In recent years, the ongoing controversy surrounding transgender rights has led some to come to the conclusion that there is an ongoing attempt at genocide against transgender people in the United States and beyond. Others have said this notion is not only false but derogatory to the victims of genocide. Yet one group that hasn’t said much about this is historians of genocide. Does history support the idea of a trans genocide? Can there even be such a thing? If there is, what can be done? Well, I am a historian who has studied genocide, mostly the late Ottoman Armenian genocide, as well as a trans woman, and I am here to answer all of these questions in this essay.
Before we even begin, we must define genocide. This is easier said than done. Most historians of genocide do not use the colloquial definition of genocide offered by say the Oxford dictionary, but rather use the definition of genocide founded in international law. For this essay, that is the definition we will use. The term was coined by Polish Jewish lawyer Raphael Lempkin in his 1944 book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe. In this book he states, “By ‘genocide’ we mean the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group. This new word, coined by the author to denote an old practice in its modern development, is made from the ancient Greek word genos (race, tribe) and the Latin cide (killing). Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. Genocide is directed against the national group as an entity, and the actions involved are directed against individuals, not in their individual capacity, but as members of the national group.”
Of course, the keen eyed among you see the issue with concept of trans genocide from the beginning if we are using this definition. Transgender people come from many different ethnic groups and national groups, and thus, do not fit in neatly into the conventional notions of genocide. This is a conundrum in which many scholars have struggled against, as oftentimes modern atrocities do not always target specific ethnic groups but rather ideas and political movements. For example, Argentina’s dirty war against suspected leftist groups in the 1970s. As such, a broader word to define such atrocities that are close to genocide but not fully analogous was created by Lempkin as well; ethnocide.
Bartolomé Clavero describes the difference between the two words as, "Genocide kills people while ethnocide kills social cultures through the killing of individual souls.” In this, we see that transgender culture, while not monolithic in and of itself, does fall into this definition. As such, the attempted elimination of transgender culture and wider gay culture on the whole would be covered under the definition of ethnocide. This includes drag bans, pronoun bans, bathroom bans, and more all aimed at the elimination of transgender people from daily life.
However, as I will lay out later, the threat to transgender people in the US and beyond goes beyond simply eliminating trans people from everyday life and forcing them back in the closet. In some cases it utilizes withholding medical treatment, which can be seen as a genocidal act according to international law. Also worth mentioning is the stochastic nature of violence against trans people as opposed to simple government ordered mass killings. Critics may point out this as evidence against genocide, but the opposite is actually true. Genocide does not mean direct action of elimination, it can also mean indirect action of elimination. For instance, during the Armenian genocide, many deported Armenians were attacked by Kurdish and Arab tribesmen while on the roads between Aleppo and Meskene in modern day Syria. How was this a genocidal act? Ottomans in the Committee of Union and Progress knew that ethnic conflict could erupt on these roads, but did nothing to stop it. In fact, they were hoping such violence would happen and would spare them some of the blame for the forcible deportations of Armenians. That willful disregard for Armenian lives and intent to endanger them is what makes this particular act genocidal. What truly matters in the crime of genocide, is intent.
For the sake of simplicity, for the rest of the essay I will be discussing the crimes of genocide and ethnocide interchangeably. Keep in mind there is an academic difference between them in accordance with international law and philosophy, but to be frank given the current moment in history we are experiencing, I think that distinction only serves to be a distraction. The actual discussion we should be having, and the question we should be asking, is if there is an attempt to eliminate trans people and culture through a political project in the United States of America currently? I find the answer to be a resounding yes. Whether that technically fits into the definition of genocide or ethnocide is besides the point.
But how do we know there is political project that aims to eliminate trans people? How can we tell if I am just being hysterical or over exaggerating? Let’s perform a bit of historical analysis. Let’s take one real Genocide, one fake genocide, and the current acts towards trans people, compare them, and see towards which side the supposed trans genocide is most comparable to.
