Sage and Sage's Law
And the man in a dress who opposes it
February 2, 2023
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EDIT: I am updating this post to include this excellent piece from the feminist publication Reduxx, which reported on the story last October.
Reduxx is doing some of the best investigative reporting out there on how the abolition of sex is harming women and girls. If you want to stay up to date, please read their work and follow them on Twitter @ReduxxMag.
I am compiling the information below from various news sources (all conservative-leaning because no mainstream left-leaning media outlet will report on any of this) and doing my best to distill the story to its essence. All of this information is widely available and can be documented.
Sage (whose last name is being withheld for privacy purposes) was 14 years old when she started to wear stereotypical boys’ clothing. In 2021, she entered Appomattox County High School in Virginia, and told school staff that she was a boy. The school started calling her by her chosen name and using male pronouns to refer to her. The school said nothing about any of this to her parents (Sage’s adoptive parents are her biological grandparents; they adopted her after her father died when she was an infant).
Sage would eventually tell her mother that “boys were following behind her in a group, touching her, threatening her with knife violence and rape, and even shoving her up against the hallway wall.” School records and video would eventually confirm that this was true. She started using the boys’ bathroom, where she encountered hostility from boys who didn’t want her there. She also eventually told her mother that a school counselor had referred her to a “transgender website,” where she encountered “creepy” older men and pornography.
Terrified and suffering from additional mental health problems, Sage ran away from home and was found nine days later in Baltimore, having been sex trafficked and raped. The FBI told Sage’s mother that she had endured “horrific brutal sexual abuse.”
When Sage’s parents went to Baltimore to see her, they learned that she had been incarcerated in a detention facility for boys. They were ordered to appear in court for a hearing, and they did. Sage appeared remotely on a screen. A public defender appearing on Sage’s behalf stated that “he” did not wish to return home because “he” had been “both emotionally and physically abused by his parents in connection with [his] expressed male gender identity and desire to live as a trans male.”
Both parents have been cleared of any abuse charges.
For two months, the Maryland judge kept her locked up. First in solitary detention as a runaway (even though she had been sex trafficked) and later in a boys’ detention facility. She was the only girl there and she says that she was repeatedly assaulted while in detention.
The judge eventually conceded lawful custody to Sage’s parents, but in his order opined that “more likely than not” Sage had “endured emotional abuse and neglect by his parents,” including “misgendering” and “misnaming.”
By this point, Sage had turned 15. She ran away again to meet a “friend” she had met online. In Texas. Finally, Texas Marshals found her and notified her parents. The police told them that Sage’s “friend” had raped, starved, drugged, and brutalized her.
Sage was again detained in Virginia, but at least by this point her parents were allowed to visit her. Slowly, over time, Sage came to realize that she is female. She is now home with her parents and going by her real name.
There is so much more to learn about the tragic story of Sage and her parents, and again, it’s all available online.
The Virginia House of Delegates is currently considering House Bill 2432, “Sage’s Law.” I don’t know enough about this bill to have an opinion about it, but its stated intent is to prevent more stories like Sage’s from happening, which is undoubtedly a good thing.
It is one thing to know about Sage’s story. It is another thing to listen to her mother, Michele, tell it. Michele bravely testified in support of the bill before a committee of the Virginia House of Delegates on Monday. You can watch the video here or by clicking below.
According to The Washington Examiner, the Democrats who control the state Senate have vowed to kill the bill. Democratic Delegate Danica Roem said, “Even more children will be put in danger if government interjects itself into the most personal of family discussions like this, regardless of whether it’s safe for the child to be out.”
It should surprise no one that Danica Roem is a man who masquerades as a woman. He was elected to the Virginia House of Delegates in 2017. You can read all about him here.
This is Danica:
Photo credit: Danica Roem