thisearthlyride | Should Trans-Folks Kill Puppies?

So I'm on this email list. It states that it is "a discussion group for political, social and cultural advocacy and issues affecting transgendered, transsexual, intersexed and all other gender variant people... Please keep your discussions respectful of all transgender/gender-variant (TGV) identities, and do not overreact."

For the past year or so, I've limited myself to skimming the posts. I get tired of the infighting- the "transer than thou" arguments. And, quite frankly, the immaturity.

So after a few weeks of arguing over whether or not trans people should be working together with glbq people and whether or not transsexual people should be lumped together with transgender people, I wasn't excited to skim the digest version in my inbox this morning. And then I saw this (I did ask permission to repost this- identifying information has been removed):

Subject: Should Trans-Folks Kill Puppies?

Seriously. What have puppies ever done to advance trans-rights? Nothing. So why should we allow them to live?

Absurd, heavy sarcasm? Attention getter? Yes. But it's necessary because so many people here seem to think that exclusionary practices are justified based on some sort of semantic moat they've carved around their existence. Never mind the fact that we're all in this ride together, for better or worse.

Some things you do because it makes sense as part of common decency and the shared human condition. No, neither I nor anyone else can make you do anything. But the hypocrisy it takes to sit there and spout some tread-worn crap about WBT or "TS not TG" is amazing. It's rank idiocy. It's high school clique bullshit that should have been left in high school. Fucking grow up and show a little maturity.

Meanwhile, when we are faced with the greatest opportunity in the last 30 years to make a positive difference and significant progress in the rights of LGBT people, I'm seeing the same petty bullshit issues being argued about that were being argued 10-15 years ago--argued by some of the same people using the same tired, long-refuted arguments--but no progress or way forward.

Jimminy-freaking-Christmas.

I couldn't have said it better...