Fascist Discrimination
{Sara M. Arnold}
THERE HAS BEEN a considerable amount of backlash to the increasing acceptability of trans* folks.
Unfortunately, the election of Donald Trump puts trans* folks as targets. Transgender athletes seem like a big deal for his supporters, who seem to be disgusted by the whole concept of being trans* and consider transgender people in sports to have an unfair advantage. (Spoiler alert: they don’t.)
And many, especially trans* people who are BIPOC, end up dead simply because of who they are. It breaks my heart to see young people, mostly teenagers and young adults, who are murdered by those who refuse to accept reality.
In the roaring ‘20s in Berlin, trans* people were receiving more support from the German public. Then the ‘30s happened. It’s a little known fact that the Nazis persecuted trans* folks and shut down their clubs before the Final Solution. Millions of trans* people died at the hands of fascism. Trans* folks and the disabled, especially those in institutions, were purged first. The Nazis got Zyklon B right using trans* people, which they would eventually use to exterminate millions of Jews.
Millions of trans* and gay people were massacred at concentration and labor camps as well. Similar to Jews and the Star of David, they had their own patch to identify them -- a pink triangle.
“Never again,” they said, but there is a rise in both anti-Semitism and fear of trans* people coming for their children. Six million Jews died in WWII, but so did approximately six million other people. And people forget that it included millions of LGBTQIA+ adults and children.
Families with LGBTQIA+ children are leaving states in droves. Some states are starting to call gender-affirming care to be child abuse. The risks to children in Southern states, especially in rural areas, are real. Some families are so afraid of what is happening and the mental health risk to their children that they are leaving their states and coming to more supportive states like those in the Northeast (including Massachusetts).
We are going backward in this country. We are facing people who want to exterminate LGBTQIIA+ people, including kids. Some homophobic and trans* Trump voters voted only on this issue.
Are we going back to 1933? I don’t know. I’m worried about that. Is trans* discrimination and the attacks on DEI the first shots of a new breed of fascism?
What about the tract of the Freedom 2025 document the ultra right-wing is using to change this country forever and to persecute more people who aren’t “normal” or who describe themselves as LGBTQIIA+ or are neurodivergent (or all of the above).
(No one is normal, even cis het white people.)
I’m afraid that history is repeating. Every time we make a more tolerant and accepting world, there is backlash from fascism and the ultra-right.
This is what is happening now.
Right now.
Fascism is back because of Trump and Elon Musk and the voters who gave Trump a second term.
What happens next? History tells us the outcome of fascism isn’t good, that it would require the loss of democracy and the Constitution, and the right-wing will take over, and will persecute -- even disappear people or execute them -- until their “undesirables” no longer exist.
It might not be enough to protect trans* children even in liberal Northern states or the pockets of Southern states that are different, like Austin or Knoxville.
I have friends who are considering moving to another county if things keep getting worse in the US. I can’t say I blame them. I’m a dual-citizen and so is my daughter, so we can get out. I just hope we (and our loved ones) get out in time.
Being trans* is not a mental illness. It is part of who some people are. And we need to fight back.