The defense of transgender student rights shifts, once again, to the Westerly School Committee
Dozens of people attended the August 19 meeting of the Westerly School Committee to advocate against agenda item 12d, “Request of Counsel to seek written opinion from Rhode Island Attorney General’s Office regarding SCOTUS Decision as to transgender athletes.” The decision is West Virginia v. B.P.J., in which the United States Supreme Court upheld state laws, such as West Virginia’s “Save Women’s Sports Act,” that banned or restricted transgender women athletes from participating in women’s school sports teams on a 6-3 vote.
You can watch the relevant parts of the School Committee
meeting here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ltJLTv1o0g8
“You folks who came to the mic tonight wondering who put this item on the agenda,” said Westerly School Committee member Peter Nero. “It was me. The reason I put it on the agenda is that I want final clarity on where Rhode Island law stands, and I want the Attorney General to put that in writing, because I don’t want to have any more of these long nights… Bottom line: I wanted clarity on this so we don’t have more meetings like this, and we put an end to this now. That’s why it’s on the agenda.”
The long nights Committee member Nero is referring to are
likely the meetings where the school committee takes up potential changes to
their Transgender,
Gender Nonconforming & Transitioning Students Protocol and a
large number of people fill the room to advocate for transgender student
rights.
Committee member Timothy Killam seemed
exasperated. He wanted to talk about what he considered the positive things
happening in Westerly, like the opening of a new school in a couple of weeks.
“Why are we going around in circles about this instead of talking about some
forward progress? In my opinion, we have a protocol in place. We don’t have a
problem right now. Why are we taking the time about this?”
Committee member Killam sought to assure the people in the
room that they had misunderstood the agenda and that nothing would be decided
during the meeting. “I want you all to understand: if you read the agenda,
we’re not voting on anything today,” said Committee member Killam. “That was
never on the agenda. And if you interpreted it that way, you are incorrect. No
vote is being taken tonight. Period. There is not. It was simply a statement to
ask for something in writing.”
Seventeen minutes later, the School Committee voted 4 to 3
against seeking an opinion from the Attorney General. Later in the meeting,
Committee member Angela Goethels apologized for her yes vote,
saying that upon further reflection she was against it.
Ahead of the vote, when asked about seeking a written
opinion from the R.I. Attorney General’s Office about the status of the State
Law regarding transgender students, Attorney William Nardone said,
“I’m not sure what you want me to ask the Attorney General. If you want me to
ask him for ‘his opinion on a decision,’ frankly, I would be embarrassed to
send that letter to the Attorney General…”
The “clarity” desired by Committee member Nero doesn’t
exist, opined Attorney Jennifer Wood, who has decades of legal
expertise in the education space.
“I wasn’t going to comment tonight because I saw that you
didn’t have an agenda item that you were voting on this evening - although it
ended up being voted on - and I didn’t want to attenuate further what has been
a painful and difficult conversation for your committee over several evenings,”
said Attorney Wood. “And I definitely never wanted to discourage anyone from
seeking an opinion from the Attorney General. I would never be so arrogant as
to suggest that that should not be done.
“I appreciate the desire for clarity and finality on this
issue that this committee and that a lot of others in the community are
yearning for. I am here to share the bad news that it is not yet available. [In
the] West Virginia v. BPJ case, the Supreme Court ruled
narrowly on one aspect of the issue that relates to transgender athletes’
participation in sports. But on page three of the decision, in footnote number
one, it’s quite straightforward: Brett Kavanaugh, writing the
majority opinion says, [paraphrasing] ‘We’re not deciding most of this issue in
this decision. All we’re saying is that the 27 states who have state law that
permits the exclusion of transgender women in women’s sports, they can do that.
And the 23 states that do not have state law, and among them, Rhode Island,
states that permit the participation of students in sports teams that are
aligned to their gender identity can also do that. We’re not opining on that
today. We weren’t asked to; it’s not in the case, and we’re not doing that.’
Then they, in the footnote, the court further excludes: We’re not talking about
trans men participating in men’s sports.
“So the clarity and finality that I think everyone wants
isn’t there.”
