The United States of America, but for Trans People
cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/13932170
This will have been drawn from the work of Erin Reed Though its worth noting her only firm, DO NOT TRAVEL, so far, is florida. Though the rest are of course still dangerous.
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I really wish my friends and family would understand this. This is something that I have to worry about, all of the time. It causes me constant and immense stress.
“I would not be welcome here if they knew.” - this is what I have to be aware of, all of the time. I do volunteer work and often drive out to rural areas - stopping at gas stations where they’d leer at me if I wore a mask inside 2 years ago… - am I safe if I get pulled over?
I’ve sat at workplace trainings and heard the things that they think about people like me - debating on if there’s a way that I can say something that won’t call attention to myself. I turn on the news or scroll through Facebook and see an endless stream of debates on whether or not I should exist.
All I want is to inject myself with testosterone (which my insurance does not pay for). I want my drivers license to say M. I wanted, and paid for, a mastectomy. Testosterone makes me strong enough to carry folding tables for homeless shelters. It helps me turn my anger into energy. It helps me exist.
I don’t understand why that bothers people so much. No one gave a shit ten years ago. My Pentecostal family were happy to call me their son. Trans people are just a convenient boogey man as part of a long term backlash strategy against gay and women’s rights.
Honestly, that seems a big concern for my mom about me and I'm not sure if she even thinks I'm trans. Its just things like me growing my hair out that make her worried about more less favorable treatment if I were to get pulled over. My mom is an extremely butch lesbian, so I'm sure she's had her own experiences but she hasn't said much along those lines.
I may not be trans, but I'm brown, this helps too.
lucky, those are all the best places! ❤️
As if having good morals leads to a pleasant living environment.
as someone who is temporarily stuck in FL and moving back to NYC soon, i assure you: even if the laws were friendlier here, this place would still be a hellhole.
I’m surprised Arizona made the cut.
Yeah, they'll shoot you as you crawl down a hotel hallway on your hands and knees no matter who you are.
Yeah but that's a problem in every state.
As long as you're in the good US of A.
Yeah, especially since I know trans teachers who are leaving the state due to the environment in public education.
That sucks. Teachers are one of the professions treated the worst by our society. Losing any that are qualified and aren't bad people / bad at their job is a terrible loss.
I'm really proud of AZ. Nobody ever thought about us but we could feel the tide turning for years. Then in 2020 Trump got a surprise. But it wasn't a surprise to anyone in the state.
AZ always struck me as "the retirement state for new agers and hippies".
No doubt there's a lot of right-wing dirtbags, but I'm not surprised there's a lot of decent people there too.
Arizona in 2024 is very different. Blue leadership has led to things like actually holding people accountable for false electors, may be the 4th state to open up election interference case now that the GOP is out of the picture in terms of leadership.
https://abcnews.go.com/US/signing-arizona-attorney-generals-2020-election-probe/story?id=108864060
As a southern California I couldnt be prouder, doesnt mean they can drive for shit though.
Especially with Jan "cosplaying as a human and totally not a reptile" Brewer still technically alive.
Tucson's pretty nice
Let's be honest: Is there anything worth visiting in those missing states, anyway? Sure, Disney World is in Florida, but have you ever been to Florida? It sucks. Hot and humid as shit. Rains every single day at about 5pm. Gators and Floridians everywhere... Even the magic of Disney doesn't outweigh all that.
Cajun food is great. Basically, southern food in general is good. You can't get boiled peanuts up north. Besides food? Not really.
Minnesota State fair. Boiled peanuts were added in 2022.
Next?
southern bbq
I mean.. Dave Anderson's Old Southern BBQ is called southern... Won some awards.
To be fair, I have only had BBQ in Texas and Memphis, so grain of salt.
https://www.oldsouthernbbq.com/
Else you have black market st. Paul - wouldn't call it "southern" when it's -10 degrees and they are smoking up some pork, but damn good smoked BBQ.
https://www.blackmarketstp.com/
my buddys been to an old southern bbq restaurant a handful of times. he says its either the best bbq youve ever had or the driest shit on earth 😂 and its not even a different location
Yeah Famous Dave seems to have lost a step since he sold his namesake...
