Sam Taub

One of the best things Caitlyn Jenner did in her acceptance speech for the Arthur Ashe Award is to mention Sam Taub.

Until Caitlyn mentioned him, I'd never heard of him.  I would be that almost no one else had, either.

You see, she is one of those people who could have been another statistic--another transgender teenager who committed suicide--had Jenner not mentioned her.

The Detroit-area teen came from a troubled background:  His parents split up and his father got sole custody of him.  His father at least tried to support him when he said he was living in the wrong body. As an example, they went on shopping trips that resulted in a complete turnover of his wardrobe.  His mother, on the other hand, while saying that she had nothing against trans people, wants him to be remembered in death as a "happy little girl" named Samantha who "loved ice-skating and music and having her hair done and shopping".

Since I know neither Sam nor his mother, I will not blame her for his taking his own life.  Nor will I say that what the father did was "too little, too late".  More important than assigning blame to anyone--if indeed there is any to assign--is to understand how overwhelming it is for anyone, let alone a teenager--even with the most loving family and friends--to come to terms with, and negotiate a way of living in, the gender of her or his mind and spirit.

It's hard enough for any teenager to learn who she or is, even under the best of conditions. Even the most confident and resilient of young people don't have the emotional resources to deal with being what most of society still considers to be a freak--or the perspective to realize that it can get better, never mind that it does get better, as Dan Savage assures us.

Frankly, I don't know how I made it through that part of my life. Or my twenties.  Or my thirties.  Or the first few years of my forties.  There were good times, to be sure.  But sometimes it seems that the scars of rejection and alienation will never heal, especially to a teenager.

So, Caitlyn Jenner, thank you for another valuable service you've performed.  You couldn't save Sam Taub's life--or Leelah Alcorn's, or that of any other trans person who's committed suicide.  But at least there's less chance that their deaths will be in vain.  

Can't Escape From Hate, Even In Death

On Thursday the 14th, Rachel Bryk's body was recovered.  She was found floating in the Hudson River, near the spot where she jumped from the George Washington Bridge three weeks earlier.

Seeing at least one of the comments in response to an article about the recovery of her body, it's easy to see why she killed herself.  In addition to the daily pain she experienced from her medical conditions, she put up with bullying and harassment.  Some even taunted her to kill herself.

Now she is no longer in physical pain (or so I assume).  However, as the comments indicate, she is still being tormented by haters. 

What ever happened to respect for the dead?
 

Rachel Bryk: A Trans Woman Driven To Suicide

As I have mentioned in other posts, friends and acquaintances of mine have committed suicide.  Although I have felt--and sometimes still feel--sadness over losing them and anger over their absence, I never could condemn any of them.  For one thing, I went through years--decades--in which not a day passed without my contemplating my own self-inflicted end.  So I understand, at least somewhat, despair.  For another, I have learned that just about everybody has a limit--almost never self-imposed--on how much physical or emotional pain or anguish he or she can endure.  Of course, some people have more tolerance for such things than others, but some people are also given burdens to bear that most other people can't understand.

For some, no amount of love and support from family, friends and others can ease the suffering.  That is the reason why, so often, when someone takes his or her own life, there seems to be a chorus of people lamenting how esteemed or even loved that person was.  Those very same mourners wonder what they did or didn't do for the one who just ended his or her existence.

But then there are the ones who, knowing someone else's vulnerability, will do whatever they can to push that person over the edge.  It can be simple harassment.  Or it might be something more serious, like spreading false rumors about the person to cause him or her to lose a job, housing or to experience some other kind of life disruption.

Then there is the lowlife who wrote, "DO IT, if you're such a weak willed thin skinned (sic) dipshit, then fucking do it" in response to someone who wrote about killing herself in an online forum.  "Good riddance," responded another alleged human.

The woman who wrote about killing herself was in constant, intense pain from fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis.  And she was transgendered.

Although Rachell Bryk's mother believes that the constant pain and the rejection she received as a result of her disabilities are what drove her to jump off the George Washington Bridge, messages found on her computer described some of the online bullying she experienced.

Now, I've experienced online bullying from Dominick, who--among other things--sent me an e-mail that said he would make my life so miserable that it would "make living in a cardboard box seem good".  And he sent out e-mails claiming that I committed all of the crimes transphobes and the simply ignorant believe trans people do as a matter of course.  He did other things, too, because he was angry over ending a relationship he always claimed--while we were together--meant nothing to him. 

All of that was bad enough.  But how much more difficult would it have been for me to deal with those things had I been in constant physical pain?

