Anyone else think Trump will ultimately do more damage to the gender critical cause?

[savehannah]

I hear lots of gender critical Americans (especially despairing parents of trans-identified children) cheering Trump's changes on the gender front, and on the face of it, things like not prosecuting parents for non-affirmation of transgender status and not allowing schools to secretly socially transition pupils seem like progress.

However, since Trump is also anti-homosexual, anti-abortion and anti-reproductive (and other) rights for women, I feel this will just lead to even more of a backlash.

Gender critical people have been trying for a long time to show themselves to be on 'the right side of history' and it felt like this was starting to become realised by more and more people (at least in the UK), that it's not just right-wing nutters that believe in the importance of biological reality.

But now gender critical beliefs are being pushed hard as part of hard right-wing policy alongside lots of unacceptable things, doesn't this lend more credence to the idea of the tolerant left being correct, and mean that people who believe tolerance means stamping on women's rights and allowing lifelong medicalisation of troubled teens feel vindicated in pushing hard back the other way?

And again conflating LGB with T, something which UK gender critical groups have tried to separate. Trump hates them all and wants to take away their rights so they are all a marginalised minority and need to fight together against the fascism. Rather than people realising in many ways the trans righrs movement is homophobic, 'trans away the gay' etc.

I have had similar thoughts. I don't like Trump, there's nothing about him I respect or admire. That I agree with his position on trans ideology is neither here nor there. I'm glad he's taken action on that but he is no friend to women's rights.

My concern re this is that it sends a very clear message to people who may have been on the fence, and are now questioning things because who would want to align themselves with a viewpoint that Trump shares?

At a very basic level people are likely to link the two ie "Trump bad - anything Trump does must be bad - gender critical views/anti trans stance must be bad" (That's a really simplistic view but I have a sick child and I'm not articulating well)

Nobody wants to align themselves as holding the same views as someone they otherwise find morally repugnant. And many people feel that way about Trump. So yes, I have concerns that it might influence the views of questioning people or those who may have been beginning to question the blind acceptance of trans ideology

My view is that, if I ever get to the stage where, every time I want to voice an opinion, I have to stop and ask myself whether this might mean someone thinking I support Trump - well then Trump really will have won.

Considering how polarised Americans are supposed to be, it's amazing what happens if you concentrate on the "what" instead of the "who". There's a lot more consensus than you might think.

Trump has been pretty smart in his first weeks in going for issues with 60/40 or 70/30 approval. Or, in the case of men in women's sports, 85/15 approval.

On the other hand, if you go to Democrats and emphasise that X is a Trump proposal, or you go to Republicans and emphasise that Y is a Pelosi proposal, concentrating on the most polarising personalities in each tribe, you get close to a 50/50 split. Funny that. It's almost as if someone benefits from polarisation.

It will be really interesting when Hegseth invites DOGE into the Pentagon to look for waste and graft in the defence budget. I would bet money that the lefty Democrats in the Senate - Warren, Sanders, Markey, Wyden - will be making impassioned speeches about how you can't prune back the military-industrial complex.

If you can't stomach Trump, that's fine. I just think it's self-defeating to insist that we wait for the Democrats to become sane. During the election there were people spinning scenarios about Harris somehow becoming sex realist, when her entire record speaks against it.

We also have to consider the possibility that, left to their own devices, the Dems might never become sane on this issue.

Parties only become sane when faced with some massive external force. If it's left up to the activists, they just double down.

I think that's the answer to why a clever politician like Nicola Sturgeon sank so much of her credibility into a cause with 20% support. Everyone around her told her it was really popular.

Can't say I have noticed that, but it's a very interesting point.

Surely what the US needs is for some Democrat big hitter to come out and openly dump the gender woo. If such a person exists. Mayor Pete? Or is he not a big shot enough?

What I don't get is who was literally running the country whilst Joe Biden was incapable?
I never believed the rumors he was gaga as I thought his physician, the Vice President, his Cabinet etc would enact the mechanism to have him step down...and this is why I no longer watch/trust the mainstream media.

I have heard/read rumours that Obama was involved in running things behind the scenes.

People say Jake Sullivan, but I don't think there was one person. I think it was mostly the administrative state working on autopilot, and calling Obama if there was a crisis.

