I “enjoyed” reading this. Maybe “appreciated” reading this is a better description. Transgender issues are not something I am very familiar with nor something I choose to focus on —not because I am against transgender people but because it makes me a bit uncomfortable and there are SO many other issues that pull for my attention. Misogyny and women’s rights I am more passionate about along with the environment, for instance.
I did read your post though and I want you to know that it made me a bit less uncomfortable and a bit more curious and empathetic towards the whole trans thing. Thank you for speaking out and sharing your thoughts.
Good on you for writing an honest reply. I do understand being uncomfortable, whilst also open to new information. I myself grew up in a time and place where being trans was hidden, (and therefore seemed far more rare than it is), and where information about it was almost non-existent.
Since then, I've led a fortunate and interesting life but I still had little contact with the Trans community. Then - a couple of years ago - one of my dearly loved sons told me that he has always identified as female, and now lives as a Trans woman.
So I have had to learn a lot more, but the main thing I have learned is what I instinctively knew from the start: my Daughter, whom I previously thought of as a Son, is still the same warm, intelligent, compassionate and caring human being I have always adored. She is not a threat to anyone - though she herself, sadly, is at serious risk from people who have an irrational hatred and fear of Trans people.
So yes - we can all be uncomfortable about things we don't understand, and have had little contact with, and you are completely utterly correct to be concerned with misogyny and the shocking erosion of women's rights. We all have priorities - and yours are good. And we can learn new things, as I have, and as you are doing.
What counts is love, and care for our fellow human beings.
Very best wishes from Australia
Dave (Who is also deeply concerned about Misogyny and Women's Rights)
Hi Laurie, thank you so much for taking the time to read this essay and for honestly sharing how you feel. You are not alone. Many of us are uncomfortable by what we are unfamiliar with. I used to facilitate unconscious bias training, and we are literally wired to be suspicious of those who are different. Empathy isn’t passive. My deepest hope for this essay was that it would reach people who maybe hadn’t spent much time thinking about transgender rights. Our freedom is intersectional. Those who oppress benefit from finding ways of dividing those of us they’re trying to control. Thank you for being curious and for sharing your perspective 💛
Danielle, I appreciate the clarity and refusal to let propaganda go unchallenged. The executive order is not about protecting women—it’s about control. The language mirrors the same fear-mongering tactics used throughout history to justify oppression, and the fact that it comes from a man found liable for sexual abuse only makes the hypocrisy more glaring.
The real threat to women has always been men. The statistics make that clear. Yet instead of addressing intimate partner violence, harassment, or the erosion of reproductive rights, this administration is fixated on dehumanizing transgender people. Not because they pose a threat, but because fascism thrives on division—on manufacturing an "us" and a "them."
There’s nothing new about this. But that doesn’t mean it can be ignored. Empathy takes effort. So does critical thinking. And both are needed now more than ever.
Jay, that’s what’s so wild, nothing about this is new. These statistics and research have been around for years. With the internet, anyone can find them, and yet somehow there is a still a large swath of the population who believes this narrative. Sometimes it feels like writing about something that’s already been written about so often doesn’t matter, but then I remind myself I have a platform I want to use for good. Even if I can reach a single person and get them to think differently, it will make a difference.
Thanks for writing this, Danielle, and for including the explainer about fascism. I've been thinking a lot about our current upheaval/cluster fuck of a situation, and I am not fond of comparisons to Nazi Germany, probably because we do not have to look back very far (if at all) in our OWN history to find the wholesale abuse of our own citizens. Jim Crow. Manifest Destiny. Women Women Women. Immigrants. (I don't think most people understand or know how immigrants have been treated all throughout American history.) But you don't bring up the Nazis here. You simply guide the reader through some good old critical thinking, which as a former college teacher, I could tell you hair-raising stories--the students who major in biology but don't "believe" in evolution. Thank you, as always, for doing the work you do.
I’m a former history major. Critical thinking was drilled into me. Sources. Who wrote them? Where do they come from? How reliable are they? How do they compare from other sources at that time? Whose perspective is missing?
Our history is rampant with abuse of our own citizens. It always has been despite the attempted whitewashing.
If I ever go back to school, I'll major in art and in history. Actually, probably just history. Or maybe become a doctor (!!) (I was an art history minor) I do want to go back to school as soon as it is FREE for me, which I think will be in five years. Keep it coming, Danielle.