But then you have to be in the Midwest…
Well, but you have an international airport close by, a major mall, rent's in the mail, and you can always find a parking space. Women out number the men two to one and there's parks and zoos and.... Shhh.
Eh Maryland, and Baltimore in particular has everything from grits to chowders. If you're thinking about a crawfish boil/stew/gumbo, they have those too, and the superior crab version.
I agree the crab is better, but not the Cajun food. I've lived in Alabama and NoVA and there's a large difference. I've also lived in southern VA and SC, and they're all different. Each have benefits, but real Cajun is special.
Ah well we'll have to disagree then. I grew up in Maryland and for my money the food is the best in the world.
I don't believe that any food is the best in the world. Everywhere does something better than somewhere else. That's what makes the world great.
Do you know how easy it is making boiled peanuts?
Its literally just peanuts boiled in salty water forever
Super easy in a slowcooker or even a regular pot
You can have them whenever and wherever you want
Note: the above is talking about raw peanuts, which are very hard to find up north. Doing this to a bag of roasted peanuts will make you very sad.
Ok fair point. Raw peanuts arent too hard to find here down south. There is a farmers market grocery store by me that i can get them delivered from
I did try it with roasted peanuts the first time and like... it technically worked but raw peanuts turn out way better
Canned or fresh? Because I can buy them canned. I wouldn't but the option is there!
But I do agree the food is good. Southern and Cajun both. Also Creole.
I've done canned. They fill a hole that I miss, but fresh is special.
Wyoming and Montana have absolutely amazing mountains. I say that as someone who lives in the third best mountains state. They have mountains as good as ours but without as many people in them.
Alaska is simply amazing, one of the best places I’ve ever been in the summer. I can’t wait to go again.
Otherwise nah fuck that shit
Atlanta has cool stuff like conventions. Savannah's city center part is a nice place. Ohio has some really big events. I can't think of any other reasons to go
Friends and Family?
Yeah, Utah has Arches, Canyonlands, Zion; Wyoming has Yellowstone and Devil's Tower, Montana has Glacier... And I know I'm leaving out a ton. I hate Utah's theocracy, but the landscapes are mesmerizing. Everyone should get to see those wonders without fearing a lynching.
Parks. Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, the Everglades, that sort of thing. Some truly spectacular nature.
There's Disney California.
it's the better one given how shit FL is these days and they don't got a Disney California Adventure Park either
Spent a cumulative 5 or 6 hours driving in Florida. I saw orange groves, retirement communities, trailer parks, and barren highway. THAT'S IT. Hell, I was hungry coming off the plane and decided to pick something up on the way to where I was going 90 minutes away. I did not see a single food place. That's unheard of in civilized states.
Fuck even the most barren bi ways usually have a deli in the local store or whatever.
All LGBT are safe and welcomed in Oregon and Massachusetts, my two home states in my life :)
I love living in blue states that value people and their rights
Unfortunately, not all of our states are safe. While the population centers are mostly ok, there are plenty of places that are not safe. I had an acquaintance (gay) describe Eastern Washington as "fine as long as I don't act too gay".
Yes you're sadly absolutely right. I live in Oregon these days and the PDX area is quite nice but if you go south east, it is like you describe with eastern WA.
Piece of shits have to have their bigoted safe-spaces i guess
It's much more nuanced than that, different parts of some states act very differently from the rest.
Take Colorado for example: the same state that was the first (along with Washington) to legalize recreational weed, but it's also where Boebert came from.
Yeah this map would have much smaller areas. If you broke it down into safe counties or something
Idk, it would just look different. There are also trans friendly places within the omitted states (e.g. Austin, Texas)
I think it would prob be a population density map. Higher populations like cities tend to be better at accepting people (massively generalizing)
Certainly as important as the green book!
I only learned about this maybe a year ago, so I'm linking a source, in case anyone else missed this horrific part of history.
