After the death of Nex Benedict, a 16-year-old Oklahoma high school student who died the day after an attack in the bathroom of Owasso High School, the incident is drawing scrutiny around the rhetoric and push for anti-transgender laws in the state and across the country. Experts say that Benedict’s death underscores that laws like Oklahoma’s S.B. 615, which forces trans students to use bathrooms that aren’t in line with their gender identity, can have violent consequences.
“The loss of Nex Benedict is a profound loss for Oklahoma, the 2SLGBTQ+ community, and the wider world,” Devraat Awasthi, a legal fellow at the ACLU of Oklahoma said to Teen Vogue. “[Benedict’s] death is a stark reminder that laws like S.B. 615 have a real-world effect on transgender and nonbinary youth that should not be ignored.”
Awasthi explained that S.B. 615 is “an extreme threat to the privacy and safety of transgender youth.” In forcing…