As I said before, I am most familiar with the Armenian genocide, and I find that most people ignore you when you start talking about the Nazis, so let’s begin here.
What was the Armenian genocide? It was an attempt by the Ottoman State under the ‘three pashas’ and the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) to eliminate the Armenian people as an ethnic group. Why was this carried out? Outwardly, the deportation of Armenians was said to be a humanitarian act to protect them from the Russian army. Inwardly, The CUP believed that in order to preserve the Ottoman Empire, they must create an Ottoman national identity from their cosmopolitan empire; a national identity that mostly took from the Turkish national identity at the expense of all others, as most CUP members were Turks. The Armenians were seen as too disloyal to be allowed to stay in the empire, and as such had to be eliminated. Other ethnic minorities such as the Assyrians and Greeks were targeted as well. Who carried this out? The ottoman state, including police and army, as well as the aforementioned Kurds and Arab tribesmen who attacked the Armenians during their deportation. Prominent Armenian scholars in Constantinople were arrested and deported on April 24, 1915. Paramilitary groups accompanied these Armenians to the desert and besides from turning a blind eye to attacks by local ethnic groups, also committed countless rapes, murders, and deprived the Armenians of food and water along the journey. The planners included the three pashas, Mehmed Talaat Pasha, Ismail Enver Pasha, and Ahmed Cemal Pasha, other members of the secret society The Committee of Union and Progress, as well as various other Turkish nationalists. The outcome was a near complete eradication of the Armenian people in eastern Anatolia, with estimates ranging from 600,000 to 1.5 million dead and many more living in exile from their homeland. What proof do we have that this occurred? We have private communiques from the Committee of Union and Progress before and after the fact detailing extermination plans, countless eyewitness testimonies of abuses during the deportation not only from the victims and perpetrators but by third parties looking on, such as the many American missionaries in the region.
Now that we have a real genocide to ground ourselves, what does genocide NOT look like? The classic example of what genocide is not is the myth of white genocide. What is white genocide? White genocide is the belief that white people writ large are being ‘replaced’ in what is known as the ‘great replacement’ in the ‘west’ broadly. Notice immediately how much more vague and broad this definition is compared to the Armenian genocide. We’ll get back to that later. Why is white genocide being carried out? It depends on who you ask. Most peddlers of this conspiracy theory believe it is being carried out under the guise of ‘equity and inclusion’. They claim whatever group (mostly the jews) is subtly influencing migration laws and creating propaganda to ‘outbreed’ the majority white population of the west to the end of eradicating white people all together. After whites are eradicated, this group will have unparalleled world domination, as they believe other non-white peoples are easier to control. Who is carrying this out? Again, these answers vary wildly. George Soros is a common person said to be committing white genocide, alongside Bill Gates and a grab bag of hollywood actors and actresses. Organizations like the International Monetary Fund or the World Trade Organization are also said to be involved, as well as politicians ranging from Joe Biden to Angela Merkle. What is the outcome? Mostly speculative. Believers will point to the growing number of African and Middle Eastern refugees in Europe, declining birth rates in the western world, and the fact that very soon America might become a ‘minority majority’ nation. They claim the deaths involved in this genocide are the white people who never got to live. The suffering of whites under non-white governance is also cited as damage caused by white genocide . What proof do we have of this? Next to nothing. Some charts detailing demographic trends that usually are cropped to exclude what the actual researchers believe is the causality of these shifts, snippets of audio from various conferences or public speeches that are widely misconstrued or just outright fabricated, and wild speculation.
