um, what?

Someone please explain to me how the governor of a certain state doesn’t understand the implications of the bills he’s signing into law. As an example lets use Rick Perry of our very own lone star state. Two years ago, Perry signed a bill into law that allowed transgender people to marry someone of the opposite sex using documentation of their sexual reassignment surgery as proof of their gender. Cool, right? Well Perry’s finally realized the privilege he’s dealt out and get this “never intended” for this to happen, he firmly believes that “marriage is between one man and one woman”. So how did this happen? Your guess is as good as mine but now it looks like it’s on the path to being repealed which means two things. First, it would prevent trans people from marrying in Texas. Second, it would invalidate all current marriages of trans people in the state.

Here’s a grim example of what I’m talking about in case this isn’t relatable for you. Nicki Araguz was married to her firefighter husband, Thomas, for just 2 years before he was tragically killed battling a massive fire. Now the husband’s family is trying to take control of his benefits and estate claiming their marriage wasn’t actually legal because Nicki was born a man and had undergone sexual reassignment surgery. Although Nicki now identifies as a woman they are going by her birth certificate which still reports her sex as male. This would mean two men were married which is illegal in Texas where they lived. So her husband is recently deceased, you’re attempting to rob her of his estate, and now you’re disregarding her identity…um, what?

So basically, they want to make it so trans folk can’t marry anyone…at least in Texas. Seriously, lets think abut this. Perry wants to make it illegal for trans folk to marry persons of the opposite sex…so then does that mean they can marry someone of the same sex? Does that mean I could marry someone of the same sex? You never know, he “never intended” to allow trans people to marry, maybe he’ll grant more privileges unknowingly. I don’t know about you but I feel like this is completely ass backwards.

Since the above section is probably only feasible in my gayest of dreams lets think a little more realistically. So if what they want is for Texas law to define marriage as between one cisgender man and one cisgender woman…where does that leave intersex folks? Are we just going to marginalize them forever? Well, what do you have to say for yourself Perry? “It’s an emotional issue. I can appreciate that.” I guess we’ll wait to see exactly what he means by appreciating “that”.

See but this isn’t “an emotional issue”, it’s an issue of human rights. Rick Perry and co, you are completely writing off the existence of trans people with this law. This is abhorrent and I’m not a very proud Texan or Austin-ite right now.