Whatever the truth is about Rachel's situation, I can only hope that if there is indeed anything after this life, that it does not include the pain and torture she experienced while she was here.

 

When We Get What We Need

One of the more depressing things to write about is the poor state of mental health and high rates of suicide among trans people, especially our young.

We don't go crazy or kill ourselves because we're trans, any more than people become unwell or off themselves because they're Black, Latina, women, physically disabled or anything else.  Rather, it's the stress of living in an inhospitable world that drives us to, or over, the edge.  

And, as with any other group of people, we do just as well as anybody else when we have what we need--including medical and mental health care.

As this graphic from Anti-Media shows, our suicide rates plummet--and or overall mental health improves--when we get the care we need.  And it even saves Medicaid money!:


 
 

Blake Brockington: Another Trans Teen Suicide

Last year he was a homecoming king.  

Now he's dead, an apparent suicide.

What went wrong?  The one-word answer: hate.

Blake Brockington transitioned during his sophomore year in East Mecklenburg High School in Charlotte, North Carolina.  In January, he recounted his struggles of coming to terms with his identity and finding acceptance.  "When I got my period," he recalled, "my aunt told me, 'Welcome to womanhood'.  I was like Nooo!"  He was forced to wear dresses to church and family events.

He "came out" to his teachers and stepmothers.  "My family feels like this is a decision I made," he said.  "They think, 'You're already black, why would you want to draw more attention to yourself?'" But, he explained, "It's not a decision. It is who I am.  I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy."

Things got so bad that he moved in with a foster family.  With their support, he got counseling and started his transition.  But, it seems, the damage had already been done.  Even being crowned the homecoming king had its price:  "Really hateful things were said on the Internet."  It was hard, he said, to "see how narrow-minded the world really is."

Blake, though, experienced something worse than the narrow-mindedness of the world:  narrow-mindedness in his family.  In that, his story parallels that of Leelah Alcorn, the Ohio trans girl who, at age 17, killed herself in December.

W.H. Auden wrote, "We must love one another or die."  He knew, as well as anybody, that hate kills.  That is why I will now call the deaths of Leelah Alcorn and Blake Brockington what they are:  murders.  They were killed by those who hated them, even if those people didn't lift a finger to hurt them.  Those same people did not give them the love and support they needed, and that we all need.

What We Couldn't Share

By now, you've read of Leelah Alcorn's suicide--whether from me, another blogger, the media or some other source.

The pain she expressed in her blog--which was deleted at the request of her mother--is all too familiar.  The tragedy is, of course, that she was so young and couldn't see any light at the end of the tunnel.  But what angered me, and many other people, is the way her family, especially her mother, denied who and what she was in death as they did during her life.

As terrible and familiar as her story is, there are many other trans people who've killed themselves, not because their families and friends wouldn't accept them, but because they couldn't "come out", sometimes even to themselves.

"Calie" returned from a long absence from blogging to relate such a story about someone she knows:  "He was a good boy and had become a good man." 

So why did Calie use male pronouns in referring to her now-departed friend?  Well, the person in question never revealed her gender identity to anyone--not even to her family or to Calie--in life.  Only the note she so carefully left behind (It wasn't spattered with her blood) told of the conflict and pain he was ending with the bullet in his head.

But one thing makes this story even worse than any other I've heard before:  The young person who committed suicide was the child of a transgender parent.  A macho-guy father, to be exact.  Of course, you know why he was such a macho guy:  the same reason I trained and played sports as hard as I did for so many years, or why other would-be trans women become cops and soldiers or get involved in any number of other "manly" undertakings.

Of course, a day may come when he realizes he can't keep up the facade anymore.  Then, he will have two choices:  transition or die.  I am not exaggerating:  I had such a moment thirteen years ago.  I knew that in transitioning,  I could lose my life as I knew it and I had absolutely no idea of what could be in store for me were I to transition.  But I also knew that I would not live for very much longer if I didn't transition.  

I had that moment at age 43.  I don't know how old Calie's friend or his (I'm using the male pronoun in the same way Calie used it) father were and are.  I suspect the father is close to the age I was when I had my moment of truth.  If he is, I don't know how he's gone on for as long as he has.  I don't know how I lived as long as I did with my conflict.  When I came out to my mother, she said the same thing.

And now, again, I'm remembering Corey.  I spent what would be the last night of his life with him.  We were both in our mid-20s at the time; when he called me, I knew he was in a very bad way.  Even though we were good friends, I didn't know what I could possibly offer him that someone else could have.  But he insisted that he simply had to talk to me.