Absolutely. Sometimes searching for resources can feel overwhelming, so sharing a few here might get people to dip their toe into learning and encourage them to explore more on their own.
I really appreciate the TW you put at the top. Read through that, and when I saw that name at the top of the article I thought to myself “you know what, I actually can’t do this right now.” 🤍✨
Absolutely. I have times where I’m just not in the right headspace to consume certain things, and having the option to make that decision before I start reading is helpful 💛
Danielle Coffyn: As a 77-year-old loving son of his unique, wonderful, Walloon-Belgian mom (1921-2014) -- Charleroi; 53-years with Nancy (married 51-years) -- deeply in love; two well-loved daughters; and a wonderful 17-year-old granddaughter who is EVERYTHING to Nancy and Me -- I cannot comprehend, and am repulsed by such men and . . .
I OFTEN believe that the best love is sapphic and safe.
That's how it feels sometimes to me too Armand. Loving men isn't always easy. I'm fortunate to have a loving, gentle partner now, but I've certainly experienced the opposite.
And hello to a fellow Belgian! My father was Belgian and I was born and raised there until I was seven :)
Danielle Coffyn: We could spend all day talking about experiences of occupation by the Kaiser's army, which seemed bad until the arrival of the Third Reich's occupational forces, which showed Charleroi a living hell, right at the age my mom had hoped to be introduced to society as a Debutante.
I have been a writer forEVER - decades and decades. But I struggle to find the words and ways to convey the deepness of my sorrow and expansiveness of my rage as DT/Musk and minions daily annihilate our freedoms and persecute all who aren't white anglo saxon males. The only thing stronger than my sorrow and rage is my determination to resist these f--ckers.
Jenine I am with you. I've found it hard to write lately, but the last few days I could feel this essay burning in the pit of my stomach. I refuse to be silenced into complicity.
My grandson is transgender. I appreciate everything I can read about it. It is confusing, but we love and support him because he is our grandson, and don't really care what gender he is, other than giving him our full support.
Your essay makes so many good points. The obvious irony and hypocrisy of the proclamations by the misogynist in power are so horrific that I am surprised that every woman in America is not out marching and rallying. That time will come.
Julie how lucky for your grandson to have such supportive grandparents. I don't think any of my grandparents would have been so open-minded. He needs you and everyone who loves him more than ever.
I don't understand why everyone woman in this country doesn't realize the extent of how dangerous this rhetoric is.
In my opinion, patriarchy has taught women to be blind to real threat and instead to think that joining the patriarchal belief system is a way to be safe. Fear can rob people of their power to think clearly. Which was one of the goals of the patriarchy.
The irony from a president who has a history as a cis man of walking into women’s dressing rooms. Protect us from the overconfidence and entitlement of cis men.
Hi Prajna, I completely understand. There's so much devastating news, and sometimes we have to put it away until we're in the headspace to read it Thank you for being here in this tender space with me <3
The only that order is right is that women need protection from men.
A trans woman is not a man. Which is what a lot of people don’t understand about the trans community. If someone was to openly speak (practicing active listening) to a trans person about their life, a bridge to understanding could be made.
One thing about this I believe should infuriate women on this topic is about how people believe that women are beneath men. That there’s no way a women who compete or be equal with a men, (even if he where to put on a dress and take hormones) a man will biologically always be better than a woman.
The argument isn’t happening on the flip side men aren’t worried about trans men because they don’t believe a trans man could ever be a man. I know some trans men that could (if they wanted to) are better and stronger than the men that spread fear and separation.
This topic just boils my blood for both the trans community and women.
“In the United States, over half of women have experienced some form of sexual violence in their lifetime.”
If this is true, that’s why it’s important to not let men go into women’s spaces (even if they’re calling themselves by a different name). Like seriously! This was why women’s spaces were created in the first place. This isn’t a complicated concept.
I “enjoyed” reading this. Maybe “appreciated” reading this is a better description. Transgender issues are not something I am very familiar with nor something I choose to focus on —not because I am against transgender people but because it makes me a bit uncomfortable and there are SO many other issues that pull for my attention. Misogyny and women’s rights I am more passionate about along with the environment, for instance.
I did read your post though and I want you to know that it made me a bit less uncomfortable and a bit more curious and empathetic towards the whole trans thing. Thank you for speaking out and sharing your thoughts.
