Israel Invades West Bank – Declares Will Be Treated Like Gaza

When Israel threatens to turn the West Bank into the new Gaza, believe them.

I read about this young woman Saturday. You may be interested to read about her, too-

I do the free clicks on Free The Ocean, just to help make a dent in the amount of plastic in Earth’s oceans. The clicks are to answer trivia questions, and frequently I learn something, especially on days when I guess the answer. Yesterday’s (I had it up to post yesterday, too, but didn’t get it done until late) was about Autumn Peltier. I was interested, so I pulled up some more info on her, and she is post-worthy.

Free The Ocean tells us that “Autumn Peltier is a young Canadian activist known for advocacy for clean water and ocean protection. At the age of eight, she was inspired to make a difference. In the last 11 years, her voice has become powerful in the movement to protect marine environments and work toward a healthier planet for future generations.“

Here is some biographical info. “Autumn Peltier is the chief water commissioner of the Anishinabek Nation, and a water-rights advocate and environmental activist.

“Peltier was born on September 17, 2004, in Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory, Manitoulin Island, Ontario, Canada, and is a member of the Aniishnabek Nation.” There is more on the page, too.

An article from 2017 on CBC News tells us, “Even at the tender age of 12, Autumn Peltier speaks with the wisdom of someone much older.

“’I’m going to be an ancestor one day,’ says Peltier, from her home in Wikwemikong First Nation in northern Ontario. ‘I’m still going to have great-grandchildren on this land and I hope they are still able to drink the water.’

“Despite her youth, Peltier is already a veteran activist when it comes to the issue of clean drinking water — not just in First Nations communities, but across the country.

“’I do what I do for the water because water is sacred,’ says Peltier, who was honoured by the Assembly of First Nations as a water protector.

“Since water doesn’t have a voice, Peltier says she wants to lend hers to the cause. Even if that means taking on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as she did last December at the AFN’s annual winter gathering.”

There is even more information here, on CIWEM , the Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management. This one is current, with some family history. This is a remarkable young woman!

Got a Republican State Legislature? Watch out carefully for this…

This is an opinion piece that contains news, and cites. Also, all Republicans are not Magas, but they’re still Republicans. This is important.

Lawmakers plan brazen power grab, pushing aside Kansas voters and Gov. Laura Kelly

Snippet (it’s not a long piece, and it’s full of info.)

Let’s be clear about what Kansas Republican legislative leaders are doing with their planned overhaul of budgeting: They are launching a personal and political power grab against Gov. Laura Kelly.

They have never accepted or respected her mandate. Despite Kelly winning a second term and having two years left to go, they have continually attempted to usurp the executive branch’s authority. They have tried a constitutional amendment and prohibiting her ability to negotiate Medicaid contracts. Now they’re going after her yearly state budget proposal.

Usually, the Legislature begins its yearly budget process with a proposal from the governor. Her office submits it when lawmakers arrive for the annual session, in January. Now an interim committee wants to start the process earlier, as soon as October of the previous year.

In this new process, the governor’s budget would be a suggestion, not a starting point.

And never mind that it’s a direct attack on Kelly. House Speaker Dan Hawkins, R-Wichita, assured the audience that these changes had nothing to do with the governor.

“This process has nothing to do with the governor,” he said at the meeting earlier this month, according to Kansas Reflector reporter Tim Carpenter. “If you’re going to focus on the governor, probably not the wisest thing to do, because this process has happened over time with many, many different governors.”

He was contradicted by Senate President Ty Masterson, R-Andover, who let the proverbial cat out of the figurative bag.

“You’ll have a Republican governor, for example, or somebody you trust, and you trust the administration to build the budgets, and then you kind of rubber stamp stuff,” Masterson said. “And, then, you switch, and you have (the) opposition party and then there’s all that same power.”

Oh. So it’s like that, then.

