Compromise is often necessary [in politics], but entire marginalized identities are not expendable chess pieces.

The best way I can describe [being transgender] for myself [...] is a constant feeling of homesickness. An unwavering ache in the pit of my stomach that only goes away when I can be seen and affirmed in the gender I've always felt myself to be. And unlike homesickness with location, which eventually diminishes as you get used to the new home, this homesickness only grows with time and separation.

As trans activist Faye Seidler quipped, more Americans said they had seen a ghost than knew a transgender person, according to some polls.

There are few things more dangerous to a transgender woman than the risk of a straight man not totally comfortable in his sexuality or masculinity realizing he is attracted to her.