Young trans people’s powerful message: We are thriving
Kai is a 17-year-old filmmaker, a drama club performer and an energetic class president whose mantra is to “try to get involved with just about everything.”
The always-sunny senior is busy planning prom and virtual spirit days, while navigating through COVID-19spurred Zoom calls.
Gia, also 17, is a stellar athlete excelling in cross-country and field hockey, a student government leader and a thoughtful advocacy worker who has lobbied on Capitol Hill.
Like teens everywhere, the two are immersed in college applications and the many angsts entwined in lives of those on the brink of adulthood.
But Kai and Gia, who go by one name, share something else. They are among the faces of young transgender people in 2020, and they have a message: We are thriving.
As Transgender Awareness Week – a week devoted to raising the visibility of the trans community – begins, that message couldn’t be more powerful, said Cathy Renna, communications director of the National LGBTQ Task Force.
“Being trans is the third-most-interesting thing about me” is what Renna said she hears from many transgender young people these days. “They want to be seen as multifaceted people – not what they are, who they are. What we are seeing around young people is incredibly inspiring."
h Young transgender people have been growing up in the shadow of a complicated dynamic, Renna acknowledges. Among the threats in recent years:
h Transgender people were barred from serving in the military.
h The words “transgender” and “diversity” were banned in CDC reports.
h There have been challenges at the state level with bathroom bills and religious exemption laws.
And 2020 saw a sad milestone: At least 34 transgender or gender nonconforming people were killed by violence, most of them Black and Latino women, according to the Human Rights Coalition. Those deaths will be marked on a day of remembrance Friday.
But there also have been high points, most notably the election. Presidentelect Joe Biden, who has spoken up for transgender rights, has vowed to eliminate discriminatory executive orders from President Donald Trump and has made LGBTQ equality part of his platform. Voters also gave at least eight transgender, nonbinary and gender-nonconforming state candidates victories on Election Day, including tapping the nation's first openly transgender state senator.
Barbara Satin, 86, grew up in an era when there was “no vocabulary around what transgender was. The closest thing was transvestite.”
Satin, now a transgender activist on aging, faith and gender justice, said she was aware as early as the first grade that she was interested in feminine things and was different from her peers. “And the only thing I knew to do when you have something different is to hide it.”
Satin, who was raised in a family rooted in Catholicism and even spent some time as a teenage seminarian, was determined to silence her identity struggles. After college, she received a commission as a U.S. Air Force officer, married, raised three children and had a successful career in public relations.
When Satin retired at age 54, she finally decided to explore her identity. She became involved in a support group for transgender people, which first met secretly. Finally, her second-oldest son called and said he wanted to talk over beer and hamburgers.
“Something is going on with you,” she recalls him saying. “Tell us what’s happening.”
Satin said she blurted out “I’m transgender.” Her son’s reply: “Thank you – we’ve been waiting for you to tell us.”
For people of Satin's generation, that narrative is is the norm, she said. Satin couldn’t talk to a priest, friends or family about her identity growing up. But when she looks at young transgender people today, she sees support systems in schools, communities and families. There is a broader grasp of what transgender means and how LGBTQ people are viewed, she said, rather than some “Jerry Springer-type understanding” from earlier decades.
Bamby Salcedo, president and CEO of the TransLatin@ Coalition, said the visibility of the transgender community in recent years can lead “many people to think that the social issues trans people face have been resolved.”
For some young transgender people, particularly those who are Black and brown, the reality is much more harsh.
“I started to transition at 19,” said Salcedo, now 51. “And the very same issues I went through as a young person are the same issues young people are experiencing today” – difficulty accessing health care, homelessness, violence, and sex work as a means of survival.
“For the majority of (trans) people of color, why we end up being on the streets is because we are often disowned by our families,” Salcedo said.
Still, Salcedo is fiercely hopeful for trans youths' future. “I see great things they are doing in our society. Young people are understanding and learning that they also have power.”
Amy Green, director of research at The Trevor Project, is also familiar with hardships facing some young members of the transgender community. A recent mental health survey by the organization, which provides crisis and suicide prevention services for those under 25, revealed stark stats. Among them: 59% of Black transgender and non-binary young people have seriously considered suicide; 45% have experienced homelessness.
“There are multiple overlapping systems and layers of oppression" among groups that are often marginalized, Green said.
But she, too, is bullish on the future of young trans people. “There are people and entire organizations working for them. It’s powerful to have a community wrap around this group.”
Gia and Kai are members of one such group: Gender Cool, a youth-led movement that works to share positive experiences of young people who are transgender and nonbinary.
Gia, who came out at 11, said she “always felt invisible” in her earlier years.
She was gripped with trepidation about returning to her coed middle school’s cross-country team after she transitioned. “I was really nervous. I have very strong connections with my teammates; would they accept me transitioning to a girl?”
But coaches and fellow players greeted her exuberantly, even naming her captain. “It felt so amazing. I was competing with people I wanted to compete with,” she said.
Kai, who was the first student in his school district who transitioned, recalls a similar early struggle. “For a long time I wanted to be under the radar,” he said.
Now he is a mentor for students who are transgender and nonbinary with concerns such as restrooms and locker rooms.
“I like to think being trans is a small part of who I am. I never think ‘Oh, my life is so terrible because I’m transgender.' I don’t see it as a detriment to who I am at all,” said Kai.
His advice for other young transgender people: “Don’t let the haters get you down. Love you for you. There is a community of people fighting for you.”