A Brief History of Trans Smearing

Aren't you glad Baptists don't influence pop culture? I sure am.

Outside of political blogs and TV bobbleheads the only people that really give them the time of day are the screwballs, including the occasional nut that graces the oval orifice.

Thank heaven for that, otherwise people might still think of trans women and trans femmes as the diseased, drug addled hapless lying prostitutes we've been regularly painted to be.

Bu then wasn't it Jerry Springer (Democrat, former mayor, TV celebrity) who chose to capitalize on those stereotypes for his daily TV program?

Didn't Jared Leto trot those stereotypes out again to weasel his way into an award by way of Dallas Buyer's Club?

Let's remember that the people that kill us don't typically read the bible. They aren't usually voters. They do however, watch TV, they talk to their friends. They wallow in base pop culture stereotypes about trans people.

Those come from somewhere.

It's not the baptists. Not for lack of trying, but they're just not that good at propaganda.

ONE MILLION MOMS

• The conservative advocacy group One Million Moms launched an online petition telling Burger King to edit or remove an Impossible Whopper ad.
• The ad features the reactions of Burger King customers eating an Impossible Whopper, with one man saying “Damn, that’s good.”
• The profanity earned backlash from One Million Moms, who also campaigned against the LGBTQ+ ad on the Hallmark Channel.
• Burger King is the latest target of One Million Moms, a conservative activist group that focuses on stopping “the exploitation of our children, especially by the entertainment media,” according to its website.
• https://thehill.com/changing-america/respect/lgbtq/477945-conservative-group-calls-for-burger-king-to-remove-impossible
• Mom, are you fed up with the filth many segments of our society, especially the entertainment media, are throwing at our children? Are you tired of all the negative influences our children are forced to contend with? If so, we urge you to become a member of OneMillionMoms.com.
• https://onemillionmoms.com/about-us/
• This summer, the world was convulsing over climate change, hurricanes, terrorism, and Trump. Meanwhile, the far-right group One Million Moms was clutching its pearls over ... Toy Story 4.
  In one of its numerous calls to action, One Million Moms asked its followers to sign a petition objecting to a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment with a female couple in Toy Story 4. It was just the latest effort for the furtive group, which agitates against positive LGBTQ representations as its cause célèbre. 
• https://www.advocate.com/media/2019/10/21/one-million-moms-secretive-antigay-group-cant-stop-failing
• 
  
  
• That number, 4,525, was about 0.45 percent of one million. On Facebook, the page had a far bigger following than it did on Twitter. In fact, 98,649 people liked the page as of December 17 2019; a lower 93,533 followed the page for updates. The larger number was 9.8 percent of one million:
• https://www.truthorfiction.com/how-many-moms-are-in-one-million-moms/

• One Million Moms: Intolerance of Biblical Proportions

  How a fundamentalist Christian group markets intolerance of gays and lesbians.

• https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/you-it/201305/one-million-moms-intolerance-biblical-proportions
• 
  

Civilized Democratic Politics: Looking for Overlapping Consensus

Context

“. . . . Cornyn spoke in favor of the Republican Party fighting its way back to victory by broadening its appeal to a broader swath of voters, including moderates. . . . . the former aide explained . . . . ‘He believes in making the party a big tent. You can't win unless you get more votes.’ In contrast, DeMint portrayed compromise as surrender. He had little patience for the slow-moving process of constitutional government. He regarded many of his Senate colleagues as timid and self-serving. The federal government posed such a dire threat to the dynamism of the American economy, in his view, that anything less than all-out war on regulations and spending was a cop-out. . . . . Rather than compromising on their principles and working with the new administration, DeMint argued, Republicans needed to take a firm stand against Obama, waging a campaign of massive resistance and obstruction, regardless of the 2008 election outcome.” -- Investigative journalist Jane Mayer, Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right, 2017

“James McGill Buchanan [chairman of the economics department at University of Virginia] was not a member of the Virginia elite. Nor is there any evidence to suggest that for a white southerner of his day he was uniquely racist or insensitive to the concept of equal treatment. And yet, somehow, all he saw in the [2nd 1955 Supreme Court] Brown decision was coercion. And not just in the abstract. what the court ruling represented to him was personal. Northern liberals -- the very people who looked down on southern whites like him -- were now going to tell his people how to run their society. And to add insult to injury, he and people like him with property were no doubt going to be taxed to pay for all of the improvements that were now deemed necessary and proper for the state to make. What about his rights? Where did the federal government get the authority to engineer society to its liking and then send him and those like him the bill? Who represented their interests in all of this? I can fight this, he concluded. I want to fight this.

