What Trans Liberation Teaches Us About Authoritarianism & Fighting Back

This post lays out why trans liberation is about dismantling authoritarianism at its root, not just identity politics. From the Stonewall Riots to Compton’s Cafeteria Uprising to present-day mutual aid networks, trans people have resisted authoritarianism long before the word was mainstream.

Photo by Ehimetalor Akhere Unuabona / Unsplash

Trans Liberation Is Not a Side Issue, It’s the Blueprint

Authoritarian regimes thrive on conformity. They demand obedience, suppress deviation, and punish those who refuse to fit their mold. In this structure, trans people pose an existential threat. Not because of who they are, but because of what they reveal:

That the state’s binaries are a lie. That bodies are not the government’s to define. That freedom cannot be legislated into a cage.

Across history, trans people have been the canaries in the coal mine of fascism—first to be targeted, erased, detained, and killed. And yet, they are also among the first to resist, organize, and survive.

This post lays out why trans liberation is about dismantling authoritarianism at its root, not just identity politics.

Authoritarianism Requires Gender Conformity

Authoritarian power depends on rigid hierarchies. This includes the classic pillars of race, class, religion AND gender. Gender norms are not neutral cultural values; they are instruments of control.

Historically:

Nazi Germany criminalized homosexuality and sent trans people to concentration camps.
Francoist Spain outlawed “public scandal” laws to silence gender nonconformity.
Putin’s Russia and Orban’s Hungary have passed sweeping anti-LGBTQ laws restricting gender identity, education, and documentation.

In each case, enforcing the gender binary becomes a mechanism for reinforcing totalitarian values: obedience, heteronormativity, and reproductive control.

“A society with rigid gender roles is a society easier to control. It teaches people to fear deviation, to self-police, to obey.” — Dean Spade

Project 2025 follows this exact authoritarian playbook. In its 920-page blueprint for a second Trump term, the authors argue that sex is “immutable” and should be the sole basis of legal rights and public policy:

“Sex is not ‘assigned’ at birth; it is identified and recorded, like every other observable physical trait. The human race comes in two sexes, male and female. Period.” — Project 2025: Mandate for Leadership, p. 479

This statement appears in the Health and Human Services section authored by Roger Severino, former Director of the Office for Civil Rights under Trump. Severino’s proposals include:

Reversing federal definitions that include gender identity
Eliminating anti-discrimination protections in healthcare
Banning federal funds for institutions that affirm trans existence

In short: erase trans people from law, language, and public life.

Why Trans People Are Among the First Targeted

Authoritarianism begins by testing its violence on the most vulnerable. Trans people are often that test case: a scapegoat whose dehumanization becomes a model for broader repression.

Why?

Visibility: Trans people publicly defy the binaries authoritarian regimes rely on.
Precedent: The state uses anti-trans policy to expand surveillance, censorship, and criminalization.
Mobilization: Transphobia galvanizes a fearful base under the guise of “protecting children.”

Project 2025 outlines how this will be implemented across multiple agencies:

“The next administration should restore a proper understanding of Title IX… and reject the claim that Title IX covers ‘gender identity.’ Schools that persist in violating biological reality should be denied federal funds.” — Project 2025: Mandate for Leadership, p. 554

This includes:

Revoking protections for trans students
Criminalizing healthcare for trans youth
Redefining “civil rights” to exclude gender identity entirely

This is bio-political authoritarianism—an attempt to control not just what people do, but who they are allowed to be.

To exist as trans is to resist a regime that tells you: You are not real. We will make you disappear.

Trans Resistance Is Abolitionist Praxis

The logic of trans existence is the logic of abolition:

It refuses state-imposed identity
It exposes the violence of medical, legal, and educational systems
It insists that liberation means transformation, not assimilation

From the Stonewall Riots (led by Sylvia Rivera and Marsha P. Johnson) to Compton’s Cafeteria Uprising to present-day mutual aid networks, trans people have resisted authoritarianism long before the word was mainstream.

“We have to be visible. We should not be ashamed of who we are.” — Sylvia Rivera

Modern trans organizing includes:

Housing networks for homeless queer youth
HRT sharing and underground clinics when legal access is denied
Direct action against police violence, ICE raids, and anti-trans legislation
Legal resistance against attempts to redefine civil rights protections

These strategies mirror abolitionist frameworks: build survival outside the system, and dismantle what harms.

Project 2025 and the War on Bodily Autonomy

Project 2025 is not a neutral policy platform. It’s a coordinated authoritarian manifesto and its attack on trans rights is foundational to its larger agenda: gender essentialism as state policy.

What it proposes:

Department of Education: Strip Title IX of gender identity protections (p. 551–555)
Department of Justice: Prosecute providers of gender-affirming care (p. 363)
Department of HHS: Dismantle Office for Civil Rights enforcement authority (p. 474– 481)
Religious Liberty framework: Use “conscience rights” to justify denial of care

The logic is clear: if you can erase the legal category of trans people, you can justify the dismantling of the entire civil rights infrastructure.

Trans Liberation Is for Everyone

When trans people demand the right to define themselves, they aren’t just defending their own lives, they’re reimagining freedom for all of us.

Trans liberation offers a roadmap for:

Rejecting control-based systems
Creating care-based infrastructure
Protecting bodily autonomy as a non-negotiable right
Living beyond the state’s imagination

If trans people can survive the total denial of their existence, they can teach us all how to resist authoritarian erasure.

This is not identity politics. This is a resistance blueprint.

Call to Action: Protect Trans Lives. Fight Authoritarianism.

1. Support Trans-Led Mutual Aid

For the Gworls - LINK
Transgender Law Center - LINK
Trans Lifeline Microgrants - LINK

2. Resist Project 2025’s Gender Agenda

Demand your local/state reps pass trans protections now
Call out attempts to erase trans people from public schools, healthcare, and the law
Challenge narratives rooted in gender essentialism

3. Learn From Trans Abolitionist Thinkers

Dean Spade – Mutual Aid
Tourmaline – Black trans archives & abolition
Imara Jones – TransLash Media