Several bills passed the state House this session that would harm transgender kids--as well as all 1.2 million students in Virginia. This week, Thomas and Michael are joined by Bo Belotti, an activist and National Recruitment Director for the Trans Radical Activist Network. They talk about the harm of a bill that would require student athletes to verify their genitalia with adults before being able to compete in sports, as well as one that would require schools to notify parents of their child's transition. They also cover Delegate Danica Roem's fierce rebuttal to these bills that left many proponents without answers.

Episode Transcript

Michael Pope

This is Pod Virginia, a podcast that is taking a look at bills aimed at Transgender Virginias.

Thomas Bowman 

Virginia Republicans want to force your kids to show their genitals to adults before they can compete in school sports. And they're trying to force schools to out transgender students.

Michael Pope 

Joining us to examine the debate over these bills is the national Recruitment Director with the Trans Radical Activist Network, Bo Belotti; thanks for joining us.

Bo Belotti 

Thanks so much for having me. I wish it was under better circumstances.

Thomas Bowman

So do we.

Michael Pope 

Well, it's good to talk to you anyhow.

Thomas Bowman

All right. But let's start by setting the stage for this discussion. What is the Trans Radical Activist Network, and what do they do?

Bo Belotti 

Yeah, so we are a national organization with several state chapters and affiliates. Our goal is to dismantle transphobia, whether that is through legislation, mutual aid, or providing the ground self defense to trans folks; as we know, we experienced heightened levels of violence, as well as just our grassroots organizing.

Michael Pope 

Alright, well, let's start the discussion with a bill introduced by Republican Delegate Dave LaRock of Loudoun County. He has a bill that would require school officials to contact parents as soon as they become aware that students are transitioning from what the bill calls "biological sex."

Thomas Bowman 

The bill faced intense questioning from Delegate Danica Roem. A Democrat who is Virginia's first trans lawmaker, she pointed out a serious flaw in the LaRock bill; Virginia code doesn't even define biological sex.

Danica Roem 

How does the Delegate, in this case, define biological sex, and how is the principal or principal's designee, as mentioned in this, supposed to determine gender incongruence, as the phrase they would use, but what we would say as sex assigned at birth, as being a problem or being different than the quote biological sex end quote.

Dave LaRock 

Mr. Speaker, I don't want to be trivial about this. But it brings to mind the interview of a Supreme Court justice. I am not a biologist.

Michael Pope 

In case you're wondering what delicate the rock is talking about there, he's referencing an interchange here between Senator Marsha Blackburn and Ketanji Brown Jackson during her SCOTUS nomination. Senator Blackburn asked the Supreme Court nominee quote, can you provide a definition of the word woman? So I thought it was odd, Bo, I thought it was odd that LaRock referenced that question because you'll recall, when that moment happened with Senator Blackburn, the right just went crazy that this Supreme Court nominee, essentially, from their perspective, refused to define a woman. So I thought it was odd that LaRock invokes that in a way that seems backward to me. What did you make of that moment?

Bo Belotti 

First, I want to start by saying that that moment with now Justice Brown Jackson was really pivotal because now, in online comments and even in-person debates, people on the right love to say, okay, then what is a woman? Like, define what a woman is?

Michael Pope 

They think it's a trick question, right?

Bo Belotti 

They think it's a trick question, but the answer is really easy, it's anyone who identifies as a woman. To describe it in a cis-sexist or transphobic way, they would have to get into the nitty gritty of biology, and obviously, there's the existence of intersex people. And we know that it's just a faulty argument. But I think he was just trying to avoid the question. I don't think there's any other reason he would try to invoke that moment. Cuz I don't even think that was what he was planning, it was a very smart way to revitalize his base in any way. I don't think it was something he was doing for campaign points. And if it was, he didn't do it effectively.

Michael Pope 

In committee, Delegate LaRock tried to frame his bill as protecting kids from sex trafficking. However, that bill didn't have anything to do with sex trafficking. In fact, the word sex trafficking or not even in it. By the time the bill got to the House floor, LaRock was framing it a different way. He said the bill was about parents exercising dominion over their children.

Dave LaRock 

There are many, many other considerations that should take precedence over a child's feelings that maybe their parent wouldn't like that decision. An unemancipated child does not have the right to make medical decisions. The decision, in this case, basically amounts to a treatment decision for a medical health condition. And certainly, one that a child, a minor, a student, a minor child, does not have the authority to make.

