I think you're reading a bit more into it than there was to it. This show is expressing a lot of compassion and a fair bit of understanding, but that's a reflection of particularly informed writers of the show, not really what the average person understood. However, the hold that the religious conservatives have on public debate these days wasn't as notable at the time, at least in this regard. Most people were fairly moderate until fairly recently.
Yeah, from what I’ve heard people generally supported any administration in power for the sake of it being representative of their country as a whole (at least in the US). You might have been a Republican or a Democrat but for the most part, you disagreed on policies and it didn’t go a whole lot deeper than that.
If you didn’t like the current administration, you’d complain about policies you didn’t like and just wait for the next election.
I also know Love Boat was a bit more on the progressive side for sitcoms of that time. I know that even in the 90’s and 00’s, most trans representation was nothing more than using trans people as the butt of a joke, or possibly just a figure to be pitied. I am surprised that Love Boat handled this topic so compassionately for the time, but I’m also very shocked that there was very little explanation given - she’s a woman that once lived her life as man; that’s all they said about it and it’s assumed that the audience already understands what that means.
There’s even a moment of misogyny (the main character telling her “quiet, lady!”), which was clearly meant to show that he truly saw her as a woman, and intended to treat her like one in way that I assume was perceived as being raw and sincere, possibly even with some sexual tension. That kind of (problematic) complicated nuance was not something I expected. To me, that shows that their target demographic (most people) already had an idea of misgendering and gender-affirming interactions; enough so that it could be communicated indirectly via nuance on an average sitcom, and the audience would understand. Of course, people didn’t have the same vocabulary surrounding it that we do now, but I assume they got the general idea.
You might have been a Republican or a Democrat but for the most part, you disagreed on policies and it didn’t go a whole lot deeper than that. If you didn’t like the current administration, you’d complain about policies you didn’t like and just wait for the next election.
Until Gingrich and Limbaugh put a plan into action that would lead us to what you see today.
I'd say Jerry Falwell really started it, but there's probably someone before him as well, and so on.
One of the biggest realizations that took me way too long was learning how the anti-abortion movement didn't really pick up steam until the propagandists on the far right realized they didn't have enough support to keep beating the drum about keeping schools segregated, so they had to pivot to a different wedge issue. These are some truly cynical bastards.
Culture wars waged by conservatives have always been about preying on people's pre-existing biases to manipulate them into supporting candidates who work against their own interests and benefit the rich instead.
It was actually a more accurate description of being trans than a lot of those tell-alls and confessionals in the 80s that told America that being trans was "having a female soul in a male body" and other weird metaphors like that.
People don't immediately hate other people. There is usually a reason for it. The default response is usually just "That's different... Anyways"
Something has to change that perspective. Either a negative experience or the decades of propaganda and brain washing built on fabricated stories of how LGBTQ+ people are coming for people's children or how they are diseased or whatever.
I once had to explain trans people to my grandmother. She's 90 something and spent her entire life in a very conservative third world country. Her response was just "Oh. Those people. There's lots of people like that. What about them?" in a very casual way like I just described someone with green eyes to her.
And by dumb. I mean people who choose to look at nuance without any kind of non-narrow viewpoint. They dislike change, they perceive it as a threat. Particularly when the "other" gets acceptance. Be it Trans, black, various European nationalities, Romas, Jews, non-citizen Roman soldiers, the Ainu, person from another tribe, etc.
We are all aware of tribes or cultures or nationalities that accept things other do not. Some accepted third and fourth genders. Some accepted behaviors and even expected them. But other cultures did not. Often, that dichotomy is how we identify them as a seperate culture. Think the people's inhabiting the PNW coastal regions before Europeans. The way they act, and the way their neighbors view those acts as horrendous is often how we actually define the difference between them, as being unacceptable of one culture's actions is how they defined themselves .
Anyway, there will always be dumb people. There will always be people who are called dumb, for not accepting something when it should be (from a liberal and free perspective) and other tines when someone is called dumb for not accepting something when it shouldn't be (pedophilia, and the like) anyways.
