It has been tiring reading all the responses to Karen Bercovici’s July 9 column “Conflict of rights — Gender identity dismantles women’s and girl’s sex-based rights.” It was tiring enough just to read the initial column itself.
At the end of the day, I find it unlikely that I am going to sway any who agree with her away from their militantly held views. These “sex-based rights activists” already know that policing bathrooms by perceived gender inevitably harms all women, transgender or otherwise; That this only leads to women — all kinds of women — being harassed and punished for the “crime” of trying to use the restroom while not conforming to narrow expectations of womanhood. They are already perfectly aware that throwing trans women into men’s prisons is sentencing them to endless abuse and rape. (To those less hateful others, who are uninformed about this issue, look up “v-coding.”) They already know all about these things and more, and they simply do not care about them. I doubt we can change their minds, so I will not be bothering to try.
Instead, I want to take this moment to remind the trans people in our community that they have unyielding support from myself and so many others. I want them to feel power in that. There is a fathomless sadness in the hatred we experience, and if we let ourselves, we will drown in it. Instead, let us take one brief moment of mourning, and then stand tall together, buoyed by both our loving queer community and all the allies that continue fighting for us.
Autumn Gaffney
Easthampton