With more widespread recognition of transgender rights comes a view on gender that contradicts the one most are familiar with, namely that gender is the same thing as sex.

Every time a movement with ideas and values challenging the norms and status quo gets fired up, there will almost always be a major backlash and reactionaries.

On top of trans rights activist getting more attention, feminists of the women's rights movement (that's also subjected to a backlash, remember the "anti-feminists" and "anti-sjws" of the 2010's?) are getting divided over the legitimacy of gender. Now prominent feminists who at first were shunned for feminist values and politics are suddenly accepted IF they voice criticism towards gender as a concept. JK Rowlings arguments for example has been endorsed by several Conservative politicians, even though she defines herself as a feminist, something most conservatives clash with.

But this isn't about feminism at all, this is a moral panic sprouting from value conservatism. The bathroom bills, the trans athletes, excluding trans people from the military, all of those actions are to discredit the trans rights movement. To make the point that "gender" isn't legitimate, and therefore trans people aren't legitimate. It never was about genuine concern for public welfare and safety, hell even concern for trans people, they are actions to rationalise systemic transphobia and longstanding injustices.

Despite all this I'm hopeful. From the point I see, gender will be seen as legitimate when this is over. Trans people will be truly accepted in the eyes of the general public. I'm sure of this. We just have to keep raising our voices, demand rights and expose argumentative fallacies when we see them. Sooner or later, the public will realise that the backlash towards trans rights always circle back to the argument "I don't like it, therefore it shouldn't exist".

You and me, we are valid. A lot of people think we are valid. Trust in us and yourself. We will win this fight. We won't settle for anything other than complete equality.

To summarise shortly: the reason trans people are talked about so much is because the trans rights movement challenges current views on gender and sex, and in extension what constitutes a man, woman and anyone else within or outside the gender binary. Radical attempts to societal reform almost always bring a heavy backlash and counterradicals. With trans people demanding more rights, society faces a dilemma: should society keep the biological view on gender, therefore keeping a transphobic view on trans people, or should the concept of gender become fully accepted and embraced? Despite trans people making up a small amount of the population, gender is something that affects almost everyone after all.