Jonathan Chait (fuck that guy) uses a familiar tactic to argue that Democrats should throw trans people under the bus. He points out How Progressive Overreach Gave Trump His Favorite Attack Ad, and argues that we should back off on policies that the Republicans don’t like. He wants to use Republican hate ads as a guide to how we ought to present our principles. Trump is currently using all kinds of divisive hate ads to stir up support, and we ought to avoid advocating for the kinds of things that make Trump and his followers angry.
The Trump ad describes an answer Harris gave on an ACLU candidate questionnaire five years ago. (“As President will you use your executive authority to ensure that transgender and nonbinary people who rely on the state for medical care — including those in prison and immigration detention — will have access to comprehensive treatment associated with gender transition, including all necessary surgical care?” Answer: yes.). I’m sure neither the ACLU nor the Harris staffers who cooperated in this response set out to seed Republican attack ads. Yet a large portion of the work of the progressive nonprofit complex is functionally dedicated to this very outcome. And these kinds of perverse outcomes will continue to occur unless Democrats get wise to the dynamic that continues to produce them.
So reasonable. We need to woo the bigots, so stop alienating the people who hate trans people. Stop standing up for the rights of an oppressed minority because it annoys an oppressive majority. Be more conservative, as if the Democratic party weren’t already a center-right party as it were.
But watch Chait run away from his position: oh my, he’s in favor of trans rights, as long as he isn’t expected to allow them any rights.
The point I’m making here is purely political. I have no moral problem with prisons giving properly run transition care to prisoners who wish to change their sex. I’d also agree that Trump is exploiting the issue in a way designed to spread hatred against all transgender people, rather than to question one small program. (It is so small, indeed, that it went on throughout Trump’s presidency without Trump noticing or caring.) The issue is that political candidates need to think practically about the existing electorate, and the progressive movement is currently designed to ignore pragmatism.
Trump is “exploiting the issue in a way designed to spread hatred against all transgender people,” but don’t you dare support that issue. That’s not pragmatic. It might be a life-or-death issue for trans people, but maybe the Democrats ought to pragmatically allow them to die? For a few more votes from people who want them to suffer and die?
It’s not just trans rights. Chait is unhappy because absolutists on a whole host of issues don’t like the compromises he is willing to make, and oh boy, but Chait is eager to write criticisms of trans people and unions and climate activists, he’d sure like them to sit down and shut up, all in the name of pragmatism.
The groups in the coalition increasingly tend to define agreement with their cause in maximal terms. If you support equality and respect for trans people, but question, say, medicalizing young people, you’re anti-trans. If you support labor unions but oppose some positions they advocate, you’re a scab. Climate activists increasingly use the term “climate denier,” once reserved for those who refuse to accept the theory of anthropogenic global warming, for any skeptic of any element of their preferred remedies. The rampant absolutism makes it difficult to acknowledge even the possibility that there are political risks attached to going too far in agreement with the movement.
Only an idiot would refuse to recognize that taking new, bold positions is going to involve political risks. That’s the whole point! You’ll never make any progress if you only support the “safe” position.
I don’t think Chait’s position is pragmatic at all. I call it chickenshittery.
Hey, Jonathan, rather than always complaining about sane, moderate, humane positions that a politician takes on trans issues, why aren’t you focusing on the mad, cruel, pointless bigotries that their opponents trumpet loudly? Do you think that hating gay and trans people, or union-busting, or ignoring climate change are pragmatic policies that we ought to let stand, quietly?
Buk buk buk buKAW.
Chait is also spreading chickenshit of his own. Nobody gets called a scab just for opposing unions. It’s a very specific term.
Is there really any reason to continue reading op-eds and think pieces? They seem to come in one of three forms: chickenshit, bullshit, or plain obvious.
You might call this approach “regression to the meanest”.
How ridiculous. You will never go low enough for some people. There are actually Americans who think we should reinstitute slavery, and if you’re in prison you may well be working as a slave already…looking at you Mississippi, et al. So should political candidates not condemn slavery because someone might be offended and not vote for the “liberal” candidate…someone who will be offended anyway and not vote for a “liberal” candidate no matter what.