You might say that night is the one thing for which I haven't forgiven myself, and probably never will.  Of course, at that time, I wasn't "out" to anybody, including myself.  But he wasn't waiting for me to come out:  He just knew.

From what Callie says, her friend never knew that his father is trans.  Corey knew I am, just as he was.  I didn't know how to acknowledge, much less do anything, about it.  Or perhaps I was just too much of a coward.  Whatever the explanation, I think of what Corey and I could have shared with each other, and how he might be alive--as a she, of course--and I might have spared myself decades of frustration and pain.

All I can do now is to hope that the father of Calie's friend will end his pain and frustration, though not in the way his child did.  And I hope Calie and all of the other people who can't, for whatever reasons, be who and what they truly are will one day be free.

The Murder Of Leelah Alcorn

I find it interesting that my most-read post has become "A Lifespan of 30 to 32 Years, And A Lost Generation"--and that, in fact, there's been a spike in the number of people who've read it.  

While the figures came from Argentina, they are probably applicable to many other countries.  What those numbers tell us is, among other things, that too many of us die too soon, and for the same reason: hate.

Even in countries with trans-friendly laws and policies--like Argentina--or those where there is a high level of education and awareness among many sectors of the population, or those with advanced medical care, the life expectancy of trans people is shorter, often by decades, than it is for the rest of the population.

Much of the reason for this is the discrimination and other forms of rejection that leave too many of us unemployed and homeless--or, in the cases of many younger trans people, selling drugs or their bodies on mean streets and desolate back alleys.  Resorting to such things to survive means, of course, that death--whether by a needle, bullet or knife, or from within--can come at any moment.

But for every one who dies that way, there are others who die by their own hand.  I can't even begin to count how many times I contemplated suicide when I was living as male.  And I know that two friends of mine killed themselves because they could not deal with the conflict between what their minds and spirits told them, what their bodies indicated and what expectations they tried to fulfill--and the rejection, shame, ridicule and pure-and-simple meanness they faced in spite (or, perhaps, because) of their efforts.

Add to those numbers Leelah Alcorn of Kings Mills, Ohio.  The 17-year-old left this on her blog, Lazer Princess:

If you are reading this, it means that I have committed suicide and obviously failed to delete this post from my queue.

Please don’t be sad, it’s for the better. The life I would’ve lived isn’t worth living in… because I’m transgender. I could go into detail explaining why I feel that way, but this note is probably going to be lengthy enough as it is. To put it simply, I feel like a girl trapped in a boy’s body, and I’ve felt that way ever since I was 4. I never knew there was a word for that feeling, nor was it possible for a boy to become a girl, so I never told anyone and I just continued to do traditionally “boyish” things to try to fit in.

When I was 14, I learned what transgender meant and cried of happiness. After 10 years of confusion I finally understood who I was. I immediately told my mom, and she reacted extremely negatively, telling me that it was a phase, that I would never truly be a girl, that God doesn’t make mistakes, that I am wrong. If you are reading this, parents, please don’t tell this to your kids. Even if you are Christian or are against transgender people don’t ever say that to someone, especially your kid. That won’t do anything but make them hate them self. That’s exactly what it did to me.

My mom started taking me to a therapist, but would only take me to christian therapists, (who were all very biased) so I never actually got the therapy I needed to cure me of my depression. I only got more christians telling me that I was selfish and wrong and that I should look to God for help.

When I was 16 I realized that my parents would never come around, and that I would have to wait until I was 18 to start any sort of transitioning treatment, which absolutely broke my heart. The longer you wait, the harder it is to transition. I felt hopeless, that I was just going to look like a man in drag for the rest of my life. On my 16th birthday, when I didn’t receive consent from my parents to start transitioning, I cried myself to sleep.

I formed a sort of a “fuck you” attitude towards my parents and came out as gay at school, thinking that maybe if I eased into coming out as trans it would be less of a shock. Although the reaction from my friends was positive, my parents were pissed. They felt like I was attacking their image, and that I was an embarrassment to them. They wanted me to be their perfect little straight christian boy, and that’s obviously not what I wanted.

So they took me out of public school, took away my laptop and phone, and forbid me of getting on any sort of social media, completely isolating me from my friends. This was probably the part of my life when I was the most depressed, and I’m surprised I didn’t kill myself. I was completely alone for 5 months. No friends, no support, no love. Just my parent’s disappointment and the cruelty of loneliness.

