I am a trans woman — that means that I was designated male at birth, though I am a woman — and I want to speak firsthand to some of the concerns raised by the ad taken out by the Mankato-based Child Protection League Action and published in Sunday's Star Tribune in response to a proposal by the Minnesota State High School League to establish guidelines for transgender students to take part in high school sports.

As a trans woman, of course I want to be included with other women and to be a part of their activities. Not being allowed to do so was the cause of significant depression in my teen years, and this is not a unique finding: The rates of suicide attempts (and successes) are staggeringly high for trans youths, higher than any other group. This is not because being trans is a sign of some mental illness — it is because our most fundamental truth is being so violently, aggressively quashed everywhere we turn.

The truth is that trans kids — particularly trans girls — are far more vulnerable in an all-girls setting than are non-trans girls. We are the ones who are different, which makes us the target for hatred and abuse. The idea that we would be sexually aggressive in a shower setting is completely ludicrous — the expectation to perform and be perfect models of "good trans people" is so high, and everyone is just waiting to pounce on us for doing such a thing.

Plus, all the other hurdles — the sheer, crushing force of embarrassment at being the only girl in the room whose body is shaped completely differently would be paralyzing. In fact, I know from personal experience that it is. All a trans girl wants is to be accepted by those around her as being a girl. Not being accepted as that can lead to suicidal thoughts, drugs and other horrors that we do not wish on any of our teens. The idea that a trans girl would jeopardize that by being sexually inappropriate with her peers is preposterous — and if one ever did, you may rest assured that it would be because sexual misbehavior is a societal problem, to which girls, boys and other genders of people all contribute.

You see, this all misses a much more fundamental point. Trying to point to trans people as some sort of demonic harbingers of sexual deviancy is just a delusional tactic to avoid dealing with the real issues at stake. What we, as a society, must realize is that sexual violence is everywhere; it is written into almost every aspect of how we conduct our daily lives, and trying to blame our fears of it on boogeymen such as trans people or gay people or whatever other new fashionable-to-hate minority comes up is never going to solve the problem.

Privacy is something people need, and communal showers are not private. Why can't someone just put some dang curtains in those showers? I don't think most students are comfortable being naked with one another, and many will take ineffective showers or no shower at all in order to avoid it, regardless of the genders or anatomy of the company in question. Concerns about bathroom equity? Private stalls — most bathrooms have them, and for good reason. Worried about sexual assault happening to your child? Then go after the institutions that go easy on sexual assault — school board policies that consider it a minor infraction, colleges that want to keep it quiet, and on and on. These are much better targets for your fear than a virtually powerless minority who, like all teenagers, just want to be accepted for who they are.

As a final thought: If any trans kids are reading this, my heart goes out to you, and I wish you luck.

Lyra A. Schneider is a former Minnesota resident studying education.