Find the resources, he proposed to Darden [President of the University of Virginia], for me to create a new center on the campus of the University of Virginia, and I will use this center to create a new school of political economy and social philosophy. It would be an academic center, rigorously so, but one with a quiet political agenda: to defeat the ‘perverted form’ of liberalism that sought to destroy their way of life, ‘a social order,’ as he described it, ‘built on individual liberty,’ a term with its own coded meaning but one that Darden surely understood. The center, Buchanan promised, would train a ‘new line of thinkers’ in how to argue against those seeking to impose an ‘increasing role of government in economic and social life.’ He could win this war, and he would do it with ideas.” Historian Nancy MacLean, Democracy In Chains: The Deep History Of The Radical Right’s Stealth Plan For America, 2017

The ‘perverted form’ of liberalism included opposition to racial segregation, support of racial and gender discrimination and oppression, bitter opposition to organized labor and bitter opposition to a central government that stood for defense of equality and individual civil liberties in schools, churches, commerce, the courts and everywhere else. That was the hated form of perverted politics that Buchanan envisioned, Darden blessed, and eventually the Koch Brothers funded. Later, other GOP billionaires heavily funded and still fund today a softer variant of this radical libertarian ideology. According to MacLean, that 1955 Supreme Court public school desegregation decision was the beginning for the rise of radical right libertarianism in America based on the previously undiscovered historical records she found and wrote about.

Overlapping consensus

In her 2013 book, Political Emotions: Why Love Matters for Justice, political philosopher Martha Nussbaum describes her vision of how societies can try to approach the best that humans can hope to attain in terms of a diverse, democratic civil society, civil liberties, justice and equality. One aspect of her vision of civil society looks for overlapping consensus among all the various interests, moral and religious beliefs, innate human urges and perceived reasons to be uncivilized. There are a lot of reasons to be uncivilized, ranging from trivial to justified and grounded in reality and sound reason to fantasy and flawed reason. She argues that such a civil society and political liberalism can be built on a consensus.

“.... equal respect for citizens requires that a nation not build its political principles on any particular comprehensive doctrine of the meaning and basis of life, whether religious or secular. Political principles ought to be such as to be, potentially, objects of an overlapping consensus among all reasonable citizens -- those, that is, who are respectful of their fellow citizens as equals and ready to abide by fair terms of cooperation. .... The consensus may not exist at present, but it ought to be a plausible possibility for the future, and we should be able to envision a plausible trajectory from where we are to such a consensus.”

Nussbaum goes on to identify two characteristics of such political principles. The first is narrowness in scope to cover only political entitlements and matters of political structure. The second is having a shallow basis or foundation that is focused on ethical notions central to the core political principles such as equality and equal justice. The idea is that over time most citizens will come to accept the political principles because they respect both secular and religious values and they are also respectful of freedom and equality for people holding such diverse values.

Some of the moral content from such political principles flows from equal respect and tolerance of diverse but mutually respectful beliefs. The point of the political principles is not to establish a single doctrine, but instead to provide a basis for social glue or cohesion with as little coercion as possible, e.g., enforcement of racial anti-discrimination laws.

Instead of drawing on religious or metaphysical traditions, Nussbaum looks to sources such as empirical psychology, sociology, human development science and history to inform political principles. Those empirical sources are used for insight about how to reinforce positive emotions while discouraging negative emotions that can easily derail political liberalism and lead to intolerant tribalism and tyranny. In essence, Nussbaum looks to the science of what humans are and why they think and behave as they do. and then applies that knowledge to building a liberal political framework that is stable, compassionate and dedicated to equality and equal justice. Inherent in those beliefs is deep social moral value.

Nussbaum argues that science has made it clear that despite the human tendency for radical evil, society and culture are universal influences that can blunt its impact. Although radical evil, is inherent in the human condition from birth, society and culture and reign it in and negate most of its tendency to divide and degrade societies and how they mistreat various groups.

Can that work?

It isn't clear if Nussbaum’s vision of tolerant, just political liberalism can take hold at present. The ideology she professes is somewhat abstract, so the strength of the social glue it might afford may not be enough to do the job. Also, the power of dark free speech, lies, deceit, and emotional manipulation, to divide and corrupt morality and behaviors is painfully obvious in current American politics. It may be the case that social divisions and intolerance constitute unsuitable conditions to even try this experiment. On the other hand, there probably will never be optimal social conditions. It is hard to imagine that the new ferocity of dark free speech will lessen any time soon.

40% of Americans Believe in Creationism

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Forty percent of U.S. adults ascribe to a strictly creationist view of human origins, believing that God created them in their present form within roughly the past 10,000 years. However, more Americans continue to think that humans evolved over millions of years -- either with God's guidance (33%) or, increasingly, without God's involvement at all (22%).

The latest findings, from a June 3-16 Gallup poll, have not changed significantly from the last reading in 2017. However, the 22% of Americans today who do not believe God had any role in human evolution marks a record high dating back to 1982. This figure has changed more than the other two have over the years and coincides with an increasing number of Americans saying they have no religious identification.