(snip-More; also a vid of the sausage becoming sausage)

A little something to look at, if you’re enjoying the weekend looking at stuff

Browse 64 Years of RadioShack Catalogs Free Online … and Revisit the History of American Consumer Electronics

We had a Radio Shack here in town for a lot of years, but not as long as till 2015. The manager/co-owner also had a story in another, larger city, and eventually moved there. He and DH were really good friends before I came along, and then we all made friends. I used to do volunteer literacy tutoring; one time, our director asked me if I’d try working with a young woman who could read and pronounce English, but had no idea how to converse, having only ever used Farsi for communication. Of course I tried it. It turned out she was our Radio Shack friend’s sister in law! I still am not really sure I taught her much; she already knew how to greet people, and some rudimentary questions and answers, “What do you think about this weather?” “Do you know whose cat that is?” But, she was not confident. She could comprehend and repeat, but not necessarily always apply and respond conversationally in English (her husband sometimes came along, and did translation.) I worked with her for a few years and she seemed to feel better about it all and I saw improvement, but no real click. One time, they didn’t show up for a session, and I’ve never seen them again. I’d heard that our friend had had a little trouble, too, here in town; this would have been a few weeks after the plane crashes in Sept. of 2011. I finally got up the nerve to just ask him if they were OK. He said they moved a little farther East, by some other relatives. They were doing fine, and he’d tell them I said hello. I asked him to tell their little girl that our son said hello, too; she had a crush on him because he read to her while I was working with her mom. I guess I just needed to share that story; this Radio Shack piece reminded me of all of that. Thanks for hangin’ in with me on this!

At the Border, a Shelter By — And For — Muslim Women

I think this fits in as information relating to marginalized people. It is from a magazine that is religious, but it’s not pushy; I think everyone can read this article without feeling proselytized. It struck me as important, and overlooked. -A

By Ken Chitwood

Anyone crossing the U.S.-Mexico border faces a journey fraught with violence and danger.

But for women and children, that journey is even more treacherous. Not only are many fleeing violence at home — including gender-based violence — they also experience higher rates of violence en route. Torture, mutilation, sexual violence, femicide,disappearances, and additional health complications are common occurrences for female migrants making their way north.

That danger is amplified for the thousands of girls living in makeshift camps and tent cities along the U.S.-Mexico border without protection or accompanying support. According to the Washington, D.C.-based Kids In Need of Defense, “[u]naccompanied children are especially vulnerable to sexual violence, human trafficking, and exploitation by cartels and other criminal groups.”

Over the last few years, a group of Muslim women has stepped in to meet their needs in unique ways. Albergue Assabil (“the Shelter of the Path”), the first Muslim shelter along the U.S.-Mexico border, has been in operation since June 2022 under the leadership of Sonia Tinoco García, founder and president of the Latina Muslim Foundation. According to staff, the shelter served nearly 3,000 migrants in its first two years of operation. Many of those migrants have been women, attracted to the shelter because of its separate men’s and women’s facilities and the fact that Albergue Assabil is a female-led shelter.

And it’s not only Muslim women finding sanctuary under the shade of the shelter’s blue dome; there have also been other female immigrants looking to García and her team for assistance as they make the perilous journey north.

“A group of Muslim ladies”

When García first headed to the U.S.-Mexico border to help others in 2014, her goal was simple: to help women, especially mothers and unaccompanied children, in their attempts to claim asylum or start a new life in the United States. Having immigrated to the U.S. herself in the 1990s, García knew what it was like.

She also knew the statistics.

Though the share has fluctuated in recent decades, immigrant women and girls make up at least half of all migrants and asylum seekers, according to figures from the Migration Policy Institute. Women and girls made up a total of 53 percent of the immigrant population in 1980, 51 percent in 1990, 50 percent in 2000, and 51 percent in 2010 and 2022.

Given the scale, García gathered what she called “a group of Muslim ladies” from her mosque community in San Diego. Each had a profound understanding of the situation female immigrants were facing.

Angie Gely, who works in the office at Albergue Assabil, said being an immigrant who was deported back to Mexico and is now living in Tijuana, helps her understand what women in the shelter are going through — and what they face once they arrive in the U.S.

“Our families crossed the border to the U.S. too,” Gely said. “We can relate.”

Driven by their own past experiences and a deep desire to help female immigrants, García said she and other Muslim women started volunteering in Tijuana shelters, bringing food and clothing for people regardless of their religious, social, and cultural background.

