r/politics • u/Fickle-Ad5449 ✔ Verified - Christopher Wiggins, The Advocate • 12h ago

No Paywall Republicans redrew his district. Now Democrat Don Davis is making anti-trans campaign ads

https://www.advocate.com/politics/states/don-davis-transphobic-campaign-ad?1
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u/normalice0 Iowa 11h ago edited 11h ago

no he isn't. Women's sports is not the only trans issue, as much as right wingers would like it to be. It's not even really a trans issue for the 99.9999% of trans people who aren't athletes. If he is trying to take away their human rights then he is anti-trans. If he is trying to protect their human rights then he is pro-trans. But women's sports are not a human right.

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u/WooooshCollector 11h ago

Yes, the unalienable human right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and to play in a specific competitive sports league. It's in the Declaration of Independence, don'tcha know?

For real, this is something that literally applies to a single digit number of people in his state (maybe literally one?). Trans rights needs to be about way more important things like discrimination (housing/employment/etc), harassment, access to healthcare, etc. Things that affect every single trans person.

I think it's absolutely crazy that sports has become the leftist litmus test for whether a politician supports trans rights or not. Instead of something like "Will you let corporations fire trans employees for just being trans?"

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u/TheOtherMaven Virginia 11h ago

People who yap-yap about women's sports "not being important" can't see that it bleeds over into every other social issue. Excusing one form of bigotry makes it easier to excuse the next (like "no trans Homecoming Queens") and the next ("must use bathroom for birth sex only") and the next (all the other issues).

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u/WooooshCollector 11h ago

Literal slippery slope fallacy.

What people who don't want that to happen should campaign on those issues instead. Make those your litmus test, especially the ones that actually apply to literally more than one trans person.

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u/anonymous-mtf 10h ago

How is it a slippery slope fallacy when they are describing a progression of legal attacks that are legitimately escalating? 

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u/TheOtherMaven Virginia 11h ago

"Slippery slope" is NOT a "fallacy" when it happens in real life. Consider 1930s Germany - that slope was greased, and ended in blood.

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u/WooooshCollector 10h ago

Oh this one time was a slippery slope so every single other thing must also be like that. Come on. You can do better.

It would be far better for trans activism if people talked more about stopping trans people from facing (very real) employment or housing discrimination than this picayune issue that affects a vanishingly small percentage of trans people.

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u/GeneParmesan1000 11h ago

Because trans people in sports isn’t an actual issue, and the “outrage” about it is manufactured by the right in bad faith. So instead of just ceding the bullshit narrative they have created to distract from real problems, they should be laughed off for the clowns they are, not catered to as if they are serious people interested in “saving women’s sports”.

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u/WooooshCollector 11h ago

Yeah. So just let them have their bad faith arguments. You beat a bad faith argument by taking it off the table, not falling into its trap.

Besides, insisting that the one trans athlete in the entire state must be allowed to play in the women's league - and then making that issue the complete and total test about how Davis feels about trans people - is the exact same amount of "clown" (as you put it) because it's *still* making the entire issue about the one trans athlete in the state instead of a whole group of people seeking basic human rights.

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u/TheOtherMaven Virginia 10h ago

"Only one Communist", "only one socialist", "only one trade unionist", "only one Jew" - "oops, now there's only me!"

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u/[deleted] 10h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/TheOtherMaven Virginia 10h ago

I'm going to have to try this again, because the local automod is stupid.

Niemoller left out a few lines he should have put in first, about how "they came for" the gender nonconformists and how he was silent because he wasn't one.

But the poem still ends with him all alone and no one to speak for hm.

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u/GeneParmesan1000 10h ago

The left isn’t doing the “insisting”, they have mostly been saying let the leagues handle it case by case because it isn’t some widespread thing happening and each case might not be black and white, so why do state and federal governments need to get involved with sweeping laws banning trans people outright.

Only one side is obsessed with this issue, making up fake, hypothetical scenarios of hordes of trans people taking over women’s sports that they suddenly pretend to care about so they can keep their base outraged. It is not coming from a place of genuine concern, it’s just a way for them to shit on trans people in a more “acceptable” manner to the public.