Public Testimony
Public testimony lasted over an hour. Every person who spoke
was there in defense of transgender students. Here are some excerpts, edited
for clarity:
“I think that it is inherently important to protect the most vulnerable of our community,” said Tony, a Pawtucket resident. “Unfortunately, some people wish to hurt, exclude, and make us feel unwanted and unsafe.”
“I remember when I was a kid, I was at a similar school
board meeting when they were talking about getting rid of my local LGBT club,”
said Anna. “I imagine that there are a lot of young trans students
who are feeling similar to that right now. The idea of gender-based segregation
in sports is absurd… singling out a small group of people to force them into a
way of performing that isn’t beneficial to them and makes them feel incredibly
uncomfortable seems wrong. So you should stop it.”
“This is unacceptable,” said Phoenix. “I have no
idea why you feel the need to do this. Looking at what the actual decision
says, it’s clear that it’s just saying states have the right to decide on this,
and the State of Rhode Island has decided that it is unconstitutional and
unacceptable… This is not even up for discussion. When you ask the Attorney
General, what you’re going to get is a letter that says, ‘That’s
unconstitutional and not allowed.’
“Your insistence on discriminating against trans children
for wanting to live the same lives as everybody else is ridiculous. I can’t
imagine the motivation.
“I’d also say that, as has been brought up before, the attacks on us are not just attacks on us - it’s pushing back the line of progress. They already started targeting gay marriage and homosexual relations again. They’re already doing ethnic cleansings in this country, building mass camps, and funding private prisons…”
“I’m here because I’m the very proud father of a trans son,”
said retired Methodist minister Bill Flug. “And I discovered, the
more I entered into conversation with other people, is that many people who are
criticizing, excluding, and stigmatizing trans people have never met one, to
their knowledge. So I want to talk with you about what, if my son’s experience
is typical, trans people go through.
“My son was born 40 years ago in a culture that in one sense
was worse than ours because it was impossible to talk about being transgender.
Sadly, in a different way, it was better because there wasn’t anything like the
level of vitriol, bigotry, hatred, and violence directed at trans people, as
there is from some quarters today.
“But in his situation, feeling the need to remain silent,
even to my wife and me… Let me share with you that my deepest regret in terms
of my life with my son is that I wish he had been able to tell us as early as
he had words, because we would have cared for him and loved him no differently
even then.
“But after he came out to me, what he shared with me was
harrowing. He shared with me a sense of physical revulsion about his own body.
He shared with me a desire not to live any longer if there was no opportunity
to change what his life was going to be like. He shared with me emotional
distress that was off the scale and spiritual despair that saddened me to hear.
“I’m delighted to tell you that with our love, with the
acceptance of other people, and with his own hard, hard work, he is today the
most remarkable young man I’ve ever known. He is a compassionate, loving,
principled, decent, young man, and I could not be prouder to be his father. I
hope that as you consider your agenda item tonight, you will think about how
important it is for people going through this not to be confronted with
anything that suggests they don’t belong, that they’re not enough, that they’re
not equal, or that they don’t matter, because these people put under duress
have a harrowing suicide rate.
“Don’t be part of that. Don’t be part of adding to the burden that they already bear just because they are who they are. You don’t have to do this. I pray to God that you don’t. Thank you for letting me speak with you tonight, and I pray that you’ll act in wisdom and in compassion.
“I am speaking regarding item 12b,” said Ophelia
Rubinia, a licensed clinical social worker, a wife, and a mother. “By
simply bringing this up, you are sending a message to LGBTQ young people within
Westerly. You are telling them that they do not belong and their existence is
up for debate.
“We are talking about a population of young people who have,
as was stated before, a harrowingly high suicide rate. Part of what drives that
is discrimination. As a licensed medical social worker, I have done careful
research on this. It is abundantly clear that when we accept our trans young
people for who they are, those mental health disparities vanish.
“I encourage you to embrace the young people of this town for who they are and to reject the changes to the sports rules.”
“We created our group out of the recognition of the
coordinated attacks on trans people’s ability to exist and be ourselves,”
said Iggy, speaking on behalf of Trans Unity Resistance,
a subgroup of the Providence General Assembly. “We look to create a
safe space where trans people and our accomplices can come together and defend
trans people’s bodily autonomy and access to the necessities of life, and
strive to build a better, freer world. I’m a trans woman, but to be more specific,
I’m what’s referred to as a trans elder.
