On a forum where I am not allowed to post my thoughts without censorship, a post as made that trans folk should be like a starfish opening a clam, slow steady pressure that eventually succeeds. This is pretty wise advice for most cases and I had no quibble with that advice. But another poster came in and posted complete and utter nonsense. This poster has waged a war against transition itself and urged trans people to always “sit in the back of the bus” if even a single cisgender person objects. Here is what she said:

Yet a very relevant digression because that sort of militant action created many negative reactions and created opponents, opponents who could have cared less but were forced to become opponents because of the offensive behavior and not just fighting for gay rights but attacking many non-gays for their beliefs. Beliefs which by and large had nothing to do with gay issues.

The turning point for gays was when non-militant folks started coming out and demonstrated gay people can be decent human beings and all weren’t such offensive people.

You message here Becky is a very good one and illustrates that desires can be obtained, respect and acceptance achieved by being a decent human being first and using slow and constant change. There have been thousands just like you who have provided positive examples who have been instrumental in achieving so much for trans.

It seems more and more a certain portion of the community seems focused on flushing all this good will folks like you have earned for trans by becoming more angry at non-trans and not pushing for needs but pushing for things that go well beyond the needs of trans and not respecting things most people will find offensive.

This is my response, which I cannot post there because of censorship.

Once upon a time, most whites found the mere presence of blacks offensive. White women argued that black women would prey upon white women in integrated restrooms. Sound familiar?

There are certain things that are morally abhorrent regardless of how they are done. I take great exception to the “stay at the back of the bus” mentality. Coming out gently, the “starfish” approach doesn’t mean not rattling cages. It means doing things in a slow steady forward progression. But people can still be exceptionally stiff necked, cruel, rude, and even dangerous when faced with change they dislike. Should someone stop transition at a certain point just to satisfy family members yet remain in a suicidal depression by doing so? I don’t think so. Should a trans person be denied restroom access to simply empty their bowels or bladder because some bigot is upset that trans folk merely exist? That’s the narrative of Pacific Justice Institute – that your mere existence is harassment of cisgender women.

Among my friends and family, I’ve achieved a more than 90% success and acceptance rate among the people I know. Yet there are losses and those losses were not caused by me. Those losses were the deliberate choices of those people to reject me, despite multiple health care professionals all agreeing that this was what I needed to do. And those losses remain very painful.

Your frequent harangues against transition and against not upsetting anyone amount to allowing one family member to tell you to not seek cancer treatment when ill with cancer. That’s absurd, isn’t it? And it’s just as absurd when applied to therapies that mental health professionals can statistically prove are highly likely to succeed in reducing stress and anxiety brought about by gender dysphoria.

No one is “forced to become an opponent”. That’s an absurd rationalization for bigotry, hatred, and injustice. Becoming an opponent is a choice that the opponent makes not the trans person, not the gay person, not the black person, not the hispanic person. George Wallace chose to become an opponent of blacks. Every single person who chooses to oppose equal rights for transgender people is making exactly the same sort of choice as George Wallace. All that black people did was stand up and say, “I want to be respected and treated decently.” What George Wallace did, and what trans bigots do today is respond with, “Hell no! We’re never going to respect you! We’d turn the dogs on you, the water cannons, and we’d round you up and ship you to camps if we could!” This isn’t even an exaggeration either because trans opponents have made exactly those sort of arguments, from the Tennessee state representative who promised to “stomp a mudhole” into any trans woman he saw enter a restroom, to a North Carolina GOP state organizer who wants to send every trans person off to camps, to even my eldest son who says I need a tattoo on my forehead and arm that tell the world I am trans. (Does that sound familiar?)

Your argument is an “Uncle Tom” argument. Your argument is fear and loathing of what you and other trans folk are, and a choice to allow your rights to be trampled and yourself to be bullied, all so you don’t upset the bigots. I do not accept your choice. You’re free to sit in the back of the bus, but I won’t.

I’m not even sorry to say this, but to hell with you and your fear mongering about who we are. You are a menace to young trans people everywhere by sowing excessive doubt and worry. My only regret is I cannot post my frank opinion of your complete and utter bullshit right where it would matter.