Transgender Issues in America

 

Transgender Issues in America          Gerry OShea

The name Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence (SPI) appeared in recent news reports and, understandably, drew guffaws from many observers. The title is a spoof on religious orders who sometimes work with unwieldy names.

 The SPI members who come mostly from the queer and transgender communities dress in technicolor habits and, like so many real Sisters, they collect money to help poor and marginalized groups who have benefited by about $1.5 million since their foundation in 1979.

These make-up Sisters achieved a degree of fame recently when the Los Angeles Dodgers invited, uninvited and finally re-invited them to the club’s annual gay-pride night game where they received the Community Hero Award for their charitable work.

The baseball team management was justifiably criticized by some Catholics who resented the use of nuns’ garb to gain notoriety for their cause. Others, including some real Sisters, who share their concern about the maltreatment of the non-binary community, applauded the Dodgers’ final decision.

Bill Clinton first marked June as national “gay and lesbian pride month” back in 1999. Since then, the scope of the pride designation has expanded. President Obama included people of different gender identities in the annual celebration, and this year President Biden opened it up to include “lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex” communities. LG has become LGBTQI+. Well done Joe Biden although I had to google the meaning of the “I” word.

A clear majority (71%) of Americans now favor same-sex marriage, but a recent YouGov poll indicates that one third of Americans are turned off by the confusing multiplicity of new sexual variations. Interestingly, that poll also reveals that over 30% believe that society needs to move faster in the direction of full acceptance of people of all sexual orientations.

These gender identity issues provide the driving force for the Republican agenda in the 2024 presidential election. It is easy to poke fun at and ascribe blame to a vulnerable minority whose lifestyle seems radically different from “ordinary” people. This provides a powerful populist mishmash for many leaders on the political right, especially in this case when it is used to conjure up scenes of moral depravity.

The Republican Party is already associating Democrats with support for gay rights of all kinds, which is true. Nearly all of the declared contenders for their party’s nomination include a denunciation of LGBTQI+ rights with a loud call to arms against what they dismissively call transgenderism.

By blaming drag shows and books with queer characters they hope to beat the drum of fear and disenchantment. Nikki Haley has suggested - without any evidence - that trans children playing in girls’ sports has somehow led to more teenage girls contemplating suicide.

Ron DeSantis epitomizes the far right’s turgid dismissal of the feelings in the non-binary community. His so-called “Don’t Say Gay” laws in Florida prohibit teachers from discussing sexual orientation or gender identity with their students.

We badly need to reflect on the impact of our laws and attitudes on what is broadly termed the gay community. The respect that accompanies the open-minded live-and-let-live approach to life would lift the dark clouds of intolerance and unearned condemnation that still prevail against LGBTQI+ people. We need some consequential moral leaders to preach that prejudice and disrespect shown towards any law-abiding group is unconscionable and contrary to all ethical principles.

Among non-binary adults, male and female, 82% report feeling emotional abuse during childhood, 52% were bullied and 11% were subjected to so-called conversion therapy. This study also found that 94% of this group have considered suicide and 39% have attempted ending it all to escape negative community and sometimes family pressure.

Giving clear notice of their priorities in the upcoming presidential contest, more than 540 anti-transgender bills were filed by Republicans at both state and federal levels in 2023, three times the number that were proposed in 2022. Five years earlier only 26 of these prejudicial bills were considered. While most of them target transgender youth and their families, others place limits on the entire trans community’s access to public life.

I guarantee that you will hear much more from Republicans across the country about the pseudo - problems allegedly posed by transgender people than any policies geared to improving educational outcomes or dealing with climate change.

Donald Trump seems bewildered by this new cultural emphasis o the trans community. “I talk about cutting taxes, people go like that, but when I talk about transgender everyone goes crazy. Five years ago you didn’t know what the hell it was.”

These 540 regressive pieces of proposed legislation represent American lawmaking at its very lowest and most incoherent. They include bans on medical care and insurance coverage, participation in sports, bathroom use, as well as measures requiring schoolteachers and counselors to out transgender students.

 For youth living in unsupportive homes, forced outing frequently leads to homelessness and even worse.

Religious conservatives hiding behind biblical verses designed to meet the needs of long-ago times and cultures, who lost their fight against gay marriage but have now trained their eyes on the growing numbers in the transgender community.

 For instance, over the course of three weeks in 2022 Fox News ran 170 negative segments about transgender people. Beating the drum of prejudice and exclusion seems to come easily to this allegedly Christian community.

What about the powerful Catholic Church in the United States? What do the bishops have to say about this hot-button topic? Where does it fit in with their understanding of the spirit of the New Testament?

In an article in the National Catholic Reporter, Daniel P. Horan, a Capuchin priest and distinguished theologian, describes a recent official paper promulgated by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops dealing with transgender issues as “nothing short of a disaster, theologically, scientifically and pastorally.”

The full rather forbidding title of this document reads as follows: Doctrinal Notes on the Moral Limits to Technological Manipulation of the Human Body. It calls on Catholic hospitals and other healthcare institutions to refuse treatment for patients suffering from gender dysphoria – an acute sense of distress caused by a mismatch between a person’s sense of gender identity and his or her sex identification at birth.

Fr. Horan argues convincingly that we must respect the ongoing scientific research that continues to explore the causes and appropriate treatment for this condition. He asserts in the strongest language that the bishops’ approach on this complex  matter “betrays a gross ignorance about what the medical and scientific community has taught the world.”

Gerry OShea blogs at wemustbetalking.com