https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGcouu-4VDk&list=PLw613M86o5...
Maddison Kleeman Rose is a pretty normal Oklahoma 12-year-old. She enjoys school, she dances at the drop of a hat and she loves church. She also happens to be trans, which is why Maddie's life is anything but pretty normal.
Three weeks ago, the first day of seventh grade at the Achille public school in her tiny hometown, Maddie went to the bathroom. The girls' bathroom. She was in a new building and in the commotion none of the adults around had remembered to tell her where to find the bathroom she's allowed to use. That's the staff bathroom, part of a deal her parents worked out with the school after staff discovered she was trans back in fifth grade.
After Maddie went to girls' bathroom, transphobic parents in her community started to come out of the woodwork. Many people in the town of Achille want to welcome Maddie. But plenty would rather she never moved in.
VICE News interviewed Maddie, her family, and the leaders of her town as the Rose family prepares to leave a place they hoped they could call home.
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Category
News & Politics
Comments
A bit more
http://www.losangelesblade.com/2018/08/21/threatened-oklahom...
After violent threats, the family of transgender schoolgirl Maddison Kayleen Kleeman is trying to move away from Achille, Oklahoma, their small rural town near the Oklahoma-Texas border.
The Los Angeles Blade reported last Aug. 14 that Kleeman, 12, had been the target of a group of adults in a private Facebook Parents Group page devoted to the elementary school she attends. Members of the group were angered by her use of a girl’s bathroom and the apparent affirmation of her gender identity by school staff. Kleeman’s parents were forced to seek protective orders, the county sheriff’s office launched an investigation and one adult has been suspended from his job.
The story went viral on social media and was spotted by Anne Babb, a writer and journalist based in Oklahoma City, whose first thought was that the group was wrong. Her second thought was to start a GoFundMe to help the family move.
Babb then spoke with Kleeman’s mother, Brandy Rose, and they created a GoFundMe page. “I was just like, ‘Well, that’d be a blessing to be able to move out of the area,’” Rose told NBC News about their conversation. “That’s when she told me that her and a neighbor of hers had been discussing it. They thought that it would help us to start a GoFundMe page Move4Maddie to get the funds to move … I thought that was very sweet and amazing and a blessing, so she set that up for us.”
Babb initially wanted to set the fundraising goal for $15,000 but decided to start with $10,000. When contributions reached that goal in the first 22 hours, she increased the goal to $15,000. That figure has since been exceeded.
“I never imagined that we’d get the donations that we’ve gotten, because I mean it’s strangers,” Rose said. “I didn’t expect strangers to do that. But it’s been amazing.”
As of Aug. 20, the donations had reached nearly $25,000.
“I hope we get our ducks in a row so we can move to Houston as soon as possible,” Rose told NBC News. “We just want to do it the right way, so it’s not something that’s going to happen overnight, but that is our plan—to just get out of this little town.”
Oklahoma does not have a law protecting transgender people against discrimination and last February, the U. S. Department of Education withdrew guidance protecting trans students under federal law. A spokesperson for Education Secretary Betsy DeVoss told the LA Blade that it has sent memos out clearly stating that the USDOE will not process any complaints from transgender students experiencing discrimination in schools. – Reporting by NBC News and the staff of the Los Angeles Blade
Warning
The comment section of the video has vile sentiments about Transgender issues. It can be very upsetting/depressing reading some of them.
That' true
Sadly, I thought it was a given so I didn't mention it..
There is a reason
that Oklahoma is one of two US states that I have yet to visit. The other is Alaska but that won't get ticked off until 'he' is out of the White House.
I think that OK will remain the one state I have yet to visit for reason such as those described here.
I hope that the family find a more welcoming environment in Texas.
Samantha
OK
Although limited to my own experience and a few people I know. Except a vocal minority (which I never met in my time there) it isn't that bad a state. Experiences are OKC metro and T(ulsa)town. OU is pretty OK (pun intented) according to a T student there.
