My Response to Teed Rockwell's “A Moderate Gender Manifesto”

A 3/5ths Compromise for the 21st Century

There’s something almost admirable about the confidence, arrogance, or ignorance of a cisgender, heterosexual man sitting down to write 4,200 words explaining how an entire marginalized community should gracefully accept partial personhood for the sake of political convenience. Teed Rockwell has given us such a document, cisplaining marginalization to the marginalized and gender to trans folks, packaged as reasonableness and wrapped in the language of compromise. They call it “A Moderate Gender Manifesto.” I call it what it is: an attempt to negotiate away human rights at a discount.

Let's start with what Rockwell helpfully tells us about themselves in their bio: "I am White Anglo-Saxon Protestant Male Heterosexual cisgendered over-educated able-bodied affluent and thin." That's not a biography; it's a bingo card of privilege. And from this Mount Olympus of unexamined advantage, they've decided to descend from on high and explain to the merely trans mortals what rights they should be content with.

And I want to be clear from the start: when someone offers you a "moderate" position between "you deserve full human rights and equality" and "you are not equal and deserve no rights," what they're really offering is partial humanity. History has a name for these kinds of compromises. They age about as well as milk in the sun.

The Audacity of the Unaffected

Imagine, if you will, the level of detachment required to write a "moderate manifesto" about struggles you will never face. Rockwell will never worry about which bathroom to use. They'll never have their gender questioned by strangers. They'll never have their healthcare debated by politicians. They'll never watch their existence become a campaign issue. And yet here they are, explaining to people who face these challenges daily how much discrimination they should reasonably accept.

This is like someone who's never experienced hunger writing a manifesto about how the starving should moderate their desire for food. "Sure, you deserve nutrients," they might say, "but let's be reasonable about how many calories you actually need. Have you considered that some people are uncomfortable watching others eat?"

Rockwell opens with a claim that "recent polls have shown the American public rejects trans women playing in women sports by as much as 80%." No citation. No methodology. No consideration that public opinion polls once showed majority opposition to interracial marriage,[2] integrated schools,[3] and same-sex marriage.[5] But who is being polled? Predominantly cisgender people who, like Rockwell, will never have their right to play sports questioned. It's easy to have opinions about struggles you'll never face. It costs nothing to oppose rights you have always had and never needed to question.

But more fundamentally, Rockwell's entire premise, that rights should follow public opinion, has this backward. The author's thesis is that we should reshape fundamental rights around polling data. Imagine applying this framework historically. Should we have waited for majority approval before desegregating schools? Should marriage equality have been shelved until it polled better in swing states? The author isn't making a moral argument; they're making a marketing pitch.

When Rights Led and Culture Followed: A Historical Reality Check

If we followed Rockwell's polling-based approach to civil rights, here's what America would look like:

Interracial marriage would have remained illegal until 1995. When the Supreme Court decided Loving v. Virginia in 1967, only around 20-25% of Americans approved of interracial marriage.[2] It didn't reach majority support for nearly three more decades. Should Richard and Mildred Loving have waited another 28 years to marry?

Schools would have remained segregated until the 1980s. When the Supreme Court ordered desegregation in 1955, only about 20% of Americans in the South supported school integration, while support was much higher in other regions.[3] By Rockwell's logic, Black children in the South should have waited another generation or more for equal education.

Women might still be fighting for the vote. When the 19th Amendment passed in 1920, historians estimate only 35-40% of Americans, including women themselves, supported women's suffrage.[4] Many women actively campaigned against their own right to vote. Should we have waited for them to come around?

Same-sex marriage proves the pattern. When Massachusetts first legalized marriage equality in 2004, national support was only 28-31%.[5] When Obergefell was decided in 2015, support had risen to about 50%, still not the overwhelming majority Rockwell seems to require.[6] Yet look what happened: The sky didn't fall. Support continued to grow. By 2023, support reached 71%.[7]

The pattern is undeniable: Legal recognition of rights PRECEDES social acceptance. Rights lead culture forward; they don't wait for culture to catch up. Rockwell has the entire relationship between rights and public opinion backward. Rights exist precisely to protect minorities from majority opinion, not to be subject to it.

The Systematic Carving Away of Personhood

After establishing the faulty premise that rights should follow polls, Rockwell gets to the real work: systematically dismantling trans rights while appearing reasonable. The manifesto graciously acknowledges that trans people deserve basic employment protections and shouldn't be murdered for existing. How generous. This is like praising yourself for acknowledging that left-handed people deserve to eat food. These aren't concessions; they're the absolute basement floor of human dignity.

