their strict fundamentalist view of society.

A good friend of mine is a former Republican and a pastor, and he now constantly chides Republican people over how what they are doing is not really Godly and is not what Jesus would do. I'm thankful for him and the minority of open minded religious people like him, but there is a large group who oppose us and who now have a political voice via their control of the GOP.

Transgender Republicans need to start facing reality and realize that hoping Trump will save them from Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, and various state governments and legislatures is a false dream. And as I said, until we start voting them out, they will keep doing this. The only way for trans friendly Republicans to make headway is for anti-trans Republicans to be shoved out of office.

The country won't die if Democrats run it for 8 more years but right now, under the Trump administration, trans murders are skyrocketing even above last year's record total. We've had 7 in the first 9 weeks of 2017. At that pace, last year's record of 26 may be shattered by July. And please note that Sessions has also said he is not interested in DOJ pursuing hate crime charges in any of those deaths.

If Trump cared, he would give sessions his famous "You're fired!" line. The fact that he has not fired Sessions means that Trump accepts this, whether he personally approves or not. Often politicians will take a policy position at odds with their personal beliefs for political gain. This is what it looks like Trump has done to me. And we're the ones who will be harmed by that choice.

Bravo to Betsy Devos for that though..

Still, I agree. Dwight Eisenhower, Barry Goldwater, Wendel Willkie, Colin Powell, Calvin Coolidge and Abe Lincoln himself would have a very tough time in the GOP. I am not bashing, it is fact. All the names i just mentioned were very liberal on the social front in one way or another (Eisenhower to a lesser degree but still moderate). I found 2016 to be very similar to the 1924 election. Whereas last year the GOP had some of the most bigoted ''family values'' wanna-be Christians who are big on keepings Transgender, LBG, and other religious minoirties down the Democrats in 1924 had a KKK party going on while using their perverted view of their religion as a means to supress catholic, Jews and Blacks. Times change. There would have been a time were if I was an American I would have been a staunch Republican (like, pre mid 1960s) but today, I must say i would be a staunch Democrat. Like I said, i am unsure why the huge division in America. In Canada it is rather common for a member of a Conservative Party to speak up in support of Trans* rights.

[SailorMars1994]

Funny. I really do think that if Wendel Willkie won the 1940 election over Roosevelt todays GOP would be fighting for us. lets face it, if Willkie won he would have done a lot for civil right in his time (a very staunch supporter of civil rights even candiates of both partys often ignored or tried to down play it during campaign) With that, the GOP would have had their base of minorites back and would have not, or not very likley ever tried to do the southern strategey. Civil rights gets passed, the south that got mad at the Democrats for enacting such legislation would have held it agaisnt the GOP forver and well the solid south probabaly still would have exisited today. In other words, if that election went the other way in alternative reality I think the old GOP we all miss would still be alive today and the old Democratic Party we often try to forget about would still be as was.

[SadieBlake]

Liz, you're hitting all of the nails on their heads.

The Republican 2016 platform was even more regressive than prior ones and Trump has been making good on them. All of this shows in his completely unprecedented low approval ratings.

The only good news I can see is that his propensity to tweet first and think after is even getting him in trouble with his own side of the aisle in Congress.

Trump isn't a Republican, he's an opportunist and the party is being just as opportunist in using him to advance their agendas. It's going to be brief, the left just got a big wakeup call.

[LizMarie]

I used to be a Republican. I won't go near that party now or for the foreseeable future until there is massive change there.

It's been easier for me to argue fiscal balance to Democrats than social tolerance to Republicans these days. We might not get Democrats to dial back the government much but we saw what Republicans did when they controlled Congress and Bush was president. That was no example of "small government" and they doubled the national debt and grew the size of federal government by 75%.

In contrast, while Obama saw the debt increase by 80% under him, much of that was in just the holdover budget from Bush and the next year budget which was strapped for cash because of the Great Recession and the collapse of tax revenues. Take out those two years and Obama's debt growth was not very much at all. Then add in that government size grew by only about 20% under Obama, which factored in for 8 years of inflation, compounded annually, means that the government became smaller, as a percentage of GDP, than when he took office.

