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One thing I guess I want to explain, especially in light of this week's SGW:
Why am I so relentlessly optimistic about the long term for trans rights, lives, and futures, despite how shitty and awful the backlash against us is these days?
It really comes down to demographics and rhetoric. Like, root and stem.
(1/?)
Over 20% of Gen Z is queer and out about it, and the numbers are rising every goddamned year.
Stop and think about that. *Twenty fucking percent*. One in five. And good data suggests that better than one in twenty Gen Zers are trans and out. And that group votes almost exclusively on the left.
Absolutely no political ANYTHING wins, long term, by attacking a demographic that votes as a bloc.
(2/?)
As time passes, the people who most oppose queer and trans rights are dying, and now they're dying fast. They're being replaced by people on the opposite end of the political spectrum.
And we have absolutely no reason to believe that trans and queer folks will ever go back into the closet.
(3/?)
There's a myth that people vote more conservatively as they age, and it's bullshit. There's some rightward drift as folks become wealthier, but in general for the last several centuries the median political position on everything has drifted slowly to the left.
And our current economic inequality is only exacerbating the leftwsrd tilt of young voters, who are wildly poorer than prior generations.
(4/?)
The net of all of this is that the right is facing a reality where identity politics are failing more by the year, and they really don't have anything else in the tank.
Either they win now and fundamentally change the system, or it's game over for them.
(5/?)
So, yes, while certain candidates pose an immediate, existential threat to us, if we can avoid them for even a little while longer, all the gerrymandering in the world can't save them. Really, worse than that--it'll suddenly snap back against them, driving them from power in unimaginable waves. Just look at what happened in the most recent UK elections for a really good example of what happens when the gerrymandering collapses.
(6/?)
So, yeah, if we can make it through the next few years, we have every reason to believe this demographic tidal wave is irreversible. The time to stop it, for the right, was back in like 2014.
Theyre a decade too late. Kairos.
And that's why I'm relentlessly optimistic about our future.
(7/7)
Me happy to have read this wondering if you'll go back to old posts and replace the ? with a 7.
Because I'm dumb and my brain is annoying.
@Impossible_PhD I think it's also important to note that, when you look back through history, conservative movements are always trying to "get back to the good old days". While a few of those people have some sort of Nazi or white plantation fantasy, for most it's the "good old days" that they remember.
The number of people who remember a time when gay people weren't out and proud are rapidly dwindling. Same with trans people. We're out now and every new US voter who just turned 18 does not remember a time when trans people didn't exist in public life. As long as we stay out and proud, that is going to continue.
A few of them were so sheltered that they may not have known about trans people until they moved out of their parents house but it's a small number. (That's also why the right is so fascinated by homeschooling. It's a way to create new voters with their same regressive view of history.)
@Impossible_PhD The counter to this, of course, is that we also have thousands of years of history showing that misogyny is going nowhere and plenty of Andre Tates and Elon Musks trying their hardest to raise another generation of misogynists along with hundreds of tradwife influencers trying to groom young women into their grasps.
Even if the current flight against trans existence is doomed to fail, the fight for our humanity is far from over.
@Impossible_PhD it's the getting through the next few years... But we're sure as hell not going back
@Impossible_PhD I find your optimism quite comforting. You understand trends and demographic numbers far more then I, and see no reason to be pessimistic.
I very much hope we and many many others see the tide permanently change.
@Impossible_PhD
I don't think the UK elections are such a good example. Labour took a hard right turn several years ago, and a lot of what they do is the same as the Tories did, especially when it comes to trans people.
@gistofspirit I was referring specifically to what happens when a gerrymandering collapses, not about their politics.
@Impossible_PhD I wrote a long post last year about my optimism about the future of trans people; even though I touch on the topic of visibility rather than shifting demographics, I fully agree with what you wrote: https://c.im/@portugeek/110842531349215884
I would add something though: it used to be true that the older you got, the more conservative you tended to vote, but a lot of us (I’m a political scientist by training) didn’t realise the causation wasn’t age but wealth. It had all to do with protecting the status quo, not about wisdom or any other BS explanation shoved down our throats.
