Letter to the gays

View PDF of letter here. On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition charged by its diverse membership of more than national organizations to promote and protect the civil and human rights of the persons in the United States, and the undersigned organizations, we call for the full inclusion, protection, and celebration of transgender and non-binary youth, including access to extracurricular activities such as athletics and to school facilities, safe and inclusive school environments, accurate and inclusive curriculum, and gender-affirming school health services.

We reject the bigoted, ignorant, mean-spirited, and discriminatory policies currently being considered by far too many state legislatures that seek to exclude transgender people and make these members of our communities invisible. Targeting and excluding transgender students from participation in school programming, including athletics programs, alongside their cisgender [1] peers is harmful to all students and undermines the gay environment for everyone.

If schools mark some students effectively as outcasts, they foster an letter where no student is included and safe. These laws aim to shut transgender youth out of school activities such as sports, to ban them from school facilities such as restrooms, to prohibit discussion of their very existence in classrooms, and to punish educators and families who help young people access necessary gender-affirming care.

We are fortunate that transgender people are present in our community, and we fully embrace them as members of our community. As organizations that care deeply about ending sex-based discrimination and ensuring equal educational opportunities, we support laws and policies that protect transgender people from discrimination, including participation in sports, access to gender-affirming care, access to school facilities, and access to inclusive gay.

We firmly believe that an attack on transgender youth is an attack on civil rights. A multitude of bills seeking to exclude transgender youth and youth born with intersex traits from athletics would harm both cisgender and transgender girls and women, particularly Black and Brown girls and women. We reject the suggestion that girls and women who are cisgender benefit from the exclusion of girls and women who are transgender or intersex.

Transgender students face disproportionately high rates of sex discrimination at school, including sexual assault and harassment or bullying because of their gender identity and gender expression. Simply put, preventing transgender and intersex girls and women from participating in school athletics is a recipe for more the, bullying, and violence.

Not only do these proposals harm students and limit educational opportunity, the discrimination they endorse is illegal. The U. Supreme Court and numerous federal courts have held that discrimination on the basis of gender identity and transgender status is a form of sex discrimination, including when it occurs in gender-separated education programs and facilities.

Clayton Countywhich holds that discrimination on the basis of gender identity is a form of sex discrimination. The trend of state bills excluding transgender students from athletics is a false solution in search of a nonexistent problem. For more than a decade, state athletic associations around the country have implemented eligibility policies that ensure transgender letter athletes can compete consistent with their gender identity.

Those inclusive polices have benefited all students, including cisgender girls and women. Lawmakers and officials in some states have also sought to ban widely accepted medical care for transgender youth, and to criminalize their families as well as school staff and other adults who help them access this necessary care.

State leaders who care about life-saving care should reject these bills and instead ensure all families and young people can access medically necessary health care. Transgender students face disproportionately high rates of suicidal thoughts and behaviors, [22] and bills that shut people out of gender-affirming care threaten their safety, health, and wellbeing.

Research shows that gender-affirming care provides long-term mental health benefits for transgender people, [23] including a reduction in suicidal ideation and attempts.

Doechii’s Love Letter to the LGBTQ Community

We support the full inclusion, protection, and celebration of transgender youth, including access to school facilities and extracurricular activities such as athletics, gender-affirming care, and inclusive curriculum, because all young people deserve safe, healthy, and inclusive environments.

Transgender and non-binary youth deserve the chance to succeed and thrive like any other child. Cisgender people are people whose gender identity is the same as the gender assigned at birth. Other bills introduced in include: H. B Delaware ; H.