Who knew?
The headline is, of course, sarcastic.
Rational conservatives and untold millions of other sane Americans have known for as long as I can remember that violent protests — most recently, from the 2020-2021 Black Lives Matter "peaceful protests" (violent riots), that involved property destruction, arson, looting, and violent clashes with police across major cities like Minneapolis, Los Angeles, Portland, and Kenosha, to the anti-ICE protests more recently — have been the product of the Left, not the right.
Let's cut to the bottom line of a recently released study from Rutgers University, the Network Contagion Research Institute, and the Manhattan Institute that found a direct correlation between trans beliefs and violence — and then we'll backhoe and fill.
The study, titled “Where the Clinic Meets the Movement: Does Gender Ideology Arm Left-Wing Authoritarian Psychology?”, surveyed 1,208 U.S. adults. The authors explicitly characterize it as correlational, meaning it establishes no cause-and-effect relationship.
Yep, the good ol' "correlation isn't causation" — just because two things happen together or move in the same direction, it does not mean that one causes the other — sleight-of-hand trick.
Yet:
For decades, psychological research on attitudes toward individuals who identify as transgender has focused almost exclusively on prejudice and has attributed that prejudice to authoritarian dispositions presumed to reside on the political right.
Just one problem.
According to the study, gender ideology associated with left-wing authoritarianism (LWA) ideology is far more associated with the Left's willingness to commit — and attempt to justify — political violence.
Can I get a big "DUH"?
Here's more:
Left-wing authoritarianism (LWA) is the construct at the center of this study. It describesa psychological profile characterized by aggression toward perceived oppressors, enthusiasm fortop-down censorship and institutional enforcement, and hostility toward conventional social institutions—in short, an authoritarian disposition organized around left rather than right political content.
[...]
Broader research on perceived victimhood, moralization, and political violence suggests that identities organized around grievance, perceived victimization, and injustice, when paired with authoritarian or punitive dispositions, can predict support for anti-democratic or violent political action…
Taken together, these literatures suggest a common mechanism: ideological content that names an oppressor class, certifies ongoing victimization, and locates remedy in coercive institutional or social action which may supply authoritarian psychology with morally justified targets.
And there it is: "ideological content that names an oppressor class, certifies ongoing victimization, and locates remedy in coercive institutional or social action which may supply authoritarian psychology with morally justified targets."
As we've seen, the Left's sick "morally justified targets" have led to the brutal public assassination of former Turning Point USA founder and CEO Charlie Kirk, the graphic execution of United HealthCare Brian Thompson on a New York City sidewalk, at least three assassination attempts against President Trump, the damaging of people's ("enemies'") private property, and of course the ever-present violence against America's law enforcement officers.
The extensive study identifies where LWA falls on the Clinical Gender Affirmation Scale (CGAS) in an attempt to gauge triggers among pro-trans leftists (I know; that's redundant).
So what sets the left off — to the point of violence? Here we go:
- Failure to affirm a transgender person’s gender identity increases the risk of serious psychological distress.
- People should be supported in expressing their transgender identity.
- Using a chosen name is a necessary form of support.
- Using preferred pronouns is a necessary form of support.
- Parents should support their children’s transgender exploration.
The only surprising part about the study is the publishing of its results.
To be fair, while the majority of so-called "transsexuals" don't commit political violence, the violence is real and getting worse.
Then again, take a group of arguably already mentally disturbed people, toss in professional organization and funding, and indoctrination designed to paint Donald Trump, Christians, and conservatives in general as a direct threat to one's sexual proclivities, and there we have it.
The question is, where do we go from here?
