President Obama made history by mentioning gay rights and the Stonewall uprising in his inaugural speech last week. Sadie Croft, an 11-year-old transgender girl, wondered why trans people were not referenced in the speech and wrote President Obama a short essay.
Sadie transitioned from male to female in kindergarten and is now in the fifth grade. She enjoys her friends and wants to work for Green Peace when she grows up. She also wants to have children.
“It would be a better world,” Sadie wrote, “if everyone knew that transgender people have the same hopes and dreams as everyone else.”
Sadie’s essay to President Obama:
The world would be a better place if everyone had the right to be themselves, including people who have a creative gender identity and expression. Transgender people are not allowed the freedom to do things everyone else does, like go to the doctor, go to school, get a job, and even make friends.
Transgender kids like me are not allowed to go to most schools because the teachers think we are different from everyone else. The schools get afraid of how they will talk with the other kids’ parents, and transgender kids are kept secret or told not to come there anymore. Kids are told not to be friends with transgender kids, which makes us very lonely and sad.
When they grow up, transgender adults have a hard time getting a job because the boss thinks the customers will be scared away. Doctors are afraid of treating transgender patients because they don’t know how to take care of them, and some doctors don’t really want to help them. Transgender patients like me travel to other states to see a good doctor.
It would be a better world if everyone knew that transgender people have the same hopes and dreams as everyone else. We like to make friends and want to go to school. Transgender people want to get good jobs and go to doctors like they are exactly the same. It really isn’t that hard to like transgender people because we are like everyone else.
Read the full article at the Huffington Post.
See Also:
- All God’s Children: Teaching Children about Sexual Orientation and Gender Diversity
- MLP Gender Identity and Expression Resources
- What’s So Bad About a Boy Who Wants to Wear a Dress?, New York Times
