Played Part 2

     There's no sugar-coating it.  Judith Butler is a lot of people's idea of a boogeyman.  College professor, pioneering feminist, scholar of non-violence and censorship, Butler has written a couple of dozen books and is a highly regarded political theorist.

     Butler is a non-binary Berkeley professor -- ooga-booga! -- and so has an axe to grind in this particular political moment.  It's an axe with a keen edge.  Asked about "issue[s...] which affect very few people" in the context of GOP's attacks on "trans" and DEI, she replied:

     "You could say that about the Jews, Black people or Haitians, or any very vulnerable minority. Once you decide that a single vulnerable minority can be sacrificed, you’re operating within a fascist logic, because that means there might be a second one you’re willing to sacrifice, and a third, a fourth, and then what happens?"

     Martin Niemöller has the answer to what happens next: "Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."

     You can argue that some transpeople aren't very nice-looking.  Or that they're whiny, or pushy, or, ew--  These are not reasons to mistreat people.  You don't have to like canaries to understand how they are beneficial to coal miners.

     Butler's right.  We're being played.  A tiny, easy-to-despise minority is being used to establish the notion that it's perfectly okay to give up on one group of people so very unlike ourselves.  Who'll miss them?  --But after them, who next?  There is always a next.  Niemöller knew.  Butler knows.

     Eventually, they'll work they way to me.  As one of the very few women in a highly technical field, I spent over a dozen years working for a man who referred to me as an "EEO hire."  The next level up of management didn't believe me, and told me I needed to work harder at getting along with him.  Over and over.

     So I pay attention when people start getting singled out not for what they do, but for who they are.  "But they're sooooo icky."  Yeah, well, there's plenty ickier in this world.

     Don't get played.