This past Wednesday, Laverne Cox, a star on the Netflix series “Orange is the New Black” came to Kent State to present her series “Ain’t I A Woman?”. Cox, who is a transgender woman, told her story with emotion that filled the Ballroom of the Student Center. The audience would go from laughter to tears within moments.
She started from the beginning of her life as a child, and talked about the difficulties she had in school. Kids teased her because she was more feminine that she was “supposed” to be as a boy. “I didn’t want to grow up into a man” exclaims Cox as she talked about her struggles in school and at home. She grew up in Mobile Alabama, in a Christian community.
One night, Cox told us, with tears in her eyes, that she almost committed suicide because she was so unhappy about who she was. “41% of Transgender people almost commit suicide,” said Cox.
As she grew up, Cox told the audience how she started to become more comfortable with who she was once she reached college. Although she still struggled in college, she started to shine.
Starting in college Cox was able to shop in stores like Goodwill and The Salvation army, and was buying women’s clothing for the first time. As she started laughing, she told us how she rocked leopard bell-bottom pants.
Later on, in the 1990’s Cox moved to New York City. There, she told how she became a “club kid”. She was paid to go to parties, and dress up and just dance.While in this scene, she met another Transgender woman, who went by the name of “Tina Sparkles”. Without seeing Tina being so comfortable with whom she was, Cox said she doesn’t know if she would have ever been comfortable enough with “making the change”.
“I could be happy, healthy and free,” said Cox about how she felt once she made her transformation.
People would scream terrible things to Cox, as she would walk down the street sometimes. Such as, “That’s a man!” or just flat out “MANNN”. “A lot of transgender people do not feel comfortable with calling the police…I feel lucky that this was the worst thing that has happened to me,” said Cox.
Cox is educating so many about transgender people, just as she did here, at Kent State. For years she has worked for the equality of transgender people.
Laverne Cox is such an powerful, strong, woman, and I feel honored to have been able to hear her speak while she was Kent State.
If you are LGBTQ, or want to learn more about the LGBTQ community, you can visit http://www.glbtnationalhelpcenter.org or http://www.thetrevorproject.org!