Marquintas Oldham, 21, is a student at Morehouse who identifies as “queer, non-binary”. He explains how he prefers to use the pronouns “they” and “their,” instead of singular pronouns. Student like Oldham said they identified as men when they were initially enrolled but switched up once accepted.
“Who I am on this campus, they are trying to kind of like remove me from self-identifying myself,” Mx. Oldham said. “They said in their policy that they are going to still use male-gendered language and that affects me. Sometimes I do dress as a feminine, non-binary person, so when I dress the way I want to dress and it’s a problem, that affects me.”
Mx. Oldham, who is set to graduate in 2021, transitioned while they were enrolled. “I knew I was part of the queer community, I knew I was gay, but I got here to Morehouse and this was different for me,” Mx. Oldham said. “I decided to just live.”
Tatiana Rafael, 28, a Morehouse student, was accepted when she identified as mal. However she latered transitioned to female after she was enrolled. Transgender students who began to transition while attending Morehouse and now identify as women said the new policy ostracized them.
“It is very lonely being the only transsexual woman on campus,” Ms. Rafael said. “I feel erased and marginalized most of the time because the image that Morehouse presents is the all-male image and in that image they don’t make room for a trans woman.”
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