I remember going to the Carnival on a Teen Scene (pre teen daycare) field trip and being jazzed that I would get to spend the money my parents gave me on whatever I wanted. I was a fat kid so for me that meant CANDY! There’d been one thing I wanted more than anything in the candy store: Jelly Bellys. Jelly Bellys are these great multiflavored jellybeans that come in all kinds of different flavors. You can mix two strawberry jams and two french vanillas to get a strawberry shortcake (my personal favorite) or two green apples and a cinnamon for a candied apple! The recipes were my favorite part. Mixing and matching until I came up with a cool new taste. I remember I got sick on the popcorn flavored ones and couldn’t eat anything with butter in it for months! I loved Jelly Bellys and even as an adult I’ve been tempted to rekindle my love for them, but i’ve never bitten the bullet again. Today I don’t really feel bad about turning my back on my favorite childhood snack since it apparently hates me.

Jelly Belly Chairman Herman Rowland Sr. donated 5,000 dollars to a little initiative called “Privacy Of All Students”. this is an initiative created by the strategist for the Prop 8 Campaign, Frank Schubert who is the political director for The National Association for Marriage. The “Privacy of All Students” initiative is an attack on the “School Success and Opportunity Act” that was passed in California this past August. It allows Transgender students to use the facilities that accommodate their gender identity. This was a big win for Californians as it functioned as a means to protect transgender students from harassment. As a person that was transgender in a scholastic environment, I greatly appreciate the passing of this even though I’ve never personally faced issues in the women’s restroom.

When I first heard this story part of me was sorta underwhelmed. I mean it’s 5,000 dollars I suppose isn’t that much money. It’s almost an amount that functioned as more of a statement of where he stands than to actually help the cause. However, I can’t help but wonder what the people that boycotted Chick-fil-A or protested Duck Dynasty or protested any of the number of organizations that donated to anti-gay causes are doing in response to this. I can’t say that I’ve seen many people calling for a boycott of jellybeans (especially during Easter season).

Now, i just finished having a long and emotional debate over the ‘shemail’ issue. An issue that many people considered to be frivolous and a waste of time. I constantly heard that I should devote my passion to more pressing issues and not try to attack the people that are 'our’ allies. I screen captured this post because I wanted to point out to all of my GLB readers that this is how a lot of cis het people feel about this issue. I mean, there’s even been people straight up fabricating stories of sexual assault in order to overthrow things like SSOA.

As transgender people, we constantly have to face this demonization from a lot of very ignorant cis het people. I mean, I’ve used the women’s restroom ever since I’ve been full time. I’ve never had an issue with it and people have always seemed just as indifferent to me as any other woman in the restroom. We’re there to do our business and get out. Surprisingly rape or even looking at your children isn’t on our minds. We’re probably more worried about…ya know, washing our hands and whipping our butts. Yet to so many people our simple existence in this unnecessarily gendered space is 'intrusive’. I know it’s unfair to phrase everything based on my own experiences but I just am always so beside myself when i hear these fear of rape scenarios when people talk about trans people in the restroom. Because that’s literally never been the case for me I’ve used the women’s restroom in the best and worst places and never once received a complaint, an attack or an issue for it- even in the work place.

That all aside, I’m making this post not only to show my LGB readers what we’re dealing with but the fact that while people may support you, they find it much harder to support us. In fact they often believe that it is “too far” or “too much”. and these are the people that supposedly support you. People that have fought with you to defeat the same enemy during prop 8. Let’s have the same amount of anger and over this. Let’s boycott them the way we boycotted all other anti gay organizations in the past and currently. Let’s #boycottjellybelly and try to make the same difference we did there here TOGETHER as an acronym.

-Kat Blaque