Conservatives conjure up a 21st-century Satanic panic. Will it work?
SalonRepublicans thought they had a live one in Loudoun County, Virginia. Instead, the case is reminiscent of the "Satanic panic" that swept the country in the 80s and 90s, which was driven by similar reactionary fears and wildly misguided ideas about the realities of sexual violence. RELATED: The QAnon playbook: Republicans make school board meetings the new battleground In an essay that recently went viral, Marshall's podcast cohost, Michael Hobbes, identified one of the telltale signs that what you're dealing with is a moral panic and not a real problem: Irrelevant examples, which often turn out to be cases where "these anecdotes actually demonstrated the opposite of the panic's core thesis." The majority of feminists support trans rights, but a small and outspoken minority — the most famous being J.K. Rowling of "Harry Potter" fame — have sided with the reactionary right in seeing trans people as a threat to cis women. As happened when feminists gave credence to the Satanic panic in the 80s, these anti-trans feminists give moral cover to reactionaries bashing trans rights.
Discover Related