Rep. JR Hoell, I take issue with your Sunday op-ed and the misinformation it spreads (Monitor Forum, March 5).
Our transgendered brothers and sisters are not “sexual extremists.” They are human beings whose gender identity does not match their birth sex.
Dr. McHugh, whom you quote, is a man whose ideas have been widely debunked. The American College of Pediatricians is a small conservative organization (500 members) founded in part to fight adoption by gay couples. It is not the same as the American Academy of Pediatrics (64,000 members) which, by the way, does support the health and wellness of transgendered individuals.
The Target incident you refer to involved a man with a camera, not a transgendered person threatening women and children.
Your misinformed statements show exactly why HB 478 needs to be passed. Across this country, transgendered citizens have been discriminated against, misunderstood, vilified, assaulted and even murdered by folks who see them as “others.”
I am an older, small, straight female. Transgendered citizens do not frighten me. But you do.
NANCY BRENNAN
Weare