There have been few more toxic failures of politics in recent years than the bitter, emotive and often bad faith exchanges that have come to characterise public discussion of trans rights.
Lives have been consumed, careers and reputations trashed, and good people exhausted by experiencing politics at its worst – which is to say politics used less as a democratic means for resolving difficult conflicts, and more as a weapon. Terrified of saying the wrong thing, well-intentioned public figures have fallen silent. Progressives in particular have all too often come across as nervous and confused, thrown by the concept of an equal rights issue in which both sides can justifiably claim to be vulnerable and fearful of violence.
