Don't Be Cruel (to a Heart that's True)

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                “For every complex problem there is a clear and simple solution.

 And it is always wrong“ H.L. Menken

There is perhaps no more difficult political subject than transgender sexuality: especially when it comes to young children. Recent legislation in Iowa, Utah, Florida, Indiana, & Texas and references to the “transgender agenda” by Nebraska gubernatorial candidates Jim Pillen and Chuck Herbster make the topic worth examination.

Have you noticed competing campaigns focus on similar issues? Politicians poll issues to identify topics that stimulate the base and build voting blocs. Through campaign ads, we can infer conservative voters are focused on inflation, the complexities of pluralism, and expanding rights.

I met her in a club down in old Soho where you drink champagne and it tastes just like Coca Cola (The Kinks, Lola)

At the heart of our model of self-governance are free speech and civic debate. I remind students their grandparents founded modern-day rights movements. It is through discussions that the language and norms develop for society to operate.

While slow and often painful, the arc of moral justice has progressed.

At the signing of the Declaration of Independence, 1 in 20 white males could vote (5%). It took 80 years for all white men to get the vote. Passed after the Civil War, the 15th Amendment failed to assure black men voting rights. Omaha’s trial of Standing Bear in 1879 recognized some rights for Native Americans.

Scholars peg the late 19th Century as the era when the Irish became “white.” In 1920, the 19th Amendment recognized women’s right to vote. And despite Henry Cabot Lodge’s blistering speech in 1896, over the 20th Century, Eastern European and Mediterranean Roman Catholics were accepted into the national tapestry.

In 1948 Asian-American rights were expanded under the 14th Amendment. And after 100 years of violent oppression, The Voter Rights Act (1965) afforded voting rights to Blacks. Finally, in 2015 the Supreme Court assured marriage equality nationwide.

Well I'm not the world's most passionate guy but when I looked in her eyes well I almost fell for my Lola

There are two aspects of the so-called Transgender Agenda I want to examine. 

Politics: Some claim the Transgender Agenda is driven by “woke Marxists.“ The recent flurry of legislation and campaign ads signals that many Americans grapple with transgenderism. While Polls indicate Americans are largely supportive of LBGTQ+ rights, political campaigns focus on activists whose views are louder and less moderate. Consequently, partisan discussions over-serve far-left and far-right views in order to stir up anxiety and motivate voter opposition.

While this may make good politics: its divisive governance.

Girls will be boys and boys will be girls. It's a mixed up muddled up shook up world except for Lola

People: As we cradle our babies, intentionally or not, parents dream of that child’s future. Some friends had a child with severe autism. The mother described it as a process of learning, mourning, and readjusting. Despite the unexpected challenge that autism brought her family, their love never failed but their life plans changed.

A mother shared the challenges of psychologically mourning the loss of a daughter while learning to love her transgender son. I knew a family whose son, from a very early age, dressed in his mother’s clothes. I don’t recall them offering me Karl Marx’s book Das Kapital, but I witnessed their soul searching when life threw them a curveball.

Admittedly, trans-sexuality is vexing. The National Institute of Health estimates less than ½ of 1% are transgender. Politicizing already challenging lives for votes seems unnecessary. Why be cruel when the issue calls for compassion? This issue is hard but only a bully punches down.  

Well, I'm not the world's most masculine man. But I know what I am and I'm glad I'm a man. And so is Lola