Absent Voice

Quite some time back there was a lot of coverage on a particular issue that I feel I missed my chance to speak out on. The right of a doctor to deny treatment of a patient if it went against his or her religion has since been tossed out of law so my opinions will have no direct effect at this point but it has been nagging at me for quite a while now.

The major focus of the media coverage on this topic was abortion rights, and rightly so as that was the target of the horrible law in the first place. Another major focus was the "morning after" pill, which in my mind is not the same thing as abortion. The whole affair was a tragic infringement on woman's rights and it is right that was the focus of the media's attention. At the same time there was limited coverage for how the law had affected the gay community, but in all the coverage I watched I didn't see one mention of how it affected the trans community, at all.

I don't know how many emails I started an deleted during all this but in the end I kept silent. What I should have said is that the trans community was held hostage by this law. Trans people, and I am specifically thinking of transitioning TS men and women, depend on the medical community for a great number of things. From therapy to hormones, to cosmetic facial reconstruction to breast augmentation/mastectomy and especially GRS. While the vast majority of abortions take place at specialized clinics where the law would not have been a problem there are virtually no endocrinologists whose practice focus solely on TS people and most of the surgeries depend on hospital facilities where your doctor can't always pick and chose support staff like nurses, assisting doctors, anesthesiologists etc.

The law is gone now, and good riddance, so the only thing left to say is, 'Where was the media?" I understand that the main focus was and should have been woman's rights, but really, no coverage at all? Perhaps there just aren't enough TG and TS people to make it worth while to spend time on in a news cycle. New is a business these days and perhaps a minority within a minority just doesn't have a large enough advertising demographic to warrant coverage. Trans issues don't get nearly enough coverage in this country and in most cases none at all and the media needs to get better about it.

Mostly though I blame myself, and others like me. I kept silent on this issue and I really shouldn't have. We need to be more connected and vocal in constructive ways. I have recently resolved to use my 'trans voice' more often and more loudly. Hopefully the next time an issue like this arises we wont be quite so overlooked.

Ellinore Patricia Wilson

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