But watch what happens next. After establishing their "reasonable" credentials, Rockwell immediately pivots to explaining why trans people can't have full access to healthcare, sports, facilities, or even language that acknowledges their existence. It's a classic bait-and-switch: appear magnanimous while systematically carving away at personhood.

Take healthcare. The author acknowledges gender dysphoria is "a genuine neurological phenomenon" backed by brain scan studies. But here's what they don't tell you: those same studies support trans identities far more strongly than Rockwell admits. The neurological evidence doesn't support their gatekeeping; it undermines it.[8] Yet Rockwell deploys "think of the children," that rallying cry of every moral panic from comic books to Dungeons & Dragons to gay teachers, claiming "Minor children should not be given the authority to diagnose themselves as trans or to consent to surgery or hormone treatments."

This is fighting ghosts. Nobody is advocating for self-diagnosis. The actual process involves multiple medical professionals, psychological evaluation, parental involvement, and follows established clinical guidelines.[9] As for surgery on minors? It essentially doesn't happen (except for the most extreme of scenarios).[10] Rockwell is tilting at windmills while real trans youth suffer from lack of access to appropriate care. The author's solution? Force trans youth to endure the wrong puberty for them, then maybe let them try to undo it in adulthood and hope it is not too little, too late. This isn't moderation; it's calculated cruelty. Every major medical organization disagrees with this approach,[11] but Rockwell knows better than the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics combined, apparently.

Then there's the "social contagion" myth: old wine in new bottles. Rockwell uncritically repeats this narrative, noting an increase from "less than 1%" to "around 5%" of people identifying as trans. They claim this is "too rapid to be biological." Here's a thought experiment: Left-handedness rates "mysteriously" increased from 3% to 12% over the 20th century.[12] Was this social contagion? A left-handist agenda? Or did we simply stop forcing left-handed children to write with their right hands? When you stop punishing people for existing, more people feel safe existing openly. Revolutionary concept.

The focus on "the huge increase in women who now identify as trans men" is particularly telling. The author can't imagine why people assigned female at birth might increasingly reject womanhood in a society that's systematically stripping away reproductive rights, bodily autonomy, and basic equality. No, it must be "social contagion." A recent 2025 study directly examined this supposed phenomenon and discovered something Rockwell conveniently ignores: the data suggests that higher societal suppressive forces directed toward adolescents assigned male at birth may inhibit their expression of gender diversity, leading to fewer referrals to specialist gender services.[1] This isn't social contagion causing more trans men. It's societal suppression keeping trans women from coming out until later.

And then we arrive at sports a.k.a. the distraction Olympics. Rockwell spends more words on sports than on survival. More ink on who plays volleyball than on the 350+ trans people murdered globally last year[17]. More concern for hypothetical athletic advantages than for trans children's suicide rates. This isn't moderation; it's moral malpractice. They acknowledge research showing hormone therapy can eliminate advantages in certain sports,[14] then immediately pivot to "but what about other sports?" Here's what they conveniently omit: Trans women have been eligible for Olympic competition since 2004.[15] In two decades, how many have dominated? How many medal sweeps? The answer is telling: essentially none.

But here's what really exposes the hypocrisy: We celebrated Michael Phelps's genetic advantages - his wingspan, double-jointed ankles, body that produces half the lactic acid of typical athletes. We called him the GOAT. Caster Semenya's naturally high testosterone? Banned. The pattern is transparent: we police women's bodies, particularly Black women's bodies, particularly marginalized women's bodies, in ways we never police men's. As researcher Kirsty Miller and others have documented, research shows that after transition, trans women's performance changes dramatically. Sometimes retaining advantages in certain metrics like grip strength, but showing disadvantages in others like lung function and cardiovascular capacity. Whatever differences remain generally fall within the natural variation among cis women themselves: the same variation we've always accepted between a 5'2" gymnast and a 6'2" basketball player. The entire moral panic is about policing boundaries that were always arbitrary. Yet despite this dramatic leveling, the moral panic continues. The entire controversy is a solution desperately searching for a problem.

