Hi, here I am. I am Alyssa. I am a 44-year old woman and a parent of three wonderful children. I am an executive leader at one of the oldest and best-known financial firms on Wall Street. I am a public speaker who travels internationally to share my work at large conferences with 10’s of thousands of people a year. I am an author, my first book is currently in production and will be in print soon. I am a soccer referee, and I officiate some of the highest levels of competition in the Big1G. I am currently enrolled in flight school and planning to get my Private Pilot Certificate. I am also transgender.
Now if you didn’t know me, you might read those first six sentences and be left feeling like “wow, this woman has really accomplished a lot in her life”. I’ve come to accept that yeah, that’s right, I really have. I’ve been very fortunate to have opportunities I could have never dreamed of. I’ve taken those opportunities and made the most out of them. I’ve used my privilege and wealth in many ways to give back to my community, to those who don’t enjoy such privilege, and ultimately to try and make our world a little better place. Everything our society asks of a person I feel I have done in some way.
Except there’s that last sentence in that first paragraph. The one that tells you how I don’t fit into society’s view of human beings. The one that some people get stuck on and will focus on despite the impressive list of accomplishments that precedes it. It’s the sentence that gets me subjected to bullying, discrimination, and ultimately hatred from the people around me (even when they’re perfect strangers). That word, transgender, has been used by politicians, supposedly devout religious people, and fascists as an excuse for their hatred and even violence toward people like me.
People will use that word to tell you that I’m some sexual deviant. They will say that I have an incurable mental illness. They will say that I just want to break into women’s spaces so I can spy on them. They will tell you that my intentions are to erase women and make them irrelevant. They will tell you that I’m so disgusting that I don’t deserve access to healthcare, that I shouldn’t even be able to make my own medical choices with my doctor. They’ll say that I shouldn’t be allowed to play sports, and many will even suggest I shouldn’t be allowed to go to a public bathroom because I’m such a monster.
Of course none of that is true. I’m not a sex offender of any fashion. I don’t have a mental illness (trust me, trans people are forced to undergo tons of mental evaluation to confirm this). I advocate for women’s rights every single day, including those that don’t directly impact me. I work to uplift all people and especially to level the playing field for those that are marginalized. And when I go to the bathroom, I can assure you my only goal is to pee, poop, wash my hands, and then go on with my day. Yet the narratives of how horrible I am persist and far too many people still believe them.
This is the reality of being transgender in America today. Over 150 bills have been proposed across 47 states in the first three months of 2022 that target transgender people specifically and seek to treat us differently than other Americans. That’s literally legalized discrimination. Transgender people have become the convenient target for political ideologies that love to bully others. We’re easy targets, easily the most vulnerable right now because any protections we have against discrimination in law are dubious at best. We’re not easily seen. Transgender people are estimated to only make up 1% of the population and not all of us are easily detectable when we’re in your midsts.
But today is transgender day of visibility. It is the one day a year that transgender people devote to being visible. To letting society know that we are humans just like you, we have the same human needs each of you do, we have all the good and bad traits that exist across the beautiful rainbow of our society and our people. Transgender women, Transgender men, Non-binary, and other gender non-conforming people are still people just like you. Yet so many in our world want to vilify us and see us erased from this planet. But it’s all based on that false narrative they’ve painted of who we are.
So today, I want you to see me as just one example of who transgender people really are. Not all are like me, not all have the same wants, needs, and desires as me. However, one thing we all universally want is to be treated with the same dignity and respect that would be afforded any other human being on this planet. I ask that you stand in solidarity with ALL HUMANS and recognize that no matter what color, what gender, what sexuality, what religion we come from, we’re all HUMANS and that is a pretty damned good reason to look in awe and just how wonderful each and every one of us is.