Dee Snider: 'So, I Hear I'm Transphobic. Really?'

Twisted Sister frontman defends himself against the charge
By Newser Editors,  Newser Staff
Posted May 8, 2023 2:06 PM CDT
Dee Snider: 'So, I Hear I'm Transphobic. Really?'
In this 2016 file photo, Dee Snider from the band Twisted Sister performs in New York.   (Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision/AP, File)

Last week, Paul Stanley of Kiss was accused of being transphobic. This week, it's Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider, who is pushing back against the allegation. The two instances are related, reports KRON. After Stanley expressed concerns that our culture was "normalizing and even encouraging participation in a lifestyle that confuses young children into questioning their sexual identification," Snider tweeted his support. "You know what? There was a time where I 'felt pretty' too," he wrote. "Glad my parents didn't jump to any rash conclusions!" In response, the SF Pride Celebration canceled his upcoming appearance and scrapped the song "We're Not Gonna Take It" as its informal anthem.

"So, my lifetime of supporting the Transgender community’s right to identify as they want and honoring whatever changes they may make in how they present themselves to the world isn’t enough?” Dee wrote in a lengthy Facebook post. “So, I hear I’m transphobic. Really?” Snider wrote that he thinks children should be supported by their parents if they question their gender, but "I do not think kids have the mental capabilities to make rational, logical decisions on things of a magnitude that will affect them for the rest of their lives.”

In a statement explaining its decision to ditch Snider, San Francisco Pride praised him for being a longtime supporter of LGBTQ rights, per Consequence.net. “However, when we were notified about the tweet in which Dee expressed support for Kiss’s Paul Stanley’s transphobic statement, we were heartbroken and angry," it says. "The message perpetuated by that tweet casts doubt on young trans people’s ability to self-identify their gender.” Snider says trans groups are too fast to use the "transphobic" label against people such as himself who may not agree with "every one of their edicts." (More transphobia stories.)

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