In a few days, George Spurrier, his wife, Emily, and their 17-year-old son, Cas, diminutive of Lucas, the first name he chose for himself, will have left Arkansas. Definitely. The battery of laws targeting transgender people like their children, passed in the emergency in the spring by the Parliament of this Republican stronghold, pushed them to leave.
On April 15, their decision was made. Friendly ties and employment opportunities pushed them to New Mexico, where they will settle at the end of May, after sixteen years in Arkansas. “Faced with such a barrage, we said to ourselves that leaving was the best solution to protect our son”, explains George Spurrier.
The offensive began at the end of February with a text banning transgender people from participating in women’s school competitions on behalf of “Sports fairness”. Then another allowed doctors to oppose their conscience or their religious faith to requests for medical support from a transgender person.
The escalation continued with the adoption in March, despite the opposition of Governor Asa Hutchinson, who was also conservative, of a bill banning such treatment for minors, a first in the United States. This measure directly concerns the son of George and Emily, who has been taking testosterone for two months, after the unsuccessful use of a first drug to stop his periods. Another text aimed at forcing teachers to use the birth name of their students, on the other hand, failed in the Senate of Arkansas, which in a few weeks became the most active state against transgender people.
“Cultural war”
Member of the Family Council, a conservative organization behind the scenes, Ken Yang also puts forward “The protection of children” against what he presents as a “Chemical or surgical castration”. He denounces decisions that are often deemed hasty, or that are the product of parental pressure. “Myths! “, Emily, Cas’s mother, gets angry, denouncing the ignorance of lawmakers.
Ken Yang fully assumes an offensive that fits into the “Cultural war” which opposes the two great American political families. “Republicans have been losing this war for too many years”, he said, alluding to the legalization of same-sex marriage in 2015 by a Supreme Court that already has a conservative majority. ” It is time to react. We do not want the normalization according to which a boy can become a girl, and vice versa ”, continues this young thirty, also republican delegate of the county of Saline, south of Little Rock.
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