GOP House candidate: Transgender people have 'an issue with mental illness'

[DonViejo]

BY MORGAN GSTALTER - 05/02/18 01:55 PM EDT

A Republican running for a House seat in South Carolina suggested at a candidate forum on Monday that transgender people are mentally ill.

“You're either a man or a woman — and if you’re confused, you’ve got an issue with mental illness," former state Sen. Lee Bright said.

The Greenville News reported Tuesday that Bright made the remark at a forum for a dozen GOP candidates hoping to replace U.S. Rep. Trey Gowdy (R), who announced his retirement in January.

“If we don’t get right, God is going to judge us, and let me tell you it is going to be painful," Bright said.

During his time as a state senator, Bright sponsored a 2016 bill to ban transgender people from using public bathrooms, changing rooms and locker rooms that did not match their birth gender.

more
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/385875-gop-congressional-candidate-transgender-people-have-an-issue

[S.E. TN Liberal]

1. I gotta admit, I also have an issue with mental illness...

My issue is with the clear mental illness shared by conservatives.

How could any deity have created so many mentally ill conservatives and placed them all on this one planet?

[WhiteTara]

2. Yes they do--yours!

[Gothmog]

3. Arggh

This is so false that it is not even funny

[zipplewrath]

4. We don't teach classic Liberal Arts

The classic liberal arts education is quickly disappearing. It used to be fundamental to education from very early on, all the way through undergraduate degrees. But this education, which would have included no small amount of philosophical thought, as well as logic and rhetoric is virtually gone. And we can see the results in this kind of thinking.

He makes no attempt at all to establish the basis of his assertion, and makes no attempt to address all of the evidence to the contrary. He ignores the DECADES of academic study to the opposite and speaks as if it does not even exist.

[peabody]

5. The mental illness I see

are with people who are obsessed with other people's sexuality all the time. They just can't seem to let it go. Just why is that I'll never understand.

[procon]

6. He's very confused by too much religious lies and not enough research. nt

[gratuitous]

7. I'm not transgender

But Bright's brand of ignorant bigotry makes me crazy. Lee, you don't know what you're talking about. Take this opportunity to shut up more.

[Wounded Bear]

8. Yeah, it's called PTSD from being constantly attacked by RW extremists...