There are yet again several bills moving through the New Hampshire State House that, if put into effect, would severely limit the rights of the Granite State’s transgender population in many ways. This includes giving businesses the right to bar transgender people from using restrooms or lockers that align with their gender identity, as well as prohibiting trans and nonbinary minors from receiving any sort of gender-affirming care before the age of 18.
New Hampshire Public Radio quoted Wolfeboro Republican Rep. Katy Peternel as saying, “The time is now to protect our women and girls in the Granite State.” The assumption that allowing transgender women such as myself to use the same facilities as my cisgender fellows would increase their risk of violence is beyond ludicrous; it is baseless and insulting. The people who want to hurt women do not need permission to do so, and they certainly are not going to go through the trouble of receiving hormone replacement therapy and changing their names just to commit these acts of violence. Beyond that, forcing people like myself to occupy restrooms and other gender-segregated public spaces that align not with our gender but instead our biological sex in fact puts us at higher risk for violence. What voters must understand is that bills such as these have nothing to do with protecting women and children. They are about the removal of transgender people from public life. These bills limit freedom. They do not protect it.
Though it has been talked about to death, it bears repeating that the rates of regret for individuals who receive gender-affirming surgeries are lower than those of knee surgery patients. Why, then, do Republican lawmakers continue to express this immaterial worry that trans and nonbinary teens will regret their decisions? Republican Lisa Mazur expressed concern about “rushing minors into irreversible medical care,” which at best displays a lack of research and at worst an active attempt to misinform. Puberty blockers, the primary form of gender-affirming care that minors receive, are entirely reversible. More importantly, in most cases, including my own, gender-affirming care is life-saving medical treatment. The message Republican lawmakers are projecting is that they would rather have dead Granite Staters than transgender ones.
Our nation is in desperate need of a wake-up call. Anti-trans legislation has been on the rise from coast to coast, and while people such as myself are outraged, many cisgender Americans feel as though it does not concern them. But this nation has no right to call itself the “Land of the Free” with such cruel restrictions being placed on transgender individuals. At the end of the day, it is not only about me and the rest of the trans community, or even the wider LGBTQ+ community. It is only when freedom extends to everyone that we are truly a nation of liberty. Any American who professes to believe in the expressed values of this country cannot stand for this, because if the smallest portion of our population is not free, no one is.
May Cassidy can be contacted at
mcassidy@kscequinox.com