“That means that I’m not just old, but that I’m old for a
trans person. The average trans person lives to be just 35 years old. That’s
due to many factors. Trans individuals commit suicide at a much higher rate
than cis people; 40% of trans people have attempted suicide, while only 10% of
cis people have. Trans people attempt suicide at such a high rate because life
as a trans person is that much more dangerous and scary.
“Trans people are four times more likely to be a victim of a
violent crime than cis people, which is another reason why, on average, we die
before we reach the age of 35. I say all this not to be dramatic, but to
highlight the fact that trans individuals have an impossibly difficult life
ahead of them. Our current pedophilic fascist administration is hellbent on
erasing trans people from existence, stripping us of basic human rights, making
it nearly impossible for us to exist, let alone thrive. We are constantly in
their crosshairs, whether it be from hateful, bigoted statements from Trump and
his pedophile protectors, or through binding legislation that aims to
dehumanize us.
“Trans people are constantly being vilified and scapegoated
by the current fascist regime to distract from the never-ending barrage of
atrocities being committed. Trump raping children and covering up the Epstein
files, the genocides we’re committing alongside Israel and Palestine, along
with the growing number of other genocides in the region due to the Greater
Israeli Expansion Project, starving the people of Cuba, ICE terrorists
kidnapping and murdering our community members, whatever you want to call the
absurd imperialist power grab in Iran, et cetera, et cetera.
“Today, after eight hours of lugging around a 30-foot ladder
and climbing up roofs and attics, driving across New England, I have to drive
all the way to the end of the earth here in Westerly, from the other side of
the state. Because all the pain and suffering that trans people go through that
I alluded to isn’t enough, and y’all want to entertain the idea of further
harming and discriminating against trans kids. You claim this is about
protecting kids, but all you’re protecting are cis people’s feelings, because
they can’t accept that their ancient views on gender are wrong.
“Your current policy is in compliance with the Supreme
Court’s ruling, so this meeting isn’t even necessary, but y’all take every
opportunity you can to try and dehumanize trans kids. For context, I also have
kids who play sports. They live in a town that doesn’t try to erase trans kids,
and they play sports along with trans kids. You’d never know it, though,
because no one talks about it. After all, it’s not a real issue.
“Transphobic proposals are being added to school committee
agendas across the state, thanks to Christian nationalist hate groups such
as Moms for Liberty. They advocate against school curricula that
mention LGBTQ rights, race and ethnicity, or discrimination. That’s the reason
why towns like Westerly, which barely have any trans residents, are constantly
voting on policy changes regarding trans kids, creating a huge fuss about
issues that don’t even exist, to push their anti-LGBTQ and discriminatory
agenda on everyone. I went to the school committee’s website to look up their
mission statement and info about them, but the link doesn’t even work.
“So that’s one more pressing issue you could be addressing:
a dysfunctional website. The mission of Westerly Public Schools is to create an
inspiring, challenging, and supportive environment where students are
encouraged and assisted in reaching their highest potential.
“Please tell me, how would keeping insurance kids off the
sports team encourage or assist them in reaching their highest potential? How
does that inspire them? That’s not a supportive environment; it’s a hostile
one. Unfortunately, some members of this committee are committed to creating a
hostile environment for trans kids. Lori Wycall doesn’t believe that trans kids
exist. She thinks we’re pretending. She supports a child-raping president, as
well as Vic Mellor, who aligns himself with corrupt, morally and
financially bankrupt insurrectionists and sexual predator Rudy Giuliani.
She’s been liking his Facebook posts for weeks. She went to one of their
events, posted about it on Facebook, and even supported a ceremony in
remembrance of bigoted influencer Charlie Kirk, whose pronouns are
was/were, and who believed the Civil Rights Act was a mistake.
How does having someone who supports such cruelty help achieve the school’s
mission statement? How can someone with so much hate in their heart be
responsible for protecting trans kids? They can’t.