Along the way, García and her “Muslim ladies” started noticing how many Muslims were mixed in with the larger population of immigrants and deportees. “It got my attention when I saw some women standing at the border with hijab,” García said. “I talked to them and discovered they were from Somalia, trying to go to the U.S. or Canada.”

The more time she spent in Tijuana, the more Muslims she saw arriving. At shelter after shelter, meanwhile, she witnessed staff too overwhelmed to cater to Muslim migrants’ unique needs.

“There were Muslims who didn’t feel safe in the shelters, because they were being discriminated against or questioned because of their faith,” Gely said. As a result, some would avoid the shelters altogether, struggling to find their own way on the streets or seeking help from Muslims at Centro Islámico de Baja — Tijuana’s only mosque at the time.

“The shelters didn’t have the time or money,” García said, “to provide halal food, to provide adequate space for prayer, or even understand their situations are different from those of migrants from Central America or elsewhere.”

Sonia Tinoco García, pictured, founded Albergue Assabil in 2022, with help of other Muslim women from San Diego, Calif., and Tijuana, Mexico. Ken Chitwood/Sojourners.

García and the others did what they could to serve the immigrants sent their way — covering the cost of hotel rooms, providing home-cooked halal meals, or connecting them to the legal aid they so desperately needed, in a language they could communicate in. Overwhelmed, they turned to their mosque communities in San Diego and Orange counties to raise funds and procure translators who could speak Arabic or Urdu, Farsi or French, and many dialects in between.

But the need continued to increase. More and more Muslim immigrants were making their way to Tijuana, and the “ladies” could only do so much. Shelters were overwhelmed, and García said she was scrambling to field the many calls.

That’s why, in 2017, they decided to do more. Founding a nonprofit organization — the Latina Muslim Foundation — they raised more than $200,000 (USD) to construct a purpose-built Muslim shelter. Situated in the border city’s Zona Norte neighborhood, the shelter features separate men’s and women’s facilities, a prayer area, halal food, Quran classes, and legal services to assist migrants.

The hope, García said, was to provide a humane and helpful place for Muslim migrants to land in Tijuana. They are there to help transform the border from a topography of inhumanity into a place of dignity and opportunity, García said.

A growing number of Mexican Muslim women

García said that as a child, she always dreamed of helping people. “I wanted to become a surgeon, but do surgery for free, because people need it to save their lives,” García said. “Or an attorney who did pro bono work, to help families who don’t have justice.”

García grew up in a large family in a village of 200 people near La Paz, in the very south of the Baja California peninsula. She did not know whether such dreams would — or could — come true. “We had a simple lifestyle. We were not rich people,” she said. “Because we were 11 siblings, not everyone got education.”

García was one of the lucky ones able to finish high school. She moved to Ensenada — an hour and a half south of Tijuana — and started working with a local orthodontist serving medical tourists from the U.S. When she was 21, she met a man named Abu Hamza, a medical tourist from Lebanon living in Los Angeles. Abu Hamza spoke no Spanish at the time, and she did not speak English, but they communicated with books and through other people. Twenty days after meeting, they were married.

García had grown up Catholic and knew little of Islam. But when she saw Abu Hamza, she said, “I saw Islam in him.” After moving to the Los Angeles area with Abu Hamza, she learned English and Islam at the same time.

García joined the growing ranks of Latina converts to Islam. The first Latina and Latino converts can be identified as far back as the 1920s; others converted in the 1960s and ’70s as part of Black Muslim movements such as the Nation of Islam and the Five Percent Nation. In 2011, 6 percent of Muslim Americans identified as Hispanic, according to the Pew Research Center; by 2017, it was 8 percent. The vast majority of this cohort of Hispanic American Muslims are women, many of them from Mexico or having Mexican heritage.

Muslims remain a small minority in Mexico, said Arely Medina, a professor at the University of Guadalajara. There are multiple small groups and communities made up of both migrants and individuals native to Mexico in the country’s interior, all of which have a relatively recent history, Medina said. “Thus, one cannot speak of a ‘Mexican Islam’ per se,” she said, “even though Muslims have a history here stretching back to the conquest of the Americas and continuing with a series of Arab immigrations in the 19th and 20th centuries.”

