The absence of trans people from the British media is part of the problem. I'd like to offer mentoring to trans people trying to get into journalism, free of charge. Most of my experience is obviously in political commentary, but I might be passably useful in news and other areas.

Took me a second...

Supporting bathroom, sports and healthcare bans for trans people means signing on to a moral panic about problems that DON'T EXIST.

When people say Democrats should "moderate" on these issues, they are suggesting that we legislate a group out of public life based on lies.

Republicans are passing bathroom bills because they think men are pretending to be women so they can commit sexual assault. THEY AREN'T.

Republicans are banning trans athletes because they think boys are pretending to be girls to win competitions. THEY AREN'T.

They're also typically unburdened by trivial niceties like objective reality.

This is why they want to destroy us. Our superpower is explaining complicated things in a way that everyone can understand. They are going to try to destroy us whether we do it or not. I’m not going down without a fight.

No problem! Thanks for the clear explanation(s).

That's great, and if more people were like that I think we wouldn't be where we are.

But they're not, and so while I disagree with it, I can at least *understand* their point of view.

I would probably agree. But when you're asking the people we're referring to to vote, they *do* see it as a bad choice. I'm just visualising it from their perspective.

There's nuance I think. I've previously voted differently to who I normally vote for, or not voted at all, in protest to a party's stances.

However, *only* when it's clear that there isn't a fundamental risk of an even worse outcome.

At its heart I think it's fairly simple.

- There is a bad choice and a catastrophic choice.
- Voting for neither supports the latter.
- Everyone should vote for the former, but I *understand* why people are getting tired of being asked to vote for a bad choice.

'Uninspiring and disappointing' isn't the right term, to be fair. I was misrepresenting it. My bad.

The main issue I've seen people be disillusioned with the
Democrats on is Gaza, and there I don't disagree.

I agree! Certainly at the beginning, although it lost a little bit of momentum.

I think there's just too much (perhaps understandable) fatigue with the Democrats being uninspiring and disappointing.

For the record, I still think people should have voted for her, but I see the other side.

I don't disagree. But whether it's symptomatic of that issue or not, the frustration remains.

"Vote for me or the country is doomed." might be *true*, but that doesn't mean that it's an inspiring message, nor that it's easy to support ad nauseam.

I think we're arguing the same thing here. I think that giving anyone more liberty is a good thing *in a vacuum*, but there are other values and realities that we need to consider, which I think is what you're saying about your 'when it hits the real world' point.

I think I still disagree. Having an aspirational concept to strive towards provide a useful benchmark for the realities that we have built / are building.

You can't just say 'we want to have more liberty' without having a sense of what ideal liberty looks like.

As I've mentioned elsewhere, I do understand the frustration with being constantly asked to vote *against* someone rather than *for* someone.

But, I think you're largely right here. Unifying groups that only share a view on *one* issue is something the left is very bad at, and the right very good.