Who Is The Real Enemy?

Natalie Gwynn
Professor Simonson
Women’s Studies
16 November 2017


The election of Donald Trump as the president of the United States was one of the most controversial events that our nation has seen in some time. There were questions of his qualifications for the job, and of his moral intentions with the fate of the country. His lack of maturity, impulsiveness worried many, and rightly so. On Wednesday, July 26th, Donald Trump released a series of tweets to the world in which he announced a ban on the participation of transgender people serving in the military. To quote exactly, Trump tweeted "After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you." In my own opinion, this was no logical decision at all. This was a discriminatory decision in which Trump demonstrated yet again that as our president, he does not stand for all. He fights for some, and for others he is an enemy.
When it comes to Trump’s strategy in getting himself elected, one word comes to mind: Dog whistle politics. His entire campaign based off of saying things in valid ways that made people hear what they wanted to, while allowing himself to deny accountability when asked specifically about it. A perfect example of this untrustworthiness was his brief support of LGBTQ rights. Trump claimed to be a champion of the LGBTQ community; however, his actions in office, such as this one, have proven that he is no ally at all. Teenvogue referred to this direct attack on transgender people as another part of Trump’s “ongoing agenda to curb LGBTQ rights.” It is difficult for a moral person to understand why he would want to deny some of the bravest Americans the right to serve and protect our country, but when you think about this from Trump’s point of view, things become much simpler. It becomes a situation of Us vs. Them, rather than what it should be, a question of what is beneficial for the country as a whole. Trump values people like himself: male, white, privileged, and powerful. These are the “us” that he stands for, and the “Them” are the others- Those who do not fall into his preferred categories, such as transgender people. He works to bring people similar to him closer together and to give them more power. Not only does he refuse to protect those who are different, but he targets them. One would think that the President of the United States would stand for all Americans, and fight for each to have equal opportunity in every aspect of life, but not Trump. Just as he did by implementing this ban on transgender people, he seeks to alienate the others and damage those who he marginalized with policies such as this. The corruption is undeniable. Do these people really deserve to be called a “burden” and restricted from protecting our country simply because of a decision they have made with their bodies? The question is simple, and the answer is no.
As society has evolved, people have come to realize that biology is not only a concern of reproduction and who has what, and it means a lot more than your ability to have a child or not. Biology has become political. Your gender can be an enormous factor in how much power you are capable of holding, respect that you can earn, opportunity that will present itself to you, and even in permitting what you can and cannot do. To this same extent, it can be said that biology has become a part of our societal hierarchy. Gender differences are shaped to secure our social system and polity. So what does this mean for those who do not confine to our societal acceptances when it comes to gender? This is where the trouble comes. Some are open-minded and accepting of others choices in situations such as gender transformation, however, others are not. And the other, the one who is in charge, is not. It is evident that Trump believes that people who do not fit in with the accepted gender expectations are a problem to society. He shows it with how he oppresses them and pushes a shame in their direction. I think that his decision to restrict transgender people from joining the military is just another example of this. Trump made the claim, stated in the NPR article, that they are disruptive and expensive additions that erode military readiness and unit cohesion, yet he has no evidence or statistics to prove any of these things. Contrarily, studies on the transgender people already serving have actually found the complete opposite- no detrimental effects and an extremely small raise in expenses that is nearly nonexistent when compared to the price of the military as a whole. The claims of questionable psychological ability are nothing short of ridiculous and dismissable. So what were the real reasons for this ban? Targeting and discrimination. Transgender people do not fit the biological expectations of the society that Trump wants, so what better to do then take away their rights? What better way to punish them for their differences by becoming their enemy?
When considering the polity and hierarchical associations of biology, one must also take that a step further and consider the socialization of sex itself. We, as a society, have established and accepted a two-sex system. Individuals are expected to be able to check the box of one of the other, and anyone who cannot is deemed an outsider. Those who are trans and those who are not anything at all cannot fit into the boxes that have created. They are different from what we believe to is the normal and right way to be, and so in turn, their likability is diminished. But why is likability such a precursor to human rights in the first place? It is possible to argue that we model after our president, who chooses who he fights for the rights of based on his own likability. But just as being different should not bring about greater oppression, being different also should not decrease how liked they are by others, or the goodness of their treatment. It simply is not fair for Trump to antagonize people and take away their rights because he does not personally agree with their decision. I think that this “agree” notion is something to fixate on. People who are transgender are those who do not agree with the nature of the original gender they were given. But the question then forms, why is it so wrong to disagree? We all have things that we do not agree with, and even that our country chooses not to agree with, which is provable by the fact that there are wars for these transgender people to fight in anyways! They have made a change to the biology of their bodies, or the pronouns they prefer, but that does not mean that they should be discriminated against for these changes. Choosing members of the military off of anything other than quality and capability to fight honorably is social policy, and, as stated in the NYTimes article,  it is decision making based on gender identity. Bigotry should not be the underlying factor.
Events of Trump’s presidency and actions taken such as this one are what bring about concern and worry in a large fraction of our nation’s population. The proof that comes in saying that Trump is not equally fighting for the well-being of all diversities within the citizenry is undeniable, just the same as the criticisms of his ban on transgender participation in the military. It is instances like this that suggest that from Donald Trump’s presidency, we are retreating in the march towards equality.





Those who serve in silence.


Work Cited
Julie Hirschfeld Davis And Helene Cooper. “Trump Says Transgender People Will Not Be Allowed in    the Military.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 26 July 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/07/26/us/politics/trump-transgender-military.html.
Wamsley, Laurel. “Trump Says Transgender People Can't Serve In Military.” NPR, NPR, 26 Jul
Herman, Lily. “Donald Trump Signs Order Banning New Transgender Military Members.” Teen Vogue, TeenVogue.com, 26 Aug. 2017, www.teenvogue.com/story/donald-trump-transgender-military-ban.

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