In the US alone there are 1.4 million adults that identify as transgender. They are not trans because they want to be discriminated against. They are trans because that’s what makes them feel the best or because inside that is who they were meant to be; because being transgender is the only way for them to feel comfortable in their body; because the chromosomes that defines the sex of these people is the very thing that betrays their being.

As I learn about the life of transgrender people, I am appalled by the treatment towards them, when asked for a number, the National Health Institute comes out with a transgender person being murder every 3 days; that is 121 transgender people across the globe murdered each year for being themselves - for being happy. For the rest of the transgender population, discrimination at best is slurs, and at a worst refused healthcare, or even their public services that keeps them from being treated as a human.

The premise - which I no longer accept -  is that being transgender is unnatural and disgusting. Just as the United States was to be the new nation of people of all shapes and sizes, we became the new nation to kill our own based on their color and gender. In 1970, the first pride parade was ever held because these people and all their community were tired of being hated against - gay people, trans people, allies alike - began to riot, protest, and fight these prejudice people for their liberation.

It became a supreme court discussion, with people deciding if human rights apply to the LGBTQ community. It wasn’t until 2015 they allowed two people of the same gender to marry each other. But the rights for trans people are still up for debate. Based off the state laws there are only 12 out of the 50 states in America that have banned the “gay-panic defense” a law that allows the justified murder of a person that is not cisgendered or straight.

Figures such as these have made me and the rest of the community afraid for the future, particularly now when states are coming up with new ways to make being transgender illegal.