Nevermind the fact that most of the most “ardent defenders of women’s sports” from the “cheating trans women” have never advocated for equal pay, equal marketing, or equal treatment compared to the equivalent men’s sporting teams and contracts, resources, or exposure. Yet suddenly now they are pro women’s sports and care about unfair advantages? Please. This selective outrage is as transparent as the emperor's new clothes. The "advantage" discourse was never about fairness, just as it was never about water fountains - it was always about gatekeeping womanhood from “undesireables.”

The author suggests letting athletes vote on trans inclusion. Imagine this logic elsewhere: "Let's have white athletes vote on whether Black athletes can compete." We don't put civil rights up for popular vote because rights aren't popularity contests. Perhaps Rockwell needs to re-read his Madison, or consider a second look at the historical examples I provided? Those serve as reminders as to why a minority’s participation in society should never be contingent upon a majority approval.

Because the majority is often wrong about justice, particularly when it comes to groups they don't understand or fear.

Rights lead; culture follows - that is not a bug, it is a feature. Not just a feature, that is the entire point.

But as we will see, Rockwell's fixation on sports is just one symptom of a larger pattern of exclusion.

The Rhetorical Shell Game

But perhaps more telling than what Rockwell includes is what they systematically exclude. In 4,200 words about trans lives: No trans voices cited. No recognition of current violence statistics. No acknowledgment of medical consensus beyond cherry-picked data. No examples from countries where trans rights exist without catastrophe. This isn't accidental. It's architectural. You can't write a manifesto about people while systematically excluding their voices unless exclusion is the point.

Instead, Rockwell offers philosophical smokescreens and false equivalences. The manifesto's philosophical section attempts to sound profound while advocating for discrimination. Rockwell quotes Supreme Court justices on liberty and self-definition, then argues the government shouldn't define womanhood. But wait: if government can't define womanhood, how can it enforce sex-segregated spaces? How can it determine who plays in women's sports? The author wants it both ways: government neutrality when convenient, government enforcement when not. This isn't philosophy; it's sophistry.

The language section is where Rockwell's priorities become crystal clear. They spend considerable energy lamenting inclusive language like "pregnant people" or "chest feeding," claiming this alienates people. But let's examine the actual stakes here: Using "pregnant people" harms nobody but includes some. Not using it actively excludes people from healthcare language. The author frames this as academics "sneering at everyone else." But nobody's being arrested for saying "pregnant women." Meanwhile, trans people face actual violence for existing.[13] These are not equivalent concerns.

You know who else had thoughts about language? George Carlin. Yes, he mocked euphemisms and clichés, what he called "soft language." He may have mocked 'people-hole covers,' but he wasn't defending the status quo. He was attacking empty gesture politics that avoided real change, that avoided truth. What Carlin actually criticized was those in power using language to obscure their real intentions and make ugly things sound acceptable.

You know what's empty gesture politics? Writing a 'moderate' manifesto that uses inclusive-sounding language ('trans people deserve rights') to advocate for exclusion. Rockwell is doing exactly what Carlin hated: using language to avoid saying what they really mean. They won't say 'trans people make me uncomfortable,' so they say 'we need diagnostic tools.' They won't say 'I don't want trans women in sports,' so they say 'let the athletes vote.' Carlin's whole philosophy was about cutting through bullshit to truth. The truth here? Rockwell is using the language of moderation to make discrimination sound both reasonable and palatable. He's turned bigotry into a TED talk. Because here's a guy who thinks discrimination becomes reasonable if you use enough syllables. He's not moderate. He's just figured out how to be an asshole with footnotes. He's gentrified bigotry. He's discrimination with a liberal arts degree. And in the spirit of Carlin: That? That is some bullshit.

The bathroom panic follows the same pattern, recycling every segregation-era argument about "comfort" and "safety." Rockwell argues that cis women who "believe trans women are actually men" will be uncomfortable sharing spaces. Apply this logic historically: "White women who believe Black women are inferior will be uncomfortable sharing spaces." We don't structure society around bigotry, no matter how sincerely held. The author's solution, "penalizing people who flagrantly flout male sexual characteristics," is deliberately vague legislation that would empower harassment of anyone deemed insufficiently feminine. Butch women, tall women, women with PCOS: all become targets.

