Family Bonds Protect a Trans Teen In Texas

[soft music]

[Max] All right, I'm gonna do the red first

and then do the white and see.

[Adult] Okay.

Look at all these sprinkles.

I outsprinkled you.

That's not even a star anymore.

It's a sprinkle star.

Being trans is, like, the least interesting thing about me.

It's exhausting just to just talk about your gender

and not show everybody all these cool things you can do.

See?

[Adult] Yeah. Oh, that looks nice.

[Lulu] The bottom star's bigger than

Double-decker.

[Adult] Very good.

People want to focus on, like, what I am, not who I am.

I think it's kind of frustrating sometimes

'cause I just kind of wanna do my own thing.

Oh. I was doing

pretty good at that.

What's this thing? Oh, he's like the Chomper buddy.

[Adam] Lulu, are you in first?

Chomp, chomp. Dang it.

[Adam laughing]

Dad likes that one.

I think the land shifted. That was, like, perfect.

Stars should give you turbo.

Ooh. Oh! Somebody's mean.

Yeah.

[Interviewer] So walk me through

what you've been dealing with,

what other families have been dealing with

in the state of Texas when it comes to some

of these child protective service investigations

that they've launched.

Well, when I got a call from Amber,

'cause she had got a call from CPS

saying that we're under investigation,

she was on the floor, crying, as you might imagine.

And I got there.

My first thought was, 'cause we'd always thought

this might happen, but my first thought was,

Is it too late to get out of the state?

[light music]

I was doing a great job.

You were doing a great job. That's true.

[light music]

I was in shock.

Like, here's, like, this woman

who's been deputized by the governor

to weaponize her power against my family.

[light music]

I remember thinking to myself, Don't fall out of the chair

or she's gonna write that down,

that you're, like, an unfit mother or something.

[light music]

It's CPS.

They're gonna take my kids away.

[light music]

It's just an emotional, hard time.

I just love getting together with parents like y'all,

where it's like we can just talk about our kids.

Eventually, we'll get to that point,

where, like, Max won't be that trans kid.

He'll just be Max, right?

But like, getting through that is, like, so painful.

This is what we're up against.

Like, they are so eager

to harm our families.

And it is hard because I don't wanna leave.

I don't wanna leave you guys behind

to have to fight by yourselves.

We don't have that type of money

to just move out of state.

Especially, it's one thing to move

in a different place in Texas,

but to move completely out of the state

is, like, not something that I can do

or that, like, we can afford even.

I'm looking at it like, so if these bills pass,

like, Max is 14, like, do we have four more years?

Like, can we keep doing this for four years? I don't know.

My former employer just banned having books

with people like my own kid in them.

[Amber] Yeah. Like, that, that hits hard.

[Amber] Yeah.

[people chattering]

You are an abuser.

You are an abuser.

You're abusing a child. You should be in jail.

This child deserves better.

This poor child deserves better. You should be in jail.

You're abusing your children. They deserve better.

You're abusing your children.

There's no such thing as a trans child.

Thank you so much for coming today.

This is a place of love and acceptance.

And that love means for all.

And we want every human that walks in the door

to find a book about them.

And that's why we're here today.

[everyone clapping]

This is a book called Neither by Airlie Anderson.

What kind are you?

I'm both.

You can't be both. You must be neither.

I'm neither?

So many different kinds in the land of all.

The end.

That's a good book.

[everyone clapping]

If you guys wanna be gay

and do all this with adults, that's great.

I encourage that.

But to do this with children, that's disgusting.

You guys should be ashamed of yourselves.

And y'all were probably sexualized as a child

and that's why you guys wanna pay it forward

and that's really sad and disgusting.

Baby, there is a man who's in the store.

He went into the bathroom.

I want you to stay away from him.

I don't trust him.

And he keeps coming back in the store, and I don't like him,

and I don't want him to be near you.

Okay. Okay?

Like, you stay by me.

[light music]

Guys, you're gonna be on camera.

I just want you to know you're gonna be on camera,

and they're really hateful people, okay?

Okay, let's get going. Do you wanna cover

your face?

You wanna cover your face?

Okay.

Lulu, you come home my hand, booger,

and no one can hurt you when you're with me.

You got me? I got you.

[light music]

We're gonna go to a safe place and get a drink, okay?

Sorry it's not gonna be hot cocoa.

We'll go get you a bubble water.