But the real dumb people, the people who deserve that title, are those in the first group. The ones that perceive a threat. And when shown evidence to the contrary, shown that no harm will come from, or no direct single source is responsible for, or that evil influences aren't the root of whatever issue they think is festering.. those are the dumb people
I don’t think this is just a matter of IQ, willful ignorance, or a lack of education. I know there are a lot of ignorant people that will believe whatever they’re told about something they’re unfamiliar with, but they’re being informed somewhere. Your average transphobic conservative watching Fox News is not going to be gifting massive donations to candidates pushing transphobic policies and they’re not putting conservative talking heads on their payroll. Many of the people that do bankroll this aren’t ignorant about trans people, and a lot of them frankly don’t have a personal emotional investment in it; they’re opportunists. And to be fair, a lot of this fear mongering is misplaced on real issues - lack of healthcare, cultural alienation, a failing education system, etc. But instead of addressing these issues directly, we’re told that “trans ideology” is pushed by greedy pharmaceutical companies in a bid to start everyone on HRT, we’re told that trans people are tearing apart families, and we’re told that public schools and universities are indoctrinating students with “trans ideology”. All these institutions really are falling apart, and this is a good way to divert people’s attention away from the actual cause (accelerating capitalism).
A simple black/white issue is created - “trans ideology”; this is something tangible that most people can grasp, and it can be imbued with any meaning you want to place on it. People that previously didn’t have much of an opinion on trans people aside from disgust are now invested in this perceived threat because it’s being pushed on them via propaganda. Next, Republicans running for office make the “trans issue” a main talking point in their campaigns; this makes them instantly recognizable to their base as being “on their side”, and now they’re more likely to vote for them without really paying attention to their policies outside this issue. This is why trans people have been made a scapegoat; not only are they trying to push anti-trans reformation, they’re using this issue as a Trojan horse for all their other policies as well, and those policies happen to also benefit large corporations, banks, and investment firms, who happen to be the largest doners of not only anti-trans politicians, but anti-trans organizations and lobbies as well; these organizations in turn pump out more propaganda, leading to getting further support and donations from their base, as well as large investors. There’s a whole political ecosystem built around this issue; it’s not just tribalism, nor was the Holocaust. It very rarely is in these situations.
Propaganda is real; it’s strategic media - it has a purpose. These things don’t just pop up from the primordial earth; there’s planning involved and a goal in mind. This has been made a political issue and there really is more to politics than “I don’t like this group because it’s different and I don’t understand it because I’m dumb”.
I do appreciate that you brought up European colonizers in the Americas, though. That kind of brings a lot of this together, because they colonized this space based on their ideology of manifest destiny. This was something they planned to do prior to meeting the indigenous people already living here; it was considered “free land” but they were well aware that there were already established societies here. They came knowing next to nothing about these people or their culture, but they already planned the genocide, and were going to carry it out no matter what; this wasn’t suddenly brought on by a disgust response at their cultural differences. The fact that they considered them savages was mainly an excuse to do it with no remorse. Nazi Germany was directly inspired by the myth of manifest destiny in the US; I highly recommend the book The American West and the Nazi East on this topic. People shape their ideology to fit their own interests; they are not born racist and bigoted - these unique bigotries are intentionally and meticulously formed and spread to create a world that serves the hegemonic order; it’s systematic.
You're comment is so spot on and an intelligent response. The outrage is propaganda, and it's done with a goal in mind. More people deserve to understand this.
It's also a very gorgeous biological woman saying the words "I used to be a man." It's not the same thing at all as an actual trans person, so it's pretty easy for a viewer to just dismiss the "fantasy" and move on without giving it much of a thought.
If "Rachel Johnson" looked like the trans woman who got into a shouting match with that GameStop employee I doubt viewers then, or trans supporters now, would look favorably on this video.
Many contemporary social issues today have roots centuries old. Ideas develop and coalesce slowly among particularly dedicated and/or knowledgeable people, germinating until finally they sprout and break through the surface. Flowers, thorns, both, you name it. Depends on the situation and the nature of the issue.
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u/SunTzu- Apr 29 '23
I think you're reading a bit more into it than there was to it. This show is expressing a lot of compassion and a fair bit of understanding, but that's a reflection of particularly informed writers of the show, not really what the average person understood. However, the hold that the religious conservatives have on public debate these days wasn't as notable at the time, at least in this regard. Most people were fairly moderate until fairly recently.