Just being mean on purpose

The majority of your legislators are just mean people who are motivated entirely by a politics of being mean. 

All but one of the Republican members present on a House committee voted Tuesday to end the “Raise the Age” law that keep 17-year-old arrestees from being imprisoned with adult convicts.

On a 6-5 vote, the House Committee for the Administration of Criminal Justice advanced for a full House vote Senate Bill 418, which the state Senate already has passed. “Raise the Age” law was approved with great fanfare allowing Louisiana to join 47 states that put most 17-year-old offenders in the juvenile justice system.

Article goes on to report that Rep. Marcus Bryant pointed out that this means throwing minors who have merely been arrested into cells with adults who have been convicted of serious crimes.  That may sound bad to normal people, but it is absolutely a thing these jerks are doing on purpose. 

Similarly,

For the second consecutive year the Louisiana Legislature on Monday approved and sent to the governor a bill that would bar transgender athletes from competing in girls and women's sports.

The Senate voted 32-6 to go along with minor changes made in the House last week after the Senate endorsed it in April 19.

There was no debate Monday.

The House approved the measure last week 72-21.

The proposal, by Senate President Pro Tem Beth Mizell, R-Franklinton, is Senate Bill 44.

John Bel vetoed that same bill last year calling it "a solution in search of a problem that does not exist in Louisiana."  There were no transgender students attempting to participate in girls' sports teams at the time.  I don't know if there are any such cases this year. Regardless, our legislators are determined to be mean to them. And that's really the "problem" they are trying to "solve."  They need an excuse to be mean and this gives them one. 

There are material reasons this sort of politics gains ascendancy. But the immediate goal of this politics is to be mean.