I don't want to have to be brave.

Masculine presenting women are being forcefully removed from women’s restrooms by police.

Men are walking into women’s restrooms to confront women whom they believe do not have a right to be there.

Transmen are being beaten by men. Transwomen are being beaten by women. And vice versa.

A woman is beaten by a man for looking too masculine. “I’ll beat you like the man you want to be.”

Verbal assault. Physical assault. Sexual assault. Murder.

“I don’t want to have to be brave to use the bathroom.”

Let that sink in for a moment.

“I don’t want to have to be brave to use the bathroom.”

A child said that.

I say that, too.

I do not want to have to pause, take a deep breath, and brace myself to walk into a public restroom. And I am not a child. I am six feet tall, two hundred pounds. I should be perfectly capable of protecting myself.

But there is no protecting ourselves from what is happening in the world right now.

North Carolina’s House Bill 2, which requires me to use the women’s restroom (which I typicalky do anyway), has made it LESS SAFE for me to do so.

Because now I am on their radar.

Not yours. If you are reading my blog, you are my friend and you love me and I am not friends with transphobic bigots. Facebook is a wonderful tool for weeding those people out of our lives.

But their radar. Those who think that it is permissible for me to be the target of their abuse because of what is or isn’t between my legs, or because of my haircut, or the clothes I wear, or because of how I walk and carry my frame through the world, because of my pronouns, or because of my name.

The people who believe that a life is disposable and worthless because of the color of that life’s skin.

The people who think that a woman has no right to her body since she does not have a cock swinging between her legs.

The people who think that a person is less of a person because of the god that they choose to worship.

And Trump fanaticism grows and grows and grows.

And I am frightened.

I am frightened, friends.

This country is becoming a bad dream I cannot wake up from.

Create change.

Speak.

Vote.

Move.

Act.

Protect.

Please.

I don’t want to have to be brave to use the bathroom.