Michael Pope 

What do you make of this moment, LaRock, making a case for his bill, saying it's not up to the whim of the child what they want; it's up to the parent?

Bo Belotti 

I think it's important to start with the fact that, in my opinion, children are not the property of their parents. And to say that this is a treatment for medical health condition because he starts off this argument in a super fragile way, trying to talk about medical decisions, even though right now we're at what we're talking about as a social transition, right? The name change and changing of pronouns in reference to a student in the public school, nothing medical is happening. And then he tries to sidetrack or backtrack and says it's the treatment decision for a medical condition. But we know that gender dysphoria has been removed from the DSM 5. Also, just in general, we know that forcing schools to out transgender students can have devastating impacts on their mental health and well-being. Not to mention super detrimental impacts on their family life, including results such as homelessness.

Thomas Bowman 

Yeah, I think it's also important to point out that when children begin to realize that they're trans and want to undergo any kind of medical or hormonal intervention, they've got a very limited window pre-puberty to actually take action. And Bo, I'm sure, you're already aware of this. But for those who aren't aware of this, you can actually take hormone supplements that prevent you from going into puberty. And they're reversible, so if that child ages and are not trans and come to realize that they can go off the hormone supplements and continue the process of puberty. So I really saw this just as they're under attack by Republican lawmakers who are in a specific book club, and that the rest of us aren't necessarily in, and they're introducing bills that are more concerned about restricting rights and freedoms of people. Is that a fair characterization compared to the framing that Delegate LaRock tried to present?

Bo Belotti 

100%. And you know, these right-wing think tanks and paid lobbyists whose job it is to manufacture this trans panic that we see in order to outrage voters, which there's now exit polling that suggests that it doesn't even work.

Michael Pope 

Yeah, actually, I overheard some conversation about polling today, basically saying this looks this is a losing issue for polling. And next year, we're not going to see any of these bills. That was the supposition I heard earlier today.

Bo Belotti 

Yeah, in the polling that I read, it showed something like only 10% of Republican voters listed trans kids as one of their issues or their number one issue for showing up to the polls. So we know this is not a mobilizing issue. It is simply just something that Republican lawmakers are taking to attack a very small amount of students in public schools.

Michael Pope 

You know, it is actually a mobilizing issue on the other side. During this debate, Delegate Danica Roem brought up her predecessor, Delegate Bob Marshall, who actually introduced a very similar bill forcing schools to outs transgender students. And she mentioned his support of that bill and Republicans killing Bob Marshall's bill on the House floor. This is part of that discussion.

Danica Roem 

They were tired of having to hear kids being used as political props and thrown to the wolves where in a case like this. There is nothing in this bill, not a single thing in this bill that actually says, well, maybe we're going to take discretion. Maybe in this, we're going to say that in one kid's case. It could be unsafe; maybe, in one kid's case, it could get them hurt. Maybe one kid's case is going to create an environment that's not going to be welcoming for them. And that leads to suicide, that leads the homicide, that leads to beatings, that leads to homelessness.

Michael Pope 

So no discretion in cases where an outing of a child might actually cause harm to them. And maybe they would have known that if they had taken the time to speak to the one and only transgender member of the House of Delegates.

Danica Roem 

You're dealing with forcibly outing trans kids. And you didn't even talk to the one person in this body who actually knows what it's like to be scared to death as a 13, 14-year-old kid of anyone finding out that you're actually trans; you have no idea what you're doing, you have no idea the harm you're causing.

Michael Pope 

So help us understand what the Delegate is saying there. Do you think LaRock understands the harm that he's causing,

Bo Belotti 

I am a radical optimist until the day I die. So I truly want to believe that he is simply ignorant of the harm that he is causing. But another part of me truly believes that they do know exactly what this will do, right? A lot of these laws are written, drafted, and proposed in multiple states. With the goal of not just harming trans us but of removing them from public life. And so this harm can look like homelessness; we know that about 40% of homeless youth do identify as LGBTQ. And then we also know that trans youth have a high rate of attempted suicide. It is well documented that these kinds of bills will cause direct and material physical harm to youth. And to the point of sex trafficking, something that I brought up when I testified against this bill in committee is that forcing trans youth into homelessness will lead to more sex trafficking will lead to more drug use, which is something else that is a symptom of minority stress and as exasperated and queer communities. So really, this bill will do the opposite of what it is intended to or what this framing that he's claiming to use.

