One can never expect MSNBC's Joy Reid to be the level-headed voice of reason, but even by her standards, her Wednesday edition of The ReidOut was off the charts crazy. According to Reid, Tennessee’s law, currently being challenged at the Supreme Court, that forbids so-called “gender-affirming care” for minors is part of a Nazi-like tradition of targeting transgender people.
Reid kicked off the relevant segment by lamenting, “America's dealing with many issues, from grocery prices to gun violence, which is the number one cause of death for kids and teens, but the one issue that Republicans successfully exploited in this year's elections was their fear of the transgender community. Republicans spent at least, get this, $215 million on anti-trans TV ads with the most prominent coming from the Trump campaign itself.”
After a brief clip from the famous “Kamala is for they/them” ad, Reid added, “Trump's argument was that Vice President Kamala Harris is fighting for they/them while he's fighting for you. Erin Reed, an independent journalist covering LGBTQ issues, tracked Trump campaign spending and found that they spent, okay, more money on anti-trans ads than they did on housing, immigration, and economy ads combined.”
Reid then reached for a puzzling analogy, “For context, in the 50 states, transgender adult Americans make up .5, not 5, .5 percent of the population, or 1.3 million Americans out of, like, 320 million. There are a little over 300,000 transgender youths in America. That's 1.4 percent of all young people between ages 13 and 17. That would be the numerical equivalent of the Republican Party targeting the entire city of Phoenix, Arizona, population 1.65 million, because they don't like the desert landscape.”
It is not like that at all. First, it takes just one athlete to ruin the integrity of a women’s sporting event. Second, the like or dislike of desert landscapes is purely a personal preference, while the questions of what constitutes mankind and womankind and whether children are to be considered all wise are questions that determine whether a society lives in reality or a fantasy land.
Still, Reid then reached for another, even more ludicrous analogy, “In fact, there are more kids who have been exposed to gun violence, estimated at 3 million, than there are transgender Americans of all ages in total. Targeting trans people isn't new. It is an age-old tradition which Nazi Germany did with brutally violent ends in the 1930s. While the Supreme Court refuses to do anything about weapons of war in schools, today they seemed inclined to uphold Tennessee's ban on gender-affirming care for minors.”
To make her case, Reid put up two headlines but didn’t elaborate on the corresponding articles. Perhaps there was a good reason why, because comparing not giving hormones to 10-year-olds to concentration camps and eugenics is absurd. Ironically, the people arguing in favor of “gender-affirming care” are the ones that push others towards sterility, but such details are inconvenient for Joy Reid.
Here is a transcript for the December 4 shows:
MSNBC The ReidOut
12/4/2024
11:45 PM ET
7:35 PM ET
JOY REID: America's dealing with many issues, from grocery prices to gun violence, which is the number one cause of death for kids and teens, but the one issue that Republicans successfully exploited in this year's elections was their fear of the transgender community. Republicans spent at least, get this, $215 million on anti-trans TV ads with the most prominent coming from the Trump campaign itself.
NARRATOR: Kamala even supports letting biological men compete against our girls in their sports. Kamala is for they/them, President Trump is for you.
REID: Trump's argument was that Vice President Kamala Harris is fighting for they/them while he's fighting for you. Erin Reed, an independent journalist covering LGBTQ issues, tracked Trump campaign spending and found that they spent, okay, more money on anti-trans ads than they did on housing, immigration, and economy ads combined.
For context, in the 50 states, transgender adult Americans make up .5, not 5, .5 percent of the population, or 1.3 million Americans out of, like, 320 million. There are a little over 300,000 transgender youths in America. That's 1.4 percent of all young people between ages 13 and 17. That would be the numerical equivalent of the Republican Party targeting the entire city of Phoenix, Arizona, population 1.65 million, because they don't like the desert landscape.
In fact, there are more kids who have been exposed to gun violence, estimated at 3 million, than there are transgender Americans of all ages in total. Targeting trans people isn't new. It is an age-old tradition which Nazi Germany did with brutally violent ends in the 1930s. While the Supreme Court refuses to do anything about weapons of war in schools, today they seemed inclined to uphold Tennessee's ban on gender affirming care for minors.
While the decision is not expected for months, a majority of the justices parroted a string of debunked talking points, all under the guise of protecting the kids, just not every kid.