Can you see the differences between real and imagined genocide? What makes a genocide becomes clear the moment these two examples are set side by side. For one, the myth of white genocide is much more vague and speculative, with an overall goal that is confused and muddy. Why are non-whites easier to control than whites? Why would the Jews want to eradicate whites? How exactly is banking on demographic shifts that take tens if not hundreds of years a sound strategy for world domination? With the Armenian genocide, the goals are clear. There is an underlying belief that recent losses of territory of the Ottoman empire are due to nationalism. One of the major groups organizing national movements is the Armenians. Therefore, the Armenians are a threat to the Empire and must be dealt with. The sources are where these two differ the most. While there are mountains upon mountains of different documents from all imaginable perspectives on the Armenian genocide, there is nothing of the sort for white genocide. Only soundbites and baseless conspiracy theories. The three pashas wrote with glee their plans and ultimately did little to hide them. They boasted about their genocide and recorded it so all time could see their misdeeds. They never apologized or made any mistake over what they had done, there was no need to. To them, they did nothing wrong.
Now let’s turn our attention to trans genocide. For this, I will focus on the actions certain US states have taken, as well as proponents of national Us trans policy. I will not be focusing on the worldwide backlash against LGBTQ people and specifically trans people, especially in Russia and China, but do note that these are also going on simultaneously. During the writing of this essay, Russia launched a huge attack on LGBT people. They raided gay bars and arrested hundreds, and made being gay illegal in Russia. Please keep an international perspective in mind when listening to this as well, even though I don’t discuss it here. Bear in mind also that these atrocities are also influenced by money and power originating from the US as well. There is no uni-national perspective in this world of international communication.
So what is trans genocide? It is the current ongoing attempt at elimination of transgender people in America. Why is this being carried out? The stated justification is to protect children and other vulnerable people from potentially damaging medical treatments. The actual goal is to divide the lgbt community, create inroads to further push for stripping of rights of gay people, gain political power by scapegoating a minority, and to punish a minority that is very vocal in its disdain for the conservative political agenda. Hatred and bigotry are core to the reasons why trans people are being targeted today. Who is carrying this out? Republican Party officials, such as Ron DeSantis and Donald Trump, the Republican voter base organized under various political and paramilitary groups like Moms for liberty or the proud boys, trans exclusionary radical feminists like Kelly Jay Keane, and anti trans psychologists and organizations like the American college of pediatrics, Ray Blanchard and his colleagues, and Genspect under Stella O’Malley. All funded by billionaires like Joseph Edelman and other dark money donors. What are the outcomes? Overall, since this is still ongoing, we don’t know. But there has been a rise in anti trans violence, laws targeting trans people including limiting their accommodations and healthcare. The ultimate goal appears to be making being trans in public, and perhaps in private, illegal. The 2025 mandate for leadership written by the conservative heritage foundation claims that transgender people are inherently ‘pornographic’ and that ‘pornography is not protected by the first amendment and should be outlawed’. It states that librarians and teachers that disseminate books with gay or trans themes should be registered as sex offenders. This, coupled with Florida law allowing sex offenders to face the death penalty, indicates that at least some of the individuals within the Republican Party and conservative apparatus are laying the groundwork for an extermination of trans people under the guise of stopping child sexual abuse. What proof do we have of this? We have several email communications between various anti trans groups outlining their plan to first target young trans people under 18 before moving onto the broader population as a whole. They talk gleefully about a “holy war” against the LGBTQ community. Religious allusions to crusades and driving out the forces of Satan are rampant throughout these emails. We also have private discord logs from servers that house anti trans parents and therapists, with the second in command of genspect claiming that “the ultimate goal is the abolishment of transitioning for everyone” but they should “first focus on children under 25”. The manifesto “The Mandate for Leadership” previously discussed is also damning evidence of an attempt to eliminate trans people, with this piece being much more explicit than most in its advocacy for dismantling the US government and installing a theocratic authoritarian state to achieve that goal. Even self proclaimed “moderate” organizations like the UK based Sex Matters have been slowly but surely trying to erode trans healthcare, as a new statement by them says the group aims to pass legislation to “ban modern conversion therapy”, which it says “involves children and vulnerable people being told that if they don’t fit in as a girl or a boy, woman or man, there is something wrong with their body and they need to be fixed with hormones and surgery.” This reversal of the definition of conversion therapy to include gender affirming care but exclude actual conversion therapy for trans people is a calculated effort to promote more hard line anti-trans ideas to a more liberal audience. Former detransitioner and trans rights advocate Lee Leveille confirms as such in his essay “I’m A Trans Person That Helped Found a “Detransition Advocacy” Organization”, saying board members on the Gender Care Consumer Advocacy Network actively tried to encourage Democrats in Ohio to be softer and more ‘nuanced’ on a conversation therapy ban in the state.
