Trans And Non-Binary People Persuasive Speech

Trans people are those who are born male, but later on in life identify as female, or vice versa. Non-binaries are those who do not fit into 'male' or 'female', but may identify as both, a mix of the two, or neither. Forty-nine percent of trans people attempt suicide at some point in their lives, and one in twelve trans or non-binary people are murdered just for being trans.1 More than a quarter of trans people have also said they required anti-violence services, but the majority of violence is never even reported due to fear of being ridiculed, ignored or making the situation worse. Although, recently, society is more accepting of trans and non-binary people than it was a few years ago, the very idea still has a huge stigma attached to it.

Trans people are mistreated by the education system, the workplace, and in everyday life by strangers and very often, family. They are injured, raped and killed, and nobody seems to care.
In just the first few months of 2014, over a hundred acts of violence against non-binary individuals worldwide were taken into account.

Ten percent of these violent acts were against youths – people under the age of eighteen. These include two sixteen year olds who were shot, and an eight year old boy who was beaten to death by his very own father.2 There is an appalling volume of trans and non-binary people who are murdered, beaten, raped and pushed to suicide every year. Many of these incidents go unreported, because the media does not care enough to make it big news. This is disgusting. There needs to be more awareness for trans violence and a bigger effort needs to be made to make it stop. Violence like this should not be allowed to continue unnoticed.

There is even a phrase for the assault – whether that is physical, verbal or sexual – against trans and non-binaries. This phrase is ‘trans bashing’. Trans bashing occurs when someone is beaten or assaulted for their gender identity – similar to ‘gay bashing’ when someone is assaulted for their sexuality.2 The fact that this is such a common occurrence that it even has its own term, and is relatively well known, is, quite honestly, sickening. Sadly, this is becoming more and more

common.
One especially horrific incident of trans bashing is the rape and murder of Brandon Teena in 1993. After telling two of his male friends he was assigned female at birth, and was in fact trans, those two people forced him to take down his trousers to prove he was ‘female’, and then proceeded to rape him. They then killed Teena, as well as two other people in the house with him at the time.7 One of his murderers was sentenced to death, the other to live in prison. But Teena was one of the few victims of this disgusting act to receive some kind of justice.
Until 1993, assault due to gender identity was not considered hate crime. Minnesota in America was the first state to add it to the hate crime law. But that didn’t save Matthew Shepard, who at the time lived in a state which still didn’t count gender identity assault as hate crime. He was tied to a fence, cruelly tortured and left to die, still tied to that fence. When he was found, he was in a coma and suffering from back fractures, brain damage and dozens of cuts and bruises on his face and head. He never regained consciousness and died six days later in hospital.8 To think that this could possibly happen to someone is horrific enough, but for a person to be so heartless towards someone simply for the gender they identify as is beyond comprehension. It is even worse to think that this happens much more commonly than people seem to realise – but it mostly goes unreported. People who do this are cruel, disgusting and need to be stopped.
Recently, members of the website 4Chan have decided to band together to target transgender youths and convince them to commit suicide. 4Chan has a history of violence, specifically against women, but never before has it escalated to this point. However, the moderators of the site have made no attempt to stop these individuals or try to help those affected by their hate. One person sent a specifically hateful and cruel message, saying, ‘Why isn’t… doing more to get rid of these degenerate freaks?’ and, later, in the same message, ‘all trannies should be rounded up and slaughtered like cattle.’3 There are many more quotes I could add here, but most of them are just too disgusting to even type. To send this kind of message to someone, regardless of whom they are or what they identify as, is absolutely unforgivable. Someone who can honestly think it is acceptable to say such things need to be severely disciplined – but nothing happened to the sender of this message. Even other members of the LGBTQ+ community target trans and non-binary people, as a few of these messages were sent by gay men and women.
Even some groups which disguise themselves as support groups are actually the ones to watch out for. Gender Identity Watch claims it exists to help LGBTQ+ people, but it is a thinly veiled attempt at spreading more hate. One member of the site transadvocate said the following about the group; ‘…several thousand people regard the behaviour of Brennan’s groups to be consistent with the behaviour of a ‘hate group.’4 When people spoke out against this group, they responded by putting up photos of the people who stood up to them, and posted information such as location, family members’ names and other personal details.5 By doing this they offended and endangered the very people they supposedly wanted to protect. This proves that the group – and many others – do not really care about trans and non-binaries, but only want to add fuel to the fire.
Hate against non-binaries is much more common than most people think. There need to be more laws in place to prevent it, and a bigger effort to stop those that unnecessarily taunt, torture and kill innocent trans and non-binary people. If people took more interest in cases like these and started raising awareness through education at a young age, then the hate against non-binaries would stop. If you spread awareness and stop treating non-binaries and trans like lesser humans, then, we will finally be able to stop having to hide ourselves and live in fear of what could happen to us. When the stigma against trans and non-binaries ends, so will the violence.