Hi Laurie
Good on you for writing an honest reply. I do understand being uncomfortable, whilst also open to new information. I myself grew up in a time and place where being trans was hidden, (and therefore seemed far more rare than it is), and where information about it was almost non-existent.
Since then, I've led a fortunate and interesting life but I still had little contact with the Trans community. Then - a couple of years ago - one of my dearly loved sons told me that he has always identified as female, and now lives as a Trans woman.
So I have had to learn a lot more, but the main thing I have learned is what I instinctively knew from the start: my Daughter, whom I previously thought of as a Son, is still the same warm, intelligent, compassionate and caring human being I have always adored. She is not a threat to anyone - though she herself, sadly, is at serious risk from people who have an irrational hatred and fear of Trans people.
So yes - we can all be uncomfortable about things we don't understand, and have had little contact with, and you are completely utterly correct to be concerned with misogyny and the shocking erosion of women's rights. We all have priorities - and yours are good. And we can learn new things, as I have, and as you are doing.
What counts is love, and care for our fellow human beings.
Very best wishes from Australia
Dave (Who is also deeply concerned about Misogyny and Women's Rights)
Hi Dave, thank you for sharing your story about your daughter. How lucky she is to have a father who loves and accepts her for who she is.
Hi Laurie, thank you so much for taking the time to read this essay and for honestly sharing how you feel. You are not alone. Many of us are uncomfortable by what we are unfamiliar with. I used to facilitate unconscious bias training, and we are literally wired to be suspicious of those who are different. Empathy isn’t passive. My deepest hope for this essay was that it would reach people who maybe hadn’t spent much time thinking about transgender rights. Our freedom is intersectional. Those who oppress benefit from finding ways of dividing those of us they’re trying to control. Thank you for being curious and for sharing your perspective 💛
Wonderful, Danielle. We need clear voices.
My beautiful Trans Daughter is a threat to no-one, least of all to other women.
Best wishes
Dave
Exactly Dave. I know zero women who are afraid of transgender women. I know many women who are afraid of men. We need empathy more than ever.
Danielle, I appreciate the clarity and refusal to let propaganda go unchallenged. The executive order is not about protecting women—it’s about control. The language mirrors the same fear-mongering tactics used throughout history to justify oppression, and the fact that it comes from a man found liable for sexual abuse only makes the hypocrisy more glaring.
The real threat to women has always been men. The statistics make that clear. Yet instead of addressing intimate partner violence, harassment, or the erosion of reproductive rights, this administration is fixated on dehumanizing transgender people. Not because they pose a threat, but because fascism thrives on division—on manufacturing an "us" and a "them."
There’s nothing new about this. But that doesn’t mean it can be ignored. Empathy takes effort. So does critical thinking. And both are needed now more than ever.
Jay, that’s what’s so wild, nothing about this is new. These statistics and research have been around for years. With the internet, anyone can find them, and yet somehow there is a still a large swath of the population who believes this narrative. Sometimes it feels like writing about something that’s already been written about so often doesn’t matter, but then I remind myself I have a platform I want to use for good. Even if I can reach a single person and get them to think differently, it will make a difference.
Thanks for writing this, Danielle, and for including the explainer about fascism. I've been thinking a lot about our current upheaval/cluster fuck of a situation, and I am not fond of comparisons to Nazi Germany, probably because we do not have to look back very far (if at all) in our OWN history to find the wholesale abuse of our own citizens. Jim Crow. Manifest Destiny. Women Women Women. Immigrants. (I don't think most people understand or know how immigrants have been treated all throughout American history.) But you don't bring up the Nazis here. You simply guide the reader through some good old critical thinking, which as a former college teacher, I could tell you hair-raising stories--the students who major in biology but don't "believe" in evolution. Thank you, as always, for doing the work you do.
And, Danielle, I have to mention how poorly written this motion is--like something from an 8th grader trying to sound official and grownup. Yikes.
Oh Rebecca, so many of these sound like a child went on Chat GPT and asked it to write a garbled mess with big words without any logic or substance.
I’m a former history major. Critical thinking was drilled into me. Sources. Who wrote them? Where do they come from? How reliable are they? How do they compare from other sources at that time? Whose perspective is missing?
Our history is rampant with abuse of our own citizens. It always has been despite the attempted whitewashing.
If I ever go back to school, I'll major in art and in history. Actually, probably just history. Or maybe become a doctor (!!) (I was an art history minor) I do want to go back to school as soon as it is FREE for me, which I think will be in five years. Keep it coming, Danielle.