Instead of setting the bar lower, let’s go higher. Let’s have medical insurance and home owners insurance provided as a public service, and get rid of profiteering off people’s disasters.
Chait is such a worthless PoS.
@Walter Solomon:
Is there some implied limiter there? I mean, we’re reading a think piece by PZ in which he’s expressing his view of what politics should be. Similarly, I write think pieces fairly frequently.
Are you talking ONLY about op/eds or think pieces in specific publications?
Alan: “I want to skin all puppies alive!”
Blayne: “That’s horrible, I’m opposing that!”
Ted: “Bit extreme there, Blayne! You might upset Alan and he could use your intolerant position against you. How about you just join Alan and skin puppies yourself?”
The most frustrating thing about fuck heads like this is the fact that they are both wrong and lost of “resonable” democrats take this kind of mental diarrhea seriously. The fact is that trans rights are broadly popular and transphobia is a losing message. Instead of leaning into it though and using this ss an opportunity to educate and build a stronger coalition the democrats run away from it, gaining zero conservative voters and at the least demoralize people in their coalition. The refusal to fight back also makes you look weak and wimpy. Like you can be both aggressive and pro social, it doesn’t have to be wimpy kumbaya shit. As a trans woman I am frankly disgusted by how so many “allies” have proven to be complete cowards on this issue, when with even a tiny bit of creativity trans rights could be a strong asset, especially in light of the Caliente of roe and the question of bodily autonomy. In short thank you PZ for remaining principled and outspoken. <3
That’s supposed to be salience not Caliente.
Usually when I make arguments similar to PZ’s to liberals, I get called a “purity leftist” and told I must want Trump to win.
@crimsonsage 7
That’s a good point about the refusal to fight and the cowardice.
In a political argument space Chait would be one of the ones going after me for tone and severity instead of our supposed political opponents. I’d tell him the same as everyone else. When I see him going after my political opponents I’ll consider dropping certain rhetorical weapons.
He can make the problem a general political issue and show me he can be even handed and then he’ll be a legitimate political obstacle I’d have to take seriously.
And lots of the language is probably just accurate. Kinds of bigotry and their expression, ignorance, incompetence, irrationality, illogic…
Chait has to fight for the world where we can do this smiling and cheerful.
And caliente is salient technically.
IIRC, Chait started his professional career covering Clinton. Clinton won big by triangulating to the right and bashing hippies. Chait apparently convinced himself that was the only way for Democrats to win.
It’s that bit about “medicalizing children” that makes me think that he isn’t being honest in his attempts to frame this as a matter of tactics to win elections. He’s using it as a threat to try to pry Democrats to the right. It’s not that he’s afraid that treating trans people with decency would be politically inconvenient, I don’t think he wants people do it and he’s choosing to focus on kids because he thinks trans kids are the most vulnerable. He may be right.
I’ve seen these people before. They’re everywhere online, pretending to be arguing in support of Democrats but taking every possible argument against any kind of support for trans people. I’m not saying that all Democrats support trans people, but it always comes off as disingenuous to me. They try to paint this as if the Democratic party suddenly became focused on trans rights when the truth is Republicans suddenly became focused on attacking trans people after they lost the fight to stop same-sex marriage. It doesn’t have to be your agenda of choice, you just have to be a decent person to realize that what they’re doing is wrong and to stand up against it. And when that happens and some people choose to stand up instead and pretend to ring their hands about how that might be an inconvenient position to take, I don’t believe them. I see anti-trans activists behind the keyboards who realize that they’re losing the culture war.
“And caliente is salient technically.”
Nope.
One means ‘hot’ in Spanish, the other means “stands out” in English.
—
I see CD beat me to the irony of Walter’s comment above.
(Also, it was a silly rhetorical question; obvs, one reads those things to find out others’ opinion and thus be informed)
—
I see the citation is from NYMag, which is ranked as very leftish: https://www.allsides.com/news-source/new-york-magazine
(In an USAnian context, of course)
Heat is salient.
Comparing Chait’s behavior to chickens is an insult to a noble and upstanding animal, by which I mean the chicken.
Crip Dyke @5
Yes. Any publication that charges you for the privilege of reading their columns. I don’t know if you charge or not, but PZ certainly doesn’t.