“At the end of the day, trans individuals, especially the kids that play sports, aren’t really what you should be worrying about. It’s bigoted, pedophile-protecting monsters like Lori Wycall. You don’t get to pick and choose which kids you protect and keep safe. You’re responsible for all of them, even the trans ones. Do your job and protect trans kids from discrimination and harm.”
“I am originally from Ohio, but I’ve been in Providence
about 10 years. I am a trans woman, and I am terrified to out myself in public
to protect other children because no one did it for me,” said Cassie.
“You can imagine how much fun that is: spending my whole life hating everything
about myself and not having any idea why. That I could never be a good woman, a
good girl, good at anything, because I was always doing it wrong, because I’m
not supposed to do it. I’m not a girl. I know I look like a girl, and I sound
like a girl, but I’m not a girl. And honestly, my life would be very different
if anyone had said, ‘Hey, that’s okay, you don’t have to be a girl.’
“It took me 38 years to get to the point where I felt
comfortable being a non-gender-conforming woman, and could encourage other
women to be strong and do sports. Because, hell, we all know that Title
IX has not been around very long. Women haven’t been in sports for
very long. And we know women are only segregated in sports because men can’t
handle it when women beat them.
“Children should be in sports. It’s good for all of us.
Girls need to be in sports, especially because it keeps them from having eating
disorders and other terrible things. We all know this. This isn’t anything
fancy and fun. But let me tell you what it is like, because I know you guys
don’t know this.
“Do you know what it’s like to socially transition as an
adult, when you should have done that as a child? To finally have someone say a
thing to you that makes you feel good inside when you’ve never felt good
before. I don’t want to explain that to you, because I’ve spent my whole life
feeling terrible. And the second someone said, “You boy, come here,” I was
like, wait a minute, hang on. That sounds weird, and you’re all gonna think
it’s strange, but to be acknowledged as who you are, when no one else would do
it, is very powerful.
“When you tell those children that, yeah, you can be a boy,
you can do whatever you want. That is very powerful. You do save their lives. I
spent my whole life wanting to die, thinking about how to kill my son, because
I did not see any way out, because there was no way out. What way out can there
be? I didn’t know I could be a man. I didn’t know I could be a boy. I didn’t
know I could do anything other than suffer. And that’s what I did.
“I suffered greatly. I strapped myself in. I wore high
heels. I shaved my legs. I did everything. I did everything they told me to do,
and I couldn’t do it right. And it was wrong. And it hurt all the time. And
there were no words for that. There were no words for that. There was no one to
look at me and say, you don’t have to do that. That’s okay. Because every time
I step out of that box, someone shoves me back in. And we pretend that we live
in a modern world where that doesn’t happen and we dress black.
“People judge us for the way we dress every day. And what
does that do to anyone else? Nothing.
“There’s nothing about how I dress. Nothing. I don’t.
There’s nothing about how I identify. I don’t. Had I felt comfortable as a boy,
as a human, as a human. That’s what you guys are not remembering. Like denying
us who we are. We don’t feel like that. We don’t get to be the people we are. I
felt lost by my church, by everyone. I was told I was an abomination for my
whole life. How could I be anything good? How can I achieve anything good if I
can’t love myself because no one can see me and love me?
“I have been waiting my whole life to feel good about
myself, and I have finally started doing that because I have socially
transitioned at home, and I’m being socially transitioned at work. People use
the correct pronouns. And it... It makes my day. It lights me up. And that’s
something none of you will ever have to experience.
“I’m really happy for you that you’ve lived your whole life
in a body that feels good, in a brain that feels good. People who see you for
who you are and think about you the way you want to be thought about.
“I want you to protect these children because no one else
will do it if you don’t. No one will do it. We have to do it. No one protected
me. No one protected me until now. Here I am, saying, ‘Hey, you don’t have to
do this. You can help them in the way that I didn’t have help.’ I could have
been a confident adult. I could have been a full person my whole life. But I
wasn’t given that opportunity because people wouldn’t see me for who I was.
“I ask you to see them, to let them play sports, to protect
them, to please remember we want to exist. That’s all. We want to show up. We
want to be silly. I was a really good catcher. I wasn’t going to make it
anywhere in sports, but I could have made it as a =full human being who was
happy before they were 43. That would have been great.
