Summary
Trump and Vance have made anti-transgender attacks a central part of their campaign, using demeaning language and misrepresentations to portray transgender individuals as a threat to national identity.
Harris has largely ignored Trump’s attacks but has pushed back on his characterization of her stances, noting that federal policy allowing transgender military personnel access to gender-affirming medical care was in place during Trump’s presidency.
Advocates like GLAAD’s Sarah Kate Ellis and Charlotte Clymer warn that Trump’s approach fuels hostility, marginalizing vulnerable communities and creating a culture of animosity instead of understanding and empathy.
Oh yes, liberals absolutely are way worse about this, but I do see it even with actual leftists. It feels like with “centrists,” the deal seems to be what you described: a sort of “well, certainly the leopards won’t eat my face, and I don’t like messing with the status quo because it works well enough for me.” However, with some leftists, it seems to be more about an optimistic view of “the human condition” and an assumption that people are, by and large, good and want to do good (even to folks they don’t know).
I’m a degrowth anarchist myself, and since I live in Finland, I get to enjoy proportional representation. I vote for a democratic socialist party that is at least reasonably close to my values and actually has a chance of landing parliament seats and governmental positions. Over the decades, I’ve noted that many “actual” leftist voters and politicians are maybe a bit… well, let’s say a bit too upbeat about what sort of animal Homo sapiens actually is. These are folks who genuinely do care about “woke” stuff like intersectionality and put in the work towards really changing things, but who seem to think that deep down, everybody wants a just, more equal society and not a hierarchical hellhole where the “strong” dominate some “lesser” social classes (foreigners, poor people, whatever)