Why I refuse to hate Dylan Mulvaney
Even though it seems like every conservative influencer has tried to make me.
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It shouldn’t be hard to write an essay about why I refuse to hate a person.
But it is hard because I know it’s not in my best interest to write it, and as soon as I hit “publish” the backlash will start. Cries of GROOMER will be heard across the internet (with no sense of irony that I quite literally spend my days researching and exposing actual grooming).
Still, I feel it has to be written…because I think a lot of people out there see this issue as I do, and they’re too afraid to say it because of what the blowback will be.
So I’ll say it: I refuse to hate Dylan Mulvaney.
In fact, I kind of love Dylan Mulvaney.
I love Dylan’s videos. I enjoy them. They make me happy to watch. I could sit there and watch them for hours and be perfectly content. I would absolutely hang out with Dylan - I think it would be fun. I love that her catchphrase is “love ya!” and I find it incredibly endearing.
If I didn’t like Dylan’s videos, do you know what I would do about it?
I wouldn’t watch them.
That’s it.
I just wouldn’t watch them, and then move on with my life.
Dylan is doing nothing wrong, and does not deserve the backlash she’s getting for posting fun videos on the internet that no one is forced to watch.
But let’s back up.
For anyone who has been living under a rock, Dylan Mulvaney is a trans Tik Tok star that doesn’t really need to do much of anything to piss off the political right. Her Days of Girlhood series documenting her transition invites ire simply by existing.
(And yes, I will use she/her pronouns for Dylan because I believe everyone deserves basic respect and dignity and that it looks petty and spiteful not to respect a person with the grace of referring to them how they wish.)
Dylan is over the top in these videos. A Broadway performer prior to the pandemic when her show got shut down, Dylan has a love of flare, performance, and all of the things you would imagine a Broadway performer would love. The personality that Dylan portrays in her videos is something that you would see in a performance on the stage, and because of that, so many people think Dylan is just doing all of this for money.
However, the transition does seem real - Dylan has been on hormones for some time and recently got facial feminization surgery. She seems pretty thrilled with the results so far.
I think that Dylan is a trans person that has created a nice living for themselves by making their journey into a Broadway performance. Except that Dylan’s stage is Tik Tok and she gets to perform in front of more people in a day than she would on a Broadway stage in a lifetime.
And why is there anything wrong with that?
Dylan is obviously a drama kid. She obviously loves acting and singing and dancing and doing all the things anyone who loves performing would do. So, Dylan found a way to take what was going on in her life, add some flare to it, and make a living doing what they love to do.
Don’t we want people to make a living doing something they love? Isn’t that the American dream? Or is it just everyone else that’s allowed to be successful and happy except the people that we disagree ideologically with?
Actors want to make money acting. Successful actors make a lot of money acting. And Dylan is so smart that she came up with a way to do it where she doesn’t even need anyone to write a script for her to do it because she is following the story arc of her own life.
Some people think it’s all fake, but I don’t think so.
It turns out Dylan has ALWAYS been like this. This video was circulated this past week showing Dylan on The Price Is Right, and it looks eerily similar to pretty much every video that Dylan makes today:
Now, I’m no fan of gender ideology, particularly when it’s pushed in K-12 schools. I’m not in favor of anyone medically transitioning before the age of 18 (ideally, they’d wait until they’re 25-years-old - which is how old Dylan is - because that is when the brain fully develops…but if we can die in a war at 18-years-old then we should probably get to make decisions about our body too).
However, if I believe that to be woke is to be an authoritarian (and I do), that means being actively unwoke would be to push back against any ideology that wants to tell adults how to live their lives or express themselves.
I don’t care if people are trans. I don’t care if they’re non-binary. I don’t care if they are flamboyant and love clothes and sparkles and show tunes and make videos about girlhood and put on whole broadway performances celebrating themselves.
I don’t think being against woke ideology means that I automatically have to hate on trans people, and I think we’d be a lot more successful in waking more people up to the dangers of what the far left is doing if the rhetoric on trans people was turned down several notches.
This animosity targeting Dylan Mulvaney makes absolutely no sense to me.
About three months ago, I did a whole stream dedicated to watching Dylan. I suspected that most people didn’t like her without ever having watched her. And it turns out none of the ones she had posted at that time were even that bad.
In the earlier ones, it was obvious that Dylan was trying to find her voice. As she got more popular, she got more confident in it and started to really get to know the person she wanted to be in public.
The video about tampons that got Dylan in internet hot water was followed up with a video of Dylan talking about how she knows she doesn’t get a period (an astonishing admittance for many trans activists) and that she carries them in case she’s with someone who needs one.
