2023-09-12 12:05:42
More than 400 bills targeting trans people have been submitted to US state legislatures since the start of 2023, according to an analysis by Le Washington Post.
Although dozens of them have been rejected or withdrawn, hundreds of bills submitted so far this year – more than 360 of them – are still under consideration.
The analysis of The laterwhich draws on data collected by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on current legislation in states across the country, offers a broad but imperfect overview of the evolution of legislative attacks carried out by state legislators. States once morest transgender and non-binary people.
Some legislation, for example, reflects bills that were introduced in past years. Many bills, while no less egregious in their targeting of trans people, merely repeat past attacks, such as limiting which bathrooms or locker rooms, for example, trans people can use, or banning transgender women to participate in women’s sports.
But other bills introduce new forms of attack. Bans on health care for transgender people – including banning life-saving gender-affirming care (primarily aimed at young people but also targeting adults, in some cases) – have become more popular among anti-trans lawmakers in states across the country.
Proposals targeting transgender people in the United States ignore scientific knowledge and research on gender and contradict the advice of several medical organizations – including the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, for to name just a few – which claim the bills harm the well-being of transgender and non-binary people, particularly children.
These attacks on transgender people have had varying degrees of legislative success. Alarmingly, 29 of these bills were successfully passed – a figure that may seem small compared to the number of bills considered since the start of the year, but which strip transgender people of their rights and represent more than double the number of bills examined since the start of the year. number that has been adopted, in total, throughout 2022.
By the publication’s own admission, the count is not exhaustive. The later did not, for example, include laws that attack LGBTQ people in general in its tally of anti-trans bills. This means that the analysis by The later — through its reporting and accompanying graphics — might give the misleading impression that some state legislatures are not attacking trans people when they are.
A bill in Wisconsin, for example, that would prohibit state agencies from banning conversion therapy — a technique that claims to “cure” LGBTQ people but has no scientific basis and has been compared to torture by those subjected to it – is not included in the count by The latereven though the bill directly mentions gender identity in its text.
The laterin making this distinction, includes in its report a graphic that therefore claims that Wisconsin has not submitted any anti-trans bills since the beginning of the year.
By a different count of legislation targeting transgender and non-binary people, almost every state (except Delaware) has seen proposals targeting its transgender residents. This tally, produced by a site called Trans Legislation Tracker, puts the number of anti-trans bills submitted since the start of the year at nearly 500, with 43 bills passed.
The later also admits that executive branch actions by statewide Republican officials are not included in the analysis because the publication only examines anti-transgender measures by state legislatures. So actions — such as those taken by Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey, who last week imposed draconian restrictions on gender-affirming care — are not included in Le Washington Post rapport.
Introducing so many anti-trans bills is harming the mental health of transgender people across the country, analyzes have shown. A poll released this year by the Trevor Project shows how bad just putting these bills forward can be: According to their survey data, 86% of trans and non-binary youth said recent debates over these bills This has had a negative impact on their mental health, a huge problem given that trans children already have much higher rates of depression and suicidal ideation than their peers. cisgender.
Trans activists have denounced the bills, calling them attempts to completely eradicate transgender people.
“Slowly, states are moving toward an outright ban on being transgender — it’s for these reasons that people have started calling attacks on gender-affirming care an attempted genocide,” said journalist Erin Reed, specialist in anti-trans and transgender legislation. activist, said earlier this year.
Allison Chapman, an independent legislative researcher and transgender activist, said the reason the number of anti-trans bills has increased in 2023 is because Republicans have engaged in their hate propaganda in recent years.
“Republicans and right-wing figures have put themselves in a position where they cannot give up their hatred of trans people because of the way they had to position themselves to push for this in the first place,” Chapman said in an email to Truth.
Chapman also said the introduction of these types of bills would likely continue for the foreseeable future.
“I fully expect that these anti-trans bills and policies will continue to increase and expand more and more onto the national stage, especially as we approach the 2024 election,” Chapman said , adding that it is “absolutely crucial that trans people come forward.” with contingency plans for how they will access hormones and gender-affirming care if/when it becomes impossible to access in their state or country.
“This is the time to build a local community of trans people and allies to help everyone get through whatever is to come,” Chapman said.
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