Trucks displaying positive messages like “Trans lives are precious” were driven around Texas’s state capital during Transgender Awareness Week in a pointed message about the state’s government.
After lawmakers in Austin spent a year attacking transgender youth – forcing trans young people, their families, and activists to go to the state capitol time and again to fight misinformation and prejudice – now the city is getting a positive message about trans people.
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The online trans and queer health care platform Folx Health put the trucks on the streets of Austin with trans-positive messages like the one above, as well as “Protect trans youth.” Another message on the trucks is the name of the platform itself.
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“This weekend, we took to the streets of downtown Austin and circled the Texas Capitol to make our message clear: Trans lives are precious,” Folx Health said on Instagram.
“We need to go beyond awareness,” the group continued, referring to the week’s name. “Most people are ‘aware’ that trans people exist. We must take action and continue to fight for our trans family. We must #ProtectTransYouth.”
Republican lawmakers tried to pass multiple bills attacking trans equality this year, including a bill that actually passed and banned transgender students from participating in school sports, a bill that would have declared the parents of transgender youth to be child abusers if they provided their kids with health care in accordance with science, a bill that would have banned doctors from providing gender-affirming care to transgender youth, and a number of bills to either ban state and local agencies from fighting LGBTQ discrimination or to expand religious exemptions to anti-discrimination bills.
In the meantime, Gov. Greg Abbott (R) repeatedly pushed the legislature to pass the sports ban, got the state’s Department of Family and Protective Services to say that teachers could face jail time if they don’t report students they have “cause to believe” had gender-affirming surgery, and took information about an LGBTQ youth suicide hotline from a state website even as there is evidence that all of these attacks on transgender youth were increasing the risk of suicide.
Now a Texas Republican lawmaker is attacking LGBTQ-themed books in schools.
Pointing to the sports ban, Folx Health said that it was part of an “assault on trans liberation.”
“This #TransAwarenessWeek and every week of the year, we proclaim our ongoing love, adoration, support, solidarity and celebration of our trans community amid ongoing attacks from lawmakers.”
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