At the end of the school year, my parents finally came around and gave me my phone and let me back on social media. I was excited, I finally had my friends back. They were extremely excited to see me and talk to me, but only at first. Eventually they realized they didn’t actually give a shit about me, and I felt even lonelier than I did before. The only friends I thought I had only liked me because they saw me five times a week.

After a summer of having almost no friends plus the weight of having to think about college, save money for moving out, keep my grades up, go to church each week and feel like shit because everyone there is against everything I live for, I have decided I’ve had enough. I’m never going to transition successfully, even when I move out. I’m never going to be happy with the way I look or sound. I’m never going to have enough friends to satisfy me. I’m never going to have enough love to satisfy me. I’m never going to find a man who loves me. I’m never going to be happy. Either I live the rest of my life as a lonely man who wishes he were a woman or I live my life as a lonelier woman who hates herself. There’s no winning. There’s no way out. I’m sad enough already, I don’t need my life to get any worse. People say “it gets better” but that isn’t true in my case. It gets worse. Each day I get worse.

That’s the gist of it, that’s why I feel like killing myself. Sorry if that’s not a good enough reason for you, it’s good enough for me. As for my will, I want 100% of the things that I legally own to be sold and the money (plus my money in the bank) to be given to trans civil rights movements and support groups, I don’t give a shit which one. The only way I will rest in peace is if one day transgender people aren’t treated the way I was, they’re treated like humans, with valid feelings and human rights. Gender needs to be taught about in schools, the earlier the better. My death needs to mean something. My death needs to be counted in the number of transgender people who commit suicide this year. I want someone to look at that number and say “that’s fucked up” and fix it. Fix society. Please.

Goodbye,
(Leelah) Josh Alcorn

"Please don't be sad, it's for the better."   If a line like that isn't a gut-punch, I don't know what is.  "The life I would've lived isn't worth living in"--wait for it--"because I'm transgender."  As I relate that line, I am not fighting tears, but I am fighting the anger I feel roiling up from within me.  

She felt that her life wouldn't be worth living because she was transgender.  I felt the same goddamned fucking way when I was her age, and before that, and long after that.  (I will curse through the rest of this post. I make no apologies.)  It's been a long time since I was her age, but from reading her note, I have to conclude not one fucking thing has changed.  Not one.  

The only difference is that she experienced, overtly, the sort of hostility I might've faced had I "come out" as a teenager.  As it was, I experienced taunts and innuendoes.  But she at least had "friends" on social media who were supportive.  However, she lost them for five months because her parents pulled her out of public school and forbade her from using social media.  

Now, if I had a trans child, I might take him or her out of public school for one reason:  bullying, whether it came from other kids, teachers or administrators.  I would educate that child myself, or hire people who could. And I would not allow anyone to wreck whatever self-esteem my child might have.

Unfortunately, Leelah's parents didn't think that way.  They fancied themselves as devout Christians and, from what I've read, it seems that her mother in particular was particularly judgmental and un-accepting.  She enrolled Leelah in "Christian" school and sent her to "Christian" therapists, who told her she was a selfish sinner who should simply let God help her become the man He intended her to be.

Notice that I used the word "Christian" in quotation marks and said Leelah's parents fancied themselves as Christians.  Well, I have a good reason for that.  If you've been following this blog, you might recall that I started going to church about a year and a half ago.  Sometimes I struggle with it precisely because of people like Leelah's parents--of whom, fortunately, there are none (that I know of, anyway) in my parish--and folks like the Reverend Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church.  I don't claim to have the "right" interpretation of the Bible or of Christianity.  Then again, I'm not sure anybody does.  Still, I cannot understand how anyone can call him- or her-self a Christian when he or she is using faith and the Bible to rationalize hate and intolerance. 

If you think I am being harsh, take a look at what Leelah's mother wrote:

"My sweet 16 year old son, Joshua Ryan Alcorn went home to Heaven this morning.  He went out for an early morning walk and was hit by a truck."

Bitch, are you fucking clueless, or what?  Your daughter walked in front of a truck on I-71 after writing the post telling us that her life would never be worth living.  She didn't "go out for an early morning walk" any more than my friend Corey was measuring the height of his ceiling when he hung himself from the rafter.

Whatever else happens, I hope that Leelah's last request--that all of her belongings be sold and the proceeds donated to transgender civil rights and support groups--is honored.  And I hope, Mrs. Alcorn, that you understand what agape and philia are and that, if you can give to your daughter, now, what you couldn't give her in life--and that, if you have other kids, you can give it to them.

If you can't, I hope others will.  I will, as best as I can.  That is one reason why I won't abandon the faith I re-discovered so recently in my life.