Why are Christians in general so purposefully and viscerally hateful to trans people?

DISCLAIMER: I am a fully deconstructed Christian and a trans woman. I have put in the work, studied and debated the theology, spent time in prayer. I am 35 years old and while my faith did rattle a bit early in transition and I didn’t set foot in any church, I soon realized that those are people not God. God has embraced me. God loves me as his daughter. God understands that this is merely a medical condition I corrected so that I could live and nothing more, even if people don’t. I am not here to debate or justify my existence or “if you can really be both Christian and transgender”. I surmise you can seeing as I’m literally doing it right now. I only want my question answered.

The title comes off as inflammatory, I’m sorry I couldn’t think of a better way to word it. I also will go ahead and insert the obligatory “not all Christians” which I know to be a fact because I’m Episcopalian and go to a wonderful and welcoming Episcopal church here and while I pass now, everyone there knows I’m trans because I’ve been very open about it because it’s actually a really big part of my testimony. I want to also add that this post isn’t meant to single out this sub or really even targeting it at all. People here for the most part have been kind to me, and even stepped in to defend me against other people who were harassing me or saying mean things. The example that inspired the title actually happened in the comments section of the Fox News Facebook page.

We all know what happened with the CK killing last week. The left as a whole was swiftly blamed, the right calling for retribution and the more extreme among them openly calling for civil war. I myself received threats merely because I have some photos and posts on my social media profiles where I’m open about the fact that I’m trans. Now they’re trying to say the shooters roommate or lover may have been trans and they think that means something. That isn’t confirmed, and I don’t think it means anything even if it’s true. Either way this isn’t really about CK or his killing, it’s what happened after.

I see all the time from more conservative Christians “we don’t hate the sinner we hate the sin. We love the sinner” and “we correct you because we love you. If we didn’t care we would just let you go to hell. We love you enough to not love you into hell”. Basically all the things and attitudes my stepdad was giving me while he would beat me growing up. Point is they’ve seemingly made it clear that they don’t stand for abuse, bullying, etc, so then why do they do it? I forgot to add the classic “we think you’re mentally ill and suicidal. You aren’t a woman, you have legitimate mental issues. That’s why we need to bully, abuse and harass you relentlessly and try to make you kill yourself. Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do to mentally ill people?”

Fox News fb posted an article in which a transgender woman called for unity in the wake of the entire trans community somehow being blamed for CKs killing. Yall, I read this article, and I watched this woman absolutely PROSTRATE HERSELF before the mercy of right wing America. I watched her say things like “I totally get why you see a freak when you look at me, look at us” and “it’s true, some of us never stop looking like men. I don’t blame you for pointing it out”.

She said everything they wanted her to say. She called herself worse things than anyone else probably ever had. She said she “fully gets” why some people hate us. She also begged them to see reason, to still see her humanity anyway, to be open to dialogue, and to disavow violence and try for a better way. You want to know what thanks she got? The comments I’m about to read to you, I went to not all because there were too many, but a good majority of their profiles. A lot of them were filled with Bible verses, pictures like “Jesus, do you know him?”, and pictures of Jesus laying hands on Trump from behind while Trump seemingly was praying. Others had pictures of Jesus embracing CK upon his arrival in heaven. These people were Christian, or at least they made it their entire personality on their Facebook pages.

The way she outright abused herself before them wasn’t good enough. Comments were filled with these Christians, again regular people, not politicians or reporters, not anyone working any angle or with any financial gain at stake for continuing to stoke the division, just regular conservative America. Comments were filled with people being purposefully hurtful, clearly on purpose and going out of their way to emphasize certain words, like: the DUDE is right. – come on yall, the guy has a point. – I wouldn’t date him but he sounds like a smart man. Too bad he’s a nutcase. – I agree with this MAN. Just stay out of my daughter’s bathroom and you won’t have to get your head bashed in. – he he he he HE has a point. / and those weren’t the worst ones.

