MADISON, Wisc. — Fair Wisconsin, the state’s LGBTQ rights organization, released a statement on Thursday with other organizations and businesses in support of the transgender community after Trump’s tweets on military policy.
By now I’m sure you’ve seen the news about the President’s outrageous attack on transgender servicemembers. Fair Wisconsin joins several other LGBTQ community organizations in condemning this attack and issues the following joint statement:
The President of the United States’ announcement yesterday morning banning transgender Americans from serving their country “in any capacity” should they so choose, is an unconscionable attack on transgender Americans’ very existence.
The president’s words echo decades of denigrating speech aimed at belittling a misunderstood community whose members simply try to be the most genuine, authentic versions of themselves that they can be.
There are an estimated 15,000 transgender servicemembers in the U.S. armed forces right now, filling critical roles as translators, medics, soldiers, and technicians.
As they have chosen to pledge years of their lives to serving their government, to have that government turn around and tell them that they are an undue burden on the rest of the military is a slap in the face to them and trans people the world over.
Transgender military veterans like Navy Seal Kristin Beck and highest-ranking out trans officer Sheri Swokowski demonstrate every day that trans service members are just as capable, just as courageous, and just as necessary to a functional military as any other highly-trained armed forces personnel.
Today we stand in solidarity with trans folks inside and outside the military, both in the U.S. and abroad. Trans people are people, and trans rights are human rights.
Whether you’ve chosen to serve or not, or decry military action anywhere, transgender people deserve the same dignity and respect afforded to any other member of humanity.
The undersigned organizations stand in solidarity with the transgender community in Wisconsin, the U.S. and the world at large.
Fair Wisconsin
GSAFE
Madison Area Transgender Association
New Harvest Foundation
Our Lives Magazine
OutReach LGBT Community Center
