Originally Posted by
79blue
You are correct. This current anti trans crusade in the right wing press is very reminiscent of the anti gay propaganda over the last 40 years.
The anti gay propaganda has subsided over the last 2 decades as more and more people are no longer scared to come out as gay. In the 70’s and 80’s the gay community was mostly underground and most people did not knowingly know many gay people. Today most people have friends and family members who are openly gay and accept it as normal and don’t think twice about. They are no longer attacked in the press as the smears no longer work.
If the attitudes of days past was still prevalent today, the gay community would still be hounded by the gutter press today.
Today it is the trans community that is now the target of smears from the right wing press. The old tropes have been taken out of storage and are now aimed at them. In the past gay people were labelled as paedophiles and a threat to children, this no longer works on them but is now aimed at trans people. The press then find the worst examples of trans people and then presents them as the average trans person.
The trans community are just the most recent group to be othered by the right wing. Over the last decade or so almost every one in this country has been deemed to enemy of the people as a cover for the right wing inability to competently run the country. These include NHS workers, junior doctors, GP’s, the unemployed, the disabled, railway workers, firefighters, remainers, unelected judges, lawyers etc etc etc.
Their aim is to get people wound up about trivial matters so that they ignore what has become of this country.