Harmful Propaganda: Transgenders
Youtube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EClv4uYVYOg&feature=youtu.be
Script:
ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL said by Abraham Lincoln the 16th president of the united states when he delivered the gettysburg address. Transgenders in the United states are having a hard time with their acceptance. NO MATTER THEIR IDENTIFICATION, belief, or gender every HUMAN is equal. Just take into account caitlyn jenner. And I mean the propaganda they have to endure is difficult. They deal with testimonial propaganda, name-calling propaganda, and mirroring propaganda. And it is very tough because they correlate it to all these negative things. Many people have taken to social media to post slandering propaganda against people that have a different outlook on their sexual orientation than they do.
TWEETS LIKE THIS ONE HAVE BECOME POPULAR BECAUSE THEY SPREAD HURTFUL IMAGES TO CONVINCE PEOPLE THAT TRANSGENDER IS A MENTAL DISORDER. This type of propaganda is known as name-calling because it connects a group of people or a belief to something negative. Take these guns for example. Where they are connecting trans people to guns and claiming that they are violent.
Now, In this case it is attacking anyone who believes their gender they were born as is wrong, and they identify as the other sex. Other ways of propaganda are used as well such as “mirror Propaganda”, this is when you do to your enemies what they are falsely accusing of them. Sara Ahmed, an independent academic and former professor of race and cultural studies at Goldsmiths University of London states : “Whenever people keep being given a platform to say they have no platform, or whenever people speak endlessly about being silenced, you not only have a performative contradiction; you are witnessing a mechanism of power.”
Transphobic people take to platforms to claim that trans-gender individuals silence them and do not allow them to speak their mind. This is mirror propaganda because Trans-gender individuals do not silence them, they silence trans genders. Many highly sought after individuals have even spoken out against Trans-gender individuals or better yet LBGTQ community as a whole. Now when someone who is well known speaks out against something, This is called testimonial when a well known person endorses the topic. Take for example DONALD TRUMP who is among one of the most well known indiviuals in the UNITED STATES as he was the 45th president.
He circulated lots of propaganda and one of his well known quotes was “we will ban sanity from our military” He didn’t want any transgenders in the military because he thought they were mentally ill and a burden. He spread the propaganda and a lot of people were upset because this propaganda causes danger.People were getting hurt because they were transgender. They were getting beat up a lot of terrible things, even murder, threats, and many different things. As he was using his platform to publicly come at this entire community. Using name-calling to connect them to something negative. Hate is scary and this is what is being spread around this community of people that has a similar belief. Hopefully everyone can stand together and one day, accept any and all beliefs leading to less danger, harm, and fear and most of all HATE. Some are born into their bodies, others have to fight for it. And its something that we are all going to have to work together to solve because no one should ever be correlated to mental health because of their belief, harm, murder, hate words or anything because of how they believe.
Blog Post: Harmful Propaganda the effect on Transgenders
By: Hannah Lorusso
I chose to talk about the Transgender community because I work for Channel 10 news in providence, Rhode Island and I hear many stories of harm to this community. They endure so much that makes it hard for their community to be open, and live their lives. Change starts with one person, and I thought that could be me. I remember the shock of the nation when Caitlyn Jenner came out as transgender because it was so new at the time. People slandered her and treated her differently because of her decision, while others supported her. As time went on it became more normal to be transgender but the hate never went away. People like Donald Trump used propaganda techniques like testimonial, name-calling, and mirroring propaganda to make their entire community look bad. This was tough to watch and listen to because it was negatively showing an entire community. As the propaganda continued to spread it progressively got worse. Photos showing transgenders with guns promoting them as violent began to be spread with altered context. This was tough to look at as I did this assignment because I unstood the techniques used to alter these pictures to show off a certain negative view. You can never trust what you see online is legit. Although, finding pictures for the screencast was especially easy because so much propaganda is spread about this community, I found that so sad. The name-calling was tough because many people identify this community with mental illness simply because they are different than the rest of us. My hope is that we can all become one and stop the hate, hate is scary. The violence against transgender is terrible because people get murdered, assaulted, hurt, and name called all because of this belief. This propaganda is especially harmful because of the violence it inflicts on this community, and my hope was my video would show how dangerous this propaganda can be. The stories I have heard of people being hurt to death is enough to make anyone have the chills. People for some reason struggle with accepting people who are different than them. It has been in our history for ages. It seems to me that people do not learn from the past and they continue to cause people so much pain, and suffering as a result. Ultimately, no one deserves to be treated any different because of their belief. When it came to the screencast I did have some trouble getting the right timing for words and pictures. It took me several tries to get it correct, but when I did I was very happy with it. I am glad that I reminded people that Abraham Lincoln said all men are created equal when he was trying to stop slavery. I wanted to show that this is still evident today, and we cannot forget the past because we can learn so much from it. Transgenders are human too, and they should be treated as such, and I hope to make a difference to this community and hear less about violence towards them at my news job.
Works cited
“Civics Election Unit Day 4 Types of Propaganda.” TPT, https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Civics-Election-Unit-Day-4-Types-of-Propaganda-3858977.
“Extremists at CPAC Laid Bare Hatred at Root of Vile Legislation Targeting Trans People.” Human Rights Campaign, https://www.hrc.org/press-releases/human-rights-campaign-extremists-at-cpac-laid-bare-hatred-at-root-of-vile-legislation-targeting-trans-people.
Kennedy, Natacha. “How Anti-Trans Activists Silence Their Opponents.” OpenDemocracy, 5 Dec. 2022, https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/5050/anti-trans-transphobia-gender-critical-mirror-propaganda/.
Sr. Helena Burns, FSP. “Social Contagion and Trans Propaganda.” CR Banner since1893 02, The Catholic Register, 7 July 2022, https://www.catholicregister.org/opinion/columnists/item/34582-social-contagion-and-trans-propaganda.
“Two Genders.” Mind Over Media, https://propaganda.mediaeducationlab.com/rate/two-genders.
