OPINION: When it comes to trans kids and sports, what’s our problem?

When I was raising my kids, they played a lot of sports. In conversation with other parents, we would often refer to these activities collectively as “sportsball.” Not that we didn’t know which specific practice they were at or didn’t care, but which uniform they put on or the outcome of the game was never the point. What’s important about kids’ sports isn’t the final score, but the time they spend with one another, the friends they make, and the skills of teamwork, self-reliance and discipline that they build through training and competition.

This Legislature has done well to mostly focus on issues that impact all Alaskans — education, budgets, energy — but a few bills targeting trans kids in schools are threatening to derail that agenda. One, designed to exclude trans kids from playing sports at public schools, would deprive them of this chance to learn, grow and play with their friends. My kids’ teams have championed acceptance, sportsmanship and participation, not exclusion, which is why it’s so hurtful that some legislators spend so much time trying to deny this basic opportunity to a handful of kids.

Other bills would seek to intimidate doctors away from providing trans kids the care they need and prevent teachers at school from acknowledging their identity. Taken together, these proposals present a clear and bigoted message to trans people and their families: “You aren’t welcome here.”

Let’s be clear. This isn’t about trans kids playing sports. It’s about legitimizing hate against them and obscuring the real needs of our children. Kids in Alaska show up in each morning to schools that are falling apart, to overfilled classrooms, to teachers leaving the classroom. The problem our kids face is that their schools are desperately underfunded — that they’re not receiving the quality education guaranteed to them under Alaska’s Constitution — not that a trans kid might play basketball.

Rep. Donna Mears represents House District 21, South Muldoon, in the Alaska Legislature.

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