I’m fucking a logging, I don’t even care!
First, most of the news I’ve seen and references in this thread seem to be under the impression that this is all stemming from Zooey telling legislators who oppose gender-affirming care for minors that they have “blood on [their] hands.” False! What this is stemming from is Zooey telling legislators who oppose gender-affirming care for minors that he hopes “when [they] bow [their] heads to pray, [they] see blood on [their] hands.”
This is standing out to me for a couple reasons — namely that this “blood on your hands” statement may be unique in its delivery, but he’s been echoing the same sentiment since day one. I looked for like 14 seconds and, even with the influx of news from the last few days, I found an example from February 23 of much the same, as in implying that legislation is killing people, and I know for a fact there are more:
Warning: very dumb article ahead serves as the source.
So this rhetoric from him isn’t new. WHAT IS NEW, however, and what the Speaker is actually referring to as the statement which requires an apology, is the “when you bow your heads to pray … “ part. THAT’S the issue, as I’m perceiving it. He used the opposing legislators’ perceived religious views (which tbf, he’s right, they are mostly non-denom Christians; MT Catholics lean left) as an argument! That’s so objectively inappropriate! It’s (imo) inappropriate when the GOP invokes Christian beliefs as a valid reason in and of themselves for opposing abortion, and it’s inappropriate when Zooey appeals to opposers’ Christian beliefs as a valid reason to flip to his position ( as in implying they’re hypocrites and also are bad at their religion, or, more accurately, as a reason they should feel Very Badly about themselves, huh Zac?).
You shouldn’t be able to single out someone’s religious beliefs in that kind of context, it’s just, it’s just plain inappropriate! It’s bad decorum! It blurs the line between church and state! It has no place in that which should answer to secular laws and rules! THAT’S what the apology is sought for! He offended those guys with that; the way he spoke is probably bordering on blasphemy for some of them, and that’s why stuff like that has no place in these contexts! If it was a tweet, okay, whatever. Tacky and melodramatic, but that’s on brand. But it wasn’t a Tweet, it was in a professional legislative context and it just isn’t right to speak that way to people and evoke their personal religious beliefs like that, no matter which side they’re on or from which side it’s coming. So he should apologize for that; even if he refuses to apologize for the sentiment, it would be enough for him to get his speaking privileges back if he took back that one statement. But he doesn’t want to.
That brings me to my next MATI point!
From
CBS News
So let’s talk about how this is being reported—with a simple and ultimately meaningless apology, because it’s totally legal to apologize without actually feeling remorse for what was done or said, Zac could have restored his right to speak and avoided possible censure, been able to say whatever he was going to say on the bill that started all of this, and allowed the legislature to smoothly finish out the last few days of what has been an objectively pretty long session (January 2nd to now).
Instead, as we’ve seen, he has chosen not to do that. Okay, so why are all the mainstream news outlets burying the lead so hard on that? Why go with the “silencing strong trans woman!!!!!!” narrative when you can go for the “strong trans woman refuses to back down in the face of silencing!” narrative? The latter is more honest AND it still serves their agenda. Why are they burying the lead here? We know they’re fine with spewing violent rhetoric with no intention of apologizing, we’ve all seen it 1,000 times. “MT Representative Zephyr is silenced until an apology is issued. Here are all my loony troon reasons why she shouldn’t have to” type stuff would do the trick to achieve adherence to some level of honesty AND make their point that Zooey is a freedom fighter. I just … I hate all the bullshit, you guys! I hate newspaper editors! The misleading and inaccurate headlines are unironically bad for the world and bad for America! God! When will it end? And honestly, regarding the Speaker, why feed their victim complexes in the first place with this? Everyone gets offended by things; ultimately, when business is at hand at it’s just words, grownups should be able to brush it off and move on, imo, so I personally think there are dweebs on both sides. Business as usual
P.S. I’m laughing that they officially misgendered him in print, and agreeing with everyone who said it was probably genuinely an accident and Zac was all *hand on heart* “How DARE you remind me that everyone around me is aware of a material fact about myself and merely being polite by not mentioning it!”
") where he looks particularly deranged.