Michael Pope 

Actually, that's a very interesting and salient point that we should probably make sure our listeners fully grasp before we move on to the next part of the discussion, which is the Republicans refer to this as Sage's law, to reference a person who started going through a transition and then was sex trafficked, and now has decided not to go through with the transition. And so the feeling is that if the school did not hide the transition of this student, this person would not have been sex trafficked. And that's why LaRock brought up sex trafficking in the committee. Even though the bill doesn't talk about sex trafficking doesn't even mention the words sex trafficking. But you know, from their side, there is a concern that if schools hide this kind of information, then that child might end up being sex trafficked. What do you make of that?

Bo Belotti 

I think this is just another example of the groomer rhetoric that we've seen. That's by somehow allowing trans adults to exist and for trans youth to be out that we are creating some kind of underground conspiracy pipeline that causes sex trafficking. And I also just want to say that it's really important, at least in my opinion, that we use words like allegedly when talking about this person the law is named after because we have not heard from them directly. We've only heard from their cisgender caretaker. And I am very skeptical of the fact that the namesake of this law has not had any interest in speaking about it publicly in any way.

Thomas Bowman 

Michael, if I can just piggyback onto what Bo just said and make a really good salient point about the groomer rhetoric? Engaging with that kind of rhetoric, it's also a misdirection from places where we actually know kids are being groomed for sex crimes, and that is in religious organizations like the SBC, that's, the Southern Baptist Convention, which had a huge scandal of hundreds of pastors in their network, covering up and committing crimes against children. Suppose you weren't already convinced that GOP stood for a government overreach party. Let's examine another bill. This time from freshmen Delegate Karen Greenhalgh. Her bill targeted discrimination against the nine trans kids in Virginia who wanted to play sports last year. It also, in the process, forces the parents of over a million school athletes in the Commonwealth to show their kid's genitals to other adults each year to reprove their kid's biological sex. With this legislation in the Commonwealth, every student will compete according to biological sex as determined in the already required sports physical.

Michael Pope

Alright, so that was the talking point. Bo, how do you respond to delegate Greene off the talking point for this bill? School athletes are already required to get sports physicals.

Bo Belotti 

Well, one, we can talk about the grotesque overreach that is making students prove their biological sex. And then there's also this other component of the fact that intersex children also exist. Sex is not always something that is physically visible; it can be a combination of different chromosome pairs, and it can be a combination of the internal and external genitalia that may not match what we consider for non-intersex people. And then there's a kind of another layer of this is this kind of a physical examination has been used actually against cisgender Black women. And I feel like it's really important to acknowledge that we've seen the allegations that Black women just have more testosterone, and therefore they should not be competing or they have some sort of physical advantage. And it's the same kind of rhetoric actually in committee. Delegate Jeff Boren brought up an amazing point, which was how is this different than the race science that was used to keep Black athletes from competing in the Olympics? and I thought that was a really interesting point. But to get back to Delegate Greenhalgh's bill specifically, even if it was a hundred trans kids. That still does not justify a single child having to go through a physical examination of their genitalia once a year to prove their biological sex, which we already talked about; it is kind of like this failing fallacy of a phrase.

Michael Pope 

You know, this bill suffered from something that I call talking point failure. Karen Greenhalgh had her talking point, and she was gonna stick to it no matter what. So her defense was, essentially, this doesn't change anything because athletes already get annual physicals. So Delegate Danica Roem, ask Delegate Greenhalgh question after question, detailed questions about how this would actually work.

Thoms Bowman

Questions like, wasn't it true that students would have to expose their genitals to a medical professional every single year?

Michael Pope 

Or would public schools have to forfeit games against private schools that don't make children expose their genitalia to adults every year? Delegate Greenhalgh couldn't answer any of the Delegate realms questions. And because she only had that one talking point, and it didn't address any of those points. This is what happened.

Danica Roem 

Mr. Speaker for the Delegate, kneel for the question?

Todd Gilbert 

Would the Delegate yield a question?

Karen Greenhalgh 

Sir, I don't think that there was another answer.

Todd Gilbert 

The Delegate declines to yield.

Danica Roem 

Well, then, Mr. Speaker, will the Education Committee Chairman yield for questions?

Todd Gilbert 

I don't know. Let's find out. Will the Delegate yield a question?

