Nikita Dragun

Moise Vîrforeanu Mihaela Lavinia

Popescu Gabriela Maria
Bunea Daniel AI-AI, IFR
Paciu Marian Robert Group 412
Transphobia within the juridic system
Beauty influencer and business owner Nikita Dragun, an openly
transgender woman, has been placed in a men’s unit of the “Turner
Guilford Knight Correctional Center” in Miami this month.
Sources and police reports state that the influencer was causing a
disturbance, walking around naked on the property of the “Good
Time Hotel”. After several warnings from the hotel’s security,
sources state that she did not comply. Furthermore, the staff
complained about her reaction,
as she threw water at them.
After the staff called the police, they asked her again to stop
disturbing the other patrons.
In protest, she is said to have thrown an open water bottle at the
security guards and
police officers, drenching them in water.
The influencer is now facing charges of misdemeanor disorderly
conduct and felony battery
of a law enforcement officer.
Nikita has been placed in the men’s unit of the correctional facility,
despite her being
legally a woman. She has since been released, but the crass violation
 Our position on the matter
• An article from the US Department of Justice entitled “Lost in the
Gender Maze”, explains how most judges and correctional facilities
identify inmates as male or female based on their assigned at birth sex
and/or genitalia, rather than their gender identity and transition
status/legal sex in their documents.
• Time and time again, studies have proven that transgender people,
placed in the incorrect gendered facility will face assault and abuse far
more than a cisgendered person.
• In 2021, only the states of California and New York were known to
consider adapting their housing within prisons to accommodate
transgender people.
• Regardless of her charges, her prior controversies, and regardless of
her status, Nikita should have been placed in a female holding facility,
for her own safety. Placing a transgender woman in a men’s unit will
not only put her in great danger, but it should be considered a human
rights’ violation.
• The systematic discrimination the transgender community faces outs
their lives in danger even outside correctional facilities. The rate of
 Systematic transphobia
•The issues that the transgender community is facing do not only
cause severe discrimination but incite to violence against the people
who identify as transgender. A few examples are:
- Lack of legal protection – gender identity-based discrimination
is not taken as seriously when it comes to transgender people,
especially transgender women.
- Poverty – 29% of white transgender adults live bellow the
poverty line. That percentage only grows when it comes to
transgender people of color. 39% of black transgender adults,
48% Latinx trans adults, and 35% of Asian trans adults all live
bellow the poverty line.
- Stigma, harassment, and discrimination – Even if the support
towards the community has grown considerably in the past few
years, trans youth still faces a lot of discrimination. 40% of all
homeless youth identify as LGBTQ+ and there are no federal
resources specific for them.
- Violence - Trans people experience violence at rates far greater
than the average person. Over a majority (54%) of trans people
have experienced some form of intimate partner violence, 47%
have been sexually assaulted in their lifetime and nearly one in
ten were physically assaulted in between 2014 and 2015.
- Lack of Healthcare Coverage– An HRC Foundation analysis
found that 22% of trans people and 32% of trans people of color
have no health insurance coverage.
- Identity Documents – The widespread lack of accurate identity
 The lack of
representation
•Most people are unaware of the gravity of the issues that
transgender people face. Sometimes, even other LGBTQ+ member
turn a blind eye to the discrimination transgender people face.
•We like to think we are aware of what is happening around the
world, but we cannot possibly fathom what it feels like. We have
seen ourselves represented our entire lives in one way or another.
The lack of presence of openly transgender police officers,
teachers, love interests on tv shows is subconsciously making
cisgendered people think that being transgender is “unnatural”.
•This lack of representation is also making trans children and young
adults feel that they are not worth being seen or heard. It also
keeps the systemic issues that they faced in the shadow.
•Outside of the United States, the situation gets even more dire for
transgender people. Very few countries have adapted to the needs
of this community, and the stigma gets even worse in most places.
•Religious parents, especially Christian followers, are much more
likely to stop contact with their LGBTQ+ children, and even throw
them out of the house. Christian conversion camps are still legal in
the United States. Parents can “legally kidnap” their children and
teenagers and send them to remote camps, where they suffer
abuse, in the hopes of converting them “back to normal”.
Trans rights are
human rights
•Articles 1-3 of the Human Rights Act speak about the right of security,
equality, and not being discriminated on the premises of your sex, gender,
race, etc. They also state that everyone has the right to life, liberty, and
security of person.
•We have established so far that the stigma against transgender people creates
violence and discrimination based on their gender identity. But the regular
people are not the only danger trans people face.
•Laws that prohibit trans people from taking puberty blockers, from easily
changing their paperwork to reflect their identity, and the lack of healthcare
are systematic infringements on their human rights.
•Another example of discrimination transgender people face are gender
affirming surgeries,
•They are a normal occurrence for cisgendered women (BBL surgeries, breast
enhancement, etc), but when a trans woman does it, people consider it
“cheating the system”.
•During 2020, the transphobic community even produced a “new” sexuality to
specifically exclude trans people.
•Such a marginalized and endangered community should be protected, and
not so bluntly discriminated against, as we have seen in Nikita’s case. Her
human rights to security were not respected, and her life has been
endangered, because of the lack of laws to protect trans people. The
systematic transphobia needs to be addressed everywhere, sooner rather than
later.
Questions for
the public
1.How would you feel if
your identity had been
ignored in this way?
2.If you were the judge,
would you have given a
different response?
Bibliography

•shorturl.at/hHT23
•https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-li
brary/abstracts/lost-gender-maze-pl
acement-transgender-inmates-priso
n-system
•https://lesley.edu/article/the-cost-o
f-coming-out-lgbt-youth-homelessn
ess
•https://www.un.org/en/about-us/u
niversal-declaration-of-human-right
s