A federal judge has ruled on the side of trans rights after a conservative group tried to overturn an Ohio school district’s anti-bullying policy.
The national conservative group Parents Defending Education (PDE) tried to get a preliminary injunction passed on the Olentangy Local School District’s prohibition on misgendering trans students. The policy includes students, teachers, and parents and it applies to out-of-school hours and social media as well.
PDE’s lawsuit claimed the policy is unconstitutional because “they compel speech, discriminate based on content and viewpoint, and are unconstitutionally overbroad.”
U.S. District Chief Judge Algenon L. Marbley disagreed, writing in his opinion that “ultimately, transgender youth are far too often subject to harassment and bullying in public schools. They are threatened or physically injured in schools at a rate four times higher than other students. They are harassed verbally at extraordinarily high rates. More than one in five attempt suicide…. Allowing speech that creates a hostile environment for transgender students can have devastating consequences.”
Citing another case, Marbley also reminded PDE that “the fundamental right of parents to direct the care, upbringing, and education of their children does not encompass a right ‘generally to direct how a public school teaches their child’ or how the school disciplines their child.”
This is seemingly a direct indictment of the right-wing’s “parent’s rights movement,” the belief that parents should have the power to control everything their children are exposed to at school. The fight for “parent’s rights” has been a thinly veiled way to advocate for banning LGBTQ+ content and lessons about race from schools.
A statement from the district lauded the judge’s decision and said that it “affirms our commitment to maintaining a safe learning environment where all feel welcome and supported. We will continue to do so and are looking forward to another great school year.”
According to local news outlet WCMH, PDE is appealing the decision.
If you or someone you know is struggling or in crisis, help is available. Call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org. The Trans Lifeline (1-877-565-8860) is staffed by trans people and will not contact law enforcement. The Trevor Project provides a safe, judgement-free place to talk for youth via chat, text (678-678), or phone (1-866-488-7386). Help is available at all three resources in English and Spanish.
Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach (R) has filed a lawsuit to force the state government to discriminate against trans people on their driver’s licenses and birth certificates.
The suit asks the court to demand the Department of Revenue’s Division of Vehicles comply with S.B. 180, a sweeping new anti-trans law that, among other things, bans trans people from updating the gender marker on their birth certificates and driver’s licenses.
This is Kobach’s latest move in an ongoing battle between himself and the state’s Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly.
In April, Kelly vetoed S.B. 180, but the state’s Republican-led legislature overrode her veto to pass the bill. Once the bill took effect on July 1, Kelly directed state agencies to continue to allow transgender citizens to change the gender markers on their birth certificates and driver’s licenses in defiance of Kobach.
A banner at the top of the Department of Revenue’s website declares that the “enactment of Senate Bill 180 on July 1 will not impact the longstanding procedures for obtaining, renewing, and updating a Kansas driver’s license as they pertain to gender markers.”
Kobach – who also lost to Kelly in the 2018 gubernatorial race – also filed a motion in June to end a 2019 consent decree settling a 2018 lawsuit brought by four transgender residents who claimed that the state’s refusal to correct birth certificates violated their constitutional right to equal protection.
In conjunction with that motion, Kobach announced that trans people who already had a birth certificate or license changed could keep the documents but that the state’s data would revert back to their sex assigned at birth.
Prior to Kobach’s announcement, legal experts had assumed that the state would not move to change gender markers that had already been updated under the 2019 consent decree, leading many transgender Kansans to rush to update their documents before the law was scheduled to take effect.
Kobach’s current lawsuit against the Department of Revenue blasts Kelly, declaring she “cannot pick and choose which laws she will enforce and which she will ignore.”
“She does not possess the power that English monarchs claimed prior to the ‘Glorius Revolution’ of 1688,” the suit continues, “namely, the power to suspend the operation of statutes.”
Yet Kobach has also been accused of failing to enforce the law in his attempt to retroactively remove gender markers from the documents of trans citizens who received their licenses before the law took effect.
American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas executive director Micah Kubic told KMUW that S.B. 180 does not require the measures Kobach has announced. “These are of his own volition and interpretation, driven by his own extreme ideological perspective, not by requirements of the law, the constitution, or the best interests of Kansans.”
“The laws should not be considered retroactive,” UMKC Law School professor Steve Leben told KCTV5 News. “The law itself says it’s effective July 1, takes effect and it’s enforced from that date.”
