{"id":21775,"date":"2015-09-03T16:03:41","date_gmt":"2015-09-03T20:03:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/?p=21775"},"modified":"2015-09-03T16:03:41","modified_gmt":"2015-09-03T20:03:41","slug":"missouri-transgender-deeply-divides-high-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/?p=21775","title":{"rendered":"Missouri Transgender Deeply Divides High School"},"content":{"rendered":"

Students Protest Transgender Teen\u2019s Use of Girls\u2019 Locker Room: What Are Her Rights?<\/h1>\n

<\/p>\n

Korin Miller
\nYahoo Health<\/p>\n

\"tumblr_inline_nu2jdqKV7E1t4rmqt_1280.png.cf\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Caitlyn Jenner and other transgender celebrities like Laverne Cox, Candis Cayne, and Chaz Bono have received a large show of public support. But Lila Perry\u2019s situation is not uncommon for transgender people who aren\u2019t in the spotlight. <\/b>(Photo: AP\/Robert Cohen)<\/i><\/p>\n

A transgender teen in Missouri is at the center of a heated debate about her right to change in her high school\u2019s girls\u2019 locker room.<\/p>\n

Nearly 200 students walked out of Hillsboro High School on Monday in a protest that lasted two hours.<\/p>\n

Lila Perry, the 17-year-old at the center of the debate, reportedly identified as a gay male until she was 13 and publicly came out as transgender in February. She previously used a gender-neutral faculty bathroom but began changing in the girls\u2019 locker room this school year before her physical education class.<\/p>\n

Protesters were divided: One side supported Perry\u2019s right to change in the girls\u2019 locker room; the other wants her to continue to use the gender-neutral bathroom.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wasn\u2019t too long ago white people were saying, \u2018I don\u2019t feel comfortable sharing a bathroom with a black person,\u2019 and history repeats itself,\u201d Perry told Fox News<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Lila Perry stands outside her school with a group of friends.<\/b><\/i>(Photo: AP\/Robert Cohen) <\/i><\/p>\n

She also assured parents that she is not going to \u201churt\u201d their daughters. \u201cI\u2019m not going to expose myself. I\u2019m not a pervert,\u201d she says. \u201cI\u2019m a transgender woman. I\u2019m a girl. I\u2019m just in there to change, do my business, and if they have any questions about being transgender, they are more than welcome to talk to me, and I\u2019ll be happy to explain it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Perry says she began using the girls\u2019 locker room because she didn\u2019t want to feel segregated.<\/p>\n

But some female students say they\u2019re uncomfortable because, while Perry wears dresses and a wig, she still has male genitalia.<\/p>\n

\u201cI find it offensive because Lila has not [gone] through any procedure to become female,\u201d student Sophie Beel told Fox. \u201cPutting on a dress and putting on a wig is not transgender to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some parents also argue that many are left feeling uncomfortable to accommodate one person. \u201cThe girls have rights, and they shouldn\u2019t have to share a bathroom with a boy,\u201d Tammy Sorden, who has a son at the high school, told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch<\/i><\/a>.<\/i> She added that it\u2019s not right to give Perry special treatment \u201cwhile the girls just have to suck it up.\u201d<\/p>\n

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 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Students Protest Transgender Teen\u2019s Use of Girls\u2019 Locker Room: What Are Her Rights?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21775\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateofthenation2012.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}