Anti-transgender legislation devastates trans children — even when it fails

This one's a bit of a read, so get some coffee (or other beverage of choice). This piece goes beyond trans children to address how anti-trans legislation affects trans adults, as well. The anti-trans and trans-skeptic attitudes these legislation attempts promote in the public cause all of us significant mental harm.

Here are some quotes I thought were particularly poignant:

“It’s about the fear, and the emboldened nature of some of the folks who have recognized that it’s safe to be a bigot,” said Dr. Angello. “In the sixth months after the presidential election, I had more young people in particular hospitalized for mental health issues, suicidality, or just having a difficult psychiatric time than I have in my entire 20-year career with trans people.”

For [one trans girl], the prospect of using the men’s room was so uncomfortable and dispiriting that she simply stopped using the school bathroom at all. She would force herself to hold it during the long daytime hours rather than subject herself to a worse misery. In order to make it through the day, she stopped drinking anything until she got home.

[One 55-yo trans person] felt as though his legislature and even his ministers were telling the cisgender population that trans people shouldn’t be out in public, and he was afraid that somebody would attack him.

“Every time I see news about a new anti-trans measure,” [one trans high school teacher in North Carolina] said, “[...] I get this nauseous feeling. My brain starts thinking, ‘this is the start.’ [...] It’s a feeling I’ve had since Trump was elected, this concern that any day now there’s going to be legislation that criminalizes me just existing out in the world.”

To the teenager who attempts suicide, or is committed to a hospital, it is little consolation if the discriminatory bill eventually fails[...]. To a large extent, especially for children, the damage has been done.

The last [U.S. Trans Survey], in 2015, reached almost 28,000 trans people, and the mental health findings were harrowing — almost 40 percent will attempt suicide in their lives, roughly nine times the rate of the U.S. population.

The child felt bullied by the church [after transphobic messages from the pulpit], and had a pressing question on the next visit to Dr. Angello’s office: “If God doesn’t even love me, what’s the point?”

And here are a few other important quotes:

[One negative psychological factor] is fear — the idea that even if things aren’t bad now, they could get really bad. [...] Third, there’s the sense that any progress has been reversed, taking with it the hope for a comfortable life free from constant hyper-vigilance.

“These adolescents, they see the political culture,” she said. “It is so hard being anybody in the world right now, but being a child who is different, when society is telling them to be ashamed of themselves, is just so hard.”

[...] in the current political climate [Dr. Angello has] noticed a re-emergence of what she calls the “skeptic parents” who are influenced by hate groups and pseudoscientific gender concepts. These people believe their child needs to be repaired in some way.

She pointed specifically to Jeff Sessions withdrawing the Title IX guidance, which [...] fundamentally broadcasts the message that administrators and teachers do not have to treat trans students with respect.

Some [attempts at legislation] are particularly cruel, as in the Ohio bill that would require teachers, guidance counselors, or health care professionals — under penalty of a fourth-degree felony — to notify parents if their child so much as questioned his or her gender identity. Not only would this law “out” transgender children against their will, but it could also legally deprive them of a sympathetic ear in a time of great struggle. (The bill is currently in committee in the Ohio House.)

“Knowing that there are kids out there who have to keep themselves hidden or the people they trust are legally obliged to tell on them, it’s terrifying,”