Kobach also argues in the lawsuit that the state has already been using sex and gender synonymously since state statute says driver’s licenses must reflect an individual’s “gender” but the actual documents issued use the word “sex.”
Today, only three days after Kobach filed the lawsuit, District Judge Teresa Watson ordered the Kansas Department of Revenue to immediately stop allowing gender changes. The order will last up to two weeks but can be extended as the hearing goes on.
S.B. 180 has been characterized as a “women’s bill of rights” by Republican supporters who claim it is necessary to keep transgender women and girls out of women’s restrooms and locker rooms. In addition to legally defining “sex” in terms of reproductive biology, the law also bans trans people from accessing facilities that correspond with their gender identity in schools, prisons, women’s shelters, rape crisis shelters, and locker rooms.
A Catholic “Pride Mass” at Duquesne University was canceled at the urging of the Pittsburgh diocese after being bombarded with messages from anti-LGBTQ+ protestors.
Planned by the organization Catholics for Change in our Church, the mass was meant to be promoted as a service held in solidarity with LGBTQ+ Catholics. But according to local news outlet WESA, all hell broke loose when a flyer referring to the event as a “Pride Mass” was obtained and published by the far-right Daily Signal. The flyer was reportedly put out by a parish member without approval from the organizers.
Her rhetoric is getting more combative, saying trans women are just faking it so that they can attack cis women in the bathroom.
In a letter calling for the cancellation of the event, Bishop David Zubik said the messages the diocese received “used condemning and threatening, and some might say hateful, language not in keeping with Christian charity.”
Zubik also emphasized he never approved the mass.
“This event was billed as a ‘Pride Mass’ organized to coincide with Pride Month, an annual secular observance that supports members of the LGBTQ community on every level, including lifestyle and behavior, which the Church cannot endorse,” he wrote.
He claimed that the Church welcomes LGBTQ+ people but that it “cannot endorse behavior contrary to what we know to be God’s law.”
“We are very sad and very frustrated,” said Kevin Hayes, president of Catholics for Change in our Church. Hayes said the organization just wanted to “have LGBTQ Catholics feel welcomed as beloved sons and daughters of a loving God and just be affirmed for who they are within the context of the Eucharist, which we feel is appropriate.”
Hayes also said that the group held a mass for LGBTQ+ Catholics last year and no one complained. But anti-LGBTQ+ vitriol from the right has been growing more and more extreme, and this year, extremists have made it their mission to take down any company or organization that supports Pride.
“It concerns me that our Christian brothers and sisters became angry over the mere support of the LGBTQ community by having them participate with us in a mass,” said Deacon Herb Riley of the St. Joseph the Worker’s LGBTQ ministry, who was helping to plan the service, to WESA.
Creighton University theology professor Todd Salzman added that despite the fact that polls show the majority of Catholics support LGBTQ+ people, bishops have been hesitant to follow suit.
Salzman said Zubik’s decision to cancel the event validated the protestors’ actions. He also called out the hypocrisy of stances like Zubik’s.
“The church does not exclude Catholics who practice artificial birth control, even though the church condemns that — the vast majority of Catholics do practice artificial birth control in a marital relationship,” he said. “So there’s a singling out of LGBTQ people.”
While speaking at the Politico Health Care Summit, out Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) expressed the need for the federal government to collect more data about LGBTQ+ people, especially when it comes to mental health.
Federally funded surveys, she said, rarely provide questions on LGBTQ+ identities.
“I think it’s so important people are counted. It’s hard to claim with great reliability how much greater risk gay and lesbian, bisexual, transgender children and adults are at risk for suicide. It is really important that we get that data because it helps us make our arguments for greater resources and greater services.”
As The Hill reports, Baldwin also voiced plans to reintroduce the “LGBTQI+ Data Inclusion ACT,” which would require federal agencies that collect demographic data through surveys to include questions on LGBTQ+ identities. The House passed the bill last year, but it died in the Senate.
During her time at the health summit, Baldwin also emphasized the need for filibuster reform, though acknowledged it would be “difficult at this particular moment” to make it happen.
In April, Baldwin announced she is running for reelection to a third term in Congress.
In a statement, Baldwin said she’s “committed to making sure that working people, not just the big corporations and ultra-wealthy, have a fighter on their side. With so much at stake, from families struggling with rising costs to a ban on reproductive freedom, Wisconsinites need someone who can fight and win.”
She made history in 2012 when she became the first out gay senator in the nation and the first woman senator from Wisconsin. At the time, she declared, “I didn’t run to make history. I ran to make a difference.”