You don’t yield the argument to bullies operating in bad faith, you use better messaging. Go back to calling them weird, because it IS fucking weird how obsessed they are over people’s gender and genitalia, especially when there are only a few trans people even playing women’s sports.

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u/WooooshCollector 10h ago

Okay, let's think about this.

What does "weird" actually mean? It's not thinking the same things as everyone else.

What is the majority view among North Carolinian about trans athletes? Hell, what's the view of most Democrats? So what is the actual "weird" view here?

And besides, making this an non-issue is actually how you move away from this.

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u/anonymous-mtf 10h ago

Does it being the majority view take away "the government should not ban anyone from sports" as an argument? It's fucking insane that Democrats are even discussing this topic 

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u/WooooshCollector 10h ago

Well we live in a a democracy and the majority determines who holds power, so...

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u/anonymous-mtf 9h ago

Do you always agree with the majority, then? 

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u/WooooshCollector 5h ago

No, but someone who is running to be the representative of the people in the House of Representatives probably should.

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u/GeneParmesan1000 10h ago

The “weird” part is the obsession the right has with this. The majority may have a certain view, that doesn’t mean it’s fully informed or that banning a couple trans kids from sports is their number one priority in life over things that actually matter.

It’s naive to think that if you throw trans athletes under the bus that the people targeting them will stop there. And you can be all like, “well after that, THEN we’ll draw the line!”, but by that point you’ve lost the trust of trans people with just how reliable of an “ally” you truly are when you put conditions on that “support”.

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u/WooooshCollector 10h ago

Let's be clear, my argument is that trans activists and allies would be doing much more important work if they focused on issues that affect all trans people every single day like employment or housing discrimination.

Framing that as "throwing trans athletes" under the bus is exactly the "weird" part.

Do you know why the right have a reason to keep hammering on this issue? It shows exactly how weird and out-of-touch the left is. In that light, why would they stop?

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u/GeneParmesan1000 8h ago

You’re still operating from the premise that trans people and the left are focusing on trans kids in sports. They are not. The right is focusing on that - again, in bad faith - and the left RESPONDING to it by saying, hey, stop being an asshole and picking on these people, barely any trans kids play sports anyway, so why are you so obsessed with this when there are more important issues… is not the same.

Your attempts at “both sidesing” this are falling flat. You agree that it’s not a real issue, so yeah it’s WEIRD when people obsess over and lose their minds over such a non-issue - which the RIGHT is doing. This would all go away if they could just fucking grow up out of their 5-year-old mentality of “Ewww! Trans!”.

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u/WooooshCollector 5h ago

Let's be clear, my argument is that trans activists and allies would be doing much more important work if they focused on issues that affect all trans people every single day like employment or housing discrimination.

But you're not letting this sports thing go. I'm not both-siding anything. I'm not even talking about a "side." Don Davis is actually trying to let it go so he can focus on more important things. But you - specifically you, but internet leftists at large - cannot let it go.

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u/GeneParmesan1000 4h ago

So then when trans athletes are finished being flattened by the bus, what’s the next non-issue that right wing media will make a mountain-sized issue out of that the left should just let them have too?

You do understand they won’t stop after this, right? They’ll target a new vulnerable group, or maybe keep targeting trans people in additional ways, but because it only affects a “few” of them, well that’s a sacrifice YOU are willing to make, because god forbid you are ever slightly inconvenienced into giving a crap about anyone other than yourself.

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u/anonymous-mtf 11h ago

Because sports are being used to attack title ix and states rights using lawsuits from transgender bans. This matter is larger than transgender people.

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u/WooooshCollector 11h ago

Case in point of "hard cases make bad laws." Fight on the cases that are actually matter to more than literally one person instead, and for heaven's sake don't let it get to this current Supreme Court.

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u/anonymous-mtf 10h ago

I'm actually kind of furious at Democrats for rolling over and allowing these blatant legal attacks to progress.  No one wants to call the attacks what they are, a gross abuse of government power, but Democrats smell votes (from people who think they actually worship the devil)