Argument with younger family members

[CandidLurker]

I know there’s been a couple of threads but could do with thoughts/advice as to how to settle this in my mind.

At a family gathering yesterday someone brought up the SC decision. I knew exactly the reaction of two young women (both 20’s/very early 30’s) in the family so I tried not to say anytthing.

However, one did argue it from the point of view that this is an oppressed minority and it’s treating them like gay men used to be treated which annoyed me because I don’t think it’s the same at all, then I said I agreed with the SC decision and oh my God the outrage….
….some of the things that were said….no trans people were consulted in the SC decision…trans women don’t have a physical advantage in sports because they can take puberty blockers during adolescence….one shouted at me “BUT THEY HAVE GRC’s” and almost spat out JK Rowling’s name like she is an evil bitch.

I’m kind of upset because these are 2 young privileged women with parents who have helped them overcome every possible difficulty in life they have yet encountered. They’ve probably never encountered sexism in the workplace to the extent I did starting work in a male dominated profession in the 80’s. They weren’t born during the AIDS crisis and have no knowledge/memory of the kind of institutional prejudice gay men encountered (eg not being able to be honest about being gay as then they couldn’t get life insurance which was a requirement for a mortgage in those days).

i feel like they hate me. It feels a bit like when you are a child and you are accused of something serious you haven’t done!

I don’t think trying to speak to them about it will achieve anything..

Any words of wisdom appreciated.

Same here with my teens. Which has been very tricky as a close family member has fully embraced the TRA ideology. And I do mean fully.

The only approach with the wider family is to keep all conversations light and fluffy. I will not be responsible for putting a bomb under the extended family but I am also fully aware that over time, the bonds are becoming weaker and weaker.

For progressive read regressive. I have never before seen such backward views on gender stereotypes except among extreme conservatives, and I have never seen such self righteousness and intolerance as I see among so-called progressives.

Not quite sure that’s progression!

Let her stew in her own juice.

My experience is that it is OK to show your distress at being attacked and shouted at. It's often unproductive to defend yourself though, and definitely unproductive to shout back! Showing your distress may or may not elicit any empathy from those who see it, of course. With my children, half have come to some degree of understanding of my views (but fundamentally disagree with me) and can have a reasonably respectful discussion, and the other half refuse to tell me what they think but either shout at me or cut me out of their lives as much as they can.

So many young people seem to be vulnerable now, the amount of children avoiding school, anxious, ND, there's a big part of the generation who seem unable to stand alone, for them the tribalism of the transgender movement seems to give them a feeling of belonging, of solidarity. As DC will show their worst behaviours to the people they know they can rely on to love them regardless, especially their DMs, it's evident how much the TRAS seem to reserve their greatest distain for older women and how they can't cope with them not being onside. Is this because they're used to older women always being on their side or is it our old friend misogyny? I always remember reading an article 10 years or so ago about a man who said he'd become a transwoman- he said his DM didn't accept the transition so now they were NC- what struck me most was that his DM gave birth to him, raised him and loved him but he cut her off without a backward glance, all she merited was one dismissive line in a two page article.
Covid made everything worse but there's a new generation coming up now for whom it was a non event, I wonder how different their views on the whole trans debate will be