Walter, I read that referenced column by clicking on the link provided in the OP.
No charge for the privilege.
felixd, the comparison is to chickenshit, not to chickens.
Before MLK and the strong Black civil right movement got started Black people hoping for change were dependent on White politicians, who mostly reasoned like Chait.
And a similar argument can be made about US Middle East policies…
‘Pragmatism’ lets an inflamed wound get worse.
No, Birger.
Pragmatism (no scare quotes) treats an inflamed wound so it doesn’t get worse.
(Words mean things)
[related]
I saw a similar take today:
https://www.vox.com/2024-elections/378238/kamala-harris-fox-interview-bret-baier-2024-election-immigration
(extracts from the piece by Christian Paz)
Pragmatism is a code word for “I am not arguing for something because I don’t really want to, but the cost for just coming out and saying that would be too high for me personally.” Actual Pragmatism would be to counter attack vis a vis trans rights using the actual facts and pointing our what kind of fucking weird genital obsessed freaks all the rightwingers are. But they don’t want to do that because they don’t actually believe in trans rights and it’s easier for them to just stay silent. After all who else are us freaks gonna vote for? The republicans?? Lol! Better to cater to the lowest common denominator hog, who isn’t going to vote for them anyway.
Pragmatism is a dogwhistle for self important centrists and nothing more.
I don’t know why you’re objecting to this; you’ve already done it to the Palestinians by agreeing to support Biden and Harris despite their ongoing, doubled-down support for genocide. Why not trans people too? And gay people? And black people? And asians? Heck, you’ve let the bigots get their feet in the door and you’ve agreed to Vote Blue No Matter who as Biden turns into a further-right version of Ronald Reagan, why draw any lines at all? The parties should just merge outright, and then Democrats can vote for Trump the way they ever-so-clearly wish they could, if only he wore a different-colored jersey.
@19. John Morales : “felixd, the comparison is to chickenshit, not to chickens.”
Chickenshit can be useful fertiliser which helps plants grow.* Chait’s spineless capitulation to transphobia is worse than useless and hurts real people.
But, yeah, metaphors how do they work again?
Oh and has anyone yet mentioned the adage : “The standard you walk past being the standard you accept’”” and its implications here?
.* FWIW
Source : https://www.organicgardener.com.au/the-wonders-of-chook-poo/
You pretend to be purblind, but O so many times you have been told why: the alternative is not just a bit worse, it’s a shitload worse.
Sticking to your talking points when reality 100% contradicts them is, well, what Trump does.
(You daren’t go off-script, do you?)
[OT]
StevoR, I’ve had chooks for 25 years now.
You should have read further:
See, chickenshit becomes manure, but it’s nasty stuff before that.
</pedantry>
Its not throwing away the rights of an oppressed minority in favour of an oppressive majority. Its about throwing them away in favour of an oppressive minority. In a finely divided electorate minorities, oppressive or otherwise can determine the outcome of an election. Democrats need to go on the offensive and target and oppose that oppressive minority by using the same brutal tactics as the Trumpublicans.
Here’s how I would frame an attack ad.
I would use the famous words of Martin Niemöller the German Lutheran pastor who spoke out against Hitler beginning with “First they came for” with an image of Trump. As you list the minorities Trump has come after and they are pretty much the same as those Adolph targeted, including Jews. As you intersperse the words of Martin Niemöller with scenes of Nazi hate crimes and more recent neo-Nazi marches and an appropriate “Nazi” sound track. I would morph Trump’s image into something resembling Hitler along with some of his crazy rants in the sound track. Once the transition to the Orange Feuhrer is complete I would end with Niemöller’s closing words with one change, “me” to “you”; “Then they came for you—and there was no one left to speak for you.”
Trump has targeted virtually every minority group there is and most Americans are either a member of one of them or has family or friends that are part of one of them.
Do elucidate about these alleged implications, if you care to.
First, it’s not an adage, it’s a quotation.
Second, it doesn’t apply here.
There are two (2) standards at play here; Vicar claims to accept neither, so he’s gonna sit and just not walk at all (hey, I can brutalise metaphors too!).