So I've been arguing fiscal balance with Democrats who are surprisingly responsive to that. Another ex-Republican I know wants to try to see if certain social issues Democrats care about can be solved with less intrusive mechanisms that small government Republicans would prefer. He also has found a moderately warm reception to some of his ideas.

I would urge people not to believe most of the misrepresentations about Democrats or the current Democratic party. They want a healthy America also. People can differ in policy and goals yet still come to reasonable agreements, except, as Barry Goldwater noted, when they believe they are doing it for "God" and thus become inflexible.

[Janes Groove]

"Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them."

As I noted in a previous post:  https://www.susans.org/forums/index.php/topic,220929.msg1956017.html#msg1956017

I'm to the point where it seems pointless to try to have a rational discussion with people whose argument always defaults to, "The devil makes you do it."
Sadly, I know this all too well from personal experience.  My own anti-LGBT parents would always default to this nuclear option when any discussion of social issues was broached.  I often compare it to the story of Abraham and Isaac.  After folks get in that Abraham mindframe, then even the most heinous act conceivable - the murder of one's own child - becomes acceptable in the service of a cruel angry god. 

[Raelynn]

I've actually been a staunch Republican since I registered to vote in 1986. No,I don't always agree with them, but I agree with Republicans more often than Democrats. The thing that bothers me the most about the LGBT community partnering with the Dems is the radical and violent protesting that has recently become the norm for the Democrat Party. The more violence by the radicals and media exposure of the LGBT association with that crowd (actual or perceived) casts a negative light on all of us. I just want to live my life. Everything was great until the rioting began and I got put into the 'liberal ->-bleeped-<-' category because of my lifestyle. The radicals are ripping us apart and we will never achieve anything when viewed as the crazies. We need to pick our battles and our associations more carefully. My 2 cents.

Sent via IBM Selectric on Tapatalk

[Deborah]

I know several Republicans like you describe who've left the party precisely because of this sort of activity.

I'm one of them.



Conform and be dull. —James Frank Dobie, The Voice of the Coyote

[SadieBlake]

I also used to vote Republican, the last time I did that was ghw Bush and I probably wouldn't have if I'd known the extent to which he was in bed with the Saudis. I also worked for John Anderson when Reagan was poised to take over the Republican party. I've never registered as either party because as far as I can see, parties exist first to line their pockets and those of their donors all before they do anything for their voters. I've never once voted my wallet over my conscience.

I think people have generally missed the significance that our last two elected presidents have been populists.

I lean to anarchist thinking and there are only three things I'd change about our political system:

Do away with gerrymandering

Eliminate the electoral college in favor of the popular vote

Set an amendment that no elected office can be filled until a candidate can get some reasonably large fraction of the total number of eligible voters; when turnout basically never reaches 2/3

Obama did real things for us and Trump is the pendulum swinging the other way. Honestly if this is what it takes to make people see that both parties suck then I can live with it.

[SailorMars1994]

I also used to vote Republican, the last time I did that was ghw Bush and I probably wouldn't have if I'd known the extent to which he was in bed with the Saudis. I also worked for John Anderson when Reagan was poised to take over the Republican party. I've never registered as either party because as far as I can see, parties exist first to line their pockets and those of their donors all before they do anything for their voters. I've never once voted my wallet over my conscience.

I think people have generally missed the significance that our last two elected presidents have been populists.

I lean to anarchist thinking and there are only three things I'd change about our political system:

Do away with gerrymandering

Eliminate the electoral college in favor of the popular vote

Set an amendment that no elected office can be filled until a candidate can get some reasonably large fraction of the total number of eligible voters; when turnout basically never reaches 2/3

Obama did real things for us and Trump is the pendulum swinging the other way. Honestly if this is what it takes to make people see that both parties suck then I can live with it.

Daddy Bush or baby Bush?