Though much of the reporting on the Little v. Hecox court case is about transgender sports participation, the SCOTUS ruling could impact all rights of transgender people.
The supreme court is almost certain to rule against trans people in this ruling. 6-3 ruling almost guaranteed, with an outside chance of a 7-2 if they can peel off one of the liberals, which is possible but not likely.
The conservatives on the court have already made up their minds on this before arguments even start. So this seems a useless going-through-the-motions sort of thing. The only hope that can come out of this is that blue states will continue to be able to maintain stronger protections than the country as a whole - the constitution allows individual states, if they want, to enact a higher standard of civil liberties than that maintained by the gov’t as a whole.
Given how hostile this supreme court has been towards trans people thus far, I have zero faith that these cases end up ruling in our favor. Although I would very much love to be proved wrong.
I think the best we can hope for in this case is a narrowly written loss.
I only hope there is nothing in dicta or anything binding in the decision which tends to preclude transgender people from being legally recognized to exist -- as opposed to being actually cisgender people with a sexual fetish, a mental illness, or who are demonically possessed . . .
. . . which is how I believe the social conservatives and "gender critical" ideologues actually view us.
This ruling could open the door. That is the stated intent of Project 2025 with regard to trans people. We cannot allow that. Our lives and legimacy cannot be legislated or adjudicated.
I have to add, if the biological basis of being transgender and the time history dependent nature of testosterone's evident athletic advantage do not even come up, we are definitely cooked. At some point we have to ignore all the soft science mumbo jumbo and lean on the data -- until we do that, we will always lose to the majority who are more comfortable thinking we are some kind of ivory tower nonsense.
"That could include adult bathroom bans, restrictions on birth certificates, housing discrimination, and more."
The "and more" is what I'm most worried about. Could this slippery slope lead to the abolition of our hard-fought protections from discrimination in employment, healthcare (e.g. for the treatment of "Trans Broken Arm Syndrome"), public accommodations, credit, and housing (beyond the context of dormitories)? Could it even be the precedent for stripping us of our other Constitutional rights as PEOPLE, without respect to gender or sex, such as the 8th Amendment? Or the 1st or 2nd - or any of them, really? Could we be denied our right to vote? Just how far can this slippery slope send us? And would this eventually have to be fixed with a Constitutional amendment just for trans (and perhaps lesbian and gay) people to affirm that LGBTQ, emphasis 'T', are protected by the Constitution just as much as cis-het people?
I wish I could be there tomorrow to help support everyone. I also hope that the rally outside the Supreme Court tomorrow is very large and loud. I am hopeful for a positive result from the Supreme Court ??
This provides excellent, detailed information about how to respond and suggestions about what to write. There are 3 rules to object to. The first deadline is very soon: Jan 20!! the other 2 are Feb 17
We need to flood local publications with op/eds (local pubs more likely to publish because they are else inundated) about what attacks on trans people portend for all people. I have a template on my substack for local sports issues-- feel free to adapt!
I do so look forward to the day when I no longer have to be deeply invested in whether or not I've got a right to do a thing, which I never had any interest in doing in the first place, because a pack of fascist pricks are using that as a lever to pry away all of my other rights. I would 𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘭𝘺 love to never have to spend another moment thinking about sports again.
I, too. I've spent my entire life being bullied by straight people, including especially in PE/gym as a kid. Any appreciation I might have ever had for sports was roundly beaten out of me, and sports sounds/smells trigger my PTSD to this very day. (And I'm an old lady.) So, the many years of this trans sports debate have taken a toll on my mental health. I want so badly for it to go away.
I hope chase strangio isn’t arguing this case. I was quite disappointed at his defense during skrmetti.
That said it doesn’t matter. They’ve already made up their mind. Anyone bringing cases to the federalist idealogically captured court I believe wants to restrict trans rights.
"I was quite disappointed at his defense during skrmetti."
I am still gobsmacked by his inability to affirm that GAC tends to prevent suicide in transgender youth. It's just an own goal of staggering existential proportions.
