According to a new report, conditions for trans women in Florida are more inhumane than we could have ever imagined.
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Per a newly-released feature from the nonprofit news source The Marshall Project, incarcerated trans women are forced to give up all possessions deemed “female”—including basic necessities like bras and hygiene products—under Ron DeSantis’s unusually cruel new dictates which went into effect this fall.
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These women are also being forced to cut their hair unless they gain special permission to grow it out under these rules. If the women disobey, they could be forced to spend days in solitary confinement.
While the ACLU’s Florida chapter is busy fighting DeSantis’s policies as unconstitutional, conditions in Florida prisons remain horrific for trans women who are denied access to gender-affirming care unless they can “prove” their need for it. Personal items like women’s undergarments are also considered contraband under the new rules, resulting in punishment for those who try to sew their own underwear or hide the undergarments they came in with.
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For starters, there are no parades here and there are no rainbow flags.
“I feel like they’re taking away my identity,” one woman told The Marshall Project after being placed in solitary confinement before being forced to cut her hair off.
That’s exactly what DeSantis is trying to do to these women. Surviving as an inmate in America’s prison system is dehumanizing enough. For trans women being forced to give up all the things that make them feel affirmed and sane, the effect is even worse.
The 2006 documentary Cruel and Unusual goes deeper into the process of V-coding, by which trans women were previously placed in men’s prisons and subjected to horrific treatment by fellow inmates, COs, and other staff. While some things have changed since that time, this report shows that nowhere near enough progress has been made in treating incarcerated trans women with the care, respect, and humanity they deserve.
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