Leelah Alcorn's Story

                                    

                                          
Worry not, my pretties, for I have returned! Get ready for a rant.

                          

                          
I'd say this is pretty old by now, and that probably most of you are familiar with this case. Well, I never got to voice my opinions and plan to do so now.
                          

                          

                          
In this chapter I'll comment on several bits of her note, which, by the way, is no longer available because her parents grew sick of the criticism and deleted it. The image at the side is a snapshot borrowed off the web.
                          

                          

                          
Throughout the note Leelah makes it pretty obvious that her parents were very religious, and obviously took religion over everything. She says how her mom took her to Christian therapists, and not in order to cure her depression, oh no. It was to cure her of being transgender.
                          

                          

                          
Which in itself is one of the stupidest things I have ever heard. Cure her of WHAT? Of being herself?  Sadly enough for me, I live with a person who has very similar views to those of Leelah's parents, so I know how cruel and stupid they can be. They don't base these views on their logical thinking, off the information they have of this planet - only off the fact that 'god said it's wrong' (which I don't recall seeing in the Bible).
                          

                          

                          
But her parents didn't say exactly that to her, instead they said that 'god doesn't make mistakes'. Really? It seemed like a pretty big mistake to give these to two a child who grew up to be a transgender. You know, that besides things like deformed human and other animal babies, cancer, the human trachea etc., etc.
                          

                          

                          
She then goes on to say that when s/he came out as gay in school, her school mates were cool with it but her parents were even more pissed and told her that she was shaming them.
                          

                          

                          
Oh, okay. So, you mentally abused your child and basically started hating her for trying to be herself, because to you it appeared that it was shaming YOUR name.
                          

                          

                          
You know, reading about this story, I can't help but wonder - d'you think her parents are ashamed now? They probably are, seeing how they deleted her note. But do they see the fault of their actions? Do they realize that their 17 year old child committed suicide primarily because of them?
                          

                          

                          
Now, I think I made it pretty clear that I think that yes, religion is at fault here. But am I saying that all religious people are unaccepting, ignorant assholes? No, of course not. My very (and I mean very) religious school hung up posters telling us to accept and support our friends of different sexuality's and genders (we're an all-girls school). In fact, since those posters came up one of the girls finally came out as a trans-gender, and that she considers herself to be a male.
                          

                          

                          
So no, I don't think that all religious people are like that. But the majority of them are, and that's a problem.
                          

                          

                          
And possibly the most quoted line "Fix society. Please" with the previous "My death must mean something" is really meaningful - she died for a reason. She doesn't want her death to be forgotten. And it sure as hell will not.
                          

                          

                          
If any of you follow me on Twitter, you probably saw my one and only tweet on this case.
                          
#LeelahAlcorn 's story  story is such a tragedy mostly because it could have been avoided so easily ; simply by love and acceptance. [*]
                          

                          
And let's face it - that pretty much sums it up. So often that's all it takes - love and acceptance from friends and loved ones - to save a life. The fact that her parents failed to provide that is what really pisses me off, and really hurts.
                          

                          

                          
It should probably also be brought to your attention that her parents never really seemed to accept the fact that they drove their daughter to kill herself and that they continue to refer to her as a 'him' and as Josh. In other words - they continue to disrespect their child even after her death. This is just sad.
                          

                          

                          
The only comment that I remember reading that made by her parent's was "We don't support it [transgenders] religiously." I'll leave that up for interpretation for you.
                          

                          
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Hope you enjoyed - votes, opinions, reads, ya know what I want from you in return for the precious cintents of my perfect mind.
                          
Cheers.