From High School Activist to Full-Time Advocate

Henry Seaton didn’t set out to become an activist. In 2016, as a high school senior in a Nashville suburb, he just wanted to use bathrooms that corresponded with his gender identity. After school administrators restricted him to using the often-locked bathroom in the nurse’s office, Seaton got involved in efforts to protect trans students, including testifying before a Tennessee state legislative committee and starting a petition against bathroom bills that garnered 67,000 signatures.

“The traumas of my life were about to become law and dictate the traumas for thousands of children,” he says. “I had never thought about getting involved before, but I’m glad I did.”

After graduating from high school, Seaton spent a year working as an LGBTQ organizer at the ACLU of Tennessee, primarily fighting anti-trans bathroom bills and acting as a voice for trans youth. Now, with a degree from the University of Denver, he has come back to the Tennessee affiliate to serve as their first-ever trans justice advocate.

Since starting the role in January, he has focused on lobbying legislators about urgent trans issues, including access to school sports and gender-affirming health care. He’s also focused on grassroots efforts, empowering trans communities across the state and educating rotary clubs and children’s organizations. “I’m trying to change the narrative of transness in Tennessee from a negative one to a positive one,” he says.

As the fight for trans justice has shifted from bathroom bills to health care bans, Seaton has seen his own role shift too. At 24, he’s now working to help young people share their own perspectives.

“I see my role now as empowering voices for the future, rather than always being that voice myself,” he says. “The ladder that I climbed to testify is the ladder that I’m trying to build for other young people.”

What you can do:

Take the Pledge: Support Trans Youth Now

Take the pledge

Comments

The Supreme Court Declined a Protestors' Rights Case. Here's What You Need to Know.

The Supreme Court recently declined to hear a case, Mckesson v. Doe , that could have affirmed that the First Amendment protects protest organizers from being held liable for illegal actions committed by others present that organizers did not direct or intend. The high court’s decision to not hear the case at this time left in place an opinion by the Fifth Circuit, which covers Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, that said a protest organizer could be liable for the independent, violent actions of others based on nothing more than a showing of negligence. Across the country, many people have expressed concern about how the Supreme Court’s decision not to review, or hear, the case at this stage could impact the right to protest. The ACLU, which asked the court to take up the case, breaks down what the court’s denial of review means. What Happened in Mckesson v. Doe? The case, Mckesson v. Doe , was brought by a police officer against DeRay Mckesson , a prominent civil rights activi...

Search This Blog