College students are attempting to store Republican efforts to move up trans rights by urging the state’s largest school to consider itself a haven for trans youth as Kansas prepares to ban gender-affirming care for minors.
On Wednesday, the GOP-controlled Legislature approved its proposed ban on minor surgery, hormone replacement therapy, and puberty-blockers, evidently with the two-thirds majority needed to bypass a Democratic governor’s expected veto. Laura Kelly. Wyoming last week announced that it would meet 24 other state in outlawing or restricting gender-affirming care for adolescents.
However, the University of Kansas ‘ main campus ‘ Student Senate overwhelmingly approved a plan to add trans rights laws to the university’s code of student rights the week before when a ban was already in effect. The plan calls on officials to support individuals ‘ “right to choose their own names,” direct workers to use their preferred brands and pronouns, and commit to updating scholar records to reflect their gender identities. Officials have not fully responded.
The university’s town of Lawrence, between Kansas City and the state capital of Topeka, now has a reputation for being more democratic than the rest of the Republican- leaning position. However, transgender rights proposal participants said it is essential to demonstrate that the college will support LGBTQ youth despite a Legislature they believe to be angry.
” The people in charge have made the decision to help some things that are really violent and unnecessary and unjustifiable”, Jenna Bellemere, a 21- year- old trans top, said of lawmakers. Students and the younger generation are the ones who have to kind of step up and say,” No, we do n’t think that’s okay and fight back.”
Republicans in Kansas have been a part of a multi-year and nationwide push by GOP lawmakers to halt transgender rights. They overrode Kelly’s last year-related vetoes of laws preventing transgender people from entering college and playing female K-12 sports.
Six months ago, conservative GOP Attorney General Kris Kobach’s lawsuits forced Kelly’s administration to stop changing the” sex” listing on transgender people’s birth certificates and driver’s licenses.
A non-binary University of Kansas junior named Chris Raithel has been a part of the team that has been drafting the Student Senate proposal since last fall. They said that while their goal was not to cause a fight between the university and the legislature that might lead to a budget-cutting backlash,” we do believe it would be a great service to the trans students at the university if these protections were in university policy and students would see that they were understood and that they are protected.”
Despite opposition from transgender children, their families, and medical professionals in Kansas, Republicans have pushed for a ban. The decision also contradicts the advice of major American medical organizations, despite the National Health Service of England’s recent announcement that it no longer would routinely cover minors ‘ hormone treatments and puberty blockers.
Senate President Ty Masterson, a Wichita- area Republican, described his chamber’s approval as a firm stand against “radical transgender ideology”.
Legislators who support the Kansas measure include a number of doctors who assert that they are shielding children from potentially irreversible medical treatments with long-term health effects.
” The bias, as some people call it, is predicated on fear — fear of the unknown — and there is still a lot that we do n’t know about what we’re embarking on, particularly with minors”, said state Republican state Rep. John Eplee, a doctor from the state’s northeastern corner. ” This is not meant to be hateful or hurtful”.
Republican Sen. Mark Steffen, a central Kansas anesthesiologist and pain- management doctor, suggested the proposed ban would protect” troubled children” from “wayward parents and a wayward health care system”.
GOP legislators approved a proposed ban last year but could n’t override Kelly’s veto. Supporters saw a net gain of 12 votes in the House this year to get the required two-thirds majority.
In the state Senate, supporters were one vote shy last year but picked it up Wednesday from Republican Sen. Brenda Dietrich, of Topeka, a former local school superintendent. She switched because this year’s supporters added a provision that would allow doctors to take patients off hormone treatments or puberty blockers until the end of the year.
Dietrich’s voice shook as she explained her decision to colleagues Wednesday evening, saying it was a difficult vote. She stated she was concerned about the potential harm of abruptly stopping treatments, but she has always agreed with residents of her GOP-leaning district who “overwhelmingly” oppose gender-affirming procedures for minors.
She said,” Their anger over doctors and their parents allowing surgeries on children is palpable.”
Even those who support the ban have acknowledged that Kansas doctors perform a few minor gender-affirming surgeries. In interviews, young transgender adults have reported that they have first undergone months, sometimes even years, of hormone treatments, and puberty medications.
And transgender youth’s critics of a ban claimed that the provision allowing a gradual withdrawal of treatments that reduce the risk of suicide, while potentially better medically than an abrupt end, does n’t prevent harm to the physical and mental health of transgender youth.
According to Amanda Mogoi, an advanced practice registered nurse from Wichita who has been providing such treatments for eight years,” Minors and their families are already experiencing significant emotional turmoil as they continue to face these hateful bills.” ” They will not want to stop their life- saving medications”.
The University of Kansas proposal would only cover treatments for people under the age of 18, but the college students who supported it still see it as a threat to them, in part because they do n’t expect GOP lawmakers to go away from it. Health committee Chair Brenda Landwehr argued in the House on Wednesday that Kansas should think about extending the ban to people in their 20s.
” If I could ban this until a child’s brain fully developed, I would do that in a heartbeat”, said Landwehr, a Wichita Republican.
According to Bellemere, doctors may stop treating young transgender adults because they fear lawsuits or other legal issues even without a broader ban.
Another transgender University of Kansas student, Raine Flores- Peña, a junior and LGBTQ+ rights activist working at the school’s Center for Sexuality &, Gender Diversity, said some friends transferred to other universities after Kansas legislators ended the state’s legal recognition of their gender identities. But he began his transition after moving to Lawrence in 2018 and describes himself as very resolute.
” I do n’t want to get kicked out of my own home”, he said.