That’s what you, Vicar (singular) advocate: for people to abrogate their say in the election, and either recuse themselves or waste their vote.
(Fucking transparent, it is)
Another reason to not trust “moderates”.
[oops, meant to add a separator. Previous obs addresses two people, in a segue]
gijoel: “Another reason to not trust “moderates”.”
Um, care to define what you mean by “moderates” in quotation marks?
Wikipedia: “Moderate is an ideological category which designates a rejection of radical or extreme views, especially in regard to politics and religion.”
So, are you suggesting that the only trustworthy people are those with radical or extreme views?
(Because Trumpists certainly qualify)
You can also dilute it into a tea by stirring a few shovelsful into a huge 55 gallon (no idea the volume in sensible world units) drum. Let it stew for awhile while it reeks to high heaven. If you water your plants first, you can siphon this slurry out and use it as a fertilizer while it is still relatively fresh and this prevents if from burning.
So clearly we need to dilute and ferment this Chait guy.
Chait … points out How Progressive Overreach Gave Trump His Favorite Attack Ad, and argues that we should back off on policies that the Republicans don’t like.
Does this Chait guy ever cite any instance where Democrats actually won by following this advice?
#25: Heck, why vote for anyone at all then?
You might notice that I don’t quietly accept Biden/Harris’s policy on Palestinians. I do not support their policies on that at all. Unfortunately, the system doesn’t give me a line item veto on the Democratic agenda.
We saw this game forty years ago when it was gay people and kids who were the predators towards our precious children and needed to be blocked from restrooms and locker rooms and kept off sports teams and out of the military. The problem didn’t originate from the Democratic party but from socially accepted bigotry aided by articles in our liberal media like the NY Times. The Republicans seized on that bigotry and whipped up a frenzy against a minority group. That frenzy was enough to stampede Clinton and the party. Bigotry takes a long time to overcome.
Right now, when both the NY Times and WaPo have repeated the moral betrayals of forty years ago by having yet again people who can’t imagine thinking like “those people” write the columns and editorials, we are starting again with the odds stacked against us. When your writers are so sure that no-one could really feel that way, it’s easy to dismiss the reality of minority experience and still believe “I’m really a Liberal but those people are just misguided.”
Harris pitched the police aspects of the border bill to FOX because the other progressive features can’t be pitched in the thirty words she would be able to get in. There is also the continuing problem of needing to provide cover for Democrats running in tight races. The time to pitch those progressive aspects will be after the bill and election are passed. Meanwhile, the convention was laden with pro-immigrant presentations so don’t claim nothing has been said.
So, if some conservative takes something from one of Chait’s columns, and uses that to attack democrats, he’ll eat his words, right?
Don’t tell me… that’s already happened?
I’m genuinely impressed with Chait’s cowardice, he’s arguing for a future in which the Right can neutralise the Left on any topic merely by whinging about it.
Republicans are frothing about trans people! We musn’t upset the Repubs, sorry trans folk, under the bus you go.
Republicans are frothing about abortions! We musn’t upset the Repubs, sorry pregnant people, under the bus you go.
Republicans are frothing about Ukrainian aid! We musn’t upset the Repubs, sorry Ukrainians, under the bus you go.
Republicans are frothing about Unions! We musn’t upset the Repubs, sorry unions, under the bus you go.
Republicans are frothing about environmental regulations! We musn’t upset the Repubs, sorry Earth, you’re fucked now.
Ad dreary infinitum.
I’d say gender essentialism is pretty absolutist.
Does this Chait fellow ever stop to think that, in other people’s eyes, maybe HIS positions are unacceptably uncompromising?
Take the whole “trans issue” for instance (a horrible framing, but we’ll go with it). Trans people’s “maximal” demands amount to complete liberation from an oppressive system that harms and endangers them. A ground-up restructuring of attitudes, systems of hierarchy and dominance, economic, social and cultural realities to accommodate gender diversity in all its forms. What trans rights organizations ACTUALLY campaign for is a pale shadow of that. They campaign for some very basic rights to legal recognition and protections, access to healthcare in a deeply inadequate system and some kind of acknowledgement in public life that they exist and are valid.