“Please, allow them to be themselves, to see who they can be, to see what life is like when you feel good every day because people say, ‘Hey, there you are. I’m happy to see you.’ That’s all.”
“I’ve been a Providence resident for over 10 years. I’m a
teacher and a father. I have two daughters, 21 years old and 18 years old,”
said Michael King. “My oldest is queer; my youngest is trans. They
were both gender nonconforming when they were little kids before they had any
idea what gender was. My youngest, my trans daughter, periodically wore dresses
until she was about eight. We lived in California. We never really said very
much. We moved to upstate New York before we moved here. And things changed.
“She would come home, not wearing the dresses anymore, they
were older sisters’ dresses, not wearing the dresses anymore, we asked why. Was
somebody saying something in school? Did somebody do something to you? She
looked down, didn’t want to say, and that was the end of the dresses.
“As someone who was raised working-class Irish Catholic, I
had mixed feelings, which I kept to myself, about the dresses the whole time. I
didn’t quite understand. But I knew she wasn’t being 100% honest with me about
why she stopped wearing them. I didn’t like her being made to feel small and
constrained just so the people who made her feel less than could be
comfortable.
“As a parent, I always tried my best to give them everything
I could. I helped them deal with conflicts and struggles with their friends. I
never tried to force them to dress a certain way, be interested in certain
things, or tell them they needed to be a certain way for me to love them. One
thing I taught my two girls was not to tolerate bullies, to stand up to them,
and not to back down. And that, regardless of what came or the consequences, I
had their back.
“In simple terms, the people who put these policies forward
are bullies. There’s a national movement; I’m not going to go on. People talked
eloquently enough about the Trump administration. There’s a national movement
to ostracize kids for being different under the guise of protecting kids. And
it’s a smart thing; who’s opposed to protecting kids? But the people being put
at risk: Why should the school board allow some of the most vulnerable kids to
be bullied by people who are ostensibly grown-ups?
“I think one thing that’s changed since I was a kid is the
kind of bullying problems that have been put forward. And I think teaching
college kids can kind of- it’s not perfect in terms of there’s no bullying, but
things have gotten better. So why should we let grown-ups bully our own kids,
especially in this institution and the obligation and purview of this council?
Just a little bit of statistics.
“I know people mention this. Trans people are five times
more likely to experience physical assault than cisgender people. Over 80% of
trans people have been harassed or assaulted in their lifetimes. A 2023 study
published in a peer-reviewed journal found that the passage of anti-trans laws,
after the passage of those laws, increased 72% of trans people trying to commit
suicide.
“So after policies like this, we had a 72% increase in the
number of people who are trying to kill themselves. It’s hard being a teenager.
You all know that. Psychologically, in terms of kids finding themselves, it’s
arguably harder than it used to be in a lot of different ways, I would say. And
these kids are not brainwashed by the internet. Trans girls aren’t withstanding
all sorts of ridicule and bullying so that they feel lucky.
“One of the conservative concerns around trans kids in
sports is the question of sex and sexuality in the locker room. I tell you, I
wrestled with it as a young person. They want us to believe that there are no
gay guys on the wrestling team. They want us to believe there are no lesbians
on the field hockey team; back when I tried to stereotype. Unless your
religiosity is based on self-righteous judgmentalism, your family values are
rooted in dehumanizing people and subjecting them to violence, these young trans
people are not a threat to me, or the moral fabric of this community.”
“The person who spoke before me was my father,” said Anna.
“I am the trans kid that you described. And I want to talk to you today and
give you a high schooler’s perspective on this. I graduated from Classical High
School in Providence last year. I was a high schooler very recently. I
discovered my gender while I was in high school, and I transitioned while I was
in high school, and I had two wonderful, supportive parents. I had wonderful,
supportive teachers, friends, and classmates. I went to the most progressive
school in my city. I had all of the advantages a young trans kid could ask for.
“Despite that, it was a very difficult time for me, and I
don’t want to try to guilt trip you or anything, but I was really struggling.