If I could go back to school for free I would too :)
Thank you especially for including the links to other resources. I’m incandescent with fury over this fascist administration.
Absolutely. Sometimes searching for resources can feel overwhelming, so sharing a few here might get people to dip their toe into learning and encourage them to explore more on their own.
I really appreciate the TW you put at the top. Read through that, and when I saw that name at the top of the article I thought to myself “you know what, I actually can’t do this right now.” 🤍✨
Absolutely. I have times where I’m just not in the right headspace to consume certain things, and having the option to make that decision before I start reading is helpful 💛
Danielle Coffyn: As a 77-year-old loving son of his unique, wonderful, Walloon-Belgian mom (1921-2014) -- Charleroi; 53-years with Nancy (married 51-years) -- deeply in love; two well-loved daughters; and a wonderful 17-year-old granddaughter who is EVERYTHING to Nancy and Me -- I cannot comprehend, and am repulsed by such men and . . .
I OFTEN believe that the best love is sapphic and safe.
That's how it feels sometimes to me too Armand. Loving men isn't always easy. I'm fortunate to have a loving, gentle partner now, but I've certainly experienced the opposite.
And hello to a fellow Belgian! My father was Belgian and I was born and raised there until I was seven :)
Danielle Coffyn: We could spend all day talking about experiences of occupation by the Kaiser's army, which seemed bad until the arrival of the Third Reich's occupational forces, which showed Charleroi a living hell, right at the age my mom had hoped to be introduced to society as a Debutante.
I have been a writer forEVER - decades and decades. But I struggle to find the words and ways to convey the deepness of my sorrow and expansiveness of my rage as DT/Musk and minions daily annihilate our freedoms and persecute all who aren't white anglo saxon males. The only thing stronger than my sorrow and rage is my determination to resist these f--ckers.
Jenine I am with you. I've found it hard to write lately, but the last few days I could feel this essay burning in the pit of my stomach. I refuse to be silenced into complicity.
My grandson is transgender. I appreciate everything I can read about it. It is confusing, but we love and support him because he is our grandson, and don't really care what gender he is, other than giving him our full support.
Your essay makes so many good points. The obvious irony and hypocrisy of the proclamations by the misogynist in power are so horrific that I am surprised that every woman in America is not out marching and rallying. That time will come.
Julie how lucky for your grandson to have such supportive grandparents. I don't think any of my grandparents would have been so open-minded. He needs you and everyone who loves him more than ever.
I don't understand why everyone woman in this country doesn't realize the extent of how dangerous this rhetoric is.
In my opinion, patriarchy has taught women to be blind to real threat and instead to think that joining the patriarchal belief system is a way to be safe. Fear can rob people of their power to think clearly. Which was one of the goals of the patriarchy.
Absolutely Julie, fear is one of the most powerful tools of manipulation and coercion.
The irony from a president who has a history as a cis man of walking into women’s dressing rooms. Protect us from the overconfidence and entitlement of cis men.
Yes please, I’d like to see that protection put into law.
Hi Danielle
I’m gonna come back to this very important piece. Right now I don’t have the bandwidth for a topic that lives close to me.
Thank you for writing this
🌹👏🦋💙
Hi Prajna, I completely understand. There's so much devastating news, and sometimes we have to put it away until we're in the headspace to read it Thank you for being here in this tender space with me <3
Thank you for say it out loud.
The only that order is right is that women need protection from men.
A trans woman is not a man. Which is what a lot of people don’t understand about the trans community. If someone was to openly speak (practicing active listening) to a trans person about their life, a bridge to understanding could be made.
One thing about this I believe should infuriate women on this topic is about how people believe that women are beneath men. That there’s no way a women who compete or be equal with a men, (even if he where to put on a dress and take hormones) a man will biologically always be better than a woman.
The argument isn’t happening on the flip side men aren’t worried about trans men because they don’t believe a trans man could ever be a man. I know some trans men that could (if they wanted to) are better and stronger than the men that spread fear and separation.
This topic just boils my blood for both the trans community and women.
The real threat to women is men no matter how they identify. That includes trans identifying men. FTFY. You are welcome.
“In the United States, over half of women have experienced some form of sexual violence in their lifetime.”
If this is true, that’s why it’s important to not let men go into women’s spaces (even if they’re calling themselves by a different name). Like seriously! This was why women’s spaces were created in the first place. This isn’t a complicated concept.