The World Professional Association for Transgender Health is NOT an insurance company. It is subject to its own enabling Act, and is neither an entitlement nor a welfare program.

Gender dysphoria is broadly defined as Section 7, operated by a board of directors pursuant to the Comprehensive Health Insurance Plan Act (215 ILCS 105/1 et seq.)

Discomfort or distress that is caused by a discrepancy between a person’s gender identity and that person’s sex assigned at birth must be eligible for this state program.

Transsexual, transgender, and gender nonconforming individuals who plan to change gender roles permanently will result in termination from the program as of the date required by state law.

The following is a brief description of the benefits provided by CHIP for covered services, drugs and supplies:

• surgeons
• patients
• mental healthcare professionals
• other health professionals
• clinical care

CHIP will not pay for any expense or charge set forth in more detail in any benefit plan booklet.

Transgender adjective must continue to meet all of the CHIP eligibility requirements.

Transsexual adjective must continue to meet all of the CHIP eligibility requirements.

Services, drugs or supplies that are for, or resulting from, surgery or surgeries performed in connection with sexual reassignment or gender transformation are often applied by the medical profession (referred to herein as Section 15).

Section 15 is neither an entitlement nor a welfare program.

Mental health professionals who plan to change gender roles permanently must be eligible for this state program before you can enroll.

The Illinois General Assembly- broadly defined as discomfort or distress – will not pay for any expense or charge.

Chicago Women’s Health Center (CWHC) is a non-profit health collective that provides sliding scale services including basic gynecological care, health education, counseling, massage, acupuncture and alternative insemination. The Trans Greater Access Project (TGAP) is an agency wide initiative to increase access to sliding scale health care services or trans individuals. As we look at ways we can better meet the health care needs of transfeminine communities, we are seeking input from trans women to inform our services.

The purpose of these focus groups is to:

• Assess how we can meet health care needs of transfeminine communities;
• Learn from transfeminine individuals’ experiences initiating hormone therapy in order to inform the development of our hormone administration services.

We are seeking both:

• Transfeminine individuals of any age who would like to share their thoughts and experiences regarding personal or community need for health care services.

AND

• Transfeminine individuals 18 years of age or older who have been on hormone therapy for a minimum of 6 months.

Focus groups will occur in May 2012.
As a participant, you will be provided with a cash incentive to thank you for your time.
Food provided.
If you are interested in participating, please call Jess at 773.935.6126 X222

Needless to say, the US Military probably wouldn’t want me, should they reinstate the draft. I’ve transitioned since turning eighteen: gotten hair removal, grown my hair own, grown breasts, legally changed my name from Jared to Rebecca. Repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell means gays can legally serve in the military, but being transgender is still considered cause for medical discharge, under the same clause which forbids servicemen and women from sexually abusing children. Which, not surprisingly, doesn’t prevent transgender people from existing in the military. There’s a slowly growing lobbying effort by trans veterans for better treatment while in the military and better healthcare once out. Transgender people are everywhere. Even a Miss Universe pageant.

I don’t follow pageant culture. My attitude about the trans woman attempting to compete in Miss Universe is pretty simple: good for her, and how silly to forbid her from doing so. I can even imagine the allure of competing in a pageant, particularly for someone who might feel themselves as less than a “real” man or woman. Winning a pageant, or a beauty contest, or ILM (International Leather Man), or the like would give the winner a sense of validation: See? I am real. This panel of judges just proved it.

And yet, forbidding trans people from beauty pageants seems particularly odd to me. Few people pretend that pageants are an examination of “natural” beauty. Even without considering plastic surgery, pageant beauty still consists of plucking and waxing and primping and curling and painting and suck in here and lift up there and twirl now and there that’s better. Plastic surgery simply extends that effort at beautification beneath the skin. When considered in pursuit of the ideal of beauty, what’s the difference between a dress which hides fat and a surgeon who removes it?

But to be trans is, apparently, to go too far. Because – as the presidential primaries have brought to light – being a real woman is about one thing: The ability to bear children, whether you want to or not. Or, at least, the hypothetical ability to do so – no one is seriously proposing that a woman loses her womanhood after her childbearing years are over, or whether a woman rendered barren by genetics or medical necessity becomes neuter. But for trans women, there is no hypothetical – it was never in the cards for me to give birth, and so I must not be a real woman.

