Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) somehow continues to give Republicans a bad name — an impressive task in the party of Matt Gaetz, Donald Trump, and Ron DeSantis.
Still, despite the competition, Marj consistently stands out as one of the U.S. far-right’s most unhinged talking heads. She tops fierce competition on a daily basis with wild conspiracy theories and blatant information, even as she leaves her constituents in Georgia out to dry.
No one is claiming Greene was ever good at her job, of course, but the Georgia Republican recently seems to forget exactly what that job is. Rather than spend time actually engaging with the citizens of her own state, tackling their issues and representing them like she was elected to do, Greene is busy sharing decade-old news clips out of context, and indulging in some Georgia BBQ.
Making full use of both her civilian and professional Twitter pages, Greene tweeted on both topics recently. She started with the more contentious of the two, of course, in order to stir up some good chaos as January bled into February. Leaning on the same transphobic outrage that helped get her elected in the first place, Greene shared an out of context clip from a 2012 episode of Dateline and tried to twist it to her favor.
The clip in question shows as then 11-year-old Josie speaks with a doctor and receives puberty blockers as the first step of her eventual transition. The entire time her wonderfully supportive mother is at her side, holding her hand and noting that, without this treatment, she doesn’t know “that [Josie] would have survived male puberty” had she been forced to endure it.
Instead, Josie was given blockers and — hopefully — made her way through puberty without sporting the same emotional scars so many trans people are forced to bear. But this isn’t about Josie or her happiness, its about toxic politicians using her story to their advantage. Which is exactly what Greene — prompted along by the Libs of TikTok Twitter/X account — attempted to do when she retweeted the context-less clip from her official government page with a note that “This is child abuse,” and a call for Congress to “pass my bill Protect Children’s Innocence Act to make it illegal to perform this on children.”
Numerous studies have taken on the question of how gender-affirming care affects patients and whether or not it is morally acceptable to begin the process at a young age, and nearly all of them confirm that, for some patients, gender-affirming care is literally life saving. Some people require surgical intervention to feel at home in their bodies, and without it they can spiral into body dysmorphia, depression, and even suicidal tendencies.
But that wouldn’t suit good ol’ Marj’s narrative, now would it? People like her don’t stay in office without some big scary enemy to fight, and since so many of the United States’ current enemies spawn from her side of the political aisle, she’s got no choice but to make enemies of literal children.
Its a horrific tactic, but its worked for countless politicians and — as much as it hurts to admit it — it will work, at least among some of her supporters, for Greene too. At least a few of her Georgia constituents are starting to see through the ruse, however, particularly as Greene continues to do little other than spout regurgitated dog whistles and eat BBQ.
The latter was done in an attempt to identify with those regular Georgians who will (hopefully) vote Greene out of office this Fall. Greene shared a photo of herself enjoying a BBQ sandwich in Rome, Georgia on Feb. 3, and quickly prompted backlash from the very people she supposedly serves. Georgians piled on in the comment section of the post, urging Greene to go to the real Rome, and stay there.
They also blasted her for sitting down for a photo shoot rather than actually meeting with constituents and acknowledging their needs. While she happily sits back and tweets out of touch messages and baseless attacks on our most vulnerable citizens, real Georgians are in need of help and getting none. At least they’ll have the chance to rectify that when Marj’s seat comes up for grabs this November.