It’s called smokescreen. Turns the attention of the masses away of their wealth and power

Scapegoating

They are a fairly small group compared to other marginalized groups, and particularly vulnerable compared to others. There is already a lot of misinformation about them. Average people often dont run into them or understand them Well enough to make informed decisions. Its easy for billionaires and republicans to wield religion against them. They are often vocal about their beliefs. Intersectionality is also important (e.g. supporting and protecting other minority demographics’ rights because it is the right thing to do, and tearing each other down is counterproductive) to them, which isnt always the case. Disappearing them sets an example and is a test run for setting up the infrastructure and means to take control. See: nazi germany with the deaf, and current marginalization by the trump administration of the trans and disabled communities.

I wouldn’t say that JK Rowling was “going after” transfolk, she just didn’t agree with their premise. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that’s hatred

Gender is a load bearing brainworm for capitalist society. Capitalists need stratification, having a gradient of various degrees of precariousness for workers to experience that would push them into accepting a worse deal for selling their labor. Gender is clearly one of the primary ways to achieve this: an absolutely incredible amount of domestic labor is performed without compensation by women every day, and society would fall apart if it wasn’t. The rigid structure of the patriarchy is a key feature of this system, which means that trans people represent a clear break in that logic; if AFAB individuals can just choose not to be subjected to gender-based exploitation, it starts to rip the whole thing apart. Equally, transfeminine people represent another break in the opposite direction. The patriarchy is more or less incompatible with the existence of trans people, at least without significantly transforming itself.

Trans people’s very existence requires the rest of us to question our own upbringing. There are a lot of childhood experiences that boil down to you doing something or not doing something on no basis other than the fact that you were told.

You were told by your family, you were told by your friends, you were told by random strangers, you were told by the media, and they were all telling you the same thing. So you listened, even though you didn’t know why they were saying it. Surely EVERYBODY can’t be wrong, right? Some people might have told you something contrary but they were the losers, the outcasts, the villains. You don’t want to be any of that, surely?

For someone to transition, they are required to do the exact opposite of what so many told us all. They embrace the very outcome we were threatened with when we failed to conform, that we would not actually be the gender we were failing to conform to.

To accept that they are valid in doing so requires us to admit that many of our own guiding forces were actually just bullshit. We have to question why we are the way we are anew. If what they’re doing is strong, what we did, what we’re continuing to do, was weak.

When confronted with the idea that we were all just raised wrong and that much of what we collectively spend our time and energy stressing about is stupid and pointless, how many people do you know that will just shrug and say “oh well” and then move on with their lives? Easier to find an excuse to keep doing what you were already doing. “They’re just lying because they’re perverts that wanna cheat at sports.”

Some of these rich people are insidious and manipulative, no doubt, but the loud ones are usually just idiots no different from the uncle you don’t want to talk to except that being rich means they’re able to yell louder.

Transphobia, just like any form of queerphobia, serves the maintenance of property rights and the reproduction of the workforce that generates billionaires’ wealth. This is where the antagonism comes from.

Also, please don’t call Elon Musk that.

trans people are a threat to the status quo of the patriarchal-capitalist Gender regime. the ideology of patriarchal capitalism is that your gender assigned at birth is immutable and there are only two. in patriarchal capitalism your gender defines a lot of what path your life will take, the societal expectations placed on you, and importantly what opportunities and privileges are afforded to you. obviously the setup is men dominating and oppressing women which has been going on for far longer than capitalism but worsened significantly under it. according to traditional gender roles, women are expected to act as broodmares to reproduce more worker stock and also perform most or all domestic labour in essentially a slave role. the existence of trans and trans nonbinary people disproves the two axioms on which this all rests, that your gender is immutable and one of just two. gender in capitalist ideology is little more than a tool or system of oppression, and by existing and living our lives as we see fit and not railroaded by traditional expectations based on assigned gender at birth, we show clearly that it doesn’t have to be that way. so to answer your question they come for us because we are a genuine threat to capitalist patriarchal orthodoxy, we show by our actions and existence that a better social order is possible, one where individuals are actually afforded self-determination instead of being locked into a predetermined role based on what genitalia you are born with.

Mostly a people to blame and for others to fear monger, it’s a way to make people look the other way also, a common “enemy” instigated from the true enemy. And sense there is not a lot of trans people statistically it’s hard for them to defend themselves. It’s all about manipulation and control over the people

preface: conjecture

musk and zuckerberg benefit from “othering” a group so that the majority of people get caught up in arguing about the rights of that group. While you’re busy being distracted by that they can push for agendas that benefit their companies and personal wealth, which inherently fuck you over.

musk does seem to have a personal vendetta as well given his issues with his trans daughter but I truly think this is ancillary to enriching his wealth and power. He also seems to love getting involved in topics that rile people up because deep down he’s a 14 year old reddit troll

rowling is double down and attention. She has a shit take, posts about it, people call her out. She’s a literal billionaire “beloved author” used to being surrounded by hangers on so being challenged wrecks her shit. Rather than reflect and look at scientific consensus she doubles down on her shit take. Because of people like above this gets her increasing amounts of attention and relevance so her beliefs are reaffirmed and deepened constantly. Now she’s consulted to speak authoritatively on the matter despite having no actual qualification other than being a rich lady who got into twitter arguments about it

Many of these apply to nobodies as well. Your stupid anti trans neighbor benefits from “othering” someone because it gives them someone to deflect blame onto. For most of American history it was black people, or Hispanic people, sometimes Jews, basically any minority. They also will double down when called out on shit takes and will absolutely respond to attention given for shit takes.

My personal opinion is twofold:

1. they need a diversion. Like a magician (or more accurate a pickpocket) they will take anything to make people blind while they amass their power. It is a sickness of the mind. They are addicted to power and ever anxious to loose it. Minorities are a good enemy for the people to blame the problems on that these people either cause themselves or dont want to take care of. In the past it was witches, nowadays it is other minorities.
2. minorities have been fighting for a place in the world for a long time and there have been significant improvements. But that is not a positive development if you want to rule supreme. If you‘re power crazed, you need people to fall in line. Otherwise it wont work. We have ample evidence that only a sufficiently subdued population will not rise up against authority.

Point 8

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ur-Fascism

There are a lot of other good answers, but it seems worth remembering lots of poor powerless folks hate trans folks too.

Part of the reason they’re coming after trans people is because it’s human nature to hate or fear those you don’t understand and who are different. A dark, and sad part of human nature, but part of human nature nonetheless

All the other stuff folks are talking about is also a true, but it’s not like they’re unique in their contempt for people who are different

Correlation is not causation.

Personally I just think they’re just pandering some group of people who have real power to determine how money flows in a society and they happen to be right wing conservatives.

US democracy is collapsing and the future throne is probably already set and they might have inside information.

Like you said, trans people can’t really do anything. Perfect target when you want to show where you are planning to stand.

There must always be an “underclass” in capitalism for the upper echelons to threaten the middle echelons. No exceptions. Wether that’s the homeless, psychiatric patients, gay or trans people… doesn’t matter. There will be some regional differences in what constitutes this underclass but the end result is always the same. Capitalism CANNOT FUNCTION without this implicit threat of excommunication and starvation.

The only real difference with the recent past is that all of this has become much, much more explicit than it ever used to be before. But make no mistake, even with a Biden or Harris at the helm, this would still be the case, just much more muted.

This is a feature of the system, not a flaw, and will never change as long as capitalism in its current form dominates.