Some days, I was just too stressed or insecure to go to school. And I sat
through the start of this meeting. I know how invested all of you are in your
students’ well-being—all the little changes to the schedule. I see how much you
care. I wish you cared about every little aspect of their transition to high
school.
“These kids need your support. More than other kids. They
need help not to feel like they’re ostracized, not to feel like they don’t
belong, or that there aren’t spaces for them.”
“I grew up just in the next town, and went to school here,”
said Nicole Hurst. “But I went to church on this first street over
at Destiny Baptist and met a lot of friends there growing up. And even though
there’s supposed to be this rivalry between General and Wesley, I was always
very jealous of the Wesley kids because it sounded like they had an amazing
school system. Their math league teams and science club teams were always doing
well at state and went on national tours.
“Their jazz band played at the White House. They had an
amazing music program. And, I have to admit, their sports teams always kicked
their butts. So it was very outside the realm.
“But I always remember being very impressed. And me just
sitting here today, hearing about getting to do drum lessons- like, that sounds
amazing. Sounds like one of the, still keeping that top-notch field system in
town. Great for me to hear. But to me, it seems that if we move forward with
this agenda, that is going to put a blemish on our community’s record. And it’s
going to signal to the trans kids in the community that they are not welcome
here. They can’t be who they want to be.
“It signals to their parents that they probably shouldn’t be
taking their kids to this school. And they can probably go elsewhere. And it
signals to the rest of the town and the state, and probably the rest of the
country, that Australia is not the shining beacon it used to be.
“So I would strongly urge you to reconsider this event and keep that reputation intact.”
“I’m going to start by saying that it sounds like you
already have a policy that’s working, and the sky is still where it belongs- it
hasn’t fallen,” said Mariana Sotos. “Broad, blanket policies like
this impose real costs, legal exposure, and enforcement burden- who will be the
decider? Who’s checking? What will be the, you know, who’s enforcing this?
Who’s checking people’s bodies, right? Where is that going? That’s a huge legal
and obviously invasive personal risk to a lot of people.
“School sports exist for participation, not for competition.
This is a place where the primary purpose is building teamwork, physical
activity, that kind of thing. We’re not creating elite competitors just yet.
Excluding kids from the team sacrifices those benefits for a student who might
want to play with their friends. Again, it comes down to who is verifying and
the legal risks you open yourselves up to that you’re not facing right now.
Sorry. I get stupidly nervous about talking to a bunch of people like this.
“I think, you know, there isn’t a problem. This is a problem
that doesn’t need solving. So you can choose to let it go. And so, you know,
talk about being nervous coming up here. I wasn’t actually going to. I was
gonna come hold up my sign to show support. But I looked around the room at all
these beautiful, brave people. Who come into such risk to themselves to come up
and stand in front of a group being live-streamed to whoever might be seeing
this, right?
“So how can I stand and hide in the back?
“[Reverend Flug] who so bravely shared the story about his
son. If your heart didn’t skip a beat listening, I’m gonna start crying. If
your heart didn’t skip a beat listening to him talk and some of the other
people sharing their experience, I would wonder what’s inside.
“So, and as I think, was it you that said this is a choice, right? You’re making this choice even to have all the- look at the number of people that came- who come to school committee meetings? Who comes to school committee meetings? So for this many people to show up in support of the trans kids in the community should really say something to you. And I’ll end by asking you to look inside your hearts. And if there’s nothing kind and warm and loving and inclusive in there, then at least ask yourself, what side of history do you want to be on?”
“I want to start by thanking all the trans people who have
come here, younger or older,” said Ellie. “I am a trans woman
myself. I am from the town of North Kingstown. I don’t know if you remember, a
couple of years ago, a coach performing fat, naked fat tech checks on students,
which, you know, sounds horrible. He was looking at all these high school kids’
naked bodies. How do you expect somebody to check if somebody is trans?
“That’s ridiculous. Segregation in all its forms hurts
people. It hurt Black people, it hurt Jewish people, it hurt Italian people
when this nation started. There’s no situation where you hear yourself talking
about how these people should not be included and think that you are not going
to be on the same side as history as Nazis, racists, and Confederates were.
