"Florida Republicans Take Aim at Gender-Affirming Care, Drag Shows... [The bill] would treat parents as abusers for allowing medical care to children, and cracks down on parenting harder even than Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s notorious anti-trans child executive order." [1]
"Florida lawmakers approve death penalty in child rapes, sending bill to governor... The Florida Senate on Tuesday passed a bill that would allow the death penalty for people who commit sexual batteries on children under age 12, sending the issue to Gov. Ron DeSantis." [2]
"Florida to allow death penalty with 8-4 jury vote instead of unanimously... If the Republican governor signs the bill into law, Florida prosecutors trying capital felony cases would need to convince only two-thirds of the 12-member jury that someone who is convicted deserves the death penalty, rather than a unanimous decision by a jury." [3]
This is just like the Dobbs decision. When that landed, you had assured us it was a great thing because it meant the states could finally decide once and for all their local norms based on local politics. Well here we are now and there's a nationwide ban on abortion medicine because of an ideologue federal judge with a religious bent, writing laws from the bench, who decided he didn't like it, so we all have to abide by that. People who live in communities that support these medications will be affected, and we were assured by conservatives on the court (and their supporters) that this situation would not come to pass. Yet here we are.
So really, I can't stand any more predications about what restraint the right will use with the passing. Any loophole in there will be used as such. Omissions and vague language isn't an oversight in lawmaking, it's a tool which allows leeway to apply the law in whatever way law enforcement (Ron DeSantis) prefers.
We cannot give Florida the benefit of the doubt that they aren't currently laying the edifices for genocide because a man like Ron DeSantis would never aspire to exact that kind of revenge on his enemies. Please. The man oozes petty authoritarianism. He is a walking narcissistic injury, and he's willing to use his office to exact personal revenge against political opponents. He's not fooling anyone, and any calls to "please let's all give everyone the benefit of the doubt" doesn't pass the laugh test when he's lowering the threshold for the death penalty.
[1] https://www.advocate.com/politics/florida-republicans-transg...
[2] https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-ne-nsf-death-p...
[3] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/florida-allow-death-penalty...
Yeah sure, let's put child rapists to death, who could disagree with that? Until all of a sudden what you do in your private or with your friends or with your family is considered "child abuse". Until your lifestyle is considered "child abuse". Until your existence is considered "child abuse". The way fascists work your religion will be considered "child abuse" eventually. You've heard of the 9 most terrifying words, well the 4 most terrifying words in English are "think of the children!" There's no limit to the atrocities people will commit in the name of God and in the name of protecting children.
Do you ever wonder how a society can go from civil to erecting industrial scale human-death factories. It's little steps like these, and people rationalizing them along the way. We can make our children safe from rape and abuse without putting anyone to death. 0 people have to be put to death to keep children safe. And yet, here we are, the state is making it easier to put human beings to death as a matter of law. There should be no higher red flag raised than that.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_grooming_conspiracy_theor...
Surely you've noticed?
> drag shows for children.
God forbid someone in a dress read a storybook. Try not to engage in this ridiculous moral panic.
What's happening is that those parents are making a fuss about what other parents are deciding to do.
Telling other kids and parents what to do is a consistent position. Like forced identity disclosures in schools. It isn't enough that they would like to get notified, but every kid who asks to be called something different has to be disclosed, or if they don't want their kid playing sports with a trans kid, they would rather kick out the trans kid out than make choices about their own participation.
This is nonsense and you aren't seriously engaging in any conversation by typing crap like this
There are no state-mandated drag shows. Liberals do not have the power to compel you to attend drag shows or to take your children there. Full stop. Get a grip.
Sorry, but what's the problem with sexual identity being a form of self expression? Really struggling with this...
Look, we are not going to agree on that. What we can agree on, however, is that God (or the pre-natal endocrine environment, if you prefer) makes certain people different, and that those people should be able to participate in social institutions like marriage consistent with their biology. That premise is the lynchpin for 71% of the American populace supporting same-sex marriage.
On the other hand, if you want to force a debate on whether sexuality should be private or public, or whether individuals have social roles and be subject to social norms dictated by their biology, that is an entirely different fight, and it's one you don't want to have.
I mean, no, we can't agree on that restrictive phrasing.
Even to the extent we might agree that biological differences might sometimes be socially relevant, there is no special biological privilege to pre-natal effects.
(But mostly this seems to be appealing to the flawed “born different” premise for legal rights.)
What I hear you saying, however, is that DeSantis is correct. Liberals really are using “accept people how God made them” as a pretext to teach kids “you can choose to be who you want to be.” If that is the case, we really do have an ideological war on our hands against the malign forces of secular humanism coming for our kids.
Agree on what? I didn't ask you to agree. I asked you to express what the problem with sexual identity being a form of self expression? I literally do not understand what your problem with this is, and knowing what the words mean, how it was not already inherently the case.
> What we can agree on, however, is that God (or the pre-natal endocrine environment, if you prefer) makes certain people different, and that those people should be able to participate in social institutions like marriage consistent with their biology.
Lol okay?
>On the other hand, if you want to force a debate on whether sexuality should be private or public, or whether individuals have social roles and be subject to social norms dictated by their biology, that is an entirely different fight, and it's one you don't want to have.
I don't want to force a debate on anything? I'm not sure why you seem to be incapable of having a conversation with me as opposed to some sort of globally disagreeable boogeyman you've invented on my behalf... I litereally asked you a simple question and rather than answer it, you came back telling me that I'm trying to force something? You put like 10 carts before your horse there...
"Consistent with their biology" is not a precondition that you could find broad agreement on - I don't think you could even find a broad agreement on what it means.
You can start by pulling back from the obvious rhetorical flourishes. We can acknowledge that social liberals aren’t literally child molesters. At the same time, can you acknowledge that parents in Florida don’t want to put anyone to death, but simply don’t trust what liberal teachers will tell their kids about sexuality?
Like is it possible for you to acknowledge that folks in Florida don’t want to kill sexual minorities, but are also wary of a resurgent sexual revolution that could change the behaviors of kids who aren’t born gay or trans? Like can you seriously deny that there is an emerging trend of sexual identity becoming a form of self expression? https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/19/health/pronouns-guide-for-par...