Rocker Alice Cooper described “gender-affirming” medical procedures for children as a “fad” in an interview with Stereogum magazine on Wednesday, drawing criticism from Billboard and other establishment outlets.
Cooper, whose on-stage look features theatrical costumes, long hair and plenty of eyeliner, acknowledged that “there are cases of transgender,” but argued it was “also a fad,” with “a lot of people claiming to be this just because they want to be that.”
He criticized adults who he said are planting the idea in children’s heads and confusing them at a vulnerable time, explaining: “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.’”
Cooper, whose real name is Vincent Furnier, continued with a broader swipe at “the whole woke thing,” questioning who was “making the rules” that imposed politically-correct neologisms on the English-speaking population.
“Is there a building somewhere in New York where people sit down every day and say, ‘OK, we can’t say ‘mother’ now. We have to say ‘birthing person.’ ‘Get that out on the wire right now’? Who is this person that’s making these rules?” he asked, dismissing the phenomenon as an absurdist “comedy.”
While the interviewer mentioned other glam rockers who had opined on the trans issue and then eaten their words after public backlash, Cooper insisted he was not being “old school” in his views but simply “logical,” arguing his opinions were those of the vast majority.
The 75-year-old rock star said that biological males identifying as women could pose a threat to women and girls in public bathrooms, saying that a predator could “just say ‘I just feel like I’m a woman today’ and have the time of his life in there.”
“Somebody’s going to get raped,” he warned. Transgender activists have attempted to downplay such incidents, and a Virginia school district even moved a supposedly gender-nonconforming pupil who assaulted a girl in the restroom to another school – only for him to reoffend.
Kiss guitarist Paul Stanley was excoriated earlier this year over comments on the “dangerous fad” of gender-affirming care for children.
When Twisted Sister frontman Dee Snider retweeted those comments, he was similarly attacked and even had his invitation to march as a grand marshal with the San Francisco Gay Pride Parade retracted due to his alleged transphobia, despite insisting he supports the community.