Can you just imagine, every single day when you look into the mirror the person looking back isn't you. Imagine, every time someone says your name or talks about you, you feel a pang of sadness. Imagine not being able to feel comfortable in your own skin for even a second. But can you just imagine if suddenly you found out there was a way to fix it. Imagine how much better it would make you feel when you look in the mirror and see yourself, and people talk about you and not the body you were once trapped in. Imagine how you could actually just be you for once in your life, but then imagine how much it would hurt when that feeling was stripped away from you; stripped away by people who claim to be “protecting you”.
Now, imagine a different scenario, you are in 7th grade. You find out you don’t fit into the box you’ve been put in, but you know you can’t be who you really are at home because your parents won’t accept you. You decide you feel safe enough to be yourself at school and it’s amazing, but then you’re told you can’t anymore. You learn your teachers can’t even talk to you about what you’re going through and now you’ve lost your only outlet and safe space. Not only that but the people who took it away still claim to be “protecting you”. Due to the recent passing of Senate Bill 150, a bill that takes away the rights LGBTQ+ youth have to be themselves, this is the emotional rollercoaster that so many transgender youth in Kentucky are going through.
Senate Bill 150 is a Kentucky law that restricts gender affirming care for transgender youth and limits discussions of topics related to sexuality in schools, among other things. Robert P. Jones, CEO of nonpartisan group Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), claims Republican lawmakers “want to preserve their vision of a white, Christian America (and) they're willing to embrace all sorts of anti-democratic means to protect it” (Contreras 1). This law is a great example of these “anti-democratic means” seeing as SB 150 bans gender affirming treatments “even though many major medical associations — including the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics — deem those treatments ‘medically necessary care’” (Cineas and Narea 1). The Kentucky state government needs to abolish SB 150 because it takes away the freedom transgender youth have to find out who they are and to feel comfortable in their own state, their own schools, and most importantly their own skin.
SB 150 is not the first bill of its kind, it is part of an influx of new bills being proposed by republican lawmakers across the country. NPR, a non-profit organization, found that “over the past two years, state lawmakers introduced at least 306 bills targeting trans people, more than in any previous period.” On top of that they found “86%, focuses on trans youth” (Hanzhang Jin and Nakajima 1). The real reason that so many of these bills are being passed is that they “ensure evangelical voters show up to vote — even after the religious right achieved its decades-long goal of overturning Roe v. Wade last year”(Cineas and Narea 1). These lawmakers do not seem to care about the lives their actions affect but instead the power they gain from those actions.
SB 150 will take a mental toll on transgender and LGBTQ+ youth in Kentucky by taking away their representation and expression. A survey by the Trevor Project, a group aimed at supporting LGBTQ+ youth, “found that 86 percent of trans or nonbinary youth reported negative effects on their mental health stemming from the political debate around trans issues, and nearly half had seriously considered suicide in the past year” (Cineas and Narea 1). These statistics do not even include the effects of the alienation and dysphoria this bill will cause LGBTQ+ youth. Dylan Brandt, a 17 year old transgender male, says that the gender affirming care he is receiving significantly improved his mental health, but now “that joy is overshadowed by fear that his access to treatment may soon disappear because of a 2021 law passed” similar to SB 150 in his home state “Brandt is now part of an ACLU lawsuit seeking to overturn the ban, and says that if the law is upheld, he and his family would have to leave the state” (Hanzhang Jin and Nakajima 1). The negative effects this bill and ones like it will have will not be outweighed by whatever money or power republican lawmakers will gain.
SB 150’s ban on discussion of sexual orientation in the classroom will leave LGBTQ+ students, or students with LGBTQ+ family members, feeling alienated and vulnerable to bullying. According to a 2021 survey from the American Journal of Public Health, transgender Americans are already “four times more likely to be victims of violent crime than their cisgender peers” (Cineas and Narea 1). SB 150 and similar bills only seclude LGBTQ+ youth more than they were to start. This will only cause more bullying and harassment towards LGBTQ+ youth. Governor Andy Beshear showed that he shared this perspective when he said that despite not having read the bill at the time “from what he has heard about it he has concerns it will ‘increase bullying in our schools, especially for students that are already marginalized’” (Krauth 1). Beshear eventually vetoed the bill, presumably for that reason, but his veto was overruled. The fact that the governor was able to tell that SB 150 would increase bullying with just an overview shows how obvious it was. These lawmakers are creating bills that aim to “protect kids'' but end up hurting them instead.
One of the biggest concerns relating to SB 150 is that it puts the mental and physical healths of trangender youth at risk. This law was made despite the fact that renowned medical organizations “including the American Medical Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics, consider gender-affirming care medically necessary and potentially lifesaving for transgender youths” (Contreras 1). If so many well known organizations are saying the same thing, it should be clear that it shouldn’t be ignored. This care can not only change how people look but also how they feel. 17 year old Bradnt says “‘I felt better because I was looking better. I felt free. I felt happy’” (Hanzhang Jin and Nakajima 1). Banning this care will cause so much damage to thousands of people's lives for no good reason.
These bills will significantly increase the suicide rates of transgender youth. According to Trevor Project employee, Sam Ames, "’Regardless of if these bills pass ... it is already having a negative impact for LGBTQ youth generally’” (Hanzhang Jin and Nakajima 1). The stress and anxiety relating to the proposal of the bills is enough to increase suicide rates on its own. When these laws pass it only makes these issues worse. On top of that, “Identity-affirming spaces have been shown to reduce the risk of suicide for trans youths, nearly one in five of whom attempted suicide in the last year ” (Krauth 1). Parts of SB 150 take away the safe space many trans youth found in their schools. Many trangender youth are already struggling with suicidal ideations and the comfort in their schools is what was allowing them to hold on, but that has now been stripped away from them.
SB 150 is a law that takes away a person's right to be themself. This law was made by people who look at the numbers they affect when they should be looking at the people they affect. These laws are not only affecting people mentally but physically as well and they take away people's safety. If new lawmakers are not elected, laws like these will continue to be created affecting so many more people's lives. The Kentucky state government desperately needs to abolish SB 150 because this law does not allow LGBTQ+ youth to be themselves or to feel comfortable doing so.

Works Cited
Conteras, Russell. “The groups behind anti-trans bills in U.S. states.” Axios, 31 March 2023, axios.com/2023/03/31/anti-trans-bills-2023-america. Accessed 24 May 2023.
Krauth, Olivia. “Kentucky lawmakers advance anti-'woke' schools bill despite trans pleas.” Courier-Journal, 9 February 2023, courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/09/kentucky-lawmakers-advance-anti-woke-schools-bill-despite-trans-pleas/69889240007/. Accessed 24 May 2023.
Nakajima, Koko, and Connie Hanzhang Jin. “Bills targeting trans youth are growing more common — and radically reshaping lives.” NPR, 7 May 2019, npr.org/2022/11/28/1138396067/transgender-youth-bills-trans-sportsls-2023-america. Accessed 24 May 2023.
Narea, Nicole, and Fabliola Cineas. “The wave of anti-trans laws from state legislatures, explained.” Vox, 6 April 2023, vox.com/politics/23631262/trans-bills-republican-state-legislatures. Accessed 24 May 2023.