Welcome to Trump’s America, Faggot.
Less than a day after Korea threatened to strike the continental U.S. with nuclear warheads, Trump thought it would be a great idea to weaken our military by distracting it with tweets about removing transgendered people from the military. The reason cited was that providing healthcare for trans people was too expensive.
You can’t make this shit up. As it currently stands, these are simply tweets from a mad man that cannot be enforced until going through the proper channels. Yay, I guess? Honestly, it’s unclear whether or not our draft-dodging Commander in Chief even knows what the proper channels for a change in policy are, or what the litigation costs of the gender discrimination lawsuits would be if trans people were to all of a sudden be fired in droves.
It seems pretty obvious by now that trans rights are the civil rights issue of this generation, and the media and trans allies have been quick to rally in support of trans people. That’s cool I guess. They’ve written articles about how three nuts and a bolt for an aircraft costs more than caring for trans soldiers that spend months at a time away from their families and friends for their country. They’ve talked about how Trump’s persistent weekend vacations to Maralago cost more than providing healthcare to transpeople that risk their lives daily for their job. They’ve come out with nifty charts like this that show how little of the budget actually go to transpeople’s healthcare:

This is all true, and speaks volumes about what this country truly values. Thanks allies! But… here’s the thing: We shouldn’t be talking about how cheap it is to ensure transpeople as the main talking point of the argument against Trump’s hateful ideas. I don’t care if providing healthcare for these soldiers costs half of the military budget; like any employer that asks it’s workers to do extremely dangerous and life threatening things, we as a country should be proud to provide them with top notch care. Keeping soldiers healthy should be considered a reasonable cost of war. They are not disposable assets. It is not up to the taxpayers, media or political leadership to decide what these soldiers do with their healthcare. We should not be in the business of policing people’s bodies or personal lives.
I know human beings generally only care about themselves deep down, so I’ll put it this way: If we lower the perceived value of trans healthcare coverage, you’re next. This is a conversation about healthcare just as much as it is a trans rights issue. Deciding who is worthy of government funded healthcare is a very dangerous slippery slope. While you may be ok with transpeople begging for scraps of money for their hormone shots, you won’t be ok when it’s your IUD, your viagra or your cancer screenings. Despite popular republican rhetoric, being trans just like being sick or disabled is not a moral failing. In Trump’s America, if you aren’t a part of the 1% you’re considered a minority. Start acting like it. Ok faggots now let’s get in formation.
We should not be talking about who deserves a healthy, happy life.
This distraction tactic is a smart one-two punch; it distracts us from our impending nuclear war and his failure to pass any legislation thus far on healthcare as promised, and it also gets us to fight amongst ourselves about who deserves healthcare. We police ourselves by empowering racists and bigots to form hostile environments for detractors and minorities. He’s making healthcare into a social issue. Crazy person or political genius? What’s the difference anymore.
Let’s keep our eye on the ball here. Transpeople, like any other human being, are worthy of top notch healthcare. Transpeople deserve access to conventional care AND hormone therapy, gender reassignment surgery, catered mental health services, etc. If you don’t believe that and you don’t stop this conversation dead right now, you’re going to be fighting for yourself next. And you won’t be fighting your politicians, you’ll be fighting an angry mob.