Last year, Baldwin spearheaded the passage of the Respect for Marriage Act (RMA), which repealed the Defense of Marriage Act, federally recognizes interracial and same-sex marriages performed by states, and requires states to recognize marriages performed in other states.
“Thank you to the millions of same-sex and interracial couples who truly made this moment possible,” Baldwin tweeted after it passed. “By living as your true selves, you changed the hearts and minds of people around you.”
Editor’s note: This article mentions suicide. If you need to talk to someone now, call the Trans Lifeline at 1-877-565-8860. It’s staffed by trans people, for trans people. The Trevor Project provides a safe, judgement-free place to talk for LGBTQ youth at 1-866-488-7386. You can also call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.
Missouri Gov. Mike Parson (R) signed two anti-trans bills targeting kids into law on Wednesday, one banning gender-affirming care for trans youth and one banning trans women and girls from playing on women’s sports teams.
S.B. 49, the “Missouri Save Adolescents from Experimentation (SAFE) Act”, is set to take effect on August 28 and bans all gender-affirming treatments (including reversible puberty blockers) until August 2027. Any healthcare providers who violate the law risk losing their license. Some states that have passed gender-affirming care bans have required trans youth already receiving this care to wean themselves off their medications and detransition, but this law allows those already undergoing care to continue.
“We support everyone’s right to his or her own pursuit of happiness,” Parson tweeted upon signing the bill. “However, we must protect children from making life-altering decisions that they could come to regret in adulthood once they have physically and emotionally matured.”
The anti-trans sports bill, S.B. 39, says both private and public schools all the way through college must require trans youth to play on sports teams according to their sex assigned at birth.
In his tweet about the bill, Parson declared that inclusivity was unjust “nonsense.”
“Women and girls deserve and have fought for an equal opportunity to succeed, and we stand up to the nonsense and stand with them as they take back their sport competitions. In Missouri, we support real fairness, not injustice disguised as social righteousness.”
LGBTQ+ advocates have roundly condemned the legislation.
“These bills represent a two-pronged approach to targeting trans youth and eliminating their stories, their perspectives, and their right to a happy, healthy childhood,” said Human Rights Campaign state legislative director and senior counsel Cathryn Oakley in a statement. “SB 49 tosses aside decades of scientific research and guidance from every major medical and mental health organization, representing over 1.3 million American doctors, in favor of the discriminatory whims of politicians in Jefferson City.”
Shira Berkowitz, senior director of public policy and advocacy for Missouri advocacy group PROMO said Parson has “showed just how little Missouri’s state government values LGBTQ+ lives and, in particular, transgender and gender-expansive youth. Berkowitz added that the laws are part of an “embarrassing history of elected leaders intentionally taking action to harm transgender Missourians.”
As GOP-led states continue to ban medically necessary care for trans youth and some adults, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) has signed an executive order protecting gender-affirming care.
“In the state of Maryland, nobody should have to justify their own humanity,” Moore saidwhile signing the order at a Pride event. “This order is focused on ensuring Maryland is a safe place for gender-affirming care, especially as other states take misguided and hateful steps to make gender-affirming care cause for legal retribution. In Maryland, we are going to lead on this issue.”
Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller said the order shows that “this administration is saying to all LGBTQIA+ Marylanders: You deserve to be your authentic selves, during Pride month and every month. You deserve to live safely, openly and freely; and receive the gender-affirming care you need.”
This is one of several moves state leaders have made this year to protect the more than 94,000 trans and nonbinary Marylanders. In March, Moore signed the Trans Health Equity Act, which requires state Medicaid plans to cover gender-affirming care. Among the treatments covered are hormone therapies, puberty blockers, and surgeries, as well as voice training, fertility preservation, and permanent hair removal.
Moore was also the first governor in state history to formally recognize March 31st as the International Transgender Day of Visibility.
The state also recently repealed an archaic law banning sodomy. Moore did not sign the bill overturning the Unnatural or Perverted Sexual Practices Act, but he allowed it to go into effect without his signature.
The Pride event at Government House – the state’s official governor’s residence – is the first to ever be held there.
“I want you to know that in this house, you aren’t just welcome, you are necessary,” said First Lady Dawn Moore.
Members of a culture-warring Florida school district spent a contentious eight-and-a-half hours at a school board meeting expressing their exasperation with the divisiveness plaguing the schools.
