Star Trek actor George Takei has compared GOP opposition to transgender medical procedures for children to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
In an essay published Monday in The Daily Beast, he also wrote that these “dark forces” are similar to what “led to the horrors of the Holocaust in Europe.”
“I have seen where scapegoating, if left unchallenged, leads. And it is a very dark place,” Takei wrote. “And I am alarmed that the fearmongering and hate, particularly against the trans community, are just the beginning.”
Despite decades of advocacy for LGBTQ+ rights, the troubling pattern of scapegoating persists. As someone who experienced forced relocation as a child, the sense of déjà vu is deeply unsettling. It's crucial that we learn from history, push for change, and use our votes to secure… pic.twitter.com/UQstgZoMt0
— George Takei (@GeorgeTakei) August 21, 2023
Takei was interned as a boy during World War II, his family uprooted from California on orders from the Franklin Delano Roosevelt administration and sent to live in a camp in Arkansas.
In his essay, Takei argued that the scapegoating of Japanese-Americans is happening all over again, only this time the target is LGBTQ+ people — specifically, those who want to medically transition children.
More ominously, and in the name of “protecting” trans kids and in defiance of all expert opinion, politicians at the state level have banned critically necessary trans medical care, leaving desperate parents and families without alternatives. It was not only ignorant, but it was also deliberately cruel. And it is leading to untold suffering for young people already burdened with the weight of successfully transitioning. They are a group that currently suffers the highest rates of suicide among teens.
Takei’s apparent motive for writing the essay reveals itself in the final paragraph.
“In 2024 we, and our allies, must vote as if our lives depended on it—because they do,” he wrote.
Takei was one of Joe Biden’s biggest Hollywood boosters during the 2020 presidential election. The actor even teamed up with the Biden campaign for a “Trek the Vote to Victory” fundraiser.
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