Migrants from numerous nations gather for Friday prayers inside the Albergue Assabil’s musallah, or prayer room. Ken Chitwood/Sojourners

According to Medina and other experts, most Mexican converts to Islam are women. Among them are sizable numbers of female Muslim immigrants from places such as Egypt, Morocco, Syria, Pakistan, Ghana, and Turkey who have made Mexico home. “Some hope to reach the United States and are concentrated along the northern border,” Medina said. “Others concentrate in places like Mexico City, Guadalajara, or Monterrey.”

It is difficult, if not impossible, to generalize these women’s motivations, plans, or situations, Medina said. As is true of those staying at Albergue Assabil, “There is not a single story,” she said. “Each one carries a narrative.”

Because these women face a variety of challenges — such as wearing the veil in a cultural context where Islam is not a prominent reference point or searching for a sense of freedom and security in the face of domestic violence and harassment — Medina said they find in each other a sense of solidarity. “They are in search of a better life,” she said. As Europe, the United Kingdom, and even the U.S. are experienced as less welcoming, Medina said, “Latin America is now seen as a place of possible openness.”

Empowered to help others

Whether local converts or newcomers from elsewhere, Muslim women have carved out their own spaces in Mexico, including the Albergue Assabil shelter and the Nur Ashki Jerrahi Sufi order in Mexico City, which is headed by a woman — Shaykha Amina Teslima.

García often reminds donors, partners, volunteers, journalists, and authorities that Albergue Assabil is a shelter run by women. And not just any women, but Muslim women.

That, she said, makes a difference.

“We found that Islam gives women rights; it gave us empowerment,” she said of her and the other women running the show at Albergue Assabil. “I could do whatever I wanted to do — more than what I could do with my own culture or my own religion before,” she said. “Islam says that women can go study; men cannot tell you no. Men know this. My husband knows he doesn’t own me. He is my support.”

Indeed, her husband, Abu Hamza, is supportive of García’s work. He is often seen around the shelter too, pulling up on a motorcycle with García, bringing in donations, making phone calls, and generally doing whatever needs to be done. When asked about the shelter, he insistently points to his wife. “She knows better than me,” he said.

García said part of the shelter’s work is passing their own empowerment on to women who arrive at their gates. “In the shelter, when women come, we give them tools to be able to continue their education: English, Spanish, computers, cooking,” she said. “We want to give them the basics so that they are not reliant on men. In the time they stay in the shelter, we teach them as much as we can so that they can live for themselves.”

Increasingly, said Gely, that means more and more women are finding their way to Albergue Assabil — Muslim and non-Muslim. “Just yesterday, three ladies from Russia came here looking for shelter,” Gely said. “They’re not Muslim, no. But they hear how nice it is and want to come. Of course we take them in.”

One of them is Amie. Amie has struggled getting an appointment through the U.S. Customs and Border Protection app CBP One. She has spent three months in Mexico so far, arriving at Albergue Assabil six weeks after bouncing from shelter to shelter in Tijuana. Sojourners is withholding Amie’s last name, at her request, to protect her immigration status.

“They’ve been so kind to me,” she said, “out on the street, in other shelters, I feared for my life, worried I would be tortured, abused, or killed. This shelter is the only place I feel I could survive.”

As we talk, two more young Russian women walk through the front doors. They too are looking for shelter. Amie tells them to take a seat. Gely or García will be here soon, she says.

“They’ll take care of you,” Amie said. “They always do.”

https://sojo.net/articles/news/border-shelter-and-muslim-women

Kansas women rally adjacent to J.D. Vance fundraiser, with vulnerable plea for reproductive rights

By: Grace Hills – August 24, 2024 8:28 am

First some content warning; the article has a warning that it references rape. The article is below, but I’ll leave some space here; the first mention is in the first sentence beneath their warning. The article will be beneath the Xs; I can’t get formatting to leave space. Also, Sen. Marshall lies like a Trump.

Amber Dickinson spoke on reproductive rights at the "Kansas Women for Harris" rally Aug. 22. (Grace Hills/Kansas Reflector)

Amber Dickinson speaks on reproductive rights at the “Kansas Women for Harris” rally Aug. 22, 2024, in Leawood. (Grace Hills/Kansas Reflector)

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Trigger warning: This story references rape.

