The GOP obsession with trans people, particularly trans women, is an old tactic that has gotten increasingly worse as the party loses its grip on power. Most recently, their anti-trans tactics have shifted away from debates about bathrooms and now consists of concentrated efforts to ban transgender girls from competing in women’s sports.
Mississippi and Arkansas have introduced and passed bills aiming to ban transgender girl from competing in K-12 girl’s sports. South Dakota’s Senate Bill 6 states that any school that allows trans or gender non-conforming students to participate in a sport that does not coincide with their biological sex will not receive state funding, the same tactic a Connecticut bill used. Most recently, a similar bill in Kansas is on its way to the Republican Governor’s desk after it was approved by the Senate and House.
These efforts have primarily been led by white, conservative, cis-women lawmakers whose rhetoric taps into white, conservative cis-women’s oldest weapon: victimhood. The bills centered around the erroneous claim that cis-women are at an indisputable disadvantage in sports, even though the N.C.A.A.’s efforts to include trans and gender non-conforming (GNC) athletes already demands trans girls to be on testosterone suppression treatment for a year before they are allowed to compete. Furthermore, the “injustices” the bills are founded on are mostly hypothetical as there is no nation-wide trend of trans girls taking over school sports.
This latest anti-trans GOP trend has less to do with athletic concerns than it does with a cheap power-grab by Republican party. Already, the impact of these bills is going well beyond the courts. This month, Arkansas became the first state to outlaw gender-confirming treatment for anyone in the state under the age of 18. Clearly, these bills are meant to sow the seeds of larger discrimination against trans youth and the trans community in general.
The GOP is diverting attention from real issues by attacking some of the most marginalized children in our society. Trans and GNC youth, like all kids, are just trying to figure out who they are. Extracurricular activities are a fundamental tool through which they can find community and pride by being celebrated for being a part of something. These exclusion attempts are pathetic and dangerous, led by power-hungry lawmakers who play with the safety of the queer community.