Given the examples of the real Armenian genocide and the fake white genocide, where does trans genocide fall? It is, unequivocally, more similar to the real genocide than a fake conspiracy theory. The most important piece of evidence showing this is the sources. Notice how the sources for Armenian and trans genocide are direct, methodical, and straightforward, whereas sources for white genocide are vague at best and nonexistent at worst. No one in power has come forward to directly claim they wish to end the white race by replacing them with immigrants. People in power have come forward claiming they wish to end the existence of the Armenian people. People in power have come forward to claim they wish to end the existence of trans people. As a historian, sourcing is extremely important to this line of work. It is the evidence we use to make our historical claims. Without it, the entire field of history wouldn’t exist. So when I hear people argue that trans genocide is fake or compare it to white genocide, I find their dismissal of overwhelming evidence rather telling. They are usually arguing in bad faith. To them this is all unsubstantiated hysteria, when in reality it is a very credible and real fear. Time will tell if the worst comes to pass, but rest assured, if it does, those same people will claim they never saw it coming and there was nothing we could do to stop it.
Trans genocide is real, and it is much closer than you think.
But this essay is not designed to fearmonger. I am not here to preach doom and gloom. There are ways out. There is plenty of hope. Genocide is never an inevitability. The question now is obvious: what are we to do? How can we stand against this well organized, well funded threat? The answer can be summed up in two words: be annoying. If there is anything to learn from history, it is that complacency is what really facilitates genocide, not furvor. Take for instance the case of mass killings in Argentina. How was this military junta who operated with near impunity for a decade brought down? Moms. During the junta Argentina would routinely kidnap, torture, and rape suspected political dissidents and leftists. They were taken on so called “death flights”; helicopter flights where victims were stripped naked, drugged, and thrown out of helicopters over the river Plate so their bodies would wash ashore in Buenos Aires and terrify the local population into submission. With so many missing, a group of unlikely heroes rose to the occasion. The mothers of Plaza De Mayo, named as such because of the central plaza where they marched, formed from families and concerned citizens of the so called ‘disappeared’; those taken by the Junta. The government’s cruel response and disappearance of several mothers and nuns in the group, combined with the international pressure applied after the Argentine World Cup in 1978, would lead to cracks forming in the government. They could get away with disappearing young males, they could not with old mothers. Eventually this forced the government to take drastic measures to recoup popular support. In 1982 the Junta invaded the Falkland Islands, in a desperate move to get a win over an ailing Great Britain. It was a huge gamble that backfired. With poor performance in the war, most notably the sinking of the General Belgrano, the Junta collapsed. Democracy was restored to Argentina in 1983. The continued pressure of the mothers of the Plaza de Mayo led to a trial of the Junta leaders in 1985, earning some justice for the victims and defeating fascism in Argentina.
Successful resistance was even achieved against the Nazis and their genocides. Aktion T4 was the first campaign of mass murder taken up by the German Reich. It was designed to be a euthanasia program for disabled people. Though there was heavy propaganda to justify the killings, they were mostly carried out in secret after a decision by Hitler to begin extermination came down in 1939. Opposition actually began from religious objections, most notably from Catholics. In 1940, following pressure from those Catholic families around Munster, the Catholic Church decreed that the killings went against Divine law. The Bishop of Munster, Clemens August Graf Von Galen, went further and preached a series of 4 sermons that condemned the actions of the gestapo in seizing church property and their monstrous killings of the disabled and infirm without the knowledge of their families. Because of these protests and others by Protestants, the killings were officially suspended on august 24, 1941. Hitler, angered by Galen but realizing his popularity and connections to the Catholic Church, vowed to ‘deal with him’ after the war.