Several others called her a literal demon in human skin, and emphasized that they were not saying she was demon possessed, but that she herself was actually a demon. People made comments to check her hard drives, insinuating trans people are pedophiles. People telling her to “41% yourself”, a “joke” mocking the trans suicide rate which is 41%. People said we had our chance at peace but we lost it when “we” killed their “nice guy”.

I did the dumbest thing I’ve ever done probably and jumped in to defend a person who wasn’t even there and subjected myself to relentless abuse. My fb profile in particular is locked down, some photos are public but I make it a point to ensure that any trans related posts or pictures can only be seen by my friends. My threads and insta are more open. My name on there is my chosen name and like I said I pass now, like I literally just live my life as a woman and everything is fine, I use the bathroom with zero issues etc, so they just saw me as a regular cis woman in the comments. People told me they hope I don’t have kids because I will change their gender. Asked me how would I feel if “one of them” went in the bathroom with me or my daughter. Just really really nasty stuff. And again, this was like 98% of the comments on that article, these and the comments I mentioned before. And easily 90% of them had Jesus stuff ALL OVER their pages.

I saw no humility in them. No love. No desire to reach out and understand. Even the misgendering comments. I know many of you will say well, you can’t force us to say something we don’t believe. And that’s true. So you can just not gender the statement then. “I agree with this person” is fine, and the all caps emphasis of specifically gendered words like SIR which they also used, none of these were accidents. They were TRYING to HURT this woman, and to make her hate herself more than she clearly already did if her article was any indication.

My question is why? I truly don’t think that’s how Jesus would have acted to her, or me. We can debate the theology of trans existence and acceptance, but that’ll have to be another time. Why can’t they just be nice, especially while claiming the mantle of Christ? They literally didn’t have to mention her gender at all and they chose to.

On threads, I’ve gotten threatening messages threatening rape or death to me, and again when I go to these pages, Jesus stuff everywhere. It doesn’t make sense to me except when I start to think, maybe they really have exchanged truth for a lie. Funny to think about now because that’s literally exactly what my now ex pastor told me when I started my transition. But maybe they’ve done that. Maybe they really have given up on Christ. Maybe they really are worshipping the golden calf.

They always want to talk about “what the Bible says”. Well, the Bible tells us pretty plainly to bear one another’s burdens. Are you doing that by purposefully misgendering a trans woman? Calling her he, sir, calling her a freak and demon and every foul name out there, literally more than I can even think of right now? Not even trying to meet her where she is, sit with her in her pain, ask her questions, understand why she is the way she is? Literally reach out at all in any capacity?

This feels evil. Like this feels dark. Like a spirit of darkness is on this administration and these people and it’s really REALLY starting to scare me. The only thing I can say with certainty is the spirit of Christ was not on these people when they were making their comments, and perhaps the most worrisome thing of all is that they will say he was. That he was the one who told them to write that stuff.

TLDR: I saw a Fox News article where a trans woman was pleading for unity after the CK killing, and the comments of mostly Christians, verified by going to their pages and checking myself were very mean, very mean spirited and not Christlike at all. It is one thing to disagree. I wouldn’t associate with you but you’re free to do that. But these comments were not that. I fear the greater American church is, as of this moment, worshipping a false god. Even on the post I made here the other day in which I detailed how genuinely terrified I am with this administration right now and the state of the country, people saw fit to come in the comments and belittle and demonize me, and call me confused etc, even after I specifically asked them not to do that. They couldn’t put their own biases to the side for 5 minutes and even make an attempt at comforting me, to calm me down, to see my humanity and dignity. I was and am nothing more than a freak of nature to them. But I am more than that to God. SO much more. Thankfully the mods here usually do a really good job.

Genuinely sorry this came out so long. I really tried not to, but evidently I don’t have it in me to write short posts. My brain has too much to say, too much on the mind.

God bless all of you.

~Victoria