I've seen a depressing trend of Democratic politicians embracing anti trans talking points and compromising gender affirming care for young people. This is extremely concerning as states and the federal government are undermining access to care now more than ever. Democrats standing by trans people has far more dire consequences now than ever, yet we're being treated as politically disposable by people who used to campaign on lgbtq issues like Gavin Newsom and Pete Buttigieg.
I can't say I'm surprised. Liberal papers like the New York Times has been uncritically promoting unscientific transphobia for years that claims alternatives exist to gender affirming care. My guess is that people see a person transitioning as an unfortunate thing, desperately wishing there was another way. They ignore the fact that gender affirming care is both the best treatment for dysphoria, and one of the most successful treatments for any mental condition ever discovered.
To put it simply, making gender affirming care harder to obtain for kids will kill many of them. Kids being kept from care by their parents already drives people to suicide, and a slimy politician preventing supportive parents from helping their kids will do the same. Every time I see people claim these guys are our best shot at beating fascism, I die inside. I have no doubt that they'll eventually axe care for all adults like everyone who was originally "worried about fairness in sports" is currently pushing for. The only way they won't is if we make it a costly issue for them.
As an AAPI kid, I am more than used to liberals and leftists abandoning and shitting on us at the drop of a hat. In a just world? That wouldn't fucking happen. In the world we live in? I'll settle for not being actively attacked. Let us fight the slow burn fight just don't actively harm. Just so long as it wins elections and does overall harm mitigation.
But that isn't the case. Democrats increasingly try to be "republican lite" and it just doesn't fucking work. Because the DNC seems to believe the bullshit that the republicans are full of "bush era republicans" and "mavericks" who all hate what the party has become and are just looking for an opportunity to do the right thing. And they completely ignore that all those "mavericks" still vote lockstep with the magats (barring one or two personal issues) because they actually also want the hate and suffering but don't like that it isn't them who are leading the charge.
But when one candidate is running on the gas chamber for all trans people and the other candidate just wants to rough them up a bit? The hateful shitheads aren't going to settle for less. But to everyone else? "Both sides suck".
There are more important reasons we need to oppose the "lesser evil." I simply have no faith that they can defeat the fascists in their current state, which means we need to at least shape them up before the next chance they have to take power. Unless they become more competent and politically capable, they might not be able to capitalize on Trump's inevitable death, nor will they be able to maintain power for long if they make the same mistakes as Biden.
The only way they will not be weak and useless is if there is a capable left wing they need to contend with. It's why they oppose Mamdani more strongly than Trump; they would no longer have a solid monopoly on progressives, and would need to share capitulate to maintain an alliance.
I can understand the cold hard logic of opposing highly progressive candidates (in favor of people like Biden and Kamala who were progressive but are also very much in the DNC's preferred overton window). The US is a fundamentally conservative country. Going too Left as a party opens the Democrats up to "bunch of fucking socialists" rhetoric and can potentially lose a LOT of purple states.
I personally don't agree that attacking Mamdani et al is the right answer and I very much point at people like AOC who started as a firebrand and will still fight "when it matters" but has also learned that she needs additional support in Congress to do anything.
But yeah. The Democrats as they stand? trump could broadcast himself raping a toddler from the oval office and the best we can hope for is a bunch of old white guys awkwardly nodding their head to the Hamilton soundtrack while shouting down anyone who dares to try to capitalize on things.
At the end of the day: Politics is compromise. And, at the national level, a lot of those compromises are inherently increasing the suffering of others. While I will never say that throwing someone under the bus is "worth it", it is hard not to awkwardly talk around it when it leads to a win and an overall net good. But we don't have that. We consistently see the Democrats pivot to the right while not actually getting anything for it other than demoralizing the base more and more every day.
One needs a stronger position to make a more favorable compromise, which will also do more to invigorate the right and left of the Democrats. If the right wing Dems feel they can rest on they're laurels, they neglect the base and are weaker against the GOP. If the left of the party is highly motivated by winning seats and gaining power, the right will need to work harder to maintain control of the party. It'd really be emblematic if the monopolistic tendencies of capitalists in a system that only innovates when they don't have what they want.