Glenn Davis 

Sure.

Thomas Bowman 

So then she turned to the Chair of the House Education Committee, Glenn Davis, and he couldn't answer her questions either. Listen to what happened next.

Karen Greenhalgh 

Mr. Speaker, would any other member on the other side of the aisle yield a question on this bill?

Todd Gilbert 

I think you could certainly make whatever points you need to make.

Danica Roem 

Mr. Speaker, speaking to the bill.

Todd Gilbert 

The Delegate has the floor.

Michael Pope 

The Delegate has the floor, you know, Bo, Thomas, I have to say, in my years of covering the General Assembly, I have literally never seen this happen. I've never seen a Delegate exhaust people with questions to the extent that they can't answer them on the floor. So they just give up. This was really a moment. So then Delegate Roem took the floor and said this.

Danica Roem 

There is already an alternative that is effective. And that's working right now, but it does not require miners to have to strip in front of medical professionals who are adults in order for them to compete.

Michael Pope 

And she didn't stop there.

Danica Roem 

If we want to support female athletes, then show to their games, and fight for equal pay for them. But at the same time, beat up on trans kids because nine trans kids last year wanted to play sports; we're now going to affect a policy for more than 1.2 million students?

Michael Pope 

This was such a fascinating debate. I mean, Delegate Roem kind of dismantled this bill on the House floor, exposing all of its weaknesses; nobody could answer her questions. And then they voted for it anyway. I mean, it's actually really important for our listeners to know that LaRock bill passed the House, and it's now being considered in the Senate. This Greenhalgh bill that we're talking about has now passed the House; it's now under consideration in the Senate. Despite this fact, they couldn't answer any of these questions. Bo, what do you make of all this?

Bo Belotti 

I had to take a deep breath, relisting on those. Something that I want to acknowledge foremost is that these bills passed through committee and now the House and going on to the Senate. We know that regardless of the eventual result, through our legislative process of these bills, just the introduction, just the debate is harmful to the psyche of trans youth. Being debated, the minority stress that caused Is has detrimental impacts on trans youth, and trans youth deserve the right to participate in sports. And this bill is an attack on their dignity and their right to be part of their community. We know that trans people have been participating in sports across this country without issue. And this bill is very much a solution in search of a problem. Danica Roem's talking points remind me of a conversation I had after the debate about Leah Thompson, which I think was her name. Leah Thomas. And I was talking to someone, and I asked when the last time you watched women's swimming was. And they said, well, I've never seen it before. And it kind of really speaks to that stark contrast that that the Delegate was speaking to. And then there's the obvious, you know, forcing students to expose their bodies is invasive, it's dangerous, and it sets a bad precedent for privacy rights. It's not only discriminatory, but it goes against medical professionals' ethical code to maintain confidentiality and privacy with their patients. And above all else, trans youth belong, and we deserve trans youth deserve to be sent a message of support and community.

Thomas Bowman

Well, some of the things you said reminded me of an interesting anecdote because I can tell you the last time I watched women's swimming, it was during the Olympics. And the Olympics actually stopped testing the sex of the athletes that compete or the biological sex of the athletes that compete. And the reason they stopped doing that is that the athletes competing were getting startling revelations that their blood tests were coming back, and they were not the gender that they thought they had been all their life. And the reason for that is because gender or sex, rather, isn't binary. So you made this point earlier that intersex people exist. And binary means there can only be two. So if there are ever any more than two, then it is, by definition, not binary. But it's not just intersex, right? So and Michael, many of the people serving the General Assembly were actually taught wrong in school. They were taught that biological girls have XX chromosomes and biological boys have XY chromosomes. But then, when they were testing the Olympians, they found all sorts of differences, like there are XXY chromosome combinations, or XYY or XX chromosomes that that person thought they were a man their whole life. And that's why they stopped doing it because they realized, and this also gets to the point of why nobody can define what a woman is. There isn't anything but a cultural definition of what a woman is.

Bo Belotti 

Yeah, and something else that I found super interesting that I learned recently was these kinds of people that you're talking about that are either at a hormonal level, a chromosomal level, or an internal and external level, non-intersex people who are born this way actually account for about one to 3% of births, which is the same amount as redheads.

Thomas Bowman

Well, that's, that really puts it into perspective.