About the 12yo. The person who started that mess wasn't even a parent with a kid at that school. She has (had?) a lot of support in town. But as I said vocal minority ... grmbl.which pretty much goes for every state in around those parts.
L
Out of State Trolls
Let me say, as a resident of Oklahoma I am heartsick about this.
According to one article I read a large percentage of the vilest comments were made by people that don't even live in Oklahoma. Remove them and a lot of the animosity they brought and things become much simpler to deal. I don't think Oklahoma is any worse than any other state, the pinheads full of hate are just more vocal. Personally I'd rather deal with hate and ignorance head-on then worry about who is going stab me in the back.
I also read that this is not the first move the family has had to make. They moved from Texas to Oklahoma due to the harassment. I can only guess where they might go next. :-( Remember, bigotry exists in all 50 states.
“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn’t become a king. The palace becomes a circus.” - Turkish Proverb
Oklahoma
My father, who passed in 2008, spent the last dozen years of his life in Tulsa. I visited him there several times. While I wouldn't choose to live there, the primary objection is the weather (I'm a native and life-long Californian). The people I met there couldn't have been nicer. I do like living in a state where prayer in the public schools isn't an issue. Even back in the '50's, when I was in elementary school, we didn't pray in school. Nevertheless, on the whole, I think you can find bigotry and intolerance pretty much everywhere. Tulsa is "the buckle in the Bible Belt," but true Christianity leaves judgement up to The Lord. I can't say it enough - the people I met in Tulsa, without exception, were lovely. If you avoid Oklahoma because of a mistaken preconception, you will miss out on a worthwhile experience.
By the way, the Philbrook Museum of Art and the Gilcrease Museum are each worth a visit to Tulsa. Both are world-class museums of Western art.
Bathroom Dispute
A few days ago a story was criticized for using a bathroom trope -- since bathroom stories are cliche.
This issue is real and hurtful. It is an issue only because of a failure in leadership.
The school "forgot" to inform Maddy which bathroom to use? Listen to the Superintendent's false equivalency. It sounds eerily like the remarks made from the WH after Charlottesville.
Even if the "majority" of people in that town don't believe Maddy has a right and absolute need to be herself, the moral imperative exists.
Elections have consequences, even for 12-year old girls.
The comments are revealing. They reflect years of hateful action by our psychiatric community. I can distinctly remember how badly I felt when I first read the DSM in the early 1990s and "realized" my "mental disorder" was equated to pedophilia.
An obvious danger exists of backsliding into a world where the remedy is allowing the students to beat that nonsense out of her . . . as suggested in one comment.
I wonder if anyone suggested to Harriet Beecher Stowe that stories about slaves had been done to death?
Literature is powerful. Choirs need preaching.
Jill
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Just so you know...
Russian hackers that supposedly elected your president typically don't care who uses what bathroom. Many of them used wrong gendered bathrooms at the time of crisis, when other bathroom was too far...
(And yes, I was personally aquinted with some of the typical "Russian hackers"...)
Russians in general, when not upset by the people outside of Russia, are quite relaxed and have no care as to whom is doing what in which bathroom. I by mistake for different reasons several times happened to use woman's bathroom at my "masculine best" (suite, tie, polished shoes). Got couple of looks from girls but no comments and no cries for security.
It doesn't matter what
It doesn't matter what Russians in general, or "typical Russian hackers" (whatever that may be) think about any issues in the US. The work done by the "troll factories" or "troll farms" is just a business, kind of like advertising. They do what the client (in this case the Russian government) pays them to do. They had a job; to stir the pot on emotional contentious issues. They posted (and still post) on both sides of the issues trying to raise the level of anger and vitriol, trying to enlist and encourage more Americans to be even more at odds with their fellow Americans on the other side.
BTW, I think Russians, in general, are fine people. I have nothing against the average Russian. When Russians and Americans get together on a personal level (no international politics involved) they tend to do well.
Kris
{I leave a trail of Kudos as I browse the site. Be careful where you step!}