cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/22334414

Summary

Two transgender women, Dahlia and Jess, were attacked at a Minneapolis rail station, with onlookers cheering their assailants instead of helping.

After confronting a man yelling transphobic slurs, the situation escalated into a violent assault involving four or five others, leaving both women unconscious.

Advocates attribute the rise in anti-trans violence to emboldened transphobia fueled by misinformation and political rhetoric, including Donald Trump’s anti-LGBTQ+ policies.

The local trans community is responding with solidarity rallies, self-defense classes, and firearm training to prepare for a potential increase in attacks.

Police are investigating, but no arrests have been made.

  • j4k3@lemmy.world
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    15 hours ago

    Please arm yourselves and learn to shoot. Never pull a gun you are unwilling or unable to shoot.

        • djsaskdja@reddthat.com
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          8 hours ago

          Or just, you know, walk away? Try to deescalate the situation maybe? Pulling out a gun and blasting away seems like the worst option here.

          • VerilyFemme@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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            6 hours ago

            Yeah I’ll try that if I’m ever on the ground being beaten by five grown men… Walking away.

            Obviously you de-escalate when the situation calls for de-escalation. In this case, it was probably a good idea to just ignore those guys from the get-go. But you know what? That’s implying getting assaulted was the victims’ fault.

            All those women did was ask to not be spoken to the way they were, and the man’s response to that was a sucker punch. That’s not a situation you can de-escalate, he already assaulted her. Maybe it would have been wiser to run off and lawyer up. But quite frankly, I respect that she stood her ground and clocked him one back.

            Those women were assaulted, and maybe I would have dealt with one jackass smacking me differently. But if I’m on the ground with five grown men beating me senseless, sorry not sorry but one of us is gonna be limping for the rest of their life after this and it’s not gonna be me.

            • djsaskdja@reddthat.com
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              6 hours ago

              That’s dismissing all the actions that led up to being beaten. Once the first punch is thrown, sure do whatever you can to defend yourself. Unless we get video of the incident, we probably won’t know for sure what happened. But at least according to the article the victims “confronted” their harassers. I ride the MSP light rail everyday. Been harassed by, mostly mentally ill or drug addicted people, dozens of times. It sucks, but every time I keep my mouth shut and I walk away. One guy did try to punch me, but he missed and I was long gone before he had another chance. Don’t “confront” these psychos if you’re not ready for a fight.

              • KeriKitty (They(/It))@pawb.social
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                5 hours ago

                More victim blaming. You’re disgusting.

                Besides that, not everyone’s gonna live just like you. Though you say we may not know for sure what happened, you assume that they straight-up started a fight with five guys because they did anything at all, which is wrong because it’s not what you would do. For all you claim to know the “confrontation” was them just saying “Hey, don’t call us that!” but you openly insist that they brought that brutality on themselves.

                What a great way to make a better world, just sit down and shut up unless someone’s calling out a problem, at which point they’re the problem.

                • djsaskdja@reddthat.com
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                  2 hours ago

                  I’m just going by what the article says. If we find something different happened, I’d be willing to change my stance.

  • microphone900@lemmy.ml
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    14 hours ago

    Oh, so one of the cities with the lowest levels of racial equality also has a problem with transphobia? I’m not shocked, I’m not surprised. Between this and the people in Springfield Ohio instilling fear in the towns Haitian residents, I will never understand how people can become so hateful.

    • jjjalljs@ttrpg.network
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      7 hours ago

      People are emotional, tribal, creatures. It’s very easy for us to hate the out group. That was probably beneficial for pre-history humans, where the other tribe could be a real threat. It’s not so useful today, where “the other group” is just some people waiting for the train.

      I think the best paths forward have to make people believe more people are in-group. That’s a reason why stuff like representation matters. People might be like “who cares if there’s a trans main character in a movie?”, but that helps people be less hateful. They don’t hate the character from the movie, they relate to them, and then a person in real life gets seen in that light.

    • kvasir476@lemmy.world
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      14 hours ago

      It should not be forgotten that it was not the wider ‘people of Springfield’ who pushed that shit. There were certainly kooks/nazis in Springfield who were willing to say it, but the responsibility falls on the politicians/media organizations who maliciously propagated it.