Help is available.

LEAWOOD — Amber Dickinson took a personal and vulnerable stand for reproductive freedom as she talked publicly for the first time about being raped.

Before her speech Thursday in Leawood at a rally of “Kansas Women for Kamala Harris,” only a handful of people knew she is a survivor. Through tears, she explained that she was worried she would stand in front of strangers and cry, when she was supposed to be strong.

“But whose definition of strong are we obligated to adhere to? It is time that women create their own definition of strength,” Dickinson said. “Because strength is not sexually abusing women like Donald Trump. Strength is not belittling women like J.D. Vance.”

Dickinson, a political science professor at Washburn University who has written opinion columns for Kansas Reflector, joined speakers who highlighted the ways Harris’ and former President Donald Trump’s policies affect Kansans. The rally was a counter-protest to Vance’s nearby fundraiser, where Republicans claimed he raised $1.5 million.

Dickinson spoke on reproductive rights, highlighting experiences of women in Oklahoma, a neighboring state with a total abortion ban. She spoke of a fetus found in an Oklahoma college residence hall bathroom. She said this is what the future looks like “if you allow wicked men like J.D. Vance and Donald Trump get what they want from us.”

After Dickinson spoke on reproductive rights, other women spoke on gun safety and funding in public schools.

Kristen Blackton, a former middle school teacher and part of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, said she witnessed the rise of mass shootings in schools, resulting in her students asking her: “Can you protect us?”

“In our state, in Kansas, the rate of gun deaths has increased 48% from 2013 to 2022 and gun violence also disproportionately affects communities of color, with Black people in Kansas being over two times more likely to die by guns than white people in Kansas,” Blackton said. “This is not normal.”

Child paints a "we're with her" sign at the "Kansas Women for Kamala Harris" rally on Aug. 22. (Grace Hills/Kansas Reflector) — A child paints a “we’re with her” sign at the “Kansas Women for Kamala Harris” rally on Aug. 22, 2024, in Leawood. (Grace Hills/Kansas Reflector)

She talked about legislation introduced by Rep. Linda Featherston, D-Overland Park, that would make safe storage of firearms a requirement. Blackton and other Moms from the group pushed for the bill, which failed to advance.

“Do you know why? We currently have a Republican supermajority in Topeka,” Blackton said. “This means that Republican lawmakers often act like they have no need to listen to their constituents and work across the aisle to improve the lives of Kansans.”

Rep. Mari-Lynn Poskin, D-Leawood, spoke about Moms for Liberty, a group that is known for challenging books in public schools.

Poskin praised Ruby Bridges, the first Black child to attend formerly a whites-only school after Brown v. Board, as a Civil Rights icon. Poskin said she donated copies of “Ruby Bridges’ Walk to School,” a children’s book written by Bridges, to local elementary schools.

“Moms for Liberty attempted to ban this sweet book from the second and third grade curriculums in the state of Tennessee,” Poskin said. “And if you don’t think it’s coming here, you’re wrong.”

Ten miles away from the Democratic women rally, at Indian Hills Country Club in Mission Hills, Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance dined with donors who paid $5,000 to $50,000 to attend. Former U.S Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Kansas U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall and Oklahoma U.S. Senator Markwayne Mullin also were part of the fundraiser.

Mike Brown, chairman for the Kansas Republican Party, called the dinner a “huge success” in the party’s weekly newsletter Friday. Brown said more than 300 people attended, and raised $1.5 million.

On Tuesday, Marshall told KWCH, a radio station in Wichita, that he has heard from Kansans whose top concerns are inflation, border security, and government overregulation.

Peace & Justice History for 8/29

https://www.peacebuttons.info/E-News/peacehistoryaugust.htm#august29

DNC Convention: DEMolish HATE! | Christopher Titus | Armageddon Update

State Line

‘Legislators don’t see me as human’: Missouri trans youth fight to survive anti-LGBTQ+ bills

GOP lawmakers have made the state hostile for trans youth. These teens and their parents vow to ‘assert themselves’

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/aug/24/missouri-trans-youth-anti-lgbtq-bills

Some parents have stockpiled medications in hidden locations. Some have stopped socializing with neighbors. Some have made plans to flee the state.

