An Invitation to Action
Hi friend,
I tend to focus on the resilience, joy, and liberation of the trans+ experience. It takes courage and grit to be yourself in a world that doesn’t understand you, validate you, or affirm you. There is incredible joy and freedom in living openly as yourself, when it’s safe to do so.
And yet, I think it’s time to address the elephant in the room: We are currently living in a moment when trans and gender non-conforming people are being legislatively targeted on federal and state levels. These take the form of banning trans athletes from playing in high school sports, such as in Montana.
They also take the form of banning gender affirming care for trans youth, such as the horrific bill that was just passed in Arkansas last week.
A new bill just introduced in North Carolina not only prohibits doctors from providing gender affirming care to anyone under 21, it also protects conversion therapy, and requires educators to report students; “gender non-conforming” behavior to parents.
Creating a more inclusive world for gender diverse folks necessarily involves protecting gender diverse folks. What can you do? Depends on what you’re up for. Here are some options:
Make your opposition to these anti-trans bills LOUDLY known to politicians. Transathlete.com is a great resource. Not only do they have a helpful glossary and a comprehensive status tracker of anti-trans bills moving through state legislatures, they also provide specific scripts you can use to contact legislators to make your stance known. Don’t be shy about contacting legislators from other states—this shows them that people from outside their state are paying attention.
Have conversations with the people around you. Between pandemic burnout and the constant chaos in the news, it can be hard for people to really understand what is at stake with these bills unless they are really paying attention and are invested in understanding. Conversations with people we know help us learn in a way that scrolling through Twitter does not. This powerful op-ed from soccer star Megan Rapinoe shows how this conversation can be approached in a down-to-earth way.
Engage with LGBT+ news outlets. If it’s not already your habit, seek out and read news sources that are by LGBT+ people for LGBT+ people, like The Advocate and Them. These outlets often cover these issues with much more depth because they’re not treated like a “special interest” story. They’re given in-depth, nuanced coverage that offers more information on the topic, in addition to doing so from an LGBT+ perspective.
I know a lot of us are dealing with burnout and compassion fatigue, so these three options have different levels of involvement. You can pick and choose based on what you’re feeling up for at the moment. (Look out for a future newsletter elaborating this topic further!)
What else are you doing to protect and advocate for trans, nonbinary, and gender non-conforming folks? I’d love to hear from you.
Fondly,
Cate