- The Guardian
- Issue #2132
Reactionaries don’t need to be popular to stay in power – they just need to keep us distracted. While the cost-of-living spirals, wages stagnate, and unions face relentless attacks, the right zeroes in on convenient scapegoats: banning trans healthcare, stirring up fear around migrants, or launching moral panics about education.
In all of these so-called “culture wars,” the objective is the same: create a wedge within the working class, pitting us against each other so we don’t unite against the real culprits – bosses, landlords, and complicit politicians.
In Queensland, we see this tactic in the Liberal National Party’s (LNP) ban on hormone treatments for trans youth.
Once any minority group is successfully targeted, broader rights – including workers’ rights – are at risk.
The LNP’s ban on puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy for minors is a direct assault on what the Australian Medical Association (AMA), the Endocrine Society of Australia, and many global health bodies deem vital medical care. The LNP cites the UK’s ban as “proof” of doubt about these treatments, pointing to the controversial Cass Review, widely criticised for bias and minimal input from trans people or experienced clinicians.
They also raise allegations of malpractice at a single Cairns clinic to justify outlawing an entire field of healthcare. If one doctor mis-prescribed insulin, would we ban all diabetics from accessing it? Obviously not.
Dr Nick Yim, AMA Queensland president, puts it plainly: “We cannot let a knee-jerk reaction to an isolated incident deprive people of the care they need.” Instead of a targeted investigation, the LNP has imposed a blanket ban – a political decision, not a medical one.
Health Minister Tim Nicholls claims “children’s wellbeing” is his priority, but his actions tell a different story. This ban ignores decades of puberty blockers being safely used for conditions like precocious puberty or endometriosis – only now declared “dangerous” in the context of trans youth. Nicholls also dismisses last year’s independent review of the Queensland Children’s Gender Service, which found no evidence of coercion and recommended expanding these services instead of slashing them.
This inconsistency reveals the true motive: weaponising transphobia to distract from skyrocketing rents, flat wages, and underfunded public services. Queensland’s LNP is simply mimicking the international trend of anti-trans bans in the UK and various US states, all under the guise of “protecting children” – while stubbornly refusing to address genuine crises in healthcare, housing, and education.
Such attacks can only gain traction when working-class power is diminished and left-wing alternatives aren’t clearly on offer. After Hawke and Keating adopted neoliberal reforms – privatising industries, slashing union power, and overhauling the economy – many workers felt abandoned. By the time John Howard took power, the labour movement was weakened, and he could intensify anti-union policies and push a regressive agenda on social issues.
Today’s Queensland LNP ban on trans healthcare is cut from the same cloth: distract from dire economic realities – low wages, high rents – and test how easily a wedge issue can divide the working class, opening the door for bigger attacks on unions, social services, and civil liberties.
From Queensland to Westminster to US state legislatures, conservative governments keep adopting the same playbook. They demonise minorities, amplify culture wars, and escalate police powers to distract from austerity, wage theft, or climate inaction.
Australia isn’t immune: attacks on the CFMEU, hostility to pro-Palestine demonstrations, and the clampdown on climate protesters are all part of the same divide-and-conquer strategy as well as trying to suppress dissent. It flourishes whenever genuine working-class political power hasn’t honed our strategy of organising and standing together no matter what the issue is.
Transphobia, like other social oppressions and discrimination, is more than personal prejudice. Historically, capitalism and colonialism forced rigid gender norms to control labour and reproduction. Today, politicians use transphobia to split the working class – if we’re busy debating who “deserves” rights, we’re less likely to unite the working class over shared economic interests.
Each time trans people are stripped of vital healthcare, it normalises the idea that some groups are disposable. That opens the way for further oppression, from clamping down on unions to tightening protest laws. In that sense, “culture wars” aren’t beside class politics – they’re a strategic part of it.
Within left circles, there’s a recurring worry: that prioritising trans rights (or other social issues) detracts from key economic battles. But that is exactly how divide-and-conquer succeeds. If we act like trans healthcare is a sideshow, we allow reactionaries to shape the narrative – and to isolate and target small groups now, so they can come after broader worker protections later.
Moreover, bigotry doesn’t pull the vast majority of workers into unions or campaigns. Aside from a fringe of ultra-conservatives, people generally organise because they need decent wages, job security, and affordable housing. Politicians dangle hate to distract us from these unifying on these bread-and-butter issues. Ignoring the culture war doesn’t stop it; it just gives the right a free pass to inflame prejudices and fracture solidarity.
That’s why we must hold the line on any attack aimed at marginalised communities whether it be people with disability, mental illness or First Australians. The best traditions of the labour movement insist that an attack on one is an attack on all. This principle isn’t just moral – it’s a tactical necessity. If we let trans rights slip now, tomorrow it could be migrant rights, then union rights, then the right to strike.
A crucial part of refusing to let culture-war debates divide us is not engaging in bad-faith arguments about whether a minority “deserves” healthcare or dignity. We hold it as non-negotiable that no worker’s rights are up for debate. This stance unites us around a simple truth: scapegoating is a tool for exploitation. By defending trans workers and trans youth today, we strengthen the entire working class and close off reactionary avenues for future attacks.
Social controversies, from trans healthcare bans to anti-immigrant rhetoric, are calculated attempts to split the working class. Ignoring these attacks won’t preserve our unity; it will give reactionaries free rein to shape the conversation and pick off different groups one by one. Only by actively defending every section of our class can we prevent these wedge tactics from undermining our power.
When we stand in solidarity with trans youth, we’re defending more than one group’s rights – we’re defending the principle that no worker can be cast aside for political expediency. That unity is what truly frightens the establishment and their corporate allies.
By ceding nothing on social issues, we make it impossible for them to divide us, and we lay the foundations for a working-class movement strong enough to fight for all – on wages, housing, healthcare, and beyond. That’s how we break the cycle of distraction and exploitation, and build a future where no one’s rights are ever negotiable.
