I think there’s a difference between good-faith ignorant-ass posts and bad-faith ignorant-ass posts. I’ve said my share of ignorant-ass things on the internet, and some of those were how I learned things, including what it actually means to be trans. I try to pay that forward by spending some of my time answering what I believe to be good-faith ignorant-ass questions. I know what it’s like to have zero openly queer (let alone trans) people in your IRL life, and I know the kinds of irrational, offensive, and deeply hurtful ideas that can live unchallenged in the mind in that kind of environment. I try to give grace to those people when I have grace to spare.

However.

I know there are people who are invested in not allowing those conversations to happen, and if you just want to shut down conversations, an easy tactic is to flood the zone with bullshit, intentionally clouding any signal with malicious noise. This is an inherently asymmetric relationship, since posting bullshit is intrinsically easier than responding with thoughtful, meaningful conversation. Nonsense is simply easier to create than sense. For these types of bad-faith ignorant-ass comments, I think the best strategy is to ban them when they crop up. It’s not a perfect solution and I do think some good-faith ignorant-ass people get caught up in the bullshit filter, and that sucks. But I think it’s the best way to allow some helpful discussion to happen without getting drowned out that we’ve come up with so far.