You might be wondering why I chose this topic. Well, there isn’t a straightforward response. I chose it because there are a lot of cases where people don’t understand or accept this. There was one shooting in Nashville where the shooting was transgender and wasn’t accepted in their religion. Audrey Hale, the assailant, shot and killed 6 people at an elementary school.

There are many statistics that say the number of identifying as trans has nearly doubled in recent years. They say that students are identifying as trans because of peer pressure and/or because of the influence of social media. There was an article that stated something along the lines of “there are people being encouraged to identify as transgender among those who are not transgender”. In “Gender Expectations: Trans identity in teens considered as a social contagion.” there is a part of it that states “people are identifying as transgender, but it can be confused with underlying mental health conditions”. Some people that are transgender will experience gender dysphoria. Gender dysphoria is when they have phycological distress about their gender. 18% of the 375 patients with gender dysphoria were nonbinary. Over half were assigned male at birth but prefer the pronouns they/them. Some articles said that teens are identifying as trans because of the influence from people around them. There were many incidents were males identified themselves as female and participated in competitions. Avi Silverberg identified as a female and participated in the women’s bench press competition. He beat the record by a couple of 100 pounds. The previous person that held the records was a transgender person that had beat and dominated the past 8 competitions that they joined as a woman. This shows that transgender polices harm female athletes. Many people might disagree with me, but I think the people that are identifying as transgender should participate in a different group if they are going to compete in competitions. I am not trying to discriminate but I think it isn’t fair for the females. They could also change the policies.  

Kearns, Madeleine. “Gender Expectations: Trans identity in teens considered as a social contagion.” National Review, vol. 75, no. 3, 20 Feb. 2023, pp. 21+. Gale In Context: Canada, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A739916502/GPS?u=43dcbs&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=bd6bc2a9. Accessed 2 Apr. 2023. 

“Trans teens: Should schools notify parents?” The Week Magazine, 10 Feb. 2023, p. 16. Gale In Context: Global Issues, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A739766567/GPS?u=43dcbs&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=dd1d15c1. Accessed 2 Apr. 2023. 

Scott, Katie Collins. “How Boston Archdiocese crafts gender-identity policy.” National Catholic Reporter, vol. 58, no. 11, 3 Mar. 2023, pp. 1+. Gale In Context: Canada, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A741359657/GPS?u=43dcbs&sid=bookmark-GPS&xid=e7e6ae02. Accessed 2 Apr. 2023.