And as less and less wealth is distributed among younger generations, the more these will shift towards the left, regardless of them being queer or not. Although (and here I can tie my point to yours) the more visibility is given to our community, the more people will feel free to understand they are queer, come out and identify as their true selves (looking at myself here). Knock-off effects and all that.
TLDR: The right is devoid of ideas and is basing its platform on little more than hate and vitriol. And the more they do that, in defence of their wealth and power, the more they will drive people away from electing them.
@Impossible_PhD (American citizen, not queer ->) this made me quite happy to read thank you :-)
@Impossible_PhD pretty big [citation needed] on that one?
@purple The UK part? I mean, tory-built gerrymanders meant that About won 64% of the seats in the most recent election on something like 34% of the votes, specifically because of tactical voting.
https://www.ft.com/content/ce4457fd-8a88-4928-a465-33f7d5a15337
@Impossible_PhD wow that first one's ancient, I'd honestly forgotten Cameron tried to shrink the house — yeah that didn't happen, never even made it to a vote, '10/'15/'17/'19 all used the same map drawn under Blair. Amusingly enough all of Blair's wins ('97,'01, and '05) used a map approved in Major's time.
The second misses honestly some of the more concerning parts of the Elections Act 2022, and that the Tories themselves had already admitted in 2023 that VoterID had actually hurt them more than benefited (and mysteriously Labour are apparently fine with the whole thing).
In the third is more to the point: the Tories lost the election because ‘moderates’ had had enough of the chaos, and the extremists wanted something more extreme.
So then Labour won by accident, not because of odd shaped borders, but because FPTP — supported by both major parties — is a terrible voting system. They hold 144 seats by a margin smaller Reform's local vote, and got half a million fewer total votes 2019.
@purple I have an outsider's understanding. 
@purple @Impossible_PhD yep agree with this. The most recent election was tactical voting (e.g. against the Tories, not for anything) taken to the extreme giving Labour a massive majority on a very small percentage of the vote. I do think there are some demographic changes e.g. parts of Essex and Suffolk are getting younger due to people moving out of London along with it, but it was a unique election and the next one could swing back dramatically on an equally unrepresentative vote - mainly if there is a Reform/Tory pact or merger again.
@catch56 @Impossible_PhD I'm not sure, and of course this is largely just my own speculation, the overall result was even particularly dependant on ‘anti-tory tactical voting’.
It was definitely a factor, and in a number of individual seats it almost certainly did swing it, but macro? I think it's got fair bit more to do with the spoiler effect of Reform, and people plain not turning up at all, combined with the just bizarre nature of the whole election and general Tory implosion.
FPTP really is ‘the worst’, as are the two major parties, and it's hard to say the resultant Commons makes much sense at all — and sadly doesn't, unlike perhaps France, show a rejection of the far-right, in many ways the opposite even :/
For the future we've got those big questions of ‘how will Tory/Reform resolve?’ ‘will Starmer manage to make anyone care about him?’ ‘will Labour split?’ — all with big implications on the next election, and it's simply to early to make much sense of that…
No pasarán
@Impossible_PhD As I've heard it: people don't inherently get more conservative as they age, but rather, those who align with Privilege are more likely to *survive* to old age.
Of course, that too is changing, I'd wager.
@CuriosityCat @Impossible_PhD in some sense the marchers with torches were right; it won’t be the Jews that replace them, but the queers. And it’s going to be fabulous.
@Impossible_PhD I am far less optimistic. Their propaganda is targeted at parents of young children, and it is devastatingly effective. It is almost like "Invasion of the Body-Snatchers" to see its effect on people and it scares the Hell out of me!
@Impossible_PhD
I'm early Gen X and have been married to a lovely lady for over 30 years.
Might have played the pink oboe a bit before that though 
@Impossible_PhD @quixoticgeek I mourn the lost in other generations. They existed but couldn’t.