MSNBC’s Ali Velshi kicked off his first show of Pride Month on Saturday by not just condemning Republicans for doing things such as “taking medically-necessary health care away from children,” but gleefully reporting that such positions are unpopular. Unfortunately for Velshi, not only does popularity not equal rightness, it just so happens to be that it is his position that is unpopular.
To make his point Velshi, like most of the media since the start of the month, repeated polling data from GLAAD to make the claim that, “Now, it's clear that Americans overwhelmingly support the LGBTQ community and its right to exist peacefully, which is why the targeted attacks on the rights of LGBTQ Americans seems like a losing political strategy.”
The problem for Velshi is that GLAAD’s questions were vaguely worded and avoided policy questions while choosing to stick with questions like whether or not people are comfortable seeing LGBTQ people in advertisements.
However, Velshi took those polls and tried to extrapolate policy preferences:
Yet, just in the last year alone, Republican lawmakers have introduced more than 500 anti-LGBTQ bills into state legislatures, according to the Equality Federation. A majority of those measures take aim at transgender youth, they range from bans on gender-affirming care for minors, to not allowing trans kids to play on sports teams that align with their gender identity, to bills that we can or undermine nondiscrimination laws.
He further added, “This is just not popular policy. Take a look at the 2022 midterms, you can see that there was a rainbow rave, a record 340 LGBTQ candidates won their elections across the country, according to the Victory Fund, so many candidates with anti LGBTQ stances were rejected.”
When it comes to protecting female-designated spaces, Velshi portrayed the Republican position as “deciding who looks feminine or masculine enough to use certain bathrooms.”
After condemning Republicans for “shutting down drag shows and taking medically-necessary health care away from children,” Velshi got personal, “Might I suggest turning down the volume and listening to the American people, because the loudest person in the room is rarely the smartest or the strongest.”
Velshi mentioned several issues in his rant. On the issue of sports teams, even with pollsters using transgender activists’ preferred language, 65 percent of Americans do not want males competing against females. Fifty-eight percent do not want 15-17-year olds to have access to hormone treatment and 68 percent say the same for 10-14-year olds, which puts them in agreement with an increasing number of European governments that are not exactly known for their social conservatism which discredits the "medically-necessary" part of the diatribe.
Finally, 52 percent say it is inappropriate to talk to middle schoolers about trans identity, a number that increases to 70 percent for fourth and fifth grades and 77 percent for third grade and under.
What was Velshi saying about the loudest people in the room?
This segment was sponsored by Colonial Penn.
Here is a transcript for the June 3 show:
MSNBC Velshi
6/3/2023
10:21 PM ET
ALI VELSHI: Now, it's clear that Americans overwhelmingly support the LGBTQ community and its right to exist peacefully, which is why the targeted attacks on the rights of LGBTQ Americans seems like a losing political strategy. Yet, just in the last year alone, Republican lawmakers have introduced more than 500 anti-LBTQ bills into state legislatures, according to the Equality Federation. A majority of those measures take aim at transgender youth, they range from bans on gender-affirming care for minors, to not allowing trans kids to play on sports teams that align with their gender identity, to bills that we can or undermine nondiscrimination laws.
This is just not popular policy. Take a look at the 2022 midterms, you can see that there was a rainbow rave, a record 340 LGBTQ candidates won their elections across the country, according to the Victory Fund, so many candidates with anti LGBTQ stances were rejected.
Americans want gay and lesbian, trans and non-binary people to be able to live their lives, and yet some Republican lawmakers are choosing to focus their attention on deciding who looks feminine or masculine enough to use certain bathrooms and shutting down drag shows and taking medically-necessary health care away from children.
It is all just noise until it gets so loud that the rhetoric turns into legislation that hurts LGBTQ Americans. Might I suggest turning down the volume and listening to the American people, because the loudest person in the room is rarely the smartest or the strongest.
