It’s funny, isn’t it? In the wake of Rachel Dolezal’s outing as a race-fraud, there was a couple of years where the left couldn’t quite form a consensus on why trans-race couldn’t be a thing if trans-gender could. We saw that inability when a few years later, a feminist at Hypatia magazine still thought the left wouldn’t murder her if she asked questions about this inconsistency.

As best I can tell their final solution was “Dolezal didn’t grow up facing the racism that her fake race does so she wasn’t molded by that experience and can’t be a real member of that race. Now please don’t ask us any more questions, like why we don’t feel the same way about a boy/man becoming a woman despite not growing up facing the misogyny that we otherwise claim is pervasive in society!” I’ve heard right wingers speak what is probably closer to the true answer, which is that too many currently active monetary grifts depend on race tensions to allow just anyone to jump into the game. It’s all down to the lobbying power really. Transgender being “real” has enough proponents, some who make money off it and many more whose ego depends on it, that we’ve landed in a place where “trans is legit!” is the default.