Transgender students make progress

By Leslie Fajardo

Beit Gorski is a psychotherapist at Trans Health Boulder County. Gorski introduces xemself by saying, “I use xe, xem, xyr pronouns. I can’t say I’m a man or I’m a woman.”

Generally, that’s not a problem when Gorski meets people in a personal setting, face-to-face. But out in the great big world, xe doesn’t always have that luxury. For instance, RTD bus drivers don’t always seem to get Gorski’s inter-sex identity.

“I noticed that I get ‘ma’amed’ in the morning, and ‘sirred’ in the evening,” said Gorski, a University of Colorado Boulder graduate. “I took the bus, got on in the morning, the bus driver said good morning ma’am. Coming back into Boulder, same bus driver took me back home and said goodnight, sir.”

Most of the people reading this article today usually never even think about their preferred pronouns. Take a moment and think of yourself saying, “I use the pronouns she, her, her” (or, “he, him, his”). Feels odd, doesn’t it?

And it extends beyond pronouns. It includes marriage. It includes bathrooms. It includes health insurance, unemployment, and even feeling safe.

Most recent analyses of the transgender population indicate that it is about 0.3 percent of adults in the United States, or 700,000 transgender adults. The CU Boulder Student Social Climate Survey taken in Fall 2010, showed that 1.1 percent, or approximately 300 students, identify as trans or gender-queer. This percentage may seem small, but the number doesn’t align with the immense problems trans persons face on a daily basis.

Gorski said that being transgender is never easy and that there are many safety concerns for a trans individual.

“The two biggest areas would be around educational spaces, public bathrooms, and prisons,” Gorski said. “Those three are the big areas of growth that we need to have changed like yesterday. They can’t change fast enough because those three things are so horrible to trans folks.”

So, how exactly is CU Boulder making sure that trans students and faculty feel safer on campus?

Cassandra (who asked we not use her last name in the story) is a transgender woman and a programming and electrical engineering student here at CU. As a former soldier, Cassandra began her transition from male to female in March 2013, after a five-year stint in the U.S. Army. Coming out to her wife was especially difficult, and she also dealt with her family’s mixed reaction, which included her father’s sending her a Bible and a letter that indicated Cassandra would always be her “son.”

CU Boulder, with its growing diverse body of students such as Cassandra, has made strides in making its transgender students more comfortable. Most observers, though, feel CU can do even more for trans students.

Scarlet Bowen, the director of the GLBTQ Resource Center, said that it will

be done mostly through education and “a ton of programming,” including the Transforming Gender conference, held in March and free to the public. Bowen said 400 people attended last year.

Bowen also said that the center has a peer education team comprised of “students who go to classes and educate people about pronoun usage, what’s the difference between gender identity and sexual orientation.”

Although more and more people are being made aware of the difficulties transgender people face, not enough is being done to make them feel safe when using the restroom.

“Transfeminine folk can experience extra degrees of discrimination and prejudice, even within the LGBTQ community,” Bowen said. “It’s really interesting if you look at every civil rights movement it’s often been fought over bathroom access.”

Ruth Hickerson, a communication professor here at CU Boulder, said that there is a certain privilege people who identify as either man or woman have when using the restroom. A privilege that isn’t acknowledged most of the time.

“People don’t have to consider things like what restroom to go into, and will I be safe depending on the decision I make,” Hickerson said.

CU’s Wardenburg Clinic is one of the few places where a wide array of transitioning resources are offered to trans individuals. Morgan Seamont, assistant director of the GLBTQ Resource Center, was one of the first people to take advantage of these resources. Seamont said that before coming out, the trans community is invisible because they’re not counted.

So, next time you go into the restroom, Scarlet Bowen wants you to think about the privilege.

“Try as hard as you can, as you’re engaging with a new population, on campus and in classrooms, to not make assumptions,” Bowen said. “That is so helpful for any situation to not make assumptions about other people.”