As many as 47% and as few as 38% of Americans have taken a creationist view of human origins throughout Gallup's 37-year trend. Likewise, between 31% and 40% of U.S. adults have attributed humans' development to a combination of evolution and divine intervention over the same period.

Sharp Differences by Religious Preference and Education

As has been the case historically, Americans' views on evolution and creationism vary sharply based on their religious identification, how often they attend church and their education level.

Majorities of Protestants (56%) and those who attend church at least once a week (68%) believe that God created humans in their present form. Meanwhile, 59% of those who do not identify with any religion believe in evolution without any intervention from God.

Those with a college degree are much more likely to believe in evolution than creationism, while the opposite is true of those without a college degree. 

However, even among adults with a college degree, more believe God had a role in evolution than say it occurred without God.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/261680/americans-believe-creationism.aspx

The World is Facing a Crisis

Humanity faces a global environmental crisis from which war both distracts us and which it exacerbates including but not limited to adverse climate change which will disrupt agriculture, create droughts and floods, disrupt disease patterns, raise sea levels, set millions of refugees in motion, and disrupt natural ecosystems on which civilization rests. We must quickly shift the resources wasted in laying waste to addressing major problems humanity now faces. Starting with the military is a logical step. Not only does the out-of-control military budget take away much needed resources for addressing the planetary crisis, the negative environmental impact of the military alone is tremendous.

Connecting the dots – illustrating the impact of war on the environment:
• MILITARY AIRCRAFT CONSUME ABOUT ONE QUARTER OF THE WORLD’S JET FUEL
• THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE USES MORE FUEL PER DAY THAN THE COUNTRY OF SWEDEN
• THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE GENERATES MORE CHEMICAL WASTE THAN THE FIVE LARGEST CHEMICAL COMPANIES COMBINED

F-22 Raptor: “Military aircraft consume about one quarter of the world’s jet fuel.” (Image: wall4all.me)

• A F-16 FIGHTER BOMBER CONSUMES ALMOST TWICE AS MUCH FUEL IN ONE HOUR AS THE HIGH-CONSUMING US MOTORIST BURNS A YEAR
• THE US MILITARY USES ENOUGH FUEL IN ONE YEAR TO RUN THE ENTIRE MASS TRANSIT SYSTEM OF THE NATION FOR 22 YEARS
• DURING THE 1991 AERIAL CAMPAIGN OVER IRAQ, THE US UTILIZED APPROXIMATELY 340 TONS OF MISSILES CONTAINING DEPLETED URANIUM (DU) – THERE WERE SIGNIFICANTLY HIGHER RATES OF CANCER, BIRTH DEFECTS AND INFANT MORTALITY IN FALLUJAH, IRAQ IN EARLY 2010note11
• ONE MILITARY ESTIMATE IN 2003 WAS THAT TWO-THIRDS OF THE ARMY’S FUEL CONSUMPTION OCCURRED IN VEHICLES THAT WERE DELIVERING FUEL TO THE BATTLEFIELD

We simply can’t go forward with a conflict management system that relies on war in a world which will have nine billion people by 2050, acute resource shortages and a dramatically changing climate that will disrupt the global economy and send millions of refugees on the move. If we do not end war and turn our attention to the global crisis, the world we know will end in another and more violent Dark Age.

https://worldbeyondwar.org/world-facing-crisis/#note12

A Critique of Libertarianism

For years, my experiences with libertarianism was mostly unpleasant. They are an energetic bunch of folks who are rock solid certain that their ideology is best and if anyone disagrees, they usually get viciously attacked. That’s why I stopped trying to communicate with that scintillating community years ago. Each brief step back into that rigid ideological world, to test for changes indicated that the old, nasty status quo is still alive and nasty. Those folks are still right and the rest of us are idiots or worse.

Over the years, I came across things that describe most libertarians. This is a good time to put them together in one happy place for posterity’s sake.

Here’s why libertarians are right and you are wrong

This is how a prominent libertarian, Michael Shermer, describes the workings if infallible libertarian ideology:

“Ever since college I have been a libertarian—socially liberal and fiscally conservative. I believe in individual liberty and personal responsibility. I also believe in science as the greatest instrument ever devised for understanding the world. So what happens when these two principles are in conflict? My libertarian beliefs have not always served me well. Like most people who hold strong ideological convictions, I find that, too often, my beliefs trump the scientific facts. This is called motivated reasoning, in which our brain reasons our way to supporting what we want to be true. 

