Without a doubt, it has been a tough time for trans people these last few months.
The hate messaging has become overwhelming as Republicans have weaponized our existence as symbolic of liberalism run amok. It has been hard to keep our chin up while public figures on the political right openly call us filth and demons or claim that we want to mutilate children and brutalize cisgender women in boxing rings.
In Florida, we’ve also had to endure the agony of winning back our medical freedoms in court only to have the barriers of SB 254 reinstated a month later by Trump-appointed judges. The fear for their children this has caused the parents of trans kids I know has been heartbreaking. Parents like my sister.
Tragically, an appeal to a higher court will likely not put things to right because the next stop would be the Supreme Court, and they have not exactly been proponents of bodily autonomy lately. Our last defense against the transphobic onslaught at this point has been narrowed down to the ballot box.
In order to protect my rights as a trans person, I will vote blue no matter who in November, but that won’t be the cure-all trans people need. That was made crystal clear when the White House kowtowed to conservatives a few months ago by making a public statement opposing gender-affirming surgeries for minors. Something that almost never happens with trans kids but are performed far more often on cisgender teen girls who want bigger breasts or teen boys who want to get rid of theirs.
At the time, it was obviously a desperate appeal to the MAGA masses as the Biden campaign circled the drain. However, the message it sent to trans people was transparent: “Our support has limits.” Sometimes the only thing worse than our enemies are our allies.
Democrats in general have been scared to death of the “trans issue.” They have been running away and hiding instead of affirming our medical needs and basic humanity. All in an effort to seem more palatable to anti-Trump conservatives who might protest vote for Democrats this election cycle. I would faint if Harris were to even utter the word transgender in a stump speech or dare to counter one of the many anti-trans statements Trump has made in his.
It’s a classic case of Dems wanting their cake and to eat it too. Even so, I am praying that they win because at least with them we have the chance that they will ultimately support the rights of trans people to happiness and gender affirming medical care. Some hope is better than the open hostility offered by a Republican administration.
Outside of an episode of “Survivor,” nobody should have their existence put up to a vote, but I definitely feel that is where I and every trans person in the United States is at right now. I am fully terrified to my core that Trump and his brand of hate will prevail on Nov. 5. I am a livewire of anxiety mixed with existential dread because, unlike 2016, this time we know what is coming thanks to Project 2025 and its apocalyptic solution to what it calls the “toxic normalization of transgenderism” in society.
Trump has called it “transgender insanity” in his meandering speeches and followed it up with the shameless lie that schools are conducting “sex changes” so he can gin up outrage and support for his Project 2025 approved plans to stop “transgenderism.” In short, a Trump administration would issue an executive order ending the legal recognition of gender identity in favor of birth sex. Being transgender in the eyes of the government would cease to exist.
Not surprisingly, his base has lapped it up and cheered him on. They love that he is a walking, talking hate-machine intent on making the lives of anyone who isn’t white, male, cisgender, heterosexual and rich, very difficult if not outright impossible. He has said out loud what they can only say in hushed tones in private. And by being so outrageous he has given the cover they crave to turn back the clock to a time when they didn’t have to be what they derisively call “woke,” but is in actuality kindness and consideration for people who are different than themselves.
That is the true meaning behind “Make America Great Again.” It was great back when they could be as racist, homophobic, transphobic and misogynistic as they liked without being made to feel like they were bad people. It’s certainly easier than to learn and adapt to a constantly changing America.
And so we’ve arrived at the point where I would usually entreat you gentle reader to get up, get motivated and do something, but by the time you read this if you haven’t been convinced to register and vote, nothing will. Certainly not my little essay and it’s too late to register anyway. And if you are still intent on voting for a man who mishandled a pandemic, was impeached twice, attempted a coup, was convicted of 34 felonies with likely jail time to come, and already had a presidency based on the kind of greed and self-interest that kept our founding fathers up at night, then I don’t think this reminder that my humanity is worth a vote to protect it will sway you.
What I would ask instead is that you do nothing. Stay home. But to the rest of you I say, vote like your life depends on it. I know mine certainly does.
Melody Maia Monet has her own trans lesbian themed YouTube channel at YouTube.com/MelodyMaia.