Munroe Bergdorf: Generation Z is growing up in ‘most transphobic time in recent memory’ -TGN

Munroe Bergdorf also has advice for people who want to be better allies for trans youth. (Getty/Mike Marsland)

Author Munroe Bergdorf says Generation Z is growing up in “the most transphobic time in recent history” — and has warned that things are about to get much worse.

While Gen Z is the most out-of-queer generation the world has ever seen, they are growing up against a backdrop of immense anti-LGBTQ+ bigotry.

Munroe Bergdorf, 35, believes it has led a growing number of trans youth to feel they “can’t escape” the relentless attacks on the community.

“Every morning there is a debate on TV about trans children. I can’t imagine what it feels like to be exposed to that kind of negativity before you go to school,” the writer and model said during a event organized by GQ earlier this week, while talking to BBC Radio One presenter Vick Hope.

“And then the government says teachers should send trans children to their parents if school is to be a safe place for them,” she added. “There’s no escaping it.”

In recent weeks, the UK government has promised to publish long overdue guidelines for schools on how to work with trans learners. the accompaniment is delayed.

Alleged details of the policy leaked last month indicating that trans students would be banned from participating in school sports competitions that align with their gender identity.

The guidance also suggested that students at school will not be able to transition socially without express parental or guardian consent, effectively forcing teachers to outsource them to their families.

On Sunday (July 16), UK Equality Minister Kemi Badenoch dropped the biggest hint yet that the policy would effectively force students to come out to their parents.

“There is quite a bit of confusion about what the law says and it is important for parents to know what is going on with their children and what is happening to them at school,” said Badenoch.

Bergdorf, who released her memoirs transition period in February, targeted the Conservative government during London Trans+ Pride earlier this month.

Addressing a huge crowd, Bergdorf said the government had created a “moral panic” around trans people in the UK and that trans people’s lives had been kicked around “like a political football”.

“The human rights, well-being, dignity and bodily autonomy of trans people have been ignored in the pursuit of moral panic, devoid of empathy and understanding, fueled by anger and apathy,” Bergdorf said during her impassioned speech.

“The abject truth has been replaced by abstract lies. Replacing scientific guidance with media sensationalism and religious evangelicalism… replacing understanding of difference with irrational fear and knee-jerk opinions. Replace community with a closed door,” she added.

In April, Bergdorf told her 550,000 Instagram followers that unless the Conservatives were impeached in the next general election, she would “almost certainly pack (her) bags” to “start a new life” somewhere else.

While political leaders and policymakers don’t hold out much hope for trans young people right now, changemakers like Bergdorf are at least using their voices to explain how everyone can be better allies for the community.

“Be there for kids and let them be themselves,” she told the audience at GQ’s event. “Don’t force them to be what you want them to be. Create safe spaces in any environment where you are around young people, because you never know the reality of that young person.

“They’re not just a kid, they’re a little person, and they’re going to carry with them for the rest of their lives that experience of their gender or their sexuality or their race and how they were treated in childhood.”