“My friend was on my school’s swimming team. She started
transitioning. She started taking estrogen. She started growing breasts. She
was told she wasn’t allowed to switch to the women’s team and had to remain
shirtless. Who is weirder? The girl who wants to swim or the man telling her
that she needs to swim shirtless with her breasts exposed in front of everyone?
“The topic at hand right now is completely irrelevant. You
all know that it will be sent to the Attorney General, and surprise, he’s going
to say the same thing he said multiple times: that it goes against the
Constitution.
“I’ve also noticed in conversations like these many times
before that what is always forgotten is that you’re talking about children. You
aren’t talking about these invisible, non-existent, scary trans adults that are
coming for your kids. You are talking about children. And you are talking about
them like they aren’t human beings. You want trans kids to kill themselves.
There’s no way around it. If you do not give your support for a trans kid, what
you are saying is you don’t care if they kill themselves or not.
“You are sending out a hostile message for no reason. Once
again, this letter will be shot down immediately once the Attorney General
opens it. They will say, this is unconstitutional. What you want to do is you
want to send out this hostile message that you don’t support kids. You don’t
support people, and that’s how they go into school. They don’t go into school
thinking about how they want to learn. They go into school thinking, where I am
right now is being run by people who would not accept me for who I am. I’ve
also been seeing that the performance, or just the general attitude, from some
of the members on this board is childish. Cheering when you’re being told
horrible things about people you support, taking pictures of people for simply
being there, and rolling your eyes. I’ve seen who has been supporting those who
have been standing here, and I’ve been seeing those who have been rolling their
eyes, staring at the ceiling, and cheering and jeering when you have been
called out. I want to thank everyone who supports children on this board, and
I’d like to thank everyone who came to speak today.”
“I’m 17. I was born in Rhode Island. I go to school at Rhode
Island Public High School,” said Joanna Reese. “That was my best
friend who was just up talking. I recently started an organization for queer
students, also called the Rhode Island Queer Student Union, because
we’ve realized we have to come together to defend ourselves against decisions
like these that are harming all of us. I’m following up on a lot of people
talking very eloquently about being trans, but I want to talk for a minute
about sports.
“So if you live in Rhode Island, you know we have an
extremely competitive youth sports culture for some reason. I couldn’t last
three years in the mess that is Rhode Island youth recreational soccer. I don’t
know why everyone takes it so seriously. I personally played basketball in
elementary school and middle school, and I loved it.
“It was fun, it was great for my mental health, and I got
exercise, but the over-competitiveness pushed me out. To be clear, I wasn’t
even fighting the barriers and exclusion that trans students face in sports.
I’m gender non-conforming now, but then I was just a little girl trying to play
basketball. Why are we trying to make sports more exclusive instead of more
inclusive? Sports are great for your mental health. Exercise is crucial to
being healthy. And we’re talking about a minority group that has so notoriously
suffered from poor mental health and poor physical health due to that mental
health condition.
“Why are we taking away camaraderie, team building, and
exercise from kids who want to play, run around, and throw a ball around with
their friends? Because that’s what sports should be about. It’s not the
Olympics. It’s children playing a game. Let’s take this as seriously as it
deserves. Let kids be included.”
“I live in Southern Rhode Island. And I have very close ties
to this issue, as do everybody in this room,” said Carrie Cardo.
“I’m really proud to hear some of these young people advocating. I hear the
sadness. Anger, some really strong language, and rightfully so, right? When
somebody’s opinion creates a fear around them as a human, they completely
understand. I want to take a slightly different stance, and I want to thank you
all. And I know that you have to kind of stay stone-faced, but I’ve heard that
public service isn’t the easiest thing, and I really, really am grateful for
you all, as politicians, servants of Rhode Island, for your time, your
dedication.
“Thank you, genuinely. You walk in the shoes of former
public servants in Rhode Island.
“Those public servants have made Rhode Island one of the
safest states for people like me and for folks in this room. And I thank you. I
have been in my home, cheering for joy over the past years, months, and even
this past week, crying tears of gratitude for the legislation you have both
passed and prevented in this state. It means so much. So I want to thank you,
and I want to thank you for considering a vote that aligns with the spirit of
Rhode Island.”