People may not like the weather in Chicago, but it's not that bad, the summers are generally pleasant, winters are tolerable if you dress appropriately, we have a nice lake nearby, four seasons, and the people here are sane, practical midwesterners. Why are people going to Arizona with decreasing available water, where the Republicans want to pass hunting migrants for sport ( https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/arizona-bill-shoot-kill-migrants-property-trespass-border-rcna141147 ) if they cross your property? Why are they going to build tens of billions of dollars of semiconductor fabs in Phoenix ( https://www.ft.com/content/d0fe3dda-7ea4-4d37-9564-71a129b9002f ) in a place with declining water? Are the tax breaks really worth it?
The Arizona GOP is batshit insane and they're slowly losing their grip on the state because of it. The only reason Sinema was there to block the federal minimum wage law was because she ran a very progressive campaign. (And the state held a grudge so hard she's not even trying for another term) Katie Hobbs is governor now and Adrian Fontes is the SoS. They aren't going to swing back anytime soon and those insane bills are not going to make it past the governor's veto.
That said, just like anywhere in the west, be aware that much of the rural area is fueling that radical GOP branch. But Phoenix metro area, Tucson metro area, Flagstaff, Camp Verde, Winslow, Prescott, and Williams were fine when I live there ~5 years ago. Except Sedona. Everyone wants to go to Sedona to see the red rocks. You will be seeing them from your car in the eternal traffic jam that is Sedona. Go to the Grand Canyon instead, it's better anyways.
Honestly, Chicago (and more recently, Minnesota) has been on my list as places to consider moving to. I've never lived in an actual "city" city before but suburban Ohio is getting real fuckin old, and the bigoted, bible-thumping MAGA types are only getting more brazen as time goes on.
I don't know why we, as a species, are so determined to inhabit a place that functionally should not be inhabited (Deserts). Not like we don't have PLENTY of empty space in the USA.
I think you missed the trans part
I just watched a video about Utah and apparently Mormons are pretty tolerant of just about everyone and even though it's a red state they're pretty progressive on social issues.
Take with a grain of salt, my source is a YouTube video.
Edit: I was misinformed lmao
they're really not, slc has a pretty progressive community but it's in direct opposition to the mormons. they're officially accepting of gay people, but as long as they don't do anything gay. they aren't ok with trans people who transition at all.
utah also recently passed bathroom laws for all govt controlled buildings and schools and there are ones for colleges in the works.
generally mormons will be nice and accepting if they think they can convert you, but that's about as far as it goes
https://www.advocate.com/religion/2018/10/08/mormon-leader-lgbtq-advocacy-comes-satan https://www.advocate.com/religion/2019/10/03/mormon-leader-gender-assigned-birth-eternal
https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2024/01/30/utah-transgender-bathroom-ban-goes/
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/topics/transgender/understanding?lang=eng
This reminds me very much of the "hate the sin, not the sinner" that never actually happened.
https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/official-statement/same-gender-attraction
Mormons are not at all tolerant. Just because they aren't calling for the death of LGBT people, and are still willing to take their tithes, doesn't make them tolerant.
You are conflating tolerance with approval. There's a spectrum of attitudes one might have towards any particular group of people. Here they are with most friendly on the left and most unfriendly on the right:
Kinship -- Friendship -- Approval -- Tolerance -- Disapproval -- Distrust -- Fear -- Hatred
Tolerance is the acceptance or putting up with something that one doesn't approve of. Institutionally (and broadly among individuals) the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is tolerant of LGBT people, but it doesn't not approve of LGBT lifestyles. It sounds like you want more than tolerance. In a pluralistic society, I don't think that is a reasonable position to take.
In a modern society, people who discriminate against others about their gender or orientation are called bigots. I'm fine with calling LDS that.
The religion's teachings expressly prohibit discrimination on any basis. Seems to me the only bigot here is you.
They very clearly say they disallow gay people from taking full part in the church. But ok, keep defending Mormons bigot.
No, no, no, no, no. I moved to Utah five years ago and this is absolutely not the case and I'm not even LGBTQ. A couple of vignettes:
Exhibit A.
Exhibit B: I had a workplace procure a costume for me. They didn't like my lack of Mormon Jesus. This was a prominent finance firm in SLC.
I too watched that Half as Interesting/Wendover productions video, that's not what it said. In fact he explicitly said that's not what he's saying.
