Tomorrow Will Be Different: Love, Loss, and the Fight for Trans Equality

by Sarah McBride

“The best way I can describe it for myself,” I told them, “is a constant feeling of homesickness. An unwavering ache in the pit of my stomach that only goes away when I can be seen and affirmed in the gender I’ve always felt myself to be. And unlike homesickness with location, which eventually diminishes as you get used to the new home, this homesickness only grows with time and separation.”

I explained to him that, for me, gender is a lot like language. Language, too, is a social construct, but one that expresses very real things. The word “happiness” was created by humans, but that doesn’t diminish the fact that happiness is a very real feeling. People can have a deeply held sense of their own gender even if the descriptions, characteristics, attributes, and expressions of that gender are made up by society. And just as with happiness—for which there are varying words, expressions, and actions that demonstrate that same feeling—gender can have an infinite number of expressions. We can respect that people can have a very real gender identity while also acknowledging that gender is fluid and that gender-based stereotypes are not an accurate representation of the rich diversity within any gender identity.

Most people are good, no doubt, but when we are faced with issues we haven’t yet thought about or interacted with, we often look to one another for how we should respond. Our behavior models for others the acceptable reaction; acceptance creates an expectation, while rejection provides an excuse.

Each of us has a deep and profound desire to be seen, to be acknowledged, and to be respected in our totality. There is a unique kind of pain in being unseen. It’s a pain that cuts deep by diminishing and disempowering, and whether done intentionally or unintentionally, it’s an experience that leaves real scars.

We are fighting to be seen in our personhood, in our worth, in our love, and as ourselves.

Somehow society manages to treat women like both a delicate infant and a sexualized idol in the same moment.

Our thoughts are dismissed and our emotions minimized.

I finally had come out of the closet, only to find myself stuck in the kitchen.

There are few things more dangerous to a transgender woman than the risk of a straight man not totally comfortable in his sexuality or masculinity realizing he is attracted to her.

And our empathy should require us to acknowledge the plight of others in both its similarities to ours and in its differences.

Names are important. Not just in the transgender community but everywhere. It’s the first thing a parent gives to a baby. It’s how our society bestows personhood, recognizes individuality, and affirms the humanity in each one of us. That’s why one of the first steps in marginalizing someone is to remove their name. It communicates that you are unimportant and unseen. When governments seek to oppress, they often replace names with impersonal numbers. When an individual seeks to bully or commit violence, they replace names with dehumanizing slurs or insults.

“I see you are here to change your name for the purpose of a gender transition,” the judge, a young Italian woman with short dark hair, read through the glasses perched on her nose. I could feel the fifty eyes of the audience staring at me. “Yes, Your Honor,” I sheepishly responded. The judge looked up, began to smile, and responded, “I’m honored to be a part of such an important day for you. Congratulations. So ordered.”

It’s impossible for our rights to remain abstract when a person is, quite literally, sitting across from you.

I realized that I was disappointed because I want people to know who I am because I’m proud of who I am. I’m proud to be transgender. Our identities matter. They help make us who we are and shape our outlook. Existing in them is a radical act, one that requires, in many instances, courage, hard work, and determination. I am a better person because of the experiences and insights that I’ve had because I’m transgender. I’m a more compassionate person than I was before I accepted that part of my identity.

Too often we universalize the need for LGBTQ people to be out in order to move equality forward. This is an unfair burden to bear for an already marginalized community.

“There are certain lines we should not cross,” he told me. “Yes, hypocrisy is bad, but if exposing that hypocrisy requires us to commit an even greater evil, then we shouldn’t do it. We should challenge people on their ideas. We won’t bring others to our side by harming people, even hypocrites. It may feel satisfying, it may even be in pursuit of the good of revealing hypocrisy, but it violates a first principle.”

As a society, we often get so consumed by the gender identity of transgender people that we forget that behind these national debates on trans rights, behind the newspaper stories and policy papers, are real people. Real people who love and laugh, hope and cry, fear and dream—just like everyone else.

After talking with Beau, I made my way across the tent to say hello to Vice President Biden and potentially grab a picture with him. I hadn’t spoken to the vice president since coming out, although I had seen him several times while interning at the White House. I walked up to him with my phone in hand, ready to ask for a picture. But before I could even say anything, he put both arms on my shoulders and looked me square in the eyes. “Hey, kiddo. I just want you to know that Beau is so proud of you, Jill is so proud of you, and I’m so proud of you. I wanna know one thing, are ya happy?” “I am,” I responded, taken aback that he had even heard about my transition. “That makes me so happy. Give me a hug!” He pulled me in for an enveloping embrace, a quintessential gesture for the gregarious vice president. It was a powerful moment for me. As much as I had cherished that signed Joe Biden schedule growing up, this small interaction meant infinitely more to me. If meeting Joe Biden at eleven had assured me of my love of politics, his embrace at twenty-two helped confirm my belief that despite the cynicism that surrounds politics, there are still good and decent people in the arena. And with the support of both the Bidens and the Markells strongly behind us on the gender identity bill, I felt prepared for the fight to come in Delaware.

