@23jodys
Never heard it put so succinctly but "good, because I'd rather have a f*d up son who conforms than a well adjusted kid who makes the neighbors at me funny and wonder what's wrong with my family. We want to be normal not happy" explains a great deal of childhood trauma. Especially resonant to me as a trans person.
@syco579
It's almost like the people who supposedly want to protect children are actually actively harming them
@theodoredehart7194
"we want to be normal not happy." Holy shit that hit me hard.
@StephMcAlea
As a transwoman and a very long time subscriber thank you for covering this kn behalf of my American trans friends. ❤
@shassett79
It's weird how having a popular social movement dedicated entirely to demonizing and ostracizing a set of young people has had a negative impact on their mental health.
@joniroberta1950
Thank you very much, Rebecca! My wife and I were long time supporters of the Trevor Project until she died a few years ago. We also supported the Peyton Hearts Project which has combined forces with them. And I think you got it right. For the people advocating these laws, the pain and possible suicide is a feature, not a bug.
@domecrack
6:02 I'm not even LGBTQ and I'm terrified of losing my surrogate family when the day comes that I have to stand up to the entire fire dept for this one kid there, so I can't imagine how much worse it is for said kid.
@TransHippie
Thank you for making this video. I am one of the people who requested it.
@karen23826
6:35 this is exactly my parents. They didn’t want me to be happy. They wanted me to conform and pretend to be their imaginary son. They sent me to doctors and psychologists not to help me, but erase me and make me conform. My mother at one point told me point blank she’d rather I was dead than be trans. Eventually they disowned me. On the rare occasion my mother decided to reach out, it was always to yell at me and blame me for everything she did to me. She wanted to punish, control, and conform to her idea of normal. She was terrified of what the neighbors and other people would think if they found out. She didn’t want me to be happy and well adjusted. Incidentally, all these laws are triggering me up one side and down the other causing me to constantly flashback to that time when my parents abused me. The one thing that kept me going was the knowledge that more and more trans kids didn’t have to go through the torture and abuse I did. But now it’s going backwards and in many ways is even worse as instead of individual families abusing their kids, it’s entire states abusing children and encouraging families to do the same. I’ve been fighting severe depression since it all overwhelmed me a year ago. I’ve almost acted on my SI thoughts several times, and it scares me all the time. When the Montana state legislator told the chamber they had blood on their hands, She was speaking the truth and they censored her for it. The research is very clear on this point: if trans kids do not receive love, acceptance, and support from their families 1 out of every two of those kids will consider suicide. I was one of those kids and it’s a miracle I lived to see adulthood. I still don’t know how I managed.
@KetsuekiRose
it does happen, in 1991 I came out as a lesbian to my mom and she tried to beat me to death screaming that she'd rather see me dead than gay. Now I'm trans masc non-binary and genderfluid. I'll be 50 next month and I've lost 8 people close to me to suicide, 6 of whom were transgender, including my adopted baby brother 5 years ago. I beg Americans, "please just love your kids! Whoever, whatever, however! Just love them!"
@katyungodly
I grew up as a trans kid and the pressure was definitely to conform and NOT be trans. To pretend the world is pushing us into it is ridiculous, quite the contrary. We have to fight every step of the way.
@alexreid1173
It’s baffling that so many people don’t understand this at this point. I was very involved in my local trans community in high school. It was a relatively conservative area, but the trans kids were often tight-knit. I was one of the only ones who was out publicly as a teenager, but I knew lots of other trans kids who were mostly in the closet. Not all of them made it out of high school alive. This is obviously anecdotal, but the difference between trans kids with more accepting parents vs trans kids with transphobic parents was huge. The area itself was transphobic enough that suicidal ideation was the norm for every trans kid I knew, including myself, but the people who actually attempted or committed were very disproportionately those with strict, very religious parents. And that was probably ~30% of the parents in my district (others were more mainstream Christians primarily). This all pre-dates the more recent transphobic legislation in my state. I can’t imagine being a trans minor right now. My experience was bad, but there weren’t that many policies making it worse (the policies were mostly non-existent and made up on the spot as we came out). The trans kids in my state are one of if not my biggest priority when I vote. I’m preparing to leave the state (and/or help others leave the state) if or when I need to. I have no desire to leave, but if my healthcare is in jeopardy, I will. For numbers, there were typically 2-3 trans people out at my high school at a given time. The true number was at least 15-20 trans kids made up of only people who had informed me personally that they’re trans. The number of OUT trans kids has been increasing in recent years, but I have my doubts about how much the population is actually increasing. This was mostly circa 2015-2019.
@MartinPiper6502
I reported someone for transphobic and homophobic bullying. That person then proceeded to dox and harass me online. I had to take them to court to get them to stop. Of course after I got death threats specifically naming the person doing the doxing and harassment, they claimed they were "innocent" etc. It was reported in the news. You can do a search for it. The organisation I made the report to leaked my name to the subject of the complaint.
@Where_is_Waldo
I'm a straight cis white guy and I wasted unquantifiable but undoubtedly vast amounts of my limited time alive being made less happy by suppressing actual likes and interests I had which have always been integral to who I am so that I could fit in and guess what: it didn't work. I usually didn't fit in anyway because people can usually spot a phony and even when it did work the acceptance felt hollow because it wasn't me who was being accepted, it was my act and I didn't enjoy the act and I reiterate: I am a straight cis white guy. I can't even imagine the depths of depression to which conformity can take someone and even my experience is enough to say that it is universally harmful to suppress who you are to fit in.
@luzdeaurora3226
Over the years i’ve grown used (and desensitized) to people talking about us as if we’re not there. As a (usually evil) concept. And allies discuss and defend on the same terms. I teared up upon hearing “i love you, i support you”. It’s been a while since i heard some one adress us directly, thank you 💜
@littleotak
Thank you so much! All the anti-trans rhetoric is so exhausting. I think it's easy to overlook the impact it has on our day to day lives. It's hard to claw your way out of that feeling of doom without support.
@TravisHRF16CC
Unfortunately, none of this is surprising…it wasn’t too long ago that teachers and even parents would punish kids exhibiting left-handedness.
@Sky-bx9mn
4:40 One of the biggest gaps, I must imagine, is that anyone who completed their attempt could not answer the later edition of the survey.
@bobiamfake4629
I’m a trans woman and thankfully an adult who is capable of supporting herself. If I lose access to HRT, I will not be around within a year. Really glad this is finally getting talked about in clear terms, since every trans person could tell you what the consequences of a lack of gender affirming care will be.
@suimeingwong2043