There’s a joke among gender reassignment surgeons, that one of the standards for surgery is for the new vagina to look so good “not even your gyno will be able to tell.” Some even go further, saying, “not even god will be able to tell.” Because aesthetics is all they offer. It’s no small offer, to be sure: aesthetics and sensation and orgasms and a cherry on top. But can it be imbued with whatever essence converts fantasy to reality?

Once upon a time, it was thought that there was a life force which separated life from that which didn’t live: the dirt and rocks and water and sky. When you died, your life force left. Tales ranging from golems to Pinocchio  to Frankenstein’s monster dream of giving life to that which is not living. What’s to say my surgically constructed vagina, if and when I have one sculpted from the flesh between my legs, won’t need the same thing? What makes an elbow an elbow, and not a knee? Function? Aesthetics? Or its life force?

One of the things which has been frustrating for me is the knowledge that my life force, my pure force of will, has not been enough to reshape my body. No amount of wishing or hoping or pleading or crying was able to do what pills and lasers have done. And so I consider going under the knife. Not for bigger breasts or a firmer ass, not for a reshaped jawline or to pin back my ears. I consider going under the knife for something most people will never see. It won’t grant me better vision, a stronger heart, not even the ability to store spare change in my cleavage. Common English even puts its use as a passive one: to be penetrated, fucked, taken, won, defiled.

Perhaps common English is wrong. Perhaps I won’t give birth to new life, kicking and screaming and bloody from between my legs, but to a new self, kicking and screaming and bloody all the same.

THE EASY STUFF
Be open to using the pronouns/labels/language a trans person wants you to use. If you make a mistake, quickly correct yourself. This is the most important step of being an ally: allowing another to define their own identity.

If you don’t know what pronouns to use, ask. Politely and respectfully. This is a simple way to show your respect for someone else’s self-identification.

…but don’t pry or make assumptions. Don’t ask if someone had surgery or if they are on hormones or plan to do either of these things. It is invasive and personal. If someone would like to share that information with you, it is at their digression. Also understand that not all trans people choose medical to undergo medical intervention, and that not physically transitioning, taking hormones, or having surgery does not invalidate their trans identity.

Remember that gender is not the same as sexual orientation. Being trans does not mean a person is gay, and being gay doesn’t mean a person is trans. Sexuality is about attraction, gender is about a personal sense of self-identity.

Don’t out anyone. If someone tells you that they or someone else are trans, please do not share it with others unless you are told that it is okay to do so. They are trusting you, so don’t break their trust.

A LITTLE BIT HARDER, NOW
Do your research. It is not the responsibility of a trans person to be your teacher, so look up some stuff for yourself (see the end of this guide for some possible resources).

Speak up. Politely correct others if they use the wrong pronoun for a trans individual. Call out friends, peers, and media sources who make transphobic, hateful, or simply ignorant remarks.

NOW YOU’RE GETTING IT!
Don’t use “T” in your group’s name unless your group is actively working for trans rights. It is unfair to add the T to a group or organizations name if they are not doing anything to help or progress transgender rights and education of transgender issues.

Fight bathroom policing. The restroom is a focal point of anxiety, abuse and harassment for trans people as it is one of the most gendered places in our culture. At an individual level, offer to escort a trans person to the restroom to ensure their safety and comfort, particularly in unfamiliar places such as bars or restaurants. At an institutional level, encourage businesses and organizations to create gender neutral bathrooms.

Challenging binary gender systems isn’t always the same thing as being trans. Just because someone appears androgynous or not clearly presenting as masculine or feminine does not mean that they are trans. There are multiple ways that a person can express themselves or their gender identity, and they are not always related to being transgender.

Listen. The best way to be an ally is to listen to trans people themselves. Be open to learn more about terms, identities, and pronouns that you are unsure or unaware of.

Web resources:
Not Your Mom’s Trans 101 – http://tranarchism.com/2010/11/26/not-your-moms-trans-101/
Trans 101 at T-Vox.org – http://www.t-vox.org/index.php?title=Trans_101
Trans 101 at the Sylvia Rivera Law Project – http://srlp.org/trans-101

I have a question for the audience. By a show of hands, who here was happy with the changes they experienced during puberty? There’s no right or wrong answer, I’m just curious. Now, by a show of hands, who was unhappy?