But my voice did matter. It just turned out that I wasn’t actually using it. What I was saying could have been offered by anyone. Making a cogent case wasn’t my job; I needed to make a compelling case. I was ignoring the emotion that was at the heart of my own progressivism: empathy.

transgender is an adjective, not a noun—the

Transgender people shouldn’t be treated with dignity because of how some of us look; we should be treated with dignity because we are human beings. The trans community is as diverse as any community.

If our pursuit of equality is built on the ability of some of us to blend in, then we will leave many of the most marginalized behind.

I have to admit that I had mixed feelings about my central role in everything, but particularly in the Senate debate. On the one hand, privilege shields me from much of the worst discrimination faced by the transgender community; on the other hand, those same privileges allow me to shoulder the burden of public education with less risk to my safety, security, and economic well-being than would be imposed on others. Additionally, my existing personal relationships with these legislators made it even harder for them to say no to me and, therefore, the broader community. I felt a moral responsibility to use that privilege and those relationships to subvert the power of prejudice.

As I watched my parents plead with the State Senate for basic dignity, I was not overcome with pride, but instead guilt. I felt bad that they were forced to bare everything before our legislature and the media. I felt embarrassed that they had to come defend me, as though I had committed a crime and they had to attest to my character. I worried that they felt humiliated, like they were groveling for respect.

She knew the indignity of having to plead for your most basic rights.

After trying to explain your basic humanity to people over and over and over again, it can make your own government feel entirely foreign to you. And when you look around and see no one like you in the legislature, that foreignness is compounded with a profound sense of loneliness. It’s enough to dissuade even the most dedicated activist from believing that their government is capable of truly seeing them.

One study found that 70 percent of transgender women in one community reported being verbally harassed, denied access, or physically assaulted in a public restroom. And because of that discrimination—and the fear of it—transgender people are often forced to avoid bathrooms altogether, sometimes causing medical issues because we are forced to hold it for so long.

One survey found that among transgender people who had interacted with a police officer who thought or knew that they were transgender, 58 percent reported mistreatment.

First, access to a job does not begin and end with the application process; it also includes access to shelter, goods and services, and a quality education. For LGBTQ people to be able to live and thrive without fear of discrimination, it’s not enough to be protected from nine a.m. to five p.m.

In one survey, 70 percent of transgender people reported experiencing some form of discrimination in a health-care setting, including health-care professionals refusing to touch patients.

I’ve talked to other trans folks who avoid asking for help for that very reason: the fear that asking for or needing help will reinforce the prejudices and negative stereotypes many people have about those of us who are trans. I know I find myself overcompensating to show society that anything they can do I can do, too.

And here he was, facing death, apologizing that he wouldn’t be able to be there for me.

But walking out on that roof with my dad, I knew they loved me as their daughter. I knew they loved me as Sarah. And in many ways, Andy’s love for me helped them get there. Seeing someone love me as the woman I am provided my parents a path to do the same.

Andy and I were both fulfilling a dream, however bittersweet the circumstances.

None of us know how long we have, but we do have a choice in whether we love or hate. And every day that we rob people of the ability to live their lives to the fullest, we are undermining the most precious gift we are given as humans.

As I said to that state representative in Delaware who had admonished us for moving the trans equality bill too quickly, each time we ask anyone—whether they are transgender, Black, an immigrant, Muslim, Native American, gay, or a woman—to sit by and let an extended conversation take place about whether they deserve to be respected and affirmed in who they are, we are asking people to watch their one life pass by without dignity or fairness. That is too much to ask of anyone.

Hope can be limitless. Inspiration can always be found. Ideas are endless. But time, that is one resource none of us can afford to waste.

Civil rights shouldn’t depend on appearance.

We reward candidates, particularly for the presidency, who seem almost apathetic to the possibility of being elected. We love the idea of a candidate who seems to stumble their way into the Oval Office. We put effortlessness on a pedestal, which in turn punishes the marginalized for working twice as hard to get half as far. The very perseverance and determination that we require to succeed is then held against the marginalized, particularly women, as self-interested ambition.

when diverse voices are heard, when the progressive community stands together, when allies speak out, there is still a way to make the politics of fear and division, of discrimination and misinformation, no longer effective.

When young people participate in politics, they can speak from a place of history. I don’t mean the history of the past, but rather the history that remains to be written. Young people will be the ones who write the history books of tomorrow.

Too often we hear that “politics is the art of the possible,” but that belief undersells our power to effect transformational change. Instead, as barrier-breaking leaders throughout history have observed, politics is—and must always be—the art of making the impossible possible.