To be fair I watched it at a taco bell on my lunch break
Lol, fair
Lmao, good one. 🤣 The Mormons contributed over three-quarters of the funding to get Prop 8 passed in California.
https://www.theatlantic.com/daily-dish/archive/2008/10/the-mormon-money-behind-proposition-8/209748/
Yea this may be the case for some mormons, maybe, but they as a whole are not very tolerant at all. We had a mormon in our school who was very vocal about his dislike about a couple where one was trans. He pretended to be a nice guy, but his views were gross when they came bubbling to the surface.
I dont buy that mormons are a tolerant group for a second.
Mormons tend to be nice ... to your face. As soon as you leave they're likely to act like you'd expect followers of an extremely socially conservative, regressive, patriarchal religion would.
And I'm not saying all Mormons are like that -- there are good people that are mormons, but it's in spite of what the church teaches about gender, sexuality, and sin.
Nothing about the religion's teachings about gender, sexuality, and sin support mistreatment of people who believe or act differently. The broad strokes your applying to the entire religion is exactly the same as saying that all Muslims are violent terrorists just because of the actions of an extremist few.
In short, it's bigotry.
Huh. I thought it was because I'm familiar with LDS teachings, culture, and the church's extensive, sordid, and recent history of sexism, abuse, and bigotry.
Which is extensively documented by people that have left the faith.
You linked exmormon.org? That's one of the most vitriolic and biased websites dedicated to spreading hate about members of the Church. It's clear you're strongly prejudiced, so there's no point in me trying to convince you to look beyond your own animosity.
Good day.
You got gaslit
https://www.thetrevorproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/The-Trevor-Project-2022-National-Survey-on-LGBTQ-Youth-Mental-Health-by-State-Utah.pdf
Utah teen lgbtqia+ suicide rate is very high. I've got a friend who is a therapist out there and i do not envy them. The Mormon church tries to say that they love and accept everyone but if you push them they will clarify they can love someone but they hate the sin. Ask yourself, how can you love someone when you can't accept a fundamental part of them? If you practice your gayness/etc you will be treated differently by Mormon church standards. You will lose out on church privileges and be ostracized.
I saw the same video, thanks for the correction before I started spreading this false fact.
Christianity is all about being tolerant actually. Its just that most Christians dont care
There is a reason why I don't mention that I am an atheist when I travel to Utah.
We watched the same video probably.
Yeah that's it lol.
I'm in NC and I feel pretty safe
Certain cities like Chapel Hill or Durham on the piedmont are quite tolerant. But go into the coastal area and foothills and you might need to be careful.
Exactly, this is many states, like TN. Some of the southern parts of TN are insanely racist (like Polk County). Went to a halloween party in that area once when I i was in uni (will never go back to that fuckin state willingly) and I brought two black dudes who were my best buds and shit popped off pretty quick simply because black people had the nerve to show up.
Fucking gross.
God forbid they elect Mark Robinson as governor, then you have state level oppression again.
I lived in Chapel Hill during the 2016 election. The one silver lining to that Election Day was voting Pat McCrory out of office after his own bathroom bill nonsense.
That can be said for many of the states on this map.
I think Charlotte, Wilmington, Asheville, etc are likely to be fine. I think it goes for many of the states on the map too, is rural NC going to be that different from like, upstate NY or rural Virginia?
I'm in Wilmington
What did NH do?
I appreciate the response, but can you give specifics? I would have figured NH would have committed to the whole "leave me alone" vibe, but it sounds like not. Have they been passing anti-trans legislation or something similar?
I don't believe anything has made it into law but anti trans legislation has passed in the House recently. https://newhampshirebulletin.com/2024/01/04/nh-house-passes-bill-to-ban-gender-affirming-care-for-minors-sending-bill-to-senate/
https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/03/08/new-hampshire-rally-gender-affirming-care-lgbtq-youth
They're also trying to ban trans girls from playing sports.
Sununu strikes me as big enough of a dipshit to sign legislation like this into law, too.
Can somebody give me a better explanation of how NH keeps ending up red on these maps? As a trans person who's lived in both NH and VT for very large parts of my life, I've found that they're really, really similar when it comes to trans rights. Hell, NH is one of the few states to cover laser hair removal and electrolysis for facial hair under medicaid for trans people. Vermont doesn't even cover that and has repeatedly shot down any attempts to add it.