I was unhappy when puberty hit. Miserable, actually. On-and-off suicidal. I’m transgender, which means I was assigned one gender at birth (male) but identify as another (female). So when puberty hit, around thirteen, I began developing in all of the ways which are normal for boys: Hair started growing in places I didn’t really want hair to grow (namely, everywhere), my voice dropped, I didn’t grow boobs or get all curvy, I discovered how great masturbation is, and I was slightly irritable, angry, or depressed for the next seven years; any normal boy’s puberty and trans girl’s nightmare.

The things happening to my body felt totally foreign, and not simply because puberty was changing my body from a child to an adult. They felt foreign because my body was changing from a child to a man.

Hormones are powerful. They’re what drive puberty. Testosterone and estrogen, mainly; testosterone for the boys, and estrogen for the girls. They’re what cause our voice to drop, or not. To grow breasts, or not. They impact fat distribution, muscle growth, skin texture, emotional and sexual response – you name it, any part of your body, and hormones likely had a hand in shaping how it works.

Puberty is heralded by the production of gonadotropin-releasing hormones (GnRH), which triggers hormonal and physical changes throughout the body. When I was thirteen, my GnRH levels started to rise, just like they were supposed to. Like however many umpteen million years of evolution had programed them to. Aging leads to GnRH leads to puberty leads to developing into an adult. A-to-B-to-C. A cascade of peptides and neural receptors and hormones and one day I woke up with a cracking voice and a five o’clock shadow.

I would have given anything to get off that train, to halt that cascade of development.

There’s an international group of doctors who make recommendations on how to care for transgender patients. It’s called WPATH, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health. Their Standards of Care cover issues ranging from general health and wellbeing for trans people to when to prescribe hormones and who should be eligible for gender reassignment surgery. And, as it so happens, how to work with and treat transgender youth. According to the WPATH Standards of Care, Version 7:

Adolescents may be eligible for puberty suppressing hormones as soon as pubertal changes have begun.

Delaying puberty buys time. Time to talk with parents and doctors and therapists, to think about what you really want, to make sure if transitioning – going on hormones – is the right decision. But it also buys time, physically. Time to put off all those changes – fat and muscle and hair and voice and more – that come with puberty.

I’ll be honest, I’m of two minds on delaying puberty. I’m an educator, someone who regularly works with kids who are 11, 12, 13, just beginning to change from children to adults. And I know that the idea of giving such young kids – and they are just kids – such long-lasting power over their bodies is terrifying. My students don’t know who they are; how could they possibly know who they are? They aren’t qualified to tell anyone whether or not they should go on life-altering hormones. That’s what my teacher-mind tells me.

But I knew who I was – what my gender was – long before puberty. I wouldn’t have needed to wait until 11 or 12 or 13 to say so, if anyone had been asking the right questions. I know exactly what being trans and going through puberty is like: it sucks. It’s harmful. It’s damaging. Puberty is hard on every child, but when your body starts going the ‘wrong way’ it’s ten million times worse. And it doesn’t end, that feeling of wrongness. Puberty ends, and people who aren’t trans usually find peace with their body. But being trans means every day is a feeling of discomfort, of being in the wrong skin, of a body that doesn’t fit. And so, as a trans person, I’m thrilled that puberty delaying drugs are now an option for doctors and therapists to offer.

I’m not suggesting we hand out puberty suppressors like candy. Parents and doctors and therapists should be involved in these conversations. But – as lucky as I have been and as happy as I am with who I am today – I’d still give anything to go back in time and take some of those puberty suppressors. To avoid just some of the thousands of dollars and lost years I’ve spent on hormones and hair removal and therapy and missed experiences.

One last thing from WPATH:

Neither puberty suppression nor allowing puberty to occur is a neutral act.

I want to repeat that:

Neither puberty suppression nor allowing puberty to occur is a neutral act.

WPATH admits that there are legitimate health concerns about delaying puberty. But there are also legitimate mental health concerns about subjecting a transgender child to an unwanted (and potentially harmful) pubescent experience. There is no easy answer here. No obviously correct decision. And the first batch of trans kids who experience delayed puberty aren’t old enough to tell us how it worked for them. As WPATH says, “the long-term effects can only be determined when the earliest treated patients reach the appropriate age.”

I guess we’ll have to wait and see how it all turns out.

