On Feb. 7, Oklahoma high school student Nex Benedict entered his school’s women’s bathroom. He was severely beaten by three girls that had been bullying him prior, so brutally that he blacked out. After the attack, he was escorted to the nurse’s office, covered in bruises, dizzy and swaying. The school did not call medical services. The school did not call the police. Instead, Nex was suspended for two weeks and sent home. The next day, he died.
Nex Benedict should not have been bullied. He should not have fallen through the cracks of a system that has failed time and time again to help children like him. But most importantly, Nex should not have been in the women’s bathroom, because Nex was not a woman.
On May 25, 2022, Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt signed SB 615 into law, requiring students at public schools to use restrooms and locker rooms that match the sex on their birth certificates. Because of this, Nex was forced to use the women’s bathroom despite his identity. The bill was passed with an emergency clause, and went into effect immediately. The real emergency, however, are bills like these that are ostracizing, erasing and killing transgender youth.
Oklahoma is just one of many states peddling transphobic rhetoric around legislative chambers and passing bill after bill aimed at harming a demographic that makes up less than 2% of all high schoolers. These bills are targeting a population that’s already vulnerable, as trans youth are much more likely to consider suicide, develop depression and face violence for their identity.
In 2024 alone, 54 anti-LGBTQ+ bills have been introduced in Oklahoma’s legislature according to the ACLU, the most out of any other state. 54. As of March 6, the day I’m writing this, we are 66 days into the year. It makes me wonder how many bills for actually improving education and healthcare have been addressed, considering Oklahoma ranks 48 in the nation for both. When it comes to isolating queer people over issues that don’t exist, it seems that Oklahoma loves to step into the spotlight, but what about actually helping people?
And yes, these “issues” in question don’t exist. Teachers are not “grooming” children, there is no “woke gender ideology” taking classrooms by storm and acknowledging that queer people exist is not “indoctrination.”
Oklahoma’s education superintendent Ryan Walters has been instrumental in creating the harsh and practically unlivable environment that has manifested in schools for trans and gender-nonconforming youth, stating that he doesn’t believe nonbinary or transgender people exist. A state superintendent denying the existence of trans people, has adamantly voiced his disapproval with LGBTQ+ topics in schools and has boldly backed transphobic practices, but when faced with the undeniable reality that Nex Benedict died because of these policies, he victimizes himself and blames the “radical gender ideology.”
The infestation of anti-trans rhetoric in Oklahoma government and education doesn’t end with Walters, however. On Jan. 23 2024, Walters named Chaya Raichik to a library media advisory committee. Raichik, who doesn’t even live in Oklahoma, is better known as the creator of social media account “Libs of TikTok,” a hub where homophobes and transphobes unite to send bomb threats to hospitals that perform gender-affirming procedures and death threats to teachers that have pride flags in their classrooms.
A far-right, queer-bashing, misinformation-spreading, social media influencer can be admitted to a media review board in a state she doesn’t even live in, simply because her views of eradicating trans people from all elements of life align with the state superintendent’s.
It’s not rocket science. These bills single out transgender people and make them feel problematic for just being themselves. This is undeniably what’s causing the isolation, depression and bullying that already plagues trans students. Nex Benedict should still be alive, and would be if SB 615 never became law.
We are living through a moral panic over trans people. The hatred that brews in Oklahoma reflects a national trend that’s seen social media influencers, members of Congress, celebrities and political pundits rush to denounce gender-affirming procedures for minors who are just trying to feel comfortable in their own skin. People debate the right of transgender individuals to exist and receive the care that has been scientifically proven to save many of their lives while they’re further isolated and threatened.
States are passing bills that would allow genital inspections if there’s a discrepancy about a student-athlete’s gender. Political speakers are openly calling for transgender identities to be eradicated. X users jump to claim the nation’s most recent mass shooter identified as trans and don’t apologize or take down their posts when it’s proven false. If you’re a parent and you’re salty your kid lost in a sports competition, you can simply claim the winner was trans and spark an investigation that’ll capture the full attention of the school’s officials. And yes, that really happened!
It’s clear how these people feel about trans people. It’s clear how they feel about literally any queer person, but when they’re called out for creating the situations that Nex Benedict faced, they shy away. They play the victim. They blame the left, “radical gender ideology,” Biden or anything that absolves them of any responsibility.
It’s time to open our eyes and see that these bills are not helping students. They’re killing them. We cannot keep letting politicians get away with spewing unproven and harmful theories about trans identities under the guise that they’re trying to “save children,” and we cannot look away from the death of Nex Benedict.
Now more than ever, trans youth need support. They need to be reminded they have a community and a space to be themselves, especially within schools. It’s not indoctrination. It’s love, love that is desperately needed.
Nex Benedict was not the first to suffer under the policies created by legislators like Oklahoma’s, nor will he be the last. As long as this hate continues to fester, these hateful politicians will stop at nothing to eventually enact nationwide laws that will devastate the trans community. Do not look away from stories like Nex’s, no matter how hard they are to stomach. The rage, disgust, sorrow and betrayal we feel from these stories — that is what emboldens us to act.