You obviously do not understand what the Skrmetti case was all about. The only question before the court was, should this case have received heightened scrutiny at the appeals court level? And the only conceivable way to argue that it should was to argue that the Tennessee law discriminates on the basis of sex. That's it. Factual questions, which include the fact that trans kids deprived of GAC have a higher rate of suicide, would have been instantly deemed irrelevant. The entire thrust of the majority's ruling was that detailed factual questions about the medical advisability of treatments should be left to the state legislature, not decided by the courts.
These attacks on Chase Strangio are bullshit based on ignorance. There is no one who could have done a better job than he did. Put your blame where it belongs--with the six fascist justices on the Supreme Court.
You obviously have no idea what the actual problem is. And also, you do not write concisely.
When a Justice asked a question regarding a matter you claim was not about the question at hand, Strangio did not as he should have, as you have implied -- possibly without realizing it -- he did not reply to the effect of: "As that question does not pertain to the matter now before the court, I have no information at hand about it with which to answer it. If the question will not be withdrawn, I must request I be permitted to answer it in writing after I have 24 hours with which to gather the correct information."
Instead -- in a case where he is one of us, is celebrated among us and by allies as representing us generally as well as about the specific matter at hand -- when asked a question by a SCOTUS Justice he got the answer factually wrong! This is a matter which every transgender adult in the US should be factually correct about, and far more so our advocate to SCOTUS.
Your defense of Strangio's bizarre own goal is apparently founded on the principle of, baffle them with bullshit. He did simply screw that up.
I agree with you 100%. There is no hope for a positive outcome in this case, and quite honestly it would be much better if it were never coming before the court. Efforts should be invested in blue states, from this point forward, for their protective state laws are all that we really have going forward. There will be no help or protection from SCOTUS or the federal government.
So, how do we hold on to hope after this ruling? Not sure where I even go without a recognition of my humanity.
Hope never dies! Vote!
The mirror at your local poling place !
After Skrmetti, with this SCOTUS, I hold little hope. Coney Barrett was practically begging for a case such as this.
The supreme court is almost certain to rule against trans people in this ruling. 6-3 ruling almost guaranteed, with an outside chance of a 7-2 if they can peel off one of the liberals, which is possible but not likely.
The conservatives on the court have already made up their minds on this before arguments even start. So this seems a useless going-through-the-motions sort of thing. The only hope that can come out of this is that blue states will continue to be able to maintain stronger protections than the country as a whole - the constitution allows individual states, if they want, to enact a higher standard of civil liberties than that maintained by the gov’t as a whole.
Given how hostile this supreme court has been towards trans people thus far, I have zero faith that these cases end up ruling in our favor. Although I would very much love to be proved wrong.
I think the best we can hope for in this case is a narrowly written loss.
I only hope there is nothing in dicta or anything binding in the decision which tends to preclude transgender people from being legally recognized to exist -- as opposed to being actually cisgender people with a sexual fetish, a mental illness, or who are demonically possessed . . .
. . . which is how I believe the social conservatives and "gender critical" ideologues actually view us.
This ruling could open the door. That is the stated intent of Project 2025 with regard to trans people. We cannot allow that. Our lives and legimacy cannot be legislated or adjudicated.
I have to add, if the biological basis of being transgender and the time history dependent nature of testosterone's evident athletic advantage do not even come up, we are definitely cooked. At some point we have to ignore all the soft science mumbo jumbo and lean on the data -- until we do that, we will always lose to the majority who are more comfortable thinking we are some kind of ivory tower nonsense.
I'm sick of having to hold my breath every time SCOTUS gets one of these cases.
"That could include adult bathroom bans, restrictions on birth certificates, housing discrimination, and more."
