Culture

The Internet Has Mixed Feelings About the Newly-Lifted Transgender Military Ban


 

On Monday, less than one full week after being sworn into office, President Biden signed an executive order reversing the ban on transgender military service members put in place by Donald Trump in 2017. While the transgender community has largely met this news with joy, for many trans folks, the reaction has been mixed. Many trans rights advocates and service members are thrilled to regain the right to serve, but others are taking this moment to send a long side-eyed glance at the function of the military itself.

Yesterday, ACLU staff attorney Chase Strangio posted a picture of his client, Navy servicemember Brock Stone, to Instagram, writing that “so many service members fought so hard for this day and held so much. Thank you.” He also noted that it’s time to for the community to focus on the many other attacks on transgender civil liberties currently being mounted in states like Montana, South Dakota, and Oregon.

In his caption, Strangio discussed his ambivalence in celebrating the military and his skepticism regarding military inclusion work. “The reality is,” he wrote, “that the US military is the largest employer in the country and people have devoted their lives to this work and any ban risks their entire livelihood and hard-fought benefits.” He continued to explain that while he has mixed feelings about the overall role of the military in U.S. culture, trans inclusion must be seen as a win.

After reading Strangio’s statement, commenter @pyaartothepeople posted: “This is tough for me. Shouldn’t we be pushing for military abolition? Soldiers become monsters and terrorists abroad.”

They weren’t the only one to bring up the dangers of celebrating the U.S. military. On Twitter, a chorus of voices rang out reminding trans advocates that inclusion into the military isn’t the end goal: dismantling the military-industrial complex is. As part of a long thread, user @muxerisa wrote yesterday: “We have so much work to do to imagine and create a world that does not relate and confuse our right to exist as trans ppl with the state exploiting our bodies for war and destruction.” Trans poet, educator, and activist J Mase III took to Instagram to remind people that “imperialists including trans people in Imperialism is not Trans Liberation.”

After four years of having trans rights systematically stripped away by an administration that tried its best to erase the word “transgender” from the record, some folks are ready to see the lifted ban as a major win. However, as Gender Reveal podcast host Tuck Woodstock explained in a thread quoting former Oregon House of Representatives candidate Paige Kreisman, a former military service member, joining up can often be a last resort for trans people looking to find community and get out of a bad family environment.

“I was forced in the military by cisheteropatriarchy and poverty,” Woodstock quotes Kreisman as saying in their 2020 interview, “but then I became part of a whole other power structure of imperialism and then I just went on to victimize other people, on the other side of the world, and that just perpetuates these power structures.”

In short, military service may not be the liberating escape many trans folks think it is. Some users are also using the ban removal to point out that many trans folks across the country still can’t get access to basic health care or even be incarcerated with members of their same gender.

User @fembojj went so far as to call out the hypocrisy of neoliberals who want trans folks to perform their gratitude regarding the lifting of the ban.

The resounding cry from the internet can be summed up in one sentence: too little, too late. And also, too imperialist.

Perhaps user @JazzCochina put it best, writing: “As a trans person, I would like to ban the military.”

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