Transgender man testifies against two controversial bills in ND Legislature

BISMARCK — Talking with confidence, carrying a reversed ball cap and the blue, pink, and white colours of a trans flag weaved by means of his belt loop, Parker Leigh took the rostrum in a Capitol listening to room Tuesday, Jan. 24, and skim from testimony on the cellphone he held.

A number of payments referring to transgender youth and adults had been heard earlier than the Home Human Providers Committee, and Leigh, 28, testified firmly towards them.

“As a transgender male, these payments hit house for me,” he stated in an interview after the listening to.

Home Payments 1332 and 1254 would maintain important implications for the transgender inhabitants in North Dakota relating to entry to well being care and remedy therapies, Leigh informed lawmakers.

He stated he has been on testosterone for nearly three years. Initially from Idaho, he lives in Grand Forks and is a part of a homosexual Delight group there.

If handed, HB 1332 would broaden the sorts of remedy therapies social employees may supply to sufferers, together with practices that try to vary or restore their gender identification or sexual orientation.

The invoice would reverse the present administrative ban on social employees providing sufferers these sorts of therapies, sometimes called conversion remedy.

HB 1332 is likely one of the most controversial items of laws thought of thus far within the 2023 session, with 61 individuals signing in to testify for or towards — 10 occasions the common variety of witnesses who converse on a invoice.

In his testimony, Leigh stated he got here from a household who helps his identification and has at all times cherished him for who he’s. “However I’ve additionally seen firsthand from family and friends members what the impression of not being cherished for who they’re and being pressured into conversion remedy can do,” Leigh informed the committee.

HB 1332 was launched by Rep. Brandon Prichard, R-Bismarck. “Regardless of what all people is saying on it, the invoice is kind of easy,” Prichard informed the committee. “However what it does is essential.

“It expands well being care choices and permits people who’re questioning their identification to talk to a counselor and ask that counselor for the care they imagine they want,” Prichard testified.

In help of HB 1332, Prichard and others maintained that households ought to have entry to no matter remedy therapies they need, even when that therapy is conversion remedy.

Prichard and others additionally supported HB 1254, which might prohibit well being care employees from offering any observe that modifications or affirms a minor’s notion of their very own intercourse.

Restricted practices would come with hormone alternative therapies, reversible puberty blockers, and vasectomies.

Testifying towards the payments, Leigh stated they “can be detrimental to a whole marginalized neighborhood. Conversion remedy has been discredited by each main skilled affiliation that offers with psychological well being on this nation.”

Leigh stated the payments quantity to a harmful violation of civil rights and primary well being care entry for younger transgender people.

“You can’t say you might be defending youngsters, then proceed to select and select the children you defend,” he informed the committee.

“I can not fathom what it will do to the youth. I do know that if I couldn’t be on my hormones that I’ve been on for nearly 4 years, I can say with confidence that I might in all probability not be (alive right this moment).”

Leigh stated he’ll proceed his advocacy efforts in Grand Forks, combating for consciousness, suicide prevention, and an finish to discrimination for the queer neighborhood.

“Love is love,” he stated in a later interview, “and love conquers all.”

The committee didn’t instantly act on HB 1332 and 1254. To trace these payments, go to

ndlegis.gov

.

Isabelle Ballalatak is a reporting intern with the North Dakota Newspaper Affiliation.