Hey, thanks for being here.

[crowd yelling]

Hi. Hi, y'all.

Oh, I love you, babies.

[Protesters] Shame on you. Shame on you.

You don't listen to them.

You don't listen to them, sweetheart.

They're hateful people, so I'm really sorry.

Good afternoon.

My name is Amber Briggle,

and I am terrified to be here today.

I'm terrified because I'm the parent of a transgender child.

My son is the most popular boy in the seventh grade,

and loved by our friends, family,

our church, and our community.

This is possible because he has parents

who affirm him and provide him the support he needs.

Taking that support away from him, or worse,

taking him away from his family

because we broke the law to provide that support

will have devastating and heartbreaking consequences.

[somber music]

So this is our safe folder.

It's something that every parent of a trans kid should have.

And it's just, it's a collection of documents

and pictures and just kind of evidence over the years

that your kid really is trans,

and they are who they are inherently.

So we've got pictures

of Max from starting in kindergarten.

Yeah, that's a good one. That's a really,

he's super cute.

We have here a self-portrait

that Max made of himself probably,

when do you think that was?

[Adam] Ooh.

Fourth grade maybe?

Also, I think we have something in here,

like a letter from his principal

from his elementary school,

saying that he's a good student and that we're good parents.

The idea is that there's a suspicion

that you must be child abusers if you have a trans child.

And so this isn't what most parents have to think about.

[Amber] I mean, I keep an eye on social media.

And, like, I saw this on my way home.

[Adam] It's somebody tying a noose.

Yeah.

That seems problematic.

Threatening, and so yeah, and I just,

and I requested more police patrol

at my business and for Patchouli Joe's

and around my neighborhood for the next little while.

[Amber] It's getting scary. Yeah.

This is why people are leaving the state.

It's not just, you know, it's occurred to me.

It's not just they think

the state's gonna take their kid away.

It's that they think they're gonna get caught

in the crosshairs of something like this.

Right? And they're gonna end up dead.

[footsteps clomping]

Hey, booger.

What are you doing? Good.

I love you. What are you doing?

Oh, you're so nice. Were you overhearing my conversation?

Mm-hm.

Oh, I'm sorry that you had to hear that, sweetheart.

You're the best daughter in the whole wide world.

I'm really sorry that you had to hear that.

Is there anything you wanna talk about?

No. No?

Do you feel safe? Mm-hm.

[somber music]

Thank you for joining us tonight

to honor and remember our trans

and gender nonconforming siblings we have lost

to transphobic violence.

[somber music]

From 2017 to 2021,

at least 175 trans and GNC people

were killed across the US.

Only three cases were charged as hate crimes.

Only 28 cases resulted in murder convictions.

59 of those cases remain unsolved.

[somber music]

Martina Caldera, 38, Channelview, Texas.

Amarey Lej, 21, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Maddie Hoffman was 47 years old,

killed in Malvern, Pennsylvania.

[Attendee] Miia Love Parker, 25.

[Attendee 2] Jasper Aaron Lynch, 26.

[Attendee 3] Ace Scott was only 15 years old.

Tiffany Banks, 25.

[Attendee 4] Nedra Sequence Morris.

[Attendee 5] Tatiana Labelle.

Kathryn Newhouse. Oakland, California.

Texas. Michigan.

Indiana. 24 years old.

26. 19.

21. 29.

45. 33.

[Attendee 6] 17 years old.

[somber music]

[Together] Say their names. Say their names.

[Together] Say their names. Say their names.

[Together] Say their names. Say their names.

[Attendee] We say their names and we remember them.

[somber music]

Thank you for participating.

Are we ready? We're ready. Let's go.

Okay.

Okay, it's tight.

Lulu, I like your hair. It looks really good.

♪ You can hold my hand ♪

♪ When you need to let go ♪

♪ I can be your mountain ♪

♪ When you're feeling valley low ♪

♪ I can be your streetlight ♪

♪ Showing you the way home ♪

[somber music]

I feel like there's a hurricane around you,

and you're like the center of the hurricane.

You try to be as calm as possible,

but everything is, like, collapsing around you.

[somber music]

I stay calm by just doing things that I enjoy.

Talking with my friends at school

and hanging out with my family, stuff like that.

We're just a normal family, and I'm a normal kid.

[somber music]

[somber music continues]

[somber music continues]

[light music]