Okay, thanks. Were they trying to avoid him stepping down and having Kamala in charge?
It says everything that there is no investigation in the media...

Well yeah, anyone who's ever cared for an elderly relative with dementia could see that he wasn't capable.

And the media spent four years - longer! - telling us not to believe our lying eyes. Makes you wonder what else they're prepared to lie about.

Yes, I read about this. It’s very worrying. A serious but unforeseen outcome.

As I posted earlier the removal of the word "women" (or age or race) had NOTHING whatsoever to do with gender vs. sex.

It is about Trumps absolute believe that nobody should be given money, opportunity or even compensation for being part of a group that is or has been discriminated against by a dominate white male patriarchy.

So saying a woman has now been into space is one thing. But saying a woman has been into space because she was helped by a programme helping women get to the same level as men is by his world view manipulation and an impingment on the natural order of things. ie why he thinks white farmers in South Africa should be offered refugee status as compensation for having to "help" indigenous citizens of SA have access to some of the land (stolen) from them. And you can be he wouldn't be making racist jokes about them eating dogs and cats.

(If anyone is interested in a running commentary on how the Trump administration is interacting with existing US government rules etc., Heather Cox Richardson who is a historian is writing some informative daily "letters". - Dont know if she is a feminist. Her latest is here https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/february-20-2025 - she also posts on facebook.)

Yes I think the Democrats have big questions to answer about how much they were covering up Biden's condition, and who was really in charge, and until they do, any claims they make to holding the moral high ground are going to ring pretty hollow.

I dont think any Democrats are claiming the high ground.

They are only too aware that their failure has landed the US with this man who boasts about how he is the supreme leader, who has no need to be accountable and hasadopted the cartoon of him as a king - in a country that was created out of getting rid of being run by a monarch.

Perhaps the US needs to bring in a law that anyone standing for president has to take an exam to show they understand the US constitution.

Ironically the Democrats could benefit out of this, because as Trump gets more and more extreme even Republican politicians are critical of the things he is saying or doing. So his extremism gives the Democrats a rallying point as a potential alternative. But whether they are competent to run an effective campaign against Trump will be the ultimate test.

It is far more likely that Trump will lose not because of his global grandstanding, but if cuts to welfare and medicare, medicaid impact republican voters. Already some of the "Latino" voters who switched to him are saying they didn't vote for him to tear their families apart.

No, I don't think that @savehannah.

For a start, Trump is in no way Gender Critical and secondly the vast majority of people know the 2 sexes are different sexes. It's a biological reality that there's no getting round.

He will damage America. He will damage women. He will damage the Right. But I don't think he'll damage the GC cause.

I don't know about doing more damage to the GC issue but I do think he will do a lot more damage to women that trans women ever did.

Arguably 'Trump owes his victory to gender ideology.

Trump and people in the U.S took the lead from women here in the U.K. It is people here who have been doing all of the heavy lifting. As far as I'm concerned Trump is just riding the wave, as populists tend to do.

I know it's difficult but personally think it best not to get too hung up on personalities, and just focus on the issues. We know that most people when they become more conscious of what is involved reject trans ideology. All of the Trump/Musk business is just a distracting hate fest.

Trump owes his victory to gender ideology

Ridiculour over statement.

It was just one issue to exploit to get on side those who dont like the Democrats.

Even if the issue of women and sport reached a wider audience, and even the clever line about them and us which in fact wasn't distributed widely, was more about political attitudes towards how far the state should be involved in people's lives.

Well, yes - the biggest problem was Biden's insistence on running again.

But it certainly didn't help.

Maine has not complied with the EO and is still letting biological males compete in female divisions.

https://x.com/i/status/1893013201656201662

I'm sure the same applies to some other blue states. Wasn't Newsom harrumphing about this?

Always fun to see the Democrats revert to Confederate nullification.

Maine has not complied with the EO and is still letting biological males compete in female divisions.

Rathr than not complying isn't it about the fact that it is one of the many EO being challenged in court.

So effectively is not yet a fact.

But didn't Biden start some this with a gender-y EO on his first day? I suppose the difference is, the apparatus of government was a lot more sympathetic to Biden than Trump.