Alice Cooper repeats just about every anti-trans talking point in vile rant

Alice Cooper is the latest elderly cis male rock star famous for wearing makeup onstage to describe kids identifying as transgender as “a fad.” But he went even further than that, spewing dangerous anti-trans misinformation and right-wing talking points in a new interview with Stereogum this week.

Earlier this year, Kiss frontman Paul Stanley and Twisted Sister’s Dee Snider both made headlines for anti-trans comments they made on social media, questioning whether parents should affirm their trans and nonbinary children’s gender identities. Both rockers later attempted to walk back their statements, which perpetuated the current moral panic around transgender youth that has led to Republican efforts to ban gender-affirming care for young people in states across the country.

Related:

Twisted Sister & Kiss frontmen say “encouraging” trans kids is a “dangerous fad”

Both men led “hair metal” bands known for their outrageous clothes and makeup.

Asked to weigh in on Stanley and Snider’s initial comments in his interview with Stereogum, Cooper said he agreed with them.

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“I’m understanding that there are cases of transgender, but I’m afraid that it’s also a fad, and I’m afraid there’s a lot of people claiming to be this just because they want to be that,” he said. “I find it wrong when you’ve got a six-year-old kid who has no idea. He just wants to play, and you’re confusing him telling him, ‘Yeah, you’re a boy, but you could be a girl if you want to be.’”

Cooper also echoed false claims proliferated by anti-trans politicians and activists online that kids these days are identifying as cats and using litter boxes. “I think that’s so confusing to a kid. It’s even confusing to a teenager. You’re still trying to find your identity, and yet here’s this thing going on, saying, ‘Yeah, but you can be anything you want. You can be a cat if you want to be.’ I mean, if you identify as a tree… And I’m going, ‘Come on! What are we in, a Kurt Vonnegut novel?’ It’s so absurd, that it’s gone now to the point of absurdity,” he said.

While Cooper didn’t directly accuse supportive parents of trans and nonbinary kids of abuse, his comments also echoed that false narrative, perpetuated by anti-trans activists, which has Republican lawmakers in state legislatures across the country to introduce legislation that would criminalize parents for seeking gender-affirming care for their children in recent years.

When Stereogum pushed back on Cooper’s comments, the rocker pivoted to another incendiary anti-trans narrative: the false belief that transgender women pose a threat to cis women and girls in public restrooms.

“I can see somebody really taking advantage of this, though,” Cooper said. “A guy can walk into a woman’s bathroom at any time and just say, ‘I just feel like I’m a woman today’ and have the time of his life in there, and he’s not in the least bit… He’s just taking advantage of that situation. Well, that’s going to happen. Somebody’s going to get raped, and the guy’s going to say, ‘Well, I felt like a girl that day, and then I felt like a guy.’ Where do you draw this line?”

The myth that sexual predators will exploit nondiscrimination laws allowing trans women to use public restrooms that align with their gender identity has been repeatedly debunked. In fact, according to a 2021 report from the UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute, transgender people are over four times more likely to be the victims of violence, including rape and sexual assault, than cisgender women and men.