ISGMH Supports All Trans People and Opposes State Legislation Attacking Trans Youth

The Institute for Sexual and Gender Minority Health and Wellbeing (ISGMH) supports transgender and gender diverse young people who are increasingly under attack in state legislatures across the United States. We affirm every trans young person’s right to experience childhood and adolescence without harassment, demonization, or bullying. We believe that all trans young people deserve support, acceptance, protection, and love.

As researchers dedicated to improving the lives of LGBTQ+ communities, we know that trans young people already face undue physical and mental health burdens due to social stigmatization and structural barriers. When the governments of Mississippi, North Dakota, Montana, Utah, and more than a dozen other states propose and advance anti-trans legislation, they choose to criminalize the wellbeing of young people. They chose to subject children and young adults who experience disproportionate rates of depression and suicidality to state-sanctioned harm. They choose to weaponize “science” while willfully ignoring research-backed scientific evidence and medical best practices.

“Research consistently shows what we know to be true: Transgender people are harmed by anti-transgender attitudes, not by being transgender,” says ISGMH faculty member Ricky Hill, Ph.D. “Bills such as the ones proposed reduce trans people to biology, erasing their individual experiences and humanity. This type of legislation does nothing but subject trans children and young adults to invasive and unnecessary scrutiny, rather than allow them to grow into their true selves.”

We unequivocally oppose efforts in state legislatures to legalize the discrimination and mistreatment of trans young people. We are in solidarity with our trans community.