All music credit goes to Against Me! for the background song True Trans Soul Rebel

Transcript:
If one thing can be said about punk rock, it’s that it promotes self expression. But rooted in a masterpiece of modern-age punk rock, is a larger issue that many in the transgender community face today: Dysphoria.

By it’s dictionary definition, dysphoria can be described as a “general dissatisfaction with life” and though by that definition, it isn’t specific to any group of people, dysphoria, and specifically gender dysphoria, is very prevalently found in the transgender community, an issue brought up by Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace, a transgender women, who came out in 2012. (PICTURE HERE) Transgender is a term used to describe people who aren’t cisgender, meaning the gender they were assigned at birth is inconsistent with their gender.(DEFINITIONS HERE) Dysphoria is prevalent with the transgender community because a lot of times trans people feel like their body, and body image is inconsistent with who they perceive themselves to be, and Laura has described it as “a feeling of misalignment.” (QUOTE HERE) It’s this feeling of misalignment that can cause many of it’s victims conflict. In a place where some people feel at risk of hate crimes and discrimination, both inside or outside the home, simply for being who they are, this can rapidly decay into many different mental illnesses and disorders, possibly making people hate themselves and their bodies because of it.

Although dysphoria, like most mental issues, has no one cure, many things can be done to suppress it and better align people’s physical appearance with their mental image of who they want to be. Many transgender people who face dysphoria related to their chest, some use binders. A binder is a bra like (is it?) piece rubber or neoprene that fits over one’s chest, and compresses it, giving the appearance of a flatter chest. As well as binders, people dealing with dysphoria can be found using hormone therapy. Hormone therapy is the controlled introduction of an increased amount of estrogen or testosterone to someone’s body. Estrogen can increase one’s chest size, amongst other things. Testosterone, on the other hand, decreases breast size, increases hair growth, and deepens the voice, again amongst other things. We’ll put links in the description for a more detailed and accurate description of these. As well as those two methods, a third way to deal with dysphoria is surgery. People often use surgery as a way to change or remove parts of their body that they aren’t satisfied with. But those are all very complicated and physical ways that someone could deal with dysphoria. Dealing with dysphoria can be as easy as simply having people call you by your correct pronouns, or wearing clothes that make you feel more like you.

So, to recap, be you, be happy, and listen to punk?

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