The Supreme Court disregarded the issue of precedent stare decisis, a Latin term meaning let the decision stand when, in 2022, itsDobbs v. Jackson Womens Health Organizationdecision overturnedRoe v. Wade(1973), effectively unraveling the legal right to abortion for nearly the last 50 years. The Court left it to the states to decide whether to legalize reproductive rights.In a concurring opinion, JusticeClarence Thomaswrote that the Supreme Court should reconsider other previous rulings granting the rights to contraception access, same-sex relationships, and same-sex marriage (aka. marriage equality). Related Lets address the real reason Donald Trump sent the National Guard to Los Angeles The president doesnt care about law and order. He cares about showing off his power. SinceDobbs, many state legislatures have banned reproductive healthcare for pregnant people and those who wish to become pregnant, as well as the safe and effective drugs used in medication abortions mifepristone and misoprostol and also IVF (in vitro fertilization). Never Miss a Beat Subscribe to our newsletter to stay ahead of the latest LGBTQ+ political news and insights. Subscribe to our Newsletter today This hasresultedin several cases of women bleeding to death after having a miscarriage because doctors fear that if they treat them, they may be breaking the laws of their states. The denial of bodily autonomy continuesThe U.S. Supreme Court issued another destructive ruling on June 18 inUnited States v. Skrmetti, upholding Tennessees prohibition on gender-affirming healthcare for transgender youth. This 6-3 decision came down on partisan lines, with the Courts Republican appointees opposing trans rights and the Democratic appointees supporting trans rights.Chief Justice John Roberts wrote the opinion for the majority, with Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Samuel Alito, and Clarence Thomas writing concurring majority opinions. Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan wrote dissenting opinions.The plaintiffs arguing for trans rights claimed that the Tennessee law was unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitutions 14thAmendment, which promises equal treatment under the law regardless of sex and other characteristics. The Courts ruling, however, asserted that Tennessees ban on gender-affirming care does not discriminate on the basis of sex or trans status. The ruling will now allow the 25 states that currently have such bans to continue to enforce them.With this draconian betrayal of trans youth, families will now have to make insufferable choices in some cases, whether to flee their state or separate their families while taking on huge financial liabilities or taking major legal risks to provide young people the ability to access medically necessary care.Previously in Alabama, a majority of judges on the U.S. 11thCircuit Court of Appeals declined to reconsider Alabamas ban on gender-affirming care, which ruled that parents do not have a right to allowgender-affirming carefor young people. Previously, a three-judge panel sided with the Alabama legislatures ban on gender-affirming care.Alabamas 2022 law makes it a felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, for doctors to prescribe puberty blockers or hormones to a transgender person under the age of 19. The law also prohibits genital surgeries, even though physicians have not performed these on minors in the state. Backlash and scapegoating of trans peoplePresident Joe Biden, shortly after taking office, signed an executive order allowing trans troops to serve openly in the U.S. military, effectively repealing the ban that Trump put in place during his first presidential term.However, in May, the Supreme Court ruled that the Trump administration has the right to enforce Trumps January 20 executive order prohibiting transgender people from serving in the U.S. military. The order went into effect on February 26.Donald Trump, amid his self-proclaimed retribution campaign, has specifically targeted members of the trans community in his efforts to completely erase their existence from the human community. (No doubt he would attempt to wipe out gender diversity within non-human species too, if he could.) Trump also signed a mean-spirited and petty presidential executive order in his attempt to rewrite history by expunging trans activism and trans lives. The order demanded that trans people be deleted from New Yorks Stonewall Inn National Monument website developed by theNational Park Service. The acronym that once read LGBTQ+ has been reduced to LGB, standing for lesbian, gay, and bisexual.Did the people who voted for Trump to rise to the Oval Office a second time really want him to spend his hours behind the Resolute Desk scrubbing trans people from U.S. history?During his short second regime, another of Trumps executive orders bans trans athletes from school and professional sports, from using the public facilities of their choice, and from choosing to have gender-affirming procedures to maintain their bodily autonomy because, to Trump, there are only two genders: male and female. All else, to Trump, contradicts the natural world. He even signed anexecutive orderto this effect declaring that there are only two genders. With this came a series of specific policy