By Jamie Brandel | Production Manager
Over 1% of the population, or more than 2 million American men and women, have served in Iraq and Afghanistan fighting the global war on terror. As they return home, many face tremendous challenges. At 3 Generations we have made it part of our mission to tell the stories of our returning heroes and help raise awareness of the crises they face.
One of the shorts we filmed this year was Go Debbie, relating the experiences of a transgender Vietnam Navy veteran named Debbie. It’s estimated that over 134,000 American veterans are transgender and over 15,000 trans people are serving in the military today. Trans men and women have additional challenges compared to their fellow cisgender veterans, many of which remain largely unknown to the general public. Though support for transgender veterans has improved since the Vietnam era, transgender men and women still face barriers ranging from obtaining updated service records that do not out them as transgender, to receiving VA coverage of necessary medical procedures.
As soon as we met Debbie, we knew how vital it was from an educational perspective to tell her story. Debbie’s experiences are emblematic of the challenges faced by trans veterans. She suffered through homelessness and poverty after her service, all the while navigating through the process of accepting herself as the woman she is and beginning her transition. That is why this past month it was so incredibly exciting for us to accompany Debbie to the screening of Go Debbie at the Colorado International Activism Film Festival. The film festival showcased films that documented all types of human rights abuses from sex trafficking to the immigrant crisis. It was an honor for our film to be a part of this important showcase.
It is our mission at 3 Generations to enable survivors to record their experiences as an act of healing, a call to action and to create historical evidence. Debbie’s story was significant not only to our organization, but in order to educate and call attention to the specific issues that veteran trans men and women face in their daily lives.
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