Rep. Debbie Lesko proposes anti-transgender 'women's bill of rights'

Arizona Rep. Debbie Lesko does not sing solo.

She’s a congressional backup vocalist.

She was, for example, part of the Greek chorus of Republican lawmakers who spread lies about the 2020 election and tried to disenfranchise voters here and the rest of the country by having the results overturned.

But she was never the lead singer.

Most of the time Lesko remains an indistinguishable voice somewhere in the back row of the GOP’s choleric chorale. And for good reason.

In those few instances when Lesko gets to play the part of diva, the result is always off-key.

What's wrong with the Women's Bill of Rights

This happened last week, when Lesko’s office sent out a press release about how Lesko and Republican Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith of Mississippi have introduced (again) joint resolutions for the Women’s Bill of Rights, an artfully misleading and disingenuous title for an assault on transgender individuals.

It won’t become law, which Lesko and Hyde-Smith know for a fact.

All their resolutions are meant to do, in the end, is remind their constituents that Lesko and Hyde-Smith fully support their ugly prejudices.

In her press release Lesko said, “Now more than ever, we must protect women’s rights and combat the left’s attempts to erase women. I am excited to once again introduce the Women’s Bill of Rights to affirm the importance of women and their unique contributions to our great nation.”

Here’s the sad part. There is a legitimate need for us to discuss the complicated issues faced by and involving the LGBTQ community. But that can’t happen when the conversation begins with an idiotic comment alleging the “left’s attempts to erase women.”

Biology is more complicated than Lesko thinks

If anything, it’s Lesko’s proposal that could eliminate an entire group of people.

Or, as Olivia Hunt from the National Center for Transgender Equality put it, “The Republican resolution is another in a long line of cynical attempts by anti-LGBTQ extremists around the country to erase transgender and non-binary people from our communities. More than a century of science has shown us that biology is far more complicated than what the authors of this resolution describe and that trans and non-binary people’s genders are just as real and just as valid as everyone else’s.”

She’s not wrong about the science. Human biology is much more complicated than what Lesko’s resolution presumes.

Besides, her resolution isn’t really about protecting women, not when it endorses taking away a person’s individual rights in order to allow the government to “distinguish between the sexes.”

There is a Native American 'two spirit' tradition

Also, coming from a place like Arizona you’d think Lesko would be aware of the “two spirit” tradition in many Native American cultures. And how, rather than demonizing transgender individuals they were looked upon as being doubly blessed and, in many cases, considered religious leaders and teachers.

And that wasn’t only the case in North America, but in many regions of the world.

All that changed, historically, with European colonization. We can argue about the good and bad of that. Just as we can discuss the complicated issues faced by and involving the LGBTQ community.

But not if people like Lesko start the conversation by suggesting that the “left” (Could we be a little more specific?) wants to “erase women.”

Talk like that doesn’t protect any particular group’s sexuality.

It only diminishes everyone’s humanity.

Reach Montini at ed.montini@arizonarepublic.com.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Rep. Debbie Lesko offers an anti-transgender 'women’s bill of rights'