In Missouri, transgender youth and their families are grappling with an onslaught of attacks on their rights. Last year, Republican lawmakers outlawed critical healthcare treatments for trans youth and banned many trans athletes from school sports. Local school districts worked to censor LGBTQ+ books and prohibit trans children from using bathrooms that match their gender identity.

And the state’s attorney general has become a national leader in anti-trans policy, seeking to gain access to trans kids’ medical records, fighting to restrict trans adults’ healthcare and attacking trans adults who use public locker rooms.

The state is one of the epicenters of the moral panic and anti-trans rhetoric that have dominated campaigns and media cycles during the presidential election. Under the guise of fighting the “indoctrination of our children”, Republicans have made restricting trans rights a focus of their platforms. Donald Trump has vowed to stop “the leftwing gender insanity” while a leading Missouri Republican has celebrated residents leaving the state due to anti-trans policies, saying: “We are better if they are gone.”

The toxic discourse has fomented fear and anger among conservatives about trans people’s increasing visibility in society and created deep anxiety and distress for queer and trans people and their families.

Parents of trans youth across the St Louis region interviewed for this article said they were desperately trying to protect their kids’ health and wellbeing as politicians have zeroed in on their children. They are rationing medications and traveling hours out of state for care. Some are counting the days until their kids turn 18 and the laws don’t apply; “We are truly doing what we can to keep our children alive,” said one mother of a trans boy.

“Kids are being told by their government that they have to be eradicated from public life,” said Chelsea Freels, a recent high school graduate from St Louis, who has become a vocal advocate for trans youth like herself. “I’m 18 now. I can handle it – ish. But I have to help the kids who are younger. It’s like Sisyphus pushing a boulder up a hill. You can help them get better, but then it’s gonna go back down.”

‘Legislators don’t see me as human’

Republicans in nearly every region of the US began introducing anti-trans legislation in 2021 as Joe Biden took office and the GOP and conservative legal groups made trans people a central target of their culture wars. The campaigns were fueled by false claims that trans girls were taking over women’s sports and kids were regularly undergoing “mutilating” surgeries to transition.

In Missouri, less than 1% of young people identify as trans, but lawmakers have made control over their lives an increasing priority.

“It’s stressful and physically and mentally exhausting,” said Corey Hyman, an 18-year-old trans man who has been testifying against anti-trans bills for roughly five years. “These legislators really didn’t take me seriously as a young kid, and they don’t see me as human. I just wish they’d give up.”

Republicans have long sought prohibitions on puberty blockers and hormone therapy, treatments that allow children to medically transition, which families can consider when trans youth are persistent and consistent about their gender identities. The treatments are part of the gender-affirming care model, which is endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics, American Medical Association and other major US medical groups. There has been growing global scrutiny of the medications, including in the UK, which recently adopted restrictions, but they remain part of the recommended standards of care in America.

In Missouri, Republicans’ efforts were boosted last year by a media firestorm at a St Louis clinic for trans youth. Jamie Reed, a former caseworker at the Washington University (WashU) transgender center at St Louis Children’s Hospital, publicly denounced the clinic in February 2023, alleging youth who might not actually be trans were being rushed into treatments. A group of patients publicly rebutted the claims, saying the care was methodical and vital. Families argued lawmakers should stay out of their private medical decisions, but the GOP governor last June adopted a law banning gender-affirming treatments for minors.

The law said youth already receiving treatments could continue. WashU, however, ceased prescribing medications to all trans youth, meaning families could no longer continue treatment at a top children’s hospital.

Christine Hyman, Corey’s mom, recalled listening to the Senate hearing in her car when the ban passed: “I’ll never forget that feeling. First I was screaming, then I was crying. I sat in my car for half an hour when I got home, thinking, ‘How do I tell my son?’”

Living under the anti-trans laws

In the backyard of their St Louis house, Danielle Meert and James Thurow have a luscious garden of herbs and fruit trees that has become their oasis – a respite from the anxiety of trying to raise a trans boy in Missouri. “To be in the garden, not distracted by the bullshit that has consumed us for the past four years has been wonderful,” Thurow said, sitting in his living room one recent afternoon.