Also even though both states cover breast augmentation for trans people, Vermont refuses to cover it for me because I have a deformity and require a slightly different procedure which they go out of their way to explicitly exclude, whereas in NH that procedure is explicitly also covered.
I'm assuming there's something deeper and more sinister going on in NH if it's red even despite that. I wouldn't doubt it tbh. I can't move back there because they intentionally illegally shut off people's disability benefits hoping they just won't bother to appeal the decision, so I'm not blind to how awful the state can be.
Only thing I could find were laws that were introduced, but none that passed, listed on anti-trans legislation trackers. But that doesn't seem like enough reason given how easily outliers can introduce bills that have no chance of actually passing. Here's some recent news related to anti-trans legislation in NH: https://www.glad.org/nh-senate-tables-bill-that-would-have-rolled-back-some-transgender-nondiscrimination-protections/
Apparently, Utah can be added to this. Though they vote overwhelmingly Republican they are surprisingly supportive of lgbtq rights , at least according to a video I saw yesterday.
I think it was called Why is Utah Weird? I think Bobbybroccoli did it.
Anyone from Utah with a different experience, please correct me so I don't spread any more disinformation.
Edit: Just read down about 30 comments and apparently I was gaslit by a YouTube video. Whoduhthunk?
Yeah no... They have bathroom bills that require you to have appropriate sex change documents. It's one of the spots bathroom gestapo check your papers. Also trans care for youth has been banned and 4 anti trans bills have passed in the 1st quarter of 2024...Utah ain't safe gov'ner.
The video was well researched and overall a very good description of life in salt lake, less so in other counties like st George. As he said in the video 80% of the population resides in "the valley", and he didn't really concern himself with the rest of the state. I also wouldn't choose to live in Provo or Spanish Fork as a queer person despite them being in the valley, but I wouldn't consider them dangerous or actively hide it there.
That would have been from the channel ~~Half as Interesting for anyone... Interested. ~~ Wendover Productions. My bad - Half as Interesting is front he same people, but shorter-form content.
Close, but it was actually on Wendover
Oh thanks I forget they're technically two separate channels.
waves from behind enemy lines hiiii
I live in a dark blue state, in-laws in a light blue state, the rest of my family in a state not pictured. I haven’t seen them in probably half a decade, and then only for a funeral. I have niece/nephews that only know me and my husband as the people that ship them gifts in the mail.
This is total bullshit, I live in the state not pictured and I know tons of trans people who are openly accepted by the community
That’s great. I’m really glad to hear it. It’s not that they don’t exist. It’s that they are subject to violence under the law.
It sucks but those other states don't matter. Culinary wastelands full of poorly run operations. They had some nature but they paved it over.
Culinary wastelands? Cajun/Creole cuisine is some of the best this country offers. Barbecue. Fried chicken. Come on now.
Cajun is A level, but let's not pretend the south has a monopoly on BBQ and Fried Chicken in the same way as Louisiana and Cajun. And when it comes to southern seafood, Maryland is right there on the map.
Fine. You get one city and the rest is wasteland. Now lie to my face and tell me that your flyover state small town has options beyond traditional diner and pizza.
Shit, I'm as lucky as they come, straight white male, and I don't want to visit any of the missing states, except for Savannah, Georgia, which is just a nice time.
Upstate NY probably not so Trans friendly either, but always gets lumped in with NYC. It's really a wasteland outside of maybe the finger lakes region. Saratoga/Lake George are all right too.
Upstate NY is also pretty pointless. You get to the TPZ bridge and best turn around.
For all the fucked up shit in the South, the food is amazing.
It is pure diabetes and heart disease
Those are probably true but 'left behind' people make bad choices at the ballot box. We kind of had this in the UK where all the poorest constituencies in the North of England voted for brexit.
Like chicken and egg. Do bad voters give you bad policy or does bad policy give you bad voters? It is morbidly fascinating to watch people who have so little figuring out ways to have even less.
I'm sorry, but honestly this reads like someone who lives in a bit of a bubble. Essentially every state has bigger cities filled with LGBT people who live there fine.
I agree, sadly basically every state is going for your rights, just different ones.