I have trans friends leaving the UK out of fear

Too exhausted from being constantly vilified, my trans friends’ mental health and physical health has been taking a beating.

They live in fear of what’s going to happen and whether or not they can even freely be themselves anymore in this country.

Many of them are seriously considering leaving England, while others have already. 

I know others who avoid going out of their house if they can, and don’t dare to go on public transport because they’re afraid of harassment. It’s chilling.

When people feel that they can no longer walk their own streets, use public transport and live freely in this country, we have a serious problem on our hands.

When are we going to wake up and smell the transphobia? Because if we don’t do it now, it might be too late.

Hard-won rights might be stripped away and trans people will be forced back into the closet, and back into hiding. 

And this culture of fear is being enabled by our government. 

I hate using public toilets as much as the next person. You never know if there is going to be a long queue, whether they’re going to be clean, or if you can even lock the door properly.

But we all just put up with it because we don’t have a choice — when you’ve got to go, you got to go. You don’t really think too much about it. Well, that is, if you’re not transgender.

Just last week, equalities minister Liz Truss assured MPs that the government will ‘fight’ for single sex services to ‘restrict’ users based on ‘biological sex’.

What this likely means is that the government wants to restrict and ban trans people from those spaces — or at least those that people perceive to be trans or gender-non conforming.

This is despite stating, back in February, that the equalities minister had ‘no interest’ in banning trans people from single-sex spaces – as well advising, in a previous meeting in April 2020, that it was the government’s aim to ensure that ‘transgender adults are free to live their lives as they wish without fear of persecution’. Today, the reality couldn’t be further from the truth.

This shouldn’t only be a worry for trans people, but anyone that doesn’t look traditionally feminine, such as butch lesbians and other queer women.

A ban of this sort does nothing but enforce outdated and oppressive gender stereotypes about how women are supposed to look.

How this government aims to enforce such restrictions is a mystery to me, as you simply cannot tell at all times who’s transgender and who’s not. Transgender people come in all shapes and sizes, just like everyone else.

So unless the government is going to station guards at toilets and shelters that essentially sexually assault you by forcing you to pull down your pants and prove you have a cervix, or show a chromosome certificate, I don’t see how exactly they envision this in practice.

The reality is that queer people aren’t queer because they were abused — they were abused because they were queer

Single-sex spaces have become a contentious arena of transphobic rhetoric, despite the fact that trans people have been using these spaces for years, and have a legal right to use them under the Equality Act (2010). 

For the majority of my life, I’ve used single sex spaces as a woman. I use bathrooms, changing rooms and all other spaces that are segregated without any issue. The concept of having to suddenly use the men’s toilets or locker rooms in the UK is not only ludicrous, but entirely unsafe for me – just as it would be for any other woman.

I am just as vulnerable to male violence as other women, and I cannot count the times that I’ve been accosted or harassed by men throughout my life, whether as a young person or as an adult.

As a survivor of sexual assault, I’ve used and worked for a women’s shelter, and it was an important haven for me to be able to resolve my trauma. Having access to those spaces was vital for me.

But according to the equalities minister, that’s not something I should be afforded because I’m transgender — despite research showing that trans women and trans feminine people are at an increased risk of sexual and domestic violence. 

But Liz Truss isn’t the only government minister that is repeating deeply harmful and damaging rhetoric about trans people.

This April, health secretary Sajid Javid said that excluding transgender people from a ban on conversion therapy was justifiable because we need to be more ‘careful’, and suggested that people might just think they are trans because they’ve suffered child sex abuse, or because they’ve been bullied. 

This is, of course, nothing new — the same was and is often said about gay people, as an attempt to undermine their identity and justify lack of support and protection.

When I was in school, I often suffered name-calling and bullying for who I was. I didn’t mysteriously become transgender because someone called me a ‘sissy’ and laughed in my face. I am who I am, and who I have always been – no amount of bullying, abuse or doubt is going to change that. 

The reality is that queer people aren’t queer because they were abused — they were abused because they were queer and exhibited behaviour that abusers picked up on as easy targets.

It’s quite evident that the government is actively working against transgender rights and LGBT+ equality, as the prime minister has defended the abhorrent government decision to exclude them from conversion therapy, even when their own reports show that trans people are at more risk to suffer conversion therapy. 

The prime minister also spoke out against the inclusion of transgender athletes in sporting competitions, which trans athlete Emily Bridges said led to her getting sent threats of physical violence online – with Johnson adding that he believes transgender women shouldn’t compete in sports.

It’s incredibly callous of the prime minister and the government to continue to disparage and speak against trans rights, as it can impact the physical and mental well-being of trans people across the country. 

This is a trend we’ve seen in other countries, such as from Donald Trump when he was president of America; as well as in Poland with their No LGBT zones, Hungary with their stripping of LGBT rights and a number of other countries across Europe.

We are well on our way to another Section 28 if this continues, and that is something everyone should be concerned about.

Is this really a country we want to live in? Where people have to hide who they are out of sheer fear of persecution? 

I know I don’t.

Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing jess.austin@metro.co.uk. 

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