The "and more" is what I'm most worried about. Could this slippery slope lead to the abolition of our hard-fought protections from discrimination in employment, healthcare (e.g. for the treatment of "Trans Broken Arm Syndrome"), public accommodations, credit, and housing (beyond the context of dormitories)? Could it even be the precedent for stripping us of our other Constitutional rights as PEOPLE, without respect to gender or sex, such as the 8th Amendment? Or the 1st or 2nd - or any of them, really? Could we be denied our right to vote? Just how far can this slippery slope send us? And would this eventually have to be fixed with a Constitutional amendment just for trans (and perhaps lesbian and gay) people to affirm that LGBTQ, emphasis 'T', are protected by the Constitution just as much as cis-het people?
I wish I could be there tomorrow to help support everyone. I also hope that the rally outside the Supreme Court tomorrow is very large and loud. I am hopeful for a positive result from the Supreme Court ??
https://dredf.org/protect-trans-rights
This provides excellent, detailed information about how to respond and suggestions about what to write. There are 3 rules to object to. The first deadline is very soon: Jan 20!! the other 2 are Feb 17
I so appreciate your coverage of these issues. Thank you!
We need to flood local publications with op/eds (local pubs more likely to publish because they are else inundated) about what attacks on trans people portend for all people. I have a template on my substack for local sports issues-- feel free to adapt!
I do so look forward to the day when I no longer have to be deeply invested in whether or not I've got a right to do a thing, which I never had any interest in doing in the first place, because a pack of fascist pricks are using that as a lever to pry away all of my other rights. I would 𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘭𝘺 love to never have to spend another moment thinking about sports again.
I, too. I've spent my entire life being bullied by straight people, including especially in PE/gym as a kid. Any appreciation I might have ever had for sports was roundly beaten out of me, and sports sounds/smells trigger my PTSD to this very day. (And I'm an old lady.) So, the many years of this trans sports debate have taken a toll on my mental health. I want so badly for it to go away.
I hope chase strangio isn’t arguing this case. I was quite disappointed at his defense during skrmetti.
That said it doesn’t matter. They’ve already made up their mind. Anyone bringing cases to the federalist idealogically captured court I believe wants to restrict trans rights.
"I was quite disappointed at his defense during skrmetti."
I am still gobsmacked by his inability to affirm that GAC tends to prevent suicide in transgender youth. It's just an own goal of staggering existential proportions.
You obviously do not understand what the Skrmetti case was all about. The only question before the court was, should this case have received heightened scrutiny at the appeals court level? And the only conceivable way to argue that it should was to argue that the Tennessee law discriminates on the basis of sex. That's it. Factual questions, which include the fact that trans kids deprived of GAC have a higher rate of suicide, would have been instantly deemed irrelevant. The entire thrust of the majority's ruling was that detailed factual questions about the medical advisability of treatments should be left to the state legislature, not decided by the courts.
These attacks on Chase Strangio are bullshit based on ignorance. There is no one who could have done a better job than he did. Put your blame where it belongs--with the six fascist justices on the Supreme Court.
You obviously have no idea what the actual problem is. And also, you do not write concisely.
When a Justice asked a question regarding a matter you claim was not about the question at hand, Strangio did not as he should have, as you have implied -- possibly without realizing it -- he did not reply to the effect of: "As that question does not pertain to the matter now before the court, I have no information at hand about it with which to answer it. If the question will not be withdrawn, I must request I be permitted to answer it in writing after I have 24 hours with which to gather the correct information."
Instead -- in a case where he is one of us, is celebrated among us and by allies as representing us generally as well as about the specific matter at hand -- when asked a question by a SCOTUS Justice he got the answer factually wrong! This is a matter which every transgender adult in the US should be factually correct about, and far more so our advocate to SCOTUS.
Your defense of Strangio's bizarre own goal is apparently founded on the principle of, baffle them with bullshit. He did simply screw that up.
I agree with you 100%. There is no hope for a positive outcome in this case, and quite honestly it would be much better if it were never coming before the court. Efforts should be invested in blue states, from this point forward, for their protective state laws are all that we really have going forward. There will be no help or protection from SCOTUS or the federal government.
We are watching.