Major trans rights, minor trans rights, and political expediency

Jonathan Chait argues that Democrats must distinguish "major" from "minor" trans-rights questions and take a stand on the major questions while leaving minor (and, coincidentally, unpopular) issues alone. According to Chait (for whom this is bound up with sensitivity to accusations of being anti-trans):

The major questions about trans rights are: Do some people have the chance to live a happier and more fulfilling life in a different gender identity than the one to which they were born? Do some of these people need access to medical services to facilitate their transition? Do they deserve to be treated with respect and addressed by their chosen names and pronouns? Do they deserve equal protections from discrimination in employment, housing, and military service? Must society afford them access to public accommodations so as not to assault their dignity?

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Democrats mainly ran into trouble because they either supported or refused to condemn a few highly unpopular positions: allowing athletes who transitioned from male to female to participate in high-level female sports, where they often enjoy clear physical advantages; allowing adolescent and preadolescent children to medically transition without adequate diagnosis; and providing state-funded sex-change surgery for prisoners and detainees.

Some thoughts about why it is not as simple as he makes it sound:

• Republicans and MAGA do not draw these distinctions. They use the unpopularity and demagoguery of the "minor" issues to attack the major issues. And since most people do not draw Chait's distinctions, no one will notice when the policymakers sweep away the major issues in a broad attack on trans rights which they justify by the minor issues. Stated differently, the minor issues represent the camel's nose to get the major issues. Democratic surrender on the minor issues will empower, not assuage. Chait insists the evidence shows that efforts to target major issues would be unpopular. Recent state legislative efforts (likely to be copied in the Trump Administration) suggest he is wrong.

• The minor issues are straw people, grounded in false narratives, or at least debatable.

    • I discussed sports. But Chait sweeps away issues, such as defining "high-level." Professional and Olympic, obviously. What about college--is there a difference between Division I and Division III? Or between Power 5 women's basketball and Mountain West volleyball? What about high school, where a cis-girl's loss to a trans-girl in a track meet deprived the former of opportunity to run in college?

    • Doctors do not commonly prescribe or provide medical transitions without adequate diagnoses (as they do not commonly perform any procedure without adequate diagnosis); restricting this would be redundant and performative. And using the rare ambiguous story as a cudgel to suggest a broader problem demanding action (as Chait and others did) is intellectually dishonest.

    • Prisoners have an 8th Amendment right (and detainees a 5th Amendment right) to constitutionally adequate care; in a humane penal system (yes, I know), the state should surpass the constitutional floor. Beyond general opposition to trans rights, no one has offered a good reason for denying that form of medical care while providing (as constitutionally required) other medical care. Especially because the number of prisoners/detainees who would seek (and thus the public cost of) this care would be so small--contrary to MAGA demagoguery and compared with what states spend on common treatments for a larger number of prisoners.

In other words, Chait's minor issues are not so different than his major issues, other than some sense of popularity and his personal preferences.

• Chait ignores several issues (or is not explicit about them) that sit on the leading edge of the anti-trans movements. He never mentions bathrooms. And he never mentions government documents (which might fall under names and pronouns, but it is not clear).