You Cannot Put a Human Being to a Vote

Most Americans oppose anti-trans policies — but trans people’s right to exist is not a popularity contest.

On the one hand, you have innate human dignity no-one can take away. On the other hand… should you????Photo by Elena Mozhvilo on Unsplash

On Monday, the Washington Post published a front-page headline I’d been dreading for years: “Most in U.S. Back GOP’s Anti-Trans Policies.” Fortunately, it wasn’t true.

Multiple polls, including very recent polls, show that the majority of Americans oppose anti-trans discrimination. As Parker Molloy has shown, the Washington Post’s own polling found the same thing — of the 823 cis people surveyed, large majorities believed that trans people should be protected from discrimination in schools, protected from discrimination at work, and supported in receiving safe, affordable gender-affirming healthcare.

The only area where this was untrue was gender-affirming care for children and teenagers. The WaPo found that a majority, sometimes a very slim majority, opposed giving minors access to puberty blockers and HRT. This finding is in line with other recent research: Last month, a PBS NewsHour/NPR/Marist poll found that a majority of respondents supported trans rights, but “about half,” or 54 percent, opposed gender-affirming healthcare for minors. This dip in support is likely due to the past few years of anti-trans messaging from the right, which has…