Regulating the Internet to Deregulate Gender Variance

Hatred and disinformation on the internet have ushered in a state of emergency for gender-variant people. Among other effects, they have generated political will to enact sweeping regulations that threaten to eradicate gender variance “from public life entirely,” as one political commentator has announced. This Note turns to history—specifically the history of the sex/gender binary and cross-dressing laws—to understand why false and inflammatory representations of gender variance are so prolific in our digital milieu.