Thread by @RottenInDenmark

Struggling to get mad about The Atlantic's latest transphobia laundromat because it is so fucking boring that no one will make it past the first few paragraphs
theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…

The entire piece is an effort to discredit an obscure, 3-year-old guidance document that tells teachers to call children by their preferred name and pronouns even if their parents object.

This barely even qualifies as an ethical dilemma. Respecting children's wishes over those of their parents is pretty unobjectionable. My parents called me Mickey at home as a kid. I told my teachers to call me Mike and they did. Who cares.

And yet Conor still somehow manages to whip this up into thousands of words of pedantic, hand-wringing tedium. The journal is hypocritical! They should say this is hard, not easy! This won't apply to 100% of children!
Seriously *try* to get through these full paragraphs.

After pushing this intellectual rock up a hill and letting it roll back down for nearly 2,500 words, Conor finally (I think?) settles on the correct outcome: Teachers should call kids what they want.
So in sum, a document you've never heard of is probably fine. Terrific stuff.

This article is a perfect example of how polite transphobia works: Highlight alleged liberal hypocrisy, downplay Republican bigotry and repeatedly insist that a "legitimate debate" is being suppressed.

Conor blithely notes that Virginia is *prohibiting* teachers from using kids' preferred pronouns. Yet it's the random, non-binding "liberal" document he singles out for thousands of words of criticism — even while admitting it's correct on the merits.

Dammit I started tweeting and it turns out it's not such a struggle to get mad.

aaaand there it is. Behind all the mellifluous prose Conor knows exactly whose message he's promoting.