Take gun control. I always accepted the libertarian position of minimum regulation in the sale and use of firearms because I placed guns under the beneficial rubric of minimal restrictions on individuals. Then I read the science on guns and homicides, suicides and accidental shootings (summarized in my May column) and realized that the freedom for me to swing my arms ends at your nose. The libertarian belief in the rule of law and a potent police and military to protect our rights won't work if the citizens of a nation are better armed but have no training and few restraints. Although the data to convince me that we need some gun-control measures were there all along, I had ignored them because they didn't fit my creed. 

My libertarianism also once clouded my analysis of climate change. I was a longtime skeptic, mainly because it seemed to me that liberals were exaggerating the case for global warming as a kind of secular millenarianism—an environmental apocalypse requiring drastic government action to save us from doomsday through countless regulations that would handcuff the economy and restrain capitalism, which I hold to be the greatest enemy of poverty. Then I went to the primary scientific literature on climate and discovered that there is convergent evidence from multiple lines of inquiry that global warming is real and human-caused: temperatures increasing, .... 

The clash between scientific facts and ideologies was on display at the 2013 FreedomFest conference in Las Vegas—the largest gathering of libertarians in the world—where I participated in two debates, one on gun control and the other on climate change. .... In the climate debate, when I showed that between 90 and 98 percent of climate scientists accept anthropogenic global warming, someone shouted, “LIAR!” and stormed out of the room.”

Philosophers speak

From the philosophy world come these salty comments: “Libertarian solutions favored by the political right have contributed even more directly to the erosion of social responsibilities and valued forms of communal life, particularly in the UK and the US. Far from producing beneficial communal consequences, the invisible hand of unregulated free-market capitalism undermines the family (e.g., few corporations provide enough leave to parents of newborn children), disrupts local communities (e.g., following plant closings or the shifting of corporate headquarters), and corrupts the political process (e.g., US politicians are often dependent on economic interest groups for their political survival, with the consequence that they no longer represent the community at large).”

Martha speaks

And finally, this is how political philosopher Martha Nussbaum describes flawed libertarian thinking:

“Even the minimal libertarian state has its own characteristic culture of emotions. Libertarians sometimes suggest that it is an advantage of their ideal that they do not need to rely on extensive sympathy. They can use human nature just as it is, relying on acquisitiveness, Hobbesian fear and limited sympathy to propel the machinery of competition. By contrast, liberals, they allege, want to engage in intrusive and uncertain projects of improvement. There is less to this contrast, however, than meets the eye. Even libertarians are opposed to force and fraud. .... Competitive acquisitiveness and the desire to rise above others can upset even that type of state, causing it to degenerate into lawless tribalism. .... Furthermore, proponents of the libertarian state typically assume, and do not argue, that their claims about “human nature” are true apart from culture. .... And yet history indicates that people’s capacity for extended sympathy varies greatly in accordance with the culture in which they live, as do their desires to outdo others in rank and status, or to dominate other racial or ethnic groups. .... we must pay attention to the facts of human psychology, insofar as these are at all understood, and we must not ask of people what they cannot deliver, or can deliver only with great strain. .... Take antidiscrimination laws. All the just state needs to do is to remove artificial barriers to trade, minority hiring, and so forth. Employers, being rational, will quickly see that hiring minority workers is in their interest. Libertarian thinkers argue that these laws are unnecessary because, discrimination is economically inefficient. .... They will not be held back by entrenched hatred, disgust, or, again, the desire to humiliate through segregationist practices. All are understood, moreover, to have a nondeformed view of the potentiality of African Americans, rather than a view deformed by racist stereotypes, whether those impute laziness, low ability or criminal propensity.  .... Libertarian politics is naïve, because people are just not like that. .... And as John Stuart Mill observed, the most ubiquitous and enduring exclusion of all, the exclusion of women from employment opportunities and political participation, is a bizarre policy for a utility-maximizing society, and one that could be held in place only by irrational prejudice.” (emphasis added)

And the libertarian has no grip on reality - don't vote libertarian

Conclusion

Together, those comments nicely describe what it is about libertarianism that has never had any personal appeal. It took others to articulate it for me, but this is basically it. This seems to explain why criticism of libertarianism and its beliefs are sometimes met with such ferocious, often vulgar push back. Libertarian ideology strikes me as one of those logic-proof compartments that Edward Bernays described way back in 1923 in his masterpiece on the staggering power of propaganda, Crystallizing Public Opinion: “Intolerance is almost inevitably accompanied by a natural and true inability to comprehend or make allowance for opposite points of view. . . . We find here with significant uniformity what one psychologist has called ‘logic-proof compartments.’ The logic-proof compartment has always been with us.”

Fun fact: The GOP has been taken over by very wealthy, powerful radical right libertarians including the Koch Brother’s organization and money. Their vision for government is exactly as described in the condensed party platform shown above and in the delightful poem. They are dead serious about those things and they tolerate no dissent from GOP politicians to their vision for a new American tyranny.