Support trans youth facing anti-trans laws

Editorial:

Since the 20th century, lawmakers have shown they do not prioritize LGBTQ+ rights and people. From ignoring the AIDs epidemic in the 80s to today, conservative legislators have been working to eradicate the ability to live authentically as queer and trans people–especially targeting the rights of trans and nonbinary youth. Not only do the bills going through and passing states oppress trans and nonbinary people, but they also have and will continue to impact the mental health of these people.

The dangers of the bills are evident in mental health statistics found by The Trevor Project’s 2022 National Survey. When queer and trans youth are in supportive environments, their likelihood of committing or considering suicide drastically decreases, and rates of anxiety and depression decrease. The introduction and implementation of anti-trans legislation has caused and will continue to have detrimental impacts on trans and nonbinary youth. Many of the bills will result in teachers forcibly outing students to parents, not being able to talk about the LGBTQ+ community in classrooms and banning lifesaving gender-affirming care. These will and do worsen suicide rates across the states.

The Olympian believes that it is hypocritical for lawmakers to claim to care about students’ safety at school, yet enact policies that directly increase suicide rates, while ignoring real dangers such as gun violence. Already in 2023, there have been 93 school shootings, according to the K-12 School Shooting Database, mean -