Has the Trans community overplayed their hand?

Did the activism of the trans community have a significant negative effect on the election? Almost certainly.

Did the trans community overplay their hand? I HAVE NO IDEA.

And I don’t know if anybody else really knows either.

What I do know FOR SURE is that social media amplifies division and hate for any issue, and it definitely had an impact on the election — probably had the most significant impact on the election. Every demographic has unreasonable people and assholes in it, and the trans community is no exception. (I have met many Clergy, Jews, Christians, Spiritual People, etc. who were raging assholes. The list goes on. Most people in all these demographics are good people, but each of them has their own group of a-holes).

So what social media does, is find those unreasonable assholes and amplifies their sentiment so that many people start to believe the ENTIRE community is mostly unreasonable assholes. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see this happening, but so many people CHOSE to not see this.

Why do social media platforms do this? To increase engagement and/or their stock price / valuation. That’s an easy one.

Why do individuals listen to this crap and draw these conclusions about an entire demographic? Well I can only speak from experience, about my friends and family that I know who have gone off the deep end (e.g. claiming that the Left is killing babies 8 months into their term or after their born, and that MOST trans people are part of the “Woke Mind Virus”, etc). All of them have 1 thing in common. They are isolated, feel unimportant, and/or are depressed. (Several of them retired to the mountains or rural areas). They sit on their phones, or computers, or watching the same news outlets ALL DAY — to make themselves feel important. They like feeling outraged, blaming their frustrations and problems on other people. Why? Because it’s SO MUCH easier doing that vs. getting off the couch and doing the difficult task of engaging with a diverse group of people to generate a positive impact on the world around them. Social Media obsession of this type is a drug. And we know addicts, don’t want their drugs taken away.

And our enemies (e.g. Putin) know exactly how to use Psychological Warfare and Social Media addiction to take us down by dividing us and putting in leaders who promote that process. It’s hidden in plain site. Putin himself said the only way to take down America is this way. (And ironically, it’s social media noise and propaganda that allows it to remain hidden, drowned out in the noise).

And you can pick any of the other hot button issues — the economy, inflation, immigration, etc and see the same thing. It’s much easier to simply switch sides in an election (which is happening all around the world increasingly), vs go through the arduous task of trying to understand the complexities and work through it with people. It’s SO MUCH easier listening to social media propaganda, oversimplifying things to give you a simple explanation so you can easily vote based on your emotions. And it’s SO MUCH easier for a political candidate to use this to get power. Our world is SO COMPLEX now, and SO COMPETITIVE for resources, that our collective ability to mange it has cratered. It takes way too long to listen to logic for most people. We’re all too busy trying to put food on the table, and we want a little quick entertainment, in little injections, to make us feel better.

So did Trans people overplay their hand?

Certainly SOME of them have. I’ve personally met many trans people, where if you ask a simple question about their position on transgendered women in sports, or giving gender affirming care to minors, they will lash out at you and claim you hate trans people. Even if you’re a trans person! These are extremely complex topics, and many people talk about it like a child would. For example, there is a huge difference between competitive sports where there is money involved vs. Junior High school — but that’s too complicated to discuss in less than 30 seconds, which is the situation we find ourselves in. Similar issue with gender affirming care for minors — you gotta be real careful with that as there are SO many factors that would drive a child to want to change their gender — and you need to give them time to work through it. One could write an entire book on the topic. How are you going to consider it in a bunch of 10 second or 120 character chunks?

I have no idea if a very small percentage of trans folks are making unreasonable demands and being assholes or it’s a large number. Is it 0.25% of trans people with social media amplifying it making it look like it’s 80%+, or is it 10%, 20%? I don’t think it’s a large number based off individual conversations I’ve had. Most trans people can’t stand that small percentage of unreasonable trans assholes any more than non-trans people — probably even more so.

What I learned spending 3+ months in Jerusalem

I’m not a religious person, but I spent 3+ months in Jerusalem on a spiritual question. And here is what I learned more than anything:

There are 2 types of Jews — cool people and assholes

There are 2 types of Christians — cool people and assholes

There are 2 types of Muslims — cool people and assholes

Wow, some of the rabbis giving talks at events were the biggest arrogant pricks I’ve ever met. And they were supposed to be leading and inspiring us?? And I’m Jewish —my thinking certain Jews are raging assholes doesn’t make me a bad Jew.

If you go to Jerusalem, you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for. If you think it’s full of duplicitous assholes, you’ll find them. If you think it’s full of interesting, thoughtful great people, you’ll find them.

And them same is true of social media. If you want to find somebody to blame why your life sucks, or why our country is fucked up, you’ll find it. If you want to go deep and understand the issues and find reasonable solutions, you’ll find that. We decide our destiny, and if most of us are looking for the easy way out by scapegoating a demographic, something that each of our parents are suppose to warn us about, then we’ll collectively get exactly what we sow.

I’m naturally optimistic — but only after first accepting the worse things that could happen. For when we hit bottom, then we often find the energy to collectively solve our problems. After all, throughout history, it’s hard to admit, war has had a lot of positive outcomes. I wish it weren’t true. But maybe we can evolve, and learn to harness this power through games? Ah, we live in a complex world indeed.