Brooklyn Political Clubs Will Not Invite Candidate Maud Maron to Planned NY-10 Forum
Brooklyn Political Clubs Will Not Invite Candidate Maud Maron to Planned NY-10 Forum
In the political sphere, there are often candidates who use whatever platform they have to scapegoat the most vulnerable people in our society to win an imaginary culture war. We are Brooklyn-based political clubs working every day to highlight candidates who respect the dignity of all New Yorkers and offer clear, material policies meant to empower - not harm - people. With the welfare of the LGBTQ+ community in mind, we – Lambda Independent Democrats, New Kings Democrats, Brooklyn Young Democrats, South Central Brooklyn United for Progress, Equality NY – have collectively decided not to invite NY-10 candidate Maud Maron to participate in an upcoming forum that features many of her opponents.
Maud Maron exemplifies this gross misuse of a public platform to spread hate and misinformation around gender identity and the transgender community. Maron, a candidate for Congress in New York’s 10th district, uses her platform on social media to instigate a moral panic around gender identity, intentionally citing falsehoods and scientific inaccuracies to justify bigotry against the transgender community. As volunteer-led clubs that help everyday Brooklynites learn about candidates running for office and advocate on behalf of their communities, we will not provide a platform for Maron or her bigotry.
One particular example is Maron’s apparent concerns around President Biden's recent decision to expand Title IX, which originally protected students from sexual discrimination in educational programs and activities, to also include protections on the basis of gender identity. She explained in one op-ed: "[Biden’s] proposed changes are in response to trans activists who want to replace the protected classification of biological sex with that of gender identity so that men who want to be women will be treated as though they are women. Women lose out under this reformulation." Maud Maron goes on to add she does “not consent to anyone teaching my children that gender identity exists”.
This is not only inaccurate but part of a repeated effort from individuals like Maron to imply the mere existence of transwomen means cisgender women lose some apparatus of power, though it is never explained clearly how this displacement exists. We note that Maron does not make these same curious equivocations with “biological men” losing out to transgender men in any of her writings. Often the moral panic centers transgender women specifically as if their existence denotes some existential and physical threat to cisgender women. It is easy to reduce the humanity of someone when you paint them as a threat.
We emphasize concerns like these as they are often the foundational signals leading up to the justification of violence against transgender people, in particular transgender women. Throughout this country, Republicans are using similar fear-mongering (such as perpetuating cruelly inaccurate assumptions about transgender girls and women participating in competitive sports) to forge the diminution of protections against the transgender community. We know that by reducing the value and worth of a person to some imagined predatory threat, it enables people to carry out the worst against the most marginalized. Beliefs like these stand in contrast to organizations such as the National Medical Association, the National Association of Social Workers, and the American Psychological Association, who all have drafted statements and evidence-informed policy guides on the importance of not only affirming gender identity in transgender youth and adults but creating supportive, safe spaces for the community.
We will not allow our forum to serve as a vehicle for Maud Maron to perpetuate dangerously false ideas about the transgender community. New Yorkers do not need a representative whose office will be used to hurt people.
Lambda Independent Democrats
New Kings Democrats
Brooklyn Young Democrats
South Central Brooklyn United for Progress
Equality New York