Alice Cooper Thinks Trans People Are a ‘Fad:’ “Where Do You Draw This Line?”
Aging glam rockers continue to speak on things that they don’t have any business commenting on as Alice Cooper is the latest to weigh in on the existence of transgender people. In a talk with Stereogum, Cooper responded to comments made by Paul Stanley and Dee Snider by saying that he’s “understanding that there are cases of transgender” but also finds it to be a dangerous fad, making up scenarios that aren’t actually happening.
“I’m understanding that there are cases of transgender, but I’m afraid that it’s also a fad, and I’m afraid there’s a lot of people claiming to be this just because they want to be that. I find it wrong when you’ve got a six-year-old kid who has no idea. He just wants to play, and you’re confusing him telling him, ‘Yeah, you’re a boy, but you could be a girl if you want to be.’ I think that’s so confusing to a kid. It’s even confusing to a teenager. You’re still trying to find your identity, and yet here’s this thing going on, saying, ‘Yeah, but you can be anything you want. You can be a cat if you want to be.’ I mean, if you identify as a tree… And I’m going, ‘Come on! What are we in, a Kurt Vonnegut novel?’ It’s so absurd, that it’s gone now to the point of absurdity.
“The whole woke thing… Nobody can answer this question. Maybe you can. Who’s making the rules? Is there a building somewhere in New York where people sit down every day and say, ‘Okay, we can’t say ‘mother’ now. We have to say ‘birthing person.’ Get that out on the wire right now’? Who is this person that’s making these rules? I don’t get it. I’m not being old school about it. I’m being logical about it.
“It’s getting to the point now where it’s laughable. If anybody was trying to make a point on this thing, they turned it into a huge comedy. I don’t know one person that agrees with the woke thing. I don’t know one person. Everybody I talk to says, ‘Isn’t it stupid?’ And I’m going, ‘Well, I respect people. I respect people and who they are, but I’m not going to tell a seven-year-old boy, ‘Go put a dress on because maybe you’re a girl,’ and he’s going, ‘No, I’m not. I’m a boy.”
“So I say let somebody at least become sexually aware of who they are before they start thinking about if they’re a boy or a girl. A lot of times, I look at it this way, the logical way: If you have these genitals, you’re a boy. If you have those genitals, you’re a girl. There’s a difference between ‘I am a male who is a female, or I’m a female that’s a male’ and wanting to be a female. You were born a male. Okay, so that’s a fact. You have these things here. Now, the difference is you want to be a female. Okay, that’s something you can do later on if you want to. But you’re not a male born a female.”
The interview pointed out that Cooper was coming up with nonsensical or made-up arguments—there is no group of people determining what words can and can’t be said and there isn’t a mass movement of parents attempting to turn their children transgender—he fell back on a tired argument: bathrooms.
“Well, I can see somebody really taking advantage of this, though. A guy can walk into a woman’s bathroom at any time and just say, ‘I just feel like I’m a woman today’ and have the time of his life in there, and he’s not in the least bit… He’s just taking advantage of that situation. Well, that’s going to happen. Somebody’s going to get raped, and the guy’s going to say, ‘Well, I felt like a girl that day, and then I felt like a guy.’ Where do you draw this line? Something’s going to raise its ugly head, and all of a sudden, people are going to start going, ‘Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute. We’ve got to get this under control.’ It’s almost like that with AI. People would say, ‘Well, what about AI?’ And I said, ‘The only person that shouldn’t have AI is Paul McCartney.’ It’s dangerous.”
It’s disappointing and frustrating to see this kind of talk coming from Cooper (and his glam/hair metal peers) because a.) the man has literally spent most of his career wearing makeup and costumes and b.) studies have repeatedly indicated that there is no link between gender-inclusive bathroom policies and unsafe bathrooms. Another day, another confused aging rocker.
