Because they are such a tiny AND unprotected minority, they are fairly easy targets for othering / discrimination.

[ I am not condoning, just informing ]

Dave wants to wear a dress to school. Donald doesn’t like it because he thinks only girls should wear dresses. Dave says he’s a girl, too. Dave says she wants to be called Samantha. Other girls are perfectly happy with Samantha wearing a dress and playing with them, until Samantha chooses a doll which Marjorie wanted to play with. Angry that she can’t play with her doll, Marjorie tells Donald Samantha is bad. Donald says; “See? I told you it was bad!” Meanwhile Kevin stole the doll Jocelyn was playing with and started kicking it around the schoolyard, breaking it as he does. Donald says “Dave caused that!” And half the other boys agree with him. Now Samantha gets sent home from school by the teacher for fighting with Donald, while Samantha had done nothing but wear a dress and play with dolls. Neither Dave in boy clothes, nor Samantha in girl clothes show up at school the next day. Donald keeps shouting that kids like Dave are the problem. Marjorie agrees with him. Kevin destroys another doll, but they’re fine with that because he’s not wearing a dress.

The problem with trying to explain it is that bigotted hatred isn’t logical. Try to get any actual bigot to explain it and you’ll get many (often contradictory) reasons.

The reality is both more boring and more sinister than what you probably expect if you’re looking for sensible reasons.

People who hate are easier to control. The powers that be choose a minority that can be bullied without consequences, create bullshit reasons for it, and encourage people to be afraid of and hateful to that minority. Those fearful and hateful people raised kids to be fearful and hateful. Those kids grew up to make their own fearful and hateful offspring. Some of these kids grew up to join the ranks of the powers that be, and brought their fear and hate to the decision making process. Combine this with the systematic destruction of public education, and you have current events in the us.

Hate is learned.

Rich people want you to focus on people who can’t defend themselves well, so you’re looking away while the rich people are stealing money from you.

Homophobes lost the culture war around gay folks so now they’ve moved on to the next group they can abuse.

Fascism cannot function without scapegoats, and trans people are the smallest minority group. Once they normalize persecuting the smallest group, they move up to the next group which is slightly larger than the previous. It’s the Nazi playbook.

It looks like autistic people are next, based on RFK’s bullshit.

Personally I have an acquaintance that talks about how terrible trans people are all day. As far as I can tell he has no real personal reason to hate, but he subscribes to the republican agenda. The Republicans demonized Trans people so now he does too.

I really think it’s that simple for these empty heads. They hear people on TV and such talk about the “terrible Trans people” who will “invade restrooms and grape your daughter” so that’s their belief now.

It happens on both sides too. Far too many people just whole ass believe and subscribe to these talking points purely because it advances their parties agenda. Of course the parties have to sugarcoat it or straight up lie about these groups to push the belief. The evidence is right in front of us.

For example, this exact post. Talking about Trans hate like its everywhere all the time in our face. It’s just not like that. Sure a lot of people hold these beliefs, fewer wholeheartedly believe all of it, even fewer will try to do something like write politicians about it, and even fewer will go to the streets and propagate their hate. But the old saying is true “if it bleeds it leads”. Stories about hate and death are front page and shoved into our faces because it sells. Were all more aware of these problems because talking heads never shut up about it. The rise on social media and internet has made this problem exponentially worse.

Used to be if there was a shooting on the other side of the country I wouldn’t hear about it. But now there can be a shooting in Australia, a LGBT hate parade in Europe, and civilian deaths in gaza, the news cycle will make sure I know about all of it.

Not saying it’s a bad thing to know about stuff in other parts of the world, but we need to be careful lest we forget that the entire world isn’t like this. It’s overrepresented in media but it doesn’t have to be our lives.

Also closeted Trans or something idk, I live with this same fear and these are the things I try to remind myself whenever it’s just too much. Hope this helps.

Envy.

Rowling is upset that she’s had to endure a lifetime of misogyny, and envious of men. When she sees trans women, she assumes they have it better than her because they got to be male, and gets mad at them for not enjoying having what she wants.

Steven Crowder isn’t trans, but he does have a crossdressing fetish, and he’s mad trans women get to do his fetish all day long. He wants that, but he can’t have it because he’d eventually feel dysphoric.

Andrew Tate is furious that nobody thinks he’s pretty. He has to traffick women in order to get them to have sex with him. He wishes he had the attention that women get, and he’s mad that trans women are “males” who get to be pretty. He doesn’t want to be a woman, but he wants someone to find him attractive.