changes. TitledDefending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government,the order describes biological sex as being determined by the size of ones reproductive cells: small for men and large for women.Government documents, including passports, visas, and employee records, can only show male or female. The government will no longer pay for trans-related health care, such as for government employees, military personnel, or federal prisoners.In addition, all trans women incarcerated in federal prisons he ordered thrown into male prison facilities, despite multiple court rulingsblockingthe presidents policy. In another of Trumps orders, the federal government will no longer even recognize the existence of trans people and willprevent federal fundsfrom being spent on any programs that do so.The order says, Federal funds shall not be used to promote gender ideology and it directs the Bureau of Prisons to revise its policies to ensure that federal inmates do not receive any medical procedure, treatment, or drug for the purpose of conforming an inmates appearance to that of the opposite sex.Recently, Secretary of State Marco Rubio has banned rainbow flags from being flown at U.S. embassies.The Trump administration, as was the case in other authoritarian regimes throughout history, has attempted to limit the bodily autonomy of women, trans, intersex, and lesbian, gay, and bisexual people for the purpose of controlling their minds and limiting their social power. A defined norm and lack of prior claimIn her pioneer book,Homophobia: A Weapon of Sexism, Suzanne Pharr describes a series ofelementsshe finds common to the multiple forms of oppression. Such elements include what she refers to as a defined norm and a lack of prior claim, among many others.Pharr explains a defined norm as a standard of rightness and often of righteousness wherein all others are judged in relation to it. This norm must be backed up with institutional power, economic power, and both institutional and individual violence.Another way the defined norm manages to maintain its power and control is by what Pharr refers to as the element or system of lack of prior claim.This, according to Pharr, means that if you werent there when the original document (the Constitution, for example) was written, or when the organization was first created, then you have no right to inclusion.Those who seek their rights, who seek inclusion, who seek to control their own lives instead of having their lives controlled are the people who fall outside the norm. They arethe Other. In the original and unamended version of the U.S. Constitution, for example, since only European-heritage male landowners had the right to vote, allothers including women and people of color (those outside the defined norm and who lacked prior claim) had to fight long and difficult battles against strong forces to gain access to the voting booth, often under the threat of implied and actual violence against them.Some who continue to oppose marriage equality for same-sex couples claim that this legal right undermines the sanctity of marriage, and possibly leads to the destruction of society, often using religious sanctions as their justification.Those in power in the United States have excluded womens reproductive freedoms, and trans, intersex, lesbian, gay, and bisexual peoples bodily autonomy from the category of defined norms.In addition, by viewing specifically trans, intersex, lesbian, gay, and bisexual people as theother, the founding national and institutional policy documents have likewise excluded their civil and human rights from a prior claim. As a result, a spate of state legislatures have either passed or have considered passing laws prohibiting trans (and by implication, intersex) people from entering public facilities that conform to their gender identities but may differ from the sex assigned to them on their birth certificates.And yes, the denial of bodily autonomy of theOtherconforms to a patriarchal heteronormative Christian white nationalist playbook: HistorianAmanda Tylerdefines Christian nationalism as,a political ideology and cultural framework that seeks to merge American and Christian identities, distorting both the Christian faith and Americas constitutional democracy. Christian nationalism relies on the mythological founding of the United States as a Christian nation, singled out for Gods providence in order to fulfill Gods purposes on earth. Christian nationalism demands a privileged place for Christianity in public life, buttressed by the active support of government at all levels.Anthea Butlerdistinguishes, more specifically, what is white Christian nationalism: Simply put, it is the belief that Americas founding is based on Christian principles, white protestant Christianity is the operational religion of the land, and that Christianity should be the foundation of how the nation develops its laws, principles and policies.So, dont be fooled! The recent Supreme Court case ofUnited States v. Skrmetti, has less to do with supposedly protecting trans youth and more to do with reaffirming a patriarchal heteronormative Christian white nationalist dominant norm.Subscribe to theLGBTQ Nation newsletterand be the first to know about the latest headlines shaping LGBTQ+ communities worldwide.