Throughout, Rockwell treats trans people's need for safety, healthcare, and dignity as equivalent to cis people's discomfort with change. This is like saying, "Sure, diabetics need insulin, but some people are uncomfortable with needles, so let's find middle ground." The comparison to religious tolerance is particularly galling. The author argues we don't need to believe in transubstantiation to tolerate Catholicism. But nobody's debating whether Catholics exist. Nobody's passing laws about which bathrooms Catholics can use. Being trans isn't a belief system; it's an irrefutable part of who people are.

But let's examine this rhetorical trap more closely, because it's seductive in its apparent reasonableness. Rockwell argues "Tolerating trans people does not require us to believe that they are the sex they identify as." This sounds fair, even liberal. It's also fundamentally wrong.

The trap works by miscategorizing identity as belief. Religious beliefs are chosen philosophical positions about metaphysical claims. Being trans is an inherent aspect of one’s self. When you "don't believe" in transubstantiation, you're disagreeing with a theological claim. When you "don't believe" a trans woman is a woman, you're denying her fundamental identity in every interaction.

Imagine someone saying "I tolerate Jewish people, but I don't believe they're really Jewish. To me they are just confused Christians." We'd immediately recognize this as antisemitism, not religious tolerance. Yet Rockwell wants us to accept this exact framework for trans people. "I'll use your pronouns," this framework says, "but we both know I'm just humoring your delusion." That's not respect. It's condescension wrapped in civility.

Whereas one cannot expect more than polite civility in any exchange, the framing of the argument and the construction of this trap matters, and warrants scrutiny and disassembling. Because the most telling part? We never apply this "belief" framework to other identities. Nobody says "I don't believe you're really straight, but I'll respect your belief that you are." Straight or gay, like gender identity, simply is. The only reason to frame trans identity as something to "believe in" or not is to justify discrimination while maintaining plausible deniability.

The Political Calculation and Its Consequences

This is the moderate's trap: Criticize Rockwell and you're "too radical." Accept their framework and trans people get partial rights. We've seen this before with "separate but equal," "civil unions," and "don't ask, don't tell." The trap only works if we pretend it's not there.

The most revealing moment comes when Rockwell warns against "throwing trans people under the bus" not because it's wrong, but because "Independents will realize we're not being sincere." Not because it harms real people. Not because it's morally reprehensible. Because it might not poll well. This is the manifesto's true heart: trans rights as political liability to be managed, not human dignity to be protected. Rockwell openly admits they're trying to "win back" voters who've been "alienated" by trans rights. Win them back to what? A party that negotiates away the rights of its most vulnerable members for electoral advantage?

The Three-Fifths Compromise was also sold as "moderate" and "pragmatic." It balanced competing interests. It acknowledged enslaved people's humanity (partially). It was politically expedient. It was also a moral abomination that history judges harshly. Rockwell's manifesto follows the same template: systematic discrimination packaged as thoughtful moderation. Trans people can exist, but only after proving themselves through brain scans. They can transition, but only after enduring the wrong puberty. They can participate in society, but only where their presence doesn't challenge cisgender assumptions.

This manifesto exemplifies respectability politics at its worst. Rockwell pre-surrenders rights nobody's even demanded yet. They negotiate against themselves, offering to sacrifice trans dignity for imaginary political gain. But here's what respectability politics never understands: You cannot win by becoming more acceptable to your oppressors. They don't hate you for your tactics; they hate you for your existence. Making yourself smaller doesn't make them hate you less; it just makes you easier to step on.

What Real Moderation Looks Like

Real moderation on trans rights already exists. It's called following medical consensus, listening to affected communities, and recognizing that human rights aren't subject to popular vote. It's understanding that trans people aren't asking for special treatment; they're asking for the same boring dignity everyone else takes for granted: using the bathroom, playing sports, getting healthcare, existing in public without constant scrutiny.

Here's what Rockwell never asks: What if we just… didn't? What if we didn't create elaborate systems to police gender? What if we didn't force children through unwanted puberties? What if we didn't demand people prove their identities through brain scans? What if we just let people live their lives and trust them when they say who they are? We managed to get past this with gays and lesbians, and no one to this day has needed to prove their "gayness" in order to get married with a brain scan. So why must we force a brain scan on trans folks when cis folks get a free pass? Because it is "the expected norm of society"? Is it due to the seven dirty words? Because it has always been this way? Admiral Hopper would like to have a few words with you.

Rockwell claims "being able to share a social and political space with those you disagree with is an essential property of citizenship." But trans people aren't asking for philosophical agreement. They're asking to exist. These aren't abstract debates about the nature of gender; they're concrete questions about whether trans people get to participate fully in society.

