This chapter explores the traditional strategies for democratic defense developed in response to the rise of fascism in the twentieth century within the context of American political constraints and constitutional jurisprudence. Democracy is not naturally occurring. It demands the intentional commitment, and recommitment, to a shared future based on shared values. During periods of political polarization and economic stress, authoritarianism offers the illusion of unity through restrictive and exclusionary policies that promise a return to a “great mythic past.” The twentieth century democratic defense scholarship grappled with how to resist the appeal of the easy but dangerously costly answers offered by antidemocratic movements. Building on this democratic defense scholarship, this chapter recognizes the limitations of implementing intentionally antiauthoritarian safeguards within the American constitutional and political context. As an alternative, it proposes the development of a nonlinear, collaborative queer and trans liberation agenda and outlines a practice of queer transformative democratic resistance that is founded in principles of social movement theory.

This chapter examines intensifying state-led attacks on LGBTQ people and reproductive rights in the United States through the lens of patriarchal authoritarianism. It connects the rise of the worldwide anti-gender movement with the historic exploitation of preexisting patriarchal power disparities by fascist and authoritarian regimes. It exposes the retrenchment towards state control over reproductive, bodily, and sexual autonomy as a tangible marker of a nation’s transition towards patriarchal authoritarianism and a time-tested fascistic tool. Patriarchy can be wielded as a fascistic tool and help facilitate a slide into authoritarianism by expanding social control and narrowing acceptable expressions of individuality, dignity, and freedom. Patriarchy excludes women from the public sphere while also exerting control throughout the private sphere of the family. Patriarchal authoritarianism further reinscribes patriarchy by exerting state control over reproduction, sexuality, and the family. Restricting opportunities for women and narrowing avenues for gender and sexual expression support the consolidation of power by limiting individuality and nonconformity.

The conclusion describes queer and trans transformative democratic resistance as a defiant practice – driven by stubborn authenticity, joy, and empathy. It retains our humanity and works to restore that of others. However, the conclusion recognizes that this is not an exercise in certainty or fearlessness. Our defiance should not be mistaken for ignorance or denial. Instead, it is recognition of our role within the steady march that sustained queer and trans communities before Stonewall, before AZT and PrEP, and long before marriage equality. It is foundational to individual liberation and resistance within today’s rising authoritarian climate, and it will be our engine for the future.

This chapter shifts addresses the advocacy agenda of the LGBTQ rights movement, specifically the pivotal role played by the US Supreme Court. In less than two decades, the Court recognized the right to engage in same-sex sex, mandated recognition of same-sex marriage, and interpreted Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act to include discrimination on the basis of transgender status and sexual orientation as prohibited forms of sex discrimination. These developments fundamentally altered the legal lives of LGBTQ people. However, systemic efforts to undermine the integrity of the courts threaten these victories and the lives built around them. This chapter concludes that the current dominant interpretive approach of the US Supreme Court, known as originalism, is overly restrictive and arguably an expression of restorative nostalgia that prevents the Court from fulfilling its duty as a constitutionally mandated check against tyranny. An independent judiciary can serve as a powerful bulwark against democratic decline; however, courts can also provide a powerful legal veneer for otherwise patently autocratic policies. Democracy scholars refer to this as autocratic legalism. The increasing specter of autocratic legalism in the Unites States threatens to diminish the role of the Court as a tool for democratic self-defense.

This chapter addresses the deepening crisis of democratic decline and political instability in the United States. It charts the erosion of our longstanding democratic norms and institutions and explores the contours of foundational terms, such as authoritarianism, fascism, fascistic tools, and autocratic legalism. By examining the American experience in the broader global context of democratic backsliding, this chapter explains how attempts to consolidate power by imposing conformity and restricting individual rights can serve as an early warning signal of a fascistic rise. It asserts that the most recent attacks against LGBTQ people in the Unites States are part of a dangerous antidemocratic movement using scapegoating and demonization to stoke populist anger. Through this lens, the MAGA movement’s flagship policies of gender conformity and patriarchy are both a symptom of democratic decline and a fascistic tool that can be used to consolidate power. Although many Americans have only recently begun to come to terms the realities of our democratic decline, generations of queer and transgender people have spent their lifetimes navigating the fault lines of this unfolding crisis.

This chapter continues the discussion of the advocacy agenda of the LGBTQ rights movement by examining the development of the institution-based civil rights advocacy that came to define the movement during the Obama and Biden administrations. During this period, the LGBTQ rights movement secured a rapid expansion of LGBTQ rights through a combined campaign of impact litigation and congressional and administrative lobbying that was bolstered by public advocacy campaigns, corporate outreach, media buy-in, and public education. Although effective in the moment, this approach is highly dependent on functioning democratic institutions and ultimately produced gains that have been revealed to be all too temporal. This chapter critiques the constraints of civil rights advocacy in the age of neoliberalism and explains how institutional-based lobbying fundamentally narrowed the horizon of LGBTQ resistance from a potentially expansive and creative democratic project into to a competitive, rights-bound universe. It concludes that the queer and trans movements must embrace the work of democratic creation and transformation as part of a broader pro-democracy or democratic resistance movement.

The Introduction explains how queer and trans survival is inextricable bound to the future of American democracy. While acknowledging the flawed history of American democracy, it outlines the inherently liberatory values of our democratic system and the importance of democratic longevity, especially to queer and trans people. The Introduction examines the bellwethers of an authoritarian slide and explores that ways that queer and trans people are uniquely situated to help stop the slide and effect meaningful change as members of an expansive transformative, pro-democracy or democratic resistance movement. It cautions that although history does not repeat itself, it does rhyme, and our challenge is to learn from the gift of hindsight.

This chapter looks beyond traditional concepts of democratic defense and provides a framework for the queer and trans community to engage in the process of democratic creation within the broader pro-democracy and democratic resistance movements. It argues that the queer and trans experience with rejection, vulnerability, and collaborative survival has uniquely prepared us to navigate the unfolding American democratic crisis. It encourages LGBTQ people to embrace the powerful status of being an “outsider” in service to the larger democratic project. Rooted in feminist and queer theory, this chapter concludes that both our societally manufactured difference and our innate equal dignity and humanity can help us to see beyond the restrictive binary thinking of mainstream society. This chapter argues that pro-democracy movements must be fueled by a commitment to collaborative survival and mutual aid. It recognizes that the celebration of our authentic expression and humanity are radically pro-democratic actions, especially when faced with state mandated conformity.

This chapter explores the use of restorative nostalgic political propaganda by antidemocratic forces to pursue a myth of a “golden age” and reinstate policies built on racism, homophobia, transphobia, and misogyny. Although conservative political figures in the US have long capitalized on the allure of restorative nostalgia to delegitimize progressive social and political reforms, today’s populist MAGA movement is different in both kind and degree. In a quest to “make America great again,” the MAGA movement aims to turn the clock back on decades of social justice gains by villainizing the social progress and expansion of rights that have made many of our lives possible. This chapter explains the historic use of restorative nostalgic propaganda by fascist regimes to blame modernity and the expansion of civil and political rights for the loss of a “great mythic past” defined by simplicity and prosperity. Under this view, individuals who advocate for progressive reforms are demonized and branded as enemies of the state. Restorative nostalgic political propaganda demands the exclusion and erasure of nonconforming individuals to restore the “simple life” and regain national glory.