by Kevin W Byrom

Created on: July 26, 2011

Being transgendered is like being blessed with the most pleasant, wonderful gift in the entire world, while being condemned by the most dreadful, diabolical curse at the same time. It's a blessing, because transgendered men and women see the world from a perspective that nobody else can see it through. It's a curse, because to live their lives in relative happiness and to find a certain degree of contentment in their lives, they have to subject themselves to the most dreadful forms of hypocrisy, persecution and prejudice, and risk the possibility of becoming a victim of the most insidious hate crimes that nobody else could even possibly imagine.

Although Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prevents transgendered individuals from being discriminated against based on their race, color, religion, physical sex, or national origin, it denies them, as most businesses do, the basic fundamental right to be who they know they are within the realms of the emotional psyche; to simply be able to work as the man or woman their living spirit, their soul, tells them they were meant to be. And, because of this, many transgendered human beings attempt to take their own lives to end the emotional pain and suffering they're unable to cope with anymore.

In October 2010, the National Center for Transgender Equality and the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force released the results of a survey that was conducted on more than 7,000 transgendered individuals. The results of the survey indicated that 41 percent of all the transgendered individuals who were surveyed have made an attempt to commit suicide. This staggering rate is more than 25 times that of the population in general.

How can any civilized, self-proclaimed moral society allow such a travesty to occur to any of its citizens, simply because they were cast from a different gender identity mold?

If you were to scrutinize everyone you know, and you had an open door to all of their lives, you would find that one or more of your friends, or even family members, is transgendered and has been all of their life. These are people who you've had over to dinner, gone out to the movies with, served in the military with, and even worked with on a daily basis. The only reason you haven't known about them is because they're fearful of losing their job and of losing your friendship; two things that they cherish dearly and can't afford to lose.

You know many of these people as good, kind-hearted, hard-working individuals. People who you'd

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