Transgender lawmaker silenced by Montana House speaker until she apologizes

[Omaha Steve]

Source: AP

By AMY BETH HANSON today

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Montana’s House speaker on Thursday refused to allow a transgender lawmaker to speak about bills on the House floor until she apologizes for saying lawmakers would have “blood on their hands” if they supported a bill to ban gender-affirming medical care for transgender youth, the lawmaker said.

Rep. Zooey Zephyr, who was deliberately misgendered by a conservative group of lawmakers demanding her censure after Tuesday’s comments, said she will not apologize, creating a standoff between the first-term state lawmaker and Republican legislative leaders.

Speaker Matt Regier refused to acknowledge Zephyr on Thursday when she wanted to comment on a bill seeking to put a binary definition of male and female into state code.

“It is up to me to maintain decorum here on the House floor, to protect the dignity and integrity,” Regier said Thursday. “And any representative that I don’t feel can do that will not be recognized.”



Read more: https://apnews.com/article/transgender-lawmaker-silenced-montana-censure-ee3e30ee6a1cd7c0faa8fd072d580a94

[Lulu KC]

1. That is harsh

Could he be any more obviously bigoted? I wonder how this will end.

[rpannier]

3. It's Montana. The legislature meets very seldom

It will remain a stalemate, nothing will change unless something unexpected happens

[Lovie777]

2. This ridiculous.............

[2naSalit]

4. Our wayward legislature....

Meets once every two years for 90 days, the session ends in a week or two.

With a self proclaimed "freedumb caucus" super majority they will run roughshod over our rights until we get outside help to stop them.

[Wild blueberry]

5. Speaker wouldn't know "decorum" if it bit him on the ass

Rep. Zephyr accurately describes consequences of their cruel bill. Persist! We support you.

[moose65]

9. Yeah, what a joke

Republicans lecturing anyone on "decorum" is freaking hilarious.

[Marthe48]

6. The people who stand up to the fascists have more guts

and integrity in their little finger than a super majority has in all of its bullies. Excelsior!

[The Grand Illuminist]

11. It will take much more than that.

Because the right gave us no other choice.

[CincyDem]

7. What they never learn..

…is that every one of these snowflake over reactions puts a much bitter spotlight on the message (and the messenger).

Had they let her speak her 5 minutes or whatever, nobody but the people in the chamber woukf even know what she said. It wouldn’t be “news”.

So…while it’s appalling she was silenced…I hope she leverages her 15 minutes on the national stage to shove their actions back down their collective throats sideways.

[ananda]

8. I guess she made them feel "uncomfortable"..

You just can't do that to poor widdle Republicans.

[moose65]

10. I'm sure this has been discussed here before...

But it seems like these crazy Republicans don't have any issues with trans men. It's like they don't even care about them at all - but let a trans woman open her mouth and they go fucking crazy.

Why is that? The psychology behind that is fascinating to me.

[chowder66]

12. It's their new abortion. They don't care about any of these issues, they use these to get their

bases riled up to vote. Granted there a few exceptions where some of these idiots actually do hate everyone.

[NullTuples]

13. There's a social hierarchy with men at the top that must be enforced

Last edited Fri Apr 21, 2023, 10:04 PM - Edit history (1)

Maintaining & enforcing social hierarchies is much, much easier if they are assumed to be "pure", like the assumption of a pure, biological and social binary of (hetero, cis) men and women only. Anyone who blurs those lines is seen as a threat to power. The same structure was/is assumed & used for race; someone is either White, or...a "person of color" (ie everyone not-white).

But also,

A trans man going from a lower level of social privilege to a higher level of social privilege is acceptable; it confirms that men "belong" at the top and that it's something to strive for.

Going from greater social privilege to less is not acceptable as it calls the social structure itself into question. And because in their minds no man would rationally decide to go through the cost, effort and scorn of moving from greater social privilege to less...well, that also calls into question whether it's really a choice at all. And for all these years they've been insisting being LGBTQ is a choice. So they run into more cognitive dissonance.

[moose65]

14. That's fascinating

I knew it had to do with some misogynistic concept of men being inherently "better" than women.

To them, a woman who wants to be a man would be a noble thing, I guess. The other way around is unimaginable to them.

I have seen many online comments that make me shake my head. These people literally believe that there are men somewhere who just wake up one morning and say, "Gee, I think I'll be a woman today." They can't wrap their head around the concept that someone assigned male at birth would have to gall to reject that.

They say this all the time about trans women athletes. They think that some male athlete decided to "own them" by claiming to be female in order to win the game/medal/prize. If that were true, as I point out, wouldn't trans women be dominating in every sport?

Also, I laugh at that because the macho cisgender male athletes that I've known in my life would NEVER entertain the idea of becoming a woman just to win at sports. That would be unthinkable to them!

[vercetti2021]

16. Excuse me?

He? You know she is a she right? She should not at all fucking apologize! She did absolutely nothing wrong. She spoke the fucking truth. Kids will die by suicide due to their dysphoria and no treatment to help prevent it.

[Celerity]

17. Just wow. Was the intentional mis-gendering added on for extra spiciness?

Shameful.

[vercetti2021]

18. Totally was

No way that was by accident