I’ve revisited this question from time to time: Would I wish to not be trans, if given the opportunity? I wrote a story about that question last year. I should try and expand that story, since I sort of dodged the actual question. Because the short answer is, I don’t know. If our lives consist of diverging possibilities, the roads not taken, every day takes me further down the road of being trans. Put another way, every day makes my identity as a trans woman a bit more concrete, a bit less theoretical something to consider for “the future.” The future is here, I’m considering The Surgery. Being not-trans, a cis woman, might make my life prior to transitioning more enjoyable, but it would effectively reshape my life since I began to transition into something unrecognizable.

The question becomes simpler when dealing with healthcare. I would love to be cis when it comes to dealing with doctors and the medical profession. Every time I go to a new doctor, I get asked the same questions: When was the last time you were on your period? Is there any possibility you could be pregnant? Over and over. Most recently, when I had my gallbladder removed, I saw how pervasive gendered assumptions are within the healthcare community. It would have been blissfully simple to give them the answers they were expecting, and not have to reassert my identity every time a new doctor came into the room. Fortunately, none of the doctors were bigoted or gave me any problems, but the possibility was always there, lingering as a fear in the back of my mind.

Last Monday I visited Dr Bowers south of San Francisco. She’s one of the surgeons I’m looking at for gender reassignment surgery, and the first of my top three (Bowers, McGinn, and Brassard) that I’ve had a chance to meet in person. The experience was positive, and primarily for me to get a feel of her personality, but also somewhat surreal. I was sitting in a doctor’s office, with my mom, discussing the possibility of this woman cutting open my penis, removing the spongey tissue, and using the remaining flesh, blood, and nerves to make a vagina. One that I would need to continue regularly dialating for the rest of my life, lest by body decide “Whoops! That shouldn’t be there” and close back up on itself.

So all of my thoughts about healthcare and the queer body are filtered specifically through the lens healthcare and the trans body. I don’t pretend trans people are the only ones who have issues with doctors. (I know lots of lesbians who are sick of being asked “How can be positive your’e not pregnant if you’re sexually active?” Umm, because they’re not sleeping with anyone who produces sperm? Get out of your heteronormative assumptions. )

I keep thinking about this, and keep not coming to any conclusions.

March 1998, from March 2012

Dear Rebecca,

Can I call you Rebecca? I know you haven’t told many people that name. It’s one of the names mom and dad chose for you before you were born, one you’ve been using in your head since mom mentioned it while working on that genealogy project with you. I know it’s a private name for you right now, but things change. I promise they do.

This letter is coming from the year 2012, fourteen years in the future. You’re thirteen, I’m twenty-seven. You’re exploring your identity on the Internet, trying to figure out what “transgender” means and whether it applies to you. I’m writing about my identity on the Internet, trying to explain to others what “transgender” means and how it applies to me. And, from that perspective, I wanted to write you this letter.

Don’t let anyone tell you who you are. You know who you are. You know what you are. Doctors and therapists and family can help with that journey, but that can’t decide it for you. They also can’t do it for you. I know you’re dying for someone to step in and take the lead, to transition for you, to tell you what to do. And you’ll find doctors and therapists who will help along the way. But no one does it for you.

Put another way: it doesn’t get better. But you will make it better.

You won’t magically transform overnight. You won’t wake up one day and be the girl you want to be, the girl we both know you are. But you’ll get there anyway. You’ll get there by standing firm and standing tall and saying, “I know who I am.”

A few pieces of advice.

First, stand up for yourself. There will be lots of people who question your decisions – either out of love or out of ignorance or a combination of the two – but you know better than them. Don’t let their volume win over your identity.

Second, try not to care what other people think. This isn’t because there aren’t important people whose opinions you should value. Rather, it’s because the things you’re now worrying about — being perceived as a “real girl” and transitioning and all that extremely scary stuff — isn’t as scary as you think it will be. People are too wrapped up in their own shit to fret about you. It’ll all turn out OK.

Lastly, trust your allies to help you. You have some awesome friends and family, and some more awesome friends are around the corner in high school. Take advantage of them. Try stuff out, even if you’re not sure about it. It’s always better to say, “Well, that didn’t turn out the way I hoped” rather than, “Boy, I wish I’d done something tonight instead of sitting at home alone.”

