I want to talk a little bit about the method which Anti Trans activists are currently trying to tear down trans rights, because their plan is actually really bloody simple.

Step 1) Create categories of acceptable and unacceptable trans people, based on how invisible they can be.

You've likely already seen propoganda art pushing for step one. Think of any cartoon you've seen in which someone with a beard, usually drawn as a masculine looking ugly creepy fat sex predator, is in the women's bathroom acting pervy towards women, usually young girls.

Obviously, step one draws a lot on the bathroom predator myth that was prevalent in the 80's with gay and lesbian people, the idea is letting trans people into bathrooms will let predators in.

Additionally, it starts to draw a distinction that trans people lucky enough by transition timing, money, or genetics to be undetectably trans are okay, and that those who do not pass, for desire or ability, are okay to restrict rights to.

It's a lot of "We don't object to trans people, we just don't want this person with a beard in the women's bathroom". It stigmatises the visible trans population as the problem, as not being "proper" trans people.

Step 2) You create a fictional scenario, in which supporting the rights of visibly trans people allows an outside danger to arise.

You see this with bathroom laws. "Oh, if trans women with beards are allowed in the women's room, what stops a man coming in to rape women?"

You see step two a lot when talking about Self ID laws for trans folks. Self ID laws simply mean that as a trans person can change their legal gender on paperwork, once, under a signed agreement they do not plan to change back, that they believe the change will be lifelong.

What Self ID doesn't allow is a man to decide "today, I'll say I am a woman to change with the women, then the day after say I am male again so I can go back to work and not get laughed at by the lads in the office", repeating a back and forth cycle at will.

Obviously, we can also look at countries which have self ID, and the fact that none of those countries saw a rise in crimes of that nature as a result.

Sexual assault is still illegal. If someone has the confidence to enter a gendered space to commit that crime, do you really think the gender on the door was stopping them?

The idea that letting visibly trans people into gendered spaces causes assaults is untrue.

Step 3) Once you've made a clear divide between visible and invisible trans people, step three is to make it so that as many future trans people as possible are visible, and lessen how many can choose to go unnoticed.

How do you do step 3? Well, it's already underway. You restrict trans teens access to hormone blockers. You make it so that every trans person is forced to go through the wrong puberty, no matter how young they come out, and try to undo those changes later.

Currently, if a 12 year old comes out as a trans woman, they can take blockers for six years, start hormones as a legal adult, and be fine.

With access to under 18 blockers removed, that teen may start growing a beard, an adam's apple, broader shoulders, genital development.

By pushing for this, anti trans activists essentially ensure a generation of trans people will have aspects of their body that hormone replacement therapy cannot reverse. A trans woman who starts growing facial hair at 14 may forever be fighting unwanted 5pm shadow.

This all leads back to the previous two steps. Once you start to make it harder for the majority of trans people to pass, you can lump them too in the "bad kind of trans person" box, and deny them rights because allowing them rights might allow predators to sneak in etc.

It's three simple steps being used to chip away at our rights. Draw a line between visible and invisible trans people, blame the visible trans people for imagined risks to the public, then ensure that a higher percentage of people fall into the visible camp going forward.