As Robert Jones Jr. tells us: "We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist."[16]

Rockwell's "Moderate Gender Manifesto" serves one purpose: providing cover for discrimination. It gives people permission to oppose trans rights while feeling reasonable about it. It's a 4,200-word permission slip for partial humanity. It is "respectability politics" wrapped in a sales brochure. The manifesto asks trans people to be grateful for scraps, patient with prejudice, understanding of their own exclusion. It asks them to accept being 3/5ths of a person as a pragmatic compromise.

History has a name for such compromises. History also has a verdict.

When someone offers you a moderate position between dignity and dehumanization, they're not a moderate. They're just a more polite oppressor. And politeness has never been a substitute for justice.

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The author would like to note that no amount of philosophical gymnastics can transform discrimination into moderation. Math was never my strongest subject, but even I know that 3/5ths will never equal one whole person, no matter how eloquently you explain the fractions.

Never again should we accept arithmetic where human dignity is concerned.

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Citations

[1] Telfer, M. M., Tollit, M. A., Cheng, B., Tran, A. Q., & Pang, K. C. (2025). Effect of assigned sex on the age at which individuals seek specialist gender affirming care. International Journal of Transgender Health, 26(1). https://doi.org/10.1080/26895269.2025.2503221

[2] Gallup. (2017, June 21). Gallup vault: Americans slow to back interracial marriage. Gallup News Service. https://news.gallup.com/vault/212717/gallup-vault-americans-slow-back-interracial-marriage.aspx

[3] Gallup. (2003). Timeline of polling history: Events that shaped the United States and the world. Gallup News Service. https://news.gallup.com/poll/9967/timeline-polling-history-events-shaped-united-states-world.aspx

[4] Baker, J. H. (2002). Votes for women: The struggle for suffrage revisited. Oxford University Press.

[5] Pew Research Center. (2004, February 27). Gay marriage a voting issue, but mostly for opponents. https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2004/02/27/gay-marriage-a-voting-issue-but-mostly-for-opponents/

[6] Gallup. (2015, May 19). Record-high 60% of Americans support same-sex marriage. Gallup News Service. https://news.gallup.com/poll/183272/record-high-americans-support-sex-marriage.aspx

[7] Gallup. (2023, June 5). U.S. same-sex marriage support holds at 71% high. Gallup News Service. https://news.gallup.com/poll/506636/sex-marriage-support-holds-high.aspx

[8] Guillamon, A., Junque, C., & Gómez-Gil, E. (2016). A review of the status of brain structure research in transsexualism. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 45(7), 1615–1648.

[9] Coleman, E., Radix, A. E., Bouman, W. P., Brown, G. R., de Vries, A. L. C., Deutsch, M. B., … & Arcelus, J. (2022). Standards of care for the health of transgender and gender diverse people, version 8. International Journal of Transgender Health, 23(sup1), S1-S259.

[10] Rafferty, J., Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health, Committee on Adolescence, & Section on Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Health and Wellness. (2018). Ensuring comprehensive care and support for transgender and gender-diverse children and adolescents. Pediatrics, 142(4), e20182162.

[11] See positions from: American Medical Association (2019); American Psychological Association (2021); American Academy of Pediatrics (2018); American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (2019); The Endocrine Society (2017).

[12] McManus, I. C. (2009). The history and geography of human handedness. In I. E. C. Sommer & R. S. Kahn (Eds.), Language lateralization and psychosis (pp. 37–57). Cambridge University Press.

[13] James, S. E., Herman, J. L., Rankin, S., Keisling, M., Mottet, L., & Anafi, M. (2016). The report of the 2015 U.S. transgender survey. National Center for Transgender Equality.

[14] Harper, J. (2015). Race times for transgender athletes. Journal of Sporting Cultures and Identities, 6(1), 1–9.

[15] International Olympic Committee. (2004). Statement of the Stockholm consensus on sex reassignment in sports. IOC Medical Commission.

[16] Jones, R., Jr. (2015, August 18). We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist [Tweet]. Screenshot preserved at https://www.sonofbaldwin.com/

[17] Chudy, Emily. (2024) “Trans Day of Remembrance: At least 350 trans people killed globally this year”. PinkNews. https://www.thepinknews.com/2024/11/20/trans-day-of-remembrance-at-least-350-trans-people-killed-globally-this-year/