Our positions have flipped over the years. When I was your age — when I was you — I imagined this otherworldly Rebecca, from another plane of existence, who was living this perfect, unimaginable life. Now I am Rebecca, and let me tell you: The Rebecca you construct in your mind has some good advice for you, but she also spouts some bullshit. What she says about transitioning? Listen to that. What she says about killing yourself because you’re not good enough to do it? Tell her to shut the fuck up.

Life isn’t easy, but it’s too much fun to end by killing yourself. Laughter and tears and orgasms and friendships and relationships and so many other things I wish I could be there to show you. So take a deep breath. Cry a few tears when you need to; that’s always OK. And get ready to blossom. Because, let me tell you, you’re gonna be amazing.

Much love,

Rebecca

P.S. The video games in 2012 are so great! Can’t wait to play them with you.

The last few weeks have seen a rush of stories about Obama’s childhood nanny, a transgender woman named Evie. Evie was Obama’s nanny for two years, although she was presenting as male at the time. Beginning with the AP story on March 5, “Obama’s transgender ex-nanny outcast,” the story quickly made the rounds–from American news outlets to the UK, New Zealand, Turkey, and beyond. Here’s the start of the original AP story:

I talked about the TSA last year, while at the National Center for Transgender Equality’s conference on trans issues. The post discussed how the TSA was handling trans travelers, and they deserve credit for appearing at the conference at all. Likewise, when the TSA fucks up, they work (at least they say they do) to correct the problem. That said, it’s inherently obvious to anyone who works with computers – or even anyone who has a camera phone – that the TSA’s claim that the AIT scanners can’t store images is bullshit.

So I opted for the “enhanced” pat-down, preferring not to risk images of my naughty bits being sent far and wide without my knowledge or consent.

The procedure was tame and – fortunately – the TSA workers were very professional. I said I was opting out of the AIT scanners, and was asked to step aside. Within a few minutes (not a particularly long time) a security woman asked if I wanted a private screening. I said I did, so we waited another minute or so for a second TSA woman to join us.

We went into an enclosed area and she wiped down her gloves and put the wipe in a scanner, presumably to ensure there was no  explosive residue before the pat-down even began. She then explained very thoroughly what was going to happen: what parts of her hands she was going to use, where she was going to touch, when she was going to use specific parts of her hands. The process was relatively quick, and about as innocuous as having a stranger touching you can be.

And yet, I managed to smuggle my penis through security. She either didn’t mention it or – as I suspect – didn’t notice it at all. Which was fine with me, but just goes to show how ridiculous the security procedures are. Now, I imagine that the TSA scanner is more focusing on explosives or drug residue – the goal of the pat-down probably isn’t primarily to check for physical weapons. Likewise, I had to go through the regular metal detector before the pat-down. But, ultimately, I could have been smuggling some small prohibited item in the crotch of my undies. (Heaven forbid!)

Again, I’m glad she didn’t make a big deal out of my being trans. I suspect she had no idea. I wouldn’t have been happy if she’d asked what the lump in my crotch was. But I would have at least been reassured the security was secure, instead of having one more example of how invasive-and-yet-ineffective the whole charade is.

When I first came out to my parents as transgender, at around fourteen, I had a lot of unspoken questions: What did wanting to be a girl mean, when the whole world thought I was a boy? Could I ever be happy? How would this change our relationships? And, perhaps most important of all, how would transitioning from being a boy to being a girl work? What would that process be like?

I was lucky in some ways. I didn’t wonder whether my parents would kick me out of the house, or stop supporting me, or beat me, or any of the horrible things that happen all-too-often when trans youth come out to the adults in their lives. And when I said those terrifying words, “I think I want to be a girl,” my parents responded with love and compassion. My mom said, “We will love you, no matter what.” My dad said, “We’ll love you, whatever you are. As long as you’re not a Republican.” (The source of my own sense of humor was never a big mystery.) However, they didn’t know how to address my unspoken questions — or even know that those questions existed.

I tell this story a lot, and I do so for two reasons: First, to highlight a way in which my parents were awesome, by responding to my coming out by reiterating their love for me. But also to highlight a way in which they fell short, to highlight their ignorance around what it meant to be trans, to have a trans child. I tell the story of my coming out to focus on the difference between tolerance and acceptance, which my parents absolutely displayed, and support, which they didn’t know how to provide.