According to the Tampa Bay Times,topics at the meeting included book bans, LGBTQ+ rights, and the “overall direction of the … district and its closely divided board.”
Many speakers (there were over 100) denounced the right-wing propaganda claiming teachers are indoctrinating children to be LGBTQ+.
“No one is teaching your kids to be gay!” said former math teacher Alyssa Marano, who recently resigned from the Hernando school district. “Sometimes, they just are gay. I have math to teach. I literally don’t have time to teach your kids to be gay.”
The district gained notoriety in May when the Florida Department of Education began investigating a Hernando fifth-grade teacher, Jenna Barbee, for showing her class the Disney movie Strange World, which contains a scene where one of the male characters says he has a crush on a boy. Barbee has since resigned.
But Barbee is just the beginning. About 50 teachers are reportedly planning to resign due to the school’s hostile environment.
At the board meeting, teacher Daniel Scott decried the “draconian working conditions that are causing many such as myself to abandon this honored career.”
“I don’t feel that I can adequately provide a safe environment for my students anymore,” Scott said.
Students and parents also spoke, with one saying the school’s “war on woke” is actually a war on the students’ futures.
Amelie Howell, a sophomore in high school, held a sign that said “Education is not indoctrination” and told the board, “It feels like a lot of people are speaking for us. Nobody is asking what we want.”
According to the Times, meeting attendees also included Proud Boys and members of the anti-LGBTQ+ organization Moms for Liberty.
As part of his own war on so-called “woke” culture, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has been helping Moms for Liberty members get elected to local Florida school boards.
Shannon Rodriguez, a Hernando board member who was endorsed by Moms for Liberty, is the one who reported Barbee for showing the Disney film.
Both Rodriguez and fellow Board member Mark Johnson – whose campaign was focused on opposing critical race theory – have caused controversy in the district after campaigning to remove Superintendent John Stratton, whom they have accused of supporting “indoctrination.”
Stratton survived the vote of no confidence, with one board member, Susan Duval, saying you “could never find a better superintendent.”
Meetings like this are the product of a Florida culture war continually stoked by DeSantis, who recently announced his campaign for President.
Beginning with the 2022 passage of the Don’t Say Gay law – which prohibits class instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade – DeSantis and the Republican-controlled legislature have devoted their tenure to demonizing LGBTQ+ people and making schools less safe for LGBTQ+ students.
DeSantis and the Florida GOP have been so hostile to the LGBTQ+ community that the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) – the nation’s largest LGBTQ+ rights organization – joined Equality Florida to issue a travel advisory for the state.
On May 17, DeSantis signed a slate of laws targeting LGBTQ+ people, including a ban on gender-affirming care for minors, restrictions on such care for adults, a ban on all-ages drag shows, and an anti-trans bathroom bill.
DeSantis has gone to war with Disney over its opposition to the Don’t Say Gay law, has launched numerous blindsides attacking “woke indoctrination” in schools, and has taken control of the state’s education system with handpicked administrators and the power of the bully pulpit. His staff has regularly smeared LGBTQ+ people and allies on social media with vile slurs and insinuations of sexual abuse.
The Don’t Say Gay law – which has been expanded to all grades – has led to the banning of LGBTQ+ books in schools and the forced outing of students to their parents by school administrators.
In 2021, DeSantis signed a bill banning trans students from participating in school sports.
DeSantis has ranted against “woke gender ideology” and once claimed, “In the state of Florida, we are not going to allow them to inject transgenderism into kindergarten.”
LGBTQ+ students in Florida are so scared of repercussions that many have refused to speak with LGBTQ Nation about their experiences. A non-LGBTQ+ student told us that terrified queer students are learning to “shut up and keep their head low.”
Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) has signed an education bill that includes several anti-LGBTQ+ policies.
S.F. 496 bans instruction on LGBTQ+ identities through sixth grade and requires schools to out trans youth to their parents. It also bans all books containing sex acts from school classrooms and libraries, which will undoubtedly lead to the banning of several LGBTQ+ books.
And despite the fact that Iowa has already banned gender-affirming care for trans youth, the bill explicitly establishes that parents and guardians have “the fundamental, constitutionally protected right, to make decisions affecting [their] child, including decisions related to the minor child’s medical care….”
The section clarifies that it does not authorize parents and guardians to “engage in conduct that is unlawful,” and as such, parents of trans youth still do not have the right to seek gender-affirming care for their kids.
Democrats and LGBTQ+ rights groups have blasted the bill.
