“I quell chaos and make you safe by dominating outsiders” is the core argument of power, going back to the earliest records we have of the lies of the powerful.

Engravings of pharaoh, club in hand, twice as large and looming over enslaved foreigners could still work as PR today if you give pharaoh trump’s hair and make the defeated others trans.

It can be both. The bottom pane is more important, but I think a lot of right wingers have some real animosity in their hearts.

Going after the most vulnerable groups of people, the easiest to attack, and working their way to less vulnerable groups until they’re attacking them all

Patriarchy.

Persecuting trans folks keeps men and women in their “appropriate” boxes. And — crucially — keeps them seeing each other as opponents.

The vast majority of men are worse off under patriarchy than they would be if we had real gender equity.

But as long as those in power are constantly threatening your masculine privileges in case you question the regime, most men will fall in line — and most women will understandably be skeptical of men who claim to advocate for men’s liberation.

crucially, underlying all this is the fact that trans people actually do represent a threat to the status quo of patriarchy and the traditional gender regime.