I thought that was kind of sweet, and thought about how many times in my life it would have been so helpful and appreciated.
None of the videos we watched were anything to write home about. Even in the one where Dylan is speaking to younger people, she was specific to say that it was ok to slow down and not rush right into transition.
Dylan actually cautioned his audience not to rush into transition - WHICH IS EXACTLY WHAT WE WANT TRANS PEOPLE SAYING - and everyone is still upset.
See for yourself:
In her recent “Day 365” live show - a live Broadwayesque performance celebrating Dylan’s first full year being a girl - she addressed some of the hate she gets directly:
Dylan is talking about having a relationship with God, loving herself, knowing that even through the challenges life throws at you, God didn’t make a mistake. That’s actually a lovely message.
And guess what: I don’t want people who are really trans to believe that God made a mistake with them. We all have different journeys in life, we are all on different paths.
Do people really think it’s a good look for conservatives to be hating on this person so badly?
And, of course, after this video came out, all the Daily Wire hosts issued statements doubling down and, while claiming to be good Catholics/Christians, said some of the most hurtful and unnecessary things. They certainly said things I wouldn’t align with Jesus Christ or his perfect love any day.
If you don’t like someone, fine. But hate watching someone every single day just so you have an opportunity to try to destroy them is pathetic and lame. It doesn’t make you look like the good guys.
Dylan’s real crime in the eyes of the people who hate her is that she’s too successful at what she’s doing.
No one would care at all if Dylan wasn’t successful.
They care because so many people love Dylan, and they just can’t stand it.
But here’s what they don’t understand: Dylan is successful because Dylan is showing love to people. She is making them feel good and forget their worries for a moment.
Attacking her will only bring her more fans and make her more money. If you really want Dylan to fail then just stop watching and talking about her.
Dylan is not our enemy.
I watch far-left progressive/trans/queer/socialist content almost every day of the week. I watch the real stuff, the most dystopian on the internet.
What Dylan is doing is so far from that that they aren’t even in the same league.
When you watch the real stuff, you understand how innocent Dylan is.
I’d rather have someone watch Dylan over the people we watch for Socialism Saturday on my channel every week. And it’s not even close. Dylan can teach them about capitalism when she goes and buys her first designer purse, and then teach them about budgeting by explaining she bought the cheapest one not only because of that but because it would go with everything, so she would use it a lot. That explains a very good purchasing decision.
I would much rather have a teenager watch Dylan teaching them about capitalism than a socialist teaching them about Marxism every day. In Soviet Russia, no one owns designer purse.
I love Dylan.
I’m going to keep watching and enjoying Dylan’s videos.
And I really hope Dylan knows that not everyone on this side of the debate hates her.
Because I don’t want Dylan to get so much hate from people in the anti-woke space that she gets pushed into more extreme beliefs on the left because she thinks that’s the only place for her.
She’s saying pretty measured things right now. It’s a nice balance. I want her to keep talking like that, not getting pushed further and further to the left just to get away from the vitriol on the right.
And I just think it’s all ridiculous.
Can we please focus on something that matters?
What do you think?
Leave a comment and let me know more about what you think!
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Can you name one person who would applaud these videos if they featured an actual biological female? Dylan Mulvaney is a biological male and that is the entire reason anyone pays attention. It is a brilliantly executed troll on the left, the right, TERFs and trans activists, politicians, celebrities, the media. Like the shop teacher in Canada with the enormous fake boobs, but infinitely more successful, despite the acting which is mediocre at best. I don't hate Dylan. I hate the fact that so many people pretend to be so enthralled by such insipid pablum.
I’m going to re-read this and absorb it before I make any judgements. again, I love your measured principles, and you make some good points re: Dylan. one thing that I did not know was that she encouraged younger people not to rush into transitioning, which is the opposite of what we hear from educators pushing this ideology on middle school and high school kids. is this a person to hate and dwell upon? I don’t think so. is this a person who I believe is being used to normalise a woke ideology by the left, including by the Biden administration, thus affecting young people and supporting woke education? I do. does it hurt what it means to be a biological woman? I honestly don’t know. does this mean that I hate her or wish harm upon her? absolutely not. I hope she stays true to herself and does not get used by either side. the Drew Barrymore appearance was cringe, btw...but again, the woke right has used the appearance as a means to spread the message that biological women are “bowing down” to the patriarchy. I don’t know if I agree with that exactly. and I believe there are other people and ideologies to focus upon, not Dylan. let her live her life.