“We need all Iowa trans kids to know, LGBTQ kids to know, that you belong here,” House Minority Leader Jennifer Konfrst (D), reportedly said as the legislative session came to a close.
After Reynold’s signed the bill, the Iowa Senate Democrats tweeted that the law seeks to “ban books and marginalize kids just because they’re different.”
“Censorship and singling out LGBTQ Iowans is wrong for kids, and wrong for our state,” the tweet concluded.
Courtney Reyes, the executive director of One Iowa, said in a statement that the law “will harm an already vulnerable group of children and will benefit no one.”
The bill was part of a slate of education bills signed by Reynolds last week. In a statement, she said the state has “secured transformational education reform that puts parents in the driver’s seat, eliminates burdensome regulations on public schools, provides flexibility to raise teacher salaries, and empowers teachers to prepare our kids for their future.”
“Education is the great equalizer and everyone involved – parents, educators, our children – deserves an environment where they can thrive,” she said.
Reynolds has made her anti-trans views a cornerstone of her tenure. She has also made “parental control” a centerpiece of her public messaging, claiming a far-left “woke” agenda is threatening the health and well-being of the state’s children.
While campaigning for reelection in 2022, she aired a TV spot highlighting what she called her values of faith, freedom, and hard work.
“Here in Iowa,” she declared, “we know right from wrong, boys from girls.”
At the end of March this year, Reynolds signed two bills targeting trans youth. One forbids minors from accessing puberty blockers and hormone replacement therapy and forces trans teens currently receiving gender-affirming care to de-transition. It also threatens the professional licenses of any medical practitioners who provide such care. Studies show that gender-affirming care is safe, reversible, and essential to trans people’s overall well-being.
The other prohibits people from using school restrooms that don’t correspond with the gender a person was assigned at birth.
Last year, Reynolds also signed an anti-trans sports ban.
In a historic ruling, the Supreme Court of Namibia has ruled that the government is required to recognize same-sex marriages performed legally in other nations between citizens and foreign nationals.
In a 4-1 vote, the judges overturned a previous ruling from the country’s High Court that said these marriages could not be acknowledged.
The litigants spoke with LGBTQ Nation about their fight for equal rights.
“This Court accordingly found that the approach of the Ministry to exclude spouses, including the appellants, in a validly concluded same-sex marriage… infringes both the interrelated rights to dignity and equality of the appellants,” stated the ruling.
The lawsuit was brought by a Namibian woman who married a German woman, as well as a Namibian man who married a South African man (South Africa is the only African country where same-sex marriage is legal). The non-Namibian spouses could not obtain resident rights in the country, so the couples sued.
Homosexuality remains illegal in the Christian-majority nation, though according to Africa News, the 1927 sodomy law is almost never enforced.
“Today’s verdict and outcome clearly indicates that Namibia is moving towards recognizing diversity in this country irrespective of people’s political or social positioning,” LGBTQ+ rights activist Linda Baumann told Reuters.
“Today after a six-year battle, we finally won, and the court has ruled that the Ministry of Home Affairs has to recognize these marriages by foreign spouses to Namibian spouses,” Carli Schickerling, a lawyer who represented the couples, told VOA.
Baumann also spoke with VOA and cautioned that there are so many more rights to fight for.
“It is important to understand the status of this case; it’s couples that are coming back to this country to claim their right to equality, their right to dignity and their right to family. To answer that question about same-sex marriages, I believe that a lot of LGBTQ people in this country, we experience a number of inequalities in service, in benefits, in having the right to say something over your partner.”
She hopes this ruling will lead to other rights for same-sex couples as well.
Jamie Alexander is the epitome of a supportive parent. Since his daughter Ruby came out as trans as a young child, he has done everything in his power to ensure she is loved and affirmed and can lead a happy life as her authentic self.
And that includes launching an entire company so that Ruby would have something to wear to the beach.
Tanius Posey said some negative comments have come from trans people who think he’s making them “look bad.”
Ruby had been having trouble finding a bikini that fit her well. For her own safety, her parents had insisted she wear board shorts to the beach. But Ruby eventually grew frustrated and just wanted to wear a bikini like her friends.
There wasn’t much on the market to meet Ruby’s needs, so Alexander decided to change that. Three years ago, he launched Rubies, which sells form-fitting bras, underwear, and swimwear for trans girls. It’s slogan: “Every girl deserves to shine.”
