“I’m here to fight for Delawareans and to bring down costs facing families,” McBride said. “Like all members, I will follow the rules as outlined by Speaker Johnson even if I disagree with them. This effort to distract from the real issues facing this country hasn’t distracted me over the last several days, as I’ve remained hard at work preparing to represent the greatest state in the union come January.”
I could never fathom being this graceful against people literally trying to deny me the right to exist
She's going to get harassed and possibly assaulted in the men's room. I guarantee it.
I worry if it's the best strategy. She decided to take the high road, but members of vilified minority groups don't really have that as an option.
McBride ran as a very milquetoast centrist Democrat. She ran on helping Delwareans with real kitchen-table issues, she didn't run on her identity at all. Her whole message is, "look, trans people are just ordinary people. I'm running as an ordinary person. I promise not to make a big stink about being trans. I just want to help my neighbors." And of course, like any centrist Democrat, she immediately stated she was willing to work across the aisle. She's centrist Democrat to the core, fetishistic bipartisanship and all.
But here is the problem. Republicans DO NOT WANT and WILL NOT LET a trans person simply be "ordinary." They want every trans person to have to be a radical bomb thrower. They portray trans people as blue-haired bomb-throwing radicals, and having a very assimilationist trans person just acting like a normal person isn't something they can tolerate. They NEED her to be a radical. And they are going to force her, one way or another, to speak up for trans rights.
It starts with bathrooms, but it doesn't end there. The House has a gendered dress code. Are they going to make her wear a men's suit? Are they going to require that all colleagues refer to her as he/him? Are they going to deadname her on the House floor? What level of humiliation is she willing to put up with before she finally starts speaking up for herself?
Even if she is willing to personally put up with any level of humiliation, is she willing to sacrifice her own constituents for the sake of respectability politics? She is willing to abide by the House Speaker's ruling, but would she herself be willing to vote for a federal law that prohibits trans people from using restrooms on all federal property? How about any of the hundred other anti-trans laws Republicans would want to pass?
Eventually, if she wants to stick with this, "they go low, we go high" approach, she will end up having to vote for overtly Fascist policies. They will deliberately put her in situations where she has to vote to materially harm herself and other trans people. And at that point, it becomes much harder to actually stand up for your principles.
What argument could she make to oppose a federal nationwide bathroom ban? She already agreed to abide by the principle that trans women should use men's restrooms. If she tries to object now, she will seem like a hypocrite.
This is ultimately the problem that assimilationists always run into. You can try to be one of the good ones. You can tell everyone that your minority status simply shouldn't be an issue at all. The problem is that, however much you try, bullies MAKE your minority status an issue. McBride tried to simply take the high road and ignore her trans status entirely, but ultimately that's unlikely to work. Republicans have already taken advantage of her timidity to humiliate her. And they won't stop until she is forced one way or another to vocally stand up for trans rights. And unless she is willing to actively vote for her own community's destruction, at some point, her hand will be forced.
It's a trap, and she's seemed to have walked right into it.
What is her other option? Respond in a militant fashion, fight them tooth and nail over where she drops her logs? This was the best possible response, in my opinion. She rises above them, doesn’t take the bait and comes off making them look petty and small while she almost laughs off how pathetic they are.
I don’t think it denies her the ability to fight further aggressions down the road. It seems pretty simple to say “it’s one thing to come at me, I can bear your attacks but when it affects my constituents, I have to draw a line” you know?
Damn, Republicans are obsessed with genitals.
That's quite easy to explain; they are mostly sexually frustrated after all.
MAGA told us creepy men and male rapists wanted to use the law to be able to use the same bathrooms as women
The maga people were the creeps and rapists and they got their wish
In other news - "Water, wet!"
all they have to do is invite like 30 trans men to the capital for a week and you will see a quick repeal of this policy.
"Just send in the trans men" is not a fucking solution. It suggests that we can just walk into the ladies room and go "oh, but I have a vagina, I'm supposed to be here!" and they'll be like "ah damn, I guess you can go ahead". Transmascs have been beaten, arrested, and even murdered trying to use the women's room. We aren't your human shields, we're in just as much danger
Look at him with his rosy cheeks and old grandma's glasses.
I swear this guy's closeted and just projecting. Like many conservative Christians.
Democrats should go all in. Add an amendment for genital inspectors to access the bathroom.
"Ah Mr Cruz. Little below average, but it is technically a penis. Carry on."
Or one of those airport scanners that can see under your clothes.
Backscatter scanners
Bro has a burner, loves TS porn. Can't have Jr. seeing his search history.
I get sick a little bit every time i hear that story. Even assuming the best of intentions, the risk of it backfiring is so high. It's like he wants to fuck up his son's life and burden him with years of therapy.
Given how much trans porn keeps finding its way on conservative computers (and there’s nothing wrong with that if you aren’t a bigot) i seriously worry she’s going to be sexually assaulted in there. I trust her to not let it stop her, I’m sure she knew it was a likely possibility, but yeah she’s not safe in there
Ehh trans porn is really bad but not the idea itself. All porn is pretty racist and sexist, if they had proper regulation for that i would have no problem with that. But currently its really sexist
Ok yeah I used it as a shorthand for it being ok to find trans people attractive and to see our bodies as as sexual as any other adult’s body. I didn’t want to get into the reality of the fact that the sex work industry has two faces and while not inherently evil is rife with abuse. Sex is good, whatever consenting adults want to share is magnificent and even when problematic is none of anyone’s business, but the porn industry is devastating. And in particular the sex work industry ruins and ends trans lives, but it also keeps us from begging on the streets. Sylvia Rivera has talked about it in the context of prostitution as someone who sold her body as a teenager to survive and to not subject her loved ones to transphobic violence.
A speaker at day of remembrance last night spoke of selling depictions of their body for rent and the shame associated. Meanwhile I’ve dated women who sold nude pictures who did it for fun and as a side gig. It’s complicated and I hope desperately we can find our way to a society where I don’t have to worry about starving my siblings by stopping abusive sex work.
To me porn is a tough one. A lot of porn now seems to be individuals creating and sharing what they wish, within their own comfort zones. The stuff created by companies on the other hand does induce further pressures of people pushing people to do things they may not have chosen to do if they had created it themselves. All genders get pushed into doing shit by companies to perform things based off promises that are strictly manipulation and it is predatory. Companies will look to market trends / gaps that sell more advertisements/products.
If someone is choosing to share something without manipulation, I think it is ethical and just work. The question is how do you root out predatory practices companies perform without banning companies altogether. As banning them will inevitably take away the lobbying that keeps evangelicals or such from trying to ban it all together.
It needs to be safer, but I'm not sure how we can get there. Maybe someone else will throw in some ideas
trans porn is really bad
They just haven't hit a good storyline yet.
Hard to believe when it's the only genre of porn where you can fuck someone pre and post op.
He's such a fucking creep.
I wonder what the consequences of just pissing on the floor would be. Vandalism? Censure?
Did the people that smeared human feces on the walls of the capitol building on Jan. 6 face any charges?
That would seem to set precedent.
Edit: I wouldn't be at all surprised to find out that despite DNA evidence, that they didn't face any charges.
Most of the people charged with anything over Jan 6 were charged with obstructing an official proceeding or similar. Not that it matters, Trump will pardon them just as soon as he's done permanently quashing any legal proceedings against him forever.
That feeling when you change the law to force your crush to use the same toilet as yourself
This is the point where my mom grabs us both by the ear, and drags us to the front of the bathrooms, rips the signs off, replaces them with asterisks and goes "THERE, NOW BE QUIET!" and goes back to Oprah.
