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Transgender Conversations
We need to speak out in these difficult times
The Persecution is Real
The transgender persecution is real. Now emboldened by far right dominance in politics, more laws are being passed to deny rights to trans people. It reminds me of the same kind of discrimination and hatred seen in previous historical persecutions — the Jews in Hitler’s Germany, the Japanese Americans in the U.S. during WWII, even the anti-Communist era in the U.S. in the fifties, just to name a few. It is not to be taken lightly when our fellow humans are treated as less than human for any reason.
Encounters
Many years ago, I was a freelance writer in my home island of Guam. I did “soft news” — human interest, community, arts, culture. One day, I was assigned to interview a young woman who was launching a career as a fashion designer. She was friendly and lovely. I have never been much of a fashionista, but I respected what she was creating. It turns out that she remembered me from high school and reminded me that we were in homeroom together a little over ten years before. She could tell that I didn’t remember her and told me to look her up in the yearbook, reminding me of her last name. She told me she had a different first name back then.