“One of the design points for Rubies was creating underwear and swimwear that feels the same as clothing cis people are wearing,” Alexander told LGBTQ Nation. “If you’re not physically comfortable, that gets in the way of you feeling comfortable overall.”
Over the past three years, Alexander has sent out more than 10,000 packages to trans girls in over 40 countries. He has spoken on panels, guided employee resource groups, and Zoomed directly with parents seeking advice on supporting their own trans children.
Alexander has also done several collaborations with LGBTQ+ groups, most recently partnering with Alexander Switzer’s Affirming Wardrobe, a program (through Switzer’s nonprofit Valid USA) that works with schools to supply gender-affirming clothing and undergarments to middle, high school, and college students.
In addition to running an Affirming Wardrobe in Tucson, Arizona at the University of Arizona Lutheran Campus Ministries, Alexander has largely worked with schools in Northern California, namely with the Oakland Unified School District.
He met Alexander when Rubies donated some merchandise to the organization, and the pair quickly knew they wanted to continue working together.
“I really liked what he was doing,” Alexander said, adding that working with Switzer has allowed Rubies products to reach a different cohort of young people – those without supportive parents that must seek out gender-affirming attire themselves.
Last month, in honor of the Transgender Day of Visibility, Alexander donated a slew of merchandise to Switzer.
“It’s a great opportunity for me to expand even further [and reach] older youth and be able to do some good, help these people in another critical time in their journey,” he said.
Both Switzer and Alexander praised the immensely positive effects their work has had on the kids they serve.
“A lot of kids have withdrawn from doing activities they love,” Alexander said. “And I don’t know about you, but for myself, you know, being able to go swimming at the beach, go to camp and feel comfortable, it’s kind of an essential part of growing up. So people say it’s life-changing for them and their kids.”
“Right away when a kid tries on their first bikini… They get that, you know, that twirl, like ‘Hey, I feel like myself.’”
Switzer, a trans man himself, told LGBTQ Nation that based on feedback he has received from the Oakland Unified School District, trans students who have access to the Affirming Wardrobe have had better attendance and even improved grades.
“They’re more interactive with their peers, they’re happier. They’re showing up for school every day. They’re showing up for club meetings, for events in the community… It’s really brought a lot of people, a lot of students, a lot of kids just so much joy.”
Both companies hope to continue expanding their reach as much as possible. Switzer is hoping to do so through college campus ministries.
“I grew up in the Christian church and was loved and welcomed, and then I was queer and I was a sin… So I strayed away from being with any kind of religious groups for 11 years and then [found] this very welcoming group of young people… They were super excited and welcoming of the idea of the Affirming Wardrobe. So with the partnership of the other church that we work with, they were able to give me space there.”
“Now we’re looking to connect with additional campus ministries at additional colleges to try to open space at their church or their college. I connected with my pastor, and we’re going to reach out to the over 100 different groups throughout the different universities.”
And now that Ruby is 15, Alexander has been expanding the company’s product line to grow with his daughter. He introduced a bra last year, for example, and he is working on creating other, more teen-centered undergarments as an increasing number of older kids also show interest in the brand.
“There’s always more to do,” he said. “Much more to grow Rubies into for sure.”
While both founders have experienced the inevitable backlash that accompanies supporting a marginalized group, they said they do their best to focus on the positive.
“The backlash, it just sort of falls off me,” said Alexander. “I knew going into this that there are some people that hate on the trans movement. They’re going to be there irrespective of what I’m doing. I really don’t focus on them at all. Rubies is really about celebrating these great people, the great community, the kids, it’s all positive…. What Rubies and I personally try to do is really just bring some joy to this community.”
“We don’t want you to be shocked,” Switzer added. “We want this to be normal. We’re just giving our kids what they need to succeed.”
He recalls a special Affirming Wardrobe program in San Francisco that paired 18 trans and gender nonconforming kids with 18 drag artists for a shopping spree at the LGBTQ+ thrift store, Out of the Closet.
“Just helping them shop and find what really makes them feel comfortable. We had a shy, shy youth come in that at first was very hesitant. And after, they had just the biggest smile on their face. They just broke out of their shell. And it was just… it drives the work.”
As someone who regularly witnesses the positive impact trans kids experience when their gender is affirmed, Switzer has a message for the GOP legislators seeking to limit trans kids’ freedom: “Just leave us be. Let us do what’s going to make us happy. We’re not hurting anybody. We are doing things within our lives to fulfill what we need to be to be happy.”
