Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Health and Aging by Cecilia Hardacker & Kelly Ducheny & Magda Houlberg

Author:Cecilia Hardacker & Kelly Ducheny & Magda Houlberg
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9783319950310
Publisher: Springer International Publishing

7.2 Adult Violence and Trauma

Unfortunately, childhood is not the only time transgender adults experience trauma. Indeed, many studies have shown that once someone has experienced one type of victimization, they are at increased risk for experiencing even more victimizations [7]. It is important to note that while any one victimization may or may not in any way relate to the transgender individual’s gender identity or history, overall transgender older adults experience much more victimization than do their peers. For example, in one large study that compared transgender older adults (aged 50+) to their lesbian, gay, and bisexual age peers, the non-trans LGB older adults had an average of six incidents of lifetime discrimination and victimization. The transgender older adults, in contrast, had almost double that number: 11 lifetime incidents of discrimination and victimization [8]. This study found that the most common types of discrimination and victimization experienced by transgender older adult participants were verbal assaults (76%), being threatened with physical violence (54%), not being hired for job (46%), being denied or provided inferior health care (40%), being denied a promotion (39%), and being hassled by the police (37%) [8]. Transgender elders were also more than twice as likely to have experienced domestic violence in the past year (physical or verbal) than were their LGB peers [9]. One elder transgender woman explained how law enforcement refused to help her when her husband abused her:I was physically assaulted by my legal FTM spouse, to the extent that I had to go to the hospital emergency room for treatment. I got a restraining order against his return, but he violated it several weeks later and attempted to rape me. On both occasions the police appeared to think these behaviors were very funny. After the initial assault, one of the responding police officers stated, “Why the hell didn’t you just punch his lights out? You must be about twice his size.” When I responded, “Then you would have taken me in for assaulting him!” he just shook his head. Since it was clear that [city name withheld] would give me no protection at all, I abandoned my home, along with most of my personal possessions, and used the last of my money to fly back to [city name withheld] where I had friends [1].

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.