“Then there’s the guilt.”

That guilt, the couple said, comes from feeling they could always be doing more to stop anti-trans bills and protect their son Miles, who was turning 18 the following day.

WashU prescribed Miles hormones at age 15, and the treatment had obvious benefits, he said: “I feel comfortable in public. I don’t feel out of place with my friends who are dudes. It just feels good for people to view you as you are.”

Meert said the family was prepared for the healthcare ban. “We’ve been stockpiling medication and hiding it around town with friends and families in case child services shows up and raids our house. People say we’re overreacting or being hysterical, but these Republicans think I belong in jail, that my child is the downfall of America … He’s just a happy kid living his best life.”

They had rationed Miles’s medications so he had enough for his final year underage, but during that time, he lost access to his doctor; the law threatens revoked licenses for practitioners.

Miles said he had become adept at managing stress from anti-trans bills, joking of the sports bans: “It’s not like trans and gay people are known for their athleticism.” He knows how to calm his mother when she suffers panic attacks. He extends grace to those who oppose his rights, saying he understands people have questions about something unfamiliar.

He felt “very relieved” to turn 18, making his care lawful again. But he worries about younger kids.

People sit in a government hearing for a bill — Republican lawmakers in Missouri have made it one of the most hostile states in the nation for trans youths. Photograph: Hudson Heidger/Missourian

One St Louis mother of a 12-year-old trans boy has spent months talking to clinics in Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota and Michigan to try to find care for her son, who had been seen by WashU.

At a young age, the boy had repeatedly spoken of dying. “He didn’t want to grow up because he knew what that would look like,” said the mother, who requested anonymity to protect her son’s privacy. Once he started living as a boy and received gender-affirming treatment, his anger issues dissipated and he excelled at school, she added.

She scoffed at the media narrative that parents were trying to turn their kids trans. “You wouldn’t wish this upon anyone – for your child to feel uncomfortable in their body. But you do have to give freedom to children to tell you if something is wrong. You have to be loving and affirming and open to your child’s journey.”

In November, WashU sent her a letter expressing “deep regret” that a former staffer had publicly discussed her family’s treatment – an apparent reference to Reed, the former caseworker, who seemed to suggest in the media that this mother was rushing treatments.

“I was working with world-class doctors and the brightest minds in this science – how can that be wrong, how can that be illegal, how can that be bad parenting? I’m not denying my child medical care. I’m making sure I comply with the best practices,” said the mother, who provided records indicating there were roughly three years of appointments before her son got puberty blockers, which doctors recommended.

Her boy will soon need additional treatment. She has scheduled an initial appointment in Chicago, but she is anxious about travel costs and worried she will have to take medical leave. “This has robbed us of joy,” she said. “I hate counting the years until my son is 18 and he can move where he wants and go get care. I hate that I’m rushing his young, beautiful life to beat the legislative actions mandating what he can do.”

Reed declined to comment on the mother’s story and criticisms of her efforts, but has previously stood by her claims and continued to argue that the “clinic was harming kids” with medical interventions.

A ‘nightmare’ at schools

Missouri Republicans’ efforts have not stopped at healthcare. Earlier this year, lawmakers proposed bills to end legal recognition of trans people, prevent trans people from using facilities that match their gender identity in schools and workplaces and criminalize teachers who use trans students’ pronouns.

The bills did not pass, but LGBTQ+ families say the demeaning debates and news cycles have taken a toll. Some said they encountered bullying at school, hateful comments from neighbors and casual transphobia at social gatherings. Others said they were forced to cut off relatives who had absorbed misinformation or refused to use correct names and pronouns. Some outspoken advocates said they feared for their safety. Several parents said the stress had made them physically ill.

At one school board meeting last month in St Charles county, a more conservative county neighboring St Louis, queer and trans youth and their supporters sat through a lengthy discussion surrounding a proposal to make it easier for civilians to challenge potentially “obscene” materials – a move seen as an effort to increase censorship of LGBTQ+ content. Some attendees held “trust our teachers and librarians” signs and a trans pride flag, applauding when a student criticized the removal of queer characters from shelves; another speaker said kids shouldn’t be exposed to “sexual scenes”.

