We all want acceptance, and it’s especially sweet when we’re accepted for being a queen. That’s why it was it was so amazing to me that America’s first transgender high school homecoming queen, Cassidy Lynn Campbell, was at my alma mater, Marina High School in Huntington Beach.
Let me give you a run-down on the home of the Vikings, Marina High. It’s a big public school with 3,000 students (4,000 when I went there), mostly white and located along the coast in Orange County, right (and I use that word purposely) on the border with L.A. County—a deviding line that is often affectionately called “The Orange Curtain.” The area congressperson is the loudly conservative Dana Rohrabacher, who in August tweeted he would take out the “white trash” in addition to his party’s other targets—illegal immigrants, gays and “radical leftists”—who he believes are dragging this country down.
Students’ families range from a significant number of extremely wealthy households who struggle to keep the Republican trash haulers in office while they say their nightly prayers to Ronald Reagan to those who can’t seem to afford dock fees, so they park their boats on their front lawns (err, would this be the white trash Rohrabacher is referring to?). During the Prop. 8 election, nearly every lawn had a pro-Prop. 8 sign. While driving through, I remember feeling like Snoopy in a sea of ‘No Dogs Allowed’ signs.
As with most schools funded by high property values, Marina High is academically solid, students are relatively well-adjusted and the parking lot looks like a BMW dealership. For me, the main problem when I went there was that I was quite convinced I was the only student who was gay (or lesbian or transgender). Being called ‘gay’ or ‘fag’ was still the ultimate put-down, and those who really were kept their mouths firmly shut so their purses would never accidentally fall out.
The school did have its share of notable graduates, though. Dave Mustaine, of the metal bands Megadeth and Metallica and Keely Shaye Smith, TV host and wife of Pierce Brosnan, both attended with me. But it was when Kobe Bryant became engaged to his then-Marina high school girlfriend, senior Vanessa Laine, that that school got on the map. (Apparently it is quite the launching pad for those with long hair!)
Enter Cassidy Lynn Campbell.
Interviews with classmates at Marina revealed that Cassidy was indeed well-liked and well-known at school— two essential ingredients in the quest for the crown. But also, in the previous year she was living full-time as a female, perhaps the most essential ingredient of all.
Oh, sure, you are going to tell me of other examples, such as a gay college student winning homecoming queen along with his female friend who won king at Northern Arizona University. Or the lesbian couple who won homecoming king and queen at Patrick Henry High School in 2011 in San Diego. Or even the fictional example of Justin, who won homecoming queen on Ugly Betty only to give up the crown to his mother.
There is something special about this victory because it helped society grow one step closer to seeing gender not just as something that is assigned by others based on the body parts doctors see when you come out of the womb. Gender is also something in your head. And when the two don’t match, it can be a long and very difficult road.
For a brief moment in time, it appeared the world had accepted someone like Cassidy. The world of one high school, at least. And as most of us know, this can be the cruelest world of all.
The dark side of this new world is that it also has electronic social media such as Facebook and Twitter—the modern version of a voodoo doll. There people can and do say extremely vile and hurtful things that they would most assuredly not say if the person were standing in front of them. And so, as high as Cassidy rose on the night of homecoming was the emotional depth she fell to after the online bullies were unleashed.
Estimating the incidence of transgender individuals has been difficult because of the immense ostracism and shame they experience. The Williams Institute of UCLA estimates approximately 1 in 300 people are transgender. That would mean that at Marina High School alone, there were about nine other transgender teens who watched Cassidy get the crown. And think of all the other teens at all the other high schools around the nation and the world that got to witness the possibility of acceptance—or at least popularity—at its highest level.
So crowns off to Queen Cassidy! You stood up for who you are and won. Thank you for being an inspiration to the many you know but also the many, many more you will never know. By being yourself, you helped make it safe for other future queens to walk down the red carpet.