This is very weak tea stuff if one takes the entire spectrum of possibilities into account. It amounts to “you can keep the entire status quo intact, but can we please participate in that status quo a little bit, with the barest minimum of respect and dignity”. It’s not getting rid of gender segregation entirely. It’s not dismantling capitalism and its complex machineries of oppression, it’s not replacing a corrupt simulacrum of representative democracy with real participatory systems that share power among all. It’s not even modest wealth redistribution.
The truth is that progressives have ALREADY compromised far more than they should have, in the interest of appeasing others in society. They have ALREADY watered down their demands to the bare minimum. Have regressives done this? Have regressives thought to scale back their demands for mass deportation, total corporate domination, oligarchy and gender fascism to better appeal to decent people? No, they have not. And amid all this, someone like Chait dares to say we are the inflexible, absolutist ones unwilling to compromise?
@41
“No. it’s the leftists who are wrong.”
John Morales
It’s called a complimentary article. Now click on another column. You’ll find a pay wall. New York Magazine isn’t free.
The Vicar@25,
Of course we realise that nothing is anywhere near as important as you retaining your spotless moral purity by refusing to vote for the lesser evil.
@Walter Solomon
That’s a fair limiting principle.
As for my own work, it’s always available free of charge (I maintain my own Pervert Justice site, write for Wonkette, and also write for one other site, but using a different name b/c that site does straight reporting and doesn’t wish to be associated with opinion sites like PJ and W — the first two are free but accept donations, the 3rd is free and supported by advertising)
Accepting (and at times encouraging) donations may still feel coercive to some people, but there will never be a time when my reporting and op/ed stuff will have a paywall. (If I ever finish this damn novel, it might very well be available only for $$, but people seem to feel differently about paying for books.) Presumably that puts me on the good side of your rubric.
@rietpluim:
Hard agree.
Walz is saying the right thing. Also, note last line of this column
https://www.eschatonblog.com/2024/10/better.html
I suspect The Vicar is some sort of accelerationist. Which, to be blunt, is a stupid tactic.
timgueguen@48,
He’s certainly said things in the past that suggest that – IIRC, he thinks the USA is bound to collapse, so the sooner the better.
Crip Dyke @45
I was already a fan of your work here on PZ’s comment section. So, I’ll definitely be sure to check out your proper work. I’m cash strapped currently but I’ll donate when I’m able to.
The real problem with Chait’s position (and oh so many others, similar and otherwise) is that he mistakenly conflates the person(s) on the ballot, the stated policy preferences of the person(s) on the ballot, the meaning of “mandate” after elections decided by only a plurality of eligible voters, and perhaps most importantly the persons/stated policy preferences of those on the ballot in other, coordinate jurisdictions. It’s a multidimensional Venn diagram with minimal (and sometimes zero!) intersections.
A voter’s responsibility doesn’t end with casting the ballot. If that voter doesn’t like what happens afterward, communicating with the person(s) actually elected matters; so does listening to them; so does considering, parallel to Old Ironsides’ famous letter (to church leaders, no less), that in the bowels of Christ someone — the voter, the officeholder, other officeholders — might be mistaken. And, more to the point, officeholders might know things the voter doesn’t; this is especially obvious in anything relating to national security, but it’s applicable to lots of other areas (public health, effluent travel, fishery health and sustainability…). There are always limited resources, too — not just money, but time for consideration — so even when there isn’t opposition from other officeholders, one must prioritize.
In a representative democracy, nobody is above scrutiny — and the remedy for “smorgasboard of unacceptable policies” is to vote the bastards out next time around, hoping for a different result. The remedy for “unacceptable officeholder” is a bit more direct (but doesn’t include smashing windows in the Capitol, etc.). Which is an imperfect way to govern — but I’ve been “professionally interested in/engaged with” alternatives and they’re far, far worse in theory and in practice. (“Our bastard” is still a bastard.)
In particular, no pundit is above scrutiny. Death to undisclosed conflicts of interest!
Walter:
“Any publication that charges you for the privilege of reading their columns.”
↓
“It’s called a complimentary article.”
So they don’t charge you for the privilege of reading that column.
“Now click on another column. You’ll find a pay wall.”
Taking you at your word, I just did.
