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Katrina Mac's avatar

I don't think you're going to be able to tease people out until the T and all its activism is first teased out of LGB. Many LGB are disavowing the T for this very reason. And also, what you describe as far as the normies go, is an unquestioning allegiance to institutions and whatever those institutions tell them to think, say, and do. It's a terror to leave the authority of the institutions. This is why many (like me) have left the left and have found a comfortable home further right.

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Ute Heggen's avatar

Thanks for this. I feel the same. I am astonished how hard it is for those who have to identify as "liberal" to admit that the EOs are actually accurate language, structured to protect women and children. These people lecture about boycotting LL Bean because "they dropped their DEI" and advise me that perhaps I should have "tried to stay" in an untenable marriage to a husband who suddenly said he's born in the wrong body.

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Emmy Elle's avatar

I do think that when more liberals understand this, more liberals will come around. Many of them (including me until recently) see trans issues as an extension of the gay rights movement of the 90s-2010s. I have only recently learned from my gay and lesbian friends that this is not the case.

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Susan Scheid's avatar

Interesting that you note this. I am actually the gay and lesbian friend to many of my friends . For the most part, it doesn’t even occur to friends who are not LGB to ask me what I think from that vantage point, and opening a discussion, no matter how gently, remains extremely difficult, if not impossible. I do applaud your approach, though, don’t get me wrong. Keep going!

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Barb's avatar

This is so true for me too, Susan. A lot of my friends are heterosexual female college professors who are 60+ years old, and the universities are thoroughly on board with gender ideology as inviolable truth.

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Susan Scheid's avatar

I can’t tell you how much I appreciate you saying this. Though I make a good effort to set it aside, it is actually quite hurtful. And what is happening to younger lesbians is beyond awful. Yet friends like these are completely lacking in the ability to understand that, if you want to support a truly marginalized community, you should be doing everything you can to support young lesbians.

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Barb's avatar

Yup! I have lived in Park Slope for 30+ years and for the past several years I’ve seen increasing numbers of young women who have medicalized. I think nostalgically of the 1990s, when we affectionately referred to my neighborhood as dyke slope. I thank my lucky stars for having been born when I was, but I feel profoundly sad for young lesbians today.

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Susan Scheid's avatar

Barb, if you are ever inclined to meet up and brainstorm, or just plain commiserate, I would welcome it. We could meet, maybe, in the Village for lunch? I am uptown, near Columbia U.

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Barb's avatar

Sounds great!

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Susan Scheid's avatar

Terrif! Sent you a DM to make a plan.

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Katrina Mac's avatar

The "T" Coat-tailed on the rest

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