From WNYC Studios. I'm Brian Lerer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Monday, February 26th.

I got a promotional mail recently from the conservative Hillsdale College in Hillsdale, Michigan, advertising their

school and looking for donations. The very first line of the letter says, if we're going to save

America from the growing threats of socialism, transgenderism, and Marxism, there's only one way

we can do it, education. And I thought, okay, fine, a college that offers an

education based on political conservatism. They're allowed. We're a politically diverse country.

It's a private college. People can get educated in the context that they choose. But then I thought

about that opening sentence. And I thought, which one of these does not belong? Which one of the three

things that they claim they're trying to save America from? Socialism, Marxism, and

transgenderism. Now, socialism and Marxism, you can believe in them or not. Okay, fine.

But transgenderism? How you experience your own body as an ism, a belief system,

a political philosophy, that's just hate speech to my eye. It's like saying we should save the

country from left-handedism or blue-eyeism. The trans people I know didn't choose what gender they

experienced themselves to be by way in competing isms, like some audience member in a political

debate. So here's a college that's fundraising off the idea that one of the three big threats

to the country is a belief system that isn't a

belief system. Maybe they should be saying our college helps make America safe for otherism,

labeling people who are different from the majority or different from you as threats to the

social order. I had a similar thought when I saw the news last week that the Nassau County Executive on Long

Island, Bruce Blakman, banned transgender girls and women from playing in school sports on any

Nassau County athletic facilities. That's around 100 ball fields, ice rings, and other facilities.

Blakeman said, quote, there's too much bullying going on of biological hundred ball fields, ice rings, and other facilities.

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