I didn’t bother to read the entirety of it, but there was no pay wall.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/christopher-rufos-big-campaign.html
Begins “Personally, I’m not particularly offended by cat-eating,” says Christopher Rufo.”
Ends “Now, he’s starting to believe he can.”
Now, another random article on the sidebar:
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/exhausted-trump-cancels-interviews-with-unfriendly-media.html
Same thing. All there. The entire column.
So.
timgueguen@48–
No reason to suspect. Vicar has stated on several occasions that he thinks the system is broken (agree) and the only way out is for a massive political disaster to force a change (disagree strongly). To me it’s like arguing that Hindenburg’s decision to make Hitler Chancellor was a good thing because it eventually led to democracy in Germany and the only downside was the rampant political murders, WW2, and the Holocaust.
Yes, the repugs always will resort to chickenshittery. Their playbook relies on spread hatred against anyone who is not part of their cult, including all transgender people. They have no sense of decency, caring, or honesty.
Another example: throughout our neighborhood (and beyond) the maga cultists have stolen all the harris/walz yard signs 4 or 5 times in the past week or so.
Ah Vicar, you are around – answered my questions in the previous thread yet? Here :
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/10/15/hes-not-even-a-good-dancer/#comment-2239552
Notably about your own accelerationist Trumpism and support for Putin’s genocide in Ukraine & if he gets away with it no doubt elsewhere too, Hypocrite.. Do Ukrainian and other probable Putin genocide victims’s lives mean less to you?
No, the parties are NOT the same if if neither is as good as we’d wish.
Trumpism is a form of outright fascism as well as a deeply weird personality.cult. The Democratic party and their policies are NOT those things.
You used to be a reasonable commenter here that made some good points & contributed some good things here not just a drive-by troll once. Sad.
Even if..
Hey, StevoR, you are around.
#30: “Do elucidate about these alleged implications, if you care to.”
You haven’t cared to.
(Good choice))
When was this? I certainly don’t recall. And I’ve read their dreck since at least 2015.
<
blockquote>… that made some good points & contributed some good things here …
<
blockquote>
What? When did this counterfactual thing happen, in your estimation?
<
blockquote>… not just a drive-by troll once
<
blockquote>
Always a drive-by troll.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_memory#Mandela_effect)
[FFS! Too lazy
When was this? I certainly don’t recall. And I’ve read their dreck since at least 2015.
What? When did this counterfactual thing happen, in your estimation?
Always a drive-by troll.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_memory#Mandela_effect)]
@ ^ John Morales : Some of the Vicar’s criticisms of the Democrats used to be if nothing else well based in evidence if memory serves -although, as you point out maybe it does not serve well. I thought the Vicar did used to comment more often and actually discuss and argue their case with multiple replies and in a more reasonable fashion even though I didn’t often agree and post some things of intrest sometimes. Perhaps I’m misrememerbing but pretty used they didn’t use to be quite that bad herealthough am thinking quite afew years ago pre-Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
Nah, StevoR. You’re not misremembering, you’re hallucinating.
He literally wrote that he wanted Trump to win, before the 2020 election; he was vaguer during the 2016 election, but railed relentlessly and ranted about Democrats; Hillary, Oh dear!
(You are fantasising)
“First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.” Martin Luther King, Jr. “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” 1963. https://letterfromjail.com/
@ John Morales : As for
Well, @ #26 actually, I wrote :
Given the OP is about Jonathan Chait recommending the sacrificng of Trans people to get political power rather than standing up for them & their rights; I would’ve thought it was obvs but to spell it out the implication is that throwing Transpeople under the bus metaphorically speaking condemns you ethically and politically and is NOT a good idea.
The standard being transpeople being attacked and persecuted and Chait being the one accepting and walking by that.
John @59: I started commenting here late 2012. My first comments were roundly (and IMO rather rudely, but that was the SOP back then with newcomers, it seems) rebuked*. The Vicar was one of the few who defended me. And his other comments did seem quite reasonable to me back then.
*All became well in short order, after I apologized, and Caine greeted me most graciously.
“Given the OP is about Jonathan Chait recommending the sacrificng of Trans people […]”
There is no such recommendation.
(Care to try to quote that alleged recommendation?)