‘Civics, broadly defined, is the rights and obligations of all citizens.” As bell hooks declares in All About Love, “Until we live in a culture that not only respects but also upholds basic civil rights for children…they have no legal recourse…children can only rely on well-meaning adults to assist them if they are being exploited and oppressed.”
Here in the United States, our premise is “freedom from oppression,” yet this does not free us from respecting the “rights” of citizens, and abiding the “obligations” these “rights” implicate to ensure our “freedom from oppression.”
In New Hampshire, the rights of transgender people have been encoded into law. On June 12th, 2018, Governor Sununu signed HB 1319 into law. This bill codified, “prohibiting discrimination based on gender identity…whether or not that gender-related identity, behavior, or appearance is different from that traditionally assigned sex at birth” (NH-HB.1319, 6/12/18).
These protections include the arenas of employment, housing, healthcare and education. You cannot legally be hired or fired, refused housing, access to healthcare or a “fair and appropriate education” as a result of the landmark 1972 Supreme Court Title IX decision.
Title IX established equal participation of all genders in federal protection, and further updates have extended these protections for students with cognitive impairments as well. These inclusive acts sought to heal legacies left in classrooms by the 1857 Dred Scott decision that made segregation legal and the 1896 Plessy decision that coined, “separate but equal.”
Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka overturned Plessy on May 17, 1954, starting the process that would end segregation and expand civil rights and such civil “obligations” to all, guaranteeing equal participation, free from discrimination, to “fair and appropriate education.” What these civil protections intend to correct are the resulting social structures created, in part, by codifying citizens into binaries, good or bad.
Gender, and gender expression, is carrying with it cultural conditioning that teaches us to value or to be underappreciated. In effect, today, we are furthering the stereotypes that we constructed by attempting to legislate the rights of trans peoples along the same historic limitations of race, sexuality and gender.
Considering the background of civil legislation and the resulting societal progress, as determined by wider participation in U.S. society, and, when, comparing that progress to the current laws targeting transgender participation in athletics, access to state-issued ID, bathrooms, and gender affirming healthcare suggests an intentional political, not social, effort to turn back the clock on civility and participation in NH’s society.
A 2017 GLSEN assessment of New Hampshire transgender students concluded that 50% of students polled were not allowed to use their chosen names and pronouns at school, or to safely use the restroom (ACLUNH) . Meanwhile, federal and state legislators continue to argue over the intricacies of passing effective protections.
Schools in New Hampshire have begun implementing their own policies in order to address the gaps left by the lack of overarching state policy and the belonging of trans students. The NH School Board Association introduced a model of Trans and Gender Non-Comforming (TGNC) student policy in April 2015 to help guide schools and administrators, and the ACLU of NH published a report, “A Case for Lived Equality in the Classroom,” with case studies and recommendations.
Sarah Rose Huckman, in written testimony to the House Education Committee, commented that she received support from her principal, athletic director, coaches and teammates. “I participated in sports for the same reasons other girls do. For the pure love of it, for one thing—the joy and exhilaration of skiing, or running cross-country. As a girl who happens to be transgender, sports meant something else too—they were lifesaving. I wouldn’t be who I am today—a happy, healthy college freshman—if it weren’t for those teams.”
The “rights” and “obligations” that are encoded in the United States civil society are dynamic and will continue to change, to transform. Average citizens have shown support to the social movement recognizing full transgendered participation in society.
The momentum of social progress supported by the public should be the cue that legislators follow so that schools, communities, families and children are not left to themselves. These groups should not have to rely on outdated attitudes, limited imaginations and limited modes of expression for their ability to engage in the making of the social fabric of America. As shown in 1865, 1920, 1954, 1968, 1972, 2018 and continuing on in 2021, this country, this state, is indeed capable of accepting transformation, “different from tradition.”
The legacy of civil rights in the United States of America suggests it is our “obligation” as a civil society to continue trending towards a “better, more perfect union,” like Abraham Lincoln once said. Regardless of our differences, our civil society is only upheld by our agreed commitment to a shared legal code, the upholding of the various social contracts, and our ability to collectively engage in the creation of further transformation for the betterment of all.
(Ben Bacote is a humanities instructor at Waterville Valley Academy.)