Toward the end of the meeting, a board member gave a speech about her disdain for trans youth using locker rooms, an item not on the agenda.

Youth protesters and parents of trans kids gathered at the end of the meeting to commiserate.

“The trans community is burning to the ground here. It’s a nightmare. Where are the national LGBTQ+ organizations?” said Kim Hutton, who has a trans son.

“They frame these policies as ‘protecting the children’, but they’re really just hurting specific marginalized groups. It’s not fun to see when you’re part of those marginalized groups,” said Hannah Yurkovich, a 17-year-old St Louis high schooler at the meeting. “I grew up here, I love St Louis, but I can’t be part of it, if it’s going to keep being against who I am.”

Her friend, Rohan Webb, 18, attended a neighboring high school that adopted gender-neutral bathrooms to better support LGBTQ+ students and had queer support groups. “To see this school district move in the exact opposite direction is saddening,” they said. “To see them getting to make students’ lives so much worse is infuriating.”

‘Will Democrats throw us to the fire?’

Trans Missourians and their families say they have endured by leaning on each other. Families carpool to government hearings. A regional summer camp provides a safe haven for LGBTQ+ youth. Rene and Kyle Freels, the parents of Chelsea, the recent high school graduate, run a support group for trans kids and parents, and they have organized “Transgiving” potlucks for Thanksgiving.

Chelsea has dedicated significant time to supporting trans youth who don’t have the resources she has had. Over breakfast at a queer-friendly cafe with her parents, she described how she assists others in legally changing their name, saying she had just received a court alert about a case she was managing.

“It’s all in the bucket of preventing suicidality,” Chelsea said matter-of-factly. “That is what worries me the most about going to college, because sometimes I have to talk them down … What happens if I’m not in St Louis?” She said she has been fighting to stop friends’ suicides since she was 15 and learned to always gets friends’ addresses in cases of emergencies.

“The public only hears from trans people in the positions of the highest of privileges. I have supportive parents, I’m white, I’m 18, I got healthcare – later than I needed it, but I got it. But my story is one aspect of the trans story, and it’s one of the better ones, and even it is filled with sadness.”

Chelsea, who is leaving the state for college and is interested in coding and liberal arts, said she felt disillusioned with politics. On the Republican side, people were using “genocidal rhetoric” to talk about trans people, she said, referencing calls for the “eradication of transgenderism” at last year’s Conservative Political Action Conference and demonization of trans people in the Trump-aligned Project 2025.

On the Democratic side, candidates defend trans rights, but it feels fragile, she said.

“The Democrats in Missouri are our allies, they’re the best support we have in the chamber, but there’s an anxiety they won’t always be that way. When shit hits the fan, they’ll say, is it worse to be out of office and standing on your morals, or is better to just throw a little bit to the fire? But the thing they’re throwing to the fire are my friends and family.”

The Freels considered relocating to Illinois last year, but couldn’t afford it.

“There will always be trans kids and they will be out and asserting themselves,” Rene Freels said. “We’re part of this leftover crew that is super mad and stubborn and wants to see this resolved and want our kids to have full civil rights.”

A family of three smile while embracing each other and sitting on a park bench — (From L-R) Rene, Chelsea and Kyle Freels pose for a photo. ‘There will always be trans kids and they will be out and asserting themselves,’ says Rene Freels. Photograph: Sam Levin/The Guardian

Miles, who hopes to become a teacher or work with youth, said leaving is not an option: “I’ve always wanted to stay here. It sounds weird, but I really love Missouri. I have so many memories here and I could see myself raising my kids here.”

Missouri is where he spent his whole life, where his favorite restaurants and hiking trails are, where his girlfriend and her family live, where he had his first date, he said.

He can’t imagine moving away from his elderly grandparents, who he stays with on a weekly basis. “I have a plan for my life,” he said, “and I couldn’t imagine doing it somewhere else.”

Throughout Meert and Thurow’s home are objects they have repurposed from friends who left the state due to anti-trans laws.

In the garden, the couple recently put up a sign saying they had planted beans “in remembrance of the 50+ families we know that have left Missouri”. But the number of departures is greater, she said. They’ve lost count.