However this episode does showcase some pitfalls in mounting successful anti-fascist campaigns. The catholic church’s involvement in the reich is already a fairly complex and convoluted history, made even more so by the fact that many valuable sources are sealed inside the Vatican’s vaults. Aktion t4 showed that at least, tentatively, the church was willing to condemn the Nazi regime. But, their hesitation and complacency blunted whatever good they tried to do. After the official suspension of aktion t4, less systemic killings of the disabled and elderly were still carried out in various parts of the Reich. Those originally in charge of the operation were transferred to the eastern front for Operation Reinhard, aka the final solution to the Jewish question. The church, being content that their property would no longer be stolen and their clergy protected, did little to continue protesting the Nazi regime, even as harrowing reports of Jewish extermination poured in from various convents and churches in Poland and elsewhere. The Catholic Church’s hesitancy in full throated condemnation stems from their geopolitical ties to the reich. Their ties to the Nazi government and to Mussolini meant they could do little to actually influence policy, lest they damage their reputation with these two countries.
This is an important thing to note when partaking in anti-genocidal and anti fascist action: large well established institutions can only do so much and will not save you. Political parties like the American Democratic Party are much too entrenched in their positions of power to offer truly effective opposition. Don’t get me wrong, they can help. Just like how the Catholic Church influenced policy in Nazi Germany, voting and supporting the Democratic Party can help trans people. After all, wrenching control from the most fanatical supporters of eliminationist laws is a good thing. But it’s not enough. The Democrats' loyalty to institutions like the Supreme Court even when it has been shown these institutions are dysfunctional is their downfall. We cannot rely on them alone to save trans people. If we are to prevent genocide, we must act like the mothers of the Plaza De Mayo. Dedicated mutual aid networks made up of trans people, our families, and our allies fighting hard against government policies towards us. Be visible. Don’t let them disappear you. Erasure and complacency are the tools of genocidal regimes; rob them of those. Remember: be annoying.
Sources:
https://books.google.com/books?id=f_-_0d8JMtEC&pg=PA101#v=onepage&q&f=false
https://www.icrc.org/en/doc/resources/documents/article/other/57jq32.htm
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/17506980211010933
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/health-care/article277853063.html
https://www.transgendermap.com/politics/psychology/ray-blanchard/?amp
https://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.com/project2025/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf
https://slate.com/technology/2023/05/gender-exploratory-therapy-trans-kids-what-is-it.html
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10018052/.
https://kyschevers.medium.com/confessions-of-a-former-crypto-terf-e4ed59d4ec82
https://sex-matters.org/posts/updates/modern-conversion/
https://www.nonviolent-conflict.org/mothers-disappeared-challenging-junta-argentina-1977-1983/
https://archive.org/details/nazidoctorsmedic0000lift
https://archive.org/details/thirdreichatwar00evan_0
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/joseph-edelman-political-donor-transgender_n_653a8605e4b0783c4ba04deb
https://twitter.com/zjemptv/status/1720857969384903043?s=46&t=hYQMmsnAfKSvu4ElEHIqBA
https://atomicgender.com/people/tom-neumark/t-neumark-details/
https://sex-matters.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Banning-modern-conversion-therapy.pdf
https://trans.so/docket/doe-v-ladapo-4-23-cv-00114/189-3.pdf
https://trans.so/docket/index.php?p=doe-v-ladapo-4-23-cv-00114
https://trans.so/docket/index.php?p=doe-v-ladapo-4-23-cv-00114&dl=191.pdf
https://trans.so/docket/doe-v-ladapo-4-23-cv-00114/180-4.pdf
https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/11/there-is-no-trans-genocide/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4802845/
https://progressive.org/magazine/the-coordinated-attack-on-transpeople-tannehill/
https://twitter.com/esqueer_/status/1745497803625799690?s=46&t=hYQMmsnAfKSvu4ElEHIqBA