Repost from Nov 26, 2022
In the wake of last Saturday’s tragedy at Club Q, a number of far-right pundits (the usual crowd — Matt Walsh, Tucker Carlson, and the like), along with a few left-wing gender-critical commentators, are desperately hoping to turn five deaths into a gotcha moment.
Their argument stems from an article published by The Independent speculating that Anderson Aldrich’s lawyer will leverage his client’s gender identity in an attempt to dodge a hate-crime charge. It goes something like this:
Tweets from Matt Walsh accusing the left of ignoring Anderson Aldrich’s identity.
Walsh repeated his rhetoric on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” where he and the host gleefully told the left to respect Aldrich’s identity and insisted that we should honor the shooter’s “choice.”
That last word, “choice,” has been the crux of the far right’s crusade against homosexuality and gender nonconformity for decades. Yet despite his years of self-imposed soldiering, Walsh has failed to learn the most fundamental aspect of his enemy.
Identity isn’t a choice, and it never, ever has been — no matter how hard anti-LGBTQ commentators manifest. That’s why they have to invent controversies and conceal information instead.
No one wakes up one morning and decides, “I’m no longer cis” or “I’m attracted to the same sex now.” The realization doesn’t happen immediately; it’s a journey I’ve personally witnessed multiple people very close to me — including my little brother — embark on and continue, but rarely finish.
None of us knew what was happening to our bodies during puberty. Maybe we were lucky enough to have sex ed. (before the far-right went after that too), but as pimples broke out across our skin and we slowly discovered who we found attractive, we were mostly just along for the ride. It’s no different for a queer person, as almost every major medical association can attest. That’s why us scary liberals support transgender care; that’s why we believe schools should be welcoming places and respect teachers who make that happen.
Newsflash, Matt: we’re all human beings. We’re all just as messy and confused and wrapped up in stupid mores as you are.
And if you could be bothered to understand a life experience different from your own, you would grasp that.
So no, queer people aren’t dart-boarding an identity that will benefit them, regardless of how many prison cases you cherry-pick or scientifically inaccurate claims about athletes you make. You don’t get your perverse victory in Colorado Springs. Because we do respect gender identity, but it has absolutely nothing to do with this case.
I have no way to know whether Anderson Aldrich is truly nonbinary or if their lawyer is making a bad-faith ploy for sympathy from the court — nor do I particularly care. I can express empathy for a queer kid raised in a broken home with a father who’s relieved to hear that his son is simply a mass murderer, not gay. I can also condemn a cis man who walked into a club and started shooting because he too hated queer people.
Neither narrative changes the fact that five human beings are dead and over a dozen more are injured (and one of them could well have been a dear Colorado-based friend of mine if she’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time). Neither narrative shields you and yours from the consequences of your hysteria. Either Aldrich went into Club Q to open fire on an enemy, or they went in to find the only release for their anguish they had — anguish your ilk caused.
Violence like this is the utterly predictable, blatantly obvious outcome when you arbitrarily select a minority to scare voters with. Your rhetoric did this, not ours. You’ve turned human beings into political scapegoats, not the left. You tell the world LGBTQ people are endangering children, not us. And you know that; otherwise you wouldn’t be desperately deflecting the truth with empty rhetoric about pronouns.
Now take your medicine and shut up.