Donald Trump just wants to be the center of attention. He doesn’t hate trans people, but he knows attacking them gets him attention. He wants to be in the news.

Alright, literal 5 year old, I’ll give it a shot. Fair warning, most kids get these lessons in pieces over time, because attention spans. I don’t know what your metaphorical 5 year old has learned so far though, so, sorry for the wall of text, but I think we have to start from the beginning:

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Well, kid, you know how your parents always tell you that it’s what’s on the inside that counts? And that you can be whatever you want to be when you grow up? And that it’s fun to do things different sometimes?

And you know how some children are boys, and some children are girls?

Well, in very special cases, when a baby is born… sometimes we only think they’re a boy. They might even look like a boy.

But later, when that baby grows up, and learns how to talk, and tells us how they feel… it turns out that “boy” was really a girl on the inside all along!

And sometimes we think they’re a girl, but they were really a boy on the inside all along!

And sometimes they don’t really feel like a boy or a girl on the inside! Just remember that it’s what’s on the inside that counts. Whatever they look like on the outside, it’s what they feel like that matters most.

Sometimes, when we call someone a boy, but they don’t feel like a boy, that can upset them. If you know it makes them upset, then it’s not nice to do that. It’s not nice to call them names they don’t like, even if you think you’re right.

Well, there aren’t a lot of children like that. They’re very rare. Most boys feel like boys on the inside, and most girls feel like girls, and they grow up to be what we always thought they were. That’s great for them!

But because they’re so rare, most people have never met a special kid like that. Most people have never seen a child grow up to surprise everybody like that. And sometimes… sometimes adults don’t like surprises.

You know how sometimes you’re afraid of the dark? And sometimes you think there’s a monster hiding in the closet? But you come find us, and we turn on the lights, and we check your closet together, and we show you there’s nothing to be afraid of?

Well, adults can be scared too. They can be scared by what they don’t understand. Sometimes, when they get surprised and confused, they see monsters where there aren’t any, and that upsets them. And they get upset at those children, even though the child did nothing wrong.

That doesn’t always make them bad people! Sometimes they never learn, but sometimes it just takes time for that poor kid to turn on the lights and help them see there’s nothing to be scared of.

But sometimes, there are mean people who play tricks on those adults. They make scary noises and trick those adults into really believing in the monsters. They make those adults think that it’s what’s on the outside that counts, and that those special kids are like the monsters in the dark. But that’s not nice.

It’s not nice to scare people… but not everyone is nice all the time. Sometimes people are mean. Sometimes people like to lie, and cheat, and steal, and that’s not nice. We don’t do those things, because we don’t like it when people do those things to us.

You know the boy who cried wolf?

Sometimes, those mean people make those scary noises and pretend the monsters are real, and they cry wolf, even when there are no wolves… and it works. Those confused, scared adults come running, because they don’t know any better.

The story hasn’t ended yet, and they don’t know that there is no wolf, and so they keep running to chase it away, because they don’t know it’s all a trick by those mean people.

They can’t see what’s on the inside, and so they think those boys and girls are the ones being tricked, and they get angry and scared and they do all the wrong things because they think they’re the ones who are right.

It’s messy, and confusing, because sometimes things are messy and confusing.

But what you need to know, more than anything, is that it’s what’s on the inside that counts. There is no wolf to be afraid of when people are different or surprising. We can’t see what’s on the inside, so the best we can do is listen when someone tries to tell us how they feel, and do our best to be kind, and make them feel happy.

A lot of people don’t personally know any trans people. A lot of right wing media says that trans people are bad and that they want to make a lot of changes to society that might effect you too. So it’s easy to hate people when you don’t actually know them, and your “news” is telling you that they are bad.

I think that att the core its the “ew!” factor combined with “i would love this but I’m too closeted and if I cannot have fun, nobody can” which is then used and abused by savvy politicians who need a scape goat for people to trample to death while they secretly steal the people blind.

I could be mistaken , though

There is no valid reason to dislike trans people. There is no valid reason to care if someone is trans. There is no valid reason to treat trans people differently.

You can substitute any color, religion, and culture for the word trans too.

People need something to hate, decided to pick trans since they probably did zero research, decided “BoYs iN GiRls LocKeR RooM BaYuD!” And let the hate roll. Anything to make a bigot feel better about themselves, and misery is good company for a group of shitty people.

What they should focus on is all the hatred and rape and child molestation within the church

The Patriarchy is weakened when gender is not absolute.

When the Patriarch is threatened hatred is the response