Being an ally to trans folks isn’t simply about being accepting and tolerant. It’s not just acknowledging that trans folks exist, even going so far as to say that maybe they shouldn’t be discriminated against. It’s about taking an active stance around issues of trans equality and being explicitly supportive of trans people in your life, as well as those who aren’t in your life. But what does that mean? Lets take a look at some of the basics.

Step Zero: Don’t Deny Someone Else’s Reality

The first thing about being a trans ally — something really before the first thing — is to know when to keep your mouth shut. You know you’ve failed at this if you find yourself saying any of the following:

Step One: Educate Yourself

So, you’ve learned to keep your mouth shut. Awesome! You’ll go far. The next step toward being a strong trans ally (and the first real bit of work) is to transform yourself into an informed trans ally. To do that, you need to educate yourself. This is hard for lots of people: admitting ignorance and working to fix it. It’s especially hard because you — as an ally-in-training — need to remind yourself it is not the responsibility of Generic Trans Individual to educate you. Bumping into someone that you heard is trans at some social event does not give you the right to grill that individual about gender theory or what’s between their legs, in the same way straight people don’t have the right to ask gay or lesbian individuals, “Wait, how does sex work?”

So educate yourself, and don’t wait for others to do it for you. A few resources in that direction: Not Your Mom’s Trans 101 is a great primmer, particularly because it addresses things like gender binaries, self identification, and the obnoxiously persistent myths that “Sex is between your legs and gender is between your ears.” Go read it. Maybe even a few times, until it starts to make sense. You can also check out Trans 101 at T-Vox, or at the Sylvia Rivera Law Project.

This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ask questions. It means that you should know when and where it is socially appropriate to ask questions. For example, I’m an educator. I love talking about gender, identity, what it means to be trans — all that jazz. However, I’ve chosen to be an educator, and put myself in the role of teacher. If you’re in a situation where it wouldn’t be appropriate to talk about what’s between your legs, you probably shouldn’t be asking about anyone else’s business. If you don’t know what something means, Google it. (For example, Wikipedia has a solid article on what cisgender and cissexual mean.)

Step Two: Begin To Speak Up

So, you’ve read through some Trans 101 websites. You’ve got a grasp on gender identity, cissexism, why you shouldn’t use words like “tranny” and “shemale.” Now what?

Begin to flex your ally muscles. This can be incredibly simple: Call out the next transphobic joke you see on TV. (Family Guy and early seasons of How I Met Your Mother are two places where trans women are consistently the butt of jokes.) Mention to your friends how that’s bullshit. Ask your friends or coworkers or whomever to stop using words like “tranny.”

It really is that easy. Being an ally isn’t scary, but it does require some courage. One of the coolest experiences I’ve ever had was I saw a straight, cis, frat-going, sports-playing friend of mine stop a conversation he and another friend were having to say, “Wait, you’re making really problematic assumptions about gender.”

He was being an awesome ally.

Step Three – Go Big or Go Home

Now that you’ve educated yourself and know enough to call out basic transphobia among your friends or peers, it’s time to step up your game. In your own life, this can be things like asking your employer why there isn’t a gender-neutral bathroom at your workplace. (Or complimenting them if there is!) Checking if trans issues are covered in your health insurance plan. When filling out forms, ask why there are two check boxes for gender or whether gender is required for the form at all. (Hint: It usually isn’t.)

If that’s not big enough, start to look at the local, state and national level. Does your community have protections for trans folks? Chicago, Cook County and Illinois all do. Huzzah! But the Federal Government doesn’t.

Likewise, while repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell was incredibly important, I still can’t serve in the military because I’m trans; it’s an immediate medical discharge. Organizations like the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, National Center for Trans Equality, NYC’s Audre Lorde Project and Chicago’s Gender Just are all places to look for information about specific policy issues, as well as donation and volunteer opportunities.

Step Four: Evangelize

Now that you’re an awesome ally to trans folks, enlist your friends to become the same. And don’t let them get away with saying it won’t impact them. If gender expression isn’t included in non-discrimination laws, you might be protected from being fired for being a lesbian but could still be fired for being “too masculine.” If gender expression isn’t included in anti-bullying policies, a student might be protected from being called “faggot” but not from being told he “looks like a girl.” Being a strong trans ally ultimately means being an ally to the entire queer community, as well as all the folks out there who aren’t queer but are read as being a little bit “different.”

So, step up. No time to waste.