Michael Pope 

Alright, so Bo, I want to ask you one final question here, which is, what would you say to the people on the other side of this issue? So there are parents out there who are worried that their children might be transitioning without their knowledge, and the schools are hiding that from them. And there are parents out there who are worried that their girls might be swimming in a competition against a transgender female, and they don't want that to happen. So what would you say to those parents?

Bo Belotti 

I would start by saying, If you are worried about your child transitioning without your consent or knowledge, you need to be able to cultivate an open dialogue with your child. That involves educating them very early on about gender diversity and also just being there for them. Some advice that I would give, as someone who had unsupportive parents at the time, who later came around, is that the thing that made the biggest difference for us was when my parents came to me with a sense of understanding, empathy, and wanting to learn. By having that outlook, you will be able to not only learn so much about your child that you didn't already know. But you will also be able to be equipped with the tools to make them successful in whatever that means, whether that means that they are just exploring what gender presentation means to them or if it means that you do have a child that will identify as transgender for likely the rest of their lives. As far as the sports team question, I would say...

Michael Pope 

And there are only nine. I mean, this is we made this point earlier in the podcast, but it's worth circling back around to. We're going to change the policy of Virginia and expose more than a million students to showing their genitalia to adults and talk about grooming behavior. Forcing children to expose their genitalia to adult medical professionals once a year every year. We're doing this because nine children wanted to compete. That's something that you want to keep in mind when you talk about any changes to how the sports teams work. But that is a difficult question. What do you say to the parent who tells who says, my child is a girl, was born as a girl, as a cisfemale, and she's competing in this competition? And it's unfair; it's unfair for her to be competing against a transgender female; what would you say to that argument?

Bo Belotti 

I would say that no amount of competition or quote-unquote, biological advantage would be worth having for your child to experience what many people would call medical trauma, having to expose themselves to a provider for really no reason other than politicians using trans kids as political props, right? We're talking about, like, 1.2 million versus nine kids. And also that it really, until high school or until a trans woman or trans girl, in this case, reaches puberty, there is no quote-unquote, biological advantage. And even then, we're under the assumption that she hasn't been through puberty blockers or that she's not on estrogen, which actually like creates muscle deterioration as someone transitions. It's, like, a very common joke in the trans community, actually, that, like, a trans woman may be used to being able to lift 50 pounds per transitioning but can now only lift 25 post-transition because that's just what estrogen does to the body. Transitioning is so much more sophisticated now than probably what people realize or use their imaginations to think of. But generally speaking, I would say that trans youth belong and deserve community. And it's actually such a beautiful opportunity and learning experience for your child to compete with or to be on a team with a trans child; that is such a beautiful way for them to learn about the natural diversity that they will experience in the real world.

Thomas Bowman

Yeah, I got two points to make, and then we'll leave it there. One, if you're a parent that's finding out from your kid's school that they're trans-like, that parent needs to engage in serious self-reflection of why that is. I don't want to call them bad parents, but they're definitely not engaged sufficiently in their child's life if that's where they're getting their news from. The other point I want to make is this, most of that fear stems from people who consider themselves deeply religious evangelical Christians because that's exactly where the demographics line up. And I would like to speak to those people right now. And point out that the God they worship is non-binary, in the soul doesn't have genitalia, and we are both made according to their religious tenants in the image of God. So if you believe God doesn't make mistakes and that your God is not non-binary, then having a subset of the population that's trans is something that one of those people are your kid is something that you should be so excited about because you're gonna get to be able to know your God a little bit better through your child that way.

Michael Pope 

All right. Well, one other point that's important for our listeners to know is that both of these bills have now passed the House and are under consideration in the Senate. The Senate has already killed both of these bills, the Senate version of both of these bills. So there is every expectation that when these House bills go to the Senate, they will not make it to the Governor's desk. So this is not we're not talking about any new laws here. However, all these people that we've been talking about today are up for reelection this year. And they're all going to take these points on the campaign trail. So this is going to be a campaign issue and 2023, and we expect to be hearing a lot more about this in the upcoming year.

Bo Belotti 

To Thomas's point, can I add something really quick?

Thomas Bowman 

Yeah.

Bo Belotti 

I just want to read a quote. God made trans people for the same reason; they made wheat and not bread and grapes, but not wine, so that humanity might share in the act of creation.

Thomas Bowman 

Boom, let's leave it